to increase (in whatever respect) · verb, hiphil infinitive absolute
over
יוֹתֵ֑רyo.Ter
H3148
properly · noun, common masculine singular absolute
wise
תִּתְחַכַּ֖םtit.cha.Kam
H2449
to be wise (in mind · verb, hithpael jussive, 2nd person masculine singular
destroy
תִּשּׁוֹמֵֽםti.sho.Mem
H8074
to stun (or intransitively · verb, hithpael imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Romans 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but…
Proverbs 25:16 Hast thou found honey? eat so much as is sufficient for thee, lest thou be filled therewith, and vomit it.
Colossians 2:18 Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen,…
Matthew 6:1-7 Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven.
1 Corinthians 3:18 Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.
James 3:13-17 Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom.
Ecclesiastes 12:12 And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh.
Genesis 3:6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ecclesiastes 7:11-22
Solomon, in these verses, recommends wisdom to us as the best antidote against those distempers of mind which we are liable to, by reason of the vanity and vexation of spirit that there are in the things of this world. Here are some of the praises and the precepts of wisdom.
I. The praises of wisdom. Many things are here said in its commendation, to engage us to get and retain wisdom. 1. Wisdom is necessary to the right managing and improving of our worldly possessions: Wisdom is good with an inheritance, that is, an inheritance is good for little without wisdom. Though a man have a great estate, though it come easily to him, by descent from his ancestors, if he have not wisdom to use it for…
HOLDEN makes Ecc 7:16 the scoffing inference of the objector, and Ecc 7:17 the answer of Solomon, now repentant. So (Co1 15:32) the skeptic's objection; (Co1 15:33) the answer. However, "Be not righteous over much," may be taken as Solomon's words, forbidding a self-made righteousness of outward performances, which would wrest salvation from God, instead of receiving it as the gift of His grace. It is a fanatical, pharisaical righteousness, separated from God; for the "fear of God" is in antithesis to it (Ecc 7:18; Ecc 5:3, Ecc 5:7; Mat 6:1-7; Mat 9:14; Mat 23:23-24; Rom 10:3; Ti1 4:3).
over wise-- (Job 11:12; Rom 12:3, Rom 12:16), presumptuously self-sufficient, as if acquainted with the…
Be not righteous over much,.... This is not meant of true and real righteousness, even moral righteousness, a man cannot be too holy or too righteous; but of a show and ostentation of righteousness, and of such who would be thought to be more righteous and holy than others, and therefore despise those who, as they imagine, do not come up to them; and are very rigid and censorious in their judgment of others, and very severe in their reproofs of them; and, that they may appear very righteous persons, will do more than what the law requires of them to do, even works of supererogation, as the Pharisees formerly, and Papists now, pretend, and abstain from the lawful use of things which God has g…
The Church Fathers
She also said, 'The devil sometimes sends a severe fast which is too prolonged; the devil's disciples do this as well as holy men. How do we distinguish the fasting of our God and King from the fasting of that tyrant the devil? Clearly by its moderation. Throughout your life, then, you ought to keep an unvarying rule of fasting. Do you fast four or five days on end and then lose your spiritual strength by eating a feast? That really pleases the devil! Everything which is extreme is destructive. So do not suddenly throw away your armour, or you may be found unarmed in the battle and easily captured. Our body is the armour, our soul is the warrior. Take care of both, and you will be ready for whatever comes.'
No one can say that he has strayed from ignorance into some silly fancy of separating, locally, the supreme from that which is below, and assigning to the Father as it were the peak of some hill, while he seats the Son lower down in the hollows. No one is so childish as to conceive of differences in space, when the intellectual and spiritual is under discussion. Local position is a property of the material: but the intellectual and immaterial is confessedly removed from the idea of locality. What, then, is the reason why he says that the Father alone has supreme being? For one can hardly think it is from ignorance that he wanders off into these conceptions, being one who, in the many displays he makes, claims to be wise, even "making himself overwise," as the Holy Scripture forbids us to do.
But neither these, who love more, nor those, who hate, hold to the rule of truth, and the ones lie through love, the others through hatred. Whence it is fitting to put reins upon love also, and to permit it only so much liberty of roaming as will not let it plunge over precipices. It is written in Ecclesiastes: "Be not overly just, nor think things greater than yourself, lest perhaps you be struck senseless". Following this example, I can say something similar: do not love a man "with your whole heart and with your whole soul and with your whole strength"; do not love an angel "with your whole heart, with your whole soul, with your whole strength", but keep this precept, according to the word of the Savior, for God alone. For "you shall love", he says, "the Lord your God with your whole heart and with your whole soul and with your whole strength".
Dictionary and topics
Prudence · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
The first of these counsels warns against extremes, on the side of good as well as on that of evil: "All have I seen in the days of my vanity: there are righteous men who perish by their righteousness, and there are wicked men who continue long by their wickedness. Be not righteous over-much, and show not thyself wise beyond measure: why wilt thou ruin thyself? Be not wicked overmuch, and be no fool: why wilt thou die before thy time is? It is good that thou holdest thyself to the one, and also from the other withdrawest not thine hand: for he that feareth God accomplisheth it all." One of the most original English interpreters of the Book of Koheleth, T. Tyler (1874), finds in the thoughts…
However hard we work, we could always do more, and we can destroy ourselves in the process.
Rashi on Ecclesiastes 7:16
Be not exceedingly righteous. Like Shaul, who tried to display his righteousness and [misdirected] his mercy on the wicked.
Nor overly wise. To deduce from a foolish inference from a minor case to a major case, [namely,] that for [the murder] of one person, said the Torah, bring a decapitated heifer, etc.41This Rashi refers back to the preceding one and explains the misdirected logic which led Shaul to spare Amoleik.
