Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Proverbs 96. The proverb today is don't throw the baby

  • out with the bath water. Okay. Anyway, let's take a look at the note here. If someone

  • throws the baby out with the bath water he or she discards something valuable

  • along with something undesirable. So while you're getting rid of something

  • undesirable, you get rid of something good at the same time. All right. So let's

  • continue here. The proverb is German in origin and dates back to the early 1500s.

  • So it goes way back. It's been around a long time. Let's continue here. Some

  • people claim the origin of this proverb was when people shared bath water. So you

  • know going back in the early 1500s water was more scarce. So that's what they

  • think that that was the possibility and it was customary for the father to bathe

  • first and it went down in order to the baby, one at a time. So you know the

  • father then the mother and then you know if there were other children in between

  • and finally it went down to the baby. By the time the baby was bathed the water was

  • so dirty that the baby may be unseen and possibly thrown out with the bath water.

  • However there are others who claim this is nonsense. It's a nonsense story. Maybe

  • this is not really true. I don't know. In some ways maybe I hope it's not too.

  • Because you know, usually you want to take care of the baby. You think the baby

  • might be more fragile or more susceptible to getting bacteria or

  • disease. So maybe you might not want to wash the baby last in the really dirty

  • muddy water. That may not really be a good idea. But , but who knows what they

  • did in the 1500s or 1600s. Maybe that's the way they thought. Okay. Anyway, Let's

  • continue here. The earliest cited reference So the first time they can

  • actually find this comes from Thomas Murner's Narrenbeschworung , basically that's

  • in German which means appeal to fools from 1512. So that's the first, that's the

  • earliest they can go back to find it. Let's just give one example of how we

  • may use it today. It is not necessary to cancel the project. There are still some

  • good parts of it that can be saved. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. So

  • that's typically how we might use it Anyway, I hope you got it. I hope you

  • enjoyed it. Thank you for your time. Bye- bye.

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Proverbs 96. The proverb today is don't throw the baby

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it