Amsal 1:14

1:14 Join with us! ¹ 

We will all share ²  equally in what we steal.” ³ 

Amsal 3:16

3:16 Long life ⁴  is in her right hand;

in her left hand are riches and honor.

Amsal 8:16

8:16 by me princes rule,

as well as nobles and ⁵  all righteous judges. ⁶ 

Amsal 11:22

11:22 Like a gold ring ⁷  in a pig’s snout ⁸ 

is ⁹  a beautiful woman who rejects ¹⁰  discretion. ¹¹ 

Amsal 19:21

19:21 There are many plans ¹²  in a person’s mind, ¹³ 

but it ¹⁴  is the counsel ¹⁵  of the Lord which will stand.

Amsal 21:31

21:31 A horse is prepared for the day of battle,

but the victory is from the Lord. ¹⁶ 

[1:14]  ¹ 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]  ² tn Heb “there will be to all of us.”

[1:14]  ³ 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.

[3:16]  ⁴ tn Heb “length of days” (so KJV, ASV).

[8:16]  ⁵ tn The term “and” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for the sake of smoothness and readability.

[8:16]  ⁶ tc Many of the MT mss read “sovereigns [princes], all the judges of the earth.” The LXX has “sovereigns…rule the earth.” But the MT manuscript in the text has “judges of righteousness.” C. H. Toy suggests that the Hebrew here has assimilated Psalm 148:11 in its construction (Proverbs [ICC], 167). The expression “judges of the earth” is what one would expect, but the more difficult and unexpected reading, the one scribes might change, would be “judges of righteousness.” If that reading stands, then it would probably be interpreted as using an attributive genitive.

[11:22]  ⁷ tn Heb “a ring of gold.” The noun זָהָב (zahav, “gold”) is a genitive of material; the ring is made out of gold.

[11:22]  ⁸ tn Heb “in a snout of a swine.” A beautiful ornament and a pig are as incongruous as a beautiful woman who has no taste or ethical judgment.

[11:22]  ⁹ tn The verb “is” does not appear in the Hebrew but is supplied in the translation for the sake of clarity and smoothness.

[11:22]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “turns away [from].”

[11:22]  ¹¹ tn Heb “taste.” The term can refer to physical taste (Exod 16:31), intellectual discretion (1 Sam 25:33), or ethical judgment (Ps 119:66). Here it probably means that she has no moral sensibility, no propriety, no good taste – she is unchaste. Her beauty will be put to wrong uses.

[19:21]  ¹² sn The plans (from the Hebrew verb חָשַׁב [khashav], “to think; to reckon; to devise”) in the human heart are many. But only those which God approves will succeed.

[19:21]  ¹³ tn Heb “in the heart of a man” (cf. NAB, NIV). Here “heart” is used for the seat of thoughts, plans, and reasoning, so the translation uses “mind.” In contemporary English “heart” is more often associated with the seat of emotion than with the seat of planning and reasoning.

[19:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “but the counsel of the Lord, it will stand.” The construction draws attention to the “counsel of the Lord”; it is an independent nominative absolute, and the resumptive independent pronoun is the formal subject of the verb.

[19:21]  ¹⁵ tn The antithetical parallelism pairs “counsel” with “plans.” “Counsel of the Lord” (עֲצַת יְהוָה, ’atsat yehvah) is literally “advice” or “counsel” with the connotation of “plan” in this context (cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “purpose”; NCV “plan”; TEV “the Lord’s will”).

[19:21]  sn The point of the proverb is that the human being with many plans is uncertain, but the Lord with a sure plan gives correct counsel.

[21:31]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “of the Lord.” The victory being “of the Lord” means that it is accomplished by him. Ultimate success comes from the Lord and not from human efforts. The faithful have acknowledged this down through the ages, even though they have been responsible and have prepared for the wars. Without this belief there would have been no prayer on the eve of battle (e.g., Ps 20:7 and 33:17).