“Wisdom calls aloud outside; she raises her voice in the open squares. She cries out in the chief concourses, at the openings of the gates in the city. She speaks her words: “How long, you simple ones, will you love simplicity? For scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge.” (Prov 1:20-22)
How long, you naïve ones will you prefer to remain in ignorance,
Ignorance of what?
Why the truth, the complete truth not simply some of the basic truths, the “milk of the Word”, but all the truth including the “meat”, the deep things of God’s Word. How often have you spoken to someone and suggested a study on prophecy or some other hard to understand subject requiring a more thorough study and their reply was, ‘We don’t need to know these types of things, they’re not essential to our salvation, what we have is enough, we just need to have faith that the Lord is control and everything will be taken care of.’
What then was the purpose of the Lord putting prophecy and other hard to understand subjects in the Bible if we had no need of them?
Did not the Lord expressly state, “ALL SCRIPTURE is given by inspiration of God…that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped…” (2 Tim 3:16, 17)?
All Scripture, Is not prophecy a part of the “all scripture” our Lord alludes to here?
Did he not likewise say, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by EVERY WORD that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matt 4:4)?
“All our hopes of eternal life depend upon “the WHOLE counsel of God”, upon the divine plan and its promises, thus EVERY WORD, every admonition, every encouragement, every promise, is necessary to the development of those called to eternal life.”
Many of these very admonitions, encouragements and promises are found in various prophecies spoken by our Lord and his servants.
“Whom shall he teach knowledge? And whom shall he make to understand doctrine?’’
The answer is, “they that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts.” (Isa 28:9) In other words, as the Apostle declares, we must be more than “babes in Christ” in order to be over-comers of the world. We need more than “the milk of the Word.” We need the strong “meat” of the word, but that meat must be pure, free from the adulteration's and contamination's of the Dark Ages and as taught by the precepts and doctrines of men.”
“In Proverbs 9:1–12, Wisdom, personified as a woman, is giving advice. She sends out her maidens. Just as in Chapter 1, for the one who believes God is an intelligent Creator but has no understanding and is hungering to know Him, the Bible is the answer. One is to grow from the milk of the Word to strong meat to being an adult of mature development.”
The “maidens” sent forth by wisdom are prophets, teachers, evangelists, etc. As such the “maidens” are wisdom’s children, those who have heeded her counsels, and have been instructed of her. Those “established in the truth”, not just in the milk of the word, but likewise instructed in the meat as well.
A comparisons of several versions of our subject text (Prov 1:22) might help to make things a bit more clear, viz.
"How long, O naive ones, will you love being simple-minded? And scoffers delight themselves in scoffing and fools hate knowledge?” (NAS)
"How long, you simpletons, will you insist on being simpleminded? How long will you mockers relish your mocking? How long will you fools hate knowledge?” (New Living Translation)
“How long, children, will you love childishness, and you mockers desire mockery, and you fools hate knowledge?” (Aramaic Bible in Plain English)
“How long, you simple ones, will you love simplicity? For scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?”
“There are three categories listed here, (1) simple ones, (2) scorners, and (3) fools.
We will take a closer look at these in our next post.
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