Proverbs 31:29

29 ר "Many are the daughters who have done bravely, But thou hast surpassed them all together." We have already often remarked, last time under Pro 29:6, that רב, not indeed in its sing., but in its plur. רבּים and רבּות, can precede, after the manner of a numeral, as attribute; but this syntactical licence, Pro 28:12, by no means appears, and needs to be assumed as little here as at Pro 8:26, although there is no reason that can be adduced against it. עשׂה חיל signifies here not the gaining of riches (the lxx, Syr., Targ., Jerome, Luther, Gesenius, Bttcher, and others), which here, where the encomium comes to its height, would give to it a mercenary mammon-worship note - it indeed has this signification only when connected with ל of the person: Sibi opes acquirere, Deu 6:17; Eze 28:4 - but: bravery, energy, and, as the reference to אשׁת חיל demands, moral activity, capacity for activity, in accordance with one's calling, ποιεῖν ἀρετήν, by which the Venet. translates it. בּנות is, as in the primary passages, Gen 30:13; Sol 6:9, a more delicate, finer name of women than נשׁים: many daughters there have always been who have unfolded ability, but thou my spouse hast raised thyself above them all, i.e., thou art excellent and incomparable. Instead of עלית, there is to be written, after Chajug, Aben Ezra (Zachoth 7a), and Jekuthiel under Gen 16:11, עלית; the Spanish Nakdanim thus distinguish the forms מצאת, thou hast found, and מצאת, she has found. כּלּנה, for כּלּן, Gen 42:36.

This chapter is added to Solomon's proverbs, some think because it is of the same author, supposing king Lemuel to be king Solomon; others only because it is of the same nature, though left in writing by another author, called Lemuel; however it be, it is a prophecy, and therefore given by inspiration and direction of God, which Lemuel was under in the writing of it, and putting it into this form, as his mother was in dictating to him the matter of it. Here is, I. An exhortation to Lemuel, a young prince, to take heed of the sins he would be tempted to and to do the duties of the place he was called to (Pro 31:1-9). II. The description of a virtuous woman, especially in the relation of a wife and the mistress of a family, which Lemuel's mother drew up, not as an encomium of herself, though, no doubt, it was her own true picture, but either as an instruction to her daughters, as the foregoing verses were to her son, or as a direction to her son in the choice of a wife; she must be chaste and modest, diligent and frugal, dutiful to her husband, careful of her family, discreet in her discourse, and in the education of her children, and, above all, conscientious in her duty to God: such a one as this, if he can find her, will make him happy (v. 10-31).