Proverbs 4:2

For I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my law.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

4:1-13 We must look upon our teachers as our fathers: though instruction carry in it reproof and correction, bid it welcome. Solomon's parents loved him, therefore taught him. Wise and godly men, in every age of the world, and rank in society, agree that true wisdom consists in obedience, and is united to happiness. Get wisdom, take pains for it. Get the rule over thy corruptions; take more pains to get this than the wealth of this world. An interest in Christ's salvation is necessary. This wisdom is the one thing needful. A soul without true wisdom and grace is a dead soul. How poor, contemptible, and wretched are those, who, with all their wealth and power, die without getting understanding, without Christ, without hope, and without God! Let us give heed to the sayings of Him who has the words of eternal life. Thus our path will be plain before us: by taking, and keeping fast hold of instruction, we shall avoid being straitened or stumbling.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Doctrine - Knowledge orally given and received.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

CHAPTER 4

Pr 4:1-27. To an earnest call for attention to his teachings, the writer adds a commendation of wisdom, preceded and enforced by the counsels of his father and teacher. To this he adds a caution (against the devices of the wicked), and a series of exhortations to docility, integrity, and uprightness.

1, 2. (Compare Pr 1:8).

to know—in order to know.

doctrine—the matter of learning (Pr 1:5), such as he had received (La 3:1).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Good doctrine; not vain, or foolish, or false, or pernicious counsels, but such as are true and profitable.

My law; God’s law or commands, delivered to you by my mouth. See Poole "Proverbs 3:1".

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

For I give you good doctrine,.... Whose author, matter, use, and tendency, are good, and therefore should be received; so the Gospel is called, 1 Timothy 4:6; and no other is here meant: it is the doctrine concerning Wisdom or Christ, as the following verses show; which serves to exalt him, and makes for the good and welfare of immortal souls; and such is the doctrine of the Scriptures, of Christ and his apostles, even all the doctrines and truths of the Gospel;

forsake you not my law; or "doctrine" (o); not the law given on Mount Sinai, as Gersom interprets it; but the doctrine of Christ, which goes out from Mount Zion: this the children of Wisdom should not neglect, relinquish, drop, or depart from; but should keep it, and abide by it.

(o) "doctrinam meam", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Amama; "instructionem meam", Schultens.

Geneva Study Bible

For I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my law.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 2. - For I give you good doctrine. This, while stating the reason for the exhortation in the previous verse, signifies that what the teacher has given and is giving, he has received from his father. I give; nathati, literally, "I gave," is the kal perfect of nathan, "to give," but the perfect is here used for the present, as denoting not only a past action, but one that is still continuing (Gesenius, 'Hebrews Gram.,' § 126. 3). Good doctrine (lekakh tov). The doctrine or instruction is "good," not only intrinsically, but as to the source from which it was derived, and in its effects. Lekakh is, according to its root lakakh, "something which is received or taken." From the standpoint of the teacher it is that instruction which he had received of his father. With respect to his hearers it is the instruction which is communicated to them, and which they receive (see on Proverbs 1:5). The LXX. renders, δῶρον ἀγαθὸν; similarly the Vulgate, donum bonum, "a good gift." Forsake ye not; al-taazovu, from azav, "to leave, forsake" (compare the corresponding phrase, al-tiltosh, from natash, "to leave, forsake," in Proverbs 1:8). Law (torah); as in Proverbs 1:8. Proverbs 4:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

He now confirms and explains the command to duty which he has placed at the beginning of the whole (Proverbs 1:8). This he does by his own example, for he relates from the history of his own youth, to the circle of disciples by whom he sees himself surrounded, what good doctrine his parents had taught him regarding the way of life:

1 Hear, ye sons, the instruction of a father,

   And attend that ye may gain understanding;

2 For I give to you good doctrine,

   Forsake not my direction!

3 For I was a son to my father,

   A tender and only (son) in the sight of my mother.

4 And he instructed me, and said to me:

   "Let thine heart hold fast my words:

   Observe my commandments and live!"

That בּנים in the address comes here into the place of בּני, hitherto used, externally denotes that בני in the progress of these discourses finds another application: the poet himself is so addressed by his father. Intentionally he does not say אביכם (cf. Proverbs 1:8): he does not mean the father of each individual among those addressed, but himself, who is a father in his relation to them as his disciples; and as he manifests towards them fatherly love, so also he can lay claim to paternal authority over them. לדעת is rightly vocalized, not לדעת. The words do not give the object of attention, but the design, the aim. The combination of ideas in דּעת בּינה (cf. Proverbs 1:2), which appears to us singular, loses its strangeness when we remember that דעת means, according to its etymon, deposition or reception into the conscience and life. Regarding לקח, apprehension, reception, lesson equals doctrine, vid., Proverbs 1:5. נתתּי is the perf., which denotes as fixed and finished what is just now being done, Gesenius, 126, 4. עזב is here synonym of נטשׁ, Proverbs 1:8, and the contrary of שׁמר, Proverbs 28:4. The relative factum in the perfect, designating the circumstances under which the event happened, regularly precedes the chief factum ויּרני; see under Genesis 1:2. Superficially understood, the expression 3a would be a platitude; the author means that the natural legal relation was also confirming itself as a moral one. It was a relation of many-sided love, according to 3a: he was esteemed of his mother - לפני, used of the reflex in the judgment, Genesis 10:9, and of loving care, Genesis 17:18, means this - as a tender child, and therefore tenderly to be protected (רך as Genesis 33:13), and as an only child, whether he were so in reality, or was only loved as if he were so. יחיד (Aq., Sym., Theod., μονογενής) may with reference to number also mean unice dilectus (lxx ἀγαπώμενος); cf. Genesis 22:2, יחידך (where the lxx translate τὸν ἀγαπητόν, without therefore having ידידך before them). לפני is maintained by all the versions; לבני is not a variant.

(Note: In some editions לבני is noted as Kerı̂ to לפני, but erroneously and contrary to the express evidence of the Masora, which affirms that there are two passages in which we ought to read not לפני, but לבני, viz., Psalm 80:3 and Proverbs 4:3.)

The instruction of the father begins with the jussive, which is pointed יתמך־

(Note: The writing of -יתמך with the grave Metheg (Gaja) and Kametz-Chatuph (ǒ) is that of Ben Asher; on the other hand, יתמך־ with Cholem (ō) and the permanent Metheg is that of Ben Naphtali; vid., Michlol 21a [under the verbal form 25], 30.)

continued...