The verses in question:

12) To save you from the way of evil, from a person who speaks hypocritically, 13)Who leave the paths of righteousness to walk in the ways of darkness, 14)Who are happy to commit evil, and delight in the hypocrisies of evil, 15) Who are crooked in their ways and perverse in their paths, 16)To save you from a strange woman, from a foreign woman who has smoothed her words, 17) Who leaves the lord of her youth, and forgets her covenant with her God, 18) For her house sinks to the ground, and her paths to the netherworld. 19) All that go to her shall not return, and will not achieve the paths of life, 20) So that you can go in the paths of good men, and adhere to the ways of righteousness.

Before turning to our panel of commentators, we should review the simple sense of the various verses. Mishlei is continuing to explain the value in following the advice of this work, only now by explaining to us the perils from which we will be saved by so doing. First, there are evil men, who speak falsely and hypocritically, and then (beginning in verse 16, there is an evil woman. For the woman, false speech wasn’t the focus as much as "smooth" (probably seductive) speech. In addition, her evil consists primarily of her betrayal of her own husband, and the difficulty of extricating oneself from such a woman once involved with her. As we turn to our commentators, then, one area they might choose to address is the two different types of evil that Mishlei seems to have addressed.

Rashi interprets the male figure of evil in these verses as apikorsim, heretics, who try to lure people away from the Torah, and to convert it into something evil. Lest we miss the reference to Christianity (which, from a Jewish point of view, subverted the Torah in favor of another system) , Rashi interprets the female character in these verses as the Church, which lures people to heresy. To support his view, Rashi notes that the verse cannot mean the woman figure literally, since why would Mishlei single out one sin (sexual immorality) over others? Surprisingly, Rashi seems to focus here on faith issues as central to one’s observance of Judaism. While that might not surprise us with a figure such as Rambam, Rashi’s usual focus on Torah and mitsvot ordinarily gives the sense that he cared most about practical issues in one’s Jewish observance. His assumptions here belie that belief, and remind us that the problem of heresy was very much alive for Rashi as well.

Rasag takes the man and woman more literally, in that he thinks each gender is more likely to lure us to sin in specific ways. Men are more likely to create world-views, philosophies, ideas, or cultures that assert falsehoods about the world, the ramifications of which take people away from the proper paths. In Rasag’s reading, that is the meaning of the references to hypocrisy and falsehood in the first several verses. The prime example Rasag uses is Pharoah, who repeatedly told the Jews they could leave if they fulfilled certain conditions, and then changed his mind to once again refuse their request.

For the female side of the equation, Rasag points out that the verse cannot mean that men should avoid women generally, since God has set up a world in which the continuity of the species vitally needs women (as well as men, of course). Our search, then, is not for a woman-less existence, it is for a good woman. Someone who allows himself to be lured by an evil woman—and here, the fact of her being already married to someone else and nevertheless seducing a man other than her husband suffices to define her as evil—will spend his days thinking he is happy. In actuality, however, he will end up dying, having squandered his opportunities to repent. It does not seem that Rasag sees the verse as concerned with the specific sin to which this woman lures a man, since, as Rashi noted, that would raise the question of why this capital crime is singled out. Rather, becoming ensnared by such a woman will create a false sense of happiness and contentment for the man, hiding from him his need to repent until it is too late. Just like with the verses about the man, then, Rasag sees the woman as (in her own way) leading her target on a path that will deny him a broad set of spiritual values, not just one specific one.

FOR FURTHER CONSIDERATION: Rasag’s view of women is worth considering further in two ways. First, much of Jewish tradition looked down on women as inherently inferior to men, and primarily viewed marriage as a concession to human weakness, to the need to propagate, and so on. The role of the religious husband in that picture was to make sure not to allow the wife to distract him too much from his more important religious endeavors. Rasag’s assumption that there must be some value in pairing up with a member of the opposite sex, since God had decided that that was the way for us to propagate puts a new spin on marriage and relationships that are worth considering, absorbing, and applying to our own lives.

Second, Rasag’s worry that a man who finds a woman he enjoys being with will allow that satisfaction to blind him to a need to repent seems more broadly applicable to many different kinds of satisfactions. Presumably, a good woman will be one who does not blind her husband (or herself) to the need for repentance and religious growth, but it is not only adulterous women (or men) who are blinded to that need. Marital bliss, in certain situations, and certainly physical and monetary comfort (even when legitimately attained), can often lull us into a false sense of religious health and security. The verses focus on people who mislead us, but Rasag’s understanding of the dangers of the adulterous woman applies to other types of religious sedatives as well.

Like Rasag, Gra differentiates between a male and female lure, only he assumes that male and female refer to different types of evil inclination (and this has Kabbalistic roots that we need not elaborate). The male evil inclination he calls the ka`asani, the angry inclination, that which would lead to active crimes, such as robbery and murder. Within this category of sin, there are those who are straightforward about their evil and others who hide it behind sweet talk. Such talk can include bad advice—so that it seems that you are helping the person—or the pretense that you are friends with a person, when you are actually trying to bring about their downfall in some way.

In verse 13, Mishlei refers to those who leave the paths of righteousness to walk in the ways of darkness. We have once before seen the contrast between paths (which Gra takes to mean a way that is little-trodden) and ways (orkhot vs. derakhim, the latter being broadly used). In the previous example, Gra saw those who perform mitsvot as going on the broader path, while those who study Torah were on the narrower path. Here, he sees the contrast as being between the ways of righteousness (to which few bother to adhere) and the paths of evil, which are more commonly used.

Putting the two together, we get an interesting picture of the world, from Gra’s perspective. The broad path that most people take is that of evil; to adhere to righteousness already separates a person from the general pack. And yet, within that smaller group, there is yet another smaller group that actually involves itself in Torah study. I only note this because it gives a sense of how Gra viewed people’s relation to Torah study in his time—few even cared about righteousness, and of those few, still fewer dedicated themselves to the study of Torah.

Next week, be"H, we will finish this group of verses and the last two in the chapter.

Shabbat Shalom.