I have always loved the book of Proverbs. As a child, I would read it and see the overall emphasis on the importance of righteousness over wickedness, and I appreciated the tidbits of wisdom that I could understand at that time. As a teenager, I began to notice the quiet nature of wisdom as it is described in Proverbs. Take, for example, Proverbs 10:19, “10:19 When words abound, transgression is inevitable, / but the one who restrains his words is wise” (NET). Here, as well as elsewhere in Proverbs, we see a coupling of wisdom and silence.
English: The School of Athens (detail). Fresco, Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
At the same time in my life, I tripped across Plato’s writings and saw a similar theme of the wise person who refuses to “speak” because he understands his own limitations.Indeed, the biggest reason I initially fell in love with Plato’s works is because I saw strong parallels between them and the Bible, particularly Proverbs. This infatuation led to 6 years of higher education in philosophy and religion. As an adult I still return to Proverbs, and now, steeped in my analytic training, I try to look deeper into the individual proverbs. Hidden underneath each saying is a whole worldview that the proverb presupposes. In other words, instead of just looking at Proverbs and seeing the “what,” I now try to find the “why.”
Today I wish to share with you one such verse which I believe I have been able to chip away a small corner of it’s “why.” Let’s look at Proverbs 9:10, “The beginning of wisdom is to fear the Lord” (NET). A first-level understanding of this passage tells us that fear of God’s judgment leads us to obedience, which is wisdom. We may not know what is best for us, but God does, so it is wise to obey God’s commands. If this is all that you get out of reading the proverb, then great! It is a solid interpretation backed by many other passages and themes throughout the Bible. What I want to do, however, is to look deeper into the relationship between fear and wisdom.
“The fear of the LORD” is difficult. As adopted children of God, we ought not be afraid to approach our heavenly Daddy, but at the same time, a loving parent does provide corrective punishment for his children. Children should not cringe in fear when their parents walk into the room, but at the same time, there are few things in this world more frustrating as a child who ignores his or her parent’s warnings; “Get over here right now or else!” goes unheeded, as the child knows there is no reason to fear the parent’s empty threats. It is this sort of fear that is lacking in the undisciplined child that we as children of God should possess.
This sort of fear leads to obeying God, which is wise, but why is it that it is called the beginning of wisdom? As a philosopher (literally, a “lover of wisdom”), I have seen many different attempts to define what wisdom is, and how it differs from knowledge. One definition I have liked is that wisdom is the science of the proper techniques of thinking. Whereas knowledge is knowing informational content, such as who won the 1956 World Series, or what is the Lewis structure of acetic acid, wisdom is the ability to take knowledge and apply it properly–based on the rules of thought such as those found in logic. Proper thinking ought to result in proper actions, leading to the other side of wisdom, which is living righteously. Thinking of this sort of definition of wisdom, what occurs to me when I think of the fear of the LORD as the beginning of wisdom, I recall the Stoic principle that right action starts with knowing what to fear and what not to fear. The thought is simple: fear keeps us away from doing something, but oftentimes we are mistaken about what we should fear, and as a result, we end up doing things we should not and not doing things we should. Plato said the same thing about cowardice and bravery; true bravery is knowing what we ought to fear versus what we ought not to fear. Soldiers should not fear dying in battle as much as they should fear dying dishonorably or, even worse, fleeing battle and living at the expense of others. This is why the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; as Luke 8:25 says, we ought not to fear death or those who can inflict death. Instead, we should fear God who is capable of destroying both the body and the soul. With this proper alignment of fears, we should no longer fear things like suffering, poverty, loneliness, or illness. In other words, we should not be motivated by these sorts of things to do evil. If we start with the fear of the LORD, we will not steal, we will not covet, we will not murder, and we will not commit adultery.
Faith Seeking Revelation 