Proverbs 27:22

22 Though thou bruise a fool in a mortar among grit with a pestle, Yet would not his folly depart from him. According to the best accredited accentuations, אם־תּכתּושׁ has Illuj. and בּמּכתּשׁ has Pazer, not Rebia, which would separate more than the Dechi, and disturb the sequence of the thoughts. The first line is long; the chief disjunctive in the sphere of the Athnach is Dechi of 'הר, this disjoins more than the Pazer of 'בּם, and this again more than the Legarmeh of את־האויל. The ה of הרפות does not belong to the stem of the word (Hitzig), but is the article; רפות (from רוּף, to shake, to break; according to Schultens, from רפת, to crumble, to cut in pieces, after the form קיטור, which is improbable) are bruised grains of corn (peeled grain, grit), here they receive this name in the act of being bruised; rightly Aquila and Theodotion, ἐν μέσῳ ἐμπτισσομένων (grains of corn in the act of being pounded or bruised), and the Venet. μέσον τῶν πτισανῶν. (Note: The lxx translates ἐν μέσῳ συνεδρίου, and has thereby misled the Syr., and mediately the Targum.) In בּעלי (thus to be written after Michlol 43b, not בּעלי, as Heidenheim writes it without any authority) also the article is contained. מכתשׁ is the vessel, and the ב of בעלי is Beth instrumenti; עלי (of lifting up for the purpose of bruising) is the club, pestle (Luther: stempffel = pounder); in the Mishna, Beza i. 5, this word denotes a pounder for the cutting out of flesh. The proverb interprets itself: folly has become to the fool as a second nature, and he is not to be delivered from it by the sternest discipline, the severest means that may be tried; it is not indeed his substance (Hitzig), but an inalienable accident of his substance.

Solomon had said (Pro 22:15), The foolishness which is bound in the heart of a child may be driven out by the rod of correction, for then the mind is to be moulded, the vicious habits not having taken root; but here he shows that, if it be not done then, it will be next to impossible to do it afterwards; if the disease be inveterate, there is a danger of its being incurable. Can the Ethiopian change his skin? Observe, 1. Some are so bad that rough and severe methods must be used with them, after gentle means have been tried in vain; they must be brayed in a mortar. God will take this way with them by his judgments; the magistrates must take this way with them by the rigour of the law. Force must be used with those that will not be ruled by reason, and love, and their own interest. 2. Some are so incorrigibly bad that even those rough and severe methods do not answer the end, their foolishness will not depart from them, so fully are their hearts set in them to do evil; they are often under the rod and yet not humbled, in the furnace and yet not refined, but, like Ahaz, trespass yet more (Ch2 28:22); and what remains then but that they should be rejected as reprobate silver?

27:22 Foolishness is deeply ingrained in the character of a fool.