is an original formal part of this proverb. For the proverb forming, according to Mühlau's judgment, a whole rounded off: שׁלושׁ הנה לא תשׂבענה ארבע לא אמרו הון שׁאול ועצר רחם ארץ לא שׂבעה מים ואשׁ לא אמרה הון contains a mark which makes the original combination of these five lines improbable. Always where the third is exceeded by the fourth, the step from the third to the fourth is taken by the connecting Vav: Pro 30:18, וארבע; Pro 30:21, ותחת ארבע; Pro 30:29, וארבעה. We therefore conclude that 'ארבע לא וגו is the original commencement of independent proverb. This proverb is:
Four things say not: Enough!
The under-world and the closing of the womb [i.e., unfruitful womb] -
The earth is not satisfied with water,
And the fire says not: Enough! a tetrastich more acceptable and appropriate than the Arab. proverb (Freytag, Provv. iii. p. 61, No. 347): “three things are not satisfied by three: the womb, and wood by fire, and the earth by rain;” and, on the other hand, it is remarkable to find it thus clothed in the Indian language,[1] as given in the Hitopadesa (p. 67 of Lassen's ed.), and in Pantschatantra, i. 153 (ed. of Kosegarten): nâgnis tṛpjati kâshṭhânân nâpagânân mahôdadhih nântakah sarvabhûtânân na punsân vâmalocanâh.
Fire is not sated with wood, nor the ocean with the streams,
Nor death with all the living, nor the beautiful-eyed with men.
As in the proverb of Agur the 4 falls into 2 + 2, so also in this Indian sloka. In both, fire and the realm of death (ântaka is death as the personified “end-maker”) correspond; and as there the
- ↑ That not only natural productions, but also ideas and literary productions (words, proverbs, knowledge), were conveyed from the Indians to the Semites, and from the Semites to the Indians, on the great highways by sea and land, is a fact abundantly verified. There is not in this, however, any means of determining the situation of Massa.
