Matthew Henry on Proverbs 6:12-19
Solomon here gives us,
I. The characters of one that is mischievous to man and dangerous to be dealt with. If the slothful are to be condemned, that do nothing, much more those that do ill, and contrive to do all the ill they can. It is a naughty person that is here spoken of, Heb. A man of Belial; I think it should have been so translated, because it is a term often used in scripture, and this is the explication of it. Observe,
1. How a man of Belial is here described. He is a wicked man, that makes a trade of doing evil, especially with his tongue, for he walks and works his designs with a froward mouth (Pro 6:12), by lying and perverseness, and a direct opposition to God and man. He says…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Proverbs 6:19
speaketh--literally, "breathes out," habitually speaks (Psa 27:12; Act 9:1).
John Gill on Proverbs 6:19
A false witness that speaketh lies,.... Or, "that speaketh lies, even a false witness" (f); and so this is distinguished from a lying tongue, the second of these evils: this is the sin of bearing false witness against one's neighbour, a breach of the eighth command. It may be rendered, "he that bloweth lies" (g); that raises lies, and spreads them abroad, and swears to them, to the damage of others. This makes the sixth; and the seventh follows,
and him that soweth discord among brethren; whether in a natural relation, or in a civil society, or in a religious community.
(f) So Vatablus, Mercerus, &c. (g) "qui efflat mendacia", Piscator, Michaelis.
Keil & Delitzsch on Proverbs 6:16-19
What now follows is not a separate section (Hitzig), but the corroborative continuation of that which precedes. The last word (מדנים, strife) before the threatening of punishment, 14b, is also here the last. The thought that no vice is a greater abomination to God than the (in fact satanical) striving to set men at variance who love one another, clothes itself in the form of the numerical proverb which we have already considered, pp. 12, 13. From that place we transfer the translation of this example of a Midda: -
16 There are six things which Jahve hateth,
And seven are an abhorrence to His soul:
17 Haughty eyes, a lying tongue,
And hands that shed innocent blood;
18 An heart that deviseth…
