the Israelitish community, with its representative organization, its courts and councils, rested on the acknowledged justice and importance of the saying uttered in Pro 11:14, and here generalized. הפר, infin. abs. Hiph. of פּרר, to break, with the accus. following, stands here, like הפוך, Pro 12:7, instead of the finite: the thoughts come to a fracture (failure), irrita fiunt consilia. סוד (= יסוד, cf. נוסד Psa 2:2) means properly the being brought close together for the purpose of secret communication and counsel (cf. Arab. sâwada, to press close together = to walk with one privately). The lxx: their plans are unexecuted, οἱ μὴ τιμῶντες συνέδρια, literally Symmachus, διασκεδάζονται λογισμοὶ μὴ ὄντος συμβουλίου. תּקוּם has, after Jer 4:14; Jer 51:29, מחשׁבות as subject. The lxx (besides perverting ברב [by a multitude] into בלב ἐν καρδίαις]), the Syr. and Targ. introduce עצה (Pro 19:21) as subject.
Verse 23
Pro 15:23 23 A man has joy by the right answer of his mouth; And a word in its season, how fair is it!
If we translate מענה only by “answer,” then 23a sounds as a praise of self-complaisance; but it is used of true correspondence (Pro 29:19), of fit reply (Job 32:3, Job 32:5), of appropriate answer (cf. 28a, Pro 16:1). It has happened to one in his reply to hit the nail on its head, and he has joy from that (שׂמחה ב after שׂמח בּ, e.g., Pro 23:24), and with right; for the reply does not always succeed. A reply like this, which, according to circumstances, stops the mouth or bringeth a kiss (Pro 24:26), is a fortunate throw, is a gift from above. The synonymous parallel line measures that which is appropriate, not to that which is to be answered, but from a general point of view as to its seasonableness; עת (= עדת from יעד) is here “the ethically right, becoming time, determined by the laws of wisdom (moral)” (vid., Orelli, Synonyma der Zeit u. Ewigkeit, p. 48), cf. על־אפניו (translated by Luther 'in its time”), Pro 25:11. With מה־טּוב, cf. Pro 16:16; both ideas lie in it: that such a word is in itself well-conditioned and successful, and also that it is welcome, agreeable, and of beneficial influence.
Verse 24
Four proverbs of fundamentally different doctrines: 24 The man of understanding goeth upwards on a way of life, To depart from hell beneath.
The way of life is one, Pro 5:6; Psa 16:11 (where, notwithstanding the want of the article, the idea is logically determined), although in itself forming a plurality of ארחות, Pro 2:19. “A way of life,” in the translation, is equivalent to a way which is a way of life. למעלה,
