Proverbs 2:11

Discretion shall preserve thee, understanding shall keep thee:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:10-22 If we are truly wise, we shall be careful to avoid all evil company and evil practices. When wisdom has dominion over us, then it not only fills the head, but enters into the heart, and will preserve, both against corruptions within and temptations without. The ways of sin are ways of darkness, uncomfortable and unsafe: what fools are those who leave the plain, pleasant, lightsome paths of uprightness, to walk in such ways! They take pleasure in sin; both in committing it, and in seeing others commit it. Every wise man will shun such company. True wisdom will also preserve from those who lead to fleshly lusts, which defile the body, that living temple, and war against the soul. These are evils which excite the sorrow of every serious mind, and cause every reflecting parent to look upon his children with anxiety, lest they should be entangled in such fatal snares. Let the sufferings of others be our warnings. Our Lord Jesus deters from sinful pleasures, by the everlasting torments which follow them. It is very rare that any who are caught in this snare of the devil, recover themselves; so much is the heart hardened, and the mind blinded, by the deceitfulness of this sin. Many think that this caution, besides the literal sense, is to be understood as a caution against idolatry, and subjecting the soul to the body, by seeking any forbidden object. The righteous must leave the earth as well as the wicked; but the earth is a very different thing to them. To the wicked it is all the heaven they ever shall have; to the righteous it is the place of preparation for heaven. And is it all one to us, whether we share with the wicked in the miseries of their latter end, or share those everlasting joys that shall crown believers?

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Another picture of the results of living in the fear of the Lord. Not that to which it leads a man, but that from which it saves him, is brought into view. Notice also that it is one thing for wisdom to find entrance into the soul, another to be welcomed as a "pleasant" guest.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10, 11. Idea of Pr 2:9, amplified; on terms, compare Pr 2:2 and Pr 2:4.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

From wicked courses, and the mischiefs which attend upon them; as is particularly expressed in the following verses.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Discretion shall preserve thee,.... Which wisdom or the Gospel gives, or the Lord by the means of it; for the Gospel makes a man wise and discreet in the business of salvation, and in his conduct and deportment; and the discretion it gives him will put him upon his guard, and direct him to watch against every error, and every false way. And so the words may be rendered, "discretion will watch over thee"; to keep thee from everything pernicious in doctrine and practice. The Septuagint version renders it, "good counsel"; which wisdom gives, and the Gospel is full of; and which, if attended to, is a means of the preservation of the saints;

understanding shall keep thee; which is only the same thing expressed in other words. The Septuagint version renders it, "an holy thought"; and the Arabic version, "a just thought shall preserve thee in thy last times". What these are a means of keeping and preserving from is explained in the following verses.

Geneva Study Bible

{f} Discretion shall preserve thee, understanding shall keep thee:

(f) The word of God will guide you, and teach you how to govern yourself.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

11. preserve] Rather: watch over, R.V.; φυλάξει, LXX.; custodiet, Vulg.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 11. - Discretion shall preserve thee. Discretion (מְזַמָּת m'zimoth), as in Proverbs 1:4, is the outward manifestation of wisdom; it tests what is uncertain, and avoids danger (Hitzig). The word carries with it the idea of reflection or consideration (see Proverbs 3:21; Proverbs 5:2; Proverbs 8:12) The LXX. reads, βουλὴ καλή, "good counsel;" and the Vulgate, concilium. Shall preserve thee. The idea of protection and guarding, which is predicated of Jehovah in ver. 8, is here transferred to discretion and understanding, which to some extent are put forward as personifications. Understanding (תְבוּנָה, t'vunah), as in Proverbs 2:11; the power of distinguishing and separating, and, in the case of conflicting interests, to decide on the best. Shall keep; i.e. keep safe, or in the sense of watching over or guarding. The two verbs "to preserve" (שָׁמַר shamar) and "to keep" (נָצַר, natsar), LXX. τήρειν, occur together again in Proverbs 4:6. Proverbs 2:11

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

With the אז repeated, the promises encouraging to the endeavour after wisdom take a new departure:

9 Then shalt thou understand righteousness, and justice,

   And uprightness; every way of good.

10 For wisdom will enter into thine heart,

   And knowledge will do good to thy soul;

11 Discretion will keep watch over thee,

   Understanding will keep thee.

Regarding the ethical triad מישׁרים [righteousness, rightness], משׁפּט [judgment], and צדק [rectitude], vid., Proverbs 1:3. Seb. Schmid is wrong in his rendering, et omnis via qua bonum aditur erit tibi plana, which in comparison with Isaiah 26:7 would be feebly expressed. J. H. Michaelis rightly interprets all these four conceptions as object-accusatives; the fourth is the summarizing asyndeton (cf. Psalm 8:7) breaking off the enumeration: omnem denique orbitam boni; Jerome, bonam: in this case, however, טוב would be genitive (vid., Proverbs 17:2). מעגּל is the way in which the chariot rolls along; in עגל there are united the root-conceptions of that which is found (גל) and rolling (גל). Whether כּי, Proverbs 2:10, is the argumentative "because" (according to the versions and most interpreters) or "for" ("denn," J. H. Michaelis, Ewald, and others), is a question. That with כּי equals "for" the subject would precede the verb, as at Proverbs 2:6, Proverbs 2:21, and Proverbs 1:32 (Hitzig), determines nothing, as Proverbs 2:18 shows. On the one hand, the opinion that כּי equals "because" is opposed by the analogy of the כּי, Proverbs 2:6, following אז, Proverbs 2:5; the inequality between Proverbs 2:5-8 and Proverbs 2:9. if the new commencement, Proverbs 2:9, at once gives place to another, Proverbs 2:10; the relationship of the subject ideas in Proverbs 2:10, Proverbs 2:11, which makes Proverbs 2:11 unsuitable to be a conclusion from Proverbs 2:10. On the contrary, the promise not only of intellectual, but at the same time also of practical, insight into the right and the good, according to their whole compass and in their manifoldness, can be established or explained quite well as we thus read Proverbs 2:10, Proverbs 2:11 : For wisdom will enter (namely, to make it a dwelling-place, Proverbs 14:33; cf. John 14:23) into thine heart, and knowledge will do good to thy soul (namely, by the enjoyment which arises from the possession of knowledge, and the rest which its certainty yields). דּעת, γνῶσις, is elsewhere fem. (Psalm 139:6), but here, as at Proverbs 8:10; Proverbs 14:6, in the sense of τὸ γνῶναι, is masc. In Proverbs 2:11 the contents of the אז תבין (Proverbs 2:9) are further explained. שׁמר על, of watching (for Job 16:16 is to be interpreted differently), is used only by our poet (here and at Proverbs 6:22). Discretion, i.e., the capacity of well-considered action, will hold watch over thee, take thee under protection; understanding, i.e., the capacity in the case of opposing rules to make the right choice, and in the matter of extremes to choose the right medium, will be bestowed upon thee. In תּנצרכּה, as in Psalm 61:8; Psalm 140:2, Psalm 140:5; Deuteronomy 33:9, etc., the first stem letter is not assimilated, in order that the word may have a fuller sound; the writing כּה for ך is meant to affect the eye.

(Note: For the right succession of the accents here, see Torath Emeth, p. 49, 5; Accentuationssystem, xviii. 3.)