On the surface of it, these four proverbs don’t seem to have a common thread. All of them land squarely in the category of the blindingly obvious: of course it’s unfair to punish the innocent! Probably they weren’t really intended to be read as a unit, as this section of Proverbs is really a list of Solomon’s wisdom aphorisms. So why does he remind us of things we already know?
Justice is, most often, inconvenient.
Read More justice, greed, poor“Better to keep your mouth shut, and be thought a fool,” goes the old down-home version of these two proverbs, “than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”
I’ve known a few truly wise people, and a handful of brilliant scholars (which may be two quite different things!). I’ve been impressed with the realization that, in a room full of people with much to say, the wise and the brilliant are almost invariably the last to speak.
Read More silence, wisdom, listeningIt would appear that being focused on your own agenda and doing things your own way are hallmarks of foolishness, as far as God is concerned. Strangely, many aspects of our contemporary society laud exactly that kind of approach. We value take-charge people who are certain that their way is the only way. A great many of our “heroes” on the screen or field of competition are iconoclasts who march only to their own internal drummer.
Read More celebrities, individualism, source of inspirationEvery sensible person agrees that gossip is a bad thing. You don’t even have to be especially wise to come to that conclusion! It’s rarely completely truthful, almost always skewed and sometimes utterly false. Gossip always delights in whatever is salacious, demeaning, vulgar. Good news about someone is never called gossip – the news of a person’s success or promotion might be a rumor, if we are not certain of it, but gossip embellishes nasty little tales of failure or degradation or corrupt behavior, making the most of the worst.
Read More inside track, truth, gossipI know a lot of people who others characterize as lazy: homeless men and women, who sit on the sidewalk and beg. But they’re not actually lazy – they spend more hours each day just trying to survive than most people do at their jobs. And if you think panhandling is easy, just try squatting on the concrete with your hat out until you have enough to buy food, pay the rent, clothe yourself and so on.
Read More discipline, lazinessThe towers we are most familiar with are office buildings that soar much higher than any biblical writer could have imagined – and are not, as we have seen to our sorrow, strongholds of safety.
But dotted here and there along the St. Lawrence River and the eastern seaboard of Canada and the United States are a handful of squat, round military towers made of stone.
Read More security, money, safetyAgain, this passage has five separate sayings which were not intended to present a single cohesive thought. And when you look at the sayings individually, you might be forgiven for thinking, “How did Solomon get such a reputation for wisdom?
It’s not that these proverbs aren’t wise, per se – it’s just that they’re so obvious.
Read More practical wisdom, actionWhat a selfish, vengeful, adversarial world we live in!
We are so determined to demand our rights, prove our point, get what’s ours, or make sure that the person who has harmed us is punished that lawyers need never fear going hungry.
Who’s right? Who’s wrong? Who’s to blame? And especially, who is going to pay?
Read More mercy, peace, reconciliation“From the fruit of his mouth a man’s stomach is filled” is how one version expresses the first part of verse 20.
What a fascinating and counter-intuitive thought! We might normally expect that our bellies are filled by what goes into them, not by what comes out – that what we say is the product, or fruit, of ideas and influences we have ingested. And, of course, that is true enough, but these two sayings playfully flip the obvious idea on its head.
Read More words, nutrition, foodIf there has been one person in all of history who should have a clear understanding of the value of a wife, it would have to have been Solomon—after all, he famously had hundreds of them!
Although it’s frankly a little hard to imagine him sustaining a genuine intimacy with one woman over many years, this proverb indicates that he must somehow have learned a thing or two about real relationship.
Read More joy, relationship, marriage, appréciation