Core Glossary
Core Glossary: Proverbs
Curriculum: Proverbs
Language pair: English → French
Generated: Phase 1, Step 1
Companion to: analysis/07_semantic_analysis.md
This glossary lists every load-bearing term identified across Proverbs 1–31 (including full verse-by-verse treatment of the core passage, Proverbs 3:1–12). Terms already fixed in the baseline Romans translation_memory.json are marked [REUSE] and reproduce the exact recorded French rendering. New terms proposed for this curriculum are marked [NEW] and are candidates for addition to translation memory at the version increment following Phase 1 sign-off. Risk tiers and review routing follow the baseline’s doctrine_risk_registry.json conventions exactly (Critical/High → human theologian; Medium → native speaker; Low → automated).
| # | Term (Hebrew, translit.) | French rendering | Status | Risk | Doctrine(s) | Key passages | Rationale / Collision note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | יְהוָה (YHWH) | l’Éternel | NEW | Critical | Fear of the Lord; Trust in Providence | Throughout (~90 occurrences) | Must be visually/theologically distinct from baseline “Seigneur” (κύριος, Christ’s exclusive Lordship) to prevent conflating the OT covenant Name with the NT Lordship confession. |
| 2 | יִרְאַת יְהוָה (yir’at YHWH) | la crainte de l’Éternel | NEW | Critical | The Fear of the Lord as the Beginning of Wisdom | 1:7; 9:10; 31:30 (book’s inclusio) | French “crainte” risks a servile-dread reading; must be consistently taught as reverential awe, never softened to mere “respect” nor sharpened to “peur.” |
| 3 | חָכְמָה (chokmah) | sagesse | NEW | Critical | Wisdom Personified; Fear of the Lord | Throughout, esp. chs. 1, 3, 8, 9 | Collides with French Catholic “Sedes Sapientiae” (Mary, Seat of Wisdom) devotional tradition and secular folk-wisdom flattening; always anchor to “l’Éternel” as source. |
| 4 | חָכְמָה מְדֻבְּרָת (personified Wisdom as speaker) | la Sagesse (capitalized) | NEW | Critical | Wisdom Personified | 1:20-33; 8:1-36; 9:1-6 | Christological/Marian typological over-reading risk (esp. 8:22); any typological application must be explicitly labeled as later theological reflection, not the text’s own claim. |
| 5 | קָנָנִי (qanani, from qanah) | m’a acquise / m’a engendrée (avoid “m’a créée” without note) | NEW | Critical | Wisdom Personified; (adjacent to Deity/Sonship of Christ if typologically applied) | 8:22 | Historic Arian-controversy proof text (LXX “ἔκτισέν με,” “created me,” vs. Hebrew “possessed/acquired”); must not reintroduce a “Wisdom/Christ as created being” reading. |
| 6 | שֵׁבֶט (shevet, “rod” of child discipline) | la discipline / la correction (contextual, non-literal) | NEW | Critical | Practical Righteousness in Daily Life | 13:24; 19:18; 22:15; 23:13-14; 29:15,17 | Direct collision with France’s 2019 law prohibiting all corporal punishment of children (“violences éducatives ordinaires”); requires human theologian review at every occurrence. |
| 7 | חֵן (chen) | faveur (contextually “charme”) | NEW | Critical | Practical Righteousness; (adjacent to Grace) | 3:4; 31:30 | Must NOT be rendered “grâce,” which the baseline reserves exclusively for unmerited saving grace (Critical, Salvation doctrine); “faveur” is deliberately reused from baseline’s own alternatives_rejected list for grace. |
| 8 | חֶסֶד (chesed) | bonté / amour fidèle | NEW | High | Trust in Providence; Practical Righteousness | 3:3; recurring | Risk of being glossed “grâce” in some French Bible traditions; must be avoided to prevent the same collision as chen. |
| 9 | תּוֹרָה (torah, parental/wisdom sense) | enseignement / instruction | NEW | High | Practical Righteousness in Daily Life | 1:8; 3:1; 4:2; 6:20; 7:2 | Deliberately diverges from baseline’s “loi” (reserved for Mosaic Law) since Proverbs’ torah is parental/sagely instruction, not Sinai legislation. |
| 10 | מוּסָר (musar) | discipline (glossed “instruction formatrice”) | NEW | High | Fear of the Lord; Practical Righteousness | 1:2-3; 3:11; 13:24 (overlaps entry 6) | French “discipline” carries punitive/institutional/legal connotations; must foreground formative, relational correction. |
| 11 | בִּינָה / תְּבוּנָה (binah/tevunah) | discernement | NEW | High | Wisdom Personified; Fear of the Lord | 2:2-11; 3:5; 9:10 | Avoid “intelligence” — dominant modern French sense is IQ/AI, secularizing the term. |
| 12 | כְּסִיל (kesil) | sot | NEW | High | The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool | Throughout, esp. ch. 26 | One of five distinct Hebrew “fool” terms; French’s narrower lexical range risks collapsing the taxonomy — consistent, distinct assignment required across all five terms (see #12-16). |
| 13 | אֱוִיל (eviyl) | insensé | NEW | High | The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool | 1:7; 10:8,14; 12:15 | See #12; morally arrogant/obstinate fool, distinct from kesil’s dullness. |
| 14 | לֵץ (letz) | moqueur / railleur | NEW | Medium | The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool | 1:22; 9:7-8; 13:1; 20:1 | See #12; the scoffer, most advanced along the hardened trajectory. |
| 15 | פֶּתִי (peti) | le simple | NEW | Medium | The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool | 1:4,22; 9:4 | See #12; redeemable naïve/inexperienced person, Wisdom’s primary addressee — must not carry a pejorative “simpleton” tone. |
| 16 | נָבָל (naval) | insensé impie / méchant fou | NEW | Medium | The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool | Rare in Proverbs (cf. Ps 14:1) | See #12; base, morally depraved fool. |
| 17 | רֶשַׁע / רָשָׁע (resha’/rasha’) | méchanceté / le méchant (or “impie” for weightier contexts) | NEW | High | Practical Righteousness; Wise/Fool Contrast | Throughout | French “méchant” is softened by everyday usage (naughty child, dog-warning signs); risks trivializing covenant-breaking wickedness. |
| 18 | צֶדֶק / צְדָקָה (tzedeq/tzedaqah) | justice | REUSE (baseline High) | High | Practical Righteousness in Daily Life | Throughout | Cross-curriculum collision: baseline “justice” = Romans’ forensic righteousness by faith; Proverbs’ sense is practical/ethical conduct. Reuse the word per TM mandate; document the sense-divergence explicitly. |
| 19 | צַדִּיק (tzaddiq) | le juste | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness; Wise/Fool Contrast | Throughout | Standard antithesis-partner to rasha’. |
| 20 | לֵב (lev) | cœur | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness; Trust in Providence | 3:1,3,5; 4:23; 23:26 | Seat of will/intellect, not merely emotion; central term of core passage. |
| 21 | בָּטַח (batach) | se confier en | NEW | Medium | Trust in the Lord’s Providence | 3:5; 16:20; 28:25-26; 29:25 | Must not be conflated with baseline “foi” (saving faith); distinct relational-reliance register. |
| 22 | דֶּרֶךְ (derekh) | voie / chemin | NEW | Low-Medium | Practical Righteousness; Wise/Fool Contrast | Throughout (“two ways” motif) | Standard wisdom-metaphor term for life-conduct. |
| 23 | שָׁלוֹם (shalom) | paix | REUSE (baseline Low) | Low | Trust in Providence | 3:2 | Note sense-distinction from baseline’s justification-peace (Romans 5:1) in teaching material. |
| 24 | חַיִּים / מָוֶת (chayim/mavet) | vie / mort | NEW | Medium | Wise/Fool Contrast; Diligence vs. Sloth | Throughout | This-worldly covenantal-flourishing sense; distinguish from baseline’s eschatological resurrection/eternal-life vocabulary. |
| 25 | עָצֵל (atzel) | le paresseux | NEW | Medium | Diligence versus Sloth | 6:6-11; 10:26; 13:4; 20:4; 26:13-16 | Standard rendering; minor secondary association with the sloth animal, harmless. |
| 26 | חָרוּץ (charuts) | diligent / actif | NEW | Low | Diligence versus Sloth | 10:4; 12:24,27; 13:4 | Positive antithesis-partner to atzel. |
| 27 | לָשׁוֹן / פֶּה (lashon/peh) | la langue / la bouche | NEW | Low | Speech and Self-Control | 10:19-21; 12:18-19; 15:1-4; 18:21 | Metonymy for speech; doctrinally weighty though lexically low-risk. |
| 28 | נִרְגָּן (nirgan) | le médisant / le rapporteur | NEW | Medium | Speech and Self-Control | 26:20,22 | Talebearer/gossip, negative speech case. |
| 29 | תּוֹעֵבָה (to’evah) | une chose abominable / en horreur | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness | 6:16-19; 11:1,20; 12:22; 15:8-9; 16:5 | Strong covenant-violation term; note Levitical cross-reference for OT-literacy gaps. |
| 30 | אִשָּׁה זָרָה / נָכְרִיָּה (ishah zarah/nokriah) | la femme adultère / la femme dévoyée | NEW | High | Practical Righteousness | 2:16; chs. 5-7 | Avoid “femme étrangère” — risks an unintended xenophobic/immigration reading in contemporary French; concerns marital unfaithfulness, not national origin. |
| 31 | אִשַּׁת כְּסִילוּת (“Woman Folly”) | Folie (personified, capitalized) | NEW | Medium | Wisdom Personified (antithesis) | 9:13-18 | Must remain visually/structurally parallel to “la Sagesse.” |
| 32 | אֵשֶׁת חַיִל (eshet chayil) | femme de valeur / femme accomplie | NEW | High | Wisdom Personified; Practical Righteousness | 31:10-31 | Avoid traditional “femme vertueuse” — chayil denotes strength/competence, not passive moralistic virtue; deliberate departure from older French convention, to be documented. |
| 33 | גֵּאָה / גָּאוֹן (ga’avah/ga’on) | orgueil | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness | 16:18; 8:13 | Standard pride vocabulary. |
| 34 | עֲנָוָה (‘anavah) | humilité | NEW | Low | Practical Righteousness | 15:33; 22:4 | Standard humility vocabulary, antithesis of ga’avah. |
| 35 | כָּבוֹד (kavod, human honor sense) | honneur | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness | 3:9; 22:4; 25:2 | Distinguish from baseline “gloire” (reserved for divine/Christ’s radiant glory, Deity of Christ doctrine). |
| 36 | עָנִי / עֹשֶׁק (‘ani/oshek) | le pauvre / l’oppression | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness | 14:31; 19:17; 22:22; 28:27; 31:9 | Live contemporary French social-justice discourse; framing, not lexical, sensitivity. |
| 37 | זֶבַח (zevach) | le sacrifice | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness | 15:8; 21:3 | Anchor as OT ritual sacrifice; avoid unintended collision with Catholic Eucharistic “sacrifice de la messe.” |
| 38 | providence theme (Heb. no single term; cf. 16:1-9, 19:21, 21:1) | providence | REUSE (baseline Medium) | Medium | Trust in the Lord’s Providence | 3:5-6; 16:1-9; 19:21; 21:1; 21:30-31 | Direct positive continuity with baseline; retain personal/purposive sense against Enlightenment-deist “impersonal force” flattening. |
| 39 | מֶלֶךְ (melekh) | roi | NEW | Low | Practical Righteousness (governance sayings) | Chs. 16, 20, 21, 25, 29, 31 | Human monarchs; no direct collision with baseline “Royaume de Dieu,” but note the distinct referent for teaching clarity. |
| 40 | מַשָּׂא (massa) | l’oracle | NEW | Low-Medium | Fear of the Lord (adjacent) | 30:1; 31:1 | Prophetic/wisdom-oracle superscription term. |
| 41 | מוֹאזְנֵי צֶדֶק (mo’znei tzedeq) | une balance juste | NEW | Medium | Practical Righteousness | 11:1; 16:11; 20:10,23 | Economic-justice term, honest-scales antithesis to deceitful scales. |
| 42 | בֵּן (ben, “my son” address) | mon fils | NEW | Low | (Structural, all doctrines) | Throughout, esp. 3:1,11 | Must not be capitalized or treated as parallel to baseline’s Critical “Fils de Dieu” Christological title. |
| 43 | אֶשֶׁר (‘asher) | heureux | NEW | Low-Medium | Wisdom Personified; Fear of the Lord | 3:13; 8:32,34 | Beatitude-formula, distinct from an active divine-blessing pronouncement (“béni”). |
Risk Summary (This Extension)
| Tier | Count | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Critical | 7 | YHWH/l’Éternel; crainte de l’Éternel; sagesse; la Sagesse (personified); qanani (8:22); shevet/child discipline; chen/faveur |
| High | 8 | chesed; torah (parental); musar; binah/tevunah; kesil; eviyl; rasha’/méchant; tzedeq/justice (reuse, cross-curriculum flag); ishah zarah; eshet chayil (note: tzedeq counted once at #18; total High-tier entries = 8 distinct rows above) |
| Medium | 20 | See table |
| Low | 8 | See table |
| Total new/reused terms catalogued | 43 | Spanning all 31 chapters |
All Critical and High tier terms above require human theologian review per the baseline’s routing convention; Medium requires native speaker review; Low is sufficient for automated review. This glossary should be merged into a versioned translation_memory.json extension for Proverbs at the next Phase 1 checkpoint, with terms #1, #3, #6, #7, and #18 flagged for priority theologian sign-off given their direct collision potential with baseline Critical-tier Romans doctrine (Grace, Righteousness, Lordship of Christ, Sonship/Deity of Christ).
Critical Risk Terms
Son Of God
Approved rendering: Fils de Dieu
Transliteration: Fils de Dieu
Doctrine: Sonship of Christ
Rejected alternatives: envoyé de Dieu, homme divin
CRITICAL: full phrase required, conveying eternal, unique Sonship, not a divinely inspired man or messenger.
Yhwh
Approved rendering: l’Éternel
Transliteration: YHWH
Doctrine: The Divine Name of the Covenant LORD
Rejected alternatives: le Seigneur (collides with the baseline’s Critical-tier reservation of ‘Seigneur’ for Christ’s exclusive NT Lordship confession, Romans 10:9), Yahvé (TOB/Bible de Jérusalem variant; documented for reviewer awareness but not selected for this curriculum’s Segond-aligned register)
Original: יְהוָה
Category: God
The covenant, personal name of Israel’s God, occurring roughly 90 times across Proverbs. Must be visually and theologically distinguishable from the NT ‘Seigneur’ confession applied to Christ, or French readers moving between the Romans and Proverbs curricula will conflate the covenant Name with the NT title. Apply uniformly across all 31 chapters.
Fear Of The Lord
Approved rendering: la crainte de l’Éternel
Transliteration: yir’at YHWH
Doctrine: The Fear of the Lord as the Beginning of Wisdom
Rejected alternatives: respect (loses the awe/submission dimension entirely), peur (imports servile terror the Hebrew does not intend)
Original: יִרְאַת יְהוָה
Category: Wisdom
The book’s organizing thesis, structured as an inclusio (1:7 / 9:10 / 31:30). French ‘crainte’ defaults in ordinary usage toward genuine dread/apprehension (‘la crainte d’un accident’); must be consistently taught as reverential, worshipful awe that produces obedience, never softened nor sharpened. The single highest-stakes rendering decision in the entire curriculum.
Wisdom
Approved rendering: sagesse
Transliteration: chokmah
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Rejected alternatives: intelligence (secularizes toward IQ/artificial intelligence)
Original: חָכְמָה
Category: Wisdom
Skilled, God-oriented living; practical mastery of life under YHWH’s order, not mere cleverness. Collides with French Catholic devotional tradition’s ‘Sedes Sapientiae’ (Mary, Seat of Wisdom) and with secular self-help ‘sagesse’ disconnected from any divine source. Every doctrinal occurrence must retain explicit connection to ‘l’Éternel’ as wisdom’s source and referent.
Wisdom Personified
Approved rendering: la Sagesse
Transliteration: chokmah medubberet
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Original: חָכְמָה (as speaking subject)
Category: Wisdom
Wisdom depicted as a public, first-person speaking figure (1:20-33; 8:1-36; 9:1-6). Render capitalized when personified. Patristic/medieval readings apply this typologically to Christ or Mary; teaching material must clarify this is a literary personification of God’s own wise ordering of creation, and any Christological typology (e.g., 1 Corinthians 1:24,30) must be labeled explicitly as later theological reflection, never presented as the text’s own claim.
Wisdom Acquired Or Created
Approved rendering: m’a acquise / m’a engendrée
Transliteration: qanani (from qanah)
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Rejected alternatives: m’a créée (reopens the 4th-century Arian reading of Proverbs 8:22, in which the LXX’s ἔκτισέν με was cited to argue the Logos was a created being)
Original: קָנָנִי (qanani, from קָנָה qanah)
Category: Wisdom
Proverbs 8:22 was the central proof-text of the Arian controversy. Render the Hebrew primarily as ‘m’a acquise/m’a engendrée,’ not ‘m’a créée’; if the LXX rendering is cited historically, flag the controversy’s context explicitly, paralleling the baseline’s own Critical-tier caution for ‘Fils de Dieu’ and ‘incarnation.’ Requires mandatory theologian sign-off wherever taught.
Shevet Rod Of Discipline
Approved rendering: la discipline
Transliteration: shevet
Doctrine: Corporal Discipline and Child-Rearing
Rejected alternatives: le bâton (literal; pastorally and potentially legally fraught under France’s 2019 law banning ‘violences éducatives ordinaires’), les coups (literal; same risk)
Original: שֵׁבֶט
Category: Family and Discipline
A rod or staff, used figuratively and sometimes literally for parental corrective discipline (13:24; 19:18; 22:15; 23:13-14; 29:15,17). Render contextually as figurative formative correction with a standing, curriculum-wide translator’s note distinguishing the ancient idiom from any endorsement of physical punishment; requires human theologian review at every occurrence without exception.
Chen Favor
Approved rendering: faveur
Transliteration: chen
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Rejected alternatives: grâce (reserved exclusively for the baseline’s unmerited saving grace, χάρις — this rejection is the deliberate resolution protecting the Trent-vs-Reformed fence)
Original: חֵן
Category: Trust and Providence
Favor, charm, goodwill bestowed in another’s eyes (3:4; 31:30); never the technical soteriological term for unmerited saving grace. ‘Faveur’ is deliberately reused from the baseline’s own ‘grace’ alternatives_rejected list, since it is precisely the weaker, non-soteriological term needed here. Render ‘charme’ when context is specifically physical/social attractiveness (31:30).
High Risk Terms
Grace
Approved rendering: grâce
Transliteration: grâce
Doctrine: Grace
Rejected alternatives: faveur, mérite
Same word used by Catholic and Protestant traditions, but the theology differs: Catholic catechesis ties grâce to sacramental mediation (‘état de grâce’ via confession); Reformed/Segond tradition insists on grâce apart from any ecclesial mediation. Must render as wholly unmerited, per Romans’ contrast with works.
Righteousness
Approved rendering: justice
Transliteration: justice (de Dieu)
Doctrine: Salvation
Rejected alternatives: vertu, droiture
‘Justice de Dieu’ (Romans 1:17) must be read as God’s saving, gift-status righteousness, not human moral virtue. Secular French ‘justice’ primarily denotes the legal system, which risks a purely juridical, retributive reading if not clarified.
Law
Approved rendering: loi
Transliteration: loi (la Loi)
Doctrine: Fulfillment of Prophecy
Capitalize as ‘la Loi’ for Torah/Mosaic law to distinguish from civil ‘loi’. Catholic natural-law theology (loi naturelle, Thomistic) carries different theological freight than a Reformed law-gospel emphasis; keep the referent narrowly Mosaic in this curriculum.
Lord
Approved rendering: Seigneur
Transliteration: Seigneur
Doctrine: Lordship of Christ
Rejected alternatives: maître, patron
Romans 10:9 ‘Jésus est Seigneur.’ ‘Seigneur’ carries feudal-historical resonance in French (‘le seigneur du château’), risking a distant, archaic-title reading rather than a living confession of exclusive Lordship.
Eshet Chayil
Approved rendering: femme de valeur
Transliteration: eshet chayil
Doctrine: The Woman of Valor as Wisdom Exemplar
Rejected alternatives: femme vertueuse (19th-century moralistic-devotional register; reduces a dynamic, economically active figure to passive domestic piety and loses chayil’s actual strength/competence sense)
Original: אֵשֶׁת חַיִל
Category: Wisdom Exemplar
The capstone acrostic exemplar (31:10-31); chayil denotes strength, capability, valor — the same root used of mighty warriors. This is a deliberate, documented departure from older French Bible convention, justified lexically (not ideologically), to be flagged for reviewers.
Torah Parental Instruction
Approved rendering: enseignement
Transliteration: torah
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Rejected alternatives: loi (reserved for the Mosaic Law per baseline convention), la Torah (collides with contemporary French Jewish liturgical/religious usage of the capitalized term for the Written Law)
Original: תּוֹרָה
Category: Covenant and Instruction
A parent’s or sage’s personal instruction/teaching (1:8; 3:1; 4:2; 6:20; 7:2), distinct from Mosaic legislation. Deliberate divergence from the baseline’s torah=loi mapping since this is pedagogical, not Sinai, instruction.
Musar Discipline
Approved rendering: discipline
Transliteration: musar
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Original: מוּסָר
Category: Covenant and Instruction
Discipline, correction, formative instruction (1:2-3; 3:11; 13:24). French secular ‘discipline’ carries punitive/institutional/military connotations; must foreground the relational/formative sense with a mandatory clarifying gloss (‘instruction formatrice’) in teaching material at first occurrence per lesson.
Binah Tevunah
Approved rendering: discernement
Transliteration: binah / tevunah
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Rejected alternatives: intelligence (secularizes toward IQ/artificial intelligence)
Original: בִּינָה / תְּבוּנָה
Category: Wisdom
The God-oriented capacity to distinguish rightly between good and evil, wise and foolish courses (2:2-11; 3:5; 9:10).
Kesil Fool
Approved rendering: sot
Transliteration: kesil
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Rejected alternatives: insensé (reserved exclusively for eviyl)
Original: כְּסִיל
Category: Fool Taxonomy
A dull, stubborn fool capable of learning but resistant to correction out of dullness rather than malice; the book’s most frequent fool-term (esp. ch. 26). Must be kept lexically distinct from the other four fool-terms as a system, not swapped for stylistic variety.
Eviyl Fool
Approved rendering: insensé
Transliteration: eviyl
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Rejected alternatives: sot (reserved exclusively for kesil)
Original: אֱוִיל
Category: Fool Taxonomy
A morally arrogant, obstinate fool, distinct from kesil’s dullness (1:7; 10:8,14; 12:15). Part of the mandatory five-term fool taxonomy.
Tzedeq Practical Righteousness
Approved rendering: justice
Transliteration: tzedeq / tzedaqah
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Rejected alternatives: droiture (acceptable lower-stakes secondary gloss for conduct-only contexts, e.g., 11:3, 20:7, to reduce forensic-collision risk), vertu (imports an autonomous, self-achieved virtue-ethics register foreign to the text, since Proverbs’ righteousness still flows from fearing the LORD)
Original: צֶדֶק / צְדָקָה
Category: Righteousness
Right, ethical conduct and its social outworking (justice, honesty, care for the vulnerable) — behavioral/relational, not forensic. Reuses the baseline’s exact French word ‘justice’ per translation-memory mandate; see the ‘righteousness’ inherited entry above for the required cross-curriculum disambiguation note.
Rasha Wicked
Approved rendering: le méchant
Transliteration: rasha’
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Rejected alternatives: impie (reserved as the stronger contextual alternative for passages emphasizing rebellion against God specifically)
Original: רָשָׁע
Category: Righteousness
A morally culpable evildoer, a covenant-breaker before God. Everyday French ‘méchant’ is heavily softened by common usage (a ‘méchant chien’ warning sign, a merely ‘naughty’ child), risking trivialization of rasha’s moral gravity.
Chesed Steadfast Love
Approved rendering: bonté
Transliteration: chesed
Doctrine: Trust in the Lord’s Providence
Rejected alternatives: grâce (reserved exclusively for the baseline’s unmerited saving grace, χάρις)
Original: חֶסֶד
Category: Trust and Providence
Covenant loyalty and lovingkindness exceeding strict obligation (3:3 and recurring). Some French Bible traditions gloss chesed as ‘grâce’; this must be avoided to protect the baseline’s Trent-vs-Reformed grace distinction. Permit the compound gloss ‘amour fidèle’ in expository material when the covenant-loyalty dimension is the specific teaching point.
Ishah Zarah Forbidden Woman
Approved rendering: la femme adultère
Transliteration: ishah zarah / nokriah
Doctrine: Sexual Fidelity and the Forbidden Woman
Rejected alternatives: femme étrangère (risks an unintended xenophobic/immigration reading given contemporary French political discourse around ‘étranger/étrangère’; the text concerns marital unfaithfulness, not national origin)
Original: אִשָּׁה זָרָה / נָכְרִיָּה
Category: Sexual Ethics
The adulteress/seductress figure warned against in chapters 2, 5-7, 9. Prefer ‘la femme adultère’ or, contextually, ‘la femme dévoyée.‘
Medium Risk Terms
Faith
Approved rendering: foi
Transliteration: foi
Doctrine: Faith
Rejected alternatives: croyance, religion
In secular French, ‘la foi’ can drift toward generic religiosity or ‘la religion’ as an institutional label. Must specify personal trust in Christ, not adherence to a religious system.
Glory
Approved rendering: gloire
Transliteration: gloire
Doctrine: Deity of Christ
God’s radiant honor and presence. Secular ‘gloire’ (military, celebrity) risks a triumphalist, self-achieved reading rather than God’s own glory.
Providence
Approved rendering: providence
Transliteration: providence
Doctrine: Providence
Rejected alternatives: destin, hasard
18th-century Enlightenment deism used ‘la Providence’ for an impersonal benevolent order; must render Romans 8:28’s providence as the personal, purposive care of a covenant God, not a deist abstraction.
Salvation
Approved rendering: salut
Transliteration: salut
Doctrine: Salvation
Rejected alternatives: délivrance
Stable shared term. Chief risk is Catholic sacramental-economy framing (salvation mediated through Church and sacraments) versus Protestant faith-alone framing; keep both traditions’ readers in view by grounding salvation explicitly in Christ’s work, not institutional membership.
Resurrection
Approved rendering: résurrection
Transliteration: résurrection
Doctrine: Resurrection of Christ
Rejected alternatives: renaissance
No competing reincarnation folk-concept in French as there is in Hindi; the real risk is secular naturalism flattening ‘résurrection’ into a metaphor (‘renaissance’, ‘rebond’) rather than a historical, bodily event.
Covenant
Approved rendering: alliance
Transliteration: alliance
Doctrine: Davidic Covenant
Rejected alternatives: contrat
Relational covenant bond, more than a legal contract; ‘alliance’ also usefully evokes the wedding ring (l’alliance) in French, a helpful relational resonance.
God
Approved rendering: Dieu
Transliteration: Dieu
Doctrine: Deity of Christ
Secularization risk: ‘Dieu’ is used as a casual interjection (‘Mon Dieu!’) and, in academic/philosophical French, can be treated as an abstract deist concept rather than the personal, triune God of Scripture.
Amon Master Craftsman
Approved rendering: artisan
Transliteration: amon
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Original: אָמוֹן
Category: Wisdom
Genuinely ambiguous Hebrew term (8:30): ‘master craftsman/artisan’ or ‘little child/nursling.’ Render ‘artisan’ as preferred, but record the alternate ‘enfant/nourrisson’ reading in a translator’s note rather than silently resolving the ambiguity.
Woman Folly
Approved rendering: Folie
Transliteration: ishah kesilut
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Original: אִשַּׁת כְּסִילוּת / כְּסִילוּת
Category: Wisdom
Folly personified as a rival seductress-hostess, the direct literary antithesis of personified Wisdom (9:13-18). Capitalize and keep visually/structurally parallel to ‘la Sagesse’ so the book’s central antithesis survives translation.
Letz Scoffer
Approved rendering: moqueur
Transliteration: letz
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Rejected alternatives: railleur (acceptable secondary/stylistic variant, not the primary system term)
Original: לֵץ
Category: Fool Taxonomy
A mocker, actively contemptuous of correction, further along a hardened trajectory than kesil (1:22; 9:7-8; 13:1; 20:1).
Peti Simple
Approved rendering: le simple
Transliteration: peti
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Rejected alternatives: simplet (pejorative ‘simpleton’ connotation inappropriate for a redeemable addressee)
Original: פֶּתִי
Category: Fool Taxonomy
An inexperienced, morally unformed but redeemable person — Wisdom’s primary target audience (1:4,22; 9:4). Must never carry a mocking tone; the pastoral distinction from letz/kesil is doctrinally significant.
Naval Base Fool
Approved rendering: insensé impie
Transliteration: naval
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Original: נָבָל
Category: Fool Taxonomy
A base, morally depraved fool, rare in Proverbs (cf. Psalm 14:1). Rendered as a compound phrase to preserve its distinct, more morally severe register within the five-term taxonomy.
Tzaddiq Righteous Person
Approved rendering: le juste
Transliteration: tzaddiq
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Original: צַדִּיק
Category: Righteousness
The wisdom tradition’s positive moral exemplar, constant antithesis-partner to rasha’ throughout the book.
Toevah Abomination
Approved rendering: une chose abominable
Transliteration: to’evah
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Original: תּוֹעֵבָה
Category: Righteousness
That which YHWH detests; a strong covenant-violation term (6:16-19; 11:1,20; 12:22; 15:8-9; 16:5). Note cross-reference to Levitical usage for readers with low OT literacy.
Moznei Tzedeq Honest Scales
Approved rendering: une balance juste
Transliteration: mo’znei tzedeq / mirmah
Doctrine: Economic Justice and Honest Dealing
Original: מֹאזְנֵי צֶדֶק / מִרְמָה
Category: Righteousness
Honest versus deceitful scales; an economic-justice term (11:1; 16:11; 20:10,23). ‘Juste’ here retains its everyday fairness sense, not the theological ‘justice’ register.
Lev Heart
Approved rendering: cœur
Transliteration: lev
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Original: לֵב
Category: Heart and Conduct
The seat of will, intellect, and conscience, not merely emotion (3:1,3,5; 4:23; 23:26). Central term of the core passage; must convey the whole inner person, not modern French’s narrower sentimental-emotion connotation.
Derekh Way
Approved rendering: voie
Transliteration: derekh
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Original: דֶּרֶךְ
Category: Heart and Conduct
Way, road, course of life — the book’s pervasive ‘two ways’ metaphor for moral conduct. Render ‘voie/chemin’ consistently; preserve the figurative life-conduct sense against a purely literal ‘route’ reading.
Chayim Mavet Life Death
Approved rendering: vie / mort
Transliteration: chayim / mavet
Doctrine: The Contrast of the Wise and the Fool
Original: חַיִּים / מָוֶת
Category: Heart and Conduct
The wisdom tradition’s reward-antithesis: wise/righteous living leads to flourishing and longevity, foolish/wicked living to ruin and death. This-worldly covenantal flourishing, distinguished in teaching notes from the baseline’s eschatological résurrection/eternal-life vocabulary.
Batach Trust
Approved rendering: se confier en
Transliteration: batach
Doctrine: Trust in the Lord’s Providence
Rejected alternatives: la foi (reserved for the baseline’s technical saving-faith term)
Original: בָּטַח
Category: Trust and Providence
To rely on with confidence, contrasted in 3:5 with self-reliant human reasoning. Conceptually adjacent to, but distinct from, Romans’ saving faith.
Emet Faithfulness
Approved rendering: fidélité
Transliteration: emet
Doctrine: Trust in the Lord’s Providence
Original: אֱמֶת
Category: Trust and Providence
Firmness, reliability, truthfulness, paired with chesed in 3:3. Pair with ‘vérité’ where truth-content, rather than relational dependability, is primary.
Providence Theme
Approved rendering: providence
Transliteration: n/a (cf. 16:1-9, 19:21, 21:1)
Doctrine: Trust in the Lord’s Providence
Rejected alternatives: destin, hasard (inherited baseline rejections)
Original: no single lexical term; cf. 16:1-9, 19:21, 21:1, 21:30-31
Category: Trust and Providence
God’s personal, purposive governance of human plans and affairs, including the hearts of kings. Reuses the baseline’s exact term and anti-deist safeguard; French Enlightenment-era deist usage risks an impersonal-force reading.
Atzel Sluggard
Approved rendering: le paresseux
Transliteration: atzel
Doctrine: Diligence versus Sloth
Rejected alternatives: fainéant (comic/pejorative colloquial register, too mocking for doctrinal text)
Original: עָצֵל
Category: Diligence
A sluggard, avoiding productive work; the negative pole of Diligence versus Sloth (6:6-11; 10:26; 13:4; 20:4; 26:13-16). Minor harmless secondary association: ‘paresseux’ is also the everyday French name of the sloth animal.
Nirgan Talebearer
Approved rendering: le médisant
Transliteration: nirgan
Doctrine: Speech and Self-Control
Rejected alternatives: le rapporteur (acceptable secondary variant)
Original: נִרְגָּן
Category: Speech
A talebearer, whisperer, or gossip — speech that inflames strife (26:20,22). Retain the relational-harm sense, not merely idle chatter.
Kavod Human Honor
Approved rendering: honneur
Transliteration: kavod
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Rejected alternatives: gloire (reserved exclusively for divine/Christ’s radiant glory per the baseline’s Deity-of-Christ doctrine)
Original: כָּבוֹד
Category: Social Justice
Human honor or reputation, distinct from kavod’s other sense of God’s own radiant divine glory (3:9; 22:4; 25:2).
Ani Oshek Poor Oppression
Approved rendering: le pauvre
Transliteration: ani / oshek
Doctrine: Economic Justice and Honest Dealing
Original: עָנִי / עֹשֶׁק
Category: Social Justice
The poor and the oppression they suffer; calls to generosity and protection of the vulnerable (14:31; 19:17; 22:22; 28:27; 31:9). Frame as reverence-motivated generosity toward l’Éternel, not a substitute for or equivalent to secular civic welfare.
Zevach Sacrifice
Approved rendering: le sacrifice
Transliteration: zevach
Doctrine: Obedience over Ritual Sacrifice
Original: זֶבַח
Category: Worship
Ritual sacrifice contrasted with ethical obedience (15:8; 21:3,27). Must be clearly anchored as Old Testament ritual/temple sacrifice, not the Catholic Mass’s ‘sacrifice eucharistique.‘
Ga Avah Pride
Approved rendering: orgueil
Transliteration: ga’avah / ga’on
Doctrine: Pride and Humility
Original: גֵּאָה / גָּאוֹן
Category: Pride and Humility
Pride, haughtiness (8:13; 16:18). Standard, stable French pride vocabulary.
Massa Oracle
Approved rendering: l’oracle
Transliteration: massa
Doctrine: Inspiration and Transmission of Scripture
Original: מַשָּׂא
Category: Scripture
An inspired utterance; prophetic/wisdom-oracle superscription term (30:1; 31:1). Ensure ‘oracle’ is not read as generic prediction/fortune-telling but as inspired, authoritative utterance.
Shem Yhwh Name Of The Lord
Approved rendering: le nom de l’Éternel
Transliteration: shem YHWH
Doctrine: The Divine Name of the Covenant LORD
Rejected alternatives: le nom du Seigneur (reintroduces the collision with Christ’s NT title)
Original: שֵׁם יְהוָה
Category: God
The Name of the LORD as a locus of protective, personal presence (18:10, ‘a strong tower’). Reuses the yhwh rendering decision established at 3:5.
Low Risk Terms
Peace
Approved rendering: paix
Transliteration: paix
Doctrine: Peace with God
In Romans 5:1, relational peace with God through justification, not merely psychological calm.
David
Approved rendering: David
Transliteration: David
Doctrine: Davidic Covenant
Standard proper name form across all French Bible traditions.
Exhort
Approved rendering: exhorter
Transliteration: exhorter
Doctrine: Mutual Edification
Context-sensitive: use ‘supplier’ for beseeching; ‘exhorter/encourager’ for building up.
Tushiyah
Approved rendering: une sagesse efficace
Transliteration: tushiyah
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Original: תּוּשִׁיָּה
Category: Wisdom
Sound, effectual wisdom; practical competence and efficacy (3:21). Minor term, no baseline collision.
Asher Blessed
Approved rendering: heureux
Transliteration: asher
Doctrine: Wisdom Personified
Rejected alternatives: béni (implies an active divine blessing-act rather than a general beatitude of congratulation)
Original: אֶשֶׁר
Category: Wisdom
A congratulatory beatitude-formula (‘happy/fortunate is…’), 3:13; 8:32,34, distinct from an active divine blessing-pronouncement (barukh).
Shalom Peace
Approved rendering: paix
Transliteration: shalom
Doctrine: Trust in the Lord’s Providence
Original: שָׁלוֹם
Category: Trust and Providence
Wholeness, well-being, and right relational order (3:2). Reuses the baseline’s exact French term ‘paix’; see the inherited ‘peace’ entry above for the required sense-distinction note from Romans 5:1’s justification-peace.
Charuts Diligent
Approved rendering: diligent
Transliteration: charuts
Doctrine: Diligence versus Sloth
Original: חָרוּץ
Category: Diligence
Diligent, sharp, decisive in labor — positive antithesis-partner to atzel (10:4; 12:24,27; 13:4).
Lashon Peh Tongue
Approved rendering: la langue
Transliteration: lashon / peh
Doctrine: Speech and Self-Control
Original: לָשׁוֹן / פֶּה
Category: Speech
The tongue/mouth as organ of speech, metonymy for speech itself (10:19-21; 12:18-19; 15:1-4; 18:21). Lexically low-risk though doctrinal weight is High for teaching purposes given the life/death polarity in 18:21.
Anavah Humility
Approved rendering: humilité
Transliteration: anavah
Doctrine: Pride and Humility
Original: עֲנָוָה
Category: Pride and Humility
Humility, antithesis of ga’avah (15:33; 22:4). Frame as posture before God (coram Deo), not mere social modesty.
Melekh King
Approved rendering: roi
Transliteration: melekh
Doctrine: Divine Sovereignty over Rulers
Original: מֶלֶךְ
Category: Governance
A human monarch; royal-wisdom instruction genre (chs. 16, 20, 21, 25, 29, 31). No direct collision with baseline ‘Royaume de Dieu,’ but note the distinct human-ruler referent for teaching clarity.
Ben My Son Address
Approved rendering: mon fils
Transliteration: ben
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Original: בֵּן
Category: Covenant and Instruction
The direct paternal/pedagogical address used throughout the book by the father-sage to the son-disciple. Must never be capitalized or treated as parallel to the baseline’s Critical-tier ‘Fils de Dieu.‘
Shem Tov Good Name
Approved rendering: une bonne réputation
Transliteration: shem tov
Doctrine: Practical Righteousness in Daily Life
Original: שֵׁם טוֹב
Category: Social Justice
A good name or reputation, valued above material riches (22:1).
Madon Strife
Approved rendering: la querelle
Transliteration: madon
Doctrine: Speech and Self-Control
Original: מָדוֹן
Category: Speech
Strife, contention — relational/social discord, often speech-caused (17:1,14,19).
Referenced passages