C. F. Keil and Franz Delitzsch on Proverbs 16:18
Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament. Browse this work.
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Proverbs16:18
Pro 16:18 18 Pride goeth before destruction, And haughtiness cometh before a fall.
The contrast is לפני כבוד ענוה, Pro 15:33, according to which the “haughtiness comes before a fall” in Pro 18:22 is expanded into the antithetic distich. שׁבר means the fracture of the limbs, destruction of the person. A Latin proverb says, “Magna cadunt, inflata crepant, tumefacta premuntur.”An expression of similar meaning is אחרי דרגא תביר = after Darga (to rise up) comes tebı̂r (breaking = destruction); cf. Zunz, in Geiger’s Zeitschrift, vi. 315ff.
Here being dashed in pieces and overthrown correspond. שׁבר means neither bursting (Hitzig) nor shipwreck (Ewald). כשּׁלון (like בּטּחון, זכּרון, etc.), from כּשׁל or נכשׁל, to totter, and hence, as a consequence, to come to ruin, is a ἅπαχ λεγ. This proverb, which stands in the very centre of the Book of Proverbs, is followed by another in praise of humility.
C. F. Keil and Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, Proverbs 16:18. Public domain.
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