Proverbs 6:13

He winketh with his eyes, he speaketh with his feet, he teacheth with his fingers;

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(13) He winketh with his eyes . . .—A picture, taken from the life, of a malicious tattler and scandalmonger, who fills out his lying tale with winks and signs, whereby even more is suggested than he says, to the blasting of his neighbour’s character.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

6:12-19 If the slothful are to be condemned, who do nothing, much more those that do all the ill they can. Observe how such a man is described. He says and does every thing artfully, and with design. His ruin shall come without warning, and without relief. Here is a list of things hateful to God. Those sins are in a special manner provoking to God, which are hurtful to the comfort of human life. These things which God hates, we must hate in ourselves; it is nothing to hate them in others. Let us shun all such practices, and watch and pray against them; and avoid, with marked disapproval, all who are guilty of them, whatever may be their rank.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

A naughty person - literally, "a man of Belial," i. e., a worthless man (see the Deuteronomy 13:13 note). This is the portrait of the man who is not to be trusted, whose look and gestures warn against him all who can observe. His speech is tortuous and crafty; his wink tells the accomplice that the victim is already snared; his gestures with foot and hand are half in deceit, and half in mockery.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

13, 14. If, for fear of detection, he does not speak, he uses signs to carry on his intrigues. These signs are still so used in the East.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

He vents his wickedness, as by his speech, so also by his gestures, whereby he secretly signifies what he is afraid or ashamed to express openly to his accomplices, his intentions or desires of some evil towards another person; which having in the general declared by the motion of his eyes or feet, he points out the particular person by his fingers.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

He winketh with his eyes,.... Not through natural infirmity, but purposely and with design; with one of his eyes, as Aben Ezra, as is usual with such persons: it is the air and gesture of a sneering and deceitful man, who gives the wink to some of his friends, sneering at the weakness of another in company; or as signifying to them some secret design of his against another, which he chooses not to declare in any other way;

he speaketh with his feet; the motions of the feet have a language; the stamping of the feet expresses rage; here it seems to intend the giving of a him to another, by privately pressing his foot with his, when he should be silent or should speak, or do this or the other thing he would have him do;

he teacheth with his fingers; by stretching them out or compressing them; and so showing either scorn and contempt (x), or rage and fury. The whole of it seems to design the secret, cunning, artful ways, which wicked men have to convey their meanings to one another, without being understood by other persons; they have a language to themselves, which they express by the motions of their eyes, feet, and fingers: and this character of art and cunning, dissimulation and deceit, fitly agrees with the man of sin, 2 Thessalonians 2:10. So mimics are said to speak with their hands; some have been famous in this way (y).

(x) "In hunc intende digitum", Plauti Pseudolus, Acts 4. Sc. 7. v. 45. "----aliis dat digito literas", Ennius. (y) Vid. Barthii Animadv. ad Claudian. de Consul. Mallii Paneg. v. 311.

Geneva Study Bible

He winketh with his eyes, he speaketh with his feet, he {g} teacheth with his fingers;

(g) Thus all his gesture tends to wickedness,

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

13. winketh] Comp. Proverbs 10:10; Psalm 35:19.

speaketh] Not only the tongue (Proverbs 6:12), but the eye, the foot and the hand are used to make false suggestions, and to further his deceitful designs. Comp. Proverbs 16:30. Shuffleth, R.V. marg., is a rendering adopted by many good scholars, σημαίνει, LXX.

teacheth] This is retained in R.V. marg. (διδάσκει, LXX.), but giveth signs, R.V. text, is preferable.

Attention has been called to the striking parallel of the description in the Tarentilla of the Latin poet Nævius: “alium tenet, alii adnictat, alibi manus est, alii percellit pedem.”

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 13. - He winketh with his eyes, he speaketh with his feet, he teacheth with his fingers. He employs his other members for the same nefarious purpose. In the language of St. Paul, he yields his members to uncleanness, and to iniquity unto iniquity (Romans 6:19). "To wink with the eye (karats ayin)," as in Proverbs 10:10 and Psalm 35:19, or "with the eyes (karats b'eynayim)," is properly to compress or nip them together, and so to wink, and give the signal to others not to interfere (Gesenius and Delitzsch); cf. the LXX., ἐννεύει ὀφθαλμῷ; and the Vulgate, annuit oculis. Aquila and Theodoret, however, read, κνίζει, "he vexes or annoys." The observation of the teacher in Proverbs 10:10 is, "He that winketh with his eyes causeth sorrow." The same verb karuts is also used of the compression or closing of the lips in Proverbs 16:30. He speaketh with his feet; i.e. he conveys signs by them to his companion; cf. the LXX., σημαίνει δὲ ποδὶ, and the Vulgate, terit pede, which conveys much the same meaning. He teacheth with his fingers; or, as more fully expressed in the LXX., διδάσκει δὲ ἐννεύμασι δακτύλων, "he teacheth by the signs of his fingers." Symmachus has δακτυλοδεικτῶν, which, however, in its strictly classical use (see Demosthenes, 790, 20) is pointing at with the finger. "Teaching" is only the secondary meaning of the Hebrew participle moreh, which is here used. The verb yarah, to which it belongs, means properly to extend or stretch out the hand for the purpose of pointing out the way (compare the Hebrew shalakh yod, and the Latin monstrare), and hence came to mean "to teach." The crafty and deceitful character which is here presented to as is strikingly reproduced in Ecclesiasticus: "He that winketh with the eyes worketh evil: and he that knoweth him will depart from him. When thou art present, he will speak sweetly, and will admire thy words: but at the last he will writhe his mouth, and slander thy sayings. I have hated many things, but nothing like him; for the Lord will hate him" (Ecclus. 27:22-24). The heathen poet Naevius says of the impudent woman -

"Allium tenet, alii adnutat, alibi manus
Est occupata: est alii percellit pedem." Compare also Ovid's words ('Amor.,' 1:4, 16) -

"Clam mihi tange pedem:
Me specta, mutusque meos, vultumque loquacem...
Verba superciliis sine voce loquentia dicam;
Verba leges digitis." So Tibullus, 1:12 -

"Illa viro coram nutus conferre loquaces
Blandaque compositis abdere verba notis." The lesson which we may learn from this verse is not to abuse the members of our bodies, by employing them for the purposes of deceit and hypocrisy, and so to promote evil, but to put them to their natural and legitimate use. Proverbs 6:13

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

קורץ בּעיניו is translated according to the sense: who winks (nictat) with his eyes; but that is not the proper meaning of the word, for קרץ is used not only of the eyes. Proverbs 10:10 (cf. Proverbs 16:30, qui oculos morsicat or connivet), Psalm 35:19, but also of the lips, Proverbs 16:30. Thus Lwenstein's explanation: who opens up the eyes, is incorrect. The verb קרץ unites in it the meanings of Arab. qrts, to pinch off with a sharp implement, and Arab. qrd, with a blunt instrument (Arab. miḳraḍ, pincers). It means to pince, to nip, as Arab. ḳarṣ, pincer - e.g., ḳarṣ balskyn alarsasat, he cuts off with the knife the leaden seal - hence frequently, to nip together the eyes, provincially: to wink ("zwickern," frequent. of "zwicken," to nip) with the eyes - the action of the deceiver, who thereby gives the sign to others that they help or at least do not hinder him from bantering and mocking, belying and deceiving a third person (Fl.); cf. Ali's proverb, "O God, pardon to us the culpable winking with the eye (ramzat)," and Fleischer's notes thereon, the Proverbs of Ali, p. 100f.

That the words which follow, בּרגליו מולל, are meant of discourse, i.e., the giving of signs, with the feet, and, so to say, significant oratio pedestris (lxx, Aben-Ezra, Bertheau, Hitzig, and others), is very improbable, since the usage of language has set apart the Piel מלּל for the meaning loqui, and מולל admits another suitable signification, for מולל means in Talmudic fricare, confricare - e.g., המולל מלילות, he who grinds the parched ears of corn (b. Beza 12b; Ma'seroth, iv. 5) - after which Syr., Targ., תכס (stamping), Aq. τρίβων, Symm. προστρίβων, Jerome, (qui) terit pede, and Rashi משׁפשׁף (grinding, scratching); it means one who scrapes with his feet, draws them backwards and forwards on the ground in order thereby to give a sign to others; also the Arab. mll, levem et agilem esse, which as the synonym of Arab. sr is connected with Arab. fı̂ of the way, signifies properly to move the feet quickly hither and thither (Fl.).

(Note: The root-idea of the Arab. mall is unquietness of motion; the Arab. noun mallt signifies the glow with its flickering light and burning: glowing ashes, inner agitation, external haste; Arab. malil (מלל) is the feverish patient, but also one quickly hastening away, and generally an impatient or hasty person (vid., Wetstein in Baudissin in his Job. Tischendorfianus, vii. 6). The grinding is made by means of a quick movement hither and thither; and so also is speaking, for the instrument of speech, particularly the tongue, is set in motion. Only the meaning praecidere, circumcidere, does not connect itself with that root-idea: מל in this signification appears to be a nance of מר, stringere.)

מרה appears here, in accordance with its primary signification (projicere, sc. brachium or digitum equals monstrare), connected with בּעצבּעתיו; another expression for this scornful, malicious δακτυλοδεικνεῖν is שׁלח אצבּע, Isaiah 58:9.