Amsal 16:6

16:6 Through loyal love and truth ¹  iniquity is appeased; ² 

through fearing the Lord ³  one avoids ⁴  evil. ⁵ 

Amsal 18:21

18:21 Death and life are in the power ⁶  of the tongue, ⁷ 

and those who love its use ⁸  will eat its fruit.

Amsal 31:24

31:24 She makes linen garments ⁹  and sells them,

and supplies the merchants ¹⁰  with sashes.

[16:6]  ¹ sn These two words are often found together to form a nominal hendiadys: “faithful loyal love.” The couplet often characterize the Lord, but here in parallel to the fear of the Lord it refers to the faithfulness of the believer. Such faith and faithfulness bring atonement for sin.

[16:6]  ² tn Heb “is atoned”; KJV “is purged”; NAB “is expiated.” The verb is from I כָּפַר (kafar, “to atone; to expiate; to pacify; to appease”; HALOT 493-94 s.v. I כפר). This root should not be confused with the identically spelled Homonym II כָּפַר (kafar, “to cover over”; HALOT 494 s.v. II *כפר). Atonement in the OT expiated sins, it did not merely cover them over (cf. NLT). C. H. Toy explains the meaning by saying it affirms that the divine anger against sin is turned away and man’s relation to God is as though he had not sinned (Proverbs [ICC], 322). Genuine repentance, demonstrated by loyalty and truthfulness, appeases the anger of God against one’s sin.

[16:6]  ³ tn Heb “fear of the Lord.” The term יְהוָה (yÿhvah, “the Lord”) functions as an objective genitive: “fearing the Lord.”

[16:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “turns away from”; NASB “keeps away from.”

[16:6]  ⁵ sn The Hebrew word translated “evil” (רַע, ra’) can in some contexts mean “calamity” or “disaster,” but here it seems more likely to mean “evil” in the sense of sin. Faithfulness to the Lord brings freedom from sin. The verse uses synonymous parallelism with a variant: One half speaks of atonement for sin because of the life of faith, and the other of avoidance of sin because of the fear of the Lord.

[18:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “in the hand of.”

[18:21]  ⁷ sn What people say can lead to life or death. The Midrash on Psalms shows one way the tongue [what is said] can cause death: “The evil tongue slays three, the slanderer, the slandered, and the listener” (Midrash Tehillim 52:2). See J. G. Williams, “The Power of Form: A Study of Biblical Proverbs,” Semeia 17 (1980): 35-38.

[18:21]  ⁸ tn The referent of “it” must be the tongue, i.e., what the tongue says (= “its use”). So those who enjoy talking, indulging in it, must “eat” its fruit, whether good or bad. The expression “eating the fruit” is an implied comparison; it means accept the consequences of loving to talk (cf. TEV).

[31:24]  ⁹ tn The first word of the fifteenth line begins with ס (samek), the fifteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

[31:24]  sn The poet did not think it strange or unworthy for a woman of this stature to be a businesswoman engaged in an honest trade. In fact, weaving of fine linens was a common trade for women in the ancient world.

[31:24]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “to the Canaanites.” These are the Phoenician traders that survived the wars and continued to do business down to the exile.