Proverbs 23
1When you sit to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before you; 2put a knife to your throat if you are a man given to appetite. 3Don’t be desirous of his dainties, since they are deceitful food. 4Don’t weary yourself to be rich. In your wisdom, show restraint. 5Why do you set your eyes on that which is not? For it certainly sprouts wings like an eagle and flies in the sky. 6Don’t eat the food of him who has a stingy eye, and don’t crave his delicacies, 7for as he thinks about the cost, so he is. “Eat and drink!” he says to you, but his heart is not with you. 8You will vomit up the morsel which you have eaten and waste your pleasant words. 9Don’t speak in the ears of a fool, for he will despise the wisdom of your words. 10Don’t move the ancient boundary stone. Don’t encroach on the fields of the fatherless, 11for their Defender is strong. He will plead their case against you. 12Apply your heart to instruction, and your ears to the words of knowledge. 13Don’t withhold correction from a child. If you punish him with the rod, he will not die. 14Punish him with the rod, and save his soul from Sheol. 15My son, if your heart is wise, then my heart will be glad, even mine. 16Yes, my heart will rejoice when your lips speak what is right. 17Don’t let your heart envy sinners, but rather fear Yahweh all day long. 18Indeed surely there is a future hope, and your hope will not be cut off. 19Listen, my son, and be wise, and keep your heart on the right path! 20Don’t be among ones drinking too much wine, or those who gorge themselves on meat; 21for the drunkard and the glutton shall become poor; and drowsiness clothes them in rags. 22Listen to your father who gave you life, and don’t despise your mother when she is old. 23Buy the truth, and don’t sell it. Get wisdom, discipline, and understanding. 24The father of the righteous has great joy. Whoever fathers a wise child delights in him. 25Let your father and your mother be glad! Let her who bore you rejoice! 26My son, give me your heart; and let your eyes keep in my ways. 27For a prostitute is a deep pit; and a wayward wife is a narrow well. 28Yes, she lies in wait like a robber, and increases the unfaithful among men. 29Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has strife? Who has complaints? Who has needless bruises? Who has bloodshot eyes? 30Those who stay long at the wine; those who go to seek out mixed wine. 31Don’t look at the wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it goes down smoothly. 32In the end, it bites like a snake, and poisons like a viper. 33Your eyes will see strange things, and your mind will imagine confusing things. 34Yes, you will be as he who lies down in the middle of the sea, or as he who lies on top of the rigging: 35“They hit me, and I was not hurt! They beat me, and I don’t feel it! When will I wake up? I can do it again. I will look for more.”
Introduction
Proverbs 23
The sin we are here warned against is luxury and sensuality, and the indulgence of the appetite in eating and drinking, a sin that most easily besets us. 1. We are here told when we enter into temptation, and are in most danger of falling into this sin: "When thou sittest to eat with a ruler thou has great plenty before thee, varieties and dainties, such a table spread as thou has seldom seen; thou are ready to think, as Haman did, of nothing but the honour hereby done thee (Est 5:12), and the opportunity thou hast of pleasing thy palate, and forgettest that there is a snare laid for thee." Perhaps the temptation may be stronger, and more dangerous, to one that is not used to such entertainments, than to one that always sits down to a good table. 2. We are here directed to double our guard at such a time. We must, (1.) Apprehend ourselves to be in danger: "Consider diligently what is before thee, what meat and drink are before thee, that thou mayest choose that which is safest for thee and which thou art least likely to eat and drink of to excess. Consider what company is before thee, the ruler himself, who, if he be wise and good, will take it as an affront for any of his guests to disorder themselves at his table." And, if when we sit to eat with a ruler, much more when we sit to eat with the ruler of rulers at the Lord's table, must we consider diligently what is before us, that we may not in any respect eat and drink unworthily, unbecomingly, lest that table become a snare. (2.) We must alarm ourselves into temperance and moderation: "Put a knife to thy throat, that is, restrain thyself, as it were with a sword hanging over thy head, from all excess. Let these words, Take heed lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and so that day come upon you unawares - or those, For all these things, God shall bring thee into judgment - or those, Drunkards, shall not inherit the kingdom of God, be a knife to the throat." The Latins call luxury gula - the throat. "Take up arms against that sin. Rather be so abstemious that thy craving appetite will begin to think thy throat cut than indulge thyself in voluptuousness." We must never feed ourselves without fear (Jde 1:12), but we must in a special manner fear when temptation is before us. (3.) We must reason ourselves into a holy contempt of the gratifications of sense: "If thou be a man given to appetite, thou must, by a present solution, and an application of the terrors of the Lord, restrain thyself. When thou art in danger of falling into any excess put a knife to thy throat; that may serve for once. But that is not enough: lay the axe to the root; mortify that appetite which has such a power over thee: Be not desirous of dainties." Note, We ought to observe what is our own iniquity, and, if we find ourselves addicted to flesh-pleasing, we must not only stand upon our guard against temptations from without, but subdue the corruption within. Nature is desirous of food, and we are taught to pray for it, but it is lust that is desirous of dainties, and we cannot in faith pray for them, for frequently they are not food convenient for mind, body, or estate. They are deceitful meat, and therefore David, instead of praying for them, prays against them, Psa 141:4. They are pleasant to the palate, but perhaps rise in the stomach, turn sour there, upbraid a man, and make him sick. They do not yield men the satisfaction they promised themselves from them; for those that are given to appetite, when they have that which is very dainty, are not pleased; they are soon weary of it; they must have something else more dainty. The more a luxurious appetite is humoured and indulged the more humoursome and troublesome it grows, and the more hard to please; dainties will surfeit, but never satisfy. But especially they are upon this account deceitful meat, that, while they please the body, they prejudice the soul, they overcharge the heart, and unfit it for the service of God, nay, they take away the heart, and alienate the mind from spiritual delights, and spoil its relish of them. Why then should we covet that which will certainly cheat us?
Cross-references: Esth 5:12 · Jude 1:12 · Ps 141:4