Proverbs 10:4

“The proverbs of Solomon” is a heading. It opens the main collection of the book, the sayings that run from here to Proverbs 22:16. The chapters before it (Proverbs 1–9) are long appeals from a father to his son, with wisdom pictured as a person calling out in the street. From here the book gives single sayings, most of them two lines long, each complete in itself.

The word mâshâl, “proverb”, means a saying, proverb, byword, parable or oracle. A proverb puts a truth about life into a few words a person can carry with him. In this part of the book the second line usually answers the first by contrast: wise against foolish, righteous against wicked, diligent against slack. All seven verses of this passage are built that way, and the contrast is how they teach. Together they describe a world in which God has tied conduct to where it leads, as Proverbs 11:3 says of the integrity of the upright that guides them.

The collection’s first saying is about a family: “A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.” The wise son is châkâm, a word that covers practical skill, sound judgment and a life lived rightly before God. The foolish son is kᵉçîyl, the ordinary word for a fool, which Strong’s explains as stupid or silly, from a root meaning to be fat. In Proverbs the fool is the one who turns away from instruction, and the book’s motto names that very thing: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Proverbs 1:7).

In Israel the household was the center of life. Faith, land and the family name passed through it to the next generation, children were counted a blessing from God, and a son’s conduct reflected on his parents’ honor. Proverbs was written to train young people for that adult life, so it is fitting that the first saying of the collection is about how a child’s choices reach his parents’ hearts. The book comes back to it often: Proverbs 15:20 repeats the first line, Proverbs 17:21 speaks of the grief a foolish son brings, and Proverbs 23:24–25 of the joy of a wise son’s father and mother.

“Treasures of wickedness profit nothing: but righteousness delivereth from death.” The word ʼôwtsâr is a treasure, or the storehouse, treasury, armory or granary where it is kept. reshaʻ is wickedness, action contrary to God’s law that brings guilt. These are stores gathered by sin, through cheating, deceit or oppression. Their verb yâʻal means to profit or be of use, and the verse denies them any profit at all, in trouble, at the judgment or at death, where security matters most.

Wealth was a plain mark of success in Israel, and the wisdom books keep saying that wealth gained wrongly is a hollow blessing. Proverbs says it again and again: “Riches profit not in the day of wrath: but righteousness delivereth from death” (Proverbs 11:4), “Wealth gotten by vanity shall be diminished” (Proverbs 13:11), and “Better is the poor that walketh in his uprightness, than he that is perverse in his ways, though he be rich” (Proverbs 28:6). A psalm calls trust in riches vain (Psalm 49:6–7).

Righteousness, tsᵉdâqâh, is rightness: upright conduct, justice, a life that conforms to God’s will. The verb nâtsal, “delivereth”, means to snatch away, rescue or set free, and the one it rescues is the person, taken out of death’s reach. Righteousness is pictured here as a rescuer, and Jesus gives the same order of things: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33).

“The LORD will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish: but he casteth away the substance of the wicked.” Verse 2 names righteousness as the rescuer, and verse 3 names the one who acts, the LORD, Yᵉhôvâh, the covenant God of Israel. The word for soul, nephesh, comes from a root meaning to breathe, and it means a living creature, life, soul, self, person or appetite. To famish, râʻêb, is to hunger or starve. In a farming land where drought and famine were real dangers, this was a plain promise of bread. Because nephesh is the whole person with his appetite and longings, the promise covers his life and his deepest needs as well as his food. “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want” (Psalm 23:1). Another psalm sets the hungry lions beside God’s people: “The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing” (Psalm 34:10), and a third speaks of the righteous whom the LORD has kept from being forsaken (Psalm 37:25).

The wicked man’s “substance” is havvâh, from a root meaning to covet eagerly and rush upon, and by implication to fall. It means desire, and also ruin or calamity. What the wicked crave and grab is bound up with their own fall. The verb hâdaph, “casteth away”, is to thrust or push away, and the LORD himself does it. The wicked may keep their wealth for a while, and still it is unblessed and short-lived, and it counts for nothing in the end. A psalm shows them set in slippery places and brought down in a moment (Psalm 73:18–19).

“He becometh poor that dealeth with a slack hand: but the hand of the diligent maketh rich.” The word for slack, rᵉmîyâh, comes from a root meaning to slacken, relax or let go, and the noun can also mean remissness, deceit or treachery. The slack hand is loose, idle and careless with its work. To become poor, rûwsh, is to be in want, and the man with the slack hand slides into it by his own half-hearted work. The diligent man is chărûwts, a word whose root sense is cut or sharpened. It can name a trench that was dug, gold that was mined, or a threshing sledge with sharp teeth. Said of a person, it means keen and determined, someone who cuts through his work. His hand “maketh rich”, ʻâshar, to accumulate, to grow rich or make rich, and the riches are sufficiency and abundance of provision.

The hand stands for the whole person at work. In a farming country a slack hand meant weeds in the field, straying flocks and shoddy craft, and a diligent hand meant a good harvest, healthy herds and work that people trusted. Proverbs sends the sluggard to learn from the ant (Proverbs 6:6–11), shows the sluggard’s field gone to ruin (Proverbs 24:30–34), says the diligent will rule (Proverbs 12:24), and sets the sluggard’s empty desire beside the diligent man’s satisfaction (Proverbs 13:4). Getting wisdom, which Proverbs 4:7 calls the principal thing, shapes how a person works. This verse holds God’s provision and human effort together: work is one of the ordinary ways God provides for and prospers his people, and diligence is faithful stewardship of what he has given.

“He that gathereth in summer is a wise son: but he that sleepeth in harvest is a son that causeth shame.” The word “son” takes up verse 1 again. Summer, qayits, and harvest, qâtsîyr, were the most demanding weeks of the year in Israel. Fruit and grain were gathered in summer and dried and stored, and the harvest, which ran from late spring into early autumn, had to be brought in before it spoiled, was stolen or was caught by bad weather. A family’s food for the whole year depended on those weeks.

To gather, ʼâgar, is to harvest or gather in. The son who does it is wise, sâkal, a verb that means to be wise and have understanding, to consider, and also to prosper. He sees what the season asks of him and does it in time. The other son sleeps, râdam, a word for heavy sleep, the sleep that stuns a person. He is asleep at the one time when everything depends on his being awake. Ecclesiastes says there is a time for every thing under heaven (Ecclesiastes 3:1–8), Paul calls believers to be “Redeeming the time” (Ephesians 5:16), and the book of Proverbs comes back to the sluggard who lets the season pass (Proverbs 20:4). In Jesus’ parable of the talents the servant who let his master’s money lie unused is judged for it (Matthew 25:24–30).

The sleeper “causeth shame”, from bûwsh, and the shame falls on his whole household. In Israel each family’s livelihood and honor rested on all its members, and sons were expected to carry their share of the work. A son who idled through harvest left his parents short of bread and disgraced before their neighbors. The private laziness of one son became the public shame of a family.

“Blessings are upon the head of the just: but violence covereth the mouth of the wicked.” The word for blessings, Bᵉrâkâh, means blessing, and also prosperity, praise, or a gift or present. The just man, tsaddîyq, is righteous, upright and innocent, someone whose conduct toward God and toward others conforms to what is right. His head stands for the whole person and his standing among his people, so the blessings rest on him where all can see them: God’s favor shown in peace, long life, provision and a good name. Deuteronomy 28 sets out the blessings of the covenant, and a good name “is rather to be chosen than great riches” (Proverbs 22:1). Psalm 1:1–3 pictures the blessed man as a tree planted by the rivers of water, Jesus calls blessed those who hunger and thirst after righteousness (Matthew 5:6), and Paul writes that a man reaps what he sows (Galatians 6:7–8).

Violence, châmâç, is wrong, injustice and cruelty, the harm done to others that tears at the peace of a community. The mouth is what speaks, testifies and persuades, and in a culture that did its business by the spoken word it was a person’s influence. The line can be read in a few ways that all come to the same end. The violence the wicked have done comes back on them and covers their mouths, so that they are shamed and left speechless, unable to defend themselves or speak with any authority. Or God’s judgment stops their lying and boasting. Either way, the head of the just is crowned with blessing while the mouth of the wicked is covered over and silenced.

“The memory of the just is blessed: but the name of the wicked shall rot.” Memory, zêker, is remembrance, a memorial, the way a person is recalled after death. The word behind “blessed” is Bᵉrâkâh, the same word as the “Blessings” of verse 6, so the just man who carried blessing on his head in life is spoken of with blessing after he is gone. His life is recalled with gratitude and held up as an example to those who come after.

A name, shêm, carried much in Israel: a person’s character and reputation, and often the family line that bore it into the future. To “rot”, râqab, is to decay as wood does when worms eat it, to putrefy. The wicked man’s name goes bad. It is forgotten, or it is remembered with disgust, like a stench where the just leave a fragrance. “His remembrance shall perish from the earth, and he shall have no name in the street” (Job 18:17), while “the righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance” (Psalm 112:6). Ecclesiastes speaks of the wicked forgotten in the city where they did their deeds (Ecclesiastes 8:10), and it adds that “A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s birth” (Ecclesiastes 7:1). The whole contrast of this verse is the contrast of Psalm 1, the righteous and the wicked and where each way ends.

The rotting is often slow. The wicked may be famous and powerful while they live, and in time their deeds come to light and their true character is known. The just whose lives were quiet and unseen are known to God, and his remembrance of them is the one that lasts.

Each of these sayings finds its fullest meaning in Jesus Christ. He is the wise Son who always did his Father’s will and brought him gladness, the one “In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3), and God has highly exalted him and given him the name above every name, at which every knee shall bow (Philippians 2:9–11). We were the foolish sons, and the Father sent his Son to carry the heaviness of our folly: “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4–5). Through him God adopts us as his sons and daughters (Galatians 4:4–7).

He is the Just One who suffered for sins (1 Peter 3:18) and the righteous servant of Isaiah 53:11, whose righteousness delivers from death. He is the bread of life who meets the hunger verse 3 speaks of: “he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” (John 6:35). His was the diligent hand, as he said, “My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work” (John 4:34), and “I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day” (John 9:4). He told his disciples to lift up their eyes on fields already white to harvest (John 4:35), the opposite of the son who sleeps through it. The riches his work brings are “the unsearchable riches of Christ” (Ephesians 3:8), an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled (1 Peter 1:4), and Paul tells believers that their labour “is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 15:58).

The blessings of verse 6 rest on him and come to us through him, for God “hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ” (Ephesians 1:3). He also bore the violence of the wicked, and before his accusers he was as silent as Isaiah foretold, as a sheep before her shearers (Isaiah 53:7). That silence was his willing submission, and on the cross he triumphed over the principalities and powers (Colossians 2:15). Those united with him in his death and resurrection (Romans 6:5) share in his name, which will be honored for ever, while the devil, who stands behind all wickedness, comes to his final end (Revelation 20:10).

These seven sayings show the LORD at work in the most ordinary places: at a family’s table, in a storehouse, on a farm at harvest, in what neighbors say about a man after he dies. He gladdens a father through a wise son, rescues the righteous from death, feeds their souls, gives fruit to diligent hands and keeps the memory of the just. He also thrusts away the gains of the wicked and lets their names decay. Wisdom, righteousness and diligence belong together in his world, and so do folly, wickedness and idleness.

The righteousness these verses praise is the righteousness God gives in Christ, the wise Son, and it bears its fruit in the daily faithfulness Proverbs describes. The LORD who promises that the soul of the righteous will not famish is the same LORD who gave his Son as the bread of life, and the memory he keeps of his people is the one that lasts.