Proverbs 27:9-19

9 Perfume and incense make the heart glad, [also] friendship sweet with advice from the heart.

10 Don't abandon a friend who is also a friend of your father. Don't enter your brother's house on the day of your calamity -better a neighbor nearby than a brother far away.

11 My son, become wise, and gladden my heart, so that I can answer my critics.

12 The clever see trouble coming and hide; the thoughtless go on and pay the penalty.

13 Seize his clothes because he guaranteed a stranger's loan; take them as security for that unknown woman.

14 Whoever greets his neighbor in a loud voice at dawn might just as well have cursed him.

15 A leak that keeps dripping on a rainy day and the nagging of a wife are the same -

16 whoever can restrain her can restrain the wind or keep perfume on his hand from making itself known.

17 Just as iron sharpens iron, a person sharpens the character of his friend.

18 Whoever tends the fig tree will eat its fruit, and he who is attentive to his master will be honored.

19 Just as water reflects the face, so one human heart reflects another.

Proverbs 27:9-19 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO 1 KINGS 14

This chapter relates the sickness of Jeroboam's son, the application of his wife, at his instance, to the prophet Ahijah, in the child's favour, 1Ki 14:1-6, the prophecy of the prophet concerning the ruin of Jeroboam's house, and the death of the child, which came to pass, 1Ki 14:7-18, an account of the years of Jeroboam's reign, and also of Rehoboam's, 1Ki 14:19-21, and of the evil things done and suffered by the latter in his kingdom, and the calamities that came upon him for it, 1Ki 14:22-28 and the conclusion of his reign, 1Ki 14:29-31.