Proverbs 8:23

“I was set up--ordained, or inaugurated (Psa 2:6). The other terms carry out the idea of the earliest antiquity, and illustrate it by the details of creation [Pro 8:24-29].”

“I was set up - Rather, “I was anointed” (compare Psalms 2:6 margin: 2 Chronicles 28:15). The image is that of Wisdom anointed, as at her birth, with “the oil of gladness.” Or ever the earth was - literally, “from the times before the earth.” return to 'Top of Page'”

“Set up - Heb. anointed, constituted to be the person by whom the Father resolved to do all his works, to create, to uphold and govern and judge, to redeem and save the world. From the beginning - Before which, there was nothing but a vast eternity. The earth - Which together with the heaven, was the first of God's visible works. Proverbs 8:24”

“Gen 1:26; Psa 2:6; Mic 5:2; Joh 17:24; Eph 1:10, Eph 1:11; Jo1 1:1, Jo1 1:2 Proverbs 8:24”

“A designation of the When? expressed first by מאז ( Isa 48:8, cf. Isa 40:21), is further unfolded: "From everlasting was I set up, From the beginning, from the foundations of the earth." That נסּכתּי cannot be translated: I was anointed = consecrated, vid., at Psa 2:6. But the translation also: I was woven = wrought (Hitzig, Ewald, and previously one of the Greeks, ἐδιάσθην), does not commend itself, for רקּם ( Psa 139:15), used of the embryo, lies far from the metaphorical sense in which נסך = Arab. nasaj, texere, would here be translated of the origin of a person, and even of such a spiritual being as Wisdom; נסדתּי, as the lxx reads (ἐθεμελιωσέ με), is not once used of such. Rightly…”