Proverbs 10:19 - Exposition

There wanteth not sin; LXX ; "Thou wilt not avoid sin." Loquacity leads to exaggeration and untruthfulness, slander and uncharitableness (comp. Ecclesiastes 5:1-3 ; and Christ's and James's solemn warnings, Matthew 12:36 ; James 1:26 ; James 3:2 , etc.). "Speak little," says Pinart ('Meditations,' ch. 6.), "because for one sin which we may commit by keeping silence where it would be well to speak, we commit.a hundred by speaking upon all occasions" (see on Proverbs 17:27 ), Another rendering of the passage gives "By multitude of words sin does not vanish away;" i.e. you cannot mend a fault by much talking. But this weakens the contrast, and the Authorized Version is correct. Is wise. St. James calls the reticent "a perfect man" (comp. Proverbs 13:3 ). "This sentence of Scripture," says St. Augustine, in his 'Retractations,' "I greatly fear, because my numerous treatises, I know well, contain many things, if not false, at any rate idle and unnecessary."