CBS – Wisdom in Cultural Contexts: Proverbs 10, 16, 22-24, 28, 30-31

Recorded October 10th 2013

Proverbs is indeed full of little two-line aphorisms, but it also has an underlying theology about how God has created and governs the world. In many instances God’s actions are explicitly stated, and contrasted with human motivations and actions, e.g. “man may make plans in his heart, but what the tongue utters is from the Lord.”  (16:1) In other cases, God is not named, but it is implied that “this is how God created the world and designed things to happen”, such as “he who sows iniquity reaps calamity, and the rod destroys his labors.” (22:8)

There is a strong sense throughout that God rewards virtue and punishes sin: “The reward of humility and fear of the Lord is riches, honor and life. Thorns and snares are on the path of the crooked; he who would safeguard his life will shun them.” (22:4, 5) In Proverbs there is no question that God’s justice will prevail. Only later in other works, as we will see, is the question raised, “Why do bad things happen to good people?

Chapter 30 features some numerical proverbs, a particular literary form, drawing together phenomena from nature as both demonstrations of God’s wisdom, and limitations of human understanding, e.g. 30:18-20, pondering the mysteries of how birds fly, how snakes move, how ships sails and “the way of a man with a maiden” – all unsolvable mysteries!

Note that after several times earlier warning the young man to whom the book is aimed about the dangers of a seductive woman, at the  end of the book the virtues of the Ideal Wife are extolled (31:10-31), “Many are the women of proven worth, but you have excelled them all.”