Proverbschapter 22
29 verses · KJVProverbs book hub →
A.A Good Name, and the Child Trained in the Way He Should Govv. 1-16
Proverbs 22:1-2
A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches: opens the chapter valuing reputation earned by character over inherited or acquired wealth, and loving favour rather than silver and gold repeats the point from the other direction. The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all levels the two classes at their root, Henry reading it as a check on both envy from below and contempt from above, the distinction between rich and poor providence's arrangement rather than a difference in what each is worth before God.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:1, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:1
“A good name is more excellent than money, and good favor is better than heaps of silver. Faith itself redounds to itself, sufficiently rich and more than rich in its possession. There is nothing which is not the possession of the wise person except what is contrary to virtue, and wherever he goes he finds all things to be his. The whole world is his possession, since he uses it all as his own.”
Ambrose of Milan· fourth century· LETTER 15patristic
Proverbs 22:1
“Omit “good.” The word is an insertion. To the Hebrew, “name” by itself conveyed the idea of good repute, just as “men without a name” (compare Job 30:8 margin) are those sunk in ignominy. The margin gives a preferable rendering of the second clause of this verse.”
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:2, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:2
“The rich and the poor meet together, etc. Do not despise the rich because of their wealth and honors, nor the poor because of their poverty, but revere in each the merit that is the work of God, for they are made in the image …”
Bede· eighth century· Commentary on Proverbspatristic
Proverbs 22:2
“The rich and poor meet together - עשיר ashir the opulent, whether in money, land, or property; רש rash, the man that is destitute of these, and lives by his labor, whether a handicraftsman, or one that tills the ground. In the order of God, the rich and the poor live together, and are mutually helpful to each other.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 22:3-5
A prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth himself: , while the simple walk straight into the same danger and pay for it, a proverb repeated word for word at 27:12. By humility and the fear of the Lord names the true source of riches, honour and life that the chapter opened by preferring to wealth for its own sake, humility and the fear of the Lord answering the good name of verse 1 with the root that produces it. Thorns and snares in the way of the froward closes the trio with the same foresight theme, the man who keeps his soul staying clear of dangers a careless man walks straight through.
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:4, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:4
“By humility and the fear of the Lord,.... Some render it, "the reward of humility, which is the fear of the Lord" (r); so the Targum; an humble man is blessed with it.”
Proverbs 22:6
Train up a child in the way he should go: , and when he is old, he will not depart from it is read two ways among the bench, as a promise, God's own guarantee attached to faithful upbringing, so Gill and much of the older devotional reading, and as a proverb stating the ordinary tendency of things rather than a covenant guarantee, since the book's own genre is observed wisdom, the reading Bridges leans toward when he notes the exceptions Scripture itself records, such as godly Hezekiah's son Manasseh. Both readings agree on the verse's plain force, the way a child is directed young shaping the way he is inclined to go, whichever weight the outcome is finally given.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:6, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:6
“Thus, here also it calls him a new child who was reborn through the washing of regeneration and educated and made childlike, who is made fit for the kingdom of heaven through this process in the same way. The book of Proverbs, therefore, provides training which imparts perception and understanding to the recently born child who is hungry for rational and genuine milk: a perception of present realities but an understanding of future realities.”
Basil of Caesarea· fourth century· HOMILY ON THE BEGINNING OF PROVERBS 13patristic
Proverbs 22:6
“Train up a child in the way he should go - The Hebrew of this clause is curious: חנך לנער על פי דרכו chanoch lannaar al pi darco, “Initiate the child at the opening (the mouth) of his path.” When he comes to the opening of the way of life, being able to walk alone, and to choose; stop at this entrance, and begin a series of instructions, how he is to conduct himself in every step he takes.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 22:7-9
The rich ruleth over the poor: , and the borrower is servant to the lender, states a plain economic fact rather than a complaint, debt itself a form of servitude regardless of how willingly it was entered. He that soweth iniquity shall reap vanity extends the chapter's harvest imagery to wrongdoing generally, the rod of his anger, the power a wicked man wields against others, finally failing him. He that hath a bountiful eye shall be blessed closes the group with the opposite pattern, generosity toward the poor answered in kind rather than the exploitation verse 7 described.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:9, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:9
"He who is kind-hearted will be blessed," etc. This is similar to that of the same judge, who discerning the merciful from the impious, says: "Come, blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was …
Bede· eighth century· Commentary on Proverbspatristic
Proverbs 22:9
“A bountiful eye - One that disposes him to help all that he sees to be in want; the bountiful eye means the bountiful heart; for the heart looks through the eye. The merciful heart, even when the hand has little or nothing to give, shall be blessed of the Lord.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 22:10-12
Cast out the scorner, and contention shall go out: treats strife as a problem with an identifiable cause, removable once the source is removed rather than something a household simply has to endure. He that loveth pureness of heart, for the grace of his lips the king shall be his friend, credits inward character with outward favour, a courtier's advancement traced to what he is rather than only what he says. The eyes of the Lord preserve knowledge closes the cluster with the same divine oversight the chapter has already named at verse 2, watching over the truthful and undoing the transgressor's own words.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:10, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:10
If some persist in their disobedience, finding fault in secret and not openly stating their grievance, thus becoming the cause of quarreling in the community and undermining the authority of the commands given, they should be dismissed from the community as teachers of disobedience and rebellion. For the Scripture says, "Cast out the scoffer from the council, and contention shall go out with him" and also, "Put away the evil one from yourselves, for a little leaven corrupts the whole lump."
Basil of Caesarea· fourth century· THE LONG RULES 47patristic
Proverbs 22:10
“Cast out the scorner,.... That makes a mock at sin, a jest at religion, and scoffs at all good men, and everything serious and spiritual; cast such an one out of all company and conversation; out of the family, as mocking Ishmael was cast out of Abraham's family; and out of the church, and all religious societies.”
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:11, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:11
"He who loves purity of heart," etc. He who rightly preaches with a pure heart will be numbered among those, about whom the prophet says to the same King and Creator of the ages: "But to me, your friends, O God, are greatly honored" (Ps. …
Bede· eighth century· Commentary on Proverbspatristic
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:12, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:12
“The eyes of the Lord - (the Divine providence) preserve knowledge - This providence has been wonderfully manifested in preserving the sacred oracles, and in preserving many ancient authors, which have been of great use to the civil interests of man.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 22:13-14
The slothful man saith, There is a lion without: , I shall be slain in the streets, gives the sluggard's excuse-making its most absurd form yet, danger invented rather than found to justify staying home. The mouth of strange women is a deep pit turns from invented danger to a real one, the same warning the first nine chapters gave at length now compressed into one line, and he that is abhorred of the Lord shall fall therein reads the trap as consequence rather than accident, a man's own standing before God bound up with what he lets himself fall into.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:13, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:13
“The point of the satire is the ingenuity with which the slothful man devises the most improbable alarms. He hears that “there is a lion without,” i. e., in the broad open country; he is afraid of being slain in the very streets of the city.”
Proverbs 22:13
“THIS slothful man seems to cherish that one dread of his about lions as if it were his favorite aversion and he felt it to be too much trouble to invent another excuse. Perhaps he hugs it to his soul all the more because it is a home-born fear, conjured up by his own imagination, and as mothers are said to love their weakest children best, so is he fondest of this most imbecile of excuses! At any rate, it serves him for a passable excuse for laziness, and that is what he wants.”
Charles Spurgeon· The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1670: “One Lion, Two Lions, No Lion at All!” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition) (1882)Particular (Reformed) Baptist / Five-point Calvinist / 1689 LBCF / 19th-c. evangelical
Voices on this verse, 3What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:14, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:14
“The mouth of one speaking ill is a great pit, a steep precipice for the innocent, but steeper for one of ill will. An innocent person, though easily credulous, falls quickly, but when he has fallen rises again. The slanderer is thrown headlong by his own acts, from which he will never emerge or escape.”
Ambrose of Milan· fourth century· LETTER 15patristic
Proverbs 22:14
“The mouth of strange women is a deep pit - In Pro 23:27, he says, A whore is a Deep Ditch:, oud a strange woman is a Narrow Pit. The allusions in these three places are too plain to be misunderstood. Virgil’s hell has been adduced in illustration: - - Sate sanguine Divum, Tros Anchisiade, facilis decensus Averni; Noctes atque dies patet atri janua Ditis: Sed revocare gradum, superasque evadere ad auras, Hoc Opus, hic Labor est. Pauci quos aequus amavit Jupiter, aut ardens evexit ad aethera virtus, Dis geniti potuere. Virg.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 22:14
“Dread them; have nothing to do with them; for, 1. Those who abandon themselves to that sin give proof that they are abandoned of God: it is a deep pit, which those fall into that are abhorred of the Lord, who leaves them to themselves to enter into that temptation, and takes off the bridle of his restraining grace, to punish them for other sins.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Proverbs 22:15-16
Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child: follows the training proverb of verse 6 with the reason training is needed at all, folly assumed as the child's natural starting point rather than an occasional lapse, and the rod of correction is named as what drives it out. He that oppresseth the poor to increase his riches, and he that giveth to the rich, shall surely come to want closes the pair with an economic reversal, two different routes, exploiting the poor and flattering the wealthy, both ending in the same loss.
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:15, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:15
"Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child," etc. We know many children endowed with wisdom; for Jeremiah undertook the ministry of prophecy as a child. And Daniel writes, "Because God gave to the children abstaining knowledge and discipline in every word and …
Bede· eighth century· Commentary on Proverbspatristic
B.The Words of the Wise Begin: Excellent Things Written for Theevv. 17-29
Proverbs 22:17-21
Bow down thine ear, and hear the words of the wise: marks the book's third named header, opening a new section that runs to 24:22 and asking the same attentive hearing the earlier headers asked at 1:1 and 10:1. A portion of this section's proverbs run in close order and content with an Egyptian wisdom text, the Instruction of Amenemope, a real finding of later scholarship, and the traditional position, held by most of the older bench who wrote before the Egyptian text's modern discovery, is that Solomon's proverbs stand as inspired wisdom in their own right whatever their relation to other ancient collections, the direction of borrowing, or whether both draw on a common older tradition, a question scholars hold differently. That thy trust may be in the Lord states the section's own purpose plainly, the certainty of the words of truth to be answered rightly to those who ask, whatever the words' literary background.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:17, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:17
“Bow down thine ear, and hear the words of the wise,.... Here begins a new part or division of this book. According to some, the "third"; the "first" ending with Pro 9:18, the "second" at Pro 22:16, and a "third", beginning here, and ending with Pro 24:”
Proverbs 22:17
“This is the commencement of a new and entirely distinct section, opening, after the fashion of Pro 3:1, Pro 3:21; Pro 4:1; Pro 7:1; with a general exhortation Pro 22:17-21 and passing on to special precepts. The “words of the wise” may be a title to the section: compare Pro 24:23. The general characteristics of this section appear to be (1) a less close attention to the laws of parallelism, and (2) a tendency to longer and more complicated sentences. Compare the Introduction to Proverbs.”
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:18, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:18
“The advantage designed us by them. The excellent things which God has written to us are not like the commands which the master gives his servant, which are all intended for the benefit of the master, but like those which the master gives his scholar, which are all intended for the benefit of the scholar.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:19, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:19
“That thy trust may be in the Lord,.... By means of the words of the wise, or doctrines of the Gospel, faith in Christ is first had; men are directed and encouraged hereby to believe in him; and by the same means faith is increased, confirmed, and established.”
Voices on this verse, 3What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:20, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:20
“Solomon counsels that what we read "be transcribed in the heart in a threefold manner." I shall make known to your ears that which occurs to my mind, even beyond the things that we have said, and you yourself [should] do what is written: "Let one speak and the rest judge." Therefore, as I speak what I perceive, you consider and judge if it is correct or not correct.”
Origen of Alexandria· third century· HOMILIES ON JOSHUA 21patristic
Proverbs 22:20
“Have not I written to thee excellent things,.... In the Scriptures. Some render it, "three things" (c); and think that Solomon refers to the three divisions of the Scriptures among the Jews, the law, the prophets, and holy writings; so Jarchi; but some of those writings then were not: or to the three books wrote by him; the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs. Others render it, "in a threefold way" (d), as the Targum and several versions; that is, in various ways, in different forms and styles, in order the better to inform and instruct.”
Proverbs 22:20
“Excellent things - A meaning of the word derived from “the third,” i. e., “the chief of three warriors in a chariot” (compare Exo 14:7 note). Another reading of the Hebrew text gives “Have I not written to thee long ago?” and this would form a natural antithesis to “this day” of Pro 22:”
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:21, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:21
“To them that send unto thee - Better as in the margin; compare Pro 10:26. The man who has learned the certainty of the words of truth will learn to observe it in all that men commit to him.”
Proverbs 22:22-23
Rob not the poor, because he is poor: , neither oppress the afflicted in the gate, names the two easiest targets for exploitation, someone with no resources to fight back and someone with no standing in the place where legal decisions were made. For the Lord will plead their cause answers both warnings with a promise rather than only a prohibition, God named as the poor man's own advocate in court, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them completes the reversal, the exploiter facing the very treatment he dealt out.
Voices on this verse, 2What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:22, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:22
“Neither oppress the afflicted in the gate - In judgment let the poor have a fair hearing; and let him not be borne down because he is poor. The reader has often seen that courts of justice were held at the gates of cities in the East.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 22:22
“The aggravations of the sin. If their inability, by reason of their poverty, to right themselves, embolden us to rob them, it is so much the worse; this is robbing the poor because he is poor; this is not only a base and cowardly thing, to take advantage against a man because he is helpless, but it is unnatural, and proves men worse than beasts.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Proverbs 22:24-27
Make no friendship with an angry man: ; and with a furious man thou shalt not go warns against chosen company rather than accidental encounter, the danger named in the next verse as contagion, learning his ways and getting a snare to thy soul from association alone. Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts, repeats the book's recurring warning against pledging surety, and if thou hast nothing to pay, why should he take away thy bed from under thee names the plainest possible consequence, the debtor's own bed, his last remaining possession, seized for a debt he never personally incurred.
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:24, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:24
A secluded and remote habitation also contributes to the removal of distraction from the soul. Living among those who are unscrupulous and disdainful in their attitude toward an exact observance of the commandments is dangerous, as is shown by the following words of Solomon: "Do not be a friend to an angry man, and do not walk with a furious man, lest perhaps you learn his ways and take snares unto your soul."
Basil of Caesarea· fourth century· THE LONG RULES 5patristic
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:25, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:25
“Lest thou learn his ways,.... And be as wrathful and furious, as quarrelsome and contentious, as he is. Evil works and ways are soon learned; men are more ready to imitate what is evil than what is good: Joseph learned to swear in Pharaoh's court; and the Israelites learned the works of the Heathen, among whom they were mingled; "evil communications corrupt good manners", 1Co 15:”
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:27, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:27
“He - i. e., The man to whom the surety has been given. The practice of distraining for payment of a debt, seems, though prohibited Exo 22:27, to have become common.”
Proverbs 22:28-29
Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set: , protects inherited property boundaries under the same law given at Deuteronomy 19:14 and 27:17, a quiet theft accomplished by moving a stone rather than by force. Seest thou a man diligent in his business closes the chapter with the promise attached to skilled, faithful work, standing before kings rather than before mean men, and the bench reads the two verses together as the chapter's last contrast, the man who respects what belongs to others against the man whose own diligence earns him a place others cannot buy.
Voices on this verse, 3What preachers and commentators have said about Proverbs 22:28, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:28
We do not permit the faith or the symbol of the faith defined by our holy fathers assembled in their day in Nicea to be shaken by anyone, and we do not trust ourselves or others to change a word of what was laid down there, or to depart from a single syllable of it. For we remember the one who said, "Do not alter the everlasting boundaries which your fathers set."
Cyril of Alexandria· fifth century· LETTER TO JOHN OF ANTIOCH 39:7patristic
Proverbs 22:28
“Remove not the ancient landmark which thy fathers have set. Or, "the ancient border" or "boundary" (n); by which lands, estates, and inheritances, were marked, bounded, and distinguished; set by ancestors in agreement with their neighbours; which to remove was contrary to a law, and a curse is denounced upon those that did it, Deu 19:14; and was always reckoned a very heinous crime in early times; See Gill on Job 24:2. This was so sacred a thing among the Romans, that they had a deity which presided over those bounds, and had its name from them.”
Proverbs 22:28
“Remove not the ancient landmark - Do not take the advantage, in ploughing or breaking up a field contiguous to that of thy neighbor, to set the dividing stones farther into his field that thou mayest enlarge thy own. Take not what is not thy own in any case. Let all ancient divisions, and the usages connected with them, be held sacred.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Voices on this verse, 1What a preacher or commentator has said about Proverbs 22:29, in their own words.
Proverbs 22:29
“The gift of a quick and ready intellect is to lead to high office, it is not to be wasted on a work to which the obscure are adequate.”
Where the chapter sits
Proverbs 22 falls in Solomon's proverbs proper (chapters 10–24). Short antithetical and synonymous couplets; the core of the book's gnomic register. Ch 22:17–24:34 labeled ''words of the wise''.
Before it: Sayings of Solomon: long discourses, chapters 1–9. After it: Hezekiah's men: Solomon's proverbs copied, chapters 25–29.
The whole shape of Proverbs→Key words
The Hebrew words this chapter turns on, by how often it uses them. Each one opens its word study.
| Word | What it means | Verses |
|---|---|---|
| יְהֹוָהYᵉhôvâh6 times, as יְהוָֽה׃, יְהוָ֑ה, יְ֭הוָה | LORD | 2, 4, 12, 14 and 2 more |
| דַּלdal4 times, as לַדָּֽל׃, דָּ֭ל, דַל־ | poor | 9, 16, 22 |
| עָשִׁירʻâshîyr3 times, as עָשִׁ֣יר, עָ֭שִׁיר, לְ֝עָשִׁ֗יר | rich | 2, 7, 16 |
| נֶפֶשׁnephesh3 times, as נַ֝פְשׁ֗וֹ, נָֽפֶשׁ׃, לְנַפְשֶֽׁךָ׃ | soul | 5, 23, 25 |
| אִישׁʼîysh3 times, as לְאִ֣ישׁ, אִ֥ישׁ, אִ֤ישׁ׀ | man | 7, 24, 29 |
| לֵבlêb3 times, as לֵ֑ב, בְלֶב־, וְ֝לִבְּךָ֗ | heart | 11, 15, 17 |
Cross references
The 8 chapters this one speaks with, most first. Open a row for the verses it shares.
Ecclesiastes 73 verses
Proverbs 22:1
Ecclesiastes 7:1A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s birth.Proverbs 22:17
Ecclesiastes 7:25I applied mine heart to know, and to search, and to seek out wisdom, and the reason of things, and to know the wickedness of folly, even of foolishness and madness:Proverbs 22:14
Ecclesiastes 7:26And I find more bitter than death the woman, whose heart is snares and nets, and her hands as bands: whoso pleaseth God shall escape from her; but the sinner shall be taken by her.- Read Ecclesiastes 7 →
Proverbs 293 verses
Proverbs 22:3
Proverbs 29:1He, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.Proverbs 22:15
Proverbs 29:15The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame.Proverbs 22:24
Proverbs 29:22An angry man stirreth up strife, and a furious man aboundeth in transgression.- Read Proverbs 29 →
Proverbs 233 verses
Proverbs 22:28
Proverbs 23:10Remove not the old landmark; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless:Proverbs 22:17
Proverbs 23:12Apply thine heart unto instruction, and thine ears to the words of knowledge.Proverbs 22:14
Proverbs 23:27For a whore is a deep ditch; and a strange woman is a narrow pit.- Read Proverbs 23 →
2 Timothy 32 verses
Proverbs 22:12
2 Timothy 3:8Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith.Proverbs 22:6, 20
2 Timothy 3:15And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.- Read 2 Timothy 3 →
The rest of the chapters this one speaks with, 4 of them, for a reader following a thread past the four above
- Proverbs 142 verses
- Proverbs 162 verses
- Proverbs 192 verses
- 1 Corinthians 52 verses
Cross-references from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge and OpenBible.info.
Featured studies
Pages of this site that take up something in this chapter. Each one opens on its own.
The world behind itThe place, the time and the people around this chapter, for a reader who wants the setting.
The world behind this chapter
Proverbs 22The history
"Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set." Fields were marked by stones set at the corners and along the boundary, and there was no central land registry to appeal to. Quietly shifting a stone a few paces each ploughing season stole a neighbour's ground without anyone seeing it happen. The Law put a formal curse on the man who did it, which shows how common and how hard to prosecute it was.
"Train up a child in the way he should go" uses a verb tied to dedicating or starting something, putting a child on the road early, at the age when the household, not a school, did the teaching. Children learned by working beside their parents from the time they could carry a jar.
At verse 17 the book shifts again. A new heading introduces "the words of the wise," a set of about thirty sayings addressed to a young man in royal service. This section runs closely parallel, in order, in imagery, and sometimes in wording, to the Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope, which also has thirty chapters. Which way the borrowing ran is genuinely disputed: many argue Israel drew on the older Egyptian text, others that both drew on a common stock of court wisdom. Either way Scripture is doing openly what it says wisdom does, recognising truth wherever it is found and putting it under the fear of the LORD, which is the frame Amenemope does not have.
"Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings" describes a real career path. Solomon's expanded administration needed scribes, stewards, and provincial officers, and a capable young man from an ordinary family could rise into it.
What it meant to them
"The rich and poor meet together: the LORD is the maker of them all" was a levelling line in a society where the gap was widening fast under a wealthy monarchy.
And the warnings that follow, do not rob the poor because he is poor, do not move the landmark, assume that the people most able to take advantage are exactly the ones being taught here.
Sources cited
- The Instruction of Amenemope (Egyptian wisdom text)
- Kenneth A. Kitchen, On the Reliability of the Old Testament
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Proverbs 22. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on 12 works. Open for the list.
This page draws on Adam Clarke; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Ambrose of Milan, LETTER 15; Basil of Caesarea; Bede, Commentary on Proverbs; Charles Bridges, An Exposition of the Book of Proverbs; Charles Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1670: “One Lion, Two Lions, No Lion at All!” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition) (1882); Cyril of Alexandria, LETTER TO JOHN OF ANTIOCH 39:7; Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Proverbs of Solomon; John Gill; Matthew Henry and Origen of Alexandria, HOMILIES ON JOSHUA 21.