An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels.
This description of the virtuous woman is designed to show what wives the women should make and what wives the men should choose; it consists of twenty-two verses, each beginning with a letter of the Hebrew alphabet in order, as some of the Psalms, which makes some think it was no part of the lesson which Lemuel's mother taught him, but a poem by itself...
Commenting on Proverbs 31:10-31
Who can find a virtuous woman,.... This part of the chapter is disjoined from the rest in the Septuagint and Arabic versions; and Huetius (t) thinks it is a composition of some other person, and not Lemuel's mother, whose words he supposes end at Pro 31:9; but it is generally thought that what follows to the end of the chapter is a continuance of her...
This exquisite picture of a truly lovely wife is conceived and drawn in accordance with the customs of Eastern nations, but its moral teachings suit all climes. In Hebrew the verses begin with the letters of the Hebrew alphabet in order (compare Introduction to Poetical Books). Who . . . woman--The question implies that such are rare, though not entirely wanting (compare Pro 18:22; Pro 19:14).