Proverbs 1 Bible study: The beginning of knowledge

The book opens with its heading: "The proverbs of Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel" (1:1) (tap proverbs). Then five verses say what the proverbs are for, and in the WEB each begins with to or that: "to know wisdom and instruction" (1:2), "to receive instruction in wise dealing" (1:3), "to give prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the young man" (1:4), "that the wise man may hear, and increase in learning" (1:5), and "to understand a proverb and parables, the words and riddles of the wise" (1:6) (tap wisdom, instruction, simple). Here is what almost everyone misses: the book isn't only for beginners. It is for "the simple" and "the young man" (1:4), and in the very next verse for "the wise man" and "the man of understanding" (1:5). Then comes the line the book stands on: "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but the foolish despise wisdom and instruction" (1:7) (tap fear, beginning, knowledge).

Proverbs 1:20→leads toMatthew 11:19

Proverbs 1 speaks of wisdom as a woman who calls: "Wisdom calls aloud in the street. She utters her voice in the public squares" (Proverbs 1:20). Those who hear her refuse her (Proverbs 1:24-25), and her words end with what each kind of hearer comes to: "they will eat of the fruit of their own way" (Proverbs 1:31), and "whoever listens to me will dwell securely" (Proverbs 1:33). Jesus spoke of "this generation" (Matthew 11:16), which found fault with John and with the Son of Man alike (Matthew 11:18-19), and he ended, "But wisdom is justified by her children" (Matthew 11:19). Jesus doesn't cite Proverbs, so setting the two together is a reading. It rests on a shared subject, not only on the word wisdom: in both, wisdom is spoken of as her, those who hear turn away (in Matthew, from John and the Son of Man alike), and wisdom is shown right in the end. Christians read who or what wisdom is in Matthew 11:19 in more than one way, and this line doesn't settle whether the Wisdom of Proverbs is Jesus: the honest question on Proverbs 8 sets out those readings. One reading hears Jesus speaking of wisdom in the way Proverbs 1 does. Another hears his saying as his own words about his own day, with no look back to this chapter.

יִרְאָהyir'ahsay yir-AH

Brown-Driver-Briggs: "fear", and "fear of God, reverence, piety". Strong's gives it as "feminine of 3373". "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge" (1:7). Wisdom has it again, of those who refused her: "because they hated knowledge, and didn’t choose the fear of the LORD" (1:29). Proverbs has it 14 times in Hebrew, more than any other book of the Hebrew Bible, and the WEB has "the fear of the LORD" in 13 verses of Proverbs. It isn't the word of "without fear of harm" (1:33), which is pachad (tap calamity in 1:26).