Amsal 8:12

8:12 “I, wisdom, live with prudence, ¹ 

and I find ²  knowledge and discretion.

Amsal 27:15

27:15 A continual dripping on a rainy day

and a contentious wife ³  are alike. ⁴ 

Amsal 27:22

27:22 If you should pound ⁵  the fool in the mortar

among the grain ⁶  with the pestle,

his foolishness would not depart from him. ⁷ 

Amsal 28:24

28:24 The one who robs ⁸  his father and mother and says, “There is no transgression,”

is a companion ⁹  to the one ¹⁰  who destroys.

[8:12]  ¹ tn The noun is “shrewdness,” i.e., the right use of knowledge in special cases (see also the discussion in 1:4); cf. NLT “good judgment.” The word in this sentence is an adverbial accusative of specification.

[8:12]  ² tn This verb form is an imperfect, whereas the verb in the first colon was a perfect tense. The perfect should be classified as a gnomic perfect, and this form a habitual imperfect, because both verbs describe the nature of wisdom.

[27:15]  ³ tn Heb “a wife of contentions” (an attributive genitive). Cf. NAB, NIV “a quarrelsome wife”; NLT “a nagging wife.”

[27:15]  ⁴ tn The form נִשְׁתָּוָה (nishtavah) is classified by BDB as a Nitpael perfect from the root שָׁוָה (shavah, “to be like; to resemble”; BDB 1001 s.v. I שָׁוָה). The form also has metathesis before the sibilant. The LXX interprets it as “Drops drive a man out of his house on a wintry day; so a railing woman also drives him out of his own house.”

[27:22]  ⁵ tn The verb means “to pound” in a mortar with a pestle (cf. NRSV “Crush”; NLT “grind”). The imperfect is in a conditional clause, an unreal, hypothetical condition to make the point.

[27:22]  ⁶ tn The Hebrew term רִיפוֹת (rifot) refers to some kind of grain spread out to dry and then pounded. It may refer to barley groats (coarsely ground barley), but others have suggested the term means “cheeses” (BDB 937 s.v.). Most English versions have “grain” without being more specific; NAB “grits.”

[27:22]  ⁷ tn The LXX contains this paraphrase: “If you scourge a fool in the assembly, dishonoring him, you would not remove his folly.” This removes the imagery of mortar and pestle from the verse. Using the analogy of pounding something in a mortar, the proverb is saying even if a fool was pounded or pulverized, meaning severe physical punishment, his folly would not leave him – it is too ingrained in his nature.

[28:24]  ⁸ sn While the expression is general enough to cover any kind of robbery, the point seems to be that because it can be rationalized it may refer to prematurely trying to gain control of the family property through some form of pressure and in the process reducing the parents’ possessions and standing in the community. The culprit could claim what he does is not wrong because the estate would be his anyway.

[28:24]  ⁹ sn The metaphor of “companion” here means that a person who would do this is just like the criminally destructive person. It is as if they were working together, for the results are the same.

[28:24]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “man who destroys” (so NASB); TEV “no better than a common thief.”