7:16 I have spread my bed with elegant coverings, 1
with richly colored fabric 2 from Egypt.
26:14 Like 3 a door that turns on its hinges, 4
so a sluggard turns 5 on his bed.
1 tn Heb “with spreads.” The sentence begins with the cognate accusative: “with spreads I have spread my bed.” The construction enhances the idea – she has covered her bed.
2 tn The feminine noun means “dark-hued stuffs” (BDB 310 s.v. חֲטֻבוֹת). The form is a passive participle from a supposed root II חָטַב (khatav), which in Arabic means to be of a turbid, dusky color mixed with yellowish red. Its Aramaic cognate means “variegated”; cf. NAB “with brocaded cloths of Egyptian linen.” BDB’s translation of this colon is unsatifactory: “with dark hued stuffs of yarn from Egypt.”
3 tn The comparative “like” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied from context in the translation.
4 sn The sluggard is too lazy to get out of bed – although he would probably rationalize this by saying that he is not at his best in the morning. The humor of the verse is based on an analogy with a door – it moves back and forth on its hinges but goes nowhere. Like the door to the wall, the sluggard is “hinged” to his bed (e.g., Prov 6:9-10; 24:33).
5 tn The term “turns” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation from the parallelism.