Proverbs 19:13 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

The contentions of a wife, &c.— The author of the Observations remarks, that it is no wonder the easterns sleep on the tops of houses only in summer, since, however agreeable their arbours and wicker-work closets may be in the dry part of the year, they must be very disagreeable in the wet, and they that should then lodge in them, would be exposed to a continual dropping. To be limited consequently to such a place, and to have no other apartment to live in, must be very incommoding. To such circumstances then, probably, it is that Solomon alludes, when he saith, It is better to dwell in a corner of the house-top, than with a brawling woman in a wide house; (chap. Proverbs 21:9 and Proverbs 25:24.) a corner, covered with boughs or rushes, and made into a little arbour, in which they used to sleep, in summer, but which must have been a very incommodious place, to have made an intire dwelling. To the same allusion belong those other expressions, that speak of the contentions of a wife being like a continual dropping; as in the present passage, and chap. Proverbs 27:15. Put together, they amount to this: "It is better to have no other habitation than an arbour on the house-top, and be there exposed to the wet of winter, which is oftentimes of several days continuance, than to dwell in a wide and commodious house with a brawling woman; for her contentions are a continual dropping; and, wide as the house may be, you will not be able to avoid them, and get out of their reach." Nor will it be any objection to this observation, if it should be affirmed, that the boughs and wicker-work closets are not made as the corners of their parapet-walls, but on the middle of their roofs, as very probable they are, the better to receive the fresh air; since the word פנה pinnah, translated corner, does not only signify a place where two walls join, but a tower also; as appears from Zephaniah 1:16 and consequently may import such a sort of arbour, as well as one formed by means of two joining walls.