Proverbs 9

Scholars debate the meaning of the seven columns or pillars. Some say the poet is comparing Wisdom’s house to a temple, and that the feast to follow is intellectual food. Others say the pillars relate to Creation, and perhaps refer to the legendary seven pillars that hold up the world. Or maybe they’re related to the Jewish tradition of the seven heavens. Many scholars, however, say we should probably understand the columns as part of a real house. Archaeologists have found evidence of columned homes in Old Testament times, including some with seven columns.

The more literal phrase is “fear of the LORD.” This phrase shows up in Proverbs more than any other book in the Bible. “Fear,” most scholars say, doesn’t mean terror or fright. In Proverbs, it means reverence for God—devotion expressed in obedient behavior. Someone who fears the LORD is someone who lives in a way they believe pleases God. They know the rules, they value the rules, and they live by the rules. If they do this, sages promise God will give them a long and successful life (10:27; 14:27). Sages didn’t always get it right, not literally. But we should probably recognize their poetic license since they are expressing their ideas in the form of Hebrew poems. In which case, exaggeration is allowed.

Literally, Sheol, a word Old Testament writers used to describe the place of the dead. It is a kind of underworld where the dead are cut off from the living—and from God—and there is no coming back.