Instruction and Imagery in Proverbs 1-9

Abstract

Abstract Proverbs 1-9 is often characterized as an anthology of materials, loosely related to the ‘instructions’ composed in Egypt and elsewhere, and possibly originating in an educational setting. This book argues that it is, instead, a sophisticated poetic work, with a basic unity of composition and message. Beginning with an examination of the Egyptian instructions, which are themselves poetic and testamentary rather than pedagogical, the study explores the way in which Proverbs 1-9 combines conventions of the instruction genre with a figurative representation of the reasons for instruction. Drawing on a traditional association of foreign women with the corruption and apostasy of Jewish youths-which was given added impetus by the post-exilic controversy over mixed marriages-Proverbs 1-9 sets a foreign seductress in opposition to a personified figure of Wisdom. The two compete for those youths who are uncommitted, and who can only hope to recognize which invitation they should accept if they have already received and internalized instruction. In this context, instruction is associated with the Torah, and is the prerequisite for the wisdom by which God's will can be recognized. These ideas, and elements of the imagery, persist into later Jewish literature, but the linking of wisdom with traditional concepts in Jewish piety goes back to Proverbs 1-9 itself.

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