Wisdom Becomes a Guard for the Road

In Hebrew the whole chapter is one long sentence of twenty two verses, the number of letters in the alphabet, running from “if” to “then” to purpose. “Hide” is tsafan, to store up as treasure, the verb of Psalm 119:11, “Thy word have I hid in mine heart”.

“Incline thine ear” is literally “make thine ear attend”, the causative form, since an ear does not listen by itself. “Apply” is natah, to stretch or bend toward, as one leans in to catch words. Ear and heart name the outer and the inner organ of learning.

The Hebrew is “if thou callest to understanding”. The rabbis noticed that the word for “if”, im, is spelled like em, “mother”, and read “call understanding mother” (Berakhot 57a). The book itself has the same thought in 7:4: “call understanding thy kinswoman”.

Job 28 opens, “Surely there is a vein for the silver”, and goes on to say wisdom is harder to find than any metal mined. “Hid treasures” are matmonim, buried stores, the treasure Joseph’s steward said God had put in the brothers’ sacks (Genesis 43:23).

“The knowledge of God” is da’at Elohim, the phrase Hosea uses when God complains there is none in the land (Hosea 4:1) and says he desires it “more than burnt offerings” (6:6). The search that started with a father’s words ends with God himself.

Solomon asked for “an understanding heart” and was given one (1 Kings 3:9–12), the model behind the claim. “Out of his mouth” makes wisdom speech: it is spoken to people, not discovered by them. The verse is the hinge on which the chapter turns from human search to divine gift.

“Sound wisdom” is tushiyah, practical effectiveness, the counsel that actually works; it belongs almost entirely to Proverbs and Job, where Job 5:12 uses it of the crafty whose “enterprise” fails. “Buckler” is magen, the small round shield, as in Genesis 15:1, “I am thy shield”.

“Paths of judgment” are orchot mishpat, the tracks where justice is done; orach is the beaten road used by travellers and caravans. “Saints” is chasidav, his loyal ones, the people of chesed. The keeping is done on the road itself, not after arrival.

This second “then” answers the first in verse 5. “Path” here is ma’gal, a track worn by wagon wheels, the word behind the “paths” of Psalm 23:3. A good path is one many have already travelled and kept open.

“Pleasant” is na’em, sweet, the word 24:13–14 applies to honey: “so shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul”. Knowledge is pictured as a taste the soul comes to like, not only a rule it obeys. Wisdom “entereth”, taking up residence inside.

The two verbs, shamar and natsar, are the pair of verse 8, where God kept the paths and preserved the way. Now discretion and understanding do the same guarding from within the person. “Discretion” is mezimmah again, the planning power promised to the young man in 1:4.

“Froward things” are tahpukot, literally “turnings upside down”, from the verb for overturning cities like Sodom; it is a word almost wholly confined to Proverbs. In 1611 “froward” meant turned away, from-ward, perverse. His talk inverts what it touches.

The evil man of verse 12 becomes a plural here, “who leave”, one of a crowd. “Leave” is azav, abandon, the same verb as “forsaketh” in verse 17. To leave the upright paths, they must once have been on them. 4:19 names their destination: “The way of the wicked is as darkness.”

Jeremiah 11:15 says of Judah, “when thou doest evil, then thou rejoicest”. “Frowardness of the wicked” repeats tahpukot from verse 12, the upside down talk, now enjoyed in others as well as spoken. Two different verbs of joy stand in one line.

“Crooked” is iqqesh, twisted, the word Moses uses in Deuteronomy 32:5, “a perverse and crooked generation”, a phrase Paul picks up in Philippians 2:15. “Froward” here is a different Hebrew word, naloz, devious, going off at an angle.

“Strange” is zarah, an outsider to a relationship, the word used of the “strange fire” offered by Aaron’s sons (Leviticus 10:1), fire that did not belong. “Flattereth” is hechliqah, makes smooth or slippery, the root that calls Jacob a “smooth man” (Genesis 27:11).

“Guide” is alluf, closest companion, the word of Jeremiah 3:4, where Israel calls God “the guide of my youth”. Malachi 2:14 calls a man’s first wife “thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant”, so marriage itself is a covenant with God as witness. She has left both.

“The dead” are repha’im, the shades, the weakened dead of Sheol (Isaiah 14:9, Psalm 88:10); the same word names the giant peoples of Deuteronomy 2:11. “Inclineth” is shachah, sinks down, as though the floor of her house slopes into the grave.

Babylonian texts call the underworld “the land of no return”, and Job 16:22 speaks of “the way whence I shall not return”. The book borrows that language for her door. “Take hold” is nasag, to reach or overtake: the paths of life are left too far behind to catch up.

“That thou mayest” is lema’an, the third and last purpose of the long sentence, after the two deliveries of verses 12 and 16. After two things to be rescued from, the sentence ends on somewhere to walk. “Good men” is tovim, the plain word good.

The promise of the land runs through Psalm 37, which says five times that the righteous or the meek “shall inherit the earth” (37:11), the line Jesus takes up in Matthew 5:5. “Perfect” is temimim, the same word the gang used in 1:12 for the “whole” they meant to swallow.

“Rooted out” is nasach, to tear away, the verb of the covenant curse, “ye shall be plucked from off the land” (Deuteronomy 28:63). “Transgressors” are bogdim, the treacherous, from bagad, the word Malachi 2:14 uses of dealing treacherously with the wife of one’s youth.