Proverbs 7:1-5

An Appeal To ‘My Son' To Observe His Words And His Commandments And To Take Wisdom And Understanding As His Close Female Relatives, So As To Be Protected From The Foreign Woman (Proverbs 7:1).

This appeal follows the pattern of earlier appeals. For the combination of ‘words' and ‘commandments' compare Proverbs 2:1; for the combination of ‘commandments' and ‘torah (law)' compare Proverbs 3:1, and see Proverbs 6:20; for the combination of wisdom and understanding compare Proverbs 2:2; Proverbs 3:13; Proverbs 3:19; Proverbs 4:5 a, Proverbs 4:7; Proverbs 5:1; Proverbs 8:1; Proverbs 8:5; Proverbs 8:14; Proverbs 9:10. In it the young man is called on the embrace wisdom as his sister and understanding as his kinswoman in order to be delivered from the strange woman who speaks smooth words.

The appeal is presented chiastically:

A My son, keep my words, and lay up my commandments with you (Proverbs 7:1).

B Keep my commandments and live, and my law as the apple of your eyes (Proverbs 7:2).

C Bind them on your fingers, write them on the tablet of your heart (Proverbs 7:3)

B Say to wisdom, “You are my sister, and call understanding your kinswoman (Proverbs 7:4).

A That they may keep you from the strange woman, from the foreigner who flatters with her words (Proverbs 7:5).

Note that in A his ‘son' has to ‘keep' his ‘words', and in the parallel these will ‘keep' him from the strange woman who flatters with her ‘words'. In B he is to treat his torah as the apple of his eyes, and in the parallel he is treat wisdom and understanding as close relatives. Centrally in C he is to bind on his fingers, and write on his heart, Solomon's commandments and torah.

Proverbs 7:1

‘My son, keep my words,

And lay up my commandments with you.

Keep my commandments and live,

And my law as the apple of your eyes.'

In the typical phraseology of his previous appeals Solomon calls on ‘his son' to treasure and observe his words, and to lay up his commandments with him. There would appear in this to be an encouragement for him to learn them by rote. And by treasuring and observing his commandments he will ‘live' (compare Proverbs 4:4), that is he will enjoy a wholesome spiritual life before God. Elsewhere such life is promised to those who treasure and observe the Torah of Moses (Leviticus 18:5; Deuteronomy 4:1; Deuteronomy 5:33; Deuteronomy 8:1; Deuteronomy 8:3; Deuteronomy 16:20; Deuteronomy 30:6; Deuteronomy 30:16; Deuteronomy 30:19), thus Solomon is here connecting his commandments and torah with the Torah of Moses. It demonstrates his supreme confidence that he is acting as God's mouthpiece. And this is confirmed by the accompanying use of ‘my torah' (instruction). His torah, based on God's Torah, was to be guarded and treasured by the young man, as he guarded and treasured his own eyesight. The ‘apple' or ‘little man' of his eyes were the pupils, in which a man's image might be reflected in miniature. Compare Deuteronomy 32:10.

Proverbs 7:3

‘Bind them on your fingers,

Write them on the tablet of your heart.

Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,

And call understanding your kinswoman,

That they may keep you from the strange woman,

From the foreigner who flatters with her words.

‘Bind them on your fingers, write them on the tablet of your heart.' Compare for this Deuteronomy 11:18 (and see Deuteronomy 6:6; Deuteronomy 6:8), ‘you shall lay up these words in your heart, and bind them for a sign on your hand'. This was what was to be done with God's Torah. The importance of their being bound on their fingers lay in the fact that what was bound on the fingers would constantly be observed in daily life. Being written on the tablet of the heart they would affect the will and mind of the person involved. For ‘writing on the heart', signifying God's activity in bringing home His word to us, compare Jeremiah 31:33.

Solomon then calls on him to see wisdom as his sister, and understanding as his close kinswoman. By being closely related to them as insiders he will hopefully escape from the woman who is an outsider, the strange woman, the foreign woman, who seeks to introduce to him her own smooth words. Note that Proverbs 7:5 is a repetition of Proverbs 2:15. Solomon wants to ensure that ‘his son' is delivered from a stranger's flattering words. If he allows ‘his words' to guard him (Proverbs 7:1), he will be guarded from the words of a stranger.