Today, I am reading and commenting on  Proverbs 25-28.

We continue today with more short sayings which sum up important points of wisdom.  So, I am going to comment on a few of those sayings which spoke to me about my life, while encouraging you to read the passage for ones which speak to where you are.  I will start with this one:

What you have seen with your eyes
   do not bring hastily to court,
for what will you do in the end
    if your neighbor puts you to shame?

In the past I always interpreted that as being about not being in a hurry to go to court about what you see, but I realized the saying has broader application than that.  If you think about it, the writer tells us not to jump to conclusions, wait until you have all the facts before you reach a conclusion about what happened.  All too often, people will condemn others based on the first facts which come out, only learning later that the actions they condemned were justified.  Or, worse yet, they will stop paying attention and never hear the facts which justified that person’s action.

 

I really struggled about this next one because I feel like everyone should know it, but I just could not move on without highlighting it:

If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat;
    if he is thirsty, give him water to drink.
 In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head,
    and the Lord will reward you.

This connects with what Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, “do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you…” Which brings me to another phrase in today’s passage: “ an undeserved curse does not come to rest.”  Which really teaches two things. It teaches us not to be concerned by those who curse us for doing God’s will.  Their curses cannot harm us.  But it also tells us not to do things which would make us deserving of our enemies’ curses, which goes along with doing good to those who hate us.

I had more phrases which I pulled out of the passage that I intended to write about, but I am just going to tag them on the end here for you to make of them what you will (I am going to make a note about one of them).

“Like a muddied spring or a polluted well
    are the righteous who give way to the wicked.”

“fools repeat their folly. ”

remember the translators’ note from chapter one said the word translated as “fool” means someone who is morally deficient, and I believe the word translated “folly” would suggest morally repugnant behavior

Like a coating of silver dross on earthenware
    are smooth lips with an evil heart.

Do not boast about tomorrow,
    for you do not know what a day may bring.

A ruler who oppresses the poor
    is like a driving rain that leaves no crops.

OK, so here is a second note. To me this suggests that a ruler who oppresses the poor is like a farmer who eats his seed corn. A ruler who oppresses the poor is destroying his own future.

 

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.