to erect · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person masculine singular
wisdom
חָ֭כְמָהchokh.mah
H2451
wisdom (in a good sense) · noun, common feminine singular absolute
get
קְנֵ֣הke.Neh
H7069
to erect · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person masculine singular
understanding
בִינָ֑הvi.Nah
H998
understanding · noun, common feminine singular absolute
forget
תִּשְׁכַּ֥חtish.Kach
H7911
to mislay · verb, qal jussive, 2nd person masculine singular
decline
תֵּ֝֗טTet
H5186
to stretch or spread out · verb, qal jussive, 2nd person masculine singular
words
מֵֽאִמְרֵיme.'im.rei-
H561
something said · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
mouth
פִֽיFi
H6310
the mouth (as the means of blowing) · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
James 1:5 If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.
Proverbs 3:13-18 Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding.
2 Chronicles 34:2 And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the ways of David his father, and declined neither to the right hand…
Proverbs 1:22-23 How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?
Psalms 44:18 Our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way;
Job 23:11 My foot hath held his steps, his way have I kept, and not declined.
Proverbs 8:5 O ye simple, understand wisdom: and, ye fools, be ye of an understanding heart.
Proverbs 17:16 Wherefore is there a price in the hand of a fool to get wisdom, seeing he hath no heart to it?
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Proverbs 4:1-13
Here we have,
I. The invitation which Solomon gives to his children to come and receive instruction from him (Pro 4:1, Pro 4:2): Hear, you children, the instruction of a father. That is, 1. "Let my own children, in the first place, receive and give good heed to those instructions which I set down for the use of others also." Note, Magistrates and ministers, who are entrusted with the direction of larger societies, are concerned to take a more than ordinary care for the good instruction of their own families; from this duty their public work will by no means excuse them. This charity must begin at home, though it must not end there; for he that has not his children in subjection with all grav…
Get--as a possession not to be given up.
neither decline--that is, from obeying my word.
John Gill on Proverbs 4:5
Get wisdom, get understanding,.... Not only moral and political wisdom and understanding, but that which is spiritual and evangelical; Christ, and the knowledge of him; he being the only happy man that has an interest in him, and is possessed of him by faith, which is the meaning of getting him; See Gill on Proverbs 3:13; by which it appears, that what Solomon had before delivered, and afterwards repeats and urges, was the same his father David, that wise, great, and good man, taught him; and which he mentions, the more to recommend the getting of wisdom and understanding to others;
forget it not; when gotten, keep it in remembrance; be continually meditating on Wisdom, or Christ, his glori…
The exhortation of the father now specializes itself:
5 Get wisdom, get understanding;
Forget not and turn not from the words of my mouth.
6 Forsake her not, so shall she preserve thee;
Love her, so shall she keep thee.
Wisdom and understanding are (5a) thought of as objects of merchandise (cf. Pro 23:23; Pro 3:14), like the one pearl of great price, Mat 13:46, and the words of fatherly instruction (5b), accordingly, as offering this precious possession, or helping to the acquisition of it. One cannot indeed say correctly אל־תשׁכח מאמרי־פי, but אל־תשׁכח משּׁמר אמרי־פי (Psa 102:5); and in this sense אל־תּשׁכּח goes before, or also the accus. object, which in אל־תשכח the author has in his mind…
The Church Fathers
Open up the treasury door for us, Lord, at the prayers of our supplications; let our prayers serve as our ambassador, reconciling us with your Divinity. Listen, all who are wise, pay attention, all who are learned, acquire understanding and knowledge, seeing that you are instructed and wise.
Almost all bodily excellences alter with age, and while wisdom alone increases all other functions decay. Fasting, sleeping on the ground, moving from place to place, hospitality to travelers, pleading for the poor, perseverance in standing at prayer, the visitation of the sick, manual labor to supply money for almsgiving—all acts, in short, of which the body is the medium decrease with its decay.Now there are young men and men of riper age who, by toil and ardent study, as well as by holiness of life and constant prayer to God, have obtained knowledge. I do not speak of these, or say that in them the love of wisdom is cold, for this withers in many of the old by reason of age. What I mean is that youth, as such, has to cope with the assaults of passion, and amid the allurements of vice and the tinglings of the flesh is stifled like a fire fed with wood too green and cannot develop its proper brightness. But when men have employed their youth in commendable pursuits and have meditated on the law of the Lord day and night, they learn with the lapse of time, fresh experience and wisdom come as the years go by, and so from the pursuits of the past their old age—their old age, I repeat—reaps a harvest of delight. Hence that wise man of Greece, perceiving, after the expiration of one hundred and seven years, that he was on the verge of the grave, is reported to have said that he regretted extremely having to leave life just when he was beginning to grow wise.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Flattery · Wisdom, a preservative against — Wisdom, a preservative against
Wisdom · .UNCLASSIFIED SCRIPTURES RELATING TO — .UNCLASSIFIED SCRIPTURES RELATING TO
Young Men · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
In the Old Testament, to forget means more than not to remember; it is failure to obey.
Rashi on Proverbs 4:4
And he instructed me concerning that and he chastised me and said to me, “May your heart draw near to my words And since he chastened me with these words, therefore I admonish you concerning this (Rabbi Joseph Kara). Another explanation: For I was a son to my Father The prophet says, “I was a son to the Holy One, blessed be He, Who caused His spirit to rest upon me.” Now we find that the Holy One, blessed be He, called Solomon a son, for it is stated (II Sam. 7:14): “I will be to him a father, and he shall be to Me a son.”
a tender one and an only one before my mother Heb. לפני אמי, before my nation (אמתי) I am chosen and beloved like a tender and only son. Therefore, my father instructed m…
