17 Better is a simple meal where love is, than a fat ox and hate with it.
Better a bit of dry bread in peace, than a house full of feasting and violent behaviour.
It is better to be living in a waste land, than with a bitter-tongued and angry woman.
<A Song of the going up. Of David.> See how good and how pleasing it is for brothers to be living together in harmony! It is like oil of great price on the head, flowing down over the face, even Aaron's face: coming down to the edge of his robe; Like the dew of Hermon, which comes down on the mountains of Zion: for there the Lord gave orders for the blessing, even life for ever.
Again he sent out other servants, with orders to say to the guests, See, I have made ready my feast: my oxen and my fat beasts have been put to death, and all things are ready: come to the feast.
And get the fat young ox and put it to death, and let us have a feast, and be glad.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Proverbs 15
Commentary on Proverbs 15 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
We take these verses together as forming a group which begins with a proverb regarding the good and evil which flows from the tongue, and closes with a proverb regarding the treasure in which blessing is found, and that in which no blessing is found.
Proverbs 15:1
1 A soft answer turneth away wrath,
And a bitter word stirreth up anger.
In the second line, the common word for anger ( אף , from the breathing with the nostrils, Proverbs 14:17) is purposely placed, but in the first, that which denotes anger in the highest degree ( חמה from יחם , cogn. חמם , Arab. hamiya , to glow, like שׁנה from ישׁן ): a mild, gentle word turns away the heat of anger ( excandescentiam ), puts it back, cf. Proverbs 25:15. The Dagesh in רּך follows the rule of the דחיק , i.e. , of the close connection of a word terminating with the accented eh, aah, ah with the following word ( Michlol 63b). The same is the meaning of the Latin proverb:
Frangitur ira gravis
Quando est responsio suavis