Amsal 10:17

10:17 The one who heeds instruction ¹  is on the way to ²  life,

but the one who rejects ³  rebuke goes astray.

Amsal 12:1

12:1 The one who loves discipline loves knowledge, ⁴ 

but the one who hates reproof is stupid. ⁵ 

Amsal 13:1

13:1 A wise son accepts ⁶  his father’s discipline, ⁷ 

but a scoffer ⁸  does not listen to rebuke.

[10:17]  ¹ tn Heb “discipline.” The noun מוּסָר (musar) has a basic two-fold range of meanings: (1) “discipline” (so NIV; NAB “admonition”; NCV, NLT “correction”) and (2) “instruction” (BDB 416 s.v.; so KJV, NASB, NRSV). The wise person listens to instruction (first colon); however, the fool will not even take discipline to heart (second colon).

[10:17]  ² tn The term is a genitive of location indicating the goal (IBHS 147-48 §9.5.2f).

[10:17]  ³ sn The contrast with the one who holds fast to discipline is the one who forsakes or abandons reproof or correction. Whereas the first is an example, this latter individual causes people to wander from the true course of life, that is, causes them to err.

[12:1]  ⁴ sn Those who wish to improve themselves must learn to accept correction; the fool hates/rejects any correction.

[12:1]  ⁵ sn The word בָּעַר (ba’ar, “brutish; stupid”) normally describes dumb animals that lack intellectual sense. Here, it describes the moral fool who is not willing to learn from correction. He is like a dumb animal (so the term here functions as a hypocatastasis: implied comparison).

[13:1]  ⁶ tn The term “accepts” does not appear in the Hebrew but is supplied in the translation for the sake of smoothness and clarity.

[13:1]  ⁷ tc G. R. Driver suggested reading this word as מְיֻסַּר (mÿyussar, “allows himself to be disciplined”); see his “Hebrew Notes on Prophets and Proverbs,” JTS 41 (1940): 174. But this is not necessary at all; the MT makes good sense as it stands. Similarly, the LXX has “a wise son listens to his father.”

[13:1]  tn Heb “discipline of a father.”

[13:1]  ⁸ sn The “scoffer” is the worst kind of fool. He has no respect for authority, reviles worship of God, and is unteachable because he thinks he knows it all. The change to a stronger word in the second colon – “rebuke” (גָּעַר, ga’ar) – shows that he does not respond to instruction on any level. Cf. NLT “a young mocker,” taking this to refer to the opposite of the “wise son” in the first colon.