Amsal 14:17

14:17 A person who has a quick temper ¹  does foolish things,

and a person with crafty schemes ²  is hated. ³ 

Amsal 7:8-9

7:8 He was passing by the street near her corner,

making his way ⁴  along the road to her house ⁵ 

7:9 in the twilight, the evening, ⁶ 

in the dark of the night. ⁷ 

[14:17]  ¹ sn The proverb discusses two character traits that are distasteful to others – the quick tempered person (“short of anger” or impatient) and the crafty person (“man of devices”). C. H. Toy thinks that the proverb is antithetical and renders it “but a wise man endures” (Proverbs [ICC], 292). In other words, the quick-tempered person acts foolishly and loses people’s respect, but the wise man does not.

[14:17]  ² tn Heb “a man of devices.”

[14:17]  ³ tc The LXX reads “endures” (from נָשָׂא, nasa’) rather than “is hated” (from שָׂנֵא, sane’). This change seems to have arisen on the assumption that a contrast was needed. It has: “a man of thought endures.” Other versions take מְזִמּוֹת (mÿzimmot) in a good sense; but antithetical parallelism is unwarranted here.

[7:8]  ⁴ tn The verb צָעַד (tsa’ad) means “to step; to march.” It suggests that the youth was intentionally making his way to her house. The verb is the imperfect tense; it stresses continual action parallel to the active participle that began the verse, but within a context that is past time.

[7:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “way of her house.” This expression uses an adverbial accusative of location, telling where he was marching along. The term “house” is the genitive of location, giving the goal.

[7:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “in the evening of the day.”

[7:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “in the middle of the night, and dark”; KJV “in the black and dark night”; NRSV “at the time of night and darkness.”