Straight Dope on Medicine: Proverbs 1

Author

Scott Ganser
July 03, 2023

The Beginning of Knowledge

1 The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel:

2 To know wisdom and instruction,
to understand words of insight,
3 to receive instruction in wise dealing,
in righteousness, justice, and equity;
4 to give prudence to the simple,


knowledge and discretion to the youth—
5 Let the wise hear and increase in learning,
and the one who understands obtain guidance,
6 to understand a proverb and a saying,
the words of the wise and their riddles.

7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge;
fools despise wisdom and instruction.

In Hebrew, the name of this book is Mishlei (מִשְלֵי). The Hebrew word mashal, from which the name Mishlei is derived, is more akin to an extended metaphor than a pithy saying.[i]

I disagree.

אני לא חולק עליך

These are plenty pithy.

Wisdom is the key word of the book and basically means “skill in living.” It is used in the Old Testament to refer to a physical skill such as tailoring, metalwork and woodwork, spinning, engraving, and designing, and warfare. Used metaphorically (as in Proverbs), it refers to the skill to live life successfully.

For those obsessed with the Hebrew, the noun translated “proverb” is derived from the root ( משל mashal) which means “likeness.” The related Niphal verb means “to be like, be comparable with,” e.g., “he is like [נמשל, nimshal] the beasts that perish” (Ps 49:12). The noun can mean an object lesson based on or using a comparison or analogy. It may be a short pithy statement (Ezek 16:44), object lesson drawn from experience (Ps 78:2-6), saying or by-word (Deut 28:37) or an oracle of future blessing (Ezek 21:1-5). Here it means an object lesson setting out courses of action. It helps one choose the course of action to follow or avoid.[ii]

It has been said that Solomon collected over 3000 proverbs. Not only did he generate them, but he gathered them wherever he could. This is the man who asked for wisdom from God. Not treasure, power or influence.  First Kings 3:5–9 recounts Solomon asking God for wisdom in his reign over Israel,

Written between 1015 and 975 B.C. It is comprised of 31 chapters. It speaks to every area of life.

Also, due to the book’s similarities with Mesopotamian and Egyptian collections of proverbs such as “The Instruction of Amenemope,” [ probably composed during the late New Kingdom (1300–1075 BCE)][iii] it’s possible that God inspired Solomon to record this section based on wise sayings he had been exposed to throughout his life.[iv]

Gilded wooden mask of Amenomope at the Grand Hall de La Villette in Paris

The Instruction of Amenemope

Introduction[v]

The beginning of the instruction about life,
The guide for well-being,
All the principles of official procedure,
The duties of the courtiers;
To know how to refute the accusation of one who made it,
And to send back a reply to the one who wrote,
To set one straight on the paths of life,
And make him prosper on earth;
To let his heart settle down in its chapel,
As one who steers him clear of evil;
To save him from the talk of others,
As one who is respected in the speech of men.

Written by the superintendent of the land, experienced in his office,
The offspring of a scribe of the Beloved Land,
The Superintendent of produce, who fixes the grain measure,
Who sets the grain tax amount for his lord,
Who registers the islands which appear as new land over the cartouche of His Majesty,
And sets up the land mark at the boundary of the arable land,
Who protects the king by his tax rolls,
And makes the Register of the Black land.
The scribe who places the divine offerings for all the gods,
The donor of land grants to the people,
The superintendent of grain who administers the food offerings,
Who supplies the storerooms with grain
A truly silent man in Tjeni in the Ta-wer nome,
One whose verdict is "acquitted" in Ipu,
The owner of a pyramid tomb on the west of Senut,
As well as the owner of a memorial chapel in Abydos,
Amenemope, the son of Kanakht,
Whose verdict is "acquitted" in the Ta-wer nome.

For his son, the youngest of his children,
The least of his family,
Initiate of the mysteries of Min-Kamutef,
Libation pourer of Wennofre,
Who introduces Horus upon the throne of his father,
His stolist in his august chapel,

...........................................................................

The seer of the Mother of God,
The inspector of the black cattle of the terrace of Min,
Who protects Min in his chapel,
Hoermmaakheru is his true name,
A child of an official of Ipu,
The son of the sistrum player of Shu and Tefnut,
The chief singer of Horus, the Lady Tawosret.

He Says: Chapter 1

Give your years and hear what is said,
Give your mind over to their interpretation:
It is profitable to put them in your heart,
But woe to him that neglects them!
Let them rest in the shrine of your insides
That they may act as a lock in your heart;

Of course, Amenomope invokes pagan gods, but seeks to impart wisdom, nonetheless. He directs it to his son.

Neo-Assyrian clay tablet of proverbs with 19 lines of bilingual inscriptioni, from the Library of Ashurbanipal, Kouyunjik, Iraq. The British Museum, London.

Ashurbanipal's collection of Sumerian and Babylonian proverbs formed part of the famous Library of Ashurbanipal (7th century BCE) established at Nineveh for the express purpose of preserving the knowledge of the past for future generations.[vi]

The oldest of the Sumerian proverbs would have been recorded from oral tradition in the Early Dynastic Period (2900-2334 BCE) in Sumerian, later preserved in Akkadian.

What is this wisdom?

Some is lost to the ages. We can’t relate. For example, "The en priest eats fish and eats leeks; but cress makes him ill" (5.6) was probably easily understood by an ancient Sumerian but has no resonance for a modern-day audience while "A house built by a righteous man is destroyed by a treacherous man" (23.4) remains relevant.

What is its purpose?

It simply compiles numerous short instructions for living an effective, righteous life on earth. Proverbs states its theme explicitly very early in the book: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge” (Proverbs 1:7). The fear of the Lord refers to our viewing Him with the respect He deserves. It means living our lives in light of what we know of Him.

God created us. He will judge us and determine our end. As Christians, we know our end because Jesus has transferred us from the Kingdom of Darkness to the Kingdom of God.

Much of the book emphasizes listening to others so that we might learn from them and apply the combined knowledge of those who have gone before us—such as parents and elders—to the unique circumstances of our own lives (1:5, 8).

Proverbs are memorable. Often, they are short and pithy.

Modern proverbs: a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

Don’t count your chickens before they hatch.

Now compare these to modern Israeli proverbs.[vii]

“A pessimist, confronted with two bad choices, chooses both.”

“If you can’t go over, you must go under.”

“In choosing a friend, go up a step.”

“A basic rule of caution: Don’t be overly cautious.”

Proverbs are laconic to remember them better.

Laconic means: brief and to the point; effectively cut short; "a crisp retort"; "a response so curt as to be almost rude";[viii]

Another reason Solomon wrote these was to guide his children, most notably his sons. He had 19 sons. What would you expect from a man who had 700 wives and 300 concubines? Solomon didn’t just collect proverbs, he loved foreign women. His wives included the daughter of Pharaoh, as well as women of Moabite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite origins (1 Kgs 7:8; 11:1). Solomon’s sons would inherit wealth and power. Correctly dealing with such would be in their best interest, as well as the nation’s.

That didn’t go so well.

Solomon’s sons had ethical issues.

For example, Solomon was succeeded by his son Rehoboam, who continued the harsh policies of his father toward the northern tribes of Israel. The northern tribes seceded and made Jeroboam, an official of Solomon who had led a rebellion against him, king.

Splitting the nation is neither good nor wise.

Wisdom isn’t exclusively reserved for Solomon. We can ask for it too.

James 1:5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.

Solomon began with some good characteristics.

1 Kings 3:3 Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David his father, only he sacrificed and made offerings at the high places.

Loving the Lord and observing the statutes is a good place to start. Under Solomon’s leadership Israel grew and prospered. That is what you would expect having wise leadership. Israel had peace, for a while, until Solomon’s heart went astray. Solomon was very sensual, and it got the better of his wisdom.

Began to commit idolatry. Just because you have wisdom, doesn’t mean you have to use it. Solomon began drifting away from the Lord, and the Lord brought Solomon problems.

2 To know wisdom and instruction,
to understand words of insight,

We should have a thirst for knowledge. When we get it, we shouldn’t just let it reside in our heads, but put it into practice. Oxford defines having wisdom as having knowledge, experience and good judgment.

Learning can occur in a couple of ways. Either you can listen to someone who knows, or you can go through the school of hard knocks. Getting bumps and bruises can be educational.

Proverbs 1 speaks of a precise knowledge, to know a subject inside and out. To be skilled at it.

People can dabble in knowledge. One saying is that “he knows enough to be dangerous.” Someone can know a bit about a subject and convince others who know nothing about the subject that they are experts. A person who has worked one day building a bridge might know more about bridges than people who have spent no days building bridges. Still, you wouldn’t put this person in charge of any bridge-building efforts of projects.

Hebrews 5:13-1413 for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. 14 But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

Growth requires that you study, listen and do it. Otherwise, you might stagnate. A young man who wants to be a mechanic might start off learning how to change brakes, spark plugs and fuses. Doesn’t mean that he knows how to change a clutch or work on the transmission. Those are advanced topics.

We are encouraged to develop. Ephesians 4:11-15 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds[a] and teachers,[b] 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood,[c] to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.  15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,

Like Solomon received supernatural wisdom, God gave the church good leadership so that they can be wise and grow. We got the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds[a] and teachers.

There are those who are unteachable. They don’t grow wise even when exposed to knowledge and wisdom. Isaiah 6

Isaiah's Commission from the Lord

8 And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here I am! Send me.” 9 And he said, “Go, and say to this people:

“‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand;
keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’
10 Make the heart of this people dull,
and their ears heavy,
and blind their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”

 

These people are described as dull, for they are given the resources they need to be successful but can’t recognize it or put it into play. Like handing a monkey a key to a cage with his favorite food in it. He wants the food, but doesn’t know how to unlock the cage, even with the key.

It is all rather foolish, which is a good segue way into our next topic:

Proverbs was a book of contention when establishing the Jewish canon.

Why?

According to Harold Wilmington, the dean of the School of the Bible at Liberty University, there were two main reasons. First, there are several passages warning about the dangers of adultery that get explicit, and second, there are several apparent contradictions. One example of the latter is the back-to-back pair of verses 26:4 and 5, which together read, "Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes."[ix]

Fools are not a monolith. There are different varieties. Just like ice cream. Proverbs is calling upon the reader to show discernment is the variety of fool and the given situation. The first fool is unteachable so engaging him is a waste of time and effort. He is dull and won’t understand the reply. The second type of fool has enough sense to be humbled by the reply.

The presence of this anti-parallel instruction indicates that a great deal of sophistication might be involved in some ventures of wisdom, which isn’t beyond the scope of instruction.

Heb “words of discernment.” The noun בִּינָה) binah, “discernment”) functions as an attributive genitive: “discerning words” or “wise sayings” (so NLT). This noun is a cognate accusative of the infinitive of the same root לְהַבִין) lÿhavin, “to discern”). The phrase “to discern words of discernment” refers to the ability (1) to distinguish truth from falsehood or (2) to understand wise sayings, such as in Proverbs.

Even the Kabbalists desire this.

A - SEPHIROTHIC TREE Sephirothic Tree, or Tree of Life, of the Cabbalists. Each of the ten Sephiroth is named in Hebrew. Reading downwards, from left to right, the names are: Kether, Binah, Hokmah, Geburah, Hesed, Tiphereth, Hod, Netsah, Yesod and Malkuth.[x]

 

But this isn’t a newsletter about witchcraft, so tear the learning from your minds. You’ll be better off.

Physical exercise might be a better use of your time. Jewish Action advises walking in the Land of Israel. The more, the better.

Misconception: Every four cubits or amot (approximately six feet) one walks in the Land of Israel is a mitzvah.

Fact: In the context of its litany of praises for the Land of Israel, the Gemara says that “one who walks four amot in the Land of Israel merits Olam Haba.” But it does not say that every four amot or every “new” four amot is a mitzvah.

There is much debate whether the benefits of walking in the Land are accorded to a visitor or only to a resident. Rabbi Amihud Levine, in a commentary to the Rabbi Sonnenfeld story (in Eleh Masa’ei, based on Pe’at Hashulchan by the Gra’s student Rabbi Yisrael of Shklov), notes that the Rambam first describes the importance of living in Eretz Yisrael and then says that “even” one who just walks in the Land—i.e., even one who does not live there—has the merit of merely walking. Rabbi Amihud notes that the Land should be no different than any other item used for a mitzvah. Just as, for example, the residents of Jerusalem in the Temple period would hold their lulav and etrog all day out of a love of the mitzvah (Sukkah 41b), one can express love for G-d’s gift of a land in which one fulfills a mitzvah by walking in or sitting on it.[xi]

Where is Wisdom?

It can be found everywhere, even in the simplest of creatures.

Proverbs 30:24-28 ESV

24 Four things on earth are small,
but they are exceedingly wise:
25 the ants are a people not strong,
yet they provide their food in the summer;
26 the rock badgers are a people not mighty,
yet they make their homes in the cliffs;
27 the locusts have no king,
yet all of them march in rank;
28 the lizard you can take in your hands,
yet it is in kings' palaces.

Sometimes you just must be observant.

Earlier Sumerians viewed nature with a critical eye as well.

Many proverbs feature oxen, donkeys and, especially, dogs personifying various aspects of life and clarified by the context of a line. Sometimes the dog is clearly a personification of 'hunger' or of 'laziness' or 'fate' – and sometimes the dog is just a dog, as in this proverb which is a simple observation on how dogs behave: "The smith's dog could not overturn the anvil; he therefore overturned the waterpot instead" (Samuel Noah Kramer, 121).[i]

The oldest of the Sumerian proverbs would have been recorded from oral tradition in the Early Dynastic Period (2900-2334 BCE) in Sumerian, later preserved in Akkadian, while the Babylonian proverbs would date from the Old Babylonian Period (2000-1600 BCE) and later.

The following passages are taken from The Literature of Ancient Sumer, translated by Jeremy Black et al., and from The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature.

1.8. "Though I still have bread left over, I will eat your bread!" Will this endear a man to the household of his friend?

1.11. You don't speak of that which you have found. You speak only of what you have lost.

1.31. One does not return borrowed bread.

1.55. If you're poor, you're better dead than alive; if you've got bread, you can't afford salt; if you've got salt, you can't afford bread.

1.91. My girlfriend's heart is a heart made for me.

2.14. Fate is a dog walking always behind a man.

2.71. Tell a lie and then tell the truth; it will be heard as a lie.

2.81. One does not marry a three-year-old wife as a donkey does.

2.121. The good thing is to find it; the bad thing is to lose it.

5.6. The en priest easts fish and eats leeks; but cress makes him ill.

5.67. No one walks for a second time at the place where a lion has eaten a man.

5.78. A dog said to his master: "If my pleasure is of no importance to you, then my loss should not be either."

5.97. A dog which is played with turns into a puppy.

5.112. He is a dog without a tail.

7.8. The lord cursed Unug, but he himself was cursed by the lady of Inanna.

7.14. The sheepshearer is himself dressed in dirty rags.

7.31. He gathered everything for himself but had to slaughter his pig.

7.79. The sun never leaves my heart, which surpasses a garden.

How to Interpret Proverbs: 5 Principles to Guide Your Study[xii]

  1. Interpret each proverb dependent on God's assistance. ...

To interpret the contents of Proverbs without whole-hearted reliance upon God to grant understanding is to ignore the very motto of the book— “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge” (1:7, NASB)—and its own explicit instructions for learning— “Trust the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding” (3:5).

  1. Study the proverb's historical and cultural context. ...

Solomon spoke his wisdom into a time and culture that was very different from ours. He employed analogies and word pictures that were ordinary to his immediate audience but alien to our technological age. He speaks of mangers and oxen. The dogs of his day were wild scavengers, not household pets. He describes commerce in terms of scales and weights. For him, the roofs of houses were flat and the highest human authority in the land was a king.

  1. Examine the proverb's literary context. ...

Readers typically recognize that the discourse proverbs must be interpreted as whole units. Their individual statements cannot be wrenched out of context and treated as stand-alone aphorisms. Therefore, the boundaries of these instructional proverbs need to be carefully determined and everything therein treated as interdependent.

“Revelatory context” here refers specifically to antecedent revelation in particular—the special revelation God gave prior to the time of Solomon. Since God revealed his knowledge progressively through history, this antecedent body of inspired literature provides the informing theology to Proverbs’ contents.[6] Since it is assumed in the text, it must not be neglected by the reader.

As Thomas Long writes, “To listen to a proverb without at the same time hearing its covenantal background is to pry a gem from its setting.”[7] Thus, any good interpreter will consider how the proverb he is interpreting is undergirded by antecedent revelation. Considering earlier, related texts will prove invaluable in the interpretation of the proverb itself.

  1. Consider how the proverb incorporates general revelation. ...

The book of Proverbs shows that creation itself communicates wisdom. Foundational life principles can be drawn from ants, badgers, locusts, and lizards (Prov 6:6–11; 30:24–28). The seasons themselves teach that the time of sowing must precede the time of reaping—and thus, that enjoying the reward must come after the season of diligent labor. All the analogies and word-pictures drawn from the natural world prove that there is a moral order evident in creation that points to the only true God—the God of Israel—and displays his moral character, wisdom, and power.

  1. Analyze the proverb's internal structure.

Proverbs’ wisdom sayings are generally stated in four kinds of parallel statements:

Synonymous parallelism, where the lines of the proverb communicate the same idea but with different terminology in each line (e.g., 16:18).

Antithetic parallelism, where the lines of the proverb communicate a contrast that demonstrates the black-and-white world of biblical wisdom (e.g., 10:12).

Emblematic parallelism, where both lines of the proverb communicate the same idea, but one line is figurative and the other is literal (e.g., 25:14).

Synthetic parallelism, a less direct form of parallelism where the second line advances the idea of the first line (e.g., 20:4).