Proverbs19chapter 19

Proverbs 19:1-3

The chapter opens on the book's better-than form again: integrity in poverty outweighs perverse lips in a fool, the same ranking of character above condition the earlier chapters use. A soul without knowledge is named not good, and hasty feet sin, haste and ignorance read together as one failure of attention. A man's own foolishness perverts his way and then his heart frets against the Lord, the commentators noting the order, the fault is his before the blame is misplaced.

Proverbs 19:4-9

The poor-and-friends cluster opens plainly: wealth makes many friends while the poor is separated even from his own neighbour, a social fact the book states without approving. A false witness draws the same two-fold sentence twice in the cluster, unpunished and perishing, the repetition at verses 5 and 9 read by the bench as deliberate emphasis rather than careless doubling. The poor man's brothers hating him and his friends going far, pursued with words that go unanswered, is the cluster's hardest line, and getting wisdom is named loving one's own soul against that backdrop.

Proverbs 19:10-12

Luxury does not suit a fool, and a servant ruling over princes suits even less, the verse naming things out of their proper order. A man's discretion shows in deferring his anger, and passing over a transgression is called his glory, the chapter praising restraint the same way it will praise it again before its end. The king's wrath roaring like a lion against his favour like dew on the grass gives the cluster its closing image of how far apart a ruler's two moods can fall.

Proverbs 19:13-14

A foolish son is named his father's calamity, and a contentious wife a continual dropping, the household's two griefs set beside each other. Then the pairing turns: house and riches are the inheritance of fathers, ordinary and expected, but a prudent wife is from the Lord, a gift providence gives rather than an estate a family hands down. The commentators read the contrast as the verse's whole point, wealth is inherited but the right wife is given.

Proverbs 19:15-16

Slothfulness casts a man into deep sleep, and the idle soul suffers hunger, the book's steady picture of laziness as a self-inflicted wound rather than a harmless habit. Keeping the commandment is named the keeping of one's own soul, while despising one's ways brings death, the two verses setting bodily neglect and spiritual neglect side by side as the same kind of failure.

Proverbs 19:17

He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord is the book's boldest banking image, giving to the poor recast as a loan made to God himself, who will repay what was given. Bridges reads the verse as turning ordinary charity into an act of faith, since the borrower named is one who cannot default. The promise is stated without qualification, and the commentators let the verse's own boldness stand rather than softening it.

Proverbs 19:18-19

Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying, is read by the bench as urgency rather than harshness, correction offered while it can still take root and while the child's protest is not allowed to overrule the parent's judgment. A man of great wrath is named one who will suffer punishment, and delivering him from it only means it must be done again, the household discipline of the first verse answered by the civil discipline of the second.

Proverbs 19:20-22

Hearing counsel and receiving instruction are named the path to wisdom in one's latter end, a phrase the commentators read as looking past the immediate moment to the whole shape of a life. Many devices are in a man's heart, yet the counsel of the Lord alone shall stand, the verse setting human planning against divine purpose without denying that a man plans. A man's desire is called his kindness, and a poor man is ranked better than a liar, character again outweighing condition as it did at the chapter's opening.

Proverbs 19:23

The fear of the Lord tendeth to life restates the book's motto from 1:7 in its own middle chapters, tying reverence directly to a satisfied and untroubled life rather than to dread. He that hath it shall abide satisfied, and shall not be visited with evil, the bench reading the promise as covering ordinary trouble rather than every hardship, since the book elsewhere shows the righteous suffering too.

Proverbs 19:24-25

The sluggard hides his hand in his bosom and will not even bring it to his mouth again, a small comic picture the book repeats elsewhere to make laziness visible rather than abstract. Smiting a scorner is said to warn the simple, while reproving a man of understanding only sharpens what he already has, the same correction landing differently depending entirely on the hearer's disposition.

Proverbs 19:26-29

Wasting a father and chasing away a mother earns the son the names shame and reproach, the household's worst outcome named without softening. Cease, my son, to hear instruction that causes error is read by the bench as ironic warning, telling the son to stop listening to bad counsel rather than good. An ungodly witness scorns judgment and the wicked mouth devours iniquity, and the chapter closes where the book often does, judgments prepared for scorners and stripes for the back of fools, consequence stated as fact rather than threat.