Board index ‹ Specific Bible verses, texts, and passages ‹ Proverbs

[Clop Clop]

What does Proverbs 1:7 mean to you?

[Noffy]

Well it's a proverb, so it's a wise saying conveying a general truth. Verse 5 tells us that a wise man will listen to, learn from, and seek out wise counsel to attain the properties listed in verses 1-4 and 6 (wisdom, knowledge, understanding, prudence, discretion, etc.). Then verse 7 tells us that "fear of the Lord" is the beginning of all that.

This sound to me like Solomon is offering advice to other seekers of knowledge and wisdom. His advice is to listen to and seek out wise council, with God's wisdom and instruction being the ultimate wise council. To ignore God's wisdom and instructions, would be foolish.

I understand fear of the lord to mean reverence, respect, and piety.

[jimwalton]

"Fear" has five meanings in the Bible:

1. The emotion of fear. Dt. 5.5; 1 Sam. 7.7 etc.
2. The intellectual anticipation of evil without emphasis upon the emotional reaction (1 Sam. 21.13; Gen. 31.31)
3. Reverence or awe (Lev. 19.36.2; Ps. 112.1, etc.)
4. Righteous behavior or piety (Lev. 19.14; 25.17; 2 Ki. 17.34; Dt. 17.19)
5. Formal religious worship (2 Ki. 17.32-34)

Here it most likely means #3: reverence or awe. It means to live life in dependence on God. Deuteronomy 6 teaches us what it means to fear God and to learn wisdom:

1. Keep God's decrees and commands as long as you live
2. Pass God’s decrees and commands on to your children, because you love God
3. Serve God only
4. Prov. 8.13 says it is to hate evil: pride and arrogance, evil behavior, and perverse speech.

We gain all kinds of knowledge through scientific inquiry, the study of history, math, etc. But scientific inquiry can only tell us the what. The fear of the Lord (knowing his decrees and commands and passing them on) tells us the why.

Abraham Kuruvilla says, "'Fear of God' is the fundamental OT term for depicting the appropriate human response to God—the Hebrew equivalent to the Christian 'faith'. Fear of God entails obedience of the most demanding kind grounded in a deep trust in God—obedience that does not hold back even what is most precious, when God demands it, and commits to God even that future which he himself has promised (Gn. 22.1-12). Abraham is a paradigm for all his successors in his wholehearted devotion to God expressed in his obedience. And faith is an integral part of that fear. Abraham’s faith in God is underscored in 22.5: we shall worship, and we shall return. Faith against insurmountable odds (Heb. 11.17-19; James 2.21). The fear of God is the willingness to sacrifice everything."

Tremper Longman says, "Wisdom is not simply a matter of learning certain principles of life and applying them mechanistically. Wisdom begins with a relationship with God. That this relationship is characterized by fear means that the sages understand their place in the universe. While fear is not to be equated with terror, it is probably more than respect. After all, people were totally dependent on YHWH, who created and sustains them. The sages understood this and therefore trembled in the presence of God.

"The bottom line is that there is no wisdom apart from a proper attitude and relationship with YHWH. The very concept of wisdom is a theological concept, and it runs through the book. Fear of YHWH is foundational to knowledge (meant to be a close synonym to wisdom). Wisdom and knowledge have a radical relational and theocentric nature to them.

"The verse demands a particular attitude in one’s relationship to Israel’s covenant God, and that is communicated by the noun “fear.” We stand in subservient position and complete dependence upon Him. We recognize that there is no true knowledge without reference to Him."

A proper relationship with the Lord and comprehending the truth about him is the ground of a proper understanding of our world and our selves.

About the latter part of the verse ("but fools despise wisdom and discipline") Longman says, "This is not to imply that those who reject God have no knowledge or understanding of anything. Fools, however, do not see all of the big picture. True knowledge begins with an acknowledgement that everything is created and sustained by God and that He is the one who imparts knowledge not only through revelation but also through experience, observation, and reason. Not everyone is willing to submit themselves to YHWH to gain knowledge and wisdom. There is a group of people who despise such wisdom and therefore implicitly despise YHWH Himself, and they are fools."