Proverbs 4:13

Pro 4:13 Take fast hold of instruction; let [her] not go: keep her; for she [is] thy life.

Ver. 13. Take fast hold of instruction.] Nam magnum certamen sustines adversus haereticae et epicureos, saith a Jewish doctor upon this text: Heretics and epicures will seek to wring it from thee, by wrench and wile. Therefore "hold fast the faithful word, as thou hast been taught." {Tit 1:9} Hold it as with tooth and nail against those gainsayers that would snatch it from thee. For "there are many unruly and vain talkers," and so there are many loose and lewd walkers too, that would bereave thee of the benefit of what thou hast learned; but "hold fast that which is good." Let it not go, Ne languescas; surcease not, slake not, give not over striving against sin and sinners.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Pro_4:13

Take fast hold of instruction; let her not go: keep her; for she is thy life.

The hold-fast religion

Faith may be well described as taking hold upon Divine instruction. To take fast hold is an exhortation which concerns the strength, the reality, the heartiness, and the truthfulness of faith, and the more of these the better. If to take hold is good, to take fast hold is better. The best instruction is that which comes from God: the truest wisdom is the revelation of God in Christ Jesus; the best understanding is obedience to the will of God, and a diligent learning of those saving truths which God has set before us in His Word.

I. The method of taking fast hold upon true religion. At the outset much must depend upon the intense decision which a man feels in his soul with regard to eternal things. This depends much on a mans individuality and force of character. Many are truly religious, but are not intense about anything. Some who in other matters have purpose enough, and strength of mind enough, when they touch the things of God are loose, flimsy, superficial, half-hearted. If the religion of Christ be true, it deserves that we should give our whole selves to it. Our taking fast hold depends upon the thoroughness of our conversion. Another help to a fast hold of Christ is hearty discipleship. Another is a studious consideration of the Word of God. An established Christian is one who not only knows the doctrine, but who also knows the authority for it. An earnest seriousness of character will help towards maintaining a fast hold of Christ. If these things are in us and abound, there will grow around them an experimental verification of the things of God. And in the mode of taking fast hold upon the gospel practical Christianity, practical usefulness, has a great influence.

II. The difficulties of taking fast hold of instruction.

1. This is an age of questioning. Conceited scepticism is in the air.

2. This is an age of worldliness.

3. There is, and always has been, a great desire for novelty.

4. The worst difficulty of all is the corruption of our own hearts.

II. The benefits of taking fast hold. It gives stability to the Christian character to have a firm grip of the gospel. It will also give strength for service. It will bring joy. Persons of this kind are the very glory of the Church.

IV. The arguments of the text. They are three.

1. Take fast hold of true religion, because it is your best friend.

2. It is your treasure.

3. It is your life.

Mr. Arnot, in his book upon the Proverbs, tells a story to illustrate this text. He says that in the southern seas an American vessel was attacked by a wounded whale. The huge monster ran out for the length of a mile from the ship, and then turned round, and with the whole force of its acquired speed struck the ship and made it leak at every timber, so as to begin to go down. The sailors got out all their boats, filled them as quickly as they could with the necessaries of life, and began to pull away from the ship. Just then two strong men might be seen leaping into the water who swam to the vessel, leaped on board, disappeared for a moment, and then came up, bringing something in their hands. Just as they sprang into the sea down went the vessel, and they were carried round in the vortex, but they were observed to be both of them swimming, not as if struggling to get away, but as if looking for something, which at last they both seized and carried to the boats. What was this treasure? What article could be so valued as to lead them to risk their lives? It was the ships compass, which had been left behind, without which they could not have found their way out of those lonely southern seas into the high-road of commerce. That compass was life to them, and the gospel of the living God is the same to us. You and I must venture all for the gospel: this infallible Word of God must be guarded to the death. Men may tell us what they please, and say what they will, but we will risk everything sooner than give up those eternal principles by which we have been saved. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Education the business of life

I. Education is the business of life. Begin with the infant, and observe how, from the very first breath, every stage in its growth is but the antecedent of another, its chief occupation being to get ready for the next. Infancy spreads out into childhood, etc. Thus obviously is life occupied with preparation for the future. To cause men to enter on that future with the best advantage is the purpose of education, in whatever form dispensed. Consisting thus in preparation for the future, it evidently implies three things--

1. The development of the faculties. These lie folded up in the child, unobserved and inactive. By assiduous culture they are to be unfolded in their true proportions, and to be made skilful by judicious exercise.

2. The acquisition of knowledge--without which one rushes upon the future like a blind man into a wilderness. Knowledge is safety, light, and power; ignorance is darkness, peril, and imbecility.

3. Special fitness for the special employment on which one is to enter. Education is not to be conducted at random, nor with a merely general intent. It has regard to the peculiar calling of the individual. It would fit him to act well his part in the precise sphere which he is destined to fill. This, then, is one sense in which education is the business of life. It is the business of every season to prepare for the next. But there is yet a higher sense. Life itself is but one period of existence, antecedent to another and final period. Life itself is but the childhood of the immortal spirit, getting ready for its future youth and eternal manhood. Life itself, therefore, is but one long school-day; its great purpose the discipline of the powers, the acquisition of knowledge, the fitting of the character, in preparation for that immortal action to which the grave introduces. The perfect man--he who is thoroughly furnished by the completest culture of all his powers, faculties, and affections--is educated for heaven. To stop short of this is to leave the Divine work incomplete. Made to reach indefinitely after wisdom, goodness, and happiness, in this world and the next, he can rightfully propose to himself no other end; and his education is in no just sense finished until this end is attained. Whence we observe there are two essential deficiencies in the common judgment: first that the cultivation of the intellect is limited to that small exercise of the mind which just fits for some one occupation; and second, that the cultivation of character is left almost altogether (in all formal education) to circumstance and accident.

II. By what method the desired result is to be effected. There are three processes--by instruction, by circumstances, by self-discipline.

1. Instruction; by which I intend all the express external means of human or of Divine appointment which are used in early or later life. This is sometimes spoken of as including the whole of education. But a little thoughtful observation convinces us that it is far from being so in fact; that in truth formal teaching is little more than offering favourable opportunities and excitements to the individual, which he may neglect, and so, with the best instruction, remain uneducated. Essential as direct instruction may be, if left to itself, unaided and alone, it can accomplish scarce anything. It needs the concurrence of circumstances, and of the will of the instructed.

2. Circumstances have more to do with the acquisition of knowledge and the formation of character than is often supposed. They make the atmosphere by which one is surrounded, the climate in which he resides. They make up that assemblage of invisible, intangible, indescribable influences which, in the moral world as in the natural, give a complexion, hue, constitution, character, to all who are subjected to it; influences to which they of necessity yield, and which they in vain seek to counteract. It is of the first importance m education to give heed to this consideration. Inattention to this is the cause of frequent ill-success in what appear to be the best arranged processes of instruction. Great pains have been taken, and expensive apparatus employed, with most unsatisfactory results. It was the wrong sort of pains. The controlling power of circumstances was overlooked. The influences of situation, companions, example, and social habits, were disregarded.

3. To these processes is to be added that of self-discipline. Without it nothing efficient can be done by force of teaching, or by the best arrangement of most favourable circumstances. The individual must have a desire to make progress, and must exercise his own powers in making it. It is when he cheerfully, with voluntary labour and watching, applies himself to learn and to become good, that success crowns the endeavour. The general uses of this subject are as obvious as they are important.

(1) It rebukes the prevalent misconceptions, which bind down the aim of intellectual effort to that drudgery of the world by which the body is supported; which account the rational and immortal spirit sufficiently taught, and well enough employed, when it has become skilful to answer the question, What shall we eat, and what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be clothed?

(2) It rebukes the negligence and self-indulgence of those who, possessing, as we possess, peculiar advantages for the highest intellectual progress, content themselves with the lowest, think mental toil a drudgery, repine at the requisites for improvement, and set the enjoyments of indolence above the solid honours of attainment.

(3) It rebukes the yet more common error of setting aside from our notions of education the progress of character, and establishment in virtue.

(4) It brings us to the great duty of man, the leading object of life; the self-discipline of the character by which preparation is made for eternity. (H. Ware, D. D.)

Take fast hold

It is only instruction that we must take fast hold of. There are some things that we must not even touch, much less must we try to grasp them. Take fast hold of the wonderful things that are contained in the Bible.

1. We take fast hold of instruction by praying over it. If we pray often over it we shall, of course, think much about it, and then we may understand it better. And if we truly do this we shall, without fail, strive to put the truth that we have thus taken hold of into practice.

2. It is a great help if we seek to impart what we have learned of Jesus. If we tell what we know, it will fix it upon our minds. If we do not thus take fast hold of instruction, we may lose it. (J. J. Ellis.)

Hold fast

I. Fast hold must be laid upon wisdoms precepts.

1. Because many thieves lie in the way to rob us of what wisdom teacheth us--the devil, wicked men, the world, the flesh.

2. Because we may lose our wisdom ourselves--by negligence, by sinful courses.

II. Wisdoms precepts must not be parted withal, but kept safe.

1. Because parting with it brings loss of other things, as of our safety and likewise of our comfort.

2. Because it brings much danger, and that to all that is dear to us.

III. Holding fast wisdom is the way to life. What thou losest of heavenly wisdom, so much thou losest of thy life. (Francis Taylor, B. D.)

Religious instruction

Instruction is not here used for acquisition of knowledge or intellectual enlargement. It is synonymous with wisdom, understanding, heavenly teaching. Note--

1. The extreme earnestness which the wise son of David displays in pressing his advice.

2. The text suggests the natural alienation of the heart from instruction. It does not receive it willingly. It does not retain it, if received, without difficulty.

3. The last clause of the text resolves the whole question into a simple and intelligible proposition. It brings the matter to a point. Dost thou desire to live--not the life that now is, the transient and ephemeral existence of a corruptible body--but in that never-ending state when a thousand years will be as one day? Then take fast hold of instruction--in obtaining her thou hast secured thy object, for she is thy life. There is, in that word life, a comprehensiveness which conveys the fulness of joy to the penitent soul. (Lord Bishop of Winchester.)

Vigorous steadfastness

The path of wisdom requires the most vigorous steadfastness. Hold the lessons of wisdom with a firm and unrelaxable tenacity; grasp them as the drowning man the rope that is thrown out for his rescue. Firmness, said Burns, both in sufferance and exertion, is a character which I would wish to possess. I have always despised the whining yelp of complaint, and the cowardly, feeble resolve. (David Thomas, D.D.)

A wise caution

I. We must take heed of falling with sin and sinners. Our teacher having, like a faithful guide, shown us the right paths (Pro_4:11), here warns us of the by-paths into which we are in danger of being drawn aside. Those that have been well educated, and trained up in the way they should go, let them not so much as enter into it, no, not to make a trial of it, lest it prove a dangerous experiment, and difficult to retreat with safety. Venture not into the company of those who are infected with the plague, no, not though thou think thyself guarded with an antidote.

II. If at any time we are inveigled into an evil way, we must hasten out of it. If, ere thou wast aware, thou didst enter in at the gate, because it was wide, go not on in the way of evil men. As soon as thou art made sensible of thy mistake, retire immediately; take not a step more, stay not a minute longer, in the way that certainly leads to destruction.

III. We must dread and detest the wax of sin and sinners, and decline them with the utmost care imaginable. (Matthew Henry.)

Popular amusements

This advice bears, in its practical relation, on two important features developed in practical affairs. It strikes at the way of the wicked--

1. As it is traced in those open violations of integrity which are condemned alike by the laws of man and the laws of God; and--

2. In that great class of sins which falls under the term dissipation in ordinary life, which is condemned by the laws of God, and too frequently tolerated by the laws of man, which is, in itself, in fact, too evanescent, too much a thing of the heart, sinks into too great triviality, is too personal in its character, involving too exclusively the sacrifice of a mans own soul and life, and the dishonour of his Creator, to fall within the province of human legislation. Popular amusements bear directly upon both these classes of crime. They form a certain fascinating territory--a frontier lying between them and the practice of godliness. To allure the youth, the territories of criminality must be surrounded with a frontier of fascinating pleasures.

I. Every step you take in these forbidden gratifications is taken at your own cost. All the difficulties that will occur to you there are encountered at your own expense. In the very first principle of starting you forfeit all the protection, the guidance, and the help which man may expect at any time, in justifiable engagements, at the hand of God. God has designed that the whole of life should be conducted in a subjugation of the mind to His own teachings; and, in the path of these forbidden pleasures, amongst the allurements that awaken thoughtlessness of Him, and draw the heart from Him, there is no covenanted protection and guidance, and in that abandonment from God he has the elements of the final curse.

II. The popular amusements of our time are to be reprehended and forsaken because they are always attended with inducements to greater wrong. It is not merely the stealing and subtle influence that draws the heart away from God; it is not merely the dreadful effect which the fascination has in soothing down the mind into a state of self-gratification; it is not merely the fact that these delusive pleasures draw the mind away from everything distinctly religious; but they stand surrounded with inducements to drive the spirit home to the point in which it must break through the restrictions, not of Divine law only, but of human law also.

III. The direct influence of the habits formed in scenes of popular amusement is altogether opposed to the exercise of vital Godliness. In cases I have known, there was the declination of the habits of godliness, and the very gift of prayer had almost ceased; every element of piety was crippled. It is said that these popular amusements are patronised by religious people, and that they may at times be rendered subservient to virtue. The answer is that the peril in them wholly outweighs every advantage that can be derived from them. (Charles Stovel.)

Curiosity a temptation to sin

One chief cause of wickedness is our curiosity to have some fellowship with darkness, some experience of sin, to know what the pleasures of sin are like. Not to know sin by experience brings upon a man the laughter and jests of his companions. Curiosity brought about Eves fall; and a wanton roving after things forbidden, a curiosity to know what it was to be as the heathen, was one chief source of the idolatries of the Jews. This delusion arises from Satans craft. He knows that if he can get us once to sin, he can easily make us sin twice or thrice, till at length we are taken captive at his will. He sees that curiosity is mans great and first snare. He therefore tempts men violently while the world is new to them, and hopes and feelings are eager and restless. The great thing in religion is to set off well, to resist the beginnings of evil; to flee temptation; and for these reasons--

1. It is hardly possible to delay our flight, without rendering flight impossible. Directly we are made aware of temptation we shall, if we are wise, turn our backs upon it, without waiting to think and reason about it; we shall engage our mind in other thoughts.

2. If we admit evil thoughts we shall make ourselves familiar with them. Our great security against sin lies in being shocked at it.

3. There is a tendency to repeat an act of sin once committed.

4. The end of sinning is to enslave us to it. Our safeguard lies in obeying our Lords simple but comprehensive precept, Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. (Plain Sermons by Contributors to the Tracts for the Times.)

Breakers ahead

To the young it may be said, Whatever be the evil course that tempts you, your only safety lies in determined refusal to take a single step in that direction, to tamper for a moment with the temptation; and that this axiom may be as a nail fastened in a sure place. Solomon gives it six strong blows with the hammer, saying in regard to every such devious and sinful path, Enter not, go not in it, avoid it, pass not by it, turn from it, and pass away. Some of the courses against which we need to be warned.

1. The way of the fraudulent. If you cannot be rich without guile be content to be poor. To act or imply what is false is as bad as to utter a lie.

2. The way of the extravagant. Spending money you do not possess; against debt. Start in life as you mean to continue, and let this be one of your maxims, Owe no man anything.

3. The way of the gambler. This loathsome cancer is eating into the very vitals of English society. There is no evil course that is more insidious in its commencement, or more insatiable in the appetite it awakens.

4. The way of the drinker. Have the good sense to make a disaster impossible by simply refusing to touch the dangerous thing.

5. The way of the libertine. Shut your ear against every whisper of immodesty.

6. The path of the scoffer. This danger almost always springs from unwise companionships. One sceptic in an office may unsettle all his fellows. (J. Thain Davidson, D.D.)

Contamination of evil society

On the moors of Yorkshire there is a stream of water which goes by the name of the Ochre Spring. It rises high up in the hills, and runs on bright and sparkling for a short distance, when it suddenly becomes a dark and muddy yellow. What is the reason of this? It has been passing through a bed of ochre, and so it flows on for miles, thick and sluggish, useless and unpleasant. The world is full of such beds of ochre . . . Enter not in the path of the wicked, and go not in the way of evil men. (Church of England Teachers Magazine.)

The two paths

I. The path of the wicked. Bad men are here described in such terms as imply a very wretched state of society. They delight in acts of violence and plunder. Such men form the criminal classes. There are other evil-doers who are much more dangerous, because their evil-doing is not so criminal, is not usually of a sort that exposes them to the penalties of the law. One feature of bad men is pointed out. They cannot rest unless they do mischief to some one. There are men who take an intense pleasure in corrupting their juniors and making them as bad as themselves. One of the chief pleasures of sin lies in making others sinful, just as, on the other hand, one of the chief pleasures of goodness is making others good. The tempter prefers the form of the serpent, and does his evil work subtly, slyly, stealthily. Yet the wicked are blind, blinded sometimes by ignorance, sometimes by passion. They do not see what their true interest is.

II. The path of the just. As the shining light. By the just we are to understand the good man; not a man altogether free from sin, but one who, though far from faultless, sincerely desires and earnestly strives to live in all things according to the will of God. The word just signifies commanded. A just man is a commanded man, a man whom God commands, a man who acts according to Gods commandments. The just man is something more than a man who is true, honest, fair in his treatment of his fellow-men. The just man is he who, to the full extent of the knowledge of Gods will, obeys it, or does his best to obey it, and so is a commended man. The path of the just is the just mans course of life. We have a description of a good mans life in its character, its progress, its perfection. Light in Scripture bears several meanings. It means knowledge in relation to the mind, holiness in relation to the conscience, happiness in relation to the heart. The life of a just man is a life of growing knowledge, holiness, and happiness. Unto the perfect day. What is the perfect day? Never seen or experienced by Christians in this world. A poor idea of the perfect day that man must have who thinks that he has already attained to it. The difference between day and night is due to this, that the portion of the earth on which we live turns towards or from the sun. And it is the turning of our souls towards Him who is the Sun of Righteousness that makes our night of ignorance and sorrow turn into the day of knowledge and goodness and happiness. (Hugh Stowell Brown.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Proverbs

THE TWO PATHS

Pro 4:10 - Pro 4:19.

This passage includes much more than temperance or any other single virtue. It is a perfectly general exhortation to that practical wisdom which walks in the path of righteousness. The principles laid down here are true in regard to drunkenness and abstinence, but they are intended to receive a wider application, and to that wider application we must first look. The theme is the old, familiar one of the two paths, and the aim is to recommend the better way by setting forth the contrasted effects of walking in it and in the other.

The general call to listen in Pro 4:10 is characteristically enforced by the Old Testament assurance that obedience prolongs life. That is a New Testament truth as well; for there is nothing more certain than that a life in conformity with God’s will, which is the same thing as a life in conformity with physical laws, tends to longevity. The experience of any doctor will show that. Here in England we have statistics which prove that total abstainers are a long-lived people, and some insurance offices construct their tables accordingly.

After that general call to listen comes, in Pro 4:11, the description of the path in which long life is to be found. It is ‘the way of Wisdom’-that is, that which Wisdom prescribes, and in which therefore it is wise to walk. It is always foolish to do wrong. The rough title of an old play is The Devil is an Ass, and if that is not true about him, it is absolutely true about those who listen to his lies. Sin is the stupidest thing in the universe, for it ignores the plainest facts, and never gets what it flings away so much to secure.

Another aspect of the path is presented in the designation ‘paths of uprightness,’ which seems to be equivalent to those which belong to, or perhaps which consist of, uprightness. The idea of straightness or evenness is the primary meaning of the word, and is, of course, appropriate to the image of a path. In the moral view, it suggests how much more simple and easy a course of rectitude is than one of sin. The one goes straight and unswerving to its end; the other is crooked, devious, intricate, and wanders from the true goal. A crooked road is a long road, and an up-and-down road is a tiring road. Wisdom’s way is straight, level, and steadily approaches its aim.

In Pro 4:13 the image of the path is dropped for the moment, and the picture of the way of uprightness and its travellers is translated into the plain exhortation to keep fast hold of ‘instruction,’ which is substantially equivalent to the queenly Wisdom of these early chapters of Proverbs. The earnestness of the repeated exhortations implies the strength of the forces that tend to sweep us, especially those of us who are young, from our grasp of that Wisdom. Hands become slack, and many a good gift drops from nerveless fingers; thieves abound who will filch away ‘instruction,’ if we do not resolutely hold tight by it. Who would walk through the slums of a city holding jewels with a careless grasp, and never looking at them? How many would he have left if he did? We do not need to do anything to lose instruction. If we will only do nothing to keep it, the world and our own hearts will make sure that we lose it. And if we lose it, we lose ourselves; for ‘she is thy life,’ and the mere bodily life, that is lived without her, is not worth calling the life of a man.

Pro 4:14 - Pro 4:17 give the picture of the other path, in terrible contrast with the preceding. It is noteworthy that, while in the former the designation was the ‘path of uprightness’ or of ‘wisdom,’ and the description therefore was mainly of the characteristics of the path, here the designation is ‘the path of the wicked,’ and the description is mainly of the travellers on it. Righteousness was dealt with, as it were, in the abstract; but wickedness is too awful and dark to be painted thus, and is only set forth in the concrete, as seen in its doers. Now, it is significant that the first exhortation here is of a negative character. In contrast with the reiterated exhortations to keep wisdom, here are reiterated counsels to steer clear of evil. It is all about us, and we have to make a strong effort to keep it at arm’s-length. ‘Whom resist’ is imperative. True, negative virtue is incomplete, but there will be no positive virtue without it. We must be accustomed to say ‘No,’ or we shall come to little good. An outer belt of firs is sometimes planted round a centre of more tender and valuable wood to shelter the young trees; so we have to make a fence of abstinences round our plantation of positive virtues. The decalogue is mostly prohibitions. ‘So did not I, because of the fear of God’ must be our motto. In this light, entire abstinence from intoxicants is seen to be part of the ‘way of Wisdom.’ It is one, and, in the present state of England and America, perhaps the most important, of the ways by which we can ‘turn from’ the path of the wicked and ‘pass on.’

The picture of the wicked in Pro 4:16 - Pro 4:17 is that of very grossly criminal sinners. They are only content when they have done harm, and delight in making others as bad as themselves. But, diabolical as such a disposition is, one sees it only too often in full operation. How many a drunkard or impure man finds a fiendish pleasure in getting hold of some innocent lad, and ‘putting him up to a thing or two,’ which means teaching him the vices from which the teacher has ceased to get much pleasure, and which he has to spice with the condiment of seeing an unaccustomed sinner’s eagerness! Such people infest our streets, and there is only one way for a young man to be safe from them,-’avoid, pass not by, turn from, and pass on.’ The reference to ‘bread’ and ‘wine’ in Pro 4:17 seems simply to mean that the wicked men’s living is won by their ‘wickedness,’ which procures bread, and by their ‘violence,’ which brings them wine. It is the way by which these are obtained that is culpable. We may contrast this foul source of a degraded living with Pro 4:13, where ‘instruction’ is set forth as ‘the life’ of the upright.

Pro 4:18 - Pro 4:19 bring more closely together the two paths, and set them in final, forcible contrast. The phrase ‘the perfect day’ might be rendered, vividly though clumsily, ‘the steady of the day’-that is, noon, when the sun seems to stand still in the meridian. So the image compares the path of the just to the growing brightness of morning dawn, becoming more and more fervid and lustrous, till the climax of an Eastern midday. No more sublime figure of the continuous progress in goodness, brightness, and joy, which is the best reward of walking in the paths of uprightness, can be imagined; and it is as true as it is sublime. Blessed they who in the morning of their days begin to walk in the way of wisdom; for, in most cases, years will strengthen their uprightness, and to that progress there will be no termination, nor will the midday sun have to decline westward to diminishing splendour or dismal setting, but that noontide glory will be enhanced, and made eternal in a new heaven. The brighter the light, the darker the shadow. That blaze of growing glory, possible for us all, makes the tragic gloom to which evil men condemn themselves the thicker and more doleful, as some dungeon in an Eastern prison seems pitch dark to one coming in from the blaze outside. ‘How great is that darkness!’ It is the darkness of sin, of ignorance, of sorrow, and what adds deeper gloom to it is that every soul that sits in that shadow of death might have been shining, a sun, in the spacious heaven of God’s love.

Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

(Compare Pro 3:18). The figure of laying hold with the hand suggests earnest effort.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 13. Take fast hold] החזק hachazek, seize it strongly, and keep the hold; and do this as for life. Learn all thou canst, retain what thou hast learnt, and keep the reason continually in view - it is for thy life.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(13) For she is thy life.—Comp. 1Jn_5:12, “He that hath the Son hath life.”

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Take fast hold of instruction,.... Not the law, as Jarchi and Gersom interpret it; but the instruction of wisdom, the doctrine of Christ or the Gospel; see Pro 8:1; which is an instruction into the mind and will of God, concerning the salvation of men; into the grace of God, showing that salvation, in all its branches, is of pure grace; into the person and offices of Christ, and into the business of salvation through him; into the doctrines of peace, pardon, righteousness, and eternal life by him. This should be "taken fast hold of"; in order to which, men should take heed unto it, attentively hear it; they should come with a cordial affection to it, and an eager desire after it, or they will never lay fast hold on it; for taking fast hold, as it supposes a careful attention to the Gospel, so a reception of it in the love of it, and an eagerness to be possessed of it: such may be said to take fast hold on it, who receive it into their hearts, and not into their heads only; head knowledge of the Gospel instruction is not hold fast enough, it must be heart knowledge of it; it is taken fast hold on when it is mixed with faith when heard; when it is digested and incorporated as it were into men, and becomes the ingrafted word; when men are led experimentally and practically into it, and are not hearers only, but doers of it; and, being thus taken fast hold of,

let her not go; the instruction of wisdom, or the Gospel of Christ; do not drop it, nor depart from it, nor waver about it; nor be languid in a profession of it, nor indifferent to it: "be not remiss" (x), as the word signifies; or let not thine hand be remiss, or let not thine hand go; having, as it were with both hands, took fast hold of the Gospel, hold it fast, neither drop it through negligence and carelessness, nor suffer it to be taken from thee by fraud or force;

keep her, for she is thy life; which may be understood either of the Gospel, Wisdom's instruction, which should be kept as a rich treasure, and not parted with at any rate; since it is the means of quickening dead sinners; of showing sensible ones the way of life by Christ; of producing faith in them, by which they live upon him; and of maintaining and supporting the spiritual life in them, and of reviving and comforting them under the most drooping and afflictive circumstances; a man would as soon part with his life surely as part with this! Or else, seeing the feminine gender is here used, which does not agree with the word translated "instruction", but with "wisdom", mentioned Pro 4:11; so Aben Ezra; therefore Christ may be here meant, who is to be kept as the pearl of great price, being more precious than rubies and all desirable things, and especially since he is the "life" of his people: he is the author and maintainer of their spiritual life; he is their life itself, it is hid with him; and because he lives, they live also: all the comforts and supplies of life are from him, and he is their eternal life; it is given through him and by him, and ties greatly in the enjoyment of him.

(x) "ne remittas", Tigurine version, Mercerus, Gejerus, Michaelis.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

The conductor, and preserver, and comfort of thy life.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

13. Let her not go — Rather, do not let go, relax not thy grasp. The pronoun her is not in this sentence, though it is in the next. Herein is trouble; for musar, instruction or discipline, is masculine. Umbreit solves it by saying that Solomon forgot, and thought he had written hhokmah, wisdom, which is feminine. The true solution, probably, is, that the chief subject, hhokmah, was in the mind of the writer, though other terms, some of which were masculine, were occasionally, perhaps for variety’s sake, interchanged with it. Some notice the parallel between this, (she is thy life,) and the incarnate Wisdom or Logos, (Joh_1:4,) of which it is said, “In Him was life.”

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The short but urgent admonitions in this verse may be explained by the knowledge which the father has of the temptations to which youth is exposed and the liability of youth to fall into them, as well as by the fact that Instruction, or Wisdom, is the bestower of life. This latter conviction is the reason why he urges "taking fast hold" of Wisdom. The tenacious grasp with which the shipwrecked sinking sailor lays hold on any spar or plank floating near will illustrate the kind of grasp with which Wisdom is to be held. It is no less a virtue to keep and hold fast a good thing than to get it at the first beginning (Muffet). Instruction (musar), usually of a disciplinary nature, (see Pro_1:3) here more particularly the instruction of the father, but in a wider sense wisdom generally, with which it is synonymous, as appears from the feminine, "let her not go, keep her," musar being masculine; or the feminines may refer back to "Wisdom" in ver. 11. So Mercerus and Buxtorf. For she is thy life (ki hi khayyeka); i.e. she brings life to thee. Wisdom is represented as the bestower of long life, in Pro_3:2, Pro_3:16, Pro_3:18. Just in proportion as Wisdom is retained and guarded, so is life secured, and so far as the hold upon her is lost, so are the hopes of life diminished. Life depends upon the observance of her precepts.

Holding fast.

I THE NECESSITY OF HOLDING FAST. This is to be in regard to instruction in Divine wisdom. There are difficulties in keeping to the truth of God.

1. The knowledge of it is an attainment. It is not innate; it does not come by inevitable experience; it is not received without conscious effort. What has been won may be lost. That which is not naturally a part of our being may be detached from us.

2. The truth is spiritual. Therefore it belongs to a different region from that of everyday experience in the world, and it is in danger of being thrust aside by the rude demands of material facts. The rush and roar of outward life drown the whispers of the "still, small voice.

3. It is morally exacting. God"s instruction concerns our conduct, and that in a way not always agreeable to ourselves. It urges us with lofty mandates, it seeks to regulate our lives by great principles. But weakness shrinks and self-will rebels against such a yoke. Therefore unless we held fast to the instruction, we shall soon lose it. Mere negligence is enough to imperil the choice possession. By simple indifference we may let slip the truth of God. (Heb_2:1)

II HOW WE MAY HOLD FAST.

1. Attention must be directed. As we have a certain command of our thoughts in the power of fixing attention on certain topics in preference to others, we can turn our minds towards Divine truth by a voluntary movement. External aids are here of use. The reading of the Bible is most helpful, not merely to obtain fresh truth, but to impress and revive the truth we already know. The ordinances of public worship are also designed with this end in view. The Christian preacher has not merely to instruct the ignorant and to lead those who know some truth to higher regions of revelation. A great part of his work consists in impressing upon men what they already know, and aiding them to hold it fast. None of these means of directing attention are sufficient without the addition of personal prayer and meditation.

2. Truth must be realized in practice. There is no better way of holding fast to instruction than by obeying it. The greatest truths are vague ideas till we commence to put them in practice. We hold best those truths which we follow most closely in life.

III THE ADVANTAGE OF HOLDING FAST. It is our duty to hold the truth which God has revealed to us, and to attend to the commandments which he has sent us. But it is also for our own soul"s profit. This is a matter of life and death. Divine truth is not a mere luxury for the leisured classes. It is a necessary of life.

1. This truth is a guide from the way of ruin. God speaks words of the utmost moment to warn us from continuing in the old course of sin, and to show us the way of salvation.

2. It is an immediate source of life. God gives his Spirit through his truth, and the Spirit of God is the quickening power of our souls. Thus God"s truth is the soul"s food. To lose it is to starve. To hold it fast is to secure eternal life. The words that Christ speaks to us are spirit and life. (Joh_6:63)

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The exhortations attracting by means of promises, now become warnings fitted to alarm:

13 Hold fast to instruction, let her not go;

Keep her, for she is thy life.

14 Into the path of the wicked enter not,

And walk not in the way of the evil

15 Avoid it, enter not into it;

Turn from it and pass away.

16 For they cannot sleep unless they do evil,

And they are deprived of sleep unless they bring others to ruin.

17 For they eat the bread of wickedness,

And they drink the wine of violence.

Elsewhere מוּסר means also self-discipline, or moral religious education, Pro 1:3; here discipline, i.e., parental educative counsel. תּרף is the segolated fut. apoc. Hiph. (indic. תּרפּה) from tarp, cf. the imper. Hiph. הרף from harp. נצּרה is the imper. Kal (not Piel, as Aben Ezra thinks) with Dagesh dirimens; cf. the verbal substantive נצּרה Psa 141:3, with similar Dagesh, after the form יקּהה, Gen 49:10. מוּסר (elsewhere always masc.) is here used in the fem. as the synonym of the name of wisdom: keep her (instruction), for she is thy life,

(Note: Punctuate כּי היא; the Zinnorith represents the place of the Makkeph, vid., Torath Emeth, p. 9.)

i.e., the life of thy life. In Pro 4:14 the godless (vid., on the root-idea of רשׁע under Psa 1:1) and the habitually wicked, i.e., the vicious, stand in parallelism; בּוא and אשּׁר are related as entering and going on, ingressus and progressus. The verb אשׁר signifies, like ישׁר, to be straight, even, fortunate, whence אשׁר = Arab. yusâr, happiness, and to step straight out, Pro 9:6, of which meanings אשּׁר is partly the intensive, as here, partly the causative, Pro 23:19 (elsewhere causative of the meaning, to be happy, Gen 30:13). The meaning progredi is not mediated by a supplementary צעדיו; the derivative אשׁוּר (אשּׁוּר), a step, shows that it is derived immediately from the root-idea of a movement in a straight line. Still less justifiable is the rendering by Schultens, ne vestigia imprimas in via malorum; for the Arab. âththr is denom. of ithr, אתר, the primitive verb roots of which, athr, אתר = אשׁר, are lost.

Pro 4:15

On פּרעהוּ, avoid it (the way), (opp. אחז, Job 17:9; תּמך, Psa 17:5), see under Pro 1:25. שׂטה, elsewhere (as the Arab. shatt, to be without measure, insolent) used in malam partem, has here its fundamental meaning, to go aside. מעליו (expressed in French by de dessus, in Ital. by di sopra) denotes: so that thou comest not to stand on it. עבר means in both cases transire, but the second instance, "to go beyond (farther)" (cf. Sa2 15:22, and under Hab 1:11), coincides with "to escape, evadere."

Pro 4:16

In the reason here given the perf. may stand in the conditional clauses as well as in Virgil's Et si non aliqua nocuisses, mortuus esses; but the fut., as in Ecc 5:11, denotes that they (the רעים and the רשׁעים) cannot sleep, and are deprived of their sleep, unless they are continually doing evil and bringing others into misery; the interruption of this course of conduct, which has become to them like a second nature, would be as the interruption of their diet, which makes them ill. For the Kal יכשׁולוּ, which here must have the meaning of the person sinning (cf. Pro 4:19), and would be feeble if used of the confirmed transgressors, the Kerı̂ rightly substitutes the Hiphil יכשׁילוּ, which occurs also Ch2 25:8, there without an object, in the meaning to cause to fall, as the contrast of עזר (to help).

Pro 4:17

The second כּי introduces the reason of their bodily welfare being conditioned by evil-doing. If the poet meant: they live on bread which consists in wickedness, i.e., on wickedness as their bread, then in the parallel sentence he should have used the word חמס; the genitives are meant of the means of acquisition: they live on unrighteous gain, on bread and wine which they procure by wickedness and by all manner of violence or injustice. On the etymon of חמס (Arab. ḥamas, durum, asperum, vehementem esse), vid., Schultens; the plur. חמסים belongs to a more recent epoch (vid., under Sa2 22:49 and Psa 18:49). The change in the tense represents the idea that they having eaten such bread, set forth such wine, and therewith wash it down.

Keil & Delitzsch — Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–1891) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API. (Old Testament only.)

Hold on to instruction, do not let it go

The writer speaks of a person remembering what he has learned as if "instruction" were an object that the person can hold tightly. AT: "Continue to obey what I have taught you and never forget it" (See: Metaphor)

for it is your life

The writer speaks of discipline preserving a person's life as if it were that person's life. AT: "for it will preserve your life" (See: Metonymy)

Do not follow the path of the wicked and do not go along the way of those who do evil

The writer speaks of a person's actions as if that person were walking along a path. AT: "Do not do what wicked people do and do not join in the actions of people who do evil" (See: Metaphor)

Avoid it

"Avoid the path of the wicked"

translationWords

life

evil

turn

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

Take fast hold of discipline, do not let it loose Grasp the Torah, as in (Gen. 21:18) “and grasp (והחזיקי) your hand onto him”; (Ex. 4:4) “and he stretched out his hand and grasped it (ויחזק).”

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.