Reading: Proverbs 28-31, Psalm 7
Do you feel extra wise now? Ready to answer all the questions of life by any who ask? Reading through the book of Proverbs never leaves me feeling like I understand everything really well now. I think it actually does the opposite. Once during my first year in grad school I heard a student about to complete his program say he thought he would have all the answers by now, but instead he understood so much less than when he started. While I’m sure this was in some ways hyperbole, I find there are times that the honest study of the Biblical story has a similar outcome. Rather than gaining the perfect answers, I find myself having increased in my awareness of my ignorance.
As I mentioned yesterday, at the end of the book of Proverbs we have two writers that do not appear to be related in any way to the wise king Solomon. We get no information at all about Agur, son of Jakeh. He writes on existential themes that get bigger than the rest of Proverbs, bearing more similarities to Job than Solomon. Then there is the often referenced oracle of the “excellent wife” that the mysterious king Lemuel received from his mother. Scholars at various places and times have thought perhaps Lemuel was really Solomon using a pseudonym for some reason. There is no way to know, but he certainly returns to Solomon’s favorite metaphor for everything.
I’ve read through Proverbs a bunch of times, usually as part of a year long reading program like the one I’m offering commentary on. Despite this, I don’t know that I have ever paid much attention to the words of Agur. After all the Solomonic wisdom dispensed over the previous 29 chapters, perhaps I was in a mental fugue state unable to absorb new ideas, from which I emerged just in time to read Lemuel’s nice poetry about some really awesome woman. In any event, I recommend taking the time and effort to pay attention to Agur’s one chapter contribution to Proverbs. Anything that opens with Surely I am too stupid to be a man, and have not the understanding of a human deserves our attention.
Funny how that works. He doesn’t make a big deal of it here, but Solomon’s claim to fame it being the wisest of all kings, a veritable living wonder of the ancient world. Towards the end of a book full of his wisdom, we get this guy Agur who claims to be plain dumb. I’m putting Agur into his own oracle here, assuming the man he is talking about is himself. He envisions a challenge to this dumb man in 30:4 that sounds a lot like God’s challenge to Job. Agur goes on to discuss the qualities of various humans and animals, painting a picture of a bigger world than the one any king or ruler can possibly be responsible for. The ants, the locust, the eagle, the serpent- these all live their lives and do what they do wholly apart from the understanding or will of humans. Agur admits he cannot hope to understand even the way of the man with a virgin, which I think is shorthand for the whole process of human procreation. He concludes from his lack of knowledge in a call for humility. If you think yourself wise, raise your eyes a bit to the wider world and take in how much you do not understand.
In our world today we know a great deal more than Agur. We had complex descriptions of ants, locust, eagles, and serpents. We can map procreation and even track genetics across multiple generations. Yet in all our knowledge of these things we are no closer to really understanding them. To being able to answer why the ant or the locust is the way they are. We have models of development, but no reason for it. We are very good at making observations, but do poorly at determining purpose. When we raise our sights just a bit beyond the horizon of what we know, we realize that we know nothing. I think Agur is included in the book of Proverbs to keep the reader humble. You can have all the wisdom of Solomon and still understand very little.
Finally, we have the sayings of Lemuel, and the poem about the excellent wife. The first ten verses are good advice to a ancient world ruler: don’t get mixed up with a bunch of women, don’t run around drunk, don’t pervert justice, but speak up for the oppressed and protect them. Good advice, and a bit of a shorthand for good leadership in a time and place where authority tended to the absolute. Then we turn to an acrostic poem about a good wife. Far too often this is used as a kind of instruction manual for being a housewife. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I do not think that is what is going on here. The king is advised to seek character qualities of an excellent wife, who is wise, prudent, productive, trustworthy. The woman is described in reference to her heart. Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. The husband in the poem is also described in terms of his social respect. I think these qualities are transferable in how we apply this to ourselves in the present day. The charm and beauty of a man is just as deceitful and vain as that of woman, and the social respect of women is just as valuable as that of man. The contrast set up here is not between roles of men and women, it is between humans who fear the God of Israel and those who do not. This is, after all, the theme of the entire book of Proverbs. If one does not fear the Lord, all the wisdom, beauty, and charm in the world is worthless.