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Love righteousness, all you who are judges of the earth. Think of the Lord with a good mind. Seek him in singleness of heart,
Verse 1. Goodness. Entertain just sentiments of the Deity, and avoid all duplicity. This truth is placed in the strongest light in the five first chapters, or preface.
Greek in goodness.
because he is found by those who don’t put him to the test, and is manifested to those who trust him.
for crooked thoughts separate from God. His Power convicts when it is tested, and exposes the foolish;
Verse 3. Unwise. He shews that their wisdom is all folly, and that they cannot withstand his power. Calmet.—There are mortal sins of thought. Worthington.
because wisdom will not enter into a soul that devises evil, nor dwell in a body that is enslaved by sin.
Verse 4. Subject. Or “enslaved to sin.” Bible.—Soul and body are intimately connected, so that the actions of one defile the other, and banish wisdom.
For a holy spirit of discipline will flee deceit, and will depart from thoughts that are without understanding, and will be ashamed when unrighteousness has come in.
Verse 5. Discipline. The instructive light of the Holy Ghost.—Understanding. Those who deny God or Providence, ( Calmet.) and lead a wicked life, are abandoned. Bible.—Not abide. Ελεγχθσεται: “He shall be connected or manifested,” shewing that he will not acquit the guilty, verse 6. Menochius.—When Solomon fell, his wisdom ceased. Iniquity soon betrays itself. Calmet.
For wisdom is a spirit who loves man, and she will not hold a blasphemer guiltless for his lips, because God is witness of his inmost self, and is a true overseer of his heart, and a hearer of his tongue.
Some authorities read the spirit of wisdom is loving to man.
Or, reviler
Because the spirit of the Lord has filled the world, and that which holds all things together knows what is said.
Verse 7. That. Saint Augustine reads hic, “this who,” more correctly than hoc, as it refers to the spirit, ( Calmet.) which having made and filled all things, must be perfectly acquainted with every action. Bible.
Greek the inhabited earth.
Therefore no one who utters unrighteous things will be unseen; neither will Justice, when it convicts, pass him by.
For in his counsels the ungodly will be searched out, and the sound of his words will come to the Lord to bring his lawless deeds to conviction;
because a jealous ear listens to all things, and the noise of murmurings is not hidden.
Verse 10. Jealousy. God is strong and jealous. Exodus 20. Calmet.—He examines the smallest deviation from the paths of rectitude. Bible.
Beware then of unprofitable murmuring, and keep your tongue from slander; because no secret utterance will go on its way void, and a lying mouth destroys a soul.
Don’t court death in the error of your life. Don’t draw destruction upon yourselves by the works of your hands;
Verse 12. Seek not with such eagerness (zelare) your own ruin, ( Calmet.) by an evil life, ( Worthington.) or rather thrown not the blame on death, as if you were necessitated to sin. God created man to be immortal.
because God didn’t make death, neither does he delight when the living perish.
For he created all things that they might have being. The generative powers of the world are wholesome, and there is no poison of destruction in them, nor has Hades royal dominion upon earth;
Verse 14. Health. Good. Genesis 1:31. Calmet.—Poison, or medicine, ( Worthington.) medicamentum. Worthington.—Poison and wild beasts become noxious to man only after sin. It is this which infects the veins. All may derive an antidote from Jesus Christ.
Or, a royal house
for righteousness is immortal,
but ungodly men by their hands and their words summon death; deeming him a friend they pined away. They made a covenant with him, because they are worthy to belong with him.
Verse 16. It. Septuagint αυτον.—Death. The wicked strive Menochius. to draw upon themselves the second death ( Calmet.) as they will not repent. Worthington. Isaiah 28:15. Bible.
Or, were consumed with love of him