Proverbs 24:14-16

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Proverbs 24:14 tn D. W. Thomas argues for a meaning of “seek” in place of “know” (“Notes on Some Passages in the Book of Proverbs,” JTS 38 [1937]: 400-403).
2. Proverbs 24:14 tn The phrase “is sweet” is supplied in the translation as a clarification.
3. Proverbs 24:14 tn The term “it” is supplied in the translation.
4. Proverbs 24:14 tn Heb “there will be an אַחֲרִית (ʾakharit), which means “end, result, following period.” It suggests a future, which may imply posterity. It is sometimes connected with hope (Jer 29:11: 31:17; Prov 23:18).
5. Proverbs 24:15 tn The word “wicked” could be taken as a vocative (cf. KJV, ASV, NASB, “O wicked man”), but since the next line refers to the wicked this is unlikely. It serves better as an adverbial accusative (“like the wicked”).
6. Proverbs 24:15 sn The saying warns that it is futile and self-defeating to mistreat God’s people, for they survive—the wicked do not. The warning is against a deliberate, planned assault on their places of dwelling.
7. Proverbs 24:16 tn The clause beginning with כִּי (ki) could be interpreted as temporal, conditional, or emphatic. It may be viewed as concessive (“although”) but a concessive force would typically arise from its context and relationship to other independent clauses. In any case, the first half of the proverb assures that the righteous keep getting up and going again.sn The righteous may suffer adversity or misfortune any number of times—seven times here—but they will “rise” for virtue triumphs over evil in the end (R. N. Whybray, Proverbs [CBC], 140).
8. Proverbs 24:16 tn The verb is a Hebrew imperfect of נָפַל (nafal) which should be understood as future “will fall” or modal “may fall.” If it is future, it is exemplary and not predictive of the number of times a righteous person will metaphorically fall down. It is followed by a vav plus perfect consecutive, which either continues the force of the preceding verb, or advances it one logical step, like the apodosis of a condition.
9. Proverbs 24:16 tn The Niphal of כָּשַׁל (kashal; to stumble) is typically reflexive “to collapse.” Intransitive verbs do not tend to have passive meanings, but the Niphal may refer to the resulting state, “be collapsed, fallen, brought down,” (although some take the Niphal unusually as “caused to stagger”). The imperfect verb form could be taken as a general present, but the future presents a better parallel to the first half of the proverb.