Mother's Day reflection from Proverbs

Proverbs 23:24–25 (ESV)

24 The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice;

he who fathers a wise son will be glad in him.

25 Let your father and mother be glad;

let her who bore you rejoice.  

From God's Wisdom in Proverbs, 258:

We must not miss that Solomon turns it around and makes this an imperative to the son: you must give joy to your father and mother; you must give your mother reason to rejoice. This is nothing but an application of the imperative in Exodus 20:12, which morally and spiritually obliges children not merely not to dishonor their father and mother, but positively to seek ways to honor them. In that same way, a child is obliged, not only not to bring sorrow and grief to his parents, but positively to seek ways to bring joy and gladness to them.

Kid's Rube Goldberg device... and a lesson about kids

Dawn Lewis directed me to this:

The buildup is a little long, but the payoff is very sweet.

But now parents (and kids), notice: did this boy get excited and do a victory dance because of unconditional self-esteem? Or was it because he tried and accomplished something?

Loaded question. Of course, the latter.

Yes, parents should encourage their kids, and tell them we love them, period. But at the same time, we should encourage them to do, to try, to accomplish. And then we should praise them for their accomplishments.

Even a child makes himself known by his acts,
by whether his conduct is pure and upright.
(Proverbs 20:11)

Very briefly noted: Proverbs, by Andrew E. Steinmann

Probably every nonfiction author has been bitten this way: you work hard to consult the best and most current works you can get your hands on, you try to send off your manuscript as up-to-date as you can... and immediately afterwards, some pertinent book is either published or discovered.

That's the case with me and Andrew E. Steinmann's Concordia Commentary entry on the book of Proverbs.  The book is a 719-page tour-de-force, written from the perspective of believing Lutheranism. I wish I had had it in preparing my book of Proverbs studies. In writing that book, I had opportunity to refer to some valuable research by Steinmann in journal articles... but only after the manuscript was completed did I discover this volume.

It is a pity, too. The book was already in print (2009), but Steinmann's confessional Lutheranism and "my" circles often don't overlap. So I never even saw a hint of this book until it was too late. I contacted Concordia and was sent a review copy, which I've been using for several months now.

I haven't read most of the book, but I did want to let you know about it. Steinmann's approach to authorship is not my own, but it is another conservative and faithful view. He believes in the text as the Word of God, and closely examines the Hebrew text. Each section receives his own translation, a section of notes on the Hebrew wording, and then a commentary. The commentary is readable, practical, and warmly Christ-centered and Gospel-centered.

In years past I read H. C. Leupold's volumes on Genesis and Daniel with profit, but always wished he'd done Proverbs. This is similar to that — but I think better than anything Leupold could have done. My impression is that Steinmann has produced a volume which will serve Christ's church for a great many years, as have works by other Biblically-faithful Lutherans such as Keil, Delitzsch, Hengstenburg and others. Steinmann deserves to be numbered with them, from what I have seen.

When I have read the whole book I plan to give a full review. But I can already recommend it to anyone wanting a close, detailed commentary on the entire book.

For Singles Only

This is a companion-post to the piece over at Pyro today. There I discuss the difficult time singles can sometimes have in local church fellowships.

One need is that it can be difficult for Christian singles to meet other Christian singles. Church should be the best place to meet one's future mate, but some churches are small, or in isolated areas, and the opportunities are nil. So Christians turn to online resources or others. Best is church, or connections though good friends or relatives. But sometimes "best" just is not an option.

In our meta, I'm encouraging singles only to identify themselves, share any of their experiences they'd like to share. I know we had a couple of single readers here at BibChr and over at Pyro who actually met (I'm not sure whether it was because of being co-readers) and married. I wouldn't mind being the connection point for other happy unions — to say the least.

However, let me issue a caution: any single, man or woman, needs to be extremely cautious in starting a relationship with someone you've met over The Intrawebs.

HSAT:

Some of you are reading or have read the Proverbs book. Please feel free to share how it spoke to you as a single as well... because, in writing, I didn't forget you.

The meta at Pyro is open for anyone according to the normal rules. This meta, I'd like to see dominated by singles only.

Well, you know, except for me. But I was one once, and I haven't forgotten what it was like.

Father's Day, in light of Proverbs 12:4

Aigh! Suddenly, I've run out of week!

I had in mind to do something on Father's Day, as I have on Mother's Day in the past. But now here it is, Thursday. I already have a post; tomorrow's Hither and Thither... and you just don't "bump" Hither and Thither.

I have many thoughts about manhood and fatherhood in our culture, but unfortunately most of them are half-formed and not ready for prime-time.

...then I wrote three sentences, and deleted them all. Which sort of proves, or at least illustrates, my point.

So I'll start and pretty much end with Proverbs 12:4, and an application:

An excellent wife is the crown of her husband,
but she who brings shame is like rottenness in his bones.:

One could almost write a book on that single verse, but I'll restrain myself. Note that it is the mark of an excellent wife, which in Hebrew suggests a wife of character and substance, is marked by making her husband feel like a king. She adorns him. She puts him in a high place.

Wisdom would suggest the further thought that such a man has the position and motivation to do great exploits for his wife and his family.

Is that a reach? Hardly. Simply move on to Line B and ask, What is the point of contrast? Here we see a woman who shames her husband, who disgraces him and causes him to blush. What is the effect? A rotten skeleton. Bone cancer.

Think, as Solomon means us to do: what can a man accomplish, if his bones are all rotten? Nothing — which suggests a vicious cycle. She demoralizes him, he slumps, this infuriates her, she demoralizes him, he slumps, this infuriates her....

Clearly then the two portraits are meant to clash off of each other. The first creates a cycle also. Because she's a woman of character, she treats her husband in a God-centered way. She has embraced her created role as helper and soul-mate with all her heart (Genesis 2:18). She's happy to be a woman of God, and does her best to make her husband happy to be a man of God. What he does feeds her happiness.

She is in this way a contrast to the foolish woman of Line B, who tears down her house with her own hands (Proverbs 14:1).

There's more to say, but I'll stop. (But here is a little more.) Having blasted the Proverbs 31:28-31 horn lustily in the past — and even done it, right here, in front of everyone! — I thought perhaps you might bear with this word of exhortation.

So, ladies, how are you going to make your guys feel like kings this Father's Day? (Or if that's a secret, how have you done it in the past?)

There. Now I think at one time or another I've given good "bumps" to Father's Day and Mother's Day.

"Outdo one another in showing honor" (Romans 12:10b)

A product for the Proverbs 19:24 man

Food-lift!

More as to why Solomon did not say "Go to the cat, thou sluggard"

Lazy Freaking Cat - Watch more Funny Videos

PS - don't go to that site. Really, don't.

Calvin clearly hasn't read Proverbs 6:6-11

What... you thought I meant John Calvin?

As if!

Kidner on Proverbs 13:1

In my personal reading, I'm doing the Proverbs/Psalms thing currently. That is, I'm reading a chapter of Proverbs, and five psalms, each day.

Derek Kidner's commentary on Proverbs is really quite marvelous. I could wish he'd revisited it, and written one 3-4 times as large; but its beauty is, in part, its brevity. I didn't appreciate this when I first got the commentary, but I have come to after decades of use.

Here is the first verse I read in Proverbs today:

A wise son hears his father's instruction,
but a scoffer does not listen to rebuke
(Proverbs 13:1)

And here is Kidner's proverbially terse comment:

The pairing of a son, under training, with a scorner, who is a fool in the last stages of folly (cf. 26:12 [or see 21:24, or 24:9]), suggests that if you cannot stand home truths from your own father you are well on the way to becoming insufferable.
(Kidner, Proverbs, p. 100)

Ah yes. This is why God gave us parents, etc.

Meandering mashal musings

[...a title that will only amuse my Hebrew readers. (Mashal is a hamfisted transliteration of the Hebrew word for "proverb," as in mishley shlomoh — "Proverbs of Solomon.")]

Over on Pyro I just reviewed Longman's commentary on Proverbs. Since I didn't want the review to equal the book in length, there were some things I left out, among which are the following:

I really liked Longman's handling of many of the sapiential terms (the Hebrew words behind "wisdom," "discernment," "understanding," "insight"). I will go back and revisit my own translations, and perhaps reconsider some of them.

And while I'm not dead-sure I agree, Longman's wrestling with Proverbs 8, with issues of the afterlife, with gender-issues, was beneficial. One area with which I know I disagree, however: on the one hand, he unapologetically affirms that the supposed audience is male, but says we can just turn around remarks about men or women, genderwise. For instance, things Solomon says about marriage to an argumentative and angry women can simply be flipped to apply to an argumentative and angry man.

Now, in the first place, of course it is true: marriage to an argumentative and angry man has to be nightmarish.

On the other hand: it seems to me that respect for verbal inspiration leads us to wonder why some things are recurrent themes in Proverbs. The argumentative woman, the woman driven to destroy her family (14:1b) and specifically her husband (12:4b); by contrast the excellent woman who makes her husband feel like a king (12:4a), and is so encouraging that he achieves excellence and prominence himself (31:23).

Is it really just a flip of the coin that these are all gender-aimed as they are? I don't think so.

Also, I wish the book had been laid out different. The Theological sections are not well set apart, as far as the printed layout. I wish a smarter "hand" had guided the composition of the book, in terms of typesetting — if that isn't an archaic term.

I was puzzled that Longman didn't interact with Kidner more. On that, Pyro readers may be puzzled that I consider Waltke and Kidner as indispensible. Waltke is about 95,000 pages, and misses nothing; Kidner is about 12 pages, and brief. How can I say that they are both "must-haves"?

That was my initial impression of Kidner as well: too brief! But as the years passed, and my understanding of Proverbs (I hope) deepened, so did my appreciation for Kidner. Kidner is simply a marvel of compression. His style is almost Proverbial in itself. One title, one phrase, will be so well-crafted, so pithy, so memorable, that it will suggest a whole line of thought all its own.

Oh, theologically I'm to the right of Kidner. For that matter, I'm to the right of most writers. But his comments, while brief, expose a depth of thought and reflection, and a mastery of wordcraft, that Longman and I both would do well to pursue, but to which neither of us has attained.

I do read commentaries on Proverbs with some trepidation. It has long been a dream of mine to write a commentary on Proverbs myself. For that matter, it's a dream of mine to be published, period. (I was given hope on that a year or so ago, but it has dwindled.)

But Proverbs has lacked commentaries that are academically and exegetically sound, theologically rich, and both pastorally and homiletically useful. Something like Leupold, only in Proverbs.

So I read each commentary with the thought in the back of my mind: is there still a need for such a commentary?

I read Waltke and think "Yes," because it is almost too deep — though it is certainly excellent. I read Longman and think "Yes," for reasons suggested in the Pyro review.

I'm reading Kitchen now... and it's worrying me.