Psal. 41. 7.
Isai. 26. 16.
11. There is also another word which is used in divers places, which is לָחַשׁ mussitavit, he hath muttered, or murmured, and is taken generally for any kind of murmuring for any cause whatsoever, as in this place, But when David saw that his servants whispered. And again, All that hate me, whisper together against me. And in another place: Fuderunt submissam orationem, a low whispering prayer. In which places it is taken for any kind of low speaking, whispering or muttering. Of this we may observe these things.
1. Sometimes by a Metonymie it is taken for a low and modest speech, the art of Oratory, or Eloquence, as Isaiah 3. 3. & intelligentem vel peritum eloquentiæ, and sometime for an ear-ring inauris, as in the 20. verse of the same Chapter.
Psal. 58. 6.
2. It is also ascribed unto Charmers or Inchanters as in the Psalm, That doth not hearken unto the voice of the charmers: Where it is plain that all Charmers were whisperers and mutterers, but not on the contrary, that all whisperers or mutterers are Charmers.
Eccles. 10. 11.
3. And whereas our English translation readeth it, Surely the serpent will bite without inchantment, and a babler is no better; It may as well be read, as Arias Montanus translates it, Si mordeat serpens in non susurro, vel absq: susurro, If the Serpent bite without hissing, or sibilation. And Schindlerus to the same purpose: Si mordebit serpens absq; incantatione, vel murmure, id est sibilo. And so Avenarius: Si mordeat serpens absq; susurratione, id est absq; sibilo. And though Tremellius, and the whole troop of Translators do render it, as our English Translators do, yet that will not make sense: for it would inferr that as a Serpent will bite except it be charmed, so will a babler do also. But who ever heard of a bablers being charmed? So that truly considered that cannot be the sense of the place.
But if it be taken exactly according to the Hebrew, then the sense runs thus, If the Serpent bite without, or in not hissing, and excellency is not to him that hath a tongue; that is, The Serpent doth hurt with his biting, without making a noise with his tongue; but a babler doth make a noise, but effecteth nothing, or speaketh to no purpose.
Jerem. 8. 17.