Proverbs

Proverbs A (Proverbs 1:1–9:18)

Whereas Proverbs B and C are mostly one-verse sayings, Proverbs A is a series of talks, typically ten or twenty verses, taking the form of exhortations by a father and mother to their offspring about living a wise life. The process whereby Proverbs A came into existence would thus be different from that of Proverbs B or C. We don’t know whether it transcribes actual teaching that parents or teachers gave their offspring or students or whether that is a figure of speech, nor do we know how the material was used, as we don’t know whether the attribution of comparable Egyptian works to a pharaoh or other famous figure is figurative or literal. Perhaps individual units reflect the work of parents or mentors while potentially functioning as outline notes for talks that someone might give. The talks work with similar assumptions and language, but that need not suggest they all derive from the same person, and the authors could have been men or women. Perhaps a number of mentors shared drafts in a writers room and modified them there, and eventually the chair of the writers room assembled them into the sequence that we have, as a lead-in to Proverbs B, and also composed the introduction, 1:1–7. While Proverbs A might once have stood alone, within Proverbs it provides readers with a framework for reading the rest of the book, and it interacts with it. Proverbs B and C thus give specifics to the wisdom that Proverbs A encourages; Proverbs A motivates people to take seriously the insight and exhortations expressed in Proverbs B and C. It introduces the key character types who will continue to be prominent there (notably the wise and the faithful, and their opposites), the pedagogical and moral vision with which it wants readers to study the book, and the theology of Yahweh’s sovereignty and wisdom with which it wants readers to approach it.¹

Chapter 1 forms an introduction to Proverbs A, and chapter 8 brings the work to a climax. On average each chapter in printed Bibles corresponds to three units in MT: what were originally shorter units have thus been assembled so that several make up a longer one, but the resultant chapter arrangement in Proverbs A does generally suggest meaningful divisions in the text.

1. See Arthur Jan Keefer, Proverbs 1–9 as an Introduction to the Book of Proverbs, LHBOTS 701 (London: T&T Clark, 2020).

PROVERBS 1:1–33

WISDOM, ETHICS, THEOLOGY, SPIRITUALITY

This opening chapter brings together three originally independent units (separate petukhot in MT). The first introduces in general terms wisdom, discipline, knowledge, faithfulness, and awe for Yahweh on one hand, and the naïve, the cynical or satirical, and the dimwitted on the other. Through the juxtaposition of the three units, the second and third give concrete illustrations of what those priorities look like and why they are necessary in light of the temptation to identify with the naïve, the cynical, and the dimwitted.

1:1–7 · INTRODUCING WISDOM

¹ Verses of Solomon ben David, king of Israel:

² For getting to know wisdom and discipline,

for gaining discernment into sayings that are discerning,

³ For receiving discipline that is judicious—

faithfulness in the exercise of authority, and honesty;

⁴ For giving naïve people smartness,

someone young knowledge and shrewdness—

⁵ Someone wise is to listen and add to what they have received,

and someone discerning will gain expertise;

⁶ For gaining discernment into verse and satire,

the words of wise people and their enigmas—

⁷ Awe for Yahweh is the beginning of knowledge,

whereas idiots despise wisdom and discipline.

After a line giving the work its title (v. 1), a prologue introduces the book as a work concerned with education or knowledge that relates to questions about ethics (vv. 2–3), maturity (vv. 4–5), and spirituality (vv. 6–7). While it would claim the attention of teachers in this connection,¹ indirectly it invites attention from anyone, including both young and mature (vv. 4–5), and it presents an initial profile of virtues for the book’s readers.² It compares and contrasts with the introduction to Jeremiah, which is of similar length, expands on the origin of the messages that will follow, refers to Yahweh’s word, and details the messages’ historical context. This introduction to Proverbs focuses on the purpose of its material (no other biblical book begins with as clear a statement of purpose),³ then comes to its relationship to Yahweh near the end. The opening lines in both Jeremiah and Proverbs implicitly urge attentiveness to what follows. Proverbs will fulfill this prologue’s promise.⁴

Its individual words and phrases are mostly clear, but how they fit together is a trickier question. The nearest First Testament parallel for the sequence of infinitives or gerunds (for getting … for gaining …), which are apparently dependent on verses in v. 1, is Qohelet 3:1–8. The Qumran Community Rule begins in a similar way to Proverbs and looks dependent on it:⁵ the community rule, for seeking God … for doing what is good … and for loving … and for hating … (1QS I). The Proverbs prologue also compares with the introduction to the Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope.⁶

Unlike MT, EVV set off v. 7 from vv. 2–6, and v. 7 does introduce a new note in its reference to awe for Yahweh, but it also picks up the words knowledge, wisdom, and discipline from v. 2, and it actually rounds off vv. 2–7. The sequence of gerunds in vv. 2–3a, 4, and 6 is interwoven with variations in vv. 3b, 5, and 7, which suggests that vv. 2–7 form three strophes comprising pairs of verses, with the variations marking the close of each strophe.

The prologue’s opening (v. 1) announces that Proverbs will comprise verses (meshalim); Jeremiah comprises words, which suggests straightforward messages. While Proverbs will shortly refer to words (vv. 2 and 6), verses is a more unusual term suggesting something more complex. The traditional translation is proverbs, and Proverbs probably includes examples of what we call proverbs in English, but this word’s meaning is broader (see, e.g., Num 23:7; Job 27:1; Ps 78:2; Isa 14:4; Ezek 17:2). It suggests something poetic or parabolic and something that makes one think. While such a definition does not fit Proverbs A very well, it fits Proverbs B and C, so one might see this opening verse as an anticipatory description of the entire book that applies more directly to Proverbs 10–31. In Jeremiah, the words are delivered by a named individual with a priestly background; in Proverbs, the verses link in a more elusive way to a named individual with a royal background. Describing Proverbs as Solomonic implies that it is worthy of him, that he could have articulated or approved it.

Wisdom (v. 2) is not an overarching technical term in the First Testament, as the English word is in theological discussion.⁷ Nor does it commonly refer to something as rarified as that English word may suggest. It is often down-to-earth: it implies know-how, expertise, or skill. Solomon’s wisdom was chiefly practical; he knew how to run the country. And the rest of this introduction and most of Proverbs imply a practical meaning. Discipline covers instruction (e.g., 1:8) and chastisement (cf. 23:13) and stands between them: it’s tougher than the one and less painful than the other. It indicates that learning involves effort and self-control, like an athlete’s training. Discernment takes readers back to knowledge or wisdom, and it will also imply the practical insight that can see what to do. Sayings that are discerning makes explicit that from the beginning, Proverbs 1–9 puts speech on center stage as a primary means by which character is formed.⁸ And given the principle that living wisely is most basically a matter of attending to the right words, even though being human means being subject to various desires and attractions, it’s not difficult to see the difference between wisdom and stupidity.⁹

Discipline that is judicious (v. 3), the discipline of being judicious, indicates that the self-control implied by v. 2 expresses itself in action that is sensible and therefore successful, that accomplishes what one aims to do (cf. 17:8). But the words that follow then make explicit that wisdom and judiciousness involve ethics. The lack of a gerund at the beginning of v. 3b makes this line stand out, and the strophe comes to a climax with these three concepts that constitute a world in itself.¹⁰ Grammatically, the three qualities are further objects of receiving, but they are different sorts of things to be the objects of this verb, compared with wisdom and discipline, and they reframe what one might mean by wisdom, discipline, or being judicious. Faithfulness (tsedeq) is a key scriptural virtue. You can’t be wise without being faithful. And you can’t be faithful without being wise. The traditional translation is righteousness, also the traditional translation in the New Testament for dikaiosynē (not least in 2 Tim 3:16), but that English word suggests a virtue embodied in someone’s life as an isolated individual, whereas the Hebrew and Greek words concern someone’s life in relation to God and to other people. This virtue is important to people in leadership, and in the First Testament faithfulness often pairs with the exercise of authority (mishpat). That word’s traditional translation is justice, and the First Testament does assume that the exercise of authority implies justice. But the word directly denotes the power that ideally finds expression in just action, and there can be wrongful exercise of authority (e.g., Hos 10:4; Hab 1:4), wrongful administration of justice, whereas there cannot be wrongful justice. So the common pairing of the exercise of authority with faithfulness makes explicit what should be implicit. Honesty, being on the level, uprightness, then underlines the point. Like being faithful, being on the level is incumbent on everyone (e.g., 14:9, 11; 15:19). But it features especially in connection with God’s exercise of authority (e.g., Pss 9:8[9]; 98:9; 99:4—each time in association with faithfulness), which sets the standard for the uprightness of human leaders’ actions (1 Chr 29:17). The sequence of words in v. 3b, literally faithfulness and the exercise of authority and honesty, recurs—spread over two lines—in 2:9, where it is clearer that faithfulness and the exercise of authority is a hendiadys implying faithfulness in or with the exercise of authority. The hendiadys and variants recur elsewhere (e.g., Pss 89:14[15]; 97:2; Prov 21:3).