Proverbs24chapter 24

Proverbs 24:1-2

Be not thou envious against evil men repeats a warning the collection returns to more than once, and this pairing gives the reason: their heart studieth destruction, and their lips talk of mischief. Gill reads the envy warned against as wishing for their apparent ease or success rather than approving their acts, a temptation the plain man feels precisely because the wicked often look comfortable. The proverb answers desire with diagnosis, showing what actually occupies the heart the reader might otherwise envy.

Proverbs 24:3-4

Through wisdom is an house builded turns from moral counsel to a builder's proverb, wisdom, understanding and knowledge named as three distinct workers raising, establishing and filling a household in turn. The chambers filled with all precious and pleasant riches reads on two levels at once, the literal household well stocked and the wise life itself furnished within, and Bridges takes the verse as a small parable for any undertaking that wants a foundation before it wants decoration.

Proverbs 24:5-6

A wise man is strong: A wise man is strong sets knowledge beside physical power and ranks it equal or higher, a claim the next line applies directly to warfare: by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war, and in multitude of counsellors there is safety. Henry reads the war language as covering any serious undertaking, since the same principle, that a plan improves under more than one mind, governs a household or a kingdom as much as a battle.

Proverbs 24:7-9

Wisdom is too high for a fool: Wisdom is too high for a fool explains why he openeth not his mouth in the gate, the public place where legal and civic business is settled, since wisdom's reach is simply beyond him rather than merely unwelcome to him. The scorner is an abomination to men closes the unit with the thought of foolishness itself called sin, not only the foolish act, and Gill reads the escalation from fool to scorner as the collection's usual pattern, folly hardening into open contempt.

Proverbs 24:10

If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small stands as its own terse proverb, adversity named as the test that reveals a strength never truly proven until then. Bridges reads the verse as diagnostic rather than accusing, adversity exposing a weakness that comfortable days had simply never called upon, so the fainting is evidence of a condition rather than its cause.

Proverbs 24:11-12

Deliver them that are drawn unto death, and those that are ready to be slain reads most plainly as rescuing the condemned from unjust execution, and Henry and the older bench take it that way, a call to intervene for a neighbor about to suffer a miscarriage of justice. Clarke notes the verse has also been read more broadly of anyone perishing, physically or spiritually, whom a bystander could help and does not; the excuse offered in verse 12, we knew it not, is answered either way by the same question, doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it, God weighing the plea against what the bystander actually knew.

Proverbs 24:13-14

My son, eat thou honey, because it is good returns to the father's direct address and uses the collection's favorite image for wisdom's sweetness, the honeycomb pleasant to taste and to the palate proof enough of its worth. So shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul makes the comparison explicit, and thy expectation shall not be cut off repeats the promise already given at 23:18, a hope that outlasts present appearances. Gill reads the doubled promise as deliberate reinforcement rather than mere repetition.

Proverbs 24:15-16

Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the righteous addresses the aggressor directly, and the reason given looks past any single ambush to the whole shape of a righteous life: a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again, but the wicked shall fall into mischief. Bridges reads the seven falls as ordinary setbacks rather than moral failures, and the verse's real force in the resilience, a righteous man's troubles are never his last word, while the wicked man's single fall is final.

Proverbs 24:17-18

Rejoice not when thine enemy falleth corrects an instinct the previous verses might almost invite, forbidding satisfaction even at a genuine enemy's downfall. Lest the Lord see it, and it displease him, and he turn away his wrath from him gives the surprising reason, gloating can move God to relent toward the very man being gloated over, and Henry reads the verse as guarding the heart of the righteous from becoming, in its own way, as ungracious as the wicked it opposes.

Proverbs 24:19-20

Fret not thyself because of evil men restates the chapter's opening warning in almost the same words the psalmist uses to begin Psalm 37, fret not thyself because of evildoers, the same pastoral counsel meeting the same temptation in two books. For there shall be no reward to the evil man, the candle of the wicked shall be put out gives the settled reason, a light that goes out is a light with no future, and Delitzsch reads the repeated warning across the chapter as proof of how persistent the temptation to envy actually is.

Proverbs 24:21-22

My son, fear thou the Lord and the king places the two fears side by side without confusing them, reverence for God and due respect for civil authority named in one breath. Meddle not with them that are given to change warns off political agitators and conspirators, and their calamity shall rise suddenly gives the reason, sudden ruin awaiting those who stir against settled authority, a caution Gill reads as wisdom rather than mere political conservatism, since the chapter has already warned against fretting at any injustice with rash action.

Proverbs 24:23

These things also belong to the wise is the book's fourth header, marking a short new collection attributed simply to the wise rather than to Solomon by name, matching the pattern already set at 22:17. It is not good to have respect of persons in judgment opens the new section on the same note the earlier collection struck, impartial justice named first among the things belonging to the wise.

Proverbs 24:24-26

He that saith unto the wicked, Thou art righteous names the judge or witness who calls evil good, and the people curse him, nations shall abhor him states the social cost of that corruption in the strongest terms the header collection uses. But to them that rebuke him shall be delight sets the opposite reward, and every man shall kiss his lips that giveth a right answer closes the unit with a figure of honor, Bridges reads the kiss as the ancient token of respect given to one whose word could be trusted.

Proverbs 24:27

Prepare thy work without, and make it fit for thyself in the field, and afterwards build thine house sets a plain order for a farming household, income secured before comfort is built, and the older commentators generalize it to any undertaking that puts foundation before ornament. Henry reads it beside verse 3's house built through wisdom, the two verses framing the header collection's practical wisdom around the same image of a household rightly raised.

Proverbs 24:28-29

Be not a witness against thy neighbour without cause forbids false or needless testimony, and deceive not with thy lips widens the ban to any lying speech against him. Say not, I will do so to him as he hath done to me answers a private urge to repay injury with injury, and I will render to the man according to his work leaves that rendering to a judge or to God rather than to personal revenge, a proverb the bench reads alongside Rom 12:17's recompense to no man evil for evil as the same instinct answered twice in Scripture.

Proverbs 24:30-32

The chapter closes as an eyewitness report rather than an abstract saying: I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding, and lo, it was all grown over with thorns, the stone wall broken down. Then I saw, and considered it well, I looked upon it, and received instruction states the method as much as the finding, Bridges noting that the observer learns wisdom by watching a real ruin rather than by being told a rule, the same instructive habit the book commends throughout.

Proverbs 24:33-34

Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep, and the poverty that follows as one that travelleth and as an armed man repeat 6:10-11 word for word, the collection's own refrain closing the chapter exactly as it closed the earlier warning to the sluggard. Gill reads the repetition as deliberate rather than careless, the same field observed and the same lesson drawn twice because the danger it names never stops recurring.