Proverbs 9 - It is so simple!

I wish it was easy to talk people into reading the Proverbs. Each time through them, they get deeper. One of the pluses of the 10 Lists Reading is Proverbs is it,s own cycle so it repeats ever month.

For today just read and look at John Gill's sharp comments on the last verses.

https://www.biblegateway.com/audio/mclean/kjv/Prov.9

The Way of Wisdom

Pro 9:1  Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars:

Pro 9:2  She hath killed her beasts; she hath mingled her wine; she hath also furnished her table.

Pro 9:3  She hath sent forth her maidens: she crieth upon the highest places of the city,

Pro 9:4  Whoso is simple, let him turn in hither: as for him that wanteth understanding, she saith to him,

Pro 9:5  Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the wine which I have mingled.

Pro 9:6  Forsake the foolish, and live; and go in the way of understanding.

Pro 9:7  He that reproveth a scorner getteth to himself shame: and he that rebuketh a wicked man gettethhimself a blot.

Pro 9:8  Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee: rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee.

Pro 9:9  Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a just man, and he will increase in learning.

Pro 9:10  The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.

Pro 9:11  For by me thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life shall be increased.

Pro 9:12  If thou be wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself: but if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it.

The Way of Folly

Pro 9:13  A foolish woman is clamorous: she is simple, and knoweth nothing.

Pro 9:14  For she sitteth at the door of her house, on a seat in the high places of the city,

Pro 9:15  To call passengers who go right on their ways:

Pro 9:16  Who so is simple, let him turn in hither: and as for him that wanteth understanding, she saith to him,

Pro 9:17  Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

Pro 9:18  But he knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell.

Proverbs 9:17 Gill

Stolen waters are sweet,.... Wells and fountains of waters in those hot countries were very valuable, and were the property of particular persons; about which there were sometimes great strife and contention; and they were sometimes sealed and kept from the use of others; see Gen 26:18; now waters got by stealth from such wells and fountains were sweeter than their own, or what might be had in common and without difficulty, to which the proverb alludes. By which in general is meant, that all prohibited unlawful lusts and pleasures are desirable to men, and sweet in the enjoyment of them; and the pleasure promised by them is what makes them so desirable, and the more so because forbidden: and particularly as adultery, which is a sort of theft (r), and a drinking water out of another's cistern, Pro 5:15; being forbidden and unlawful, and secretly committed, is sweeter to an unclean person than a lawful enjoyment of his own wife; so false worship, superstition, and idolatry, the inventions of men, and obedience to their commands, which are no other than spiritual adultery, are more grateful and pleasing to a corrupt mind than the true and pure worship of God;

and bread eaten in secret is pleasant; or, "bread of secret places" (s); hidden bread, as the Targum, Vulgate Latin, and Syriac versions; that which is stolen and is another's (t), and is taken and hid in secret places, fetched out from thence, or eaten there: the sweet morsel of sin, rolled in the mouth, and kept under the tongue; secret lusts, private sins, particularly idolatry, to which men are secretly enticed, and which they privately commit, Deu 13:6; the same thing is designed by this clause as the forager.

Deu 13:6  If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers;

(r) "Furtiva Verus", Ovid de Arte Amandi, l. 1. "Furta Jovis, furtiva munuscula", Catullus ad Mantium, Ep. 66. v. 140, 145. So Propertius, l. 2. eleg. 30. v. 28. γλυκυ τι κλεπτομενον μελημα κυπριδος, Pindar; for which he was indebted to Solomon, according to Clemens of Alexandria, Paedagog. l. 3. p. 252. (s) סתרים"latebraram", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Michaelis. (t) "Quas habeat veneres aliens pecunia nescis", Juvenal. Satyr. 13.

Proverbs 9:18

But he knoweth not that the dead are there,.... In the house of this foolish and wicked woman, into which she invites passengers to turn; the simple, that is persuaded by her, does not consider that there are none there to be his companions, but such who are dead in a moral or spiritual sense; that, though they live in pleasure, they are dead while they live. Aben Ezra refers this to "hell" in the next clause; where her guests are, and where those that are slain by her have their everlasting abode; and where the giants are, as the Vulgate Latin and Syriac versions; or the mighty ones she has cast down there, as the Targum; so the word "rephaim" sometimes signifies: and some think that reference is had to the giants of the old world, that corrupted their way on earth, and brought a deluge on it; see Pro 7:26;

and that her guests are in the depths of hell; not only in the way to it, and on the brink of it, but in the very midst of it: there are many in hell she has invited into her house, and persuaded to turn in there, and commit fornication with her; and all that worship the beast, or commit spiritual adultery with the whore of Rome, will go down to perdition with her, and have their portion in hell fire, in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone; which they do not consider that are drawn into her idolatrous practices, Rev 14:9.