This chapter has no single argument running through it, only a long series of unusually vivid pictures — a fining pot, a fig tree, a fool in a mortar, iron on iron — each one doing in one line what a whole paragraph of plain instruction could not.
A study in Proverbs 27 · Arthur Baldwin · StandUp4Jesus.Org · 13 min read
Boast Not Thyself Of To Morrow
“Boast not thyself of to morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth; a stranger, and not thine own lips.”
Proverbs 27:1-2
Two different kinds of overreach are joined in these two verses — claiming a future no one actually controls, and claiming a praise that only means something coming from someone else’s mouth — both of them a person reaching for certainty that was never his to grant himself.
“A stone is heavy, and the sand weighty; but a fool’s wrath is heavier than them both. Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous; but who is able to stand before envy?”
Proverbs 27:3-4
“Who is able to stand before envy?” ranks envy above even wrath and anger, both of which this verse has just called cruel and outrageous — a question left genuinely open, as if envy is the one temper this book is not fully confident anyone can withstand.
Faithful Are The Wounds Of A Friend
“Open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.”
Proverbs 27:5-6
“Wounds” and “kisses” are set exactly backward from what a person would naturally trust — pain from a friend called faithful, and affection from an enemy called deceitful, the source of an action mattering more here than how the action itself feels.
“The full soul loatheth an honeycomb; but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place.”
Proverbs 27:7-8
“Every bitter thing is sweet” describes hunger’s power to completely rearrange taste itself — not a minor shift in preference, but bitterness genuinely experienced as sweetness once real need is present, appetite proven stronger than the food’s own flavor.
“Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart: so doth the sweetness of a man’s friend by hearty counsel. Thine own friend, and thy father’s friend, forsake not; neither go into thy brother’s house in the day of thy calamity: for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off.”
Proverbs 27:9-10
“A neighbour that is near” is ranked above “a brother far off” without the slightest embarrassment — blood alone is not treated as automatically superior to friendship here, proximity and actual presence in a crisis counted for more than the formal tie.
My Son, Be Wise, And Make My Heart Glad
“My son, be wise, and make my heart glad, that I may answer him that reproacheth me. A prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth himself; but the simple pass on, and are punished.”
Proverbs 27:11-12
“That I may answer him that reproacheth me” gives a father’s plea an unexpectedly practical edge — not simply a wish for his son’s own good, but a defense the father himself needs, his own reputation bound up in whether this particular son turns out wise.
“Take his garment that is surety for a stranger, and take a pledge of him for a strange woman. He that blesseth his friend with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, it shall be counted a curse to him.”
Proverbs 27:13-14
“Rising early in the morning” turns an apparently generous gesture into an annoyance simply through its timing — the exact same blessing, spoken too loudly and too soon, landing as an intrusion rather than the kindness it was meant to be.
“A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike. Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself.”
Proverbs 27:15-16
The continual dropping first named in Proverbs 19:13 reappears here, sharpened by an image of trying to contain something naturally uncontainable — wind and fragrance both slip past any hand meant to hold them in.
Iron Sharpeneth Iron
“Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.”
Proverbs 27:17
Sharpening iron requires resistance, not gentleness — two equally hard surfaces working against each other — and this verse applies exactly that friction to friendship, real benefit coming from a friend who is willing to push back, not merely agree.
“Whoso keepeth the fig tree shall eat the fruit thereof: so he that waiteth on his master shall be honoured.”
Proverbs 27:18
Tending a fig tree and serving a master are placed under the same simple law — steady, attentive care given to something outside oneself is what the reward is actually attached to, in an orchard exactly as much as in a household.
“As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man. Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied.”
Proverbs 27:19-20
“As in water face answereth to face” makes one heart a mirror for another — a person’s own inner life reflected back to him in how he reads and responds to everyone else’s, before the verse turns, without warning, to the far darker mirror of an appetite that can never be filled.
As The Fining Pot For Silver, And The Furnace For Gold
“As the fining pot for silver, and the furnace for gold; so is a man to his praise.”
Proverbs 27:21
The refining image already met at Proverbs 17:3, where the LORD tried the heart, is redirected here toward something far more ordinary — not a trial of suffering, but simple praise, shown just as capable of revealing what a man is actually made of.
“Though thou shouldest bray a fool in a mortar among wheat with a pestle, yet will not his foolishness depart from him.”
Proverbs 27:22
Grinding grain with a mortar and pestle was the most thorough physical processing this book’s original readers knew — and this verse insists that even that degree of force, applied to a fool himself, could not grind his foolishness out of him.
Be Thou Diligent To Know The State Of Thy Flocks
“Be thou diligent to know the state of thy flocks, and look well to thy herds. For riches are not for ever: and doth the crown endure to every generation?”
Proverbs 27:23-24
“Doth the crown endure to every generation?” puts even a throne on the same uncertain footing as a flock of sheep — no possession, however grand, exempted from the plain fact that riches, of any kind, are not permanent.
“The hay appeareth, and the tender grass sheweth itself, and herbs of the mountains are gathered. The lambs are for thy clothing, and the goats are the price of the field.”
Proverbs 27:25-26
The chapter’s answer to riches not lasting forever is not anxiety but a season’s ordinary provision — hay, grass, lambs, goats, each one arriving in its turn, real security pictured here as something renewed rather than something stockpiled once and kept.
“And thou shalt have goats’ milk enough for thy food, for the food of thy household, and for the maintenance for thy maidens.”
Proverbs 27:27
The chapter that opened by warning against boasting of tomorrow closes on an entirely unanxious note — not a promise of tomorrow guaranteed, only enough milk for today’s household, a diligence that trusts the next season without ever needing to boast about it in advance.
