Приповісті 5

This chapter is a father grabbing his son by the shoulders before he leaves the house. It opens the way all of Proverbs' big warnings open — "my son, pay attention, lean your ear in" — and that's not throat-clearing, it's urgency Matthew Henry. The whole chapter has a clear shape: a warning (vv.1-14), then a turn to something beautiful (vv.15-20), then a sobering close (vv.21-23).

First, the warning. Solomon paints the "strange woman" — the seductress — with real sensory detail: her lips drip honey, her mouth is smoother than oil (v.3). That's not accidental language; it's seduction described as something delicious going down easy. But he flips it fast: the end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a double-edged sword (v.4). Her feet go down to death; her steps grab hold of Sheol, the grave (v.5). This isn't just "don't cheat on your wife" — it's "this road ends in the ground, and you won't even see it happening" (v.6). Then Solomon gets brutally concrete: you'll lose your honor, your years, your strength, your wealth — to a stranger, in a stranger's house (vv.9-10). And he stages a scene of regret: an old man groaning at the end of his life, wishing he'd listened, admitting he hated correction and nearly ruined himself in front of the whole community (vv.11-14). That's the most chilling part — this isn't a warning about getting caught, it's a warning about becoming someone who groans at the finish line with nothing left.

Then the turn — vv.15-20 — is startlingly tender. "Drink water from your own cistern." Enjoy the wife of your youth, be intoxicated (the Hebrew word really does mean drunk, staggering-happy) with her love always. This is one of the most positive, sensual passages in all of Scripture about marital love Tyndale — not a grudging concession but genuine delight, meant as the antidote to the poison above.

Finally, vv.21-23: God sees every road. The wicked man isn't ambushed by fate — he's caught in the ropes of his own sin. He dies "without instruction," which is the whole chapter's warning collapsed into one sentence.

Some readers (following certain church fathers) read the "strange woman" allegorically — as false teaching or idolatry luring Israel away from God Matthew Henry John Gill. Most modern readers take it plainly: real seduction, real marriage, real consequences. Both readings agree on the point — divided loyalty destroys you slowly, and you often don't feel it happening.

Proverbs 1–9 forms a father's extended instruction to his son, most likely written or compiled under Solomon's name (traditionally 10th century BC, though the collection as we have it was likely gathered and edited over centuries, some material as late as the 700s-500s BC under later scribes and kings). This section — chapters 1-9 — reads less like scattered one-liners and more like a father coaching a young man about to step into adult life: a career, a household, a marriage.

The warnings against the "strange woman" weren't abstract. In the ancient Near Eastern world, a young man of means — especially a king's son, or any son of a prosperous family — would have had real opportunity and real temptation: household servants, temple prostitutes tied to fertility cults, and married women whose husbands had legal grounds to destroy a seducer's life and property. This wasn't private morality; adultery in that world could mean public ruin, blood vengeance, loss of inheritance, and social disgrace for the whole family line — which is exactly what verses 9-10 and 14 describe Tyndale. Egyptian wisdom literature from this same era (documents like the Instruction of Ptahhotep) contains strikingly similar warnings to young men about seductive women, showing this was a shared concern across the ancient world's wisdom traditions, not a uniquely Israelite anxiety Tyndale.

Marriage in this culture was also the economic and social backbone of a household — "drink water from your own cistern" would have landed as an image every listener understood instantly: your own well, dug and maintained at cost, versus stealing water that belongs to someone else. The father isn't just moralizing; he's protecting his son's whole future — his name, his estate, his family line — from a mistake that could unravel everything in one act.

In verse 1, the father asks his son to qashab (קָשַׁב, H7181) — literally to "prick up the ears," the word used for an animal snapping to alert attention Strong's. This isn't polite listening; it's the posture of someone who knows their life depends on hearing correctly.

Verse 3 describes the seductress's lips as dripping nopheth (נֹפֶת, H5317) — honey specifically from the honeycomb, and her mouth chalaq (חָלָק, H2509) — "smooth," the same root used elsewhere for flattering, slippery speech Strong's. Sweetness and smoothness — sensory pleasure with nothing to grip onto.

But verse 4 slams against that with mar (מַר, H4751), "bitter," paired with laanah (לַעֲנָה, H3939), wormwood — a plant proverbial in Hebrew for poison and curse Strong's. Then chereb (חֶרֶב, H2719), a sword, specifically "sharp on both edges" — a weapon that cuts you no matter which way it swings.

Verse 5 is stark: her steps tamak (תָּמַךְ, H8551) — "sustain, grasp, hold fast to" — she'ol (שְׁאוֹל, H7585), the grave, the realm of the dead Strong's. The imagery is of feet locked onto a downward path, not wandering toward it but gripping it.

And in verse 19, the word rendered "be intoxicated always" comes from a root meaning to be drunk, to stagger — the father wants his son's joy in his wife to be that consuming, that overwhelming, applied to covenant love instead of stolen pleasure Keil-Delitzsch Old Testament.

Finally verse 21: God's eyes are on all a man's derek (דֶּרֶךְ, H1870) — his roads, his whole course of life — and He palas (פָּלַס, H6424) "weighs" or levels every path Strong's. Nothing is hidden from that scrutiny.

This chapter doesn't name Jesus, but it sets up a longing he answers. The father here offers wisdom, discernment, and instruction (v.1-2) as the thing that will save his son's life — and the New Testament tells us that in Christ "are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Colossians 2:3), that he himself "became for us wisdom from God" (1 Corinthians 1:30) John Gill. Every father in Proverbs pointing his son toward wisdom is a shadow of the true Father pointing us toward the true Wisdom — a person, not just good advice.

There's also a quieter thread here worth naming honestly: some early Christian readers took the "strange woman" allegorically, as a picture of unfaithfulness to God himself — chasing false gods, false teaching, anything that promises sweetness now and delivers death later Matthew Henry. Read that way, this chapter echoes the whole biblical picture of God as a jealous husband and his people as a bride who keeps wandering — a picture that culminates in the New Testament calling the church "the bride of Christ" (Ephesians 5:25-32; Revelation 19:7). The tenderness of verses 15-19 — drink from your own well, delight in the wife of your youth — becomes, in that larger story, a picture of covenant faithfulness that Jesus embodies perfectly toward his people: a love that doesn't wander, doesn't drain you, and doesn't end in bitterness.

And verse 21 — "the eyes of the Lord are on every man's ways" — anticipates a truth sharpened at the cross: nothing is hidden from God, and yet in Christ, the God who sees everything doesn't just judge the adulterer's ropes of sin (v.22), he pays the debt of sin himself. The warning of this chapter is real and unrelieved on its own terms; the gospel doesn't cancel it, it answers it — offering rescue for those already tangled in exactly the ropes verse 22 describes.

Here's the part of this chapter that should unsettle you: the danger isn't described as a trap sprung on you. It's described as a road you walk onto willingly, one sweet step at a time, not noticing you're descending until you're already gripped by it (v.6). That's how most of us actually fall apart — not in one dramatic collapse, but in small permissions. A little flattery entertained. A little fantasy indulged. A door left slightly open that should have been shut.

This chapter isn't only about sex, though it's centrally about that. It's about anything that whispers sweetness now and hides the bitter cost later — an addiction, a lie you tell yourself, a relationship you know is corrosive but keep circling back to because it feels good in the moment. The old man in verse 12-13 isn't a villain; he's just an ordinary person who kept ignoring correction until correction had nothing left to offer him.

What does this chapter cost you if you actually let it in? It costs you the fantasy that you can flirt with something destructive and walk away clean. It asks you to get honest — right now, not eventually — about the "strange woman" in your own life, whatever form she takes: the habit, the person, the scroll on your phone at 1am. And it asks you to actually believe verse 21: God already sees the whole road, so there's no use pretending otherwise to yourself or to him.

But don't miss verses 15-19. God isn't a killjoy standing between you and joy — he's redirecting you toward a well that actually satisfies instead of one that poisons you slowly. The invitation isn't "deny yourself pleasure." It's "stop drinking poison labeled as honey, and go drink from the well that was actually dug for you."

• Lord, show me honestly where I've been drinking from wells that aren't mine — habits, people, or fantasies that promise sweetness but are quietly draining me.
• Give me ears that actually prick up when correction comes, instead of a heart that hardens against it like the man in verse 12.
• Teach me to delight in what you've actually given me — my marriage, my calling, my life — instead of always eyeing what looks forbidden and shinier.
• Remind me that you see every road I walk, so help me walk today as if that were fully true, not just theoretically believed.
• Rescue me from any rope of my own making before it tightens any further; I don't want to reach the end groaning like the man in this chapter.

• What "strange woman" — habit, relationship, fantasy, substance — do I know is bitter underneath, but keep telling myself is honey?
• When was the last time I actually hated correction the way verse 12 describes, and what did I do with that feeling?
• Do I actually believe God sees every one of my roads (v.21), or do I live like some parts of my life are off his radar?
• Where have I settled for stolen water instead of delighting in what's actually mine — is there neglect in my closest relationships that's quietly pushing me toward something else?
• If I imagined myself as the old man in verses 11-13, looking back at my life right now, what would I be groaning about?