Proverbs 31:10

Who can find It is no easy thing to do.

a virtuous woman The R.V. follows the order of the Heb.: A virtuous woman who can find?, giving emphasis by the arrangement of the words to the subject of the whole Section.

virtuous Lit. a woman of might, or power, or capacity; γυναῖκα ἀνδρείαν, LXX; mulierem fortem, Vulg. The conditions of woman's life and her social position in those times and countries must be borne in mind. Comp. Proverbs 18:22; Proverbs 19:14. The rendering virtuousis retained in R.V., and no better English representative of the Heb. word could probably be found. But virtuousmust here be understood, not in the restricted sense which, in this connection, it has come to have in our language (though in that sense the phrase appears to be used in Proverbs 12:4, and perhaps in Ruth 3:11), but in the wider sense of "all virtuous living" (Collect for All Saints" Day), or of "all virtues" (Collect for Quinquagesima Sunday). The idea of capacity(comp. men of capacity, Genesis 47:6, where the Heb. word is the same) is involved in the description which follows. Our English word honest(honourable, as in Romans 12:17) has in like manner come to have a restricted meaning, as it is now commonly used.

rubies See Proverbs 3:15 note.