Honor is no more associated with fools than snow with summer or rain with harvest.
Parallel translations
- WEB Like snow in summer, and as rain in harvest, so honor is not fitting for a fool.
- KJV As snow in summer, and as rain in harvest, so honour is not seemly 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.
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 19:10Delicate living is not appropriate for a fool, much less for a servant to have rule over princes.
- Prov 28:16A tyrannical ruler lacks judgment. One who hates ill-gotten gain will have long days.
- Ps 12:8The wicked walk on every side, when what is vile is exalted among the sons of men.
- Ps 15:4In whose eyes a vile man is despised, but who honors those who fear Yahweh; he who keeps an oath even when it hurts, and doesn’t change;
- Esth 4:6So Hathach went out to Mordecai, to city square which was before the king’s gate.
- 1 Sam 12:17–18Isn’t it wheat harvest today? I will call to Yahweh, that he may send thunder and rain; and you will know and see that your wickedness is great, which you have done in Yahweh’s sight, in asking for a king.”
- Esth 3:1–15After these things King Ahasuerus promoted Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, and advanced him, and set his seat above all the princes who were with him.
- Judg 9:7When they told it to Jotham, he went and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim, and lifted up his voice, cried out, and said to them, “Listen to me, you men of Shechem, that God may listen to 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, the sort of error which proceeds from the ruler.
- Prov 26:8As one who binds a stone in a sling, so is he who gives honor to a fool.
- Judg 9:56–57Thus God repaid the wickedness of Abimelech, which he did to his father, in killing his seventy brothers;
- Ps 52:1For the Chief Musician. A contemplation by David, when Doeg the Edomite came and told Saul, “David has come to Ahimelech’s house.” Why do you boast of mischief, mighty man? God’s loving kindness endures continually.
- Esth 4:9Hathach came and told Esther the words of Mordecai.
- Prov 17:7Arrogant speech isn’t fitting for a fool, much less do lying lips fit a prince.
- Prov 26:3A whip is for the horse, a bridle for the donkey, and a rod for the back of fools!
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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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.