Bible Commentaries

The Heedless Scorner, Etc.

Proverbs 13:1-13

This verse has been rendered, "is his father's instruction;" the meaning being that a wise son embodies his father's instruction,—"Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men:" a wise man may point to his son and say, This is the sum-total of my educational efforts. Observe, however, that the most careful and loving endeavours may be thrown away, as good seed may be cast upon stony ground and profit the sower nothing. The proverb is careful to define the quality of the son whose education embodies the purpose of the father; he is to be "a wise Proverbs 13:7).

Christ's own teaching is here anticipated. He that loseth his life for Christ's sake shall find it; he that seeketh his life for his own sake shall lose it. Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die. We have to lose before we can gain; to sow before we can reap; to trust all the ministries of nature before we can fill our arms with sheaves. The voice of experience is heard in this testimony. There is nothing in mere reason to support it; on the contrary, there is much on the first appearance of things to discredit the assertion. Cause and effect would seem to be here wholly neglected. If a man be gathering all his days, will he not have an abundance at the last? If a man be scattering for a lifetime, is it; possible that he can have a mountain left at the close? The answer to these inquiries would seem to be instantaneous because obvious. Yet spiritual experience goes in a directly contrary direction. He who gives himself away most secures himself, provided the motive of the oblation be good, and that the spirit in which it is offered be the spirit of Jesus Christ. There must be no investment of charity; there must be no speculation in alms. The very spirit of sacrifice is ervealed in this noble text, especially in the words, "There is that maketh himself poor, yet hath great riches." A philosopher once said he had nothing except that which he had given away. Christian natures go out of themselves and live in the good of others; that is to say, when they see others prospering they rejoice, and draw comfort from advantages which do not immediately belong to themselves. A man who has made himself poor in order that he might educate his children, and bring them up in the ways of virtue and honour, is a rich Proverbs 13:9).

By this we are to understand that the light of the righteous burns joyously, is a very image of gladness and rapture: the sun rejoiceth as a giant to run his course; he Proverbs 13:13).

The more literal rendering would be, "He that despiseth the word shall bring ruin on himself." This is a great law of the Biblical revelation—namely, that destruction is not a merely arbitrary act on the part of God, a mere penalty, but that it involves the idea of suicide or self-ruin. The man is not merely punished from without, he is punished from within. There is no threatening in the statement that if a man put his hand into the fire he will be burned; it is not a threatening, it is a warning, a foretelling, a statement of simple fact So we are told here that whoso despiseth the word—the innermost Proverbs 13:15-24

Good understanding gives favour with Proverbs 13:20-21).

The very desire to walk with the wise is itself a sign of wisdom. No bad man could ever wish to be in heaven, for heaven itself would be no paradise to him, because of the condition of his soul. No fool could desire the society of the wise, for he could not understand their language, nor could he identify himself with their purposes. The wise are men who are disposed to encourage approach rather than to resent it, if by such encouragement they can really develop wisdom in others. It might be thought that wise men would not allow any but the wise to walk with them, which is perfectly true; but: they distinguish between a desire to be wise and the attainment of wisdom itself; in their eyes the desire for wisdom is itself Proverbs 13:22).

All this is true in the matter of material possession, but in a still larger sense is it true of moral character. There is a sense in which no man can leave his character to another; that is to say, a man cannot adopt the character of an ancestor, and use it as if it were so much material property. There Proverbs 13:24).

Under this apparent severity is to be found the spirit of true kindness. It would seem as if the last word in the text were an emphatic word. There is a good deal of chastening, but it is not timely; the will has grown strong, the passions have acquired tenacious hold upon the mind, the chastening comes too late in life. It is the easiest of all things to spare the rod; it enables family life to proceed with fluency; it avoids all controversy and all painful collision as between the elder and the younger. For a time this is beautiful, so much so that people commend the family as one characterised by great harmony and union; on the contrary, it ought to be reprobated. It is the severest cruelty that can be inflicted upon a child not to show that child the limits of his will, and the necessity of accommodating that will to the judgment and pleasure of others. The spoiled child comes to hate the spoiling parent. The child that is wisely chastened comes to love the very hand that used the rod. Children must be taught that all things are not theirs, that the world is a place for discipline, and that all life is valuable only in proportion as it has been refined and strengthened by patient endurance. What can be more pitiful than to see a parent who imagines that by allowing the child to have all its own way, he is kind, benevolent, and tender? Such a man has no right to such a character: call him foolish, selfish, cruel, tyrannical;—all these characteristics are his, for he has deserved them by the course of imbecility which he has selfishly pursued. Let no merely cruel man take encouragement from these words to use the rod without measure, and to use it merely for the sake of showing his animal strength. That is not the teaching of the passage. The chastening is to be with measure, is to be timely, is to have some proportion to the offence that is visited, and is to give more pain to the inflicter of the punishment than to its receiver. Great wisdom is required in the use of the rod. The rod has to be used upon every man sooner or later; we cannot escape chastisement: we must be made to feel that the world is not all ours, that there are rights and interests to be respected besides those which we ourselves claim: the sooner that lesson can be instilled into the mind the better; if it can be wrought into the heart and memory of childhood it will save innumerable anxieties and disappointments in all after-life.

So the book of wisdom rolls on, touching human life at every point, decorating the whole house of life with motto and maxim and philosophy, infinite in suggestion and gracious in encouragement. It would seem as if the wise man were first throwing out of his right hand and then out of his left hand—something for the good, something for the bad; a blessing for the wise, a curse for the foolish; each sentence is self-balanced, the light and the darkness go together, heaven and hell are set in juxtaposition: it is the good man, and the bad man; the wise man, and the foolish man; the righteous, and the wicked; the faithful, and the transgressor. Where the classification is so broad and distinct no mistake can be made as to our position. If we have shaded down wickedness until it has lost somewhat of its ghastliness, it is only ourselves that are deceived, the nature of wickedness itself is unchanged. If we have mitigated the penalty of righteousness until it has become quite easy to us, so easy as to cost us no thought and no effort, we have deceived ourselves, we have not brought down the standard of righteousness. All these proverbs are a call to discipline, they never spare the soul, they never caress it into idleness, or soothe it into indifference; the proverbs are so many spears dug into our sides, that we may run the race of life more surely and more speedily, keeping our eyes steadfastly fixed on the goal towards which we are hastening. We cannot, however, live upon Proverbs , however sententious and epigrammatic; we must have gospels, expositions of the fatherhood of God, comments upon the nature of sin and upon the possibilities of the soul; we must be entreated and wooed and persuaded, not spurred and goaded by sharply-pointed maxims. To the maxims we shall come in due course, and we shall affirm every one of them, sealing each with the seal of our companionship and experience. Meanwhile, we may go to the school of Christ, and learn of him who is meek and lowly in heart, and find rest to our souls, not in the adoption of moral epigrams, but in the reception of saving truths.