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Commentary on Proverbs 5 verses 1–14
Here we have,
I. A solemn preface, to introduce the caution which follows, Pro 5:1, Pro 5:2. Solomon here addresses himself to his son, that is, to all young men, as unto his children, whom he has an affection for and some influence upon. In God's name, he demands attention; for he writes by divine inspiration, and is a prophet, though he begins not with, Thus saith the Lord. "Attend, and bow thy ear; not only hear what is said, and read what is written, but apply thy mind to it and consider it diligently." To gain attention he urges, 1. The excellency of his discourse: "It is my wisdom, my understanding; if I undertake to teach thee wisdom I cannot prescribe any thing to be more properly called so; moral philosophy is my philosophy, and that which is to be learned in my school." 2. The usefulness of it: "Attend to what I say," (1.) "That thou mayest act wisely - that thou mayest regard discretion." Solomon's lectures are not designed to fill our heads with notions, with matters of nice speculation, or doubtful disputation, but to guide us in the government of ourselves, that we may act prudently, so as becomes us and so as will be for our true interest. (2.) "That thou mayest speak wisely - that thy lips may keep knowledge, and thou mayest have it ready at thy tongue's end" (as we say), "for the benefit of those with whom thou dost converse." The priest's lips are said to keep knowledge (Mal 2:7); but those that are ready and mighty in the scriptures may not only in their devotions, but in their discourses, be spiritual priests.
II. The caution itself, and that is to abstain from fleshly lusts, from adultery, fornication, and all uncleanness. Some apply this figuratively, and by the adulterous woman here understand idolatry, or false doctrine, which tends to debauch men's minds and manners, or the sensual appetite, to which it may as fitly as any thing be applied; but the primary scope of it is plainly to warn us against seventh-commandment sins, which youth is so prone to, the temptations to which are so violent, the examples of which are so many, and which, where admitted, are so destructive to all the seeds of virtue in the soul that it is not strange that Solomon's cautions against it are so very pressing and so often repeated. Solomon here, as a faithful watchman, gives fair warning to all, as they regard their lives and comforts, to dread this sin, for it will certainly be their ruin. Two things we are here warned to take heed of: -
1.That we do not listen to the charms of this sin. It is true the lips of a strange woman drop as a honey-comb (Pro 5:3); the pleasures of fleshly lust are very tempting (like the wine that gives its colour in the cup and moves itself aright); its mouth, the kisses of its mouth, the words of its mouth, are smoother than oil, that the poisonous pill may go down glibly and there may be no suspicion of harm in it. But consider, (1.) How fatal the consequences will be. What fruit will the sinner have of his honey and oil when the end will be, [1.] The terrors of conscience: It is bitter as wormwood, Pro 5:4. What was luscious in the mouth rises in the stomach and turns sour there; it cuts, in the reflection, like a two-edged sword; take it which way you will, it wounds. Solomon could speak by experience, Ecc 7:26. [2.] The torments of hell. If some that have been guilty of this sin have repented and been saved, yet the direct tendency of the sin is to destruction of body and soul; the feet of it go down to death, nay, they take hold on hell, to pull it to the sinner, as if the damnations slumbered too long, Pro 5:5. Those that are entangled in this sin should be reminded that there is but a step between them and hell, and that they are ready to drop into it. (2.) Consider how false the charms are. The adulteress flatters and speaks fair, her words are honey and oil, but she will deceive those that hearken to her: Her ways are movable, that thou canst not know them; she often changes her disguise, and puts on a great variety of false colours, because, if she be rightly known, she is certainly hated. Proteus-like, she puts on many shapes, that she may keep in with those whom she has a design upon. And what does she aim at with all this art and management? Nothing but to keep them from pondering the path of life, for she knows that, if they once come to do that, she shall certainly lose them. Those are ignorant of Satan's devices who do not understand that the great thing he drives at in all his temptations is, [1.] To keep them from choosing the path of life, to prevent them from being religious and from going to heaven, that, being himself shut out from happiness, he may keep them out from it. [2.] In order hereunto, to keep them from pondering the path of life, from considering how reasonable it is that they should walk in that path, and how much it will be for their advantage. Be it observed, to the honour of religion, that it certainly gains its point with all those that will but allow themselves the liberty of a serious thought and will weigh things impartially in an even balance, and that the devil has no way of securing men in his interests but by diverting them with continual amusements of one kind or another from the calm and sober consideration of the things that belong to their peace. And uncleanness is a sin that does as much as any thing blind the understanding, sear the conscience, and keep people from pondering the path of life. Whoredom takes away the heart, Hos 4:11.
2.That we do not approach the borders of this sin, Pro 5:7, Pro 5:8.
(1.)This caution is introduced with a solemn preface: "Hear me now therefore, O you children! whoever you are that read or hear these lines, take notice of what I say, and mix faith with it, treasure it up, and depart not from the words of my mouth, as those will do that hearken to the words of the strange woman. Do not only receive what I say, for the present merely, but cleave to it, and let it be ready to thee, and of force with thee, when thou art most violently assaulted by the temptation."
(2.)The caution itself is very pressing: "Remove thy way far from her; if thy way should happen to lie near her, and thou shouldst have a fair pretence of being led by business within the reach of her charms, yet change thy way, and alter the course of it, rather than expose thyself to danger; come not nigh the door of her house; go on the other side of the street, nay, go through some other street, though it be about." This intimates, [1.] That we ought to have a very great dread and detestation of the sin. We must fear it as we would a place infected with the plague; we must loathe it as the odour of carrion, that we will not come near. Then we are likely to preserve our purity when we conceive a rooted antipathy to all fleshly lusts. [2.] That we ought industriously to avoid every thing that may be an occasion of this sin or a step towards it. Those that would be kept from harm must keep out of harm's way. Such tinder there is in the corrupt nature that it is madness, upon any pretence whatsoever, to come near the sparks. If we thrust ourselves into temptation, we mocked God when we prayed, Lead us not into temptation. [3.] That we ought to be jealous over ourselves with a godly jealousy, and not to be so confident of the strength of our own resolutions as to venture upon the brink of sin, with a promise to ourselves that hitherto we will come and no further. [4.] That whatever has become a snare to us and an occasion of sin, though it be as a right eye and a right hand, we must pluck it out, cut it off, and cast it from us, must part with that which is dearest to us rather than hazard our own souls; this is our Saviour's command, Mat 5:28-30.
(3.)The arguments which Solomon here uses to enforce this caution are taken from the same topic with those before, the many mischiefs which attend this sin. [1.] It blasts the reputation. "Thou wilt give thy honour unto others (Pro 5:9); thou wilt lose it thyself; thou wilt put into the hand of each of thy neighbours a stone to throw at thee, for they will all, with good reason, cry shame on thee, will despise thee, and trample on thee, as a foolish men." Whoredom is a sin that makes men contemptible and base, and no man of sense or virtue will care to keep company with one that keeps company with harlots. [2.] It wastes the time, gives the years, the years of youth, the flower of men's time, unto the cruel, "that base lust of thine, which with the utmost cruelty wars against the soul, that base harlot which pretends an affection for thee, but really hunts for the precious life." Those years that should be given to the honour of a gracious God are spent in the service of a cruel sin. [3.] It ruins the estate (Pro 5:10): "Strangers will be filled with thy wealth, which thou art but entrusted with as a steward for thy family; and the fruit of thy labours, which should be provision for thy own house, will be in the house of a stranger, that neither has right to it nor will ever thank thee for it." [4.] It is destructive to the health, and shortens men's days: Thy flesh and thy body will be consumed by it, Pro 5:11. The lusts of uncleanness not only war against the soul, which the sinner neglects and is in no care about, but they war against the body too, which he is so indulgent of and is in such care to please and pamper, such deceitful, such foolish, such hurtful lusts are they. Those that give themselves to work uncleanness with greediness waste their strength, throw themselves into weakness, and often have their bodies filled with loathsome distempers, by which the number of their months is cut off in the midst and they fall unpitied sacrifices to a cruel lust. [5.] It will fill the mind with horror, if ever conscience be awakened. "Though thou art merry now, sporting thyself in thy own deceivings, yet thou wilt certainly mourn at the last, Pro 5:11. Thou art all this while making work for repentance, and laying up matter for vexation and torment in the reflection, when the sin is set before thee in its own colours." Sooner or later it will bring sorrow, either when the soul is humbled and brought to repentance or when the flesh and body are consumed, either by sickness, when conscience flies in the sinner's face, or by the grave; when the body is rotting there, the soul is racking in the torments of hell, where the worm dies not, and "Son, remember," is the constant peal [plea?]. Solomon here brings in the convinced sinner reproaching himself, and aggravating his own folly. He will then most bitterly lament it. First, That because he hated to be reformed he therefore hated to be informed, and could not endure either to be taught his duty (How have I hated not only the discipline of being instructed, but the instruction itself, though all true and good!) or to be told of his faults - My heart despised reproof, Pro 5:12. He cannot but own that those who had the charge of him, parents, ministers, had done their part; they had been his teachers; they had instructed him, had given him good counsel and fair warning (Pro 5:13); but to his own shame and confusion does he speak it, and therein justifies God in all the miseries that were brought upon him, he had not obeyed their voice, for indeed he never inclined his ear to those that instructed him, never minded what they said nor admitted the impressions of it. Note, Those who have had a good education and do not live up to it will have a great deal to answer for another day; and those who will not now remember what they were taught, to conform themselves to it, will be made to remember it as an aggravation of their sin, and consequently of their ruin. Secondly, That by the frequent acts of sin the habits of it were so rooted and confirmed that his heart was fully set in him to commit it (Pro 5:14): I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly. When he came into the synagogue, or into the courts of the temple, to worship God with other Israelites, his unclean heart was full of wanton thoughts and desires and his eyes of adultery. Reverence of the place and company, and of the work that was doing, could not restrain him, but he was almost as wicked and vile there as any where. No sin will appear more frightful to an awakened conscience than the profanation of holy things; nor will any aggravation of sin render it more exceedingly sinful than the place we are honoured with in the congregation and assembly, and the advantages we enjoy thereby. Zimri and Cozbi avowed their villany in the sight of Moses and all the congregation (Num 25:6), and heart-adultery is as open to God, and must needs be most offensive to him, when we draw nigh to him in religious exercises. I was in all evil in defiance of the magistrates and judges, and their assemblies; so some understand it. Others refer it to the evil of punishment, not to the evil of sin: "I was made an example, a spectacle to the world. I was under almost all God's sore judgments in the midst of the congregation of Israel, set up for a mark. I stood up and cried in the congregation," Job 30:28. Let that be avoided which will be thus rued at last.
Who are more strange to us than the evil spirits, separated from the lot of the heavenly fatherland? What else is our honor but to have been created in the image and likeness of our Creator, though we are made in bodies of slime? And who else is more cruel but that rebel angel who through pride smote himself with the punishment of death and who, though himself lost, has deliberately brought death on the race of humankind? He, therefore, gives his honor away to strangers, who, being created in the image and likeness of God, devotes the span of his life to the commands of the malignant spirits. He, too, gives his years to the cruel, who expends the span of the life which he has received obeying the will of an adversary who dominates him for evil. .
For who are more alien to us than evil spirits, who are separated from the lot of the heavenly country? And what honor is ours, though made in bodies of clay, that we are yet created after the image and likeness of our Maker? Or who is more cruel than the apostate angel, who has both afflicted himself with the pain of death through pride, and still, though lost himself, brought death to the human race? He who, being made after the image and likeness of God, gives his honor to aliens therefore devotes the seasons of his life to the pleasures of evil spirits. He also surrenders his years to the cruel one who spends the space of life accorded him after the will of the ill-domineering adversary.
Do not give your honor to others, etc. Do not subject the honor by which you were created in the image of God to the wills of unclean spirits, nor waste the granted time of living according to the will of the cruel adversary. For whoever succumbs to any crime, is surely enslaved to the dominion of malignant spirits.
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SUMMARY
Proverbs 5:9 serves as a potent warning within the father's urgent counsel against the seduction of the adulteress, vividly portraying the devastating and irreversible consequences of succumbing to illicit sexual sin. It underscores the profound forfeiture of one's esteemed reputation and the tragic squandering of one's most productive years, emphasizing the severe and multifaceted repercussions that inevitably befall those who deviate from the path of wisdom and righteousness.
CONTEXT
EXPOSITION AND ANALYSIS
Key Word Analysis
Verse Breakdown
Literary Devices
Proverbs 5:9 masterfully employs several potent literary devices to convey its urgent and dire warning. Parallelism, a foundational characteristic of Hebrew poetry, is prominently displayed in the two balanced clauses: "Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel." This synthetic parallelism builds upon the initial warning, presenting two distinct yet intrinsically related consequences that reinforce each other, thereby emphasizing the comprehensive and devastating nature of the loss. The verse also utilizes Metonymy or Synecdoche by employing "honour" to represent one's entire reputation, social standing, and inherent dignity, and "years" to signify one's life, vitality, and future potential. These abstract concepts are made tangible through the active verb "give," implying a voluntary, albeit ruinous, transfer. Furthermore, the phrase "unto the cruel" employs a powerful Personification or Metaphor, as "the cruel" can refer not only to merciless individuals (like the adulteress or vengeful parties) but also, more broadly, to the ruthless and unforgiving nature of sin's consequences themselves, which are depicted as an insatiable entity that devours one's life and prospects. The overall tone is one of solemn Admonition and urgent Warning, characteristic of the wisdom literature, designed to instruct, deter, and guide individuals away from destructive paths toward life and flourishing.
THEOLOGICAL AND THEMATIC CONNECTIONS
Proverbs 5:9 speaks profoundly to the biblical understanding of the holistic nature of humanity and the far-reaching, often ripple-effect, consequences of sin. It underscores that our choices, particularly in areas of moral and sexual purity, impact not only our spiritual standing before God but also our social reputation, physical well-being, and future potential. The loss of "honour" reflects the biblical emphasis on living a life that glorifies God and earns the respect of others, while the squandering of "years" highlights the preciousness of life as a sacred gift from God, to be stewarded wisely rather than consumed by destructive pursuits. This verse serves as a stark reminder that sin is never a purely private matter; its corrosive ripple effects touch every sphere of existence, diminishing the individual and often bringing profound shame to their community and, ultimately, to God's holy name.
REFLECTION AND APPLICATION
Proverbs 5:9 offers timeless wisdom that transcends its ancient context, speaking directly to the contemporary challenges of self-control, integrity, and the pursuit of fleeting pleasures in a world often characterized by instant gratification and blurred moral lines. This verse serves as a sober and essential reminder that true freedom and lasting fulfillment are found not in indulging every desire, but in disciplined living that honors God and prudently preserves one's future. It challenges us to deeply consider the long-term ramifications of our choices, particularly in areas of sexual purity and relational integrity, recognizing that seemingly private actions can have profoundly public and enduring consequences. We are called to vigilantly guard our reputation, understanding that it is a sacred trust and a reflection of our character, and to steward our time, energy, and potential, recognizing that our years are a finite and precious gift from the Creator. The warning to avoid giving our "honour unto others" and our "years unto the cruel" compels us to build lives of unwavering character and divine purpose, actively resisting temptations that promise temporary delight but inevitably deliver lasting regret, ruin, and spiritual emptiness.
Questions for Reflection
FAQ
What does "honour" specifically refer to in this proverb?
Answer: In Proverbs 5:9, "honour" (Hebrew: hôwd, H1935) refers comprehensively to one's dignity, reputation, public standing, and the respect one commands within the community. It encompasses one's good name, integrity, and the esteem associated with a life lived wisely and righteously. The loss of this honor implies public shame, disgrace, and a diminished social and personal value, which was a devastating consequence in ancient Israelite society where communal standing and family reputation were paramount. It extends beyond mere personal self-respect to include how one is perceived and valued by others, and how one's actions reflect upon their family and God.
Who are "the cruel" mentioned in this verse?
Answer: "The cruel" (Hebrew: ʼakzârîy, H394) can be interpreted in several layers, all pointing to the devastating outcomes of illicit behavior. It can refer directly to the adulteress herself, who is ruthless in her exploitation and destruction of those she ensnares, caring little for their ruin. It can also refer to external parties who would exploit the ruined individual, such as creditors seizing assets due to financial ruin, or enemies who gloat over one's downfall and further diminish their standing. More profoundly, "the cruel" can personify the merciless and unforgiving nature of sin's inherent consequences—the physical ailments, emotional anguish, financial devastation, and spiritual decay that relentlessly consume the life and vitality of one who strays from wisdom's path. The proverb warns that these consequences show no mercy, devouring one's "years" or life's productive potential. The path of sin is ultimately a cruel master, leading to bondage and destruction, as seen in the broader biblical narrative of sin's wages (Romans 6:23).
CHRIST-CENTERED FULFILLMENT
Proverbs 5:9, while a stark and pragmatic warning against the temporal consequences of sexual immorality, finds its ultimate fulfillment and deepest redemptive meaning in the person and redemptive work of Jesus Christ. Humanity, in its fallen state, has collectively "given its honour unto others" by worshipping idols, pursuing self-gratification, and rejecting divine wisdom, thereby squandering its "years unto the cruel" dominion of sin and death. By our rebellion, we forfeited our true dignity as image-bearers of God and subjected ourselves to the merciless tyranny of spiritual death, a consequence vividly articulated as the "wages of sin" (Romans 6:23). However, Christ, the very embodiment of true wisdom and the eternal Son of God (1 Corinthians 1:30), did not squander His years or His honor. Instead, He willingly "gave" His perfect life as a ransom, taking upon Himself the profound shame, the public disgrace, and the cruel consequences of our sin on the cross (Isaiah 53:5). Through His unparalleled sacrifice, He redeems our lost honor and restores our years, offering us a new life free from the cruel dominion of sin and the power of darkness (Colossians 1:13-14). In Christ, we receive not only forgiveness for our past transgressions but also a renewed purpose and power, enabling us to live lives that bring true honor to God and are no longer consumed by the destructive patterns of the world, but rather filled with the abundant and eternal life He promised (John 10:10). He is the one who bore our shame so that we might receive His glory and be brought to eternal honor (Hebrews 2:10).