Books of the Old Testament
The Psalms
- Kethuveem or The (Other) Writings
Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Five Migilloth, Daniel, Ezra-Nehemiah,
Chronicles
from
The Names and Order of the Books of the Old Testament
by E.W. Bullinger
We come now to the third and last
division of the Old Testament, called Kethuveem;
or The Writings, i.e., the other writings;
and by the Greeks the Hagiographa or sacred
writings. The Lord’s name for this division was The
Psalms, using the figure of Synecdoche by
putting a part for the whole; i.e., calling the whole
division by the name of one (its first) book, The
Psalms. (Luke 24:44).
The Proverbs
Mishlai - The Rules of Life
The Greek name is Paroimiai, which means any
dark, clever, or sententious saying which shadows forth
didactic truth. The Latin title in the Vulgate -
Proverbia - gives us our English title, “Proverbs”.
But both of these are very poor representations of the
Hebrew.
The Hebrew title, Mishlai, is
from Mashal, to rule, to have or exercise rule.
(See Genesis 1:18; 3:16; Exodus 21:8.) Then He who rules gives
the form or pattern which is to be followed.
Hence as applied to words it means words which are to
govern or rule the life. This is the design of the
Book of Proverbs, so-called. It is the book of God’s
moral government of the Earth. It is not a collection of
human wisdom, but of divine rules for life in the Earth.
They may be applied with profit even by those who are
dead and risen with Christ. Such have still to conduct
themselves in a world into which sin has entered, but in
which God is acting in a mysterious way in His
providence, in a government which He exercises for the
conservation of morality, and which manifests itself in
the numerous perplexities of terrestrial life. Man
deceives himself by pride, but here God undeceives him as
to his many seductive illusions. Man underrates the power
of the tongue, the power of fools, and
the power of women. God shows the power of each
and warns of their dangers.
As to the last of these three, God shows
how in His providential dealings He can over-rule sin as
a judgment on sin. Sin came through the woman; and God
shows in the beginning of the book the power of “a
strange woman” to bring to ruin; continues with the
miseries which an odious, brawling, contentious woman can
entail; and ends with the power of a virtuous woman to
bring to honor, happiness, and prosperity.
The the proud reasonings of man are silenced by the
wisdom of God.
It may be useful to add that the book is quoted in the
New Testament as follows:
Proverbs
3:11,12
Proverbs 3:34
Proverbs 11:31
Proverbs 25:21,22
Proverbs 26:11 |
in Hebrews 12:5,6; Revelation 3:19
in James 4:6
in 1 Peter 4:18
in Romans 12:20
in 2 Peter 2:22
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