Proverbs 16 Bible study: The LORD directs his steps

The chapter names the LORD in 11 of its 33 verses, and the first seven come one after another: every verse from 16:1 to 16:7. 16:8 doesn't name him; 16:9 does. The run opens, and after 16:8 closes, with a man's heart set beside the LORD: "The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the LORD" (16:1), and "A man’s heart plans his course, but the LORD directs his steps" (16:9) (tap plans). In between: "All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the motives" (16:2) (tap weighs), and "Commit your deeds to the LORD, and your plans shall succeed" (16:3) (tap Commit). Here is what almost everyone misses: in Hebrew shall succeed in 16:3 and directs in 16:9 are one verb, kun, and it comes a third time in "the throne is established by righteousness" (16:12) (tap directs). What becomes of plans committed to the LORD (16:3) and what the LORD does with a man's steps (16:9) are said with the same verb.

Proverbs 16:29→leads toLuke 17:1-2

"A man of violence entices his neighbor, and leads him in a way that is not good" (Proverbs 16:29). In Hebrew entices is the verb of "My son, if sinners entice you, don’t consent" (Proverbs 1:10). Jesus spoke to his disciples about one person bringing another to stumble: "It is impossible that no occasions of stumbling should come, but woe to him through whom they come!" (Luke 17:1), and "It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, rather than that he should cause one of these little ones to stumble" (Luke 17:2). Jesus doesn't cite Proverbs, so setting the two together is a reading. It rests on a shared subject, not on a shared word: in both, one person's doing brings another onto a wrong way. The proverb speaks of a man of violence and his neighbor; Jesus spoke to his own disciples (Luke 17:1) of "one of these little ones" (Luke 17:2), and named no one. One reading hears Jesus speaking to the same wrong that 16:29 names, and warning of it more sharply. Another hears his words as his own teaching to his disciples about "these little ones" (Luke 17:2), with no look back to this saying.

כּוּןkunsay KOON

Brown-Driver-Briggs gives among its senses "establish, set up" and "direct". Strong's: "to set up, in a great variety of applications". The chapter has it three times. "Commit your deeds to the LORD, and your plans shall succeed" (16:3): shall succeed is this verb. "A man’s heart plans his course, but the LORD directs his steps" (16:9). And "It is an abomination for kings to do wrong, for the throne is established by righteousness" (16:12). Proverbs has kun 19 times in Hebrew. It comes with throne again in "his throne will be established in righteousness" (Proverbs 25:5), and Wisdom has it in "When he established the heavens, I was there" (Proverbs 8:27).