Warning Against Adultery
1 Solomon exhorted to the study of wisdom. 3 He showed the mischief of whoredom and riot. 15 He exhorted to contentedness, liberality, and chastity. 22 The wicked are overtaken with their own sins.
Pro 5:1 My son, pay attention to my wisdom, turn your ear to my words of insight,
Pro 5:2 that you may maintain discretion and your lips may preserve knowledge.
Pro 5:3 For the lips of the adulterous woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil;
The words of temptation are smooth and sweet to the ears because they are carefully calculated to appeal to the inherited and cultivated weakness of mankind. An example of such words is given in ch. 7:14–20.
Pro 5:4 but in the end she is bitter as gall, sharp as a double-edged sword.
The bitterness of remorse is soon felt by the one who gives in to the temptation. If this alternation of pleasure and sorrow persisted in, the pleasure fades and bitterness increases until the helpless slave of sin slips down into the place of the dead.
Pro 5:5 Her feet go down to death; her steps lead straight to the grave.
Pro 5:6 She gives no thought to the way of life; her paths wander aimlessly, but she does not know it.
Lost to the dictates of reason and conscience, the blind, headstrong sinner turns unsteadily from one thing to another (ch. 7:12) but never enters the path of life in which alone can be found present happiness and future salvation.
Pro 5:7 Now then, my sons, listen to me; do not turn aside from what I say.
Before painting the picture of the woe that will follow for those who fail to heed his warning, Solomon calls for special attention to his words.
Pro 5:8 Keep to a path far from her, do not go near the door of her house,
The need is stressed to keep oneself out of temptation rather than to trust in one’s ability to resist those incitements to sin that have overcome so many men, great and small (Prov. 4:14; 7:24–27; 1 Cor. 6:18; 2 Tim. 2:22).
Pro 5:9 lest you lose your honor to others and your dignity to one who is cruel,
To lose the prime of life to a coarsening, desensitize existence.
To lose your honor to others and your dignity to one who is cruel, and defiling enslavement of sin is a greater punishment than physical slavery could be.
Pro 5:10 lest strangers feast on your wealth and your toil enrich the house of another.
Property and money gone, a man in those days would seek employment as a domestic slave, all profit from his labor benefiting his master and not himself.
Pro 5:11 At the end of your life you will groan, when your flesh and body are spent. The spiritual ruin that follows such a course is pictured in ch. 6. Here the emphasis is upon the total ruin of life. Life’s high hopes and boundless possibilities are worn out in sullen servitude.
Through the long years of remorse, the sinner bemoans his failure to heed the good instruction of his elders that could have spared him so much sorrow and ensured for him the true pleasure described in the verses following.
Pro 5:12 You will say, “How I hated discipline! How my heart spurned correction!
Pro 5:13 I would not obey my teachers or turn my ear to my instructors.
Pro 5:14 And I was soon in serious trouble in the assembly of God’s people.”
Amid the community of God’s people this young man has permitted himself to sin against God and man. There is a peculiar hardening of the conscience in those who flaunt their sinfulness in the face of the church.
Unlike youth brought up in Christless homes, these have sinned in the light of truth and have deliberately turned from the outstretched hands of the Saviour and the appeal of the Spirit. God has no other means to reach them. They have cut themselves off from salvation (Heb. 10:26).
These considerations should move parents and teachers, as well as youth, to sober thinking and diligent effort.
Pro 5:15 Drink water from your own cistern, running water from your own well.
A commendation of the happiness of married life. As a thirsty man is refreshed by the waters of a cistern, so a man is to find enjoyment in fellowship with his own wife (see 1 Cor. 7:1–5; 1 Tim. 5:14; cf. Ps. 127:4, 5).
Pro 5:16 Should your springs overflow in the streets, your streams of water in the public squares?
This verse should probably be rendered as a question “should thy fountains, Streams and fountains are generally found away from home. All these water supplies represent sources of enjoyment.
Pro 5:17 Let them be yours alone, never to be shared with strangers.
Pro 5:18 May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth.
If marriage remains a sharing, if there is always a mutual desire to please, the passing years will but deepen and strengthen the joys of companionship. It is only when the attentions of courting days are lost in the humdrum toil of daily life and the partner is taken for granted, that either is likely to turn and seek unlawful satisfactions.
Especially should a husband remember to express his pride in his wife and his enduring love for her in the years when age is taking its toll. Such expression will deepen his own affection and will support his companion during the period when it is necessary to make adjustments to advancing years (see Prov. 2:17; Mal. 2:15, 16).
Pro 5:19 A loving doe, a graceful deer— may her breasts satisfy you always, may you ever be intoxicated with her love.
A man’s love for his wife should be a strong affection that enters every facet of life. It should be —in a good sense—an obsession, so that nothing is thought or done without being affected by the thought of the one who shares the life.
Pro 5:20 Why, my son, be intoxicated with another man’s wife? Why embrace the bosom of a wayward woman?
How different is this infatuation from true love. Love deepens and becomes richer with the years, but a sinful attachment quickly becomes an unwanted entanglement that brings the sorrows described in earlier verses. Why should a man let himself be drawn into such a snare?
Pro 5:21 For your ways are in full view of the LORD, and he examines all your paths.
Fidelity to the marriage vow is good sense and infidelity is folly, even if there were no judgment and no afterlife. But there is an afterlife, and entrance to it is dependent upon a willingness to be cleansed from all defilement. The adulterer meets a double condemnation. He loses the true joys of this life and is barred from the greater and more enduring joys of the life to come (Prov. 15:3; Mal. 3:5; Heb. 13:4).
Pro 5:22 The evil deeds of the wicked ensnare them; the cords of their sins hold them fast.
Because he refuses instruction, the sinner is of necessity left to entangle himself more in the snares of sin. There is power to break the strongest bands, but the long indulgence of sinful propensities often leaves the sinner with no desire for salvation and no inclination to place his will on the side of the Saviour.
The case is hopeless if the man will not seek the help of Him who can save to the uttermost.