Proverbschapter 23
35 verses · Solomon and others · 10th to 5th century BC · Wisdom and poetry
Do not wear yourself out to get rich; be wise enough to restrain yourself.
Introduction
Solomon and others, Wisdom and poetry, Proverbs Overview.
This chapter belongs to the words of the wise, the instructions the book sets after Solomon's long collection, and it is addressed to a young man newly admitted to the tables of powerful men. It reads as a teacher's counsel to his student, in longer units than the single sayings before it. The first hearers were young officials learning how to behave at a ruler's banquet and how to keep their heads afterwards. Listen for the warnings about appetite, about wealth that does not stay, and about the orphan's field. Then listen for the father's appeal that rises near the end.
Context
- Who
- Young officials invited to eat with powerful men
- What
- Instructions from the words of the wise on dining with rulers, on riches, the fatherless, discipline and drunkenness.
- Where
- A ruler's banquet table, and the wine hall afterwards.
- When
- Undated by the text; the book sets the words of the wise after Solomon's sayings of about 970 to 931 BC.
- Why
- To prepare a young man in royal service to master his appetites and to keep his heart with his father's teaching.
Historical context
"When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before thee, and put a knife to thy throat, if thou be a man given to appetite." Court banquets were political events. A patron fed you well and watched how you behaved, and an eager guest revealed his appetites in public. "His dainties are deceitful meat" warns that the meal is a test with a bill attached.
Show the rest of the historical context, 3 more paragraphs
"Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye" names a figure the whole ancient Near East recognised: the grudging, stingy host who counts every bite while urging you to take more. The chapter says the food will come back up because the hospitality was never real.
"Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it giveth his colour in the cup, when it moveth itself aright" describes wine being examined the way a connoisseur examines it, held up, the colour and the bead admired. Then the chapter follows the same man to the end of the night: seeing strange things, feeling nothing when struck, lying down "in the midst of the sea, or… upon the top of a mast." That last image, a man swaying at the masthead of a ship, is the most vivid description of drunkenness in the Bible.
"Remove not the old landmark; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless: for their redeemer is mighty." The redeemer was the kinsman legally obliged to buy back a relative's lost land and defend him in court. An orphan had no such man, and the proverb says God takes that role.
Significance
For a young man newly admitted to important tables, this chapter was survival training: eat carefully, do not wear yourself out chasing riches, and remember that wealth "flieth away as an eagle toward heaven."
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
It then turns homeward: "my son, give me thine heart." After all the etiquette and the warnings, the thing asked for is not performance at the table but the boy himself.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
What is done
No public reading in the synagogue is drawn from this chapter. The site's own table in src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts was probed for this lane over Proverbs 16 to 31. It printed parashot total 0, haftarah uses total 0 and 0 chapters with a synagogue reading. It printed null for a festival reading of the book. The same probe printed 54 weekly portions and 6 festival readings in the table as a whole. The corpus ties no custom of the home or the synagogue to this chapter, so this part records the absence.
The chapter is met in the study of the Midrash and the Talmud instead. The corpus links it to twenty-two collections. The two it cites most often here are Berakhot and Bamidbar Rabbah.
How it is read
Rashi is quoted here from The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, which Sefaria reports as CC-BY. Every quotation is held to fifty words or fewer because the translation is modern. The chapter opens at a ruler's table, and Rashi reads it first as table manners. If the host is stingy, "do not eat of his [food]" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:2:1), and the morsel eaten in his house "you will ultimately vomit because of embarrassment" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:8:1). At the third verse he turns the delicacies into study, saying the student should go "before a competent teacher, and do not embarrass him with questions" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:3:1). At the seventh verse he reads a word as a verb because of its vowels and its accent (Rashi on Proverbs 23:7:1).
The riches of the fourth and fifth verses are learning gathered too fast. The student is warned against making his learning into bundles, "because you will ultimately forget it" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:4:1). In the blink of an eye "that study will no longer be found with you" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:5:1). The purchase of truth at the twenty-third verse is a rule for teachers: "If you do not find to learn for nothing, learn for pay" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:23:1). In the same note he warns the one who paid against teaching for pay in turn.
The fields of the orphans at the tenth verse are the portions the Torah gives them: "The gleanings, the forgotten sheaves, and the corner that is due them" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:10:1). The warning against envying sinners of the seventeenth verse he completes with "their success, to be wicked like them" (Rashi on Proverbs 23:17:1).
The corpus carries ten further notes on this chapter without an English text, each marked linked because Sefaria holds no English version of the ref. They are cited by ref alone: Ibn Ezra on Proverbs 23:6:1, 23:9:1, 23:12:1, 23:13:1, 23:14:1, 23:22:1 and 23:24:1 and Metzudat David on Proverbs 23:11:1, 23:15:1 and 23:20:1.
What the rabbis say
The corpus carries forty rabbinic locators on this chapter, twenty-two filed as Midrash and eighteen as Talmud, and the text of none, so each is cited here by its ref and never quoted or paraphrased. At verse 1 it holds Chullin 6a:4 and Shemot Rabbah 15:20. At verse 2 it holds Chullin 6a:2, with Ein Yaakov, Khullin 1:4. At verse 4 it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 22:9, with Midrash Tanchuma, Matot 7:1. At verse 5 it holds Avot DeRabbi Natan 41:9, with Avot DeRabbi Natan, Recension B 47:2. At verse 6 it holds Chullin 7b:5, with Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Chullin 1:3. At verse 10 it holds Jerusalem Talmud Peah 5:5:1 and Jerusalem Talmud Peah 5:5:4. At verse 13 it holds Aggadat Bereshit 41:4 and Midrash Tannaim on Deuteronomy 25:3:17. At verse 15 it holds Berakhot 4a:13 and Bereshit Rabbah 63:1. At verse 17 it holds Aggadat Bereshit 52:1 and Berakhot 7b:17. At verse 18 it holds Midrash Tehillim 73:1. At verse 20 it holds Jerusalem Talmud Sanhedrin 8:2:1, with Midrash Aggadah, Deuteronomy 21:20:1. At verse 21 it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Sanhedrin 8:4, with Ein Yaakov, Sanhedrin 8:5. At verse 22 it holds Berakhot 54a:9 and Berakhot 63a:7. At verse 23 it holds Avodah Zarah 4b:13 and Bekhorot 29a:8. At verse 24 it holds Midrash Mishlei 23:2, with Midrash Tanchuma, Toldot 2:1. At verse 25 it holds Berakhot 19a:11, with Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Berakhot 3:2. At verse 26 it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 10:2 and Jerusalem Talmud Berakhot 1:5:3. At verse 27 it holds Aggadat Bereshit 25:2 and Bava Kamma 16b:21. At verse 28 it holds Jerusalem Talmud Taanit 3:10:1. At verse 29 it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Sanhedrin 8:2, with Ein Yaakov, Sanhedrin 8:3. At verse 30 it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 10:8. At verse 31 it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 10:4. What each of them teaches is a saying of the rabbis, and it is reported as theirs wherever this site quotes one.
Sources: Rashi, Rashi on Proverbs 23:1:1 to 23:23:1, The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, reported CC-BY; Ibn Ezra, Ibn Ezra on Proverbs 23:6:1, 23:9:1, 23:12:1, 23:13:1, 23:14:1, 23:22:1 and 23:24:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; Metzudat David, Metzudat David on Proverbs 23:11:1, 23:15:1 and 23:20:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; The Sefaria corpus, scripts/data/sources/sefaria/proverbs/23.json, the 40 Talmud and Midrash locators of this chapter; The site's own files, src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts, printing no portion, no Haftarah and no festival reading for this book.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
When Thou Sittest to Eat With a Ruler
Proverbs 23:1-3
When you sit down to dine: The chapter opens at a ruler's table. The guest must "consider carefully what is set before you, and put a knife to your throat if you possess a great appetite." The delicacies are deceptive because a great man's food can be bait for a favor he means to extract.
Proverbs 23:1
“What is before thee - Beware lest dainties tempt thee to excess. Or, “consider diligently who is before thee,” the character and temper of the ruler who invites thee.”
1 more voice on this verseWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Proverbs 23:1
“Divine Scripture commands that, when we have been invited to a rich man's banquet, we should with understanding put forth our hand to the dishes. And so for us too the banquet of Scriptures has been set out as a rich man's feast. We have come into a meadow; it has very many flowers: here the rose is red, there the lilies gleam white, there are flowers of every kind. Our soul is drawn this way and that, to gather from wherever it may the more beautiful flowers.”
Jerome · written before 420 · Homilies on the Psalms 11 (Psalm 77)patristic
put a knife to your throat: The knife at the throat pictures fierce self-restraint at a ruler's table. John Gill applies it to the tongue. He warns that guests who have eaten well grow too free in their talk and give offense to the ruler or to the other guests.
for that food is deceptive: The ruler's delicacies are called deceptive because they are set before you with a purpose. Albert Barnes compares the savory food of Genesis 27:4. Clement of Alexandria applies the verse to every table of costly delicacies, which he counts part of a false and base life.
Proverbs 23:3
“There is no limit to epicurism among men. For it has driven them to sweetmeats, and honey-cakes, and sugar-plums; inventing a multitude of desserts, hunting after all manner of dishes. A man like this seems to me to be all jaw, and nothing else. "Desire not," says the Scripture, "rich men's dainties;" for they belong to a false and base life. They partake of luxurious dishes, which a little after go to the dunghill.”
Clement of Alexandria · written before 215 · The Instructor Book 2patristic
Proverbs 23:4-5
Do not wear yourself out: t to get rich" sets the limit, and "be wise enough to restrain yourself" names the discipline that keeps it. Wealth "makes wings for itself and flies like an eagle to the sky." The warning falls on the striving heart.
Proverbs 23:4
“Labour not to be rich - Let not this be thy object. Labour to provide things honest in the sight of God and all men; and if thou get wealth, do not forget the poor, else God’s curse will be a canker even in thy gold. Cease from thine own wisdom - בינתך binathecha, thy own understanding or prudence.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:4
“They have a real existence in nature and are the real gifts of Providence, but in the kingdom of grace they are things that are not; they are not a happiness and portion for a soul, are not what they promise to be nor what we expect them to be; they are a show, a shadow, a sham upon the soul that trusts to them.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
When you glance at wealth: Wealth disappears while you glance at it. It grows wings, flying like an eagle to the sky and leaving by its own motion with no thief needed. John Gill and Matthew Henry aim the warning at wearing yourself out to get rich and at the heart behind it.
Proverbs 23:5
Set thine eyes - literally, as in the margin, i. e., “gaze eagerly upon;” and then we get an emphatic parallelism with the words that follow, “they fly away as an eagle toward heaven;” “certainly make themselves wings.”
2 more voices on this verse
Proverbs 23:5
“Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not?....”
Proverbs 23:5
“Do not lift your eyes to riches, etc. Do not lift your mind to search the secrets of divinity, which you cannot penetrate. For these are open only to the heavenly citizens.”
Bede · written before 735 · Commentary on Proverbspatristic
Proverbs 23:6-8
Do not eat the bread: The "evil eye" of the King James is the stingy host, whose invitation is a performance. He says eat and drink, but "his heart is not with you." The guest who trusts the show will vomit up what he ate and waste the pleasant words he spoke in thanks.
Proverbs 23:6
“Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye,.... A sordid covetous man, that grudges every bit that is eaten, in opposition to a man of a good eye, or a bountiful one, that is liberal and generous, Pro 22:9; if he invites to a meal, do not accept of it, sit not down at his table to eat with him: neither desire thou his dainty meats; or savoury food, so as to lust after it; See Gill on Pro 23:3.”
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:6
“Wise, therefore, was he who forbids us even to dine in company with an envious man, and in mentioning this companionship at table, he implies a reference to all other social contacts as well. Just as we are careful to keep material which is easily inflammable as far away as possible from fire, so we must refrain insofar as we can from contracting friendships in circles of which envious persons are members. By so doing, we place ourselves beyond the range of their shafts. We can be caught in the toils of envy only by establishing intimacy with it.”
Basil of Caesarea · written before 379 · Homily Concerning Envypatristic
inwardly counting the cost: The stingy host says eat and drink, and his heart is counting the cost of every bite. Albert Barnes notes that the Hebrew verb occurs only here and reads it of a heart that at last shows in the man's acts. John Gill hears the invitation as a mere compliment.
Proverbs 23:7
“For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he,.... He is not the man his mouth speaks or declares him to be, but what his heart thinks; which is discovered by his looks and actions, and by which he is to be judged of, and not by his words; eat and drink, saith he to thee, but his heart is not with thee; he bids you eat and drink, but he does not desire you should, at least but very sparingly; it is only a mere compliment, not a hearty welcome.”
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:7
Thinketh - The Hebrew verb is found here only, and probably means, “as he is all along in his heart, so is he (at last) in act.”
vomit up what little you have eaten: The meal ends in disgust once the guest sees the host's grudging heart. What he ate comes back up. His pleasant words were wasted on a stingy host, and Franz Delitzsch reads the saying as a warning against judging generosity by the mouth alone.
Proverbs 23:8
“The morsel which thou hast eaten - On reflection thou wilt even blame thyself for having accepted his invitation.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Do not speak to a fool: l, for he will despise the wisdom of your words" matches the pearls-before-swine counsel the tradition drew from it. The fool's contempt lies in the fixed condition of the hearer, and the speaker's argument is not at fault. The verse teaches discernment about the audience.
Proverbs 23:10-11
Do not move an ancient boundary stone: e" repeats a command given at 22:28. The reason is a person: "their Redeemer is strong; He will take up their case." God stands as the goel for the orphan, and Henry ties the word to the office Job invokes at Job 19:25.
Proverbs 23:10
“Remove not the old landmark,.... See Gill on Pro 22:28; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless; to carry off the increase of them, to reap their wheat, or mow their grass, or turn in cattle to eat it; or to encroach upon them, take in any part of them, or join the whole to their own; for if there is a woe to them that lay field to field, much more to them that enter into and take the fields of the fatherless, and join them to their own, Isa 5:8.”
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:10
“Remove not the old landmark - See Pro 22:28 (note). Enter not into the fields of the fatherless - Take nothing that belongs to an orphan. The heaviest curse of God will fall upon them that do so.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
for their Redeemer is strong: The fatherless have a strong Redeemer who will take up their case against the man who moves their boundary stone. Albert Barnes explains the word from the duty of the next of kin, the avenger of blood. God claims the fatherless as his own kin.
Proverbs 23:11
“The reason is given for the precept Pro 23:10. Their redeemer - See Job 19:25 note. It was the duty of the גאל gā'al, the next of kin, to take on himself, in case of murder, the office of avenger of blood Num 35:19. By a slight extension the word was applied to one who took on himself a like office in cases short of this. Here, therefore, the thought is that, destitute as the fatherless may seem, there is One who claims them as His next of kin, and will avenge them.”
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:11
“For their Redeemer is mighty,.... As he must needs be, since the Lord of hosts is his name; who sympathizes with them, has mercy on them, is their father, and their friend; see Jer 50:34; he shall plead their cause with thee; or "against thee", as the Vulgate Latin version; and will certainly carry it for them, and against thee; for, when he undertakes a cause, he pleads it thoroughly.”
Buy the Truth and Sell It Not; Withhold Not Correction
Proverbs 23:12-14
Apply your heart to instruction: n" reopens the father's direct appeal. A child struck "with a rod, he will not die," and "you will deliver his soul from Sheol" states the stakes. The correction aims at the child's whole future more than at the moment's offense.
Do not withhold discipline from a child: Albert Barnes turns the verse around. A child struck with the rod will not die from it, and withholding discipline may kill him. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown weigh a small risk of bodily harm against a great hope of spiritual good.
Proverbs 23:13
“As small children who are negligent in learning become more attentive and obedient after being punished by their teacher or tutor, and as they do not listen before the lash, but, after feeling the pain of a beating, hear and respond as though their ears were just recently opened, improving also in memory, so likewise with those who neglect divine doctrine and spurn the commandments. For, after they experience God's correction and discipline, then the commandments of God which had always been known to them and always neglected are most readily received as though by ears freshly cleansed.”
Basil of Caesarea · written before 379 · Homily on the Beginning of Proverbs 5patristic
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:13
“While there is little danger that the use of the "divine ordinance of the rod" will produce bodily harm, there is great hope of spiritual good. The pleasure afforded the teacher by the pupil's progress is a motive to diligence.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
deliver his soul from Sheol: Albert Barnes explains Sheol as the world of the dead, and the verse sets the rod against that end. The rod aims at the soul's rescue. Basil of Caesarea compares the believer under God's discipline, who at last hears commands long known and long neglected.
Proverbs 23:14
“Thou shalt beat him with the rod - A proper correction of children was a favourite point of discipline with Solomon. We have already seen how forcibly he speaks on this subject. See the notes on the places referred to in 1Co 5:5 (note).”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 23:15-16
My son, if your heart is wise: The father turns from correction to affection without a seam: "if your heart is wise, my own heart will indeed rejoice." The words "my own heart" press the father's personal stake in the son's wisdom. The inmost being, the King James "reins", names the innermost organs in Hebrew idiom.
Proverbs 23:15
“Another continuous exhortation rather than a collection of maxims. Pro 23:16 The teacher rejoices when the disciple’s heart Pro 23:15 receives wisdom, and yet more when his lips can utter it. Reins - See Job 19:27 note. Pro 23:17 Envy sinners - Compare in Psa 37:1; Psa 73:3; the feeling which looks half-longingly at the prosperity of evil doers. Some connect the verb “envy” with the second clause, “envy not sinners, but envy, emulate, the fear of the Lord.” Pro 23:18 Or, For if there is an end (hereafter), thine expectations shall not be cut off.”
My inmost being will rejoice: Verse 16 carries the joy of verse 15 one step further. Albert Barnes reads the teacher as glad when the learner's heart receives wisdom and gladder still when his lips can speak it. The inmost being names a joy felt deep within.
Proverbs 23:17-18
Do not let your heart envy sinners: s" answers the pressure that runs through the book, watching the wicked prosper. The promise that "there is a future" points to an outcome the present moment cannot show. Henry sets it beside Psalm 73, where envy dissolves by looking to the last account.
Proverbs 23:17
“LAST Lord's-Day we had for our texts two promises [EverlastingLove Revealed, #2149.] I trust they were full of comfort to the tried people of God and to souls in the anguish of conviction. Today we will consider two precepts so that we may not seem to neglect any part of the Word of God, for the precept is as Divine as the promise. Here we have a command given of the Holy Spirit through the wisest of men and therefore both on the Divine and on the human side it is most weighty.”
surely there is a future: The future promised here answers the envy of verse 17. Adam Clarke reads the Hebrew as another life, with a hope of blessed immortality that will not be cut off. Albert Barnes renders the line as a condition about a hereafter.
Proverbs 23:18
“Surely there is an end - יש אחרית yesh acharith, there is another life; “and thy expectation” of the enjoyment of a blessed immortality “shall not be cut off.” The Old MS. Bible reads thus: For thou schalt hab hop in the last: and thin abiiding schal not ben taken awei. “For the ende is not yet come; and thy patient abydinge shal not be in vayne.” - Coverdale.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Proverbs 23:19-21
Listen, my son, and be wise: e" opens a fresh appeal that runs into the chapter's long drunkard poem. These verses give its first, plainer form: "Do not join those who drink too much wine." The line "the drunkard and the glutton will come to poverty" names two appetites at once.
Proverbs 23:19
“THE words are very direct and personal—and that is what I wish my sermon to be. My soul is more and more set upon immediate conversions. I have no voice with which to play the orator—I have only enough strength to be an earnest pleader with your souls. I want to come to close quarters with you and to plead with each man and woman here as if there were but one. Specially would I press my entreaties upon the young, that they may immediately begin that blessed walk which will lead them to the right hand of God.”
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:19
“It is the heart that must be taken care of and directed aright; the motions and affections of the soul must be towards right objects and under a steady guidance.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
those who drink too much wine: Adam Clarke counts three tables in this chapter, the ruler's table, the stingy man's bread, and the public feast where men drink too much wine. He reports three reasons for the warning. They are the useless expense, the lost time and the danger of bad company.
Proverbs 23:20
“Be not among winebibbers - There is much of this chapter spent in giving directions concerning eating, drinking, and entertainments in general. 1. he pupil is directed relative to the manner in which he is to conduct himself in his visits to the tables of the rich and great. 2. Relative to the covetous and his intercourse with them. And 3. To public entertainnlents, where there were generally riot and debauch. The reasons, says Calmet, which induced the wise man to give these directions were, 1. The useless expense. 2. The loss of time. 3. The danger from bad company.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
drowsiness will clothe them in rags: The poverty comes by two roads. The money goes to the table, and the drowsiness that follows excess makes a man unfit for work. John Gill says they spend all on their bellies and have nothing left for their backs, and Matthew Henry traces the same slide to rags.
Proverbs 23:21
“For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty,.... They consuming their substance upon their bellies, in eating and drinking; see Pro 21:17; and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags; excessive eating and drinking brings drowsiness on men, unfits them for business, and makes them idle and slothful; and spending all on their bellies, they have nothing for their backs, and are clothed in rags; see Pro 24:33.”
Listen to your father who gave: e you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old" renews the honor of the fifth commandment. The weight falls on "when she is old," since honor is easy while parents are strong and becomes the test once they are not.
Proverbs 23:22
“Despise not thy mother when she is old - A very necessary caution, as very old women are generally helpless, useless, and burdensome: yet these circumstances do not at all lessen the child’s duty. And this duty is strengthened by the Divine command here given.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
"Invest in truth and never sell it" stands among the book's most quoted lines, truth priced as a possession worth any cost. The line widens the same command across the book's vocabulary for the wise life, "wisdom and instruction and understanding." Bridges notes that the purchase implies labor and sacrifice.
Proverbs 23:23
Buy the truth - Acquire the knowledge of God at all events; and in order to do this, too much pains, industry, and labor cannot be expended. And sell it not - When once acquired, let no consideration deprive thee of it. Cleave to and guard it, even at the risk of thy life. Coverdale translates: “Labour for to get the treuth; sell not awaye wissdome.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:23
“John Bunyan pictures the pilgrims as passing at one time through Vanity Fair, and in Vanity Fair there were to be found all kinds of merchandise, consisting of the pomp and vanities, the lusts and pleasures of this present life and of the flesh. Now all the dealers, when they saw these strange pilgrims come into the fair, began to cry, as vendors will do, "Buy, buy, buy—buy this, and buy that." There were the priests in the Italian row with their crucifixes and their beads. There were those in the German row with their philosophies and their metaphysics.”
Charles Spurgeon · written before 1892 · The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 3449: “Buying the Truth” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition)Particular Baptist
Proverbs 23:24-25
The father of a righteous man: n will greatly rejoice" answers the promise of verse 15 from the other side. The next verse names father and mother together and then names the mother a second time, "may she who gave you birth rejoice."
Proverbs 23:24
“Righteousness is true wisdom; those who do good so well for themselves. Those are completely such as they should be who are not only wise (that is, knowing and learned), but righteous (that is, honest and good), and not only righteous (that is, conscientious and well-meaning), but wise (that is, prudent and discreet) in the management of themselves.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
May your father and mother be glad: The verse names father and mother together and then names the mother again by her act of giving birth. Bede reads it spiritually. God the Father rejoices in the believer's righteousness, and the Church, the believer's mother, rejoices with him.
Proverbs 23:25
“Let your father and mother rejoice, etc. Let God the Father rejoice over your righteousness; let the Church, your mother, also rejoice; and let the priest who regenerated you through the grace of baptism, and who educated you from childhood, rejoice in your good works.”
Bede · written before 735 · Commentary on Proverbspatristic
Who Hath Woe? Wine at the Last Biteth Like a Serpent
Proverbs 23:26-28
My son, give me your heart: t" opens directly into a warning: "a prostitute is a deep pit, and an adulteress is a narrow well." The two images share one danger, a fall a man does not see coming and cannot easily climb out of.
Proverbs 23:26
“My son, give me thine heart - This is the speech of God to every human soul; give thy affections to God, so as to love him with all thy heart, soul, mind, and strength. And let thine eyes observe my ways - Be obedient to me in all things. My son, thou believest that I Am, and that I Am the Fountain of all good. Give me thy heart; it is I alone who can make thee happy. Observe my ways - follow me; do what is right in my sight. This exhortation contains three words: Believe, Love, Obey!”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:26
“THESE are the words of Solomon speaking in the name of Wisdom, which wisdom is but another name for the Lord Jesus Christ, who is made of God unto us Wisdom. If you ask, "What is the highest wisdom upon the earth?" it is to believe in Jesus Christ whom God has sent—to become His follower and disciple—to trust Him and imitate Him. It is God, in the Person of His dear Son, who says to each one of us, "My son, give Me your heart." Can we answer, "Lord, I have given You my heart"?”
a prostitute is a deep pit: The deep pit of 22:14 returns with a narrow well beside it, both hard to climb out of. Matthew Henry draws the lesson to keep far from the brink. John Gill cites old writers who likened the prostitute to the sea, which swallows all it is given.
Proverbs 23:27
“It is like a deep ditch and a narrow pit, which it is almost impossible to get out of; and therefore it is wisdom to keep far enough from the brink of it. Take heed of making any approaches towards this sin, because it is so hard to make a retreat from it, conscience, which should head the retreat, being debauched by it, and divine grace forfeited.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:27
“For a whore is a deep ditch,.... Or, "as a deep ditch", so Aben Ezra; to which she may be compared for the filthiness of her whoredoms, and for her insatiable lust, as well as for her being never satisfied with what she receives from her lovers. Plautus compares (g) her to the sea, which devours whatever you give, and yet nothing appears; and another (h) calls a whore Charybdis, from her swallowing up and devouring all a man has.”
Like a robber she lies in wait: The picture moves from a pit to a robber lying in wait. John Gill places her at her door and at the street corner in the dark, waiting to prey on a man's virtue and his money. Each man she takes multiplies the faithless among men.
Proverbs 23:28
“She also lieth in wait as for a prey,.... At the door of her house, in the corner of the streets, in the dark of the night; laying her snares, and spreading her nets, for unwary persons, to make a prey of their virtue and of their money.”
Proverbs 23:29-30
Who has woe? Who has sorrow?: The chapter closes with its most vivid poem, six questions: who has woe, sorrow, contentions, complaints, needless wounds and bloodshot eyes. The answer lands as its own line, "Those who linger over wine, who go to taste mixed drinks." The suspense of the riddle is part of the poem's craft.
Proverbs 23:29
“Those that have contentions have woe and sorrow; and drunkards are the fools whose lips enter into contention. When the wine is in the wit is out and the passions are up; and thence come drunken scuffles, and drunken frays, and drunken disputes over the cups; many a vexatious ruining law-suit has begun thus.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Those who linger over wine: are the ones with the woe, sorrow and bloodshot eyes of verse 29. Bede allows wine taken for need and faults lingering over it past all use. Matthew Henry says mixed drinks trade reason for taste.
Proverbs 23:31-32
Do not gaze at wine: e while it is red" turns the poem to direct address. "In the end it bites like a snake and stings like a viper." The serpent figure is the poem's turn, the pleasure and the poison packed into one image.
Proverbs 23:31
“Red wine was in Canaan looked upon as the best wine, it is therefore called the blood of the grape. Critics judge of wine, among other indications, by the colour of it; some wine, they say, looks charmingly, looks so well that it even says, "Come and drink me;" it moves itself aright, goes down very smoothly, or perhaps the roughness of it is grateful.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:31
“Look not thou upon the wine - Let neither the color, the odour, the sparkling, etc., of the wine, when poured out, induce thee to drink of it. However good and pure it may be, it will to thee be a snare, because thou art addicted to it, and hast no self-command.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
it bites like a snake: Matthew Henry notes that the Hebrew says the wine bites in its latter end. The warning sets the end beside the pleasure. Wine that sparkles in the cup at verse 31 turns into a snake and a viper.
Proverbs 23:32
“To take off the force of the temptation that there is in the pleasure of the sin, foresee the punishment of it, and what it will at last end in if repentance prevent not. In its latter end it bites (so the word is); think therefore what will be in the end thereof. But the inspired writer chooses to specify those pernicious consequences of this sin which are present and sensible.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Proverbs 23:33-35
Your eyes will see strange things: The poem's last lines follow the drinker past the cup into its ruin: "Your eyes will see strange things." He lies "like one sleeping on the high seas," with danger everywhere and no sense of it. The last verse gives the drunkard his own voice, beaten and feeling nothing.
Proverbs 23:33
“Thine eyes shall behold strange women - Evil concupiscence is inseparable from drunkenness. Mr. Herbert shows these effects well: - He that is drunken may his mother kill, Big with his sister: he hath lost the reins; Is outlawed by himself. All kinds of ill Did, with his liquor, slide into his veins. The drunkard forfeits man; and doth divest All worldly right, save what he hath by beast. Herbert’s Poems - The Church Porch.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
like one sleeping on the high seas: Adam Clarke pictures a drunk man asleep at the top of a mast, bound to fall to the deck. Gill adds that the mast's top sways most. Gregory the Dialogist reads the sleeper on the high seas as a soul amid temptation that has let go of the rudder.
Proverbs 23:34
“For he sleeps in the midst of the sea who, placed among the temptations of this world, neglects to look out for the motions of vices that rush in upon him like impending heaps of waves. And the steersman, as it were, lets go the rudder when the mind loses the earnestness of solicitude for guiding the ship of the body. For, indeed, to let go the rudder in the sea is to leave off intentness of forethought among the storms of this life.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Pastoral Rule, Part 3patristic
2 more voices on this verse
Proverbs 23:34
“Yea, thou shall be as he that lieth down in the midst of the sea,.... Not in the open sea, and the waves of it, there fluctuating and tossed about; nor in an island encompassed by sea; but in a ship at sea, a drunken man reels and tumbles about, just as a ship does at sea; hence the motions and agitations of it, and of the men in it, are compared to the reeling and staggering of a drunken man, Psa 107:26; or as he that lieth upon the top of a mast: where the motion is the greatest.”
Proverbs 23:34
“Lieth down in the midst of the sea - He is utterly regardless of life; which is expressed very forcibly by one in a state of intoxication ascending the shrouds, clasping the mast-head, and there falling asleep; whence, in a few moments, he must either fall down upon the deck and be dashed to pieces, or fall into the sea and be drowned. Reader, if thou be a man given to this appetite, put a knife to thy throat.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
The drunkard speaks for himself at last. Adam Clarke marks the horror of it, a man too drunk to know who struck him and already planning to search for another drink. Gregory the Dialogist applies the verse to the careless soul that is beaten and feels no pain.
Proverbs 23:35
“They have stricken me - Though beat and abused, full of pain, and exhibiting a frightful figure; yet so drunk was he, as to be insensible who had struck him: still, after all this abuse and disgrace, he purposes to embrace the next opportunity of repeating his excesses! Sin makes a man contemptible in life, miserable in death, and wretched to all eternity. Is it not strange, then, that men should Love it?”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Proverbs 23:35
“Whence, also, the utterance of one that is stricken and yet sleeps is expressed by Solomon, who says, "They have beaten thee, and I was not pained; they have dragged me, and I felt it not. When shall I awake and again find wine?" For the soul that sleeps from the care of its solicitude is beaten and feels not pain, because, as it foresees not impending evils, so neither is it aware of those which it has perpetrated.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · The Book of Pastoral Rule, Part 3, Chapter 32patristic
Keep studying
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Basil of Caesarea, HOMILY ON THE BEGINNING OF PROVERBS 5; Bede, Commentary on Proverbs; Charles Bridges, An Exposition of the Book of Proverbs; Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor Book 2; Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Proverbs of Solomon; Gregory the Dialogist; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.