The Way of Wisdom

Proverbs 1-3

            Proverbs is the quintessential book of wisdom. The books from Job to Song of Songs are often characterized as the “Wisdom” books, but Proverbs is the model for it: chapter after chapter of short, pithy sayings describing general principles of how the world works, what sort of behaviors lead to the best results, how to live with sanctified common sense.

            We’ll get to those chapters eventually. Today we have an introduction that tells us that the simple and the young need to be taught how to live wisely (1:4) and that the wise are those who continue to learn (1:5). And then we jump into the first section of the book, which contrasts the way of wisdom with the way of foolishness or folly. The section is cast as instruction from a father to a son to pursue wisdom and avoid folly. In this case, folly has an evil sense about it, not just foolishness as we would usually think of it, but an enticement to an actively wicked way of life. So, the call of wisdom is to leave that behind. For this reason, important theme of Proverbs is, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” What’s at stake here is not a prosperous life versus a needy life; what is at stake here is following the Lord or not. Everything else flows from that.