Amsal 9:17

9:17 “Stolen waters ¹  are sweet,

and food obtained in secret ²  is pleasant!”

Amsal 6:30

6:30 People ³  do not despise a thief when he steals

to fulfill his need ⁴  when he is hungry.

Amsal 29:24

29:24 Whoever shares with a thief ⁵  is his own enemy; ⁶ 

he hears the oath to testify, ⁷  but does not talk.

Amsal 30:9

30:9 lest I become satisfied and act deceptively ⁸ 

and say, “Who is the Lord?”

Or lest I become poor and steal

and demean ⁹  the name of my God.

Amsal 28:24

28:24 The one who robs ¹⁰  his father and mother and says, “There is no transgression,”

is a companion ¹¹  to the one ¹²  who destroys.

Amsal 22:28

22:28 Do not move an ancient boundary stone ¹³ 

which was put in place by your ancestors. ¹⁴ 

Amsal 23:10

23:10 Do not move an ancient boundary stone,

or take over ¹⁵  the fields of the fatherless,

Amsal 17:12

17:12 It is better for a person to meet ¹⁶  a mother bear being robbed of her cubs,

than ¹⁷  to encounter ¹⁸  a fool in his folly. ¹⁹ 

Amsal 6:31

6:31 Yet ²⁰  if he is caught ²¹  he must repay ²²  seven times over,

he might even have to give ²³  all the wealth of his house.

Amsal 1:14

1:14 Join with us! ²⁴ 

We will all share ²⁵  equally in what we steal.” ²⁶ 

[9:17]  ¹ sn The offer is not wine and meat (which represented wisdom), but water that is stolen. The “water” will seem sweeter than wine because it is stolen – the idea of getting away with something exciting appeals to the baser instincts. In Proverbs the water imagery was introduced earlier in 5:15-19 as sexual activity with the adulteress, which would seem at the moment more enjoyable than learning wisdom. Likewise bread will be drawn into this analogy in 30:20. So the “calling out” is similar to that of wisdom, but what is being offered is very different.

[9:17]  ² tn Heb “bread of secrecies.” It could mean “bread [eaten in] secret places,” a genitive of location; or it could mean “bread [gained through] secrets,” a genitive of source, the secrecies being metonymical for theft. The latter makes a better parallelism in this verse, for bread (= sexually immoral behavior) gained secretly would be like stolen water.

[6:30]  ³ tn Heb “they do not despise.”

[6:30]  ⁴ tn Heb “himself” or “his life.” Since the word נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, traditionally “soul”) refers to the whole person, body and soul, and since it has a basic idea of the bundle of appetites that make up a person, the use here for satisfying his hunger is appropriate.

[29:24]  ⁵ sn The expression shares with a thief describes someone who is an “accomplice” (cf. NAB, NIV) because he is willing to share in the loot without taking part in the crime.

[29:24]  ⁶ tn Heb “hates his soul.” The accomplice is working against himself, for he will be punished along with the thief if he is caught.

[29:24]  ⁷ tn Heb “oath” or “imprecation”; ASV “adjuration.” This amounted to an “oath” or “curse” (cf. NAB “he hears himself put under a curse”; NRSV “one hears the victim’s curse”) either by or on behalf of the victim, that any witness to the crime must testify (cf. Lev 5:1). However, in this legal setting referring to “a victim’s curse” could be misleading (cf. also KJV “he heareth cursing”), since it could be understood to refer to profanity directed against those guilty of the crime rather than an imprecation called down on a witness who refused to testify (as in the present proverb). The present translation specifies this as an “oath to testify.”

[29:24]  sn The oath to testify was not an oath to tell the truth before a court of law in the modern sense. Instead it was a “curse” or “imprecation” expressed by the victim of the theft, or by the legal authorities, called down on any witness of the crime who kept silent or refused to testify (as here). According to Lev 5:1, if a witness does not speak up he is accountable for the crime. This person hears the adjuration, but if he speaks up he is condemned, and if he does not speak up he is guilty under the law. The proverb is an unusual one; it seems to be warning against getting mixed up in any way with the thief, for it will create a serious ethical dilemma.

[30:9]  ⁸ tn The verb כָּחַשׁ (kakhash) means “to be disappointing; to deceive; to fail; to grow lean.” In the Piel stem it means “to deceive; to act deceptively; to cringe; to disappoint.” The idea of acting deceptively is illustrated in Hos 9:2 where it has the connotation of “disowning” or “refusing to acknowledge” (a meaning very close to its meaning here).

[30:9]  ⁹ tn The Hebrew verb literally means “to take hold of; to seize”; this produces the idea of doing violence to the reputation of God.

[28:24]  ¹⁰ 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]  ¹¹ 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]  ¹² tn Heb “man who destroys” (so NASB); TEV “no better than a common thief.”

[22:28]  ¹³ sn Moving a boundary stone was (and still is) a major problem. The boundaries that were established by the forefathers were to be preserved, but no law would stop such violations if people lacked integrity (e.g., Deut 19:14; 27:17; 1 Kgs 21:16-19). Boundaries in Israel were sacred because God owned the land and he apportioned the property to the tribes. To extend one’s property illegally by moving a neighbor’s boundary marker was a violation of covenant and oath. Of course, disputes could arise when both sides claim their ancestors established a boundary.

[22:28]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “your fathers” (so NAB, NASB).

[22:28]  sn The fourth saying deals with respect for property that belongs to other people (cf. Instruction of Amenemope, chap. 6, 7:12-13 [ANET 422]).

[23:10]  ¹⁵ tn Or “encroach on” (NIV, NRSV); Heb “go into.”

[17:12]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Let a man meet” (so NASB); NLT “It is safer to meet.” The infinitive absolute פָּגוֹשׁ (pagosh, “to meet”) functions as a jussive of advice. The bear meeting a man is less dangerous than a fool in his folly. It could be worded as a “better” saying, but that formula is not found here.

[17:12]  ¹⁷ tn The second colon begins with וְאַל (vÿ’al), “and not.” This negative usually appears with volitives, so the fuller expression of the parallel line would be “and let not a fool in his folly [meet someone].”

[17:12]  ¹⁸ tn The words “to meet” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied by the parallelism and are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[17:12]  ¹⁹ sn The human, who is supposed to be rational and intelligent, in such folly becomes more dangerous than the beast that in this case acts with good reason. As R. L. Alden comments, “Consider meeting a fool with a knife, or gun, or even behind the wheel of a car” (Proverbs, 134). See also E. Loewenstamm, “Remarks on Proverbs 17:12 and 20:27,” VT 37 (1967): 221-24. For a slightly different nuance cf. TEV “some fool busy with a stupid project.”

[6:31]  ²⁰ tn The term “yet” is supplied in the translation.

[6:31]  ²¹ tn Heb “is found out.” The perfect tense with the vav (ו) consecutive is equivalent to the imperfect nuances. Here it introduces either a conditional or a temporal clause before the imperfect.

[6:31]  ²² tn The imperfect tense has an obligatory nuance. The verb in the Piel means “to repay; to make restitution; to recompense”; cf. NCV, TEV, CEV “must pay back.”

[6:31]  ²³ tn This final clause in the section is somewhat cryptic. The guilty thief must pay back sevenfold what he stole, even if it means he must use the substance of his whole house. The verb functions as an imperfect of possibility: “he might even give.”

[1:14]  ²⁴ tn Heb “Throw in your lot with us.” This is a figurative expression (hypocatastasis) urging the naive to join their life of crime and divide their loot equally. The noun גּוֹרָל (goral, “lot”) can refer to (1) lot thrown for decision-making processes, e.g., choosing the scapegoat (Lev 16:8), discovering a guilty party (Jonah 1:7) or allocating property (Josh 18:6); (2) allotted portion (Josh 15:1) and (3) allotted fate or future destiny (Prov 1:14; Dan 12:13; see BDB 174 s.v.). Here the criminals urged the lad to share their life. The verb תַּפִּיל (tappil) is an imperfect of injunction: “Throw in…!” but might also be an imperfect of permission: “you may throw.” It functions metonymically as an invitation to join their life of crime: “share with us” (BDB 658 s.v. 3).

[1:14]  ²⁵ tn Heb “there will be to all of us.”

[1:14]  ²⁶ tn Heb “one purse” (so KJV, NAB, NRSV). The term כִּיס (kis, “purse; bag”) is a synecdoche of container (= purse) for contents (= stolen goods). The adjective אֶחָד (’ekhad, “one”) indicates that the thieves promised to share equally in what they had stolen.