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 CHAPTER II.

THE FORM AND ORIGIN OF THE PROVERBS.

In one of the opening verses of the Book of Proverbs (i. 6) three technical names for varieties of proverbs are put together:—(1) māshāl, a short, pointed saying with reference to some striking feature in the life of an individual, or in human life generally, often clothed in figurative language (whence, according to many, the name māshāl, as if 'similitude;' comp. [Greek: parabolê]), (2) m'lîça, perhaps a 'bent', 'oblique' or (as Sept.) 'dark' saying, (3) khîda, a 'knotty' or intricate saying, especially a riddle. Each of these words has a variety of applications; for instance (1) is used in Num. xxiii., xxiv., for a parallelistic poem, (1) and (2) sometimes mean a 'taunting speech' (see below, and comp. Hab. ii. 6, Isa. xiv. 4, Mic. ii. 4), and (3) can be used, not merely of true riddles with a moral meaning, such as we find here and there in Prov. xxx., but also of didactic statements upon subjects as difficult as riddles (see Ps. xlix. 5, A.V. 4, lxxviii. 2). We have no collection of popular proverbs, such as exists in Arabic; the proverbs in the canonical collection show great technical elaboration, though some may be based on the naive 'wisdom' of the people. A very few specimens of the popular proverb have indeed been preserved in the canonical literature. 'Is Saul also among the prophets?' (1 Sam. x. 12, xix. 24) preserves the memory of a humorous fact in the story of that king. 'Wickedness proceeds from the wicked' (1 Sam. xxiv. 13) is, unlike the former, a generalisation, and means that a man's character is shown by his actions (comp.