THE
"ENEMY" IN ISRAELITE WISDOM LITERATURE
A
Dissertation
Presented
to
the Faculty of
the
Southern Baptist Theological
Seminary
In
Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for
the Degree
Doctor of
Philosophy
by
John Keating Wiles
June
1982
Digitized by Ted Hildebrandt,
Displayed with permission from
Dr. John Keating Wiles
APPROVAL SHEET
THE "ENEMY" IN ISRAELITE WISDOM
LITERATURE
John Keating
Wiles
Read
and Approved by:
Marvin E. Tate (Chairman)
John Joseph Owens
John D. Watts
Date: August 10, 1982
CONTENTS
Page
Chapter
1. Introduction 1
Personal Enemies in the Psalms 3
A Methodology for Investigating
"Enemies"
in the Wisdom Literature 18
Methodological Caveats 22
Contemporary Value of this Study 28
2. Enemy Designations Within the
Wisdom Literature 30
Proverbs 32
The byvx-Group 33
The fwr-Group 35
The religion of the
wicked 36
The demeanor of the
wicked 37
The speech of the
wicked 39
The allies of the
wicked 41
The Neutral Group 45
The Friends and Kinfolk Group 56
The Animals Group 59
Job 61
The byvx-Group 61
The fwr-Group 66
The Neutral Group 72
iii
The Friends and Kinfolk Group 74
The Animals Group 76
Qoheleth 77
The fwr-Group 78
The Neutral Group 79
The Animals Group 80
Sirach 80
The byvx-Group 82
The fwr-Group 87
The wicked in the
cult 91
The wicked and the
economy 92
The wicked at court 93
The wicked and their
speech 94
Wicked friends 94
The wicked and the
family 96
The wicked and
duplicity 99
The wicked and the
fool 100
The Neutral Group 101
The Friends and
Kinfolk Group 105
The Animals Group 109
Wisdom of Solomon 110
The byvx-Group 112
The fwr-Group 114
The Neutral Group 118
iv
The Friends and Kinfolk Group 119
The Animals Group 120
Summary 121
3. Derivative Enemies in Wisdom
Literature 127
Proverbs
129
Foolish Characters as Enemies 130
Righteous Characters as Enemies 138
Wisdom and Yahweh as Enemies 141
Job 146
Righteous Characters as Enemies 150
Satan as an Enemy 156
Yahweh as an Enemy 157
"The Enemy behind the Enemy" 163
Qoheleth 166
Sirach 169
Historical Characters as Enemies 171
Dispositions, Actions and Things
as Enemies 172
Fools and Sages as Enemies 176
Wisdom and the Lord as Enemies 179
Wisdom of Solomon 184
Righteous Characters as Enemies 185
Idolatry as an Enemy 186
Creation as an Enemy 188
Summary 190
v
4. Wise Responses to the Enemy 194
Proverbs 194
Rejection of Enemy Behavior 195
No Anxiety over Enemies 199
Avoidance of the Enemy 201
Securing Actions in the Face of Enemies 206
Gifts work wonders 207
Heed wisdom 208
Fear Yahweh 209
Love for the Enemy 210
Motives for Wise Responses to the Enemy 218
Self-destruction 218
Fate-fixing actor 219
Yahweh as "midwife" 222
Job 227
The Friends 228
Elihu 232
Yahweh 234
Job 235
Response to Satan? 239
Qoheleth 239
"Quietism" 240
Hatred 242
Enjoyment 245
Fear
253
vi
Sirach 258
Hostility 259
Caution 262
Reconciliation 266
Piety 275
Motives behind Sirach's Counsel 278
Death 280
Shame 281
Response to Wisdom 284
Wisdom of Solomon 285
Welcome to Strangers 285
Responses to Idols and Their Worshipers 287
Gentleness
290
Motives behind Responses to the Enemy 293
Summary 296
5.
Conclusion 299
Bibliography 307
Appendices
I. Enemy Designations within the
Wisdom Literature 321
II. Enemy Behavior within the
Wisdom Literature 329
III. Derivative Enemy Designations 350
Abstract 361
Biographical
Data 363
vii
Chapter
1
INTRODUCTION
The wisdom tradition of
way from the dominant Old
Testament attitude toward personal
enemies.
If your enemy is hungry, give him
bread to eat;
and if he is thirsty,
give him water to drink;
for you will heap coals of fire on
his head,
and Yahweh will reward
you.
Proverbs
25:21-22
This instruction, cited by Paul
in Romans 12:20, articulates
an ethic of treating enemies in
a beneficent manner. It is
perhaps the closest the Old
Testament comes to Jesus' com-
mand to love the enemy (Matt.
5:44). A few other passages
in the wisdom literature speak
of treating enemies in a
non-aggressive way.1
Examples of beneficent responses to enemies may be
adduced in other complexes of
Israelite tradition. Exodus
23:4-5 commands one to return
the enemy's stray ox or ass
and to help him lift up his
overburdened beast.2 Narratives
tell of Joseph aiding his
brothers who had conspired to kill
him, to cast him into a pit and
to sell him to the
1 Prov. 16:7; 24:17-18;
Job 31:29-30.
2 S. Driver, A Critical and Exegetical Commenter on
Deuteronomy (3rd ed.,
p.
250, commenting on Deut. 22:1, the deuteronomic reformu-
lation,
calls the Exodus form of the law "an old-world
anticipation of the spirit of
Mt. 5:44."
1
2
Ishmaelites.3 David
spared Saul's life when he was most
vulnerable.4 In the
latter case, Saul was evidently sur-
prised by David's behavior for
he asked, "If a man finds his
enemy will he let him go away
safe?" (I Sam. 24:19). Each
of these examples may be viewed
as beneficent responses to a
personal enemy.
The wisdom tradition, however, sounds this note most
clearly. The narrative examples
of this ethic may perhaps
be gainsaid since David was not
dealing with a common enemy
but with Yahweh's anointed,5
and Joseph was acting under the
watchful and subtle guidance of
God's providence.6 The
beneficent behavior mandated by
Exodus 23:4-5 is somewhat
oblique for the object of
neighborly consideration is the
enemy's livestock, not the
enemy himself. Why should
3 Gen. 37:18, 24, 28; the
whole story comprises chapters
37,
39-50.
4 I Sam. 24:1-22;
26:1-25. The two stories are doublets
of
the same tradition; see K. Koch, Was Ist
Formgeschichte?
Methoden der
Bibelexegese (3
Aufl., Neukirchen-Vluyn:
Neukirchener
Verlag, 1974), pp. 163-181.
5 1 Sam. 24:6; 26:9; in
both versions of this saga the
fact
that Saul is Yahweh's anointed is the reason given for
David's
restraint.
6 Gen. 45:4-8; 50:20; G.
von Rod argued that the Joseph
story
is a wisdom tale in "The Joseph Narrative and. Ancient
Wisdom,"
in The Problem of the Hexateuch and
Other Essays,
trans.
by E. Dickens (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966),
pp.
292-300; and in Genesis: A Commentary,
trans. by J.
Marks
(rev. ed.,
p.
435; but see also G. Coats, "The Joseph Story and Ancient
Wisdom:
A Reappraisal," CBQ 35 (1973), 285-297.
3
innocent animals suffer merely
because neighbors had become
involved in some dispute?
Personal Enemies in the
Psalms
Although personal enemies do appear in narrative
materials, law and wisdom
literature, they seem to play a
relatively minor role. With the
individual laments and
thanksgiving songs the enemies
play a major role. They form
one of the three fundamental
components of the lament.7
Furthermore, although the
Hebrew title of the Psalter
(Mylht) is
more properly translated "Praises" there is
a large amount of prayer or
petition (tvlpt);
approxi-
mately one third of the Psalms
are not in fact praises but
laments.8 It is
scarcely surprising, therefore, that
enemies appear so frequently in
the Psalter.
Because of the major role which enemies play in so many
psalms, impressions of Old
Testament attitude toward per-
sonal enemies are most easily
formed on the basis of the
Psalter. When it is examined
with a view toward discerning
how to treat one's enemies, the
results are radically dif-
ferent from the beneficent, or
at least non-aggressive,
7 C. Westermann,
"The Structure and History of the
Lament
in the Old Testament," in Praise and
Lament in the
Psalms, trans. by K. Crim and
R. Soulen (
Knox
Press, 1981), p. 169 (= "Struktur and Geschichte der
Klage
im Alten Testament," ZAW 66 [1954], 44-80).
8 A.
Eerdmans, 1981), 36.
4
responses noted in the passages
above. For example:
Break thou the arm of the wicked and
evildoer;
seek out his wickedness
till thou
find none.
Psalm
10:15
0 that thou wouldst slay the wicked,
0 God,
and that men of blood
would depart from
me,
men who maliciously defy thee,
who lift themselves up
against thee for
evil!
Do I not hate them that hate thee, 0
LORD?
And do I not loathe them
that rise up
against
thee?
I hate them with perfect hatred;
I count them my enemies.
Psalm
139:19-229
Little wonder then that many may assume that Jesus'
remark that it was said of old,
"You shall love your
neighbor and hate your
enemy" (Matt. 5:43), is an accurate
quotation of some Old Testament
passage or, at least of
some contemporary Jewish
teaching. Such an instruction is
not to be found in Jewish
scriptures, however, and nothing
like it has been discovered in
rabbinic materials.10 Never-
theless, it is very easy to
understand how readers, critical
or otherwise, could conclude
that such hostility toward
enemies was precisely the teaching
of the Old Testament, and
9 Cf. Psalms 5:11; 7:7,
10; 10:2; 12:4-5; 17:13-14;
25:3;
28:4-5; 31:18-19; 35:1-8, 26; 55:10; 58:7-12; 59:6,
12-14;
69:23-29; 70:3-4; 71:13; 79:6, 12; 83:10-19; 94:2;
109:7-20,
29-30; 129:5-7; 137:7-9; 140:10-12; 143:12.
10 T. Manson, The Sayings of Jesus as Recorded in the
Gospels according to St.
Matthew and St. Luke Arranged with
Introduction and
Commentary
(London: SCM Press, 1949),
p.
161.
5
(depending on one's
understanding of biblical authority)
rightly or wrongly so taught.11
Frequency of references to enemies is one factor which
has created a situation in
which studies of enemies in the
Old Testament are focused
almost exclusively on the Psalms.
The second factor in this focus
is the problem that the
enemies are very difficult to
identify. Since the psalmists
most often speak simply of
various enemies and evildoers,
but almost never identify them
explicitly,12 commentators
traditionally suggest various
identities.
Many suggestions have been advanced in efforts to
identify the personal enemies
in the individual laments.
The earliest suggestions are
witnessed in the scattered
historical notes of some of the
psalm titles.13 Of course,
11 Cf. J. Laney, "A
Fresh Look at the Imprecatory
Psalms," Bibliotheca
Sacra 138 (1981), 35-45; F. Hesse,
"The
Evaluation and Authority of Old Testament Texts," trans.
by
J. Wharton in Essays on Old Testament
Hermeneutics, ed.
by
C. Westermann, English trans. ed. by J. Maya (2nd ed.,
The Authority of the Old
Testament
(
Press,
1967), pp. 234-241.
12 Although this is
especially true with regard to the
individual
laments, it is also true in national laments as
in
Psalm 124. In the royal psalms it is equally difficult
to
decide. Who are the enemies in Psalms 18:38-46 and
89:43?
Granted that they are national geopolitical enemies,
but
given the history of the Israelite state, that could be
almost
anybody from
13 Suggested enemies are
Absalom in Psalm 3;
Benjaminite
in Psalm 7; all (David's) enemies and Saul in
Psalm
18; Abimelech in Psalm 34; Doeg the Edomite in
6
most modern scholars reject
these titles as far as any
historical value is concerned,
but the settings in various
situations of David's life
played a major role in attempts
to identify the enemies for
most of the church's history.14
Even after the rise of critical
studies of the Old Testament
and its wholesale rejection of Davidic
authorship in favor
of late dating of the psalms,
historical questions remained
decisive for the identity of
the enemies. The goal was to
reconstruct the historical
occasion in the life of a
psalmist which evoked each
psalm. One component of this
effort were attempts to
identify the enemies. They were
commonly identified as impious
Jews who harassed their
pious neighbors, the psalmists,
frequently in the Maccabean
era.15
Psalm
52; the Ziphites in Psalm 54; the Philistines in
Psalm
56; Saul in Psalm 57; and Saul and the men he sent
to
watch David's house in Psalm 59.
14 Cf. St. Augustine on the Psalms, Vol. I-II,
trans.
and
annotated by Hebgin and Corrigan Westminster, Maryland:
The
Newman Press, 1960, 1961); St. Basil, "Homily on Psalm
7,"
in St. Basil: Exegetic Homilies,
trans. by
(Washington,
D. C.: The
Press,
1963), pp. 175-180; The Commentary of
Rabbi David
Kimhi on Psalms CXX-CL, ed. and trans. by J.
Baker and E.
Nicholson
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973);
J.
Calvin, Commentary on the Book of Psalms,
5 vols., trans.
by
J. Anderson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949); M. Luther,
"Psalm
101," trans. by A. von Rohr Sauer in Luther's
Works
Vol.
13, ed. by J. Pelikan (
House,
1956), 143-224.
15 Cf. J. Olshausen, Die Psalmen (
1853);
C. Toy, "On Maccabean Psalms," Unitarian
Review and
Religious Magazine XXVI, No. 1 (July, 1886),
1-21; B. Duhm,
7
The work of Hermann Gunkel16 was (and remains)
of
pivotal significance for Psalm
study. With his thesis that
psalm poetry was originally
cultic, sociological-
institutional concerns were
destined to be raised. These
new questions were finally to
undermine all attempts to
reconstruct some historical
occasion in the life of a
psalmist which evoked a psalm.
The task became the attempt
to discern the cultic occasion
for which a psalm was com-
posed and, more importantly,
performed.
This attempt led to the recognition (so obvious today)
that compositions were socially
customary and appropriate to
certain situations in life and
out of place in others. If
the various kinds
("forms" or "Gattungen") of psalms were
recognized, then their social
settings could be determined.
The dominant questions
concerned what was typical of various
situations and their
correlative literature rather than what
unique, irrepeatable situation
must be presupposed in order
Die Psalmen (
Siebeck],
1899); but S. Driver, An Introduction to
the
Literature of the Old
Testament
(
(1957),
pp. 387-389; and A. Kirkpatrick, The
Psalms
(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1902) took a more
moderate
view, even allowing for some psalms of Davidic
authorship.
16 H. Gunkel, Die Psalmen
Ubersetzt und Erklart
(5
Aufl., Gottingen: Vendenhoeck und
Ruprecht, 1968,
1
Aufl., 1926); H. Gunkel und J. Begrich, Einleitung
in die
Psalmen: Die Gattungen
der religiosen Lyrik
(Gottingen:
Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1933); henceforth,
Die Psalmen and Einleitung respectively.
8
to understand a psalm. The
psalms, it was seen, make sense
and "work" for many
people and groups in many historical
settings because they bring to
expression what is typical
rather than unique.
In spite of Gunkel's recognition that psalm poetry
emerged from and belonged to
the cult, however, he remained
a man of his age. He believed
that the psalms present in
the Psalter were in fact
private compositions by and for
(post-exilic) pious groups of
laity and had no living con-
nection with the temple itself.
They were modeled after
psalms which were used in the
(Solomonic) temple, but were
not themselves written for
temple worship. Because of this
belief, Gunkel's handling of
the enemy problem did not
represent any significant
departure from pre-form-critical
solutions.17
Sigmund Mowinckel,18 a pupil of Gunkel,
followed his
teacher in seeing psalms as
cultic compositions, but he
moved one important step. He
maintained that the psalms
actually found in the Psalter
were not free and private
compositions modeled after
earlier cultic compositions, but
were in fact written for and
used in the pre-exilic temple
services. It was not necessary
to reconstruct hypothetical
17 Gunkel, Einleitung, pp. 209-211.
18 S. Mowinckel, Psalmenstudien, 6 Vols. (Kristiania:
In
kommission bei Jacob Dybwad, 191): and The
Psalms in
(Nashville: Abingdon Press,
1962).
9
models based on post-exilic
imitations. The poems of the
canonical Psalter were
overwhelmingly the actual Psalms in
Israel's
Worship, not the psalms in the worship of "'con-
venticles' of pious laymen.”19
If the vast majority of the Psalms were in fact pre-
exilic and not (late)
post-exilic compositions, then
solutions of the enemy problem
along the lines of sectarian
controversies in post-exilic
Judaism were out of the question.
Clearly, Mowinckel had to
explain the enemies differently
than had his predecessors. Early on in his career he offered
the thesis that the
"workers of iniquity" (Nvx-ylfvp)
encountered in the individual
laments, which he understood
primarily as psalms requesting
healing from sickness
(Krankheitpsalmen),20 were sorcerers (and allied demons)
whose curses had caused the
illnesses of the psalmists.21
19 The Psalms in
of
Mowinckel's originally Norwegian work titled Offersang og
Sangoffer which is literally
translated "Song of sacrifice
and
Sacrifice of song" or "Offering song and Song offering";
see
"Author's Preface to the English Edition" of the work,
p.
xxiii. The phrase "'conventicles' of pious laymen" above
is
drawn from the same work, p. 29.
20 Mowinckel, Psalmenstudien, Vol. I, 9-12, 98-103;
see
especially
p. 101 where he states, "in Wirklichkeit durften
die
allermeisten individuellen Klagepsalmen Krankheitpsalmen
sein.—Wenigstensiersich
lassen sie sichalle von dieser Annahme
heraus
erklaren.
21 Mowinckel, Psalmenstudien, Vol. I, 33-58, 76-133;
see
especially
pp. 76-77 where he states, "Bedeutet awan Zauber,
so
sind die po’ale awan die Zauberer, und diese Auntater
sind
in den betreffenden Psalmen nur eine andere Bezeichnung
der
Feinde, uber die der Beter klagt.” Cf.
also idem.,
10
Some scholars rejected Mowinckel's identification of the
personal enemies with
sorcerers,22 but the perspectives from
which a solution might be
sought (for any problem in the
Psalms) had shifted decisively.
Although he might be disputed
on such points of detail the
disputes were determined by a
new agenda.23 The
most important of the suggestions con-
cerning the identifications of
the enemies have remained
firmly anchored to
institutional and temple activities.
Hans Schmidt24 proposed an alternative to
Mowinckel's
identification of the enemies.
While Mowinckel dealt with
"Zwei
Beobachtung zum Deutung der Nv,xA-ylefEPo," ZAW 43
(1925), 260-262.
22 Cf.
L. Aubert, "Les psaumes dans le culte d'Israel,"
Revue
de Theologie et de Philosophie NS 15 (1927), 224-230;
Gunkel, Einleitung,
pp. 196-211; Birkeland, The
Evildoers
in the Book of Psalms (
1955),
pp. 40-46, henceforth, Evildoers.
23 For example,
Mowinckel's hypothetical New Year Festi-
val
may be rejected only to be replaced by an equally com-
prehensive
Covenant Festival (A. Weiser, The Psalms:
A Com-
mentary, trans. by H. Hartwell
[
or
a Royal
A Cultic History of the
Old Testament,
trans. by G. Buswell
Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag des
Erziehungsvereins,
1978]).
Scholars seem exceptionally ready to name festivals
which
the Old Testament never mentions and to disregard those
that
it does, at least for the purposes of nomenclature. Are
the
modern names better than those given by the Israelites
themselves?
24 H. Schmidt, Das Gebet der Angeklagten im Alten
Testament (Giessen: Alfred
Topelmann, 1928); and Die
Psalmen (J. C.
B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 754).
11
most individual laments from a
"medical" perspective, Schmidt
dealt with them from a judicial
one. They were uttered by
people accused of a crime and
were connected with some sort
of cultic ordeal; hence the
frequent assertions of innocence
found in the laments.25
On this view the one who laments
would be a defendant while the
enemies would be plaintiffs
or false witnesses. Although
their emphases are different
from Schmidt the judicial
perspective has also been pursued
by Delekat26 and
Beyerlin.27
Harris Birkeland28 brought forth a serious
objection to
all attempts to identify the
personal enemies in the Psalter.
He argued that "the
enemies of the individual were in prin-
ciple identical with those of
the nation, viz. the gen-
tiles."29
Beginning with five individual psalms
which
explicitly identified the
enemies as gentiles (Myvg),
25 For example, Psalms
7:4-5; 17:1-5; 26:1, 4-7, 11.
26 L. Delekat, Asylie und Schutzorakel an Zionheiligtum
(Leiden:
E. J. Brill, 1962).
27 W. Beyerlin, Die Rettung der Bedrangten in den
Feindpsalmen der Einzelnen
auf institutionelle Zusammenhange
untersucht (G5ttingen: Vandenhoeck
und Ruprecht, 1970).
28 H. Birkeland, Die
Feinde des Individuums in der
israelitischen
Psalmearteratur
(
1933);
and Evildoers.
29 Birkeland, Evildoers, p. 9.
12
strangers (Myrz) and peoples (Mymf),30
he maintained
that the enemies in these five
individual psalms were no
different than those in others
of the individual psalms.31
Therefore, the enemies in other
individual psalms must be
foreign foes of the nation of
who opposed the psalmists.
A second factor in Birkeland's argument was that all
royal psalms which mention
enemies32 refer to national
enemies, as well as a number of
psalms in which "I" appears
as a subject but a collective
interpretation is more
likely.33 Corollary
to this is the fact that "I" sometimes
appears in psalms which are
national psalms.34 Birkeland
reached the conclusion that
in more than half of all
I[ndividual] P(salms]
containing enemies, these enemies
must necessarily
be gentiles because it is expressly
stated in
almost all of them, and even in the rest of them
30 Psalms 9:6, 16, 18,
20, 21; 10:16; 43:1 speak of
(M ) yvg; 54:5 speaks of Myrz although there is a
variant
reading Mydz
(see BHS), and the same line appears
in
Psalm 86:14 reading Mydz; and 56:8 speaks of Mymf;
cf.
Kraus, Psalmen; Gunkel, Die Psalmen; Weiser, and
31 Birkeland, Evildoers, p. 14.
32 Psalms 18; 20; 21; 28;
61; 63; 89; 144; I Sam.
2:1-10.
33 Psalms 36; 66; 75; 77;
94; 118; 123; 130; 131.
34 Psalms 44:7, 16; 74:12; 60:11; 83:14.
13
the enemies are fairly
generally recognized as
national enemies.
. . . The situation, then, is that we know
who are the enemies in more than 20
psalms. In
the other half of all I[ndividual] P[salms]
they
are described in the same way. From this fact
only one method of research can be
deduced: we
have to suppose, at least as a
working hypothesis,
that the enemies are of the same
kind in those
psalms in which their identity is
not expressly
stated, as in those psalms in which
it is
expressly stated.35
Birkeland's point that the enemies in five individual
psalms are gentiles must be
granted. The texts are quite
clear. With the royal psalms
likewise the enemies are most
reasonably taken to be national
(although the Israelite
kings did have some problems
with "internal security").
The conclusion that all other
enemies must be identical
because they are described the
same way is, however, not
warranted. The fact that the
psalms were composed and used
in the cult means that the
enemies must have been, capable of
more than one meaning. The
reason that descriptions of
enemies are the same in all the
psalms which mention them
is not because the enemies are
everywhere identical, but in
order that the psalms might not
be restricted to a single
kind of enemy. If the psalms
were to be used in the cult
then they had to be capable of
referring to more than one
kind of enemy.
35 Birkeland, Evildoers, p. 15.
14
A second, consideration which speaks against Birkeland's
conclusion is the fact that
Israelites lamented and gave
thanks for personal events and
circumstances as well as
national. The Old Testament is
perfectly clear at this
point. Jeremiah's laments36
contain descriptions of his
enemies which could appear just
as easily in the Psalter,
yet they are demonstrably not
gentiles; they are the "men of
Anathoth."37
Job's descriptions of his personal enemies do
not refer to foreigners but to
people within his own com-
munity who are his enemies.38
Surely Jeremiah and Job were
not the only ones to describe
their personal home-grown
enemies like kings described
their national gentile enemies.
Finally, the observation should be made that Israelites
were not as doctrinnaire in
their use of the different forms
of psalms as modern scholars
have been. The anachronism of
Hannah uttering a royal song of
thanksgiving (I Sam. 2:1-10)
did not create any apparent
problems of verisimilitude for
the writer(s) of I Samuel.
Evidently Israelites (even
36 Jer. 11:18-12:6;
15:10-21; 17:14-18; 18:18-23;
20:7-13;
20:14-18. Cf. S. Balentine, "Jeremiah, Prophet of
Prayer,"
Review and Expositor 78 (1981),
331-344; W. Baum-
gartner,
Die Klagegedichte des Jeremias (
Topelmann, 1917); P. Bonnard, Le Psautier selon Jeremie
(Paris: Les Editions du Cerf, 1960); J. Berridge, Prophet,
People and the Word of
God
(Zurich: EVZ-Verlag, 1970).
37 Jer. 11:21, 23.
38 Cf. Job 6:15-27; 16:10, 20; 19:14-19;
30:1-15.
15
women) were able to use psalms
which were form-critically
inappropriate.39 If
the different forms were mutually
exclusive, then Hezekiah should
have used a psalm which was
more clearly royal in its
orientation (Is. 38:10-20).
Birkeland's identification of
all enemies is reductionistic.
They were (and are) open to
more than a single referent.
The "Myth and
pretation which denies the
possibility of reference to
personal enemies in the
individual psalms. On this view,
the "I" is the king
who suffers and is resurrected in the
39 Some use of royal
psalms by commoners in post-exilic
have
been used and would not have been preserved. Although
it
is historically unlikely that Hannah could have used a
royal
psalm (before there was any royalty in
fact
that she could be portrayed doing so in a pre-exilic
text
means that such use of royal psalms by non-royal
figures
was certainly conceivable during the monarchical
period.
It should also be remembered that, in principle
at
least, the royal psalmists could have reworked pre-
monarchic
individual psalms in order to make them royal.
There
was, after all, a temple in
a
king, and a temple without psalms would be an interesting
phenomenon.
In the case of Hannah's song only the con-
clusion
("he will give strength to his king, and exalt the
power
of his anointed.") requires a royal understanding.
All
the rest of the psalm is perfectly intelligible as an
individual
song of thanksgiving.
40
p.
170; A. Johnson, "The Role of the King in the
Cultus,"
in The Labyrinth: Further Studies in the
Relation
between Myth and Ritual
in the Ancient World,
ed. by S.
Hooke
(New York: The Macmillan Company, 1935), pp. 71-111.
Cf.
J. Eaton, Kingship and the Psalms (
Alec
R. Allenson, 1970). His extensive royal interpreta-
tion,
though not the same as the "Myth and
would
essentially rule out personal enemies in the Psalms;
they
would rather be enemies of the king.
16
cultic drama. The enemies,
therefore, cannot be real human
beings, but are rather mythic
powers who attack the god-
king. This position may have
some merit when explicit
mention is made of Sheol as an
active and potent reality,41
but the Old Testament nowhere
speaks of the king playing the
role of any god (certainly not
Yahweh) in a cultic drama.42
One other option which would seem to deny the possi-
bility of reference to personal
enemies is that of Othmar
Keel.43 He
interprets the enemies psychoanalytically as
physical personifications of
the distress of the psalmist.
While their ancient near
eastern neighbors could objectify
their anxieties (Angste) and apprehensions (Sorgen) by
speaking of various gods and
demons,
space for such projections was
limited by Yahweh's intoler-
ance; it was restricted to
Yahweh and the human (and animal)
world. Therefore, the enemies
must be seen much more as
representatives of a sinister world
of evil than
as individuals in our sense. In
order to be able
to describe the evil and hostility with which the
41 Cf. Psalms 18:6; 89:49.
42 Cf. M. Noth,
"God, King, and Nation in the Old
Testament,"
in The Laws in the Pentateuch and Other
Essays,
trans.
by D. Ap-Thomas (
1967),
P. 175.
43 O. Keel, Feinde and Gottesleugner: Studien zum
Image
der Widersacher in den
Individualpsalmen
(Stuttgart Verlag
katholisches Bibelwerk, 1969).
17
supplicant found himself confronted
these supply
an abundance of comparisons and metaphors.44
Undoubtedly the enemies in the individual psalms can
function this way45
and, presumably, they could have in
likely be effective if there
were known examples of such
people and actions in the
external world. By way of illus-
tration, the descriptions of
enemies who "dig a pit"46 is
probably to be taken
metaphorically, but it could be used
only because this spoke of a
real danger which even the
legal tradition recognized.47
Laws are not formulated to
regulate metaphorical digging
of pits, but real pits.
This brief survey48 of suggested identities of
the
enemies in the individual
psalms may be summarized in three
44 “ . . . Reprasentanten einer unheimlicher Welt des
Bosen als Individuen im
unserm Sinne. Um die Bosheit and
Feindseligkeit, denen sich
der Beter gegenubersieht
schildern zu konnen, dedarf
dieeser einer Menge von
Vergleichen und Metaphern.” Keel, p. 91.
45 S. Meyer, "The
Psalms and Personal Counseling,"
Journal of Psychology
and Theology
2 (Winter 1974), 26-30.
46 Psalms 7:16; 9:16;
35:7.
47 Exod. 21:33-34.
48 Helpful summaries of
research on the Psalms may
found
in
Criticism, ed. by J. Hayes (
press,
1974), pp. 179-223; R. Clements, A
Century of Old
Testament Study (London: Lutterworth
Press, 1976), pp. 76-
P;
Keel, pp. 11-35; and B. Feininger, "A Decade of German
Psalm-Criticism,"
Journal for the Study of the Old
Testament
20 (1981), 91-103.
18
brief statements. (1) The
enemies are not unique historical
figures or groups, but are
stereotypical and multivalent.
(2) They are sometimes, but by
no means always, gentiles.
(3) Israelites evidently did
have personal enemies whom they
described as the individual
psalms describe the enemies.
A Methodology for
Investigating
"Enemies" in
Wisdom Literature
Note has already been taken above of the fact that
personal enemies seem to play a
relatively minor role in
wisdom literature, as well as
other complexes of Israelite
tradition. Yet, they are
prolific in the Psalms; indeed, at
times the impression may emerge
that the psalmists suffered
from paranoia. Were the sages
oblivious to such folk as the
enemies and their attacks? How
could they notice such
varied phenomena as trade,49
sexual promiscuity,50
etiquette,51 legal
procedure,52 wealth and poverty,53
49 Prov. 20:10; 14, 23;
Sir. 26:29-27:3.
50 Prov. 7:1-27;
23:26-28; 30:20.
51 Prov. 25:6-7; Sir. 30;
31-32:13.
52 Prov. 18:17; 25:7c-10.
53 Prov. 10:15; 11:4, 24,
28; 13:7, 8; 14:21; 16:19;
18:11;
19:4, 17; 22:1, 9; 23:4; 28:6; 30:7-9; Qoh. 5:9-10;
Sir. 4:8-10; 13:24; 14:3-10;
30:16.
19
animal husbandry,54
alcohol abuse,55 and even friendship56
and scarcely mention the
problem of enemies? Was their
social world so different from
the psalmists', or did they
perceive it differently?
This investigation intends to demonstrate that the sages
were in fact aware of the folk
designated and described as
enemies in the Psalms. The
method to be used begins by
noting all the designations of
enemies within the individual
laments, thanksgiving songs and
songs of confidence in the
Psalter.57 The enemy
designations thus determined are then
sought within the wisdom
literature,58 and they form the
54 Prov. 27:23-27.
55 Prov. 23:19-21, 29-35,
56 Prov. 3:28-29; 6:1-5,
29; 11:9, 12; 13:20; 14:20, 21;
16:29;
17:17, 18; 18:19, 24; 19:4, 6, 7; 21:10; 22:11,
24-25;
24:28-29; 25:7c-10, 17, 18, 20; 26:18-19; 27:6, 10,
14,
17; 28:7; 29:3, 5; Job 2-11; 6:14, 15, 27; 12:4; 16:20,
21;
17:5; 19:13, 14, 21; 22:6; 31:9; 42:10; Qoh. 4:4, 9-12;
Sir.
5:12; 6:17; 7:12; 9:14; 10:6; 12:9; 13:21; 15:5;
20:23;
25:18; 37:1-6; 41:18, 21.
57 0f course, individual
judgments may differ on a given
psalm,
but the selections listed below represent a reason-
able
consensus; they form the basis of the enemy designa-
tions
and behaviors gleaned in preparing this study. Psalms
3;
4; 5; 6; 7; 9-10; 11; 12; 13; 14; 17; 18; 22; 23; 26; 27;
28;
30; 31; 32; 34; 35; 36; 7,61; 39; 40; 41; 42-43; 52; 53;
54;
55; 56; 57; 58; 59; 61; E2; 63; 64; 69; 70; 71; 73; 86;
88;
102; 109; 119; 138; 139; 140; 141; 142; 143; cf. Kraus,
Psalmen; Gunkel, Die Psalmen; Weiser, and Anderson at the
passages
listed.
58 See "Appendix I:
Enemy Designations within the
Wisdom
Literature." Lists of enemy designations in the
Psalms may be found in Keel,
pp. 94-98; and L. Ruppert,
20
basis of the discussion in
Chapter 2, "Enemy Designations in
the Wisdom Literature."
A second avenue to the location of enemies in wisdom
literature is to note which
figures are described as enemies
are described in the Psalter.
This involves, of course,
determining how enemies'
actions and dispositions are pre-
sented in the Psalms59
and then locating any of these
actions and dispositions which
appear in the wisdom litera-
ture.60 As will be seen, some figures (such as the
"lord
of anger" in Prov. 22:24)
appear as subjects of these
actions or dispositions who did
not appear in the discussion
of enemy designations. These
new enemies have been called
"derivative enemies,”61
and they form the basis for the
discussion in Chapter 3,
"Derivative Enemies in the Wisdom
Literature."
Following the groundwork laid by locating enemy desig-
nations and folk who act like
enemies within the wisdom
literature, the possibility of
asking after wise responses
to the enemy will emerge. Are
beneficent (Prov. 25:21-22)
Der leidende Gerechte und
seine Feinde: Eine Wortfeldunter-
suchung (Wurzburg: Echter
Verlag, 1973), pp. 7-97.
59 Ruppert, pp. 111-168.
60
See "Appendix II: Enemy Behaviors within the Wisdom
Literature."
61 See "Appendix III: Derivative Enemies
Designations."
21
and non-aggressive62
responses to one's enemy characteristic
in wisdom literature? Or, are
they rather isolated "old-
world anticipation[s] of the
spirit of Matthew 5:44"?63
Are they "unique"
within the wisdom literature as in the Old
Testament in general?64
What presuppositions allow or
demand these, or other,
responses to the enemy on the part
of the wise? Chapter 4,
"Wise Responses to the Enemy," will
address these issues.
James Crenshaw has asked, "How can one determine
what
is distinctive of Israelite
sages in the area of ethics?"65
His question is particularly significant
for this investi-
gation because it is placed in
the midst of a discussion of
the declaration of innocence in
Job 31 where he observes,
"Nothing in the catalog of
vices falls into the category of
distinctive wisdom behavior,
"66 and these vices certainly
include rejoicing over an
enemy's calamity. Such a state-
ment requires that the final
chapter attempt to assess the
62 Prov. 16:7; 24:17-18;
Job 31:29-30.
63 See n. 2 above.
64 H. Ringgren, "byaxA; ‘ayabh; byeOx
‘oyehb;
hbAyxe ‘ebhah," Theological Dictionary of the Old Testa-
ment, tool. I, ed. by G.
Botterweck and H. Ringgren, trans.
by
Willis (rev. ed.,
65 J. Crenshaw, Old Testament Wisdom: An Introduction
(Atlanta:
John Knox Press, 1981), p. 15.
66 Crenshaw, p. 15.
22
validity of the opening thesis
of this investigation (on
page 1 above) that "the
wisdom tradition of
in a remarkable way from the
dominant Old Testament attitude
toward personal enemies."
In light of that evaluation it
will be possible to confirm,
modify or reject the initial
thesis.
Methodological Caveats
The methodology outlined above makes a very important
assumption; namely, that the
sages who were responsible for
the wisdom literature of the
Old Testament were Israelites.
They were just as Israelite as
prophets, priests, psalmists,
kings and others in ancient
but it has been disputed.67
As Israelites, they used the
same language as other
Israelites. Undoubtedly, each sphere
of Israelite society used some
technical terms,68 but the
lexical stock used to designate
and describe enemies in the
Psalter is hardly technical.
They are simply Hebrew words
which any Israelite might be
expected to know and use;
67 See G. Wright, The Biblical Doctrine of Man (
SCM
Press, 1954), p. 154, who evaluates wisdom as "lacking
almost
completely in the typically Israelite conception of
society."
68 For example, hls and Hcnml for the
psalmists,
hvhy-Mxn for prophets, tmvy tvm for
judges
or lawgivers, xmF for priests. Interestingly,
attempts
to determine a technical vocabulary for sages have
not
met with a great deal of success; cf. R. Whybray, The
Intellectual Tradition
in the Old Testament (
DeGruyter,
1974).
23
hence, the rationale for the
proposed methodology. The
enemies are not particularly
noticeable in wisdom literature
because they do not tend to
cluster as they do in the Psalms
where they constitute one of
"the three determinant
elements"69 in
the Psalter's most abundantly witnessed
forms. Because the psalmists
used conventional Hebrew to
designate and describe their
enemies, however, the assump-
tion is reasonable that sages
would draw from much the same
lexical stock when they spoke
about the same or similar
folk.
In the cases of the wisdom books of Sirach and the
Wisdom of Solomon, the
linguistic situation is complicated
by the fact that these
documents are known primarily in
Greek. As confessed by Sirach's
grandson, and translator, his
book was originally written in
Hebrew, but the Greek text is
found in the larger canon of
the Old Testament. Hebrew
textual witnesses (none
complete) have been discovered in the
modern period.70
Because of this peculiar situation in
Sirach's textual transmission
the Greek text is used as
primary in this study with
Hebrew fragments used for
69 See n. 7 above.
70
(Leiden:
E. J. Brill, 1904); Y. Yadin, The Ben
Sirs Scroll
from
(
of the Book, 1965).
24
illumination where appropriate.
The Wisdom of Solomon was
originally written in Greek and
has been preserved in that
language.71
This linguistic situation requires another step in
locating enemy designations and
behaviors. They will be
determined by sifting through
all the possible translations
of the enemy vocabulary as
witnessed by Hatch-Redpath.72
Because of the vagaries of the
Septuagint's translation
techniques,73 this
procedure does widen the field con-
siderably, but the alternative
of moving from vocabulary
found in the Greek Psalter
directly to Sirach and the Wisdom
71 D. Winston, The Wisdom of Solomon: A New Translation
with Introduction and
Commentary
(
Doubleday
and Company, 1979), pp. 14-18. Some have argued
for
an original Hebrew (or Aramaic), but their arguments
have
not won much agreement. See E. Speiser, "The Hebrew
Origin
of the First Part of the Book of Wisdom," Jewish
Quarterly Review 14 (1923-24), 455-437;
and F. Zimmermann,
"The
Book Wisdom: Its Language and Character," Jewish
Quarterly Review 57 (1966), 1-27,
101-135,
72 E. Hatch and H.
Redpath, A Concordance to the
Septuagint and the Other Greek Versions of the Old
Testament
including the Apocryphal
Books),
with Supplement by-
Redpath
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1897, 1906)l and E.
Camilo
dos
Redpath Concordance to
the Septuagint
(Jerusalem: Dugith
Publishers,
Baptist House, n. d.).
73 J. Barr,
"Vocalization and the Analysis of Hebrew
among
Ancient Translators," VTS 16
(1967), 1-11; J. Blau,
"Zum
Hebraisch der Ubersetzer des Altes Testaments," VT 6
(1956),
98-100; P. Katz, "Zur Ubersetzungstechnik der LXX,"
Die Welt des Orients 2 (1956), 267-273; D.
Riddle, "The
Logic
of the Theory of Translation Greek," JBL 51 (1932),
13-30;
J. Rife, "The Mechanics of Translation Greek," JBL
52
(1933), 244-252.
25
of Solomon runs a greater risk
of missing some expressions
which could be important.
Hence, caution must be exercised
in discussing the Greek enemy
designations and descriptions
of behavior.
Related to the linguistic caveat just noted is the fact
that this methodology neither
assumes nor argues for influ-
ence from wisdom on other
spheres of Israelite life nor vice
versa. Common language,
geography and history between
various groups means that they
are related somehow and that
these relations will exert some
kinds of influence, usually
mutual. Claims of influence
from one realm of society on
another realm of the same
society are notoriously difficult
to demonstrate74
because commonalities may be due to the
simple fact that different
groups in the same social system
are in fact part of one single
system. Israelite prophets
(or other groups) may sound
like Israelite sages simply
74 Cf. J. Crenshaw,
"Method in Determining Wisdom
Influence
on 'Historical Literature'," JBL 88 (1969), 129-
142,
for the difficulties in tracing influence from wisdom
to
other kinds of literature; W. McKane, Prophets
and Wise
Men (Naperville, Ill.: Alec
R. Allenson, Inc., 1965), for
an
attempt to trace influence from another sphere upon
wisdom;
for statements on the commonalities between wisdom
and
other complexes of Israelite tradition see M. Tate, Jr.,
A Study of the Wise Men of
Prophets (Th.D. Dissertation,
The Southern-Baptist Theo-
logical
Seminary, 1958), passim, but especially pp. 395-408;
R.
Murphy, "Wisdom--Theses and Hypotheses," in Israelite
Wisdom: Theological
and Literary Essays in Honor of Samuel
Terrien, ed. by J. Gammie, W.
Brueggemann, W. Humphreys, and
J..
Ward (Missoula, Montana: Scholars Press, 1978), pp. 39-
40;
D. Morgan, Wisdom in the Old Testament
Traditions
(Atlanta:
John Knox Press, 1981), is a very good study of
this
problem of the relations between wisdom and other com-
plexes
of Old Testament traditions.
26
because they are Israelite. The
reverse is, of course,
equally true.
Thus far no attempt has been made to define wisdom.
Terms such as "wisdom
literature," "wisdom tradition,"
"wisdom,"
"wise" and "sages" have been used without explicit
definition. This same
phenomenon is often encountered in
studies of wisdom for the
problem of definition is still
awaiting a satisfactory
solution.75 Proposed
definitions
range anywhere from the
convention which simply means to
designate the five wisdom books
of Proverbs, Job, Qoheleth,
Sirach and the Wisdom of
Solomon which are bound together by
a "mysterious
ingredient"76 to definitions in terms of a
system of thought (either
"secular," "religious" or both),77
75 J. Crenshaw, Old Testament Wisdom: An Introduction,
pp.
16-19; cf. idem., "Method in Determining Wisdom Influ-
ence
on 'Historral Literature'"; and "Prolegomena," in
Studies in Ancient
Israelite Wisdom,
ed. by J. Crenshaw
(New
York: KTAV, 1976), pp. 3-5; and B. Kovacs,
Sociological-Structural
Constraints upon Wisdom: The
Spatial and Temporal
Matrix of Proverbs 15:26-22:16, Vol. I
(Ph.
D. Dissertation, Vanderbilt University, 1978), 31-.104.
76 Crenshaw, Old Testament Wisdom: An Introduction,
p.
17.
77 Cf., for example,
altestamentlichen
Weisheit," ZAW NS 10 (1933), 177-204;
H.
Schmid, Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit:
eine
Untersuchung zur
Altorientalischen und Israelitischen
Weisheitliteratur (Berlin: Verlag Alfred
Topelmann, 1966);
G.
von Rad, Old Testament Theology, Vol.
I, trans. by D.
Stalker
(New-York: Harper and Row, 1962), pp. 418-459;
idem., Wisdom in Israel (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1972);
1117—Gese,
Lehre
und Wirklichkeit in der Alten Weisheit:
Studien zu den Spruchen
Salomos und zu dem Buche Hiob
27
a pattern of life78
or a sociological phenomenon,79 among
others.80
Most definitions of wisdom, of course, are not one-
dimensional but are varying
combinations of several factors
noted above. This study does
not seek to solve this
troublesome problem. Instead, a
consensus view has been
followed that whatever wisdom
may be, it is certainly to be
found in the books of Proverbs,
Job, Qoheleth, Sirach and
the Wisdom of Solomon.81
One final caveat is in order. That Israelite wisdom
has much in common with similar
phenomena in ancient
and
(Tubingen:
J. C. B. Mohr, 1958); and Crenshaw, "Method in
Determining
Wisdom Influence on 'Historical Literature',"
78 Cf., for example,
MaKane, Prophets and Wise Men.
79 Cf., for example, R.
Gordis, "The Social Background
of
Wisdom Literature," in Poets
Prophets and Sages:
Essays in Biblical
Interpretation
(
University
Press, 1971), pp. 160-197; and H. Hermisson,
Studien zur
Israelitischen Spruchweisheit (Neukirchen-
Vluyn:
Neukirchzner Verlag, 1968).
80 See Kovacs, Vol. I,
31-104, for a discussion of the
various
ways in which definitions of wisdom have been
formulated;
he discusses thirteen different perspectives
from
which attempts have been suggested.
81Crenshaw, Old Testament Wisdom: An Introduction,
p.
17; R. Murphy, Wisdom Literature: Job,
Proverbs, Ruth,
Canticles, Ecclesiastes,
Esther
(
1981), pp. 3-4.
28
immediately self-evident with
wisdom literature than any
other in the Old Testament.
Because of this state of affairs,
it is quite frequent to find
discussions of "Wisdom in
and the Ancient Near
East."82 This study does not pursue the
problem of enemies in the
ancient near eastern texts for
three reasons. First, this
investigator lacks the linguistic
competence to carry out the
task properly. Second, methodo-
logically this restriction
forces the investigation to deal
with
what is commonly true in the
ancient near east. Third,
considerations of space would
prohibit more than a cursory
treatment of the extensive
ancient near eastern literature.
Contemporary Value of
This Study
To say that the contemporary world is pluralistic has
become a commonplace. The
indications seem to be that while
the globe will grow
increasingly smaller due to communi-
cations, travel,
interdependence of economies and many other
developments, its peoples will
become increasingly pluralis-
tic. The "global
village" will scarcely be a village in
terms of shared values,
patterns of living, political
persuasions or religions.
82 The title of Supplements to Vetus Testamentum, Vol.
III,
ed. by M. Noth and Thomas Leiden: E. J. Brill,
1955).
29
This increasing pluralism, of course, brings with it
certain advantages--so the
conventional wisdom goes--
advantages including
opportunities of openness, new percep-
tions of old problems, breakdown
of triumphalisms, to name
a few. The dark side of this
growing situation is that
opportunities for tension,
hostility and enmity also will
rise. One person's now freedom
in a pluralistic world is
another's way of life
threatened. More people are more
likely to have more
opportunities to perceive enemies than
previously.
This study may allow for some reflection on how to deal
with enemies. Perhaps the
historical and cultural distance
of the modern student from the
Israelite sages will offer a
certain amount of
"safe" space in which to experiment
imaginatively with various
stances within the context of
enemies, their attacks and
wisdom. If such proves true in
even a limited way, then the
investigation will have been
personally rewarding. Only the
reader can make that
judgment.
Chapter 2
ENEMY DESIGNATIONS WITHIN
WISDOM LITERATURE
The task of this chapter is to analyse the data
compiled in Appendix I,
"Enemy Designations within Wisdom
Literature." All
occurrences of enemy designations in the
wisdom writings of Proverbs,
Job, Qoheleth, Sirach and
Wisdom of Solomon are listed
there. The following analysis
intends to delineate as many of
the social locations of the
folk branded with enemy
designations as possible. In
addition to social locations,
attention will be directed to
the literary contexts of these
designations for the several
writers-compilers reveal
various perceptions of these folk
through their formal placement
of enemy designations.
One obvious task of analysis is organization. This
discussion will follow the
categories developed by Othmar
Keel and Lothar Ruppert in
their studies of enemies in the
Psalms.1 Both scholars see two fundamental groups which
they designate as the "byvx" and "fwr-groups."
The
first is comprised of virtual
synonyms of byvx ("enemy")
or terms which, although not
synonymous, bespeak simple
1 0. Keel, Feinde und Gottesleugner: Studien zum
Image
der Widersacher in den
Individualpsalmen
(
Katholisches
Bibelwerk, 1965); L. Tuppert, Der
leidende
Gerechte und seine
Feinde: Eine Wortfelduntersuchung
(Wurzburg: Echter Verlag,
1973).
30
31
hostility irrespective of moral
or religious stance. The
"fwr-group" is made up of synonyms of fwr
("wicked")
or terms focusing attention on
some moral or religious stance
which issues in enmity. Two
other groups used by both these
scholars are the "family
and friendship group" whereby
enemies are explicitly
designated as either family or friends
and the "animals
group" which speaks of enemies with the
metaphors or similes of animal
figures. Ruppert adds a fifth
category which he calls the
"neutral group." This includes
several words which are
recognizable as enemy designations
only by their appearance in
contexts clearly treating of
hostile figures. Otherwise, the
members of this group may
have nothing to do with enmity.2
Although these categories
of enemy designations were
developed in studies of the
Psalms, they provide a
relatively coherent structure for
this examination of wisdom
literature as well.
2 The problem of the
enemies in the Psalter has a long
history
of study; it is now recognized that the enemies form
an
integral topic in certain forms of psalmody (cf. C.
Westermann,
"Struktur and Geschichte der Klage im Alten
Testament,"
ZAW 66 [1954], 44-80). Hence, it is reasonable
to
include such terms as Mdx, wyx and Mdx-ynb in
a
study such as Ruppert's. In wisdom literature, however,
there
is no such recognition. Therefore, only such
"neutral"
terms as, for example, rz and rw which may be
more
clearly related to enmity and which provide more pre-
cision than would terms such as
wyx have been included.
32
Proverbs
The book of Proverbs contains two basic kinds of
material: longer didactic
compositions (primarily in ch.
1-9) and shorter meshalim (primarily in ch.
10-31). The
many meshalim stand quite independently of one another as so
many "pearls on a
string." With this material, footholds
for analysis are limited to
considerations such as paral-
lelism and syntax within each
individual mashal.3 The
longer didactic compositions,
on the other hand, provide
somewhat greater breadth for
analysis insofar as their very
3 The various
superscriptions (1:1; 10:1; 24:23; 25:1;
30:1;
31:1) as well as certain other phenomena such as the
independent
acrostic of 31:10-31, the dependence of 22:17-
24:22
upon the Egyptian "Instruction of Amenemope" (cf. O.
Eissfeldt,
The Old Testament: An Introduction,
trans. by
P.
Ackroyd [
the
predominance of antithetic parallelism in ch. 10-15 and
synonymous
or synthetic parallelism in 16:1-22:16, and
numerous
examples of catch-word arrangement and other
paronomastic
devices, point to the conclusion that the book
is
in fact an anthology of several collections (cf. U.
Skladny,
Die ältesten Spruchsammlungen in
Vandenhoeck
Ruprecht, 1962]). As "collections" however,
the
contents show no unmistakable signs of intentional
development
beyond that offered by their individual members.
There
seems to be no sure reason why one mashal
should have
led
to the next, except in rare occasions (e.g., 26:4-5).
That there is, or was, some kind of
architectonic
structure
to the book does seem probable (cf. P. Skehan,
"A
Single Editor for the Whole Book of Proverbs," Studies
in Israelite Poetry and
Wisdom
[
Biblical
Association, 1971]), but it is equally probable
that
such a structure is recognizable and exegetically
significant
only in its broadest outlines. Thus, the
"Hymn
to the Good Wife" (31:10-31) forms the conclusion to
the
book in both MT and the Greek text, while 30:1-14 and
30:15-31:9
may occupy different places in the book's
arrangement.
33
length allows for more
development of thought and expres-
sion. They allow for more
connections between various terms
to be drawn or for greater
description of individual terms
to be developed.4
With these fundamental distinctions in
mind, attention may be directed
to the enemy designations
within the book of Proverbs.
The byvx-Group
Of the five references to personal enemies
(byvx, xnvW) in the book of Proverbs, one is a simple
saying,5 two are
admonitions with motive clauses,6 and two
are observations.7
The saying and admonitions are inter-
esting insofar as they provide
an insight into the sages'
4 Of course, a longer
composition may have developed by
expanding
a simple mashal, but McKane's
analysis of the
instruction
genre seems more likely (cf. W. McKane,
Proverbs: A New Approach [
Press,
1970] pp.51-182, 262-412). Even if the older form
critical
explanation is followed, however, the fact remains
that
they cannot be broken up into so many independent
sayings
as can the collections in 10:1-22:16 and 24:23-31:9.
5 16:7.
6 24:17-18; 25:21-22. Of
course, 24:17-18 might be
designated
as part of the larger instruction comprising
22:17-24:22;
cf. McKane, pp. 369-406. Interest is here
focused
on the immediate passage rather than the whole
instruction
so it is more appropriate to consider it an
admonition.
7 26:24-26; 27:6. In view
of the negative jussive
construction
of 26:25 (Nmxt-lx ), 26:24-26 is arguably
an
admonition rather than an observation. The jussive is
subordinated
to the thrust of the observation so it is best
taken
as observation with an admonitory motif.
34
ethic vis-a-vis enemies, but the present discussion is
concerned with the identity of
the enemy. In this regard,
they offer no guidance;
presumably, the enemy in question is
self-evident. With the
observations, however, descriptions
of the enemy are provided.
Hence, these must be examined
more closely.
A hater makes himself unknown with
his lips,
and sets deceit in his
innards;
When he makes his voice gracious, do
not rely
on him,
for seven abominations are in his heart.
Hatred is concealed with guile,
his evil is uncovered in
assembly.
Proverbs
26:24-26
Reliable are the wounds of a friend,
while plentiful are the
kisses of a hater.
Proverbs
27:6
The xnvW of
these two observations is a classic
example of duplicity. The
descriptions are not identical,
but they are coherent.
Fundamentally, this figure is
deceptive. The deception turns
on an interior-exterior
axis. Externally all is
pleasant and gracious, even
affectionate, while internally
the hater is full of deceit,
abominations, guile and evil.
The xnvW disguises
interior reality with speech
and kisses; the means of
falsification in both
observations involve the organs of
speech, A further complication
in recognizing the xnVW
is that his true disposition is
revealed not in the daily
course of events but "in
assembly"; that is, in view of
35
the use of
"abominations" in verse 25, probably a cultic
event.8
The fwr-Group
The "wicked" (fwr) are
the most prominent foes in
the book of Proverbs; the
designation occurs seventy-six
times in the book. Such a large
number of appearances makes
it very difficult to identify
the figure with any precision.
One step in the direction of
clarifying this term is pro-
vided by the poetic form of the
material with its ever-
present parallelism. By means
of parallelism seven expres-
sions may be identified as
synonyms for the wicked: the
"treacherous" (Mydgvb),9 "evil ones" (Myfr),10
"scoffer" (Cl),11 "godless" (Ntbvx ),12 “worthless
witness" (lfylb-df),13 "evildoers" (Myfrm),14
and "unjust man" (lvf-wyx).15 As antonyms, six
8 L. Perdue, Wisdom and Cult: A Critical Analysis of
the Views of Cult in the
Wisdom Literatures
the Ancient Near East (Missoula: Scholars
Press, 1977),
p.
161.
9 2:22; 21:18.
10 4:14, 14:19; 24:20.
11 9:7.
12 11:7.
13 19:28.
14 24:19.
15 29:27.
36
expressions appear: "good
men" (MybvF),16
"faithful"
(Mynvmx ),17
"those who keep instruction"
(hrvt-yrmvw),18
the "blameless" (Mymt),19
the
"upright" (Myrwy),20 and, most often, the
"righteous"
(Myqydc).21
It is interesting that the wise do not
appear
as antonyms of the wicked, nor
do any fools appear as
synonyms.
The religion of the wicked. Insofar as the
righteous
are those who stand in a sound,
healthy, proper relationship
to Yahweh,22 the wicked
are those who stand outside a viable
relationship to Yahweh. The
righteous are those who are
declared righteous, while the
wicked are those declared
16 2:20;
14:19.
17 13:17.
18 28:4.
19 2:21;
11:5.
20 2:21;
11:11; 12:6; 14:11; 15:8; 21:18,29; 29:27
(jrd-rwy).
21 2:20;
3:33; 10:3, 6, 7, 11, 16, 20, 24, 25, 28, 30,
32; 11:8, 10, 23, 31; 12:5, 7, 10, 12, 21, 26; 13:5, 9, 25;
14:19, 32; 15:6, 28, 29; 17:15; 18:5; 21:12, 18; 24:15, 16;
25:26; 28:1, 12, 28; 29:2, 7, 16, 27.
22 B.
Kovacs, Sociological-Structural
Constraints upla
Wisdom:
The Spatial and Temporal Matrix of
Proverbs 15:28-
22:16 (Ph.d.
Dissertation, Vanderbelt University, 1978),
pp. 383, 399, 402.
37
wicked.23 These
observations, however, are hardly any aid
in an attempt to delineate the
wicked further. The next
step must be to see how the
wicked reveal themselves.
The wicked have access to the cult, but their partici-
pation is abominable for they
sacrifice with ulterior
motives.24 For them
the cult is a means to some other end
rather than an authentic
expression of non-instrumental
worship. Unfortunately, it is
almost impossible to recog-
nize the wicked by cultic
behavior since the evaluation of
"abomination" is
Yahweh's prerogative.25
The demeanor of the wicked. In terms of their demeanor
the wicked have haughty eyes, a
proud heart, and their face
makes a bold, or perhaps harsh,
appearance.26 In spite of
such bravado, however, the mashal tradition humorously
observes that the wicked flee
when no one pursues; the
righteous under such
circumstances feel confident as a
lion.27
23 H. Schmid, Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit: Eine
Untersuch zur Altorientalischen
und Israelitischen
Weisheitsliterature (
1966),
p. 160.
24 21:27; cf. 15:8.
25 15:8; 21:27 MT reads
simply hbfvt,
but the Greek
reads
bdelugma kuri&.
26 21:4, 29.
27 28:1.
38
The wicked are also recognizable in their behavior
toward others. They overturn
common virtues. A neighbor of
the wicked finds no help from
them for their appetite craves
harm.28 As the
admonition of Proverbs 24:15-16 shows, they
characteristically lie in wait
against the righteous and
their belongings.
Lie not in wait as a wicked man
against the
dwelling of the righteous;
do not violence to his home;
for a righteous man falls seven
times, and
rises again;
but the wicked are overthrown by
calamity. Proverbs 24:15-16
Of course, these signs are often hard to detect until
it is too late to avoid
disaster. Nevertheless, there is
a hint of the wicked person's
distortion; they give them-
selves away by mistreating
their animals.
A righteous man has regard for the
life of
his beast,
but the mercy of the wicked is cruel.
Proverbs
12:10
Their "mercy" then
reveals itself for the cruelty it really
is. Presumably they think they
can get by with such
behavior toward animals since
"dumb beasts" are seldom ever
known to talk back to their
master.29
28 21:10.
29 The wicked are clearly
not students of the Torah,
else they would know of
Balaam's ass, Num. 22:28.
39
The speech of the wicked. The appearances in the
mashal
literature indicate that the greatest danger posed by
the wicked is their speech.
Their mouth conceals violence
and is perverted;30
they are like springs bubbling forth
harm and injury.31
If wisdom is the "art of steering,"32
then the "steering"
of the wicked is deceitful.33 No wonder
towns can be overthrown by
their mouth.34
The words of the wicked lie in wait
for blood,
but the mouth of the upright delivers men.
Proverbs
12:6
Their very words are bloody
ambushes!
Most likely, the danger posed by the speech of the
wicked is related not to common
gossip but to the legal
setting where false or
distorted speech and counsel can
quite literally destroy others.
At least three sayings
clearly presuppose the judicial
life of a community.
A wicked man accepts a bribe from
the bosom
to pervert the ways of
justice.
Proverbs
17:23
A worthless witness mocks at
justice,
and the mouth of the
wicked devours
iniquity. Proverbs 19:28
30 Prov. 10:6, 11, 32.
31 15:28.
32 W. Zimmerli, "The
place and Limit of Wisdom in the
Framework
of the Old Testament Theology," Scottish
Journal
of Theology 17 (1964), 149.
33 12:5.
34 11:11.
40
The violence of the wicked will
sweep them
away,
because they refuse to do what is just.
Proverbs
21:7
A fourth saying also probably
reflects a legal setting when
it observes that the wicked
"brings shame and reproach."35
The most dangerous social position for the wicked is
clearly in the circles of high
authority. Such wicked
authorities are named as
"ruler" (lwvm)36
and "ministers"
(Mytrwm).37
Again, it is interesting that expressions
such as "counselor" (Cfvy) and "wise men" (MymkH) do
not appear. The danger posed by
wicked rulers and ministers
is that they are responsible
for the administration of
justice,38 and it is
noted that
A righteous man knows the rights, of
the poor;
a wicked man does not understand such
knowledge.
Proverbs
29:7
Thus the wicked may be characterized generally as those
who stand outside a valid
relationship to Yahweh. Their
35 13:5; on wyxby as "to bring
shame" see P. Ackroyd,
"A
Note on the Hebrew Roots wxb and wvb," JTS 43
(1942),
160; cf. 27:11 where JrH reflects a legal
setting.
36 28:15; 29:12; cf.
29:2, 16.
37 29:12.
38 H. Boecker, Law and the Administration of Justice in
the Old Testament and
Ancient East,
trans. by J. Moiser
41
worship is inauthentic and
their bravado false. They over-
turn normal values of
neighborliness and common decency, and
they wreak havoc in the
judicial life of the community by
their malevolent speech and
outright distortion of the legal
system. They are able to do
such things because they func-
tion at the highest levels of
government and society.
The allies of the wicked. Of course, the wicked
have
much in common with others who
stand as obstacles to the
system of justice. The mashal literature mentions several
kinds of undesirable witnesses:
"lying" (Mybzk),39
"worthless" (lfylb) "gratuitous" (MnH),41 and
"false witnesses" (Myrqw-df).42 Such witnesses are
deceptive,43 they
breathe out lies ,44 and others are often
enticed by their lips.45
Some "violent folk" (smH wyx) appear who seek to
"entice" (htpy) their friends into "a way that is not
good."46
Another passage speaks expansively of sinners
39 21:28.
40 19:28.
41 24:28.
42 6:19; 12:17; 14:5;
19:5, 9; 25:19.
43 12:17.
44 6:19; 14:5; 19:5, 9.
45 24:28.
46 16:29.
42
(MyxFH) who
seduce (htp) simple youth to join them
in a life of banditry.
My son, if sinners entice you,
do not consent.
If they say, "Come with us, let
us lie in
wait for blood,
let us wantonly ambush the innocent;
like Sheol let us swallow them alive
and whole, like those who go down to
the Pit;
we shall find all precious goods,
we shall fill our houses with spoil;
throw in your lot among us,
we will all have one purse"--
my son, do not walk in the way with
them
hold back your foot from their paths;
for their feet run to evil,
and they make haste to shed blood.
For in vain is a net spread
in the sight of any bird;
but these men lie in wait for their
own blood,
they set an ambush for their own lives.
Such are the ways of all who get
gain by
violence;
it takes away the life of its possessors.
Proverbs
1:10-19
The final verse reveals that these sinners are all
those who make inordinate and
expedient profit (fcvb
fcb).47
Related characters are those who rob their own
parents (vmxv vybx lzvg)48 and the
"workers of
iniquity" (Nvx-ylfvp) who are dismayed when justice
is done.
47 1:19; cf. 15:27. These
characters may also stand
behind
the false weights and measures (20:10, 23) which
create
profits so quickly and unfairly. At any rate,
someone
very much like them is responsible.
48 28:24.
49 21:15.
43
Likewise dangerous to the legal system are the
"lying
tongue" (rqw Nvwl)50 and the
"treacherous"
(Mydgvb)51
who are unreliable and untrustworthy.52
Yahweh will ruin their words.53
Of course, such false words
and speakers would present
little problem in the long run
were it not for the fact that
An evildoer listens to wicked lips;
and a liar gives heed to a mischievous
tongues
Proverbs
17:4
Eager hearing of false reports
is ultimately just as
damaging to the judicial system
and community health as the
false reports themselves.
In the less specific and more common realm of daily
life such false speech is also
encountered and abhorred.
"Lying lips" (rqw-ytpW) are an abomination to Yahweh
and are used to conceal hatred.54
The lying tongue can be
used to gain wealth, fleeting
though it may be,55 or it can
50 6:17; 12:19.
51 2:22; 11:3, 6; 13:2,
15; 21:18; 22:12; 23:28; 25:19.
52 25:19.
53 22:12.
54 10:18; 12:22; cf.
26:24.
55 21:6.
44
work in conjunction with the
"flattering mouth"
(qlH-hp) for
the ruin of its hated victims.56
A few other designations which belong most appropri-
ately in the fwr-group seem to have little, if anything,
to do with worship, speech or
the judicial setting. Two
sayings are interesting in that
they are naming formulae:
The haughty, arrogant
man--"scoffer" is
his name--
who acts with overreaching pride.
Proverbs
21:24
Whoever plans to do evil,
to him they shall call, "Lord of devices!"
Proverbs
24:8
The proud and overbearing (Myxg) also belong to the
fwr—group.
Proverbs 15:25 gives little indication as to
their identity apart from the
contrast with the widow whose
boundaries Yahweh protects. The
term seems to be used with
somewhat greater clarity in
Proverbs 16:19 where it may
refer to victorious warriors
who "divide spoil."57
The final member of this group of enemies is one who
oppresses (qwvf) the poor.58 Of course, there always
exists the danger that members
of the social strata above
the poor will take advantage of
them in innumerable ways
56 26:28.
57 0n llw
qlH cf.
Gen. 49:27; Exod. 15:9; Judg.
5:30;
Isa. 9:2; 53:12; Psalm 68:13; BDB, p. 323; KBL,
p.
305f.
58 Prov. 14:31; 22:16; 28:3.
45
(a situation no less true in
mashal-users,
however, were not so enamored by a romantic
view of the proletariat that
they neglected to note that the
poor sometimes oppressed one
another.60
The Neutral Group
The concept of the "stranger" (rz) is particularly
interesting because of its
ambiguity. This figure is not
always a negative one; at times
it is precisely the stranger
who praises the wise.
Let a stranger praise you, but not
your mouth,
a foreigner, but not your lips.
Proverbs
27:2
The difficulty with strangers is that they are an
unknown quantity. One can never
know for how long they
might be in the community. Most
likely their customs are
unusual and unconventional.
Perhaps their values, always
much more difficult to detect,
are likewise unconventional.
Hence, financial transactions
with them ought to be avoided
completely.61
The word rz,
however, may not always carry an ethnic
sense. It may refer to one who
is an "outsider" from the
59 14:31; 22:16.
60 28:3.
61 11:15; 20:16; 27:13.
46
perspective of the mores of the
community.62 This may be
the case with the
"stranger" mentioned in Proverbs 6:1 where
it is paralleled by
"neighbor" (fr). Here again, though,
the point at issue is still
financial dealings with such
persons.
The "strange woman" (hrz hwx) is a problem
peculiar to Proverbs. She was
clearly a troublesome figure
for the circle(s) responsible
for Proverbs 1-9, not to
mention latter day
commentators. At least four interpre-
tations have been proposed: a
common prostitute, a cult
prostitute, the unfaithful
(foreign) wife of a Hebrew, and
Astarte or some other fertility
goddess.63
The first appearance of this figure is in Proverbs
2:16-19 which is part of an
instruction comprising the whole
62 L. Snijders, "The
Meaning of rz in the Old Testa-
ment,"
OTS 10 (1954), 63f., 78, 79.
63 Kovacs, p. 252; cf. G.
Bostrom, Proverbastudien die
Weisheit and das Fremde
Weib in Spr. 1-9
(
Gleerup,
1934); McKane, pp. 264-288, 314-320, 326-331, 334-
341,
365-368; B. Lang, Die weisheit Lehrrede:
Eine
Untersuch von Spruche
1-7 (
be
werc erlag, 1972), pp. 87-99; Perdue, pp. 146-155;
J.
Burnham, Women in the Book of Proverbs (Th. M. Thesis,
The
Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1956), pp. 56-81;
M.
Tate, Jr., A Study of the Wise Men of
to the Prophets (Th.D. Dissertation,
The Southern Baptist
Theological
Seminary, 1958), pp. 355-360; N. Habel, "The
Symbolism
of Wisdom in Proverbs 1-9," Interpretation
26
(1972),
131-157; H. Ringgren, Word and Wisdom:
Studies in
the Hypostatization of
Divine Qualities and Functions in
the Ancient Near East (Lund: Hakan Ohlssons
Boktryckeri,
1947).
47
chapter.64 Verse 16 introduces the "strange
woman" from
whom the pupil will be
delivered if he heeds the words of
the teacher.65 Verses 17-19 describe this woman as one
who forsakes the companion of her
youth
and forgets the covenant
of her God;
for her house sinks down to death,
and her paths to the
shades;
none who go to her come back
nor do they regain the
paths of life.
Proverbs
2:17-19
This woman is evidently unfaithful to her marriage.
The use of hyhlx (her God) rather than hvhy (Yahweh)
is striking since the latter is
characteristic of Proverbs
1-9. Yet, the God in question
must be Yahweh who was a
witness to the covenant between
a man and the wife of his
youth.66 Whoever falls prey to this woman is led
inevitably
to involvement "with her
in her estrangement from
society. . . . They take a
journey to the land of no
return."67
64 As McKane, pp.
278-279, notes the adherence of this
chapter
to the instruction genre is rather loose; there are
no
imperatives, and it lacks "concrete, authoritive instruc-
tion
on specific matters." Nevertheless, "the formal
structure
of the Instruction is the key to the analysis of
this
chapter."
65 Note the Mx
(if)
clauses of vv. 1, 3 and 4 on which
the
zx
(then) clauses of vv. 5 and 9 are conditioned.
66 Mal. 2:14; otherwise,
the "covenant" may refer to the
commandment
against adultery (Exod. 20:14; Deut. 5:18)
which
belonged to Yahweh's covenant with
67 McKane, p. 288.
48
The instruction of Proverbs 5 is wholly devoted to the
issue of adultery. The masculines
of verses 9, 10 and 17
(MyrHx, yrzkx, Myrz, yrkn) are troublesome.
Are these associates of the
"strange woman"? Or, do
liaisons with her lead to ruin
at the hands of these
foreigners? The difficulty
stems in part from the fact
that the aim of the instruction
is to warn against promis-
cuous behavior. What
"descriptions" there are occur in the
motivations (vv. 3-6, 9-14) and
the rhetorical question of
verse 20 which, from a formal
standpoint, are subordinate
parts of the chapter. More
important are the descriptions
of the joys of the young man's
wife which are integrally
related to the imperatives and
jussives (vv. 15, 17-19)
essential to the instruction
genre.68 Most likely the
chapter has in view
adulteresses in general who are typified
by the "strange
woman."
Although the "strange woman" (hrz hwx) does not
appear in the instruction of
Proverbs 6:20-35, the passage
is often interpreted in
association with her, primarily on
the basis of the appearance of
the "foreign woman"
(hyrkn) who
is parallel to the "strange woman"
68 McKane, pp. 1-10.
49
elsewhere.69 In Proverbs 6:24 the parallel designation is
"evil woman" (fr twx).70
The issue may, of course, be complicated if verses 20-
35 are not unitary but
composite.71 On literary grounds,
however, few good reasons can
be produced for excluding any
verse from the passage. The
instruction genre is char-
acterized by imperatives and
jussives as in verses 20, 21
and 25, and reasons why such
advice should be followed as in
verses 22-24 and 26-35.72
It seems much more likely,
69 Prov. 2:16; 5:20; 7:5.
70 BHS proposes to emend frA ("evil") to fare ("neigh-
bor")
on the basis of the Greek reading of upandrou
(cf.
also v. 29, MT reading vhfr twx and Greek
reading
gunaika upandron); another suggestion by BHS
is
to emend fr twx to hrz hwx, on the basis of
Prov.
7:5. The latter suggestion has no textual support
while
the former represents only a different vocalization
of
the same consonantal text. MT should probably be read
since,
as McKane, p. 328, notes, "the expression would have
to
be ‘eset re’aka."
71 R. Whybray, Wisdom in Proverbs: The Concept of
Wisdom in Proverbs 1-9 (
1965),
pp. 48-49, excludes vv. 23, 26-31 and 33-35 on
(unconvincing)
literary critical grounds. Bostrom, pp.
143f.,
cited by McKane, p. 328, argues that vv. 20-26 should
be
dealt with separately from vv. 27-35. His reasons are
evidently
ideological, at least to Judge from McKane's
observation
on p. 329: "Bostrom would perhaps not have
argued
the lack of unity in vv, 20-35 so rigidly if he had
no
had the special concern of advancing his theory of the
‘issa zara. She is promiscuous in
a context of cultic devo-
tion
(this is his theory), but the description of adultery
in
vv. 27-35 cannot be fitted into such a framework, and so
it
must be separated cleanly from the ‘issa
zara passages."
72 See McKane, p. 3; cf.
J. Crenshaw, Old Testament
Wisdom: An Introduction (
p.
21, who argues concerning this passage, "when he wants
50
therefore, that verses 20-35
are in fact a unity warning
against the foreign (v. 24)
wife of a neighbor (v. 29) who
commits adultery.
In the three passages relating to the "strange
woman"
which have been examined, the
interpretation which has
seemed most cogent is that she
is an unfaithful foreigner
married to an Israelite.
Proverbs 6:26 excludes the inter-
pretation of her as a common
prostitute (hnvz) for
her
price is a man's life rather
than a mere loaf of bread. The
references to her in Proverbs
2:16-19; 5:1-22 and 6:20-35
contain nothing which demands
any cultic perspective.73 An
unfaithful foreigner married to
an Israelite would fit each
of the passages.
The instruction of Proverbs 7:1-27 contains the last
explicit reference to the
"strange woman." The didactic
narrative of verses 6-23
describes her making a pitch to an
to
make his point decisively this sage quotes a proverb."
Whybray's
rigid use of grammatical person as a literary
critical
criterion leads him astray. The questions of
vv.
27-28 and 30 are certainly not addressed to some third
party
but to the "my son" of v. 20.
73 So also Perdue who
remarks concerning 2:16-19 that
"the
identity of the 'Strange Woman' in this context as a
prostitute
or temple harlot (is) only a suggestive possi-
bility"
(p. 147); concerning 5:1-22 that "the text contains
nothing
that would allow us to decide whether she is to be
regarded
as a prostitute for hire or a temple priestess"
(p.
148); and concerning 6:20-35, "she is easily identified
as
an Israelite adulteress" (p. 149).
51
unsuspecting youth.74
The reference to sacrifices
(Mymlw-yHbz) and
vows (yrdn) in verse 14 is, of
course, cultic and may indicate
that her invitation to
sexual intercourse is a cultic
invitation. Such an inter-
pretation is dependent upon
translating verse 14b in a
future perfect tense:
"Today I shall have fulfilled my
vows."75 Yet,
the Hebrew probably translates more
naturally, "Today I have
fulfilled my vows.76 If this
translation be correct then she
is claiming that she has
performed her cultic duties and
now seeks the young man
(ostensibly) to share her peace
offerings. The communion
meal is then a pretext.
Verses 6-7 of this didactic narrative pose another
possible cultic reference. The
Hebrew text presents the
wisdom teacher77
looking out the window of his house
74 On ytp see Chapter 3 below.
75 So Perdue, p. 149; cf.
McKane, pp. 221, 339; R.
Scott,
Proverbs, Ecclesiastes: Introduction,
Translation,
and Notes (
1965),
p. 64.
76 Taking the perfect
verb ytmlw
"to represent
actions,
events, or states, which although completed in the
past,
nevertheless extend their influence into the present"
(G-K
106g). Cf. RSV, KJV,
77 Perdue, p. 149, states
that "these verses describe
either
'Mistress Wisdom' or the 'Strange Woman'." In fact,
they
describe either the "strange woman" (so LXX) or the
wisdom
teacher who is the antecedent of the first common
singular
forms in vv. 1-2 and 24 while "Mistress Wisdom"
speaks
she refers to herself in first person, not third;
is
referred to as a third person in v. 4. When Wisdom
52
observing (ytpqwn) the disastrous encounter between
the young man and the
"strange woman." The Greek text,
however, reads third person (parakuptousa), and
thereby presents the
"strange woman" looking out the
window.78 This woman
who "looks out the window" has been
connected with the fertility goddess
Aphrodite
parakuptousa
of
Cyprus.79 If the Greek text
is followed
then the "strange
woman" must be identified as
a sacral priestess or a devotee of a
fertility
goddess who dresses in her sacral
garb and
takes to the streets in order to
induce
young man to join her in fertility rites.80
Following the Greek text does make a cultic interpre-
tation quite likely, but should
the Greek text be preferred
cf.
1:22-33; 8:1-36; 9:5, 11. If this were a ech
of
"Mistress
Wisdom" 7:4 would read, "Say to me, ‘you are my
sister,'
and call insight your intimate friend."
78 The full Hebrew text
of vv. 6-7 translates,
For in the window of my house,
through my
window-lattice I have looked
down,
and I saw among the simple;
I perceived among the youthful
sons one
without
sense.
The
Greek text, on the other hand, translates,
For out of the window of her house
into the streets she
peeped out,
she would see him among the simple
youth,
a young man lacking
sense.
79 So Perdue, p. 149,
following Bostrom and W. Albright,
"Some
Canaanite-Phoenician Sources of Hebrew Wisdom," VTS 3
(1955),
10.
80 Perdue, p. 149.
53
to MT? In light of two factors,
preference of the Greek
seems doubtful. First, the
character of the Septuagint
Proverbs is such that
the greatest caution should be
exercised in
employing LXX to elucidate or emend
difficult
portions of MT. To use LXX in these
circum-
stances in order to recover an
"original" Hebrew
text is in fact to invent a Hebrew
text which
never at any time existed. . . "For the
explanation of minor deviations in
the LXX
Proverbs from MT textual criticism
has, indeed,
very little help to afford, and any
arguing
which neglects the translator as a
creative
factor is very likely to lead astray."81
In this case the Hebrew is not
difficult to read or under-
stand at all. The best reason
to follow the Greek text may
well be the desire to find
cultic dimensions in the picture
of the "strange
woman."82
The second factor which argues against reading with the
Greek text against the Hebrew
follows from this character
of the Greek text. Its
translator(s) may have been fol-
lowing an exegetical tradition
which allegorically
81 McKane, pp. 34-35; in
the last sentence of the above
citation
McKane is quoting G. Gerlemann (cf. G. Gerlemann,
"The
Septuagint Proverbs as a Hellenistic Document," OTS 8
[1950],
15-27; and Studies in the LXX, III: Proverbs
(
Prov.
7:6 under his category, "Where the deviation of LXX
from
MT derives from exegetical presuppositions or from a
striving
after what are thought to be more fitting senti-
ments
than those expressed by MT."
82 The Syriac evidently
agrees with the Greek (see BHS),
but
it may have been influenced by the LXX; cf. Eissfeldt,
pp. 699-700.
54
actualized the warnings about
the "strange woman."83 This
exegetical move may be seen at
really refers to "all
powers which could estrange the member
of this brotherhood."84
Not only at
tion current but in Greek
speaking Judaism as well. The
Greek text of Proverbs 2:17-19
evidences this when it
translates the Hebrew hrz hwx ("strange woman") by
kakh
boulh ("bad
counsel”), and "the 'Madam Folly' in
Proverbs 9 LXX receives
features of the strange woman . . .
which she did not possess in
the Hebrew version."85
The objection might well be raised here that these
examples of allegorical
actualization of the "strange woman"
are simply updating what was
already very much like
83 Lang, p. 89, "erst vom zweiten vorchristlichen
Jahrhundert an haben wir
Belege fur eine allegorigische
Aktualisierun der
Warnungen vor dem fremden Frau.”
84 Lang, p. 90, ". .
. alle Krafte, die das Mitglied der
Bruderschaft dieser
entfremden konnten."--Lang
is referring
to
4 Q 184 in J. Allegro, ed., Discoveries
in the Judaean
Desert of the Jordan V (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1968).
82-85;
see Lang, p. 89, n. 7 for further bibliography.
85 Lang, p. 90, ". .
. erhalt die 'Frau Torheit' in
Spr 9 LXX Zuge der
fremden Frau . . . . die sie in der
hebraischen Version
nicht besass."
These new features that
Lang
mentions are the additions to Prov. 9:18 which derive
from
5:15-18. The additions translate,
but turn away, do not delay in the
place,
lest you set your name
upon her;
for this would pass over a strange
water
and overflow a strange
river.
But keep away from a strange water,
and do not drink from a
strange spring,
so that you may live a long time,
and life might still be
bestowed upon you.
55
allegory. The objection loses
force, however, when it is
noted that another writer who
lived in the same milieu and
stood squarely in the
mainstream of the wisdom tradition did
not follow this exegetical
procedure. Sirach's translator
rendered his grandfather's
Hebrew hrz hwx ("strange
woman" ) as gunaiki etairizomenon ( "loose woman,"
Sir.
9:3 ) and as gunaikoj etairoj ("a woman who is a harlot,
"
Sir. 41:22).
This should not be surprising for Sirach's grandson was
simply following the ancient
wisdom tradition's warnings
against promiscuous sexual
behavior. Such warnings are
common in ancient near eastern
wisdom literature, especially
in the instruction genre, as
far back as Ptah-Hotep.86 The
"strange woman" in
Proverbs 1-9, even chapter 7, is best
taken as a heightened
presentation of a woman who presents
a particularly alluring appeal
for the folly of illicit
sexual relations. The warning
is against adultery with her,
not her foreign status nor her
cultic affiliation.