Английская Википедия:Book of Proverbs

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Шаблон:Short description Шаблон:Tanakh OT

The Book of Proverbs (Шаблон:Lang-he, Шаблон:Transl; Шаблон:Lang-gr; Шаблон:Lang-la, "Proverbs (of Solomon)") is a book in the third section (called Ketuvim) of the Hebrew Bible and a book of the Christian Old Testament.Шаблон:Sfn When translated into Greek and Latin, the title took on different forms: in the Greek Septuagint (LXX) it became Шаблон:Lang (Шаблон:Transl, "Proverbs"); in the Latin Vulgate the title was Шаблон:Lang, from which the English name is derived.

Proverbs is not merely an anthology but a "collection of collections" relating to a pattern of life which lasted for more than a millennium.Шаблон:Sfn It is an example of the biblical wisdom literature, and raises questions of values, moral behaviour, the meaning of human life, and right conduct,Шаблон:Sfn and its theological foundation is that "the fear of God (meaning submission to the will of God) is the beginning of wisdom".Шаблон:Sfn Wisdom is praised for her role in creation; God acquired her before all else, and through her he gave order to chaos; and since humans have life and prosperity by conforming to the order of creation, seeking wisdom is the essence and goal of life.Шаблон:Sfn

The Book of Proverbs is divided into sections: the initial invitation to wisdom, contrasting the wise and the fool, and moral discourses on various topics. Chapters 25–29 discuss justice, the wicked, and the rich and poor, while Chapter 30 introduces the "sayings of Agur" on creation and divine power.[1][2]

Structure

Файл:Proverb scroll.PNG
Scroll of the Book of Proverbs

The superscriptions divide the collections as follows:

  • Proverbs 1–9: "Proverbs of Solomon, Son of David, King of Israel"
  • Proverbs 10–22:16: "Proverbs of Solomon"
  • Proverbs 22:17–24:22: "The Sayings of the Wise"
  • Proverbs 24:23–34: "These Also are Sayings of the Wise"
  • Proverbs 25–29: "These are Other Proverbs of Solomon that the Officials of King Hezekiah of Judah Copied"
  • Proverbs 30: "The Words of Agur"
  • Proverbs 31:1–9: "The Words of King Lemuel of Massa,Шаблон:Efn Which his Mother Taught Him"
  • Proverbs 31:10–31: the ideal wise woman (elsewhere called the "woman of substance").Шаблон:Sfn

Contents

Файл:Papyrus Bodmer VI fol. 16.jpg
Papyrus Bodmer VI, featuring a Coptic translation of Proverbs (4th/5th century AD)

"Proverb" is a translation of the Hebrew word mashal, but "mashal" has a wider range of meanings than the short, catchy saying implied by the English word. Thus, roughly half the book is made up of "sayings" of this type, while the other half is made up of longer poetic units of various types. These include "instructions" formulated as advice from a teacher or parent addressed to a student or child, dramatic personifications of both Wisdom and Folly, and the "words of the wise" sayings, longer than the Solomonic "sayings" but shorter and more diverse than the "instructions".Шаблон:Sfn

The first section (chapters 1–9) comprises an initial invitation to young men to take up the course of wisdom, ten "instructions", and five poems on personified Woman Wisdom.Шаблон:Sfn Verses 1:1-7 constitute an introduction to the whole of this section.[3] Proverbs 10:1–22:16, with 375 sayings, consists of two parts, the first part (10–14) contrasting the wise man and the fool (or the righteous and the wicked), the second (15–22:16) addressing wise and foolish speech.Шаблон:Sfn Verse 22:17 opens ‘the words of the wise’, until verse 24:22, with short moral discourses on various subjects.[4] An additional section of sayings which "also belong to the wise" follows in verses 24:23-34.[5] Chapters 25–29, attributed to the editorial activity of "the men of Hezekiah", contrast the just and the wicked and broach the topic of rich and poor.Шаблон:Sfn Chapter 30:1-4, the "sayings of Agur", introduces creation, divine power, and human ignorance.Шаблон:Sfn

Composition

Файл:Dore Solomon Proverbs.png
Solomon writing Proverbs (Gustave Doré)

It is impossible to offer precise dates for the sayings in Proverbs, a "collection of collections" relating to a pattern of life which lasted for more than a millennium.Шаблон:Sfn The phrase conventionally used for the title is taken from chapter 1:1, mishley shelomoh, Proverbs of Solomon (the phrase is repeated at 10:1 and 25:1), is likely more concerned with labeling the material than ascribing authorship.Шаблон:Sfn

The book is an anthology made up of six discrete units. The Proverbs of Solomon section, chapters 1–9, was probably the last to be composed, in the Persian or Hellenistic periods. This section has parallels to prior cuneiform writings.[6] The second, chapters 10–22:16, carries the superscription "the proverbs of Solomon", which may have encouraged its inclusion in the Hebrew canon. The third unit, 22:17–24:22, is headed "bend your ear and hear the words of the wise". A large part of this section is a recasting of a second-millennium BCE Egyptian work, the Instruction of Amenemope, and may have reached the Hebrew author(s) through an Aramaic translation. Chapter 24:23 begins a new section and source with the declaration, "these too are from the wise". The next section at chapter 25:1 has a superscription to the effect that the following proverbs were transcribed "by the men of Hezekiah", indicating at face value that they were collected in the reign of Hezekiah in the late 8th century BCE. Chapters 30 and 31 (the "words of Agur," the "words of Lemuel," and the description of the ideal woman) are a set of appendices, quite different in style and emphasis from the previous chapters.Шаблон:Sfn

The "wisdom" genre was widespread throughout the ancient Near East, and reading Proverbs alongside the examples recovered from Egypt and Mesopotamia reveals the common ground shared by international wisdom.Шаблон:Sfn The wisdom literature of Israel may have been developed in the family, the royal court, and houses of learning and instruction;Шаблон:Sfn nevertheless, the overwhelming impression is of instruction within the family in small villages.Шаблон:Sfn

Themes

Файл:Proverbs 3- 5,6 IMG 3141.JPG
Excerpt from Proverbs 3 displayed at Portland International Jetport in Portland, Maine
Файл:Incunabulum Blackletter Bible 1497.jpg
A page of the Book of Proverbs from a Bible from 1497

Along with the other examples of the biblical wisdom tradition – Job and Ecclesiastes and some other writings – Proverbs raises questions of values, moral behavior, the meaning of human life, and righteous conduct. The three retain an ongoing relevance for both religious and secular readers, Job and Ecclesiastes through the boldness of their dissent from received tradition, Proverbs in its worldliness and satiric shrewdness. Wisdom is as close as biblical literature comes to Greek philosophy, of which it was a contemporary; it shares with the Greeks an inquiry into values and reflections on the human condition, although there is no discussion of ontology, epistemology, metaphysics, and the other abstract issues raised by the Greeks. Шаблон:Sfn

The rabbinic college almost excluded the Book of Proverbs from the Bible in the late first century. [7] They did this because of its contradictions (the result of the book's origins as not just an anthology but an anthology of anthologies). The reader is told, for example, both to "not answer a fool according to his folly", according to 26:4, and to "answer a fool according to his folly", as 26:5 advises. More pervasively, the recurring theme of the initial unit (chapters 1–9) is that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but the following units are much less theological, presenting wisdom as a transmissible human craft, until with 30:1–14, the "words of Agur", we return once more to the idea that God alone possesses wisdom. Шаблон:Sfn

"The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom" (Proverbs 9:10 – the phrase implies submission to God's will).Шаблон:Sfn Wisdom is praised for her role in creation ("God by wisdom founded the earth; by understanding, he established the heavens" – Proverbs 3:19). God acquired her before all else, and through her, he gave order to chaos ("When [God] established the heavens… when he drew a circle on the face of the Deeps… when he marked out the foundations of the earth, then I was beside him" – Proverbs 8:27–31). Since humans have life and prosperity by conforming to the order of creation, seeking wisdom is the essence and goal of the religious life.Шаблон:Sfn Wisdom, or the wise person, is compared and contrasted with foolishness or the fool, meaning one who is lacking in wisdom and uninterested in instruction, not one who is merely silly or playful (though see the words of Agur for a "fool" who has wisdom and could be seen as playful).Шаблон:Sfn

For the most part, Proverbs offers a simplistic view of life with few grey areas: a life lived according to the rules brings reward, and life in violation of them is certain to bring disaster. In contrast, Job and Ecclesiastes appear to be direct contradictions of the simplicities of Proverbs, each in its own way all but dismissing the assumptions of the "wise".Шаблон:Sfn Noteworthy also is the fact that the "mighty acts of God" (the Exodus, the giving of the Torah at Sinai, the Covenant between God and Israel, etc.) which make up Israel's history are completely or almost completely absent from Proverbs and the other Wisdom books: in contrast to the other books of the Hebrew Bible, which appeal to divine revelation for their authority ("Thus says the Lord!"), wisdom appeals to human reason and observation.Шаблон:Sfn

Later interpretation and influence

The pre-Exilic (i.e. pre-586 BCE) Old Testament allowed no equals to YHWH in heaven, despite the continued existence of an assembly of subordinate servant-deities.Шаблон:Sfn The post-Exilic writers of the Wisdom tradition developed the idea that Wisdom existed before creation and was used by God to create the universe:Шаблон:Sfn "Present from the beginning, Wisdom assumes the role of master builder while God establishes the heavens, restricts the chaotic waters, and shapes the mountains and fields."Шаблон:Sfn Borrowing ideas from Greek philosophers who held that reason bound the universe together, the Wisdom tradition taught that God's Wisdom, Word and Spirit were the ground of cosmic unity.Шаблон:Sfn Christianity in turn adopted these ideas and applied them to Jesus: the Epistle to the Colossians calls Jesus "...image of the invisible God, first-born of all creation...", while the Gospel of John identifies him with the creative word ("In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God").Шаблон:Sfn

In the 4th century, when Christianity was caught up in heresies and still developing the creeds which would define its beliefs, Proverbs 8:22[8] was used both to support and refute the claims of the Arians. The Arians, assuming that Christ could be equated with the "Wisdom of God" (1 Corinthians 1:24),[9] argued that the Son, like Wisdom, was "created",[8] and therefore subordinate to the Creator; their opponents, who argued that the relevant Hebrew word should be translated as "begot", won the debate, and the Nicene Creed declared that the Son was "begotten, not made", meaning that God and Christ were consubstantial.Шаблон:Sfn

See also

Notes

Шаблон:Notelist

References

Шаблон:ReflistШаблон:Notelist

Bibliography

Works cited

Further reading

  • Crenshaw, James L. "Book of Proverbs", The Anchor Bible Dictionary, 1992
  • Dockery, David S. (general ed.), Holman Bible Handbook, Holman Bible Publishers, Nashville, 1992
  • Lasor, William Sanford, Hubbard, David Allan, & Bush, Frederic Wm., Old Testament Survey: The Message, Form, and Background of the Old Testament, 1996
  • Murphy, Roland E., Wisdom Literature: Job, Proverbs, Ruth, Canticles, Ecclesiastes, and Esther. Grand Rapids, 1981
  • Steinmann, Andrew, "Proverbs 1–9 as a Solomonic Composition", Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, 43, no. 4
  • Шаблон:Cite book
  • Шаблон:Cite book
  • Шаблон:Cite book

External links

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  1. ↑ Шаблон:Citation.
  2. ↑ Шаблон:Bibleverse: New King James Version
  3. ↑ Aitken, K. T., 19. Proverbs in Barton, J., and Muddiman, J. (2001), The Oxford Bible Commentary Шаблон:Webarchive, p. 406
  4. ↑ Шаблон:Citation.
  5. ↑ Шаблон:Bibleverse: New King James Version
  6. ↑ Шаблон:Cite book
  7. ↑ Шаблон:Cite web
  8. ↑ 8,0 8,1 Шаблон:Bibleverse
  9. ↑ Шаблон:Bibleverse
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