Proverbs 30:18

30:10 Slander not a servant to his master, accuse him not in small matters, to make mischief. 11-14. In every age there are monsters of ingratitude who ill-treat their parents. Many persuade themselves they are holy persons, whose hearts are full of sin, and who practise secret wickedness. There are others whose lofty pride is manifest. There have also been cruel monsters in every age. 15-17. Cruelty and covetousness are two daughters of the horseleech, that still cry, Give, give, and they are continually uneasy to themselves. Four things never are satisfied, to which these devourers are compared. Those are never rich that are always coveting. And many who have come to a bad end, have owned that their wicked courses began by despising their parents' authority. 18-20. Four things cannot be fully known. The kingdom of nature is full of marvels. The fourth is a mystery of iniquity; the cursed arts by which a vile seducer gains the affections of a female; and the arts which a vile woman uses to conceal her wickedness. 21-23 Four sorts of persons are very troublesome. Men of low origin and base spirit, who, getting authority, become tyrants. Foolish and violent men indulging in excesses. A woman of a contentious spirit and vicious habits. A servant who has obtained undue influence. Let those whom Providence has advanced from low beginnings, carefully watch against that sin which most easily besets them.

Proverbs 30:18-19 . There be three things too wonderful for me — The way whereof I cannot trace; the way of an eagle in the air — Either, 1st, The manner of her flight, which is exceedingly high, swift, and strong: or, rather, 2d, The way, or part of the air through which she passes, without leaving any print or sign in it. The way of a serpent upon a rock — Where it leaves no impression, nor slime, nor token which way it went. The way of a ship in the sea — In which, though at present it make a furrow, yet it is speedily closed again; and the way of a man with a maid — The various methods and artifices which young men sometimes use to slide into the hearts of young virgins, and win their love, that they may persuade them either to honourable marriage or to unlawful lust. “I would just observe upon this” last clause, says Dr. Dodd, “that some have understood it as a reference to the incarnation of the Word in the Virgin Mary.” The word עלמה , rendered maid, signifies a virgin, strictly speaking; and גבר , rendered a man, may signify the man, or great one, by way of eminence. But for more on this text the reader is referred to Schultens’s very accurate discussion of it. Houbigant thinks that the sacred writer here refers to the human conception; which is indeed truly miraculous and incomprehensible.

18 . too wonderful ] The wonder consists in these things leaving no trace behind them. Two of the four are used as illustrations of the transitoriness of a vicious life in Wis 5:10-11 (R.V.): “As a ship passing through the billowy water, Whereof, when it is gone by, there is no trace to be found, Neither pathway of its keel in the billows: Or as when a bird flieth through the air, No token of her passage is found, But the light wind, lashed with the stroke of her pinions, And rent asunder with the violent rush of the moving wings, is passed through, And afterwards no sign of her coming is found therein.” 18–20 . Four things that are inscrutable.

Verses 18-20. - A proverb concerning four inscrutable things, connected with the last by mention of the eagle. Verse 18. - There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not. The great point is the fourth, to which the three previous things lead up, all of them being alike in this, that they leave no trace. The facts are marvellous; Agur feels like Job, "I have uttered that which I understood not, things too wonderful for me, which I knew not" ( Job 42:3 ). Proverbs 30:18

The following proverb, again a numerical proverb, begins with the eagle, mentioned in the last line of the foregoing: 18 Three things lie beyond me, And four I understand not: 19 The way of the eagle in the heavens, The way of a serpent over a rock, The way of a ship on the high sea, And the way of a man with a maid. 20 Thus is the way of the adulterous woman: She eateth and wipeth her mouth, and saith: I have done no iniquity. נפלאוּ ממּנּי, as relative clause, like 15b (where Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion rightly: τρία δέ ἐστιν ἃ οὐ πλησθήσεται), is joined to שׁלשׁה המּה. On the other hand, ארבע (τέσσαρα, for with the Kerı̂, conforming to 18a, ארבּעה, τέσσαρας) has to be interpreted as object. accus. The introduction of four things that are not known is in expressions like Job 42:3; cf. Psalm 139:6. The turning-point lies in the fourth; to that point the other three expressions gravitate, which have not an object in themselves, but are only as folie to the fourth. The articles wanting after הנּשׁר: they would be only the marks of the gender, and are therefore unnecessary; cf. under Proverbs 29:2. And while בּשּׁמים, in the heavens, and בלב־ים, in the sea, are the expressions used, עלי צוּר is used for on the rock, because here "on" is not at the same time "in," "within," as the eagle cleaves the air and the ship the waves.

For this same reason the expression, "the way of a man בּעלמה," is not to be understood of love unsought, suddenly taking possession of and captivating a man toward this or that maid, so that the principal thought of the proverb may be compared to the saying, "marriages are made in heaven;" but, as in Kidduschin 2b, with reference to this passage, is said coitus via appellatur. The ב refers to copula carnalis. But in what respect did his understanding not reach to this? "Wonderful," thus Hitzig explains as the best interpreter of this opinion elsewhere (cf. Psychol. p. 115) propounded, "appeared to him the flying, and that how a large and thus heavy bird could raise itself so high in the air (Job 39:27); then how, over the smooth rock, which offers no hold, the serpent pushes itself along; finally, how the ship in the trackless waves, which present nothing to the eye as a guide, nevertheless finds its way. These three things have at the same time this in common, that they leave no trace of their pathway behind them. But of the fourth way that cannot be said; for the trace is left on the substrat, which the man דּרך, and it becomes manifest, possibly as pregnancy, keeping out of view that the עלמה may yet be בתולה. That which is wonderful is consequently only the coition itself, its mystical act and its incomprehensible consequences." But does not this interpretation carry in itself its own refutation?