Proverbs 10:17

The group of proverbs now following bring again to view the good and bad effects of human speech. The seventeenth verse introduces the transition: 17 There is a way to life when one gives heed to correction; And whoever disregards instruction runs into error. Instead of ארח חיּים (Pro 5:6), there is here ארח לחיים; and then this proverb falls into rank with Pro 10:16, which contains the same word לחיים. The accentuation denotes ארח as subst.; for ארח way, road = ארח [a wayfarer, part. of ארח] would, as שׁסע, Lev 11:7, נטע, Psa 94:9, have the tone on the ultima. It is necessary neither to change the tone, nor, with Ewald, to interpret ארח as abstr. pro concreto, like הלך, for the expression "wanderer to life" has no support in the Mishle. Michaelis has given the right interpretation: via ad vitam est si quis custodiat disciplinam. The syntactical contents, however, are different, as e.g., Sa1 2:13, where the participle has the force of a hypothetical clause; for the expression: "a way to life is he who observes correction," is equivalent to: he is on the way to life who...; a variety of the manner of expression: "the porch was twenty cubits," Ch2 3:4, particularly adapted to the figurative language of proverbial poetry, as if the poet said: See there one observant of correction - that (viz., the שׁמר [שׁמר, to watch] representing itself in this שׁמר) is the way to life. מוּסר and תּוכחת are related to each other as παιδεία and ἔλεγχος; עזב [עזב, to leave, forsake] is equivalent to בּלתּי שׁמר. מתעה would be unsuitable as a contrast in the causative sense: who guides wrong, according to which Bertheau understands 17a, that only he who observes correction can guide others to life. We expect to hear what injuries he who thinks to raise himself above all reproach brings o…

See here, 1. That those are in the right that do not only receive instruction, but retain it, that do not let it slip through carelessness, as most do, nor let it go to those that would rob them of it, that keep instruction safely, keep it pure and entire, keep it for their own use, that they may govern themselves by it, keep it for the benefit of others, that they may instruct them; those that do so are in the way of life, the way that has true comfort in it and eternal life at the end of it. 2. That those are in the wrong that do not only not receive instruction, but wilfully and obstinately refuse it when it is offered them. They will not be taught their duty because it discovers their faults to them; that instruction which carries reproof in it they have a particular aversion to, and certainly they err; it is a sign that they err in judgment, and have false notions of good and evil; it is a cause of their erring in conversation. The traveller that has missed his way, and cannot bear to be told of it and shown the right way, must needs err still, err endlessly; he certainly misses the way of life.

10:17 Wise people are not afraid to have their thinking or behavior corrected—they accept discipline as an opportunity to grow in wisdom.