Old Testament

Proverbs

Proverbs is a collection of wise sayings and teaching speeches meant to train young people, and anyone willing to learn, to live skillfully in God's world. It opens with a father's urgent lessons and the call of Wisdom personified as a woman, moves into hundreds of short sayings about work, speech, money, family, friendship and justice, and closes with a portrait of a woman of strength. It belongs in the Bible because it insists that ordinary life is lived before God, and that 'the fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge' ().

Author: The book names Solomon as the source of its main collections (1:1; 10:1; 25:1), and 1 Kings 4:32 says he spoke three thousand proverbs. It also includes 'the words of the wise' (22:17; 24:23), sayings copied by the men of Hezekiah (25:1), and the words of Agur (30:1) and of King Lemuel's mother (31:1).
Audience: First a son being taught by his parents (1:8), and more widely the 'simple,' the young and inexperienced who can still go either way (1:4). The royal setting of many sayings suggests use in training those who would serve at court.
When: Solomon reigned in the tenth century BC. Hezekiah's scribes worked around 700 BC, so the book reached its final form at that time or later; the exact date of the last editing is unknown.
Where: Jerusalem and the royal court of Judah are the main setting, but the book also draws on wisdom from beyond Israel, such as Agur and Lemuel, and many scholars note close parallels between 22:17–24:22 and an Egyptian teaching text, the Instruction of Amenemope.
Genre: Proverbs is wisdom literature. Chapters 1–9 are longer speeches and poems; chapters 10–29 are mostly two-line sayings that compare or contrast; chapters 30–31 add numbered sayings and an acrostic poem. A proverb states how life generally works, not a promise that holds in every case, and some sayings are meant to be held together, as when 26:4 and 26:5 give opposite advice about answering a fool. Read slowly, a few sayings at a time, and let them sharpen judgment rather than serve as rules to apply mechanically.

Shape of the book

A Father's Teaching and Wisdom's Call · ch 1–9A prologue states the book's purpose and motto; a father warns his son against violent gangs and the seductive woman, and Wisdom calls in the streets, describes her place at creation, and sets her banquet against Folly's.
The Proverbs of Solomon · ch 10–21The longest collection, mostly single two-line sayings: contrasts between the righteous and the wicked in chapters 10–15, then more varied sayings on the LORD's rule, kings, speech and the heart. It runs on to 22:16.
The End of Solomon's Collection and the Words of the Wise · ch 22–24Solomon's sayings close at 22:16; from 22:17 a teacher gives longer commands about protecting the poor, table manners at court, wealth that flies away, drunkenness and envy, with a short appendix in 24:23–34.
Solomon's Proverbs Copied by Hezekiah's Men · ch 25–29A second Solomonic collection, edited by scribes of King Hezekiah, with many vivid comparisons and portraits of the fool, the sluggard and the gossip.
The Words of Agur · ch 30An otherwise unknown sage confesses his limits, asks who has ascended to heaven, prays for neither poverty nor riches, and offers numbered sayings drawn from nature and society.
Lemuel's Mother and the Woman of Strength · ch 31A queen mother charges her son to defend the voiceless, and an alphabetic poem praises a capable woman who fears the LORD, closing the book where it began.

Themes

The Fear of the LORD. The book's motto stands at its start and returns at key points (; ; ; ). Reverent awe and trust toward Israel's covenant God is not one topic among many but the ground from which all true wisdom grows. Even practical advice is given 'so that your trust may be in the LORD' ().
Two Ways. Proverbs sets every choice on one of two paths: wisdom or folly, righteousness or wickedness, life or death (; ). Two women call from their houses, Wisdom and Folly, each offering a meal (, 13–18). The young reader must decide whose house to enter.
Speech. More sayings deal with the tongue than with almost any other subject. Words can heal or wound, calm anger or stir it, build up or destroy: 'Life and death are in the power of the tongue' (). The wise listen before answering, say little, and speak truth (; ; ).
Work, Wealth and the Poor. Diligence is praised and laziness mocked (; ), yet wealth is never the highest good (; ). Dishonest scales are hateful to the LORD (), and oppressing the poor insults their Maker while kindness to the needy honors Him (; ).
Wisdom in Ordinary Life. Proverbs speaks of friends and neighbors, marriage and parenting, kings and courts, ants and badgers. It shows that God's order runs through the whole of daily life, so that faithfulness is learned in the household, the marketplace and the city gate.

Where Christ is

In its first setting, Wisdom in Proverbs is a poetic picture of God's own wisdom, not a second divine person. The New Testament, though, draws on this very language when it speaks of the Son: Christ is the wisdom of God, through whom all things were made and in whom all the treasures of wisdom are hidden. Jesus is also the truly wise Son who grew in wisdom and is 'greater than Solomon' ().

Wisdom at Creation and the Son. Fulfillment of a pattern. Wisdom says she was beside the LORD when He made the world (). The New Testament says the Son was with God in the beginning, that all things were made through Him, and that He is the power and wisdom of God. The verb in is disputed and should not be pressed as a statement that the Son was created. (; ; ; ; ; )
Greater Than Solomon. Fulfillment. Solomon's wisdom drew the queen of Sheba from far away, and Jesus says something greater than Solomon is here. Luke shows the boy Jesus growing in wisdom and favor with God and man, the very gifts Proverbs promises to the son who listens. (; ; ; ; )
Wisdom's Banquet. Echo. Wisdom prepares a feast and sends servants to call the simple to eat and live (). Jesus tells of a host who sends servants to bring in the poor to his banquet, offers Himself as the bread of life, and says wisdom is shown right by her deeds. (; ; ; )
Who Has Gone Up to Heaven and Come Down?. Echo. Agur asks who has ascended to heaven and come down, and what is the name of God's son (). In context the question presses human ignorance; Jesus speaks of Himself as the one who came down from heaven, the Son of Man. (; )
The Father's Discipline. New Testament use. Hebrews quotes to explain that God disciplines believers as sons, right after pointing to Jesus who endured the cross. James and Peter both quote , that God gives grace to the humble. (; ; ; ; )

Voices

Athanasius. Against the Arians, who used to call the Son a creature, he argued that the verse does not describe the Son's eternal being but refers to His becoming man for our salvation.

Reading well, key terms and common misreadings

Read it well

Begin with 1:1–7, which tells you how to use the whole book, and keep the motto of 1:7 in view throughout.
Read chapters 1–9 as the door into the rest. They teach whose voice to trust before the short sayings show what wisdom looks like day to day.
Treat proverbs as true generalizations, not guarantees. Sayings such as 22:6 describe how things usually go; Job and Ecclesiastes show the exceptions.
Read sayings in clusters and by topic. Gathering what Proverbs says about the tongue, money or friendship across chapters gives a fuller picture than any single verse.
Notice the frame of women at the start and end: Wisdom calling in the streets (chapters 1–9) and the woman of strength who fears the LORD (31:10–31).

Key terms

Proverb מָשָׁל (mashal) — Broader than a one-line saying: a comparison, parable or teaching speech. It covers both the long poems of chapters 1–9 and the short sayings that follow (1:1, 6).
Wisdom חָכְמָה (chokmah) — Skill in living rightly in God's world, the ability to choose well in real situations. In chapters 1–9 it is personified as a woman who calls to all (1:20; 8:1).
Fear of the LORD יִרְאַת יְהוָה (yirat YHWH) — Reverent awe, trust and submission toward Israel's covenant God. It is the beginning, the first principle, of knowledge and wisdom (1:7; 9:10).
Simple פֶּתִי (peti) — The naive or inexperienced person, open to any influence. The book is written for them (1:4), and both Wisdom and Folly call to them (9:4, 16).
Fool כְּסִיל (kesil) — Not someone of low intelligence but one who rejects correction and trusts his own opinions (12:15; 18:2). Proverbs uses several words for different shades of folly.
Woman of strength אֵשֶׁת חַיִל (eshet chayil) — The 'wife of noble character' of 31:10, literally a woman of strength or worth. Boaz uses the same phrase of Ruth (Ruth 3:11).

Easy to misread

Treating proverbs as promises. 'Train up a child in the way he should go' (22:6) states a wise pattern, not a guarantee that every child of godly parents will believe. Pressing such sayings as promises leads to false guilt or false confidence.
Reading Proverbs as a recipe for wealth and success. The book praises hard work, but it also says a little with the fear of the LORD is better than great treasure with turmoil (15:16) and that riches fly away (23:5).
Using 8:22 to argue that the Son of God was created. Arius made this argument in the fourth century and was answered by Athanasius and others. The passage is poetry personifying God's wisdom, and the Hebrew verb is disputed.
Turning the woman of chapter 31 into a checklist no one can meet. The poem praises wisdom made concrete in work, trade, generosity and speech, crowned by the fear of the LORD (31:30), as the book's closing picture of wisdom lived out.

Further reading: David Guzik, Enduring Word · Matthew Henry on CCEL · BibleProject overview video