Proverbs 17:18

“He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to the LORD” (verse 15). The verb tsâdaq means to be right, or to make or declare someone right, and here it is a legal word for a verdict. A judge who “justifieth the wicked” pronounces a guilty man innocent. The wicked man, râshâʻ, is one who is in the wrong, an active doer of evil. The second judge does the reverse and declares an innocent person guilty, which can cost that person his good name, his livelihood or his life. The proverb sets the two side by side and says “they both” are an abomination, so letting the guilty walk free and punishing the innocent are equally hateful to God.

The word tôwʻêbah means an abomination, something utterly wrong and detestable, and Scripture also uses it for idols. It is among the strongest words of disapproval in the Old Testament, and the proverb names whose disapproval it is: “to the LORD”, Yᵉhôvâh. A crooked verdict wrongs the people in the case, and it also offends God himself, who is the standard of all justice.

In Israel, cases were heard at the city gate, where the elders and judges sat in public. The law given at Sinai demanded that they judge fairly. “Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked” (Exodus 23:7). The next verse forbids a bribe, because a gift blinds the eyes of the wise (Exodus 23:8). Judges were to “justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked” (Deuteronomy 25:1), the very reverse of what this proverb condemns, and they were to judge as God judges, who “regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward” (Deuteronomy 10:17). Israel was called to be holy because God is holy and to show his character in all its dealings (Leviticus 19). Isaiah later pronounced woe on those “that call evil good, and good evil” (Isaiah 5:20).

The proverb reaches beyond the courtroom. We justify the wicked when we excuse wrongdoing in ourselves or in people we favour, and we condemn the just when we judge in haste, repeat a rumour or let prejudice decide. The same holds for courts, prosecutors and public talk today. A wrongful conviction and a guilty man let off for favour or for gain are both hateful to the LORD, so keeping justice straight is part of honouring him.

“Wherefore is there a price in the hand of a fool to get wisdom, seeing he hath no heart to it?” (verse 16). The word for price, mᵉchîyr, comes from a root meaning to buy, and it means the cost or payment for something. The fool holds the means “in the hand”, ready to use. That price may be the fee for a teacher, the cost of written scrolls, or simply the time to learn. The question expects no answer, because its point is plain: the money is wasted on a man with “no heart to it”.

The fool here is the kᵉçîyl, a word Strong’s explains as stupid or silly, from a root meaning to be fat. Proverbs sets this fool apart from the simple person, the pethî, who is only untaught. The kᵉçîyl resists correction. “Fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Proverbs 1:7), and they “hate knowledge” (Proverbs 1:22). Six verses before this one the chapter says, “A reproof entereth more into a wise man than an hundred stripes into a fool” (Proverbs 17:10).

The heart, lêb, is the centre of the person in Hebrew thought, holding mind, will and feeling together. To have “no heart to it” is to lack the desire and the will to learn. Wisdom has a cost, and the fool may even hold the cost in his hand, yet wisdom comes only to a willing heart. The fault lies with the one who refuses, while the wisdom itself stays freely on offer. Jeremiah says that “the heart is deceitful above all things” (Jeremiah 17:9), and Jesus spoke in parables to people who, “seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand” (Matthew 13:13).

The verse speaks to anyone with Bibles, sermons and teaching close at hand. All of that is a price in the hand, and it profits a heart that wants it. Such a heart is itself God’s gift. Paul says that “the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not” (2 Corinthians 4:4), and God promised his people a new heart and a new spirit (Ezekiel 36:26). Christ “of God is made unto us wisdom” (1 Corinthians 1:30), and “in him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3). He promised that the Holy Spirit would teach his disciples all things (John 14:26). So God gives both the wisdom and the heart to receive it.

“A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity” (verse 17). The friend, rêaʻ, is a companion or associate, from a root meaning to associate with someone as a friend. The verb ʼâhab means to love or to have affection for someone. “At all times” uses ʻêth, the word for time or season, with “all”, so the friend’s love holds through every season of life: in plenty and in poverty, in joy and in sorrow, in health and in sickness. It is there most of all when staying costs something.

Adversity, tsârâh, comes from the idea of tightness or narrowness, and it means distress, trouble and affliction, the times when life closes in. A brother “is born for” such times. The verb is the ordinary one for being born, and the proverb uses it to say that a brother has his place from his birth, and that place is beside his family when trouble comes. In Israel the father’s house, the bet ʼav, gave a person identity, security and a living, and famine, war and illness made that bond a lifeline. The two lines of the verse complete each other. Friendship is chosen and brotherhood is given, and both are meant to hold firm when they are needed.

Proverbs praises faithful friendship in many places. “Faithful are the wounds of a friend” (Proverbs 27:6), so a true friend will tell us hard truths. “He that walketh with wise men shall be wise” (Proverbs 13:20), and “love covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12). Ecclesiastes speaks of the strength of two who stand together, where one lifts the other up when he falls (Ecclesiastes 4:9–12), and Paul tells believers, “Bear ye one another’s burdens” (Galatians 6:2). The steadfast love of a friend reflects the faithful covenant love of God, his hesed, which holds firm even when his people fail, for he is “a very present help in trouble” (Psalm 46:1).

“A man void of understanding striketh hands, and becometh surety in the presence of his friend” (verse 18). “Void of understanding” is literally “lacking heart”. The word châçêr means lacking, and lêb is the same word for heart as in verse 16. This man lacks practical sense, the foresight to weigh what his promise will cost him later.

The verb tâqaʻ means to clap, slap or strike, and with kaph, the palm, it describes clapping hands together. In Israel this handclasp sealed an agreement in front of others, much as a signature does today. To become surety, ʻârab ʻărubbâh, is to give oneself as security for another person’s debt. With no banks, loans rested on personal guarantees, and if the borrower failed to pay, the surety was bound to pay in his place, with his goods, his land and even the bed he slept on (Proverbs 22:26–27).

The words “in the presence of his friend” show who usually asks for such a pledge. The man is moved by affection, a wish to help or the pressure of the moment, and he puts his household at risk, and often the friendship too. Verse 17 praised the friend who loves at all times, and verse 18 shows that love for a friend still needs a wise head.

Proverbs returns to this danger several times. “My son, if thou be surety for thy friend, if thou hast stricken thy hand with a stranger, thou art snared with the words of thy mouth”, and the father urges his son to humble himself and get free at once, “as a roe from the hand of the hunter” (Proverbs 6:1–5). “He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it: and he that hateth suretiship is sure” (Proverbs 11:15). “Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts” (Proverbs 22:26–27). The wise man looks ahead, for “the wisdom of the prudent is to understand his way” (Proverbs 14:8).

“He loveth transgression that loveth strife: and he that exalteth his gate seeketh destruction” (verse 19). ʼâhab is the same verb of love as in verse 17, and it can be used of loving a practice as well as a person. Here it is turned toward strife, matstsâh, quarrelling and contention. Whoever enjoys a fight, the proverb says, loves transgression. The word peshaʻ means transgression or rebellion, an act that defies an authority, so a person who delights in strife has set himself against God’s order of peace. “A wrathful man stirreth up strife” (Proverbs 15:18), and James says, “where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work” (James 3:16). Paul gives the opposite path: “If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men” (Romans 12:18).

The second line pictures pride. The verb gâbahh means to be high, lofty or tall, and figuratively to be haughty. The gate, pethach, was the entrance to a house or city, a sign of standing and the place where business was done and elders sat in judgment, as Boaz did at the city gate (Ruth 4:1). To raise one’s gate high may be meant literally, building a grand entrance for show, and it pictures anyone who lifts himself up to be admired. Such a man “seeketh destruction” (sheber), because his pride invites envy and leads to his fall. “Pride goeth before destruction” (Proverbs 16:18), while “honour shall uphold the humble in spirit” (Proverbs 29:23). Paul tells believers to do nothing through strife or vainglory, and in lowliness of mind to esteem others better than themselves (Philippians 2:3–4).

Jesus is the opposite of both men in this verse. He is the sinless “Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29), and he was “wounded for our transgressions” (Isaiah 53:5). He is the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6), and his kingdom is “righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost” (Romans 14:17). Far from raising his own gate, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross (Philippians 2:6–8). He taught that the greatest is the one who serves, as he came to serve and give his life (Matthew 20:26–28), and that “he that humbleth himself shall be exalted” (Luke 14:11).

“He that hath a froward heart findeth no good: and he that hath a perverse tongue falleth into mischief” (verse 20). Froward, ʻiqqêsh, comes from a root meaning to twist or make crooked, and it describes a heart, lêb, that is warped and stubbornly turned away from what is upright. Such a heart “findeth no good”. The verb mâtsâʼ means to find or attain, and ṭôwb is the broad word for good, covering well-being, blessing, favour and what is pleasant. The crooked heart keeps reaching for good and never lays hold of it, because it is turned away from the source of all blessing.

The second line moves from the heart to the mouth. The perverse tongue is a tongue, lâshôwn, that has been turned, hâphak, so that it twists or overturns the truth through lies, slander, gossip and manipulation. That speaker “falleth”, nâphal, into mischief. The word for mischief is raʻ, evil, which takes in trouble, harm and calamity. Crooked words destroy trust and stir up conflict, and the trouble they cause comes back on the one who speaks them.

The two lines say one thing twice: the inner life and the words that come from it decide where a life ends up. “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Proverbs 4:23). James warns that “the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison” (James 3:8), and the whole of James 3 speaks of the power of the tongue. Paul gives the principle behind the verse: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Galatians 6:7).

Our hearts are twisted by nature (Jeremiah 17:9), and Christ’s heart was upright through and through. He submitted his will to the Father even to death on a cross (Philippians 2:6–8), and the people of Nazareth wondered at “the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth” (Luke 4:22). He is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6), the source of the good that the froward heart never finds. He fell into no mischief of his own, yet he bore the evil of our sin on the cross (2 Corinthians 5:21). Through him God makes crooked hearts new (Ezekiel 36:26), and a renewed heart speaks words of truth and grace.

“He that begetteth a fool doeth it to his sorrow: and the father of a fool hath no joy” (verse 21). The verb yâlad means to bear or beget, and it recalls the hope that comes with a child’s birth. The first line calls the son a kᵉçîyl, the same word for fool as in verse 16, the one who resists instruction. The second line uses a different word, nâbâl, which means a fool who is also wicked and impious, so the folly here is a matter of character as well as of sense.

The father, ʼâb, has sorrow, tûgâh, which means grief and heaviness of spirit, a lasting weight. He “hath no joy”: the verb sâmach means to rejoice or be glad, and the joy a child ought to bring is missing. In Israel a son carried on the family’s name and honour, so a foolish son brought shame on the whole household as well as private grief.

Other proverbs say the same from both sides. “A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother” (Proverbs 10:1). “A wise son maketh a glad father” again in Proverbs 15:20, while “a foolish son is the calamity of his father” (Proverbs 19:13) and “a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame” (Proverbs 29:15). “The father of the righteous shall greatly rejoice: and he that begetteth a wise child shall have joy of him” (Proverbs 23:24–25).

“A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones” (verse 22). Merry, sâmêach, comes from a root meaning to be glad, and it describes a heart, lêb, that is glad and cheerful within. Such a heart “doeth good”, yâṭab, a verb that means to be good or, as here, to do good and make well. The medicine is gêhâh, a cure, so a glad heart works like a remedy for the whole person.

The second line sets the opposite beside it. Broken, nâkêʼ, comes from a root meaning to strike, and it means smitten, crushed or wounded. The spirit, rûwach, means wind, breath and spirit, and here it is a person’s inner life and vigour. A crushed spirit “drieth the bones”: yâbêsh means to dry up or wither, and also to become weak, and the bones, gerem, stand for a person’s strength and frame. The picture is of strength draining away from the inside, the way a plant withers without water.

Scripture treats a person as one whole, so grief and joy reach the body as well as the soul. “A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance: but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken” (Proverbs 15:13). David describes what unconfessed sin did to him: “When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer” (Psalm 32:3–4). Nehemiah told the people, “the joy of the LORD is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10). This is one more reason to “keep thy heart with all diligence” (Proverbs 4:23).

These sayings move from the courtroom to the household, and in every one the LORD is near. He cares how a verdict is given, because he is just and hates to see the guilty excused and the innocent crushed. He gave us friends and brothers for the hard seasons, and he wants love that lasts and good sense in how we help. He opposes the proud and the quarrelsome, he hears the words of our mouths and sees the twist of our hearts, and he knows the grief of a father whose child turns to folly.

The same God has given what each proverb points toward. In Christ the Just One was condemned so that the ungodly could be justly declared righteous. He is wisdom for those who had no heart for it, the friend who loved his own unto the end, the surety who paid our debt, the humble King of peace and the source of a joy that does good like a medicine. Each proverb, read with him in view, shows a little more of who God is.