Proverbs 10:6 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Proverbs 10:6

Comments

What is meant by blessings? The Hebrew word means that you kneel to receive something. Something is being given freely and graciously, as when a ruler or a king gives some great favour or grace to someone. So these are gracious blessings, undeserved blessings. But these blessings are upon the head of the just. Not that by being just you earn favours: the just here means the person who is right before God. But the blessings are given particularly upon the head, which means that God will give blessings which cause that person to think and to feel in a way which is sure and stable. It is about attitudes and thoughts. It is a great blessing to be converted to God because my thoughts are no longer fearful and fragmented and contradictory. Solomon brings us another double contrast: he compares the blessing of God on the righteous with the self-inflicted curse of the wicked, and he compares the anointing of the head with the quite different covering of the mouth. Some reverse the second half of the verse and render it, ‘the mouth of the wicked conceals violence’, meaning that his words are deceptive and disguise the violence that he intends, but this weakens the contrast. When prophets, priests, or kings were appointed, their heads were anointed with oil, symbolising the Spirit of God coming upon them to prepare them for office. This was the blessing of God on them for it was he that chose them and equipped them for the task. But the wicked have no such blessing but are made silent by their evil deeds. This is either because their consciences force them to shut their own mouths as they are convicted about what they have done, or they are effectually silenced because no one will hear them on account of their well-known violent deeds. Some see this gesture as a reference to the covering of the face of the condemned (Esther 7:8; Job 9:24), but here it is the mouth not the face that is covered. The verse is about the contrast between the honour the wise receive from God because they value his righteous standards, and the shame of the foolish on account of their sinful conduct. When a person is not calm in mind and in outlook and assured of salvation and when they are not thinking spiritually about things, why what happens? Their speech is completely dominated by feelings, strong feelings: jealousy or hatred, pride or hostility. Whatever it is, they wear their feelings on the outside of the mouth. Almost everything a person says is going to be produced by some unsanctified feeling – that is the idea. Blessings and grace affect the head of the just, the way you think, your whole outlook. But if you have slipped from your spiritual walk and you are just tossed to and fro, driven by your feelings, then everything you say and the way you act, it is directed by those and it is obvious.

Application

So the challenge to us is what kind of people are we as Christian people? Have we let our feelings get the better of us? Everything we say - does it come straight from the feelings of hostility, the fallen flesh? Are we unrestrained, do we not take ourselves in hand, appreciate our blessings, deal with things prayerfully, take the standards of Scripture and walk accordingly. You see, grace affects the head, the stance, your whole way of thinking. Or, if we slip from that even as Christian, then all our hostilities and annoyances and hatreds, or selfishness, or whatever – well, they are right across our mouth. They dominate everything. That is the sense and the idea and so there is a challenge. How are we living? What kind of believers are we? How are we affected? Are we sanctified?

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Proverbs 10:6 Commentary and Bible Study