Proverbs 12:6

The words of the wicked are to lie in wait for blood: but the mouth of the upright shall deliver them.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(6) The words of the wicked are to lie in wait for blood—i.e., are calculated for this end.

The mouth of the upright shall deliver them—i.e., those for whom the wicked lie in wait.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

12:1 Those who have grace, will delight in the instructions given them. Those that stifle their convictions, are like brutes. 2. The man who covers selfish and vicious designs under a profession of religion or friendship, will be condemned. 3. Though men may advance themselves by sinful arts, they cannot settle and secure themselves. But those who by faith are rooted in Christ, are firmly fixed. 4. A wife who is pious, prudent, and looks well to the ways of her household, who makes conscience of her duty, and can bear crosses; such a one is an honour and comfort to her husband. She that is the reverse of this, preys upon him, and consumes him. 5. Thoughts are not free; they are under the Divine knowledge, therefore under the Divine command. It is a man's shame to act with deceit, with trick and design. 6. Wicked people speak mischief to their neighbours. A man may sometimes do a good work with one good word. 7. God's blessing is often continued to the families of godly men, while the wicked are overthrown. 8. The apostles showed wisdom by glorying in shame for the name of Christ. 9. He that lives in a humble state, who has no one to wait upon him, but gets bread by his own labour, is happier than he that glories in high birth or gay attire, and wants necessaries.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Shall deliver them - i. e., The righteous themselves.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6. The words—or, "expressed designs" of the wicked are for evil purposes.

the mouth—or, "words" of the righteous delivering instead of ensnaring men.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Are to lie in wait for blood; are designed and ordered to entrap or deceive others, and to destroy them.

Shall deliver them, to wit, from those that lie in wait for them; which it doth, either,

1. By prayer to God for their deliverance; or,

2. By pacifying the wicked with soft and gentle answers, or by diverting them from their evil course by their good counsels and admonitions; or,

3. By pleading their righteous cause in a judicial or other way.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

The words of the wicked are to lie in wait for blood,.... Which some understand of perjury and false witness, as Jarchi, whereby the lives of innocent persons are taken away: or it may be interpreted either of the smooth words and fair speeches, and secret artifices, antichrist and his emissaries make use of to entrap the innocent, and draw them into their net, to their ruin; see Psalm 10:7; as the Jews attempted to deal with Christ, Luke 20:20; or of the laws and edicts of the beast, that such should be killed who would not worship his image; and with the blood of these innocent ones the whore of Rome is said to be drunk, Revelation 13:15;

but the mouth of the upright shall deliver them: the innocent laid in wait for; either by their prayers to God, which are of great avail with him, and through whose importunity he will avenge his elect, and deliver them; or through their apologies for them, and defences of them, as in the times of Pagan persecution; or rather through the doctrines of the reformation, whereby many simple and unwary souls were delivered, who were in danger of being ensnared; and whereby the eyes of many princes were opened, and were stirred up to protect those innocent ones, and prevent their blood being shed.

Geneva Study Bible

The words of the wicked are to lie in wait for blood: but the mouth of the upright shall {b} deliver them.

(b) As their conscience is upright, so will they be able to speak for themselves against their accusers.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

6. to lie in wait] So R.V. marg., a lying in wait; but R.V. text, of lying in wait, comp. Proverbs 1:11.

them] This may mean either the righteous themselves, or those for whose blood the wicked lie in wait.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 6. - The words of the wicked are to lie in wait - a lying in wait - for blood (see Proverbs 1:11). The wicked, by their lies, slanders, false accusations, etc., endanger men's lives, as Jezebel compassed Naboth's death by false witness (1 Kings 21:13). The mouth of the upright shall deliver them; i.e. the innocent whose blood the wicked seek. The good plead the cause of the oppressed, using their eloquence in their favour, as in the Apocryphal Story of Susannah, Daniel saved the accused woman from the slanders of the elders. Proverbs 12:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

6 The word of the godless is to lie in wait for the blood of others,

   But the mouth of the upright delivereth them.

Our editions have דברי רשׁעים, but the right sequence of the accents (in Cod. 1294 and elsewhere) is דברי רשׁעים; the logical relation in this transformation, which is only rhythmically conditioned, remains the same. The vocalization wavers between ארב־, which would be imper., and ארב־, which is infin., like אמר־, Proverbs 25:7, ענשׁ־, Proverbs 21:11, אכל־, Genesis 3:11. However one punctuates it, the infin. is intended in any case, in which the expression always remains sketchy enough: the words of the godless are lying in wait for blood, i.e., they are calculated to bring others to this, into the danger of their lives, e.g., before the tribunal by false charges and false witness. דּם is the accus. of the object; for instead of ארב לדם (Proverbs 1:11), to lurk for blood, a shorter expression, ארב דּם, is used (Ewald, 282a). The suffix of יצּילם

(Note: Elias Levita, in his note to the root פה in Kimchi's Wrterbuch, reads תּצּילם, and so also do 6 codd. in Kennicot. But פּה is masculine.)

might appear, after Proverbs 11:6, to refer back to the ישׁרים; but the thought that their mouth saves the upright, that they thus know to speak themselves out of the danger, is by far less appropriate (vid., on the contrary, בדעת, Proverbs 11:9) than the thought that the mouth of the upright delivereth from danger those whose lives are threatened by the godless, as is rightly explained by Ewald, Bertheau, Elster. The personal subject or object is in the Mashal style often to be evolved from the connection, e.g., Proverbs 14:26; Proverbs 19:23.