NO REST FOR THE X

[Charles Doyle]

Or, "No X for the wicked."

Somebody may have pointed out this "source" in the recent
discussions; it's Isaiah 48:22, "There is no peace, saith
the Lord, unto the wicked" (Geneva Bible); and Isaiah
57:21, "There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked"
(Geneva Bible).  In both of those verses, the prophet seems
to be quoting another source (or maybe a vision).

As regularly happens when a fixed text (such as a scriptural
verse or a line from Shakespeare or Pope) passes into oral
tradition, the wording gets altered slightly.  In this
case, "peace" got changed to "rest" (although proverb
dictionaries do record versions that retain "peace").  I
don't know whether the Hebrew noun would itself admit of the
translation "rest" (it's "pax" in the Vulgate).

Jan Brunvand's Dictionary of Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases
from Books Published by Indiana Authors before 1890
(Bloomington, 1961) gives an instance of "There is no rest
for the wicked" from 1845 (p. 117).

Of course, parodying proverbs is itself an old tradition.

--Charlie

______________________________________


---- Original message ----
>Date: Sun, 21 May 2006 20:25:38 -0700
>From: "Arnold M. Zwicky" <zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU>
>Subject: NO REST FOR THE X
>To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>looks like this has become a snowclone.  in the first
hundred webhits, i get X = Clinton-obsessed, brave, woody,
query, sleepless, productive, victorious, dead, waking,
liver, victors, innocent, Talking Heads, wayfarer, workers,
cookie-maker, retiree, professors, creepy, mentally ill,
boys aboard Ericsson
>
>"query" is especially nice, given the rhyme to "weary".  and
>"innocent", the opposite of "wicked".
>
>arnold

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