for in itself it is doubtful to interpret the genit. after פיד as designating the subject, but improper to comprehend God and man under one cipher. Rather it may refer to two, of whom one class refuse to God, the other to the king, the honour that is due (Jerome, Luther, and at last Zöckler); but in the foregoing, two are not distinguished, and the want of reverence for God, and for the magistrates appointed by Him, is usually met with, because standing in interchangeable relationship, in one and the same persons. Is there some misprint then in this word? Ewald suggests שׁניהם, i.e., of those who show themselves as שׁונים (altercatores) towards God and the king. In view of קמיהם, Exo 32:25, this brevity of expression must be regarded as possible. But if this were the meaning of the word, then it ought to have stood in the first member (איד שׁניהם), and not in the second. No other conjecture presents itself. Thus שׁניהם is perhaps to be referred to the שׁונים, and those who engage with them: join thyself not with the opposers; for suddenly misfortune will come upon them, and the destruction of both (of themselves and their partisans), who knows it? But that also is not satisfactory, for after the address שׁניכם was to have been expected, 22b. Nothing remains, therefore, but to understand שׁניהם, with the Syr. and Targ., as at Job 36:11; the proverb falls into rhythms פּתאם and פּיד, שׁונים and שׁניהם. But “the end of their year” is not equivalent to the hour of their death (Hitzig), because for this פּידם (cf. Arab. feid and fı̂d, death) was necessary; but to the expiring, the vanishing, the passing by of the year during which they have succeeded in maintaining their ground and playing a part. There will commence a time which no one knows beforehand when all is over with them. In this sense, “who knoweth,” with its object, is equivalent to “suddenly ariseth,” with its subject. In the lxx, after Pro 24:22, there follow one distich of the relations of man to the word of God as deciding their fate, one distich of fidelity as a duty towards the king, and the duty of the king, and one pentastich or hexastich of the power of the tongue and of the anger of the king. The Heb. text knows nothing of these three proverbs. Ewald has, Jahrb. xi. 18f., attempted to translate them into Heb., and is of opinion that they are worthy of being regarded as original
