Proverbs 26:28

Just before this passage Solomon has said that strife ceases where there is no talebearer (Proverbs 26:20) and that a contentious man kindles strife the way coals feed a fire (Proverbs 26:21). Verses 23 to 28 then take up hatred that hides itself. Verse 23 gives the picture, and verse 24 says in plain words what the picture means.

A potsherd is a broken piece of pottery. Every household had them, and they were thrown away as worthless and fragile. Dross, çîyg, is the refuse that separates from silver when the metal is refined. It can have a metallic look, but it has no value and is discarded. Put the two together and you have something that catches the eye for a moment and is worth nothing at all, a worthless shard under a worthless shine. Scripture uses the refining of silver elsewhere for God’s own work of purifying his people (Malachi 3:3), and here the leftover dross stands for a show of goodness with nothing true beneath it.

“Burning lips” are speech hot with feeling. The verb dâlaq means to flame, literally or figuratively, and it is used of kindling a fire and of pursuing someone hotly. Such lips pour out fervent assurances, warm affection and eager praise. The heart behind them is “wicked”, raʻ, a broad word for what is bad or evil, whether in nature or in morals. The heart, lêb, is the whole inner person in Scripture, the seat of the feelings, the will and the mind. So the proverb sets lively, passionate words over a core of malice, and it says that the polish redeems nothing. Jesus spoke of people who honour God with their lips while their hearts are far from him (Matthew 15:8), and he taught that the evil which defiles a man comes out of the heart (Matthew 15:18–19). That is why Proverbs tells us to keep the heart with all diligence, since the whole of life flows from it (Proverbs 4:23).

Verse 24 names the man. “He that hateth” uses sânêʼ, the ordinary word for personal hatred, the word behind “enemy” and “foe”. He “dissembleth with his lips”. The verb nâkar properly means to look intently at something and so to recognise it, and in this form it means to disguise oneself, to act as a stranger toward what one really feels. The lips are the same Hebrew word, sâphâh, as the “burning lips” of verse 23. So the words are a false front, smooth and agreeable, with ill will behind them.

Meanwhile he “layeth up deceit within him”. Deceit here is mirmâh, fraud, craft, guile and treachery. “Within him” is qereb, the inmost part or centre of a person. The picture is of something stored away like provisions, kept ready for use. That points to planning. The hatred is held in reserve along with the means to act on it when the moment comes.

God’s law forbids false witness (Exodus 20), the prophets condemn tongues that speak peace to a neighbour while laying wait for him (Jeremiah 9:8), and David confesses that God desires truth in the inward parts (Psalm 51:6). Another psalm describes people who speak with flattering lips and a double heart (Psalm 12:2), and Paul asks that love among believers be free of all pretence (Romans 12:9).

Verse 25 gives the command that follows from the picture: “When he speaketh fair, believe him not.” The English “speaketh” stands over qôwl, the word for a voice, and “fair” translates chânan, a verb that properly means to bend down in kindness to someone lower and to show favour. His voice is gracious and winning, the kind that makes a listener feel favoured. “Believe” is ʼâman, a verb whose root idea is supporting or fostering, as a nurse cares for a child, and which comes to mean trusting and relying on someone. We are told to put no weight on this man’s words.

The reason is “seven abominations in his heart”. An abomination, tôwʻêbah, is something morally disgusting, an abhorrence, utterly wrong and detestable, and the word is also used of an idol. The heart is the same lêb as in verse 23. However kind the voice, the inner person is full of what God detests.

Verse 26 tells what becomes of the hidden hater. “Hatred” here is sinʼâh, the noun from the same root as the verb “hateth” in verse 24. It “is covered by deceit”, and this time deceit is mashshâʼôwn, dissimulation, a different Hebrew word from the mirmâh of verse 24 though the English is the same. “His wickedness” is raʻ again, the word for “wicked” in verse 23.

That wickedness “shall be shewed”. The verb gâlâh means to strip bare, especially in a disgraceful sense, and so to uncover and reveal. The cover he wove so carefully is pulled off, and the very hiding becomes the occasion of his exposure. It happens “before the whole congregation”. The qâhâl is an assembly or company, the community gathered together, perhaps at the city gate where legal matters were heard, or simply the people of the town. In Israel honour and standing in the community counted for a great deal, so being uncovered before everyone meant losing trust and reputation in full view.

Verse 27 gives two pictures of one truth. The first is the pit. To dig, kârâh, is literally to dig and figuratively to plot. The pit, shachath, is especially a pit used as a trap, and the word also means destruction and the grave. In Israel such pits were dug and hidden to catch wild animals, and sometimes to catch enemies. Digging one takes work, so the picture is of harm carefully planned. “Shall fall therein” means the trap made for someone else becomes its maker’s downfall.

The second picture is the stone. He “rolleth”, gâlal, a stone, ʼeben. Heavy stones were rolled to block wells and seal tombs, and they could be rolled down a slope onto an enemy below. “It will return upon him” uses shûwb, to turn back or return. The force meant for another comes back on the one who set it moving.

Scripture says the same thing again and again. “He made a pit, and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made” (Psalm 7:15). “He that diggeth a pit shall fall into it; and whoso breaketh an hedge, a serpent shall bite him” (Ecclesiastes 10:8). Obadiah speaks of the day of the LORD in the same terms: “as thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee: thy reward shall return upon thine own head” (Obadiah 1:15). Paul puts it as sowing and reaping, since God is not mocked (Galatians 6:7). God has built justice into the world he made, and malice turns out to be self-defeating.

Verse 28 closes the section with two kinds of false speech. The first is “a lying tongue”, where lying is sheqer, an untruth or sham, falsehood, and the tongue is lâshôwn. This tongue “hateth those that are afflicted by it”. The verb is sânêʼ, the same verb as in verse 24, and the afflicted are dak, crushed or injured, oppressed. Those most open to being crushed this way were often the poor and defenceless.

Everything these proverbs warn against is absent in Jesus. He is the truth (John 14:6), the Word made flesh, full of grace and truth (John 1:14), and no guile was found in his mouth (1 Peter 2:22). He told the truth even when it turned people against him (John 8:45), and he always did what pleased the Father (John 8:29). People wondered at the gracious words that came from his mouth (Luke 4:22), and his words brought life and healing. He uncovered the hypocrisy of those who looked righteous outwardly and were full of corruption within (Matthew 23:27–28). He is the faithful and true witness (Revelation 3:14), the one whose words we can lean on completely.

Verse 27 found its sharpest fulfilment at the cross. The leaders plotted to take Jesus by subtilty and kill him (Matthew 26:4), and that scheme became the means by which he triumphed over the principalities and powers (Colossians 2:15). Where a lying tongue hates those it afflicts, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29) bore our affliction out of love. He was made sin for us, taking what should have fallen on us (2 Corinthians 5:21), and God commended his love toward us while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8).

He also deals with the wicked heart these verses expose. God promised a new heart and a new spirit (Ezekiel 36:26) and to write his law on our hearts (Hebrews 8:10). The Spirit of truth guides us into all truth (John 16:13), and as we walk in the light as he is in the light, the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin (1 John 1:7).

These proverbs give us a clear eye for the gap between warm words and a cold heart, and they give us a rule for when a gracious voice should not be trusted. They also give us the comfort of knowing that hidden malice is uncovered in the end, and that the pit and the stone come back on their makers, because God sees the heart and governs his world in justice. The same verses hold up a mirror, since the lips and the heart they describe can be our own. In Christ we meet the one whose words and heart were always one, and who gives his people new hearts so that their words can be true as well.