Proverbs 26

The fool, of whom verses 1-12 speak, is not someone who is spiritually disturbed, but a rebellious person who denies God and has no interest in becoming wise. He is blind to his folly and does not seek deliverance from it. The fear of the LORD does not interest him at all.

To “a fool” does not fit “honor”, just as “snow in summer and rain in harvest time” do not fit together. They simply do not belong together. A fool should not find recognition, should not be clothed with authority, should not be given a position of influence. If he were given honor, it would not change him, for he is and remains a fool in his thinking, speaking and acting.

Not only does it violate the laws of nature, like snow in summer is not fitting, but it also harms what serves for food, like rain in harvest. One of the evils Solomon saw was “the fool” being “placed on great heights” (Ecc 10:6).

The flitting of “a sparrow” and the flying of “a swallow” is unpredictable and happens without any destination. Nor are they catchable. It is useless to try to do so. So it is with a curse that a fool utters for no reason. It has no effect.

Only fools utter such curses. The foolish Saul uttered a curse that did not alight (1Sam 14:28,45). The foolish Goliath “cursed David by his gods” (1Sam 17:43-44) and then was made a head shorter. Simei cursed David and was punished for it (2Sam 16:5-14; 1Kgs 2:8). The curses pronounced on Jeremiah by his enemies also dissolved into nothingness (Jer 15:10b).

It is fitting for the Old Testament believer to ask God for the wicked who harms him: “He also loved cursing, so it came to him” (Psa 109:17). When we, New Testament believers, have to deal with people who curse us, who wish evil upon us, we may respond in the way that the Lord Jesus tells us: “But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you” (Lk 6:28).

“Fools” are as difficult to urge and control as “the horse” and “the donkey”. Neither fools, nor these animals, respond to words. The animals must be driven by “a whip” and “a bridle” (cf. Jam 3:3,7-8; Psa 32:8-9). The fool must be called to order by the rod because he cannot be appealed to his reason. He must not be given authority, but authority must be exercised over him. The comparison with the animals mentioned makes it clear that the fool has lost his human dignity and must be treated in the same way.

We can apply this spiritually to “empty talkers and deceivers” (Tit 1:10), whom we can see as fools. Strict action must be taken against them: he “must be silenced” (Tit 1:11). We can consider that strict action against them as the use of the rod.

After an instruction in verse 3 on how to deal with the fool, an instruction on how to speak to the fool follows in verses 4-5. The two verses are very similar and at first glance seem to contradict each other. But what appears to be a contradiction turns out to be perfection on closer inspection. It comes down to close reading.

In verse 4 the instruction is “noy to answer a fool according to his folly”. The second line of verse explains why that should not be done. The issue here is the consequence for him who would answer. If you answer him, you will be like him. If you answer him, you become a fool yourself. This happens when you descend in your answer to his level of thinking. Therefore, you should not do that. Do not lower yourself to the level of the fool by answering his foolish question and arguing with him as if he were a wise man.

We can apply this instruction to what Paul preaches to Timothy: “But refuse foolish and ignorant speculations, knowing that they produce quarrels” (2Tim 2:23). We are not to respond to foolish and incongruous contentious questions, or else we will cooperate in producing quarrels.

In verse 5, the instruction is to answer “a fool as his folly [deserves]”. The second line of verse explains why this should be done. The issue here is the consequence for the fool. He who punishes a fool discourages him from thinking highly of himself.

The purpose of putting these two verses together is to show that human problems are often complicated and cannot always be solved by appealing to a single rule. It depends on the situation. In one case, one should not lower oneself to the level of a fool, for then one joins the circle of fools. In the other case, one should, for then the fool is put in his place.

Paul, of necessity, spoke once as an unwise, that is, as a fool. That was to correct the Corinthians, who were wise in their own eyes (2Cor 11:16-17; 12:11). The prophet Micah did both the one and the other toward Ahab (1Kgs 22:15,17). If there is grace in our heart and also the will to take nothing away from God’s Word, the Holy Spirit will let us know how to answer everyone (Col 4:6).

A preacher once answered a fool according to his folly. When he was asked a foolish, unanswerable question, he replied: ‘You can find the answer in the second chapter of the letter of Jude’.

Another comment that may help understand these two verses is found in the Jewish Talmud. The Talmud contains the commentaries of the main rabbis and other scholars on the Tenach, that is the Old Testament. It states that verse 4 presumably refers to foolish commentaries that one should ignore and verse 5 refers to a misrepresentation that one should correct.

He who uses a fool as a messenger causes himself great trouble (verse 6; cf. Pro 25:13). In the first place, it is equivalent to cutting off his own feet. Sending a messenger is like having another pair of feet. The feet of the messenger are the feet of the sender. Nothing comes of the message with which the fool is sent on a mission. He does not arrive at the address or he delivers the wrong message.

The consequences are that the sender has to deal with the violence of the addressee. The addressee has not received the message he was waiting for or he has received it mutilated, causing him to draw wrong conclusions. That damages existing good relationships. The lesson is that it is better not to send a message than to use a fool.

We can apply this to religious organizations that use unbelievers to spread the message of the gospel through them. Those organizations see themselves as a business to be run by skilled ‘businessmen’ who are good at selling a message, in this case the gospel. The annual spectacle called The Passion, a God-dishonoring display of the suffering and crucifixion of Christ, is a case in point. DC’s (Dutch Celebrities) are hired to sell the ‘product’ as successfully as possible. The effect is that nothing is left of the gospel and it damages the testimony of the biblical gospel.

Verse 7 complements verse 6. A paralytic has legs, but they are useless to him because he cannot use them. He cannot move a step with them. Thus, a fool can utter a proverb, but he does not know what it means. The proverb hangs there as limp as the legs of a cripple; it is without power in his mouth. Such is the case with all those wicked fools – people who don’t want to know anything about the fear of the LORD – hired to play in The Passion. They parrot the Bible, but they don’t know what they are saying.

“One who binds a stone in a sling” (verse 8) shows that he has no understanding of a sling. A stone should not be bound in a sling, but laid loose in it. If the stone is bound in a sling, you can spin the sling all you want, but the stone will not fly out. When it comes down to it, it can be life-threatening because the defensive weapon does not work by misuse. David would have been killed by Goliath if he had bound his stone in his sling. Because he had put the stone loose in the sling, he killed Goliath with it.

So someone “who gives honor to a fool” has no understanding of a fool. A fool cannot handle responsibility. He does not know what he is doing. He who gives a fool a position of responsibility will suffer the consequences to his own detriment.

A drunkard is unable to think soberly (verse 9). Nor can he go a steady course. He utters gibberish and staggers down the street. In his drunken state, he randomly grabs a thorn bush, causing the thorn to penetrate his hand. Because he is drunk, he does not notice it. The thorn is a symbol of sin; after the Fall, thorns came (Gen 3:18). The hand is a symbol of working, of doing something. Thus, sin clings to everything he does, even though he doesn’t notice it.

This picture applies to fools who take “a proverb” in his “mouth”. As a drunkard is without feeling for the thorn in his hand, so are fools without understanding for the proverb they take into their mouth. They are darkened in their understanding, but they think they can say wise words. A fool can read or speak a proverb, but is mentally and spiritually incapable of understanding it. He will misuse and misapply it.

People who do not have a living relationship with God through faith in the Lord Jesus can quote sayings from God’s Word, but sin clings to what they say. This is especially true of liberal theologians who read texts from God’s Word and then add their own sinful explanation to them.

This verse is difficult to translate because the different Hebrew words have very different meanings. The most likely translation is the one given here, which is also in a similar wording in a footnote in the Darby Translation: “As an archer that wounds all, so is he that hires the fool and hires passers-by.” The general meaning is that undisciplined mercenaries have the same effect as the random shooting of an archer.

Hiring “a fool” or “those who pass by” shows the folly of the one who does so. One who hires such people is compared to an archer who shoots arrows at random, which can hit and injure anyone. “A fool” is just as unreliable an employee as a random “passerby” whose laziness you also do not know. Anyone who hires, i.e. employs, a fool or a passerby, thereby gives them the opportunity to cause great harm.

“A dog” that “returns to his vomit” to eat again what it once regurgitated is quite a disgusting image. At the same time, it is a very powerful image of “a fool who repeats his folly”. A fool never learns. No matter how many negative experiences he may have and how many times he may have said he will break with his folly, he always returns to his life in sinful folly.

Peter quotes this verse in his second letter (2Pet 2:21-22a). He uses this proverb because it truthfully portrays what happens when a person has professed the Christian faith and then returns to the world. A dog is an unclean animal that voraciously and shamelessly feeds on whatever it finds or gets (cf. Isa 56:11). A dog is never satisfied. When it has eaten too much, it vomits it up. If it gets hungry again, it eats its own vomit.

This image applies to people who first bid farewell to the world, but, spurred on by teachers of error, returned to it. They had found no inner satisfaction in the world and had left it. Now they return to it anyway. This shows that inwardly they have not really changed. The dog has remained a dog.

There is someone even worse than a fool and that is a man who is wise in his own eyes. In fact, self-conceit is part of the foolishness described in this book. A snooty ignoramus is the greatest fool of all. Arrogant self-assertion and an imagined sense of superiority place a person beyond the reach of any help or correction. The prophet Isaiah says to such people, “Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight!” (Isa 5:21). All that remains for them is a “woe”, a judgment without end.

We are “not to think more highly” of ourselves than we “ought to think” (Rom 12:3; Gal 6:3). We are also told: “Do not be wise in your own estimation” (Rom 12:16).

Verses 13-16 are about the sluggard (Pro 6:6-11; 24:30-34). We see an increasing passivity. First he does not come out of his house (verse 13). Then he doesn’t get out of his bed (verse 14). Finally, he doesn’t even take his hand out of a dish of food (verse 15). There is no movement at all and no movement is to be expected.

He deludes himself that circumstances do not allow him to work (verse 13). The sluggard is work-shy, and he who is work-shy makes up the most absurd excuses for not working (Pro 22:13). He sees danger everywhere, on the road and in the open square. He sees everywhere the opposition of the devil, of whom the lion is a picture (1Pet 5:8), who prevents him from working. The real excuse, however, is not fear, but laziness.

The sluggard is as firmly attached to his bed as “a door ... on its hinge” (verse 14). It is as impossible for him to get loose from his bed as a door is from its hinge. The sluggard hinges, as it were, on his bed. Just as a door moves back and forth but does not move from its place, so the sluggard wallows from one side to the other. A door still has a function, it opens and closes, while the sluggard remains functionless.

The sluggard is even too lazy to bring the food he has taken in his hand out of the dish “to his mouth again” (verse 15). In Proverbs 19:24 there is a similar verse, but just a little more vague. Here it is stated more strongly. Burying his hand in the dish has cost him so much energy that he is exhausted. Here the wise pokes fun at the sluggard. It is a laughable depiction of things. The purpose of the exaggeration is also to make it clear to the sluggard that he is making himself ridiculous.

We can see in this a picture of people who are too lazy to examine God’s Word. They know about it, they stick their hand in, they can quote a text – of course, one that suits them – but they don’t eat it. Studying it is too much work.

The sluggard is filled with self-conceit (verse 16). He is very pleased with his laziness and considers his view of life better than that of those who strive to gain life wisdom and thereby become wise. In his eyes, these are stupid people. Work is for the stupid, in his opinion. Of course, he thinks his laziness is perfectly justified. He takes siesta all day and preaches that as the highest good for himself.

He believes so firmly in his own wisdom that no one can convince him of anything else. Even seven (wise) men – symbolizing a fullness of wisdom (Ezra 7:14; Est 1:14-15) – are unable to make him see the folly and antisociality of his laziness. His laziness has taken his mind away from him. He is beyond reason. The discreet answer of seven wise men does not reach him. Any admonition in his direction is blocked by his complacency.

The man referred to in this verse is not a sluggard, but someone who is busy, only with the wrong things. The meddler is one who gets involved in matters that are none of his business. Someone who unsolicited “meddles with strife not belonging to him” is asking for trouble. It is as dangerous and foolish as taking “a dog by the ears” because the dog will bite you. It is not your dog, but a wild dog. You yourself will be harmed by your meddling and then you can only blame yourself.

We find an example of this in the life of King Josiah, who meddled in a battle between the king of Egypt and his enemy. It cost him his life (2Chr 35:20-24). Peter still points out the great difference between suffering as a Christian and suffering because of meddling (1Pet 4:15-16).

Shouldn’t we be peacemakers then? Isn’t that what we are called to be (Mt 5:9)? Certainly, we should be. Being peacemakers is an attitude of keeping peace with all people. It does not mean that a peacemaker will involve himself in a quarrel in which he is not involved. He will not imagine that he has to get involved in it without being asked for mediation or an instruction from the Lord to do so. We are not called to meddle in every disagreement. Nor did the Lord meddle in an argument about an inheritance (Lk 12:14)..

The meddler of verse 17 has become in verse 18 “a madman” or ‘one presenting himself as insane’. He throws with materials that cause death and destruction. To such a person is compared “the man who deceives his neighbor, and says, Was I not joking?” (verse 19). This kind of person is very intent on deceiving a neighbor, for whatever reason. When he falls through, he tries to downplay his deception by saying it was a joke. You shouldn’t make a big deal out of it. If you do, then you are the bad guy and not him.

Someone who is like that in life is a loose projectile, a dangerous madman. The wise man describes the deceiver who dismisses his deception as a joke as irresponsible and dangerous. While he is out to hurt people, when he is caught he states that it was something funny, which he now expects people to laugh at. At the same time, by doing so, he wants to escape punishment. Thus a lot of people go through life while making jokes.

The comparison in verse 20 is that “wood” feeds fire and a “whisperer” feeds contention. To keep a fire burning fuel is needed. If there is no fuel, the fire goes out. The fire goes out when there is no more wood, and contention ceases when there is no whisperer. Contention is like fire. It kindles others and destroys relationships.

The whisperer is the kindler. He works in a cunning way; with his gossip he influences others negatively. Whispering or gossip is fuel for strife. The whisperer must be eliminated. This can be done by silencing him. It can also be done by not listening to him. Then the contention quiets down and ceases.

The whisperer of verse 20 is in verse 21 “the contentious man”. He has a nose for “strife” and knows how to “kindle” it. He provides the fuel for it and throws oil on the fire when there are tensions somewhere. There is already a fire and he adds the necessary fuel to it.

He is the very opposite of a peacemaker, for he causes strife. And when the strife threatens to go out, he stirs up the fire once more. To do this, he says a few ugly or insinuating words about someone, which causes the contending parties to wage war against each other again in all their fervor. Let us be careful not to cause a contention, and when a quarrel is settled, not to say things that cause the contention to flare up again.

Why do whisperers and contentious people so often get the opportunity to do their destructive work? Because gossip is so attractive to the sinful flesh (verse 22; Pro 18:8). “The words of a whisperer” are compared to dainty morsels. They are eagerly and thoroughly feasted upon by those who hear them.

If we do not reject the words of a whisperer, they will settle inside us and negatively affect our feelings. It is present there like a smoldering fire and will do its consuming work if we do not judge ourselves when we have listened to those words and have not rejected them.

Someone can deliver a speech with “burning lips”, that is, a speech that burns with love, while his words camouflage the evil plans of his “wicked heart” (verse 23). In a burning speech, such a person says things that are pleasant, but they only cover his bad character and his evil motives of forging evil.

The wise man compares such hypocritical speech to “an earthen vessel overlaid with silver dross”. Overlaying an earthen vessel with what looks like silver makes the earthen vessel appear magnificent, completely different from the clay it actually is. Even the silver is fake, for it is dross, or silver waste (cf. Lk 11:39; Mt 23:27).

Verse 24 says in different terms what has already been said in verse 23. This is done so that there can be no misunderstanding of how deceptive a beautiful appearance can be as a covering for a depraved inner being. In the evil heart of verse 23 is “hatred”. “He who hates” may say beautiful and kind things, but he “disguises [it] with his lips”. To disguise is to be hypocritical, it is pretending to be someone else than one is. This deceit is laid up in the heart, indicating that it is taken everywhere.

The way Joab approached and then killed Amasa illustrates this verse (2Sam 20:9-10a). It is a warning not to be deceived by what we see or hear. In a God-hostile world, the Christian must not go his way in gullibility, but with prudence (Mt 10:16). Nehemiah was not gullible when his enemies wanted to trap him (Neh 6:1-4).

Verse 25 connects directly to verse 24. Solomon warns his son not to believe a hypocrite even though “he speaks graciously”. For behind his kind voice and nice words is a heart in which are “seven abominations”. It will require great discernment and wisdom to discern whether a person can be believed or not. This verse may have in mind a person who has already proven to be untrustworthy, but who is now using words to hide his evil plans and to turn them into deeds.

“Seven abominations” indicates that this person is completely, thoroughly, depraved. Every kind of destruction and violence is present in him. The hater conceives these abominations in his heart, he deliberates abominable and hideous deeds that are now plans and that are directed against him to whom he speaks in a friendly voice. His heart is a storehouse of abominations. Satan is the prototype of such a person, but there are also those who are much like him in this.

To discover seven abominations behind a friendly voice requires dependence on the Lord. If we hear something from someone we do not know or from someone who is known to be untrustworthy, we must ask the Lord to make the true intentions clear. In any case, those become clear when that “friendly voice” says things contrary to the Word of God, as we see in the conversation between satan and Eve.

Even though “hatred” goes unnoticed for a time because it “covers itself with guile”, there irrevocably comes a time when this evil is revealed (verse 26). The place where that happens is “the assembly”. “The assembly” is any gathering of people called together for a specific purpose. In this case, we might think of a trial.

It can also be applied to the church of God, in which God makes known that evil is present. Ultimately, all evil will be revealed before the judgment seat of Christ (2Cor 5:10). For “there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known” (Lk 12:2).

Those who seek to plunge another into misfortune will often find that they themselves are plunged into the misfortune they had plotted for that other person (verse 27; Psa 7:15-16; 9:16; 10:2). Digging a pit and rolling a stone require effort. It is about someone who makes a great effort to plunge another into misfortune. But “whoever digs a pit may fall into it” (Ecc 10:8). And he who rolls a stone to bring it down on another will himself fall under it if the stone suddenly rolls back. It is the law of sowing and reaping, “for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap” (Gal 6:7b).

Abimelech, who killed seventy men on one stone, was himself killed by a piece of a millstone thrown on his head by a woman (Jdg 9:5,18,53). A person is measured by the measure of iniquity by which he himself has measured, so that God’s justice is executed upon him (cf. Jdg 1:6-7). Other histories illustrating this verse are found in what happened to Haman who had a gallows erected for Mordecai and what happened to Daniel’s accusers who had him thrown into the lion’s den (Est 7:10; Dan 6:24-28).

The reason a person hurts others with his “lying tongue”, that is, with his lies, is because he hates them (verse 28). He is driven by hatred. His lying tongue is in “a flattering mouth”, that is, he speaks flattering words. This is most evident in the way satan approaches Eve. This is how satan continues to work through his countless instruments, people who have him as their father. He is the father of lies that bring ruin. His nature is present in his followers and expressed in them. In politics we regularly see and hear samples of this.

All these proverbs about hypocrisy powerfully teach how much the God of truth hates every attempt to deceive. They warn us against becoming accustomed to the slightest deviations from the truth and any lack of sincerity in our speech. Deviations from the truth and lack of sincerity are totally incompatible with the Christian confession.