Proverbial Hump Day: Proverbs 1:20-33
Wisdom is a Sassy Preacher Who Mocks the Simplicity of Fools
The latter half of the first chapter of Proverbs begins with the personification of a rare human quality. In four lines, the author gives Wisdom a voice, the voice of a woman.
Proverbs 1:20-21 (Berean Study Bible) reads:
Wisdom calls out in the street,
she lifts her voice in the square;
in the main concourse she cries aloud,
at the city gates she makes her speech:
This is the introduction for what follows in verses 22 through 33.
The Voice of Wisdom
I think it’s interesting that Solomon, the wisest king in history, gives wisdom the voice of a woman. It may be because he was surrounded by so many of them—what, with 700 hundred wives and 300 concubines.
Being such a wealthy ruler, he’d have surely come across many men and women, most of them likely looking for favors and handouts. He wasn’t the man of God his father was, and he had been gifted the quality of wisdom from God rather than earn it through experience as most others do. Having come into contact with so much of humanity at the time, I’d imagine he might think—for a variety of reasons—that women were the wiser of the genders.
On the other hand, it could have just been a literary technique.
Whatever the case, he imagines wisdom raising her voice and “crying out” publicly. For she is aiming her verbal darts at fools.
What Kind of Fools Does Wisdom Mock?
The world has no shortage of fools. In the eyes of Solomon, wise king of Israel, there are a variety. They include:
The simple (I assume he means the simple-minded)
Scorners
Those who hate knowledge
I can certainly relate to that last one. Like Solomon, I shake my head at those who act as if they believe their ignorance is equal to someone else’s knowledge. Ignorance of any kind is nothing to be praised, but the kind of ignorance the king is speaking of here in this context is ignorance of the living God, creator of heaven and earth.
But why does he disdain the foolish so much? His list of reasons is longer than the list of fools itself:
They turn at wisdom’s rebuke
She has called and they refused
They disregarded her hand
And disdained her counsel
Refusing her rebuke
They hated knowledge
Did not fear God
Had nothing to do with her counsel
And because of their foolishness, wisdom will treat them according to their deeds:
She will pour out her spirit on them
She will make her words known to them
She will laugh at their calamity
And mock them when terror comes
She will not answer them when they call
Despite the harsh treatment of wisdom upon the foolish, the real danger to those who refuse to hear her voice are the natural consequences of their ongoing behavior:
They will seek wisdom diligently and not find it
They will eat of the fruit of their own way
And be filled with their own fancies
They’ll be slain by wisdom’s turning them away
And be destroyed by complacency
In short, fools will suffer the fate of their lifestyles. They will reap what they sow (Galatians 6:7). God will not be mocked, and fools do not need his judgment for they judge themselves with their own foolishness, which will swallow them up whole on the day of their destruction. Reaping and sowing is a built in quality of the created order and no one can escape it.
By contrast, those who listen to wisdom will be safe and secure, with no need to fear evil (Proverbs 1: 33).
Allen Taylor is the founder and publisher of Crux Publications. He has been walking (and wavering) with the Lord for 28 years. He has served local churches as a Sunday school teacher, a small group leader, a worship leader, a prayer group leader, and a minister of the Word. His journey isn’t over yet, and he still needs discipling.
“I am Not the King” is a personal testimony of how Jesus Christ has worked in my life. It is available at Amazon and Smashwords.