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Proverbs 22:20

"Excellent things" or "thirty sayings"?

"Have not I written to thee shalishim in counsels and knowledge?" The Hebrew text has a written form (ketiv) shilshom, "formerly / the day before yesterday," and a read form (qere) shalishim, "officers'" (hence "excellent things"). Since the discovery of the Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope, which ends "Look to these thirty chapters," many scholars read sheloshim, "thirty." The Greek and Latin read "three times."

Same letters, different readings: the consonants agree, but ancient readers vocalized or interpreted them differently

The family tree

Each row is a language or text tradition. Witnesses in the same row may share ancestry, revise one another, or have an uncertain relationship; the line under each box says which. A solid arrow appears only where direct copying or a documented revised edition is established. Order by date never implies copying. Scroll sideways on a phone.

✓ contains it · ✕ does not · ❝ quotes part of it · ⓘ reports on manuscripts · ▢ pages lost · – no copy survives

  • Same line, through lost copies
  • Translation
Hebrew
  1. The proverb as first composedCollections from the monarchy to the Persian period (debated)
  2. Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)AD 1008Descends, through lost copies, from The proverb as first composed
Greek
  1. Greek Proverbs (library: Giguet's French)Old Greek c. 2nd century BC; French 1872Translated from the Old Greek Proverbs
Latin
  1. Latin Vulgate (Clementine)Jerome c. AD 398, from Hebrew; edition 1592Translated from the Hebrew text Jerome used
English
  1. King James Bible1611Translated from printed Masoretic Hebrew
New Testament quotation

    Every witness, in order

    1. Collections from the monarchy to the Persian period (debated)

      The proverb as first composed

      – No copy survives

      No original survives. The oldest Hebrew copies of Proverbs are two small Qumran fragments (4Q102, 4Q103, 1st century BC – 1st century AD, reported).

    2. Jerome c. AD 398, from Hebrew; edition 1592

      Latin Vulgate (Clementine)

      ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from the Hebrew text Jerome used

      How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Clementine Vulgate (1592 edition).

      Ecce descripsi eam tibi tripliciter, in cogitationibus et scientia:

      Latin position: Proverbs 22:20. Jerome translated Proverbs from Hebrew (c. AD 398); the Clementine Vulgate sometimes also carries lines from the Greek.

    3. AD 1008

      Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)

      ✓ Contains this passageDescends, through lost copies, from The proverb as first composed

      How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Westminster Leningrad Codex, a digital transcription of the Leningrad Codex.

      הֲלֹ֤א כָתַ֣בְתִּי לְ֭ךָ שלשום שָׁלִישִׁ֑ים בְּמ֖וֹעֵצֹ֣ת וָדָֽעַת׃

      Have I not written for you [ketiv: formerly / qere: excellent things / emended: thirty] in counsels and knowledge?

      Hebrew position: Proverbs 22:20.

    4. 1611

      King James Bible

      ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from printed Masoretic Hebrew

      How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: King James Version (1769 text).

      Have not I written to thee excellent things in counsels and knowledge,

    5. Old Greek c. 2nd century BC; French 1872

      Greek Proverbs (library: Giguet's French)

      ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from the Old Greek Proverbs

      How the site knows this: Known here only through a translation.

      Grave ces choses trois fois sur la face de ton cœur, afin de posséder la sagesse et la science.

      Greek (digital file) position: Proverbs 22:19. Giguet's 1872 French of a printed Greek text (D check). In these chapters the Greek verse positions in the digital file shift; the matching line was found by content. No Göttingen critical edition of Greek Proverbs is published; a C check needs Rahlfs–Hanhart and specialist studies.

    What changed, and why

    The consonants shlshm (or shlshwm) can be vowelled several ways: shilshom ("formerly," the ketiv; compare Genesis 31:2), shalishim ("officers, captains," the qere: "noble/excellent things"), sheloshim ("thirty"), or shilshim/shalosh ("three"). The library's Hebrew prints both the ketiv and the qere.

    The "thirty" reading (adopted by NRSV, NIV, ESV and others) is supported by the Amenemope parallel (thirty chapters) and by the attempt to count thirty sayings in 22:17–24:22, which can be done in several ways. It is an emendation by vowelling, not a reading attested in any Hebrew manuscript. The Greek ("write these things three times on the breadth of your heart") and Vulgate (tripliciter) read "three."

    The site's assessment: "thirty" is a strong scholarly reconstruction based on the Egyptian parallel; it is not proven, and it should not be presented as the text of any surviving manuscript. The passage is a model of how one word can be read four ways from the same consonants.

    What the evidence shows

    • Independently documentedThe library's Hebrew prints a ketiv/qere in 22:20.
    • Independently documentedThe library's Greek and Latin read 'three times.'
    • Plausible, not confirmedThe original reading was 'thirty.' Supported by the Amenemope parallel; no manuscript reads it.
    • Strongly supportedAmenemope refers to its 'thirty chapters.' Reported from Lichtheim (C).

    Sources

      Related lessons

      • Proverbs 22: Train Up a Child →Proverbs 22 ends the first Solomonic collection (vv. 1–16) and begins a new one (vv. 17–29). The first part has famous sayings: "A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches" (v. 1), "The rich and poor meet together: the LORD is the maker of them all" (v. 2), "Train up a child in the way he should go" (v. 6), "the borrower is servant to the lender" (v. 7). At 22:17 a teacher says "Bow down thine ear, and hear the words of the wise" and promises "excellent things" (or "thirty sayings," v. 20). The sayings that follow (22:17–23:11) closely resemble the Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope: do not rob the poor (v. 22), do not befriend an angry man (v. 24), do not remove the ancient landmark (v. 28), the skilled worker will stand before kings (v. 29).