The Wise Woman Builds Her House
1 Every wise woman builds her house, but the foolish one tears it down with her own hands. 2 He who walks in his uprightness fears Yahweh, but he who is perverse in his ways despises him. 3 The fool’s talk brings a rod to his back, but the lips of the wise protect them. 4 Where no oxen are, the crib is clean, but much increase is by the strength of the ox. 5 A truthful witness will not lie, but a false witness pours out lies. 6 A scoffer seeks wisdom, and doesn’t find it, but knowledge comes easily to a discerning person. 7 Stay away from a foolish man, for you won’t find knowledge on his lips. 8 The wisdom of the prudent is to think about his way, but the folly of fools is deceit. 9 Fools mock at making atonement for sins, but among the upright there is good will. 10 The heart knows its own bitterness and joy; he will not share these with a stranger. 11 The house of the wicked will be overthrown, but the tent of the upright will flourish. 12 There is a way which seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death. 13 Even in laughter the heart may be sorrowful, and mirth may end in heaviness. 14 The unfaithful will be repaid for his own ways; likewise a good man will be rewarded for his ways. 15 A simple man believes everything, but the prudent man carefully considers his ways. 16 A wise man fears and shuns evil, but the fool is hot headed and reckless. 17 He who is quick to become angry will commit folly, and a crafty man is hated.
A run about self-knowledge contains the verse the book is most often quoted for, and a joke about oxen.
It opens with a builder. Every wise woman builds her house, but the foolish one tears it down with her own hands. The phrase about hands is what makes it. Nothing external ruins this house; the demolition is domestic, deliberate and performed by the person who lives there. The image returns at the end of the book in the woman of chapter 31, whose whole portrait is of building.
The fourth verse is the collection's driest joke and it is genuinely useful. Where no oxen are, the crib is clean, but much increase is by the strength of the ox. A stable with no animals in it needs no mucking out. It also produces nothing. Anyone who has chosen tidiness over productivity, or the absence of complication over the presence of life, is being quietly described.
The run then turns inward, and three verses in a row concern the limits of what anyone can see. The heart knows its own bitterness and joy; he will not share these with a stranger — a plain acknowledgment that the deepest part of a person is not accessible to observers, in a book otherwise confident about reading character from conduct. Then: Even in laughter the heart may be sorrowful, and mirth may end in heaviness. A cheerful man may be nothing of the kind, and the collection says so without suggesting he is a hypocrite.
Between them stands the verse that has outlived the chapter: There is a way which seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death. It is stated twice in the book Proverbs 16:25, and its force depends on the word seems. The man is not lying and is not being deceived by anyone else. His judgment is functioning normally and is wrong, which is the strongest argument the book makes for needing counsel from outside himself.
The practical conclusion follows a verse later. A simple man believes everything, but the prudent man carefully considers his ways. Credulity is treated as a moral condition rather than an innocent one, and the remedy is not suspicion of other people. It is examination of his own road.
settled What this mark means