6 A scoffer seeks wisdom, and doesn't find it, but knowledge comes easily to a discerning person.
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Findeth it not - literally, there is none. The successful pursuit of wisdom presupposes at least earnestness and reverence. The scoffer shuts himself out from the capacity of recognizing truth.
A scorner seeketh wisdom - I believe the scorner means, in this book, the man that despises the counsel of God; the infidel. Such may seek wisdom; but he never can find it, because he does not seek it where it is to be found; neither in the teaching of God's Spirit, nor in the revelation of his will.
A scorner seeketh wisdom, and findeth it not,.... So the scornful Greeks, that scoffed at the plainness and simplicity of the Gospel, sought natural wisdom, and thought they found it, and professed they had; but professing themselves to be wise they became fools, and with all their wisdom knew not God; and false teachers, that boasted of their evangelical wisdom, and of their great attainments in Gospel light, and derided others, were ever learning, and never came to the knowledge of the truth; and the scornful Jews, that mocked at the true Messiah, would seek him, the Wisdom of God, as they have done, and find him not; see John 7:34; Men often seek for wisdom in a wrong way and manner, in the use of wrong means; and seek it of wrong persons, and to wrong ends and purposes, and so seek amiss and find not; and some seek for wisdom, even evangelical wisdom, in a scornful manner, in a jeering sarcastic way, as the scoffing Athenians did, Acts 17:18; and find it not, nor Christ the substance of it, and so perish for lack of knowledge of him;
but knowledge is easy unto him that understandeth; the knowledge of Wisdom, or of Christ, is easy to him that has a spiritual understanding given him; the knowledge of the Gospel, and the doctrines of it, is easy to him to whom it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven; there is nothing perverse or froward in the words and doctrines of Christ; they are all plain to man whose understanding is opened by the Spirit of God; especially such as relate to the glory of Christ's person, and to the way of life and salvation by him; see Proverbs 8:8.
A scorner treats Divine things with contempt. He that feels his ignorance and unworthiness will search the Scriptures in a humble spirit.
An humble, teachable spirit succeeds in seeking (Proverbs 8:9; John 7:17; James 1:5-6).
6 In vain the scorner seeketh wisdom;
But to the man of understanding knowledge is easy.
The general sentence is concrete, composed in the common historical form. Regarding ואין, necquidquam, vid., at Proverbs 13:4. The participle נקל is here neut. for נקלּה, something which makes itself easy or light. The frivolous man, to whom truth is not a matter of conscience, and who recognises no authority, not even the Supreme, never reaches to truth notwithstanding all his searching, it remains veiled to him and far remote; but to the man of understanding, who knows that the fear of God and not estrangement from God leads to truth, knowledge is an easy matter - he enters on the right way to this end, he brings the right receptivity, brings to bear on it the clear eye, and there is fulfilled to him the saying, "To him that hath it is given."
Findeth it not - Because he doth not seek it aright. That understandeth - That is honest and pious.
*More commentary available at chapter level.