CHAPTER 31
1The words of Lemuel, king of Massa, with which his mother reproved him:
2No, my son. Oh, no, son of my womb,
3Do not give your vigor to women,
nor your ways to destroyers of kings.
4Not for kings, Lemuel, not for kings,
the drinking of wine, nor for rulers, strong drink.
5Lest he drink and forget inscribed law,
and reverse the judgment of all wretched men.
6Give strong drink to the perishing man
and wine to those deeply embittered.
7Let him drink and forget his privation,
and his misery let him no more recall.
8Open your mouth for the dumb,
for the judgment of all fleeting folk.
9Open your mouth, judge righteously,
grant justice to the poor and the wretched.
10A worthy woman who can find?ℵ
Her price is far beyond rubies.
11The heart of her husband trusts her,ב
12She repays him good and not evilג
all the days of her life.
13She seeks out wool and flaxד
and performs with willing hands.
14She is like merchant ships,ה
from afar she brings her bread.
15She gets up while it is still nightו
and provides nourishment for her house
and a portion for her young women.
16She sets her mind on a field and buys it,ז
from the fruit of her hands she plants a vineyard.
17She girds her loins in strengthח
and gives power to her arms.
18She understands that her wares are good,ט
her lamp does not go out at night.
19Her hands she reaches out to the distaff,י
and her palms hold on to the spindle.
20Her palm she opens to the poor,כ
and her hands she extends to the wretched.
21She does not fear for her household because of snow,ל
for her whole household is clothed in scarlet.
22Covers she makes for herself,מ
linen and purple, her garments.
23Her husband is famed in the gatesנ
when he sits with the land’s elders.
24Fine cloth she makes, and she sells it,ס
a loincloth she gives to the trader.
25Strength and grandeur are her garment,ע
and she laughs at the day to come.
26She opens her mouth in wisdom,פ
teaching of kindness is on her tongue.
27She looks after the ways of her house,צ
and does not eat the bread of idleness.
28Her sons rise and call her happy,ק
her husband, he praises her:
29“Many daughters have done worthy things,ר
but you—you surpass them all.”
30Grace is a lie and beauty mere breath—ש
a LORD-fearing woman, it is she who is praised.
31Give her from the fruit of her hands,ת
and let her deeds praise her in the gates.
CHAPTER 31 NOTES
Click here to advance to the next section of the text.
1. Lemuel. The name is unusual and nothing is known about him, not even whether he is a historical figure or a literary invention. In any case, this is still another unit of Wisdom exhortation, distinctive stylistically and rhetorically, that the anthologist has culled from an unknown source and decided to include. The advice here of a queen mother to her son has no precedent elsewhere in the book.
Massa. A kingdom in north Arabia.
with which his mother reproved him. The mother rather than the father in the role of the one who gives musar—reproof, admonitory moral exhortation—is unusual, though in the preceding body of proverbs there are frequent pairings of father and mother as the joint source of instruction. Her warning him not to consort with loose women—or, perhaps better, with gold diggers—is especially apt coming from a mother, as is the admonition to stay away from drink.
2. son of my vows. This locution suggests that she may have taken vows in a prayer for pregnancy, like Hannah in 1 Samuel 1.
3. vigor. The Hebrew ḥayil is not an explicitly sexual term; it can also suggest “wealth.” In verse 10, it is used in a slightly different though related sense.
destroyers. The translation, following a Hebrew fragment found in the Cairo Geniza, reads lemoḥot instead of lamḥot, “to destroy.”
4. Not for kings. A monarch has to exercise lucid judgment in determining state policy and administering justice, so he above all men should avoid drunkenness.
strong drink. The Hebrew sheikhar (from a root indicating intoxication) is not beer, as some interpreters claim, but in all likelihood is grappa. Judges 13:14 makes clear that it is an alcoholic beverage other than wine that is extracted from grapes.
6. Give strong drink to the perishing man. While the monarch should avoid alcohol, for the poor man it can provide a way of temporarily forgetting his wretchedness.
7. misery. The Hebrew ʿamal means both “toil” (its usual sense in Qohelet) and “misery” or “wretchedness” (its usual sense in Job).
8. Open your mouth for the dumb. It is the obligation of a king to speak out on behalf of those lacking the power, capacity, or boldness to speak.
all fleeting folk. The Hebrew beney ḥalof (“those who are to pass away”) might mean ephemeral or mortal human beings, as it does in modern Hebrew, or it might designate a specific disadvantaged segment of the population teetering on the brink of death, like “the perishing man” in verse 6.
10. A worthy woman who can find? This concluding unit of the Book of Proverbs is an alphabetic acrostic (the Hebrew letter for each line appears in the margin). Thus, “a worthy woman” is ʾeshet ḥayil, the first word beginning with ʾaleph, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Ḥayil means vigor, strength, worth, substance. It is a martial term transferred to civic life. Some have proposed that the term invites us to see this exemplary wife as a heroic figure, a kind of domestic warrior. It is noteworthy that the editors chose to conclude the book, in which instruction by male mentors to young men predominates, with a portrait of the ideal wife.
11. prize. The usual meaning of the Hebrew shalal is “booty.” The choice of this term might be an argument for an activation of the martial connotation of ḥayil in the previous line.
12. She repays him good and not evil. The editor may well have seen in this line a pointed antithesis to the sundry evocations of shrewish wives and adulterous wives in the body of the book.
13. willing hands. This apt phrase is borrowed from Fox. The literal sense of the whole Hebrew clause is “[she] performs with will/desire/delight with her palms.”
15. a portion for her young women. These would be the female servants or slaves of the household, which is clearly a substantial one.
16. She sets her mind on a field and buys it. The exemplary wife is active not only domestically, acquiring wool and flax, weaving and sewing, but also as a businesswoman.
from the fruit of her hands. As Fox notes, this means that she uses her earnings to buy property.
20. Her palm . . . / her hands. These terms form a neat chiasm with the preceding line: hands (a), palms (b), palm (b'), hands (a').
21. her whole household is clothed in scarlet. This is a hyperbole: warm wool garments would suffice to keep everyone in the household comfortable through the winter, but the clothing she provides is regally sumptuous as well as warm.
23. Her husband is famed in the gates. Evidently, he is able to participate in the deliberations of justice while she is busy providing for the needs of their household. But the affluence that she has made possible also enables him to hold his head up among the elders.
24. the trader. The Hebrew says “Canaanite,” a gentilic term that is also the designation of a profession because of the prominence of Canaanites—perhaps assimilated to Phoenicians—as traders.
25. the day to come. The literal sense of the Hebrew is “the latter day,” which is to say, the future, something she need not fear because she has provided so well for her household.
29. Many daughters have done worthy things. At this penultimate point in the poem, the thematic term ḥayil, “worthy,” recurs. It is also strategically effective that the husband, who has benefited from the wife’s prodigious efforts, and until now has been in the background of the poem, trusting his wife and sitting with the elders in the gates, steps forward to address her in superlative praise. The force of the direct address is underscored by the emphatic use of the second-person singular feminine pronoun ʾat in the second verset: “but you—you surpass them all.”
31. Give her from the fruit of her hands. Let her enjoy the benefits of the affluence she has amassed, and at the same time let her be praised for what she has achieved.