the heart · noun, common masculine singular construct
husband
בַּעְלָ֑הּba'.Lah
H1167
a master · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person feminine singular
trust
בָּ֣טַחBa.tach
H982
figuratively · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
need
יֶחְסָֽרyech.Sar
H2637
to lack · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
spoil
וְ֝שָׁלָ֗לve.sha.Lal
H7998
booty · conjunction + 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
1 Peter 3:1-7 Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conv…
2 Kings 4:22-23 And she called unto her husband, and said, Send me, I pray thee, one of the young men, and one of the asses, that I may run to the man of Go…
2 Kings 4:9-10 And she said unto her husband, Behold now, I perceive that this is an holy man of God, which passeth by us continually.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Proverbs 31:10–end
This description of the virtuous woman is designed to show what wives the women should make and what wives the men should choose; it consists of twenty-two verses, each beginning with a letter of the Hebrew alphabet in order, as some of the Psalms, which makes some think it was no part of the lesson which Lemuel's mother taught him, but a poem by itself, written by some other hand, and perhaps had been commonly repeated among the pious Jews, for the ease of which it was made alphabetical. We have the abridgment of it in the New Testament (Ti1 2:9, Ti1 2:10, Pe1 3:1-6), where the duty prescribed to wives agrees with this description of a good wife; and with good reason is so much stress laid…
heart . . . trust in her--He relies on her prudence and skill.
no need of spoil--does not lack profit or gain, especially, that obtained by the risk of war.
John Gill on Proverbs 31:11
The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her,.... Christ her Maker is her husband, who has asked her in marriage, and has betrothed her to himself in righteousness; and of whose chaste love, and inviolable attachment to him, he is fully satisfied, as well as of her fidelity in keeping what he commits unto her; he trusts her with his Gospel and ordinances, which she faithfully retains and observes; and with his children born in her, who are nursed up at her side, to whom she gives the breasts of ordinances, bears them on her sides, and dandles them on her knees, as a tender and careful mother does, Isaiah 60:4;
so that he shall have no need of spoil; he shall never want any; by means of…
The reason for this is now given:
11 ב The heart of her husband doth trust her,
And he shall not fail of grain.
If we interpret שׁלל, after Ecc 9:8, as subject, then we miss לּו; it will thus be object., and the husband subj. to לא יחסּר: nec lucro carebit, as e.g., Fleischer translates it, with the remark that שׁלל denotes properly the spoil which one takes from an enemy, but then also, like the Arab. ḍanymat, can mean profit and gain of all kinds (cf. Rdiger in Gesenius' Thes.). Thus also in our "kriegen" = to come into possession, the reference to war disappears. Hitzig understands by שׁלל, the continual prosperity of the man on account of his fortunate possession of such a wife; but in…
The Church Fathers
"The heart of her husband is confident about her." He certainly is confident, and he has taught us to be confident too. He commissioned the church, you see, to the ends of the earth, among all nations, from sea to sea. If she was not going to persevere to the end, her husband's heart would not be confident about her. So she despoils the world, spread throughout it everywhere; on all sides she plunders trophies from the devil.
"The heart of her husband trusts in her," etc. The husband of the holy Church is her Lord and Redeemer, who also deigned to become her price. Whence the Apostle also says to the believers, "For I have betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ" (2 Corinthians 11). Therefore, what he says, "The heart of her husband trusts in her," is undoubtedly drawn from human practice; just as he who has a strong, faithful, and chaste wife, confidently trusts in her because she can do nothing against his will, nor be contaminated even by adulterous thought, she would gladly endure all adversities for his love and desire to convert anyone to his friendship, thus undeniably does our Lord and Redeemer trust in the Church. For He knows the spirit of grace which He gave, He knows the power of charity which He infused into her breast. Therefore, He does not doubt that she will not only be incorruptibly firm in the integrity of faith but will also continually strive to gather more into the unity of that same faith. For this is what follows, "And she will not lack gain," the Church spoils the devil when through her preachers, she calls back those whom he had deceived to the path of truth. And well it is said, "Will not lack gain," for the Church will never cease to restore souls freed from the diabolical deceit to the faith of Christ until, with the completed course of the world, the fixed number of her members is also completed. However, because whatever good the holy Church or any faithful soul achieves, it receives it from above...
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
Poetry — Has been well defined as “the measured language of emotion.” Hebrew poetry deals almost exclusively with the great question of man’s relation to God. “Guilt, condemnation, punishment, pardon,…
Wife — The ordinance of marriage was sanctioned in Paradise (Gen. 2:24; Matt. 19:4-6). Monogamy was the original law under which man lived, but polygamy early commenced (Gen. 4:19), and continued to prevail…
Writing — The art of writing must have been known in the time of the early Pharaohs. Moses is commanded “to write for a memorial in a book” (Ex. 17:14) a record of the attack of Amalek. Frequent mention is…
Commerce · General references — General references
Wife · UNCLASSIFIED SCRIPTURES RELATING TO — UNCLASSIFIED SCRIPTURES RELATING TO
Wives · Good: Secure confidence of husbands — Good: Secure confidence of husbands
Woman · Good and virtuous, described — Good and virtuous, described
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).
Proverbs ends with a powerful poem celebrating the virtuous wife. The poem’s acrostic arrangement gives an impression of completeness and provides the student with an aid for learning.
31:10-12 No one can find a virtuous and capable wife without God’s help (18:22). Such a woman, like wisdom, is more precious than rubies (cp. 3:15).
Rashi on Proverbs 31:11
and he will lack no gain lit. no plunder, i.e., he will lack no good.
