of moral misleading (Ewald, §217, 2); and Arab. ' of erecting a building; but with Arab. b of the intellectual erection of a memorial (monument). It is the so-called Bâ̇âlmojâz; vid., de Sacy's Chrest Arab. i. 397. The verb מרק means in Talm. also, “to take away” (a metaph. of abstergere; cf. Arab. marak, to wipe off)[1] and that meaning is adopted, Schabbath 33a, for the interpretations of this proverb: stripes and wounds a preparedness for evil carries away, and sorrow in the innermost part of the body, which is explained by דרוקן (a disease appearing in diverse forms; cf. “Drachenschuss,”; as the name of an animal disease); but granting that the biblical מרק may bear this meaning, the ב remains unaccountable; for we say מרק עצמו לעברה, for to prepare oneself for a transgression (sin of excess), and not בעברה. We have thus to abide by the primary meaning, and to compare the proverb, Berachoth 5a: “afflictive providences wash away all the transgressions of a man.” But the proverb before us means, first at least, not the wounds which God inflicts, but those which human educational energy inflicts: deep-cutting wounds, i.e., stern discipline, leads to the rubbing off of evil, i.e., rubs it, washes it, cleanses it away. It may now be possible that in 30b the subject idea is permutatively continued: et verbera penetralium corporis (thus the Venet.: πληγαὶ τῶν ταμιείων τοῦ γαρστρός), i.e., quorum vis ad intimos corporis et animi recessus penetrat (Fleischer). But that is encumbered, and חדרי־בטן (cf. Pro 20:27, Pro 18:8), as referring to the depths to which stern corporal discipline penetrates, has not its full force. וּמכּות is either a particip.: and that is touching (ferientes) the inner chambers of the body, or חדרי־בטן is with the ב, or immediately the second object of תמריק to be supplied: and strokes (rub off, cleanse, make pure) the innermost part. Jerome and the Targ. also supply ב, but erroneously, as designating place: in secretioribus ventris, relatively better the lxx and Syr.: εἰς ταμιεῖα κοιλίας. Luther hits the sense at least, for he translates:
One must restrain evil with severe punishment,
And with hard strokes which one feels.
- ↑ Vid., Dozy's Lettre à M. Fleischer (1871), p. 198.
