As snow in summer, and as rain in harvest, so honour is not seemly for a fool.
Parallel translations
- WEB Like snow in summer, and as rain in harvest, so honor is not fitting for a fool.
- BSB Like snow in summer and rain at harvest, honor does not befit a fool.
- NKJV As snow in summer and rain in harvest, So honor is not fitting for a fool.
- NASB Like snow in summer and like rain in harvest, So honor is not fitting for a fool.
- NLT Honor is no more associated with fools than snow with summer or rain with harvest.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Honoring a fool is as out of place as snow in summer or rain at harvest. Folly does not deserve esteem.
Overview
This opens a section on the fool (vv. 1-12), teaching that giving honor to one who despises wisdom is unnatural and harmful. Honor wrongly placed disrupts the moral order, like weather that ruins a harvest. It reminds us that true honor belongs to wisdom and ultimately to God.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 16
- Prov 19:10Delight is not seemly for a fool; much less for a servant to have rule over princes.
- Prov 28:16The prince that wanteth understanding is also a great oppressor: but he that hateth covetousness shall prolong his days.
- Ps 12:8The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.
- Ps 15:4In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the LORD. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.
- Esth 4:6So Hatach went forth to Mordecai unto the street of the city, which was before the king’s gate.
- 1 Sam 12:17–18Is it not wheat harvest to day? I will call unto the LORD, and he shall send thunder and rain; that ye may perceive and see that your wickedness is great, which ye have done in the sight of the LORD, in asking you a king.
- Esth 3:1–15After these things did king Ahasuerus promote Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, and advanced him, and set his seat above all the princes that were with him.
- Judg 9:7And when they told it to Jotham, he went and stood in the top of mount Gerizim, and lifted up his voice, and cried, and said unto them, Hearken unto me, ye men of Shechem, that God may hearken unto you.
- Judg 9:20But if not, let fire come out from Abimelech, and devour the men of Shechem, and the house of Millo; and let fire come out from the men of Shechem, and from the house of Millo, and devour Abimelech.
- Eccl 10:5–7There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, as an error which proceedeth from the ruler:
- Prov 26:8As he that bindeth a stone in a sling, so is he that giveth honour to a fool.
- Judg 9:56–57Thus God rendered the wickedness of Abimelech, which he did unto his father, in slaying his seventy brethren:
- Ps 52:1Why boastest thou thyself in mischief, O mighty man? the goodness of God endureth continually.
- Esth 4:9And Hatach came and told Esther the words of Mordecai.
- Prov 17:7Excellent speech becometh not a fool: much less do lying lips a prince.
- Prov 26:3A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, and a rod for the fool’s back.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Wisdom personified, with God before creation and the agent of all things, anticipates Christ 'in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom' — the wisdom of God made flesh.
How Proverbs 26:1 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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