Proverbs 30:15 - Exposition

The horseleach hath two daughters, crying, Give, give. The word "crying" is not in the Hebrew, which says, "The alukah hath two daughters: Give! Give!" The insatiable appetite of this creature is represented by two words, which are personified as daughters, whom the mother has produced and dearly loves. This word alukah is not found again in the Old Testament; but in later Hebrew and in Aramaic it means "leech" or "bloodsucker;" and so it is translated by the Septuagint, βδέλλα , and by St. Jerome sanguisuga . The word is derived from a root which in Arabic means "to adhere." There are several kinds of leeches common in Palestine, and their bloodthirsty nature is well known; as Horace says, 'Ars Poet.,' 476—

" Non missura cutem, nisi plena cruoris, hirudo ."

It seems simple and quite satisfactory to accept the word thus, and to see in the voracity of the leech an example of the greed further developed in the following clauses; but commentators have not been contented with this explanation, and have offered various suggestions which are either unnecessary or inadmissible. Thus the Talmud considers alukah to be an appellation of hell, and the two daughters to be the Power of the world, and Heresy. Some of the Fathers regard it as a symbol of the devil and his dominion; others, as a personification of cupidity with its two offshoots avarice and ambition. Some moderns deem it to mean a vampire or blood thirsty demon, a ghoul, in accordance with Eastern myth. But, as we have said, such interpretations are unnecessary and unsupported by sufficient authority. The allusion to the tastes of the leech is found elsewhere. Thus Theocritus, 'Idyll.,' 2.55—

αἲ αἲ ἔρως ἀνιαρέ τί μευ μέλαν ἐκ χροὸς αἵμα

ἐμφὺς ὡς λιμνᾶτις ἅπαν ἐκ βδέλλα πέπωκας

And Plautus, 'Epidic.,' 2.2, 5—

" Jam ego me convortam in hirudinem atque

Eorum exsugebo sanguinem,

Senati qui columen cluent ."

Ewald and others find traces of mutilation in this proverb, and endeavour to supply what is lost in various ways; but the text as it stands is intelligible, and needs no addition. The rest of the verse is an application of the truth first stated. The type of cupidity there enunciated is instanced and exemplified in four special cases. There are three things that are never satisfied. And then a corrective climax is addressed. Yea, four things say not, It is enough. The four in the following verse are divided into two plus two. Septuagint, "The leech had three daughters dearly beloved, and these three did not satisfy her, and the fourth was not contented to say, Enough."