a people (as a congregated unit) · noun, common masculine singular absolute
make
וַיָּשִׂ֖ימוּvai.ya.Si.mu
H7760
to put (used in a great variety of applications · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural
houses
בֵּיתָֽםbei.Tam
H1004
a house (in the greatest variation of applications · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
rocks
בַסֶּ֣לַעva.Se.la'
H5553
a craggy rock · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
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
Psalms 104:18 The high hills are a refuge for the wild goats; and the rocks for the conies.
Leviticus 11:5 And the coney, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Proverbs 30:24-28
I. Agur, having specified four things that seem great and yet are really contemptible, here specifies four things that are little and yet are very admirable, great in miniature, in which, as bishop Patrick observes, he teaches us several good lessons; as, 1. Not to admire bodily bulk, or beauty, or strength, nor to value persons or think the better of them for such advantages, but to judge of men by their wisdom and conduct, their industry and application to business, which are characters that deserve respect. 2. To admire the wisdom and power of the Creator in the smallest and most despicable animals, in an ant as much as in an elephant. 3. To blame ourselves who do not act so much for our…
The coneys are but a feeble folk,.... Or "rabbits"; though some think these creatures are not intended, because they are not so little as those with which they are ranked, the ant, the locust, and spider; and because of the places in which they burrow and make their houses, which though in holes and caverns of the earth, yet not in rocky but sandy places; rather therefore it is thought that the mountain mouse, or bear mouse (o), as Jerom calls it, is meant; of which, he says (p), there were great numbers in Palestine, and which had their habitations in the holes of rocks; though if Spain has its name from as some say, because of the multitudes of coneys in it; and hence that part of Spain c…
Another proverb with the cipher 4, its first line terminating in ארץ:
24 Four are the little things of the earth,
And yet they are quick of wit - wise:
25 The ants - a people not strong,
And yet they prepare in summer their food;
26 Conies - a people not mighty,
And yet set their dwelling on the rocks;
27 No king have the locusts,
And yet they go forth in rank and file, all of them together;
28 The lizard thou canst catch with the hands,
And yet it is in the king's palaces.
By the disjunctive accent, ארבּעה, in spite of the following word toned on the beginning, retains its ultima-toning, 18a; but here, by the conjunctive accent, the tone retrogrades to the penult., which does not elsewhere…
The Church Fathers
"And the conies, a feeble folk, have made their houses in the rocks." The Gentiles, that is to say, are built upon Christ, the spiritual rock, which is become the head of the corner.
The rock, in fact, is the refuge of badgers in which they live. You too, he says, even though you are weak, run to the rock of true faith, and with it restore life. The one who is supported by deeds enters the kingdom. Therefore, he says, do not despair of the kingdom of heaven because of the weakness of your faith; but believing in the promises, hasten to those works which are commanded.
The coney, a weak people, etc. And this too denotes the people of the Church, who are called weak; either because, as we said earlier, they do not seek to avenge their own injuries; or because they have learned not to trust in their own strength, but to hope for salvation in the aid of their Redeemer. And this is to place their habitation in the rock, to say to the Lord, against the assaults of life, with the Psalmist: "Be to me a rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me; for you are my rock and my fortress" (Psalm. . . .). Instead of coney, the ancient translation used "chirogrillus." It is an animal not bigger than a hedgehog, resembling a mouse and a bear, abundant in the regions of Palestine; and they habitually live in rock crevices and earth holes. It should be noted that in the psalm, where we sing, "The rock is a refuge for the hedgehogs" (Psalm CIII), in some manuscripts we find coneys, in others chirogrillus. And even in this saying of Solomon, some manuscripts have hedgehog instead of coney. For in the book of Hebrew names, we find the same Hebrew word, sapham in Jeremiah, translated as chirogrillus, coney, and hedgehog by Saint Jerome.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Agur — Gatherer; the collector, mentioned as author of the sayings in Prov. 30. Nothing is known of him beyond what is there recorded.
Coney — (Heb. shaphan; i.e., “the hider”), an animal which inhabits the mountain gorges and the rocky districts of Arabia Petraea and the Holy Land. “The conies are but a feeble folk, yet make they their…
Coney · 18; — 18;
Industry · 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).
Another example of number parallelism. Here, small, insignificant animals are surprisingly powerful and resourceful.
Rashi on Proverbs 30:20
and [she] wipes Heb. ומחתה she turns over her lower orifice, as it is written (II Kings 21:13): “as one wipes (ימחה) a dish, he wipes (מחה) and turns it upside down.”
she eats Scripture speaks euphemistically.
