Proverbs 6:20

My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Benson Commentary

Proverbs 6:20-23. Keep thy father’s commandment — So far as it is not contrary to God’s command. And forsake not the law of thy mother — Which children are too apt to despise. Bind them continually upon thy heart — Constantly remember and duly consider them; tie them about thy neck — See on Proverbs 1:9; Proverbs 3:3. When thou goest, it shall lead thee — Namely, the law of God, which thy parents have taught thee, and pressed upon thee, shall direct thee how to order all thy steps and actions. It shall talk with thee — It shall give thee counsel and comfort. For the commandment is a lamp — It enlightens the dark mind, and clearly discovers to a man the plain and right way. And reproofs of instruction — Wise and instructive reproofs or admonitions; are the way to life — Both to preserve and prolong this life, and to ensure eternal life to those that obey them.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

6:20-35 The word of God has something to say to us upon all occasions. Let not faithful reproofs ever make us uneasy. When we consider how much this sin abounds, how heinous adultery is in its own nature, of what evil consequence it is, and how certainly it destroys the spiritual life in the soul, we shall not wonder that the cautions against it are so often repeated. Let us notice the subjects of this chapter. Let us remember Him who willingly became our Surety, when we were strangers and enemies. And shall Christians, who have such prospects, motives, and examples, be slothful and careless? Shall we neglect what is pleasing to God, and what he will graciously reward? May we closely watch every sense by which poison can enter our minds or affections.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

A new section, but not a new subject. The closing words, "he that soweth discord" (Proverbs 6:19, compare Proverbs 6:14), lead us to identify the sketch as taken from the same character. With the recognized Hebrew form of climax (see Proverbs 30:15, Proverbs 30:18, Proverbs 30:24; Amos 1:1-15; 2; Job 5:19), the teacher here enumerates six qualities as detestable, and the seventh as worse than all (seven represents completeness), but all the seven in this instance belong to one man, the man of Belial Proverbs 6:12.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

20-23. (Compare Pr 1:8; 3:3, &c.).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Keep thy father’s commandment, so far as it is not contrary to God’s command.

Forsake not the law of thy mother, whom children are too apt to despise. See Proverbs 1:8.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

My son, keep thy father's commandment,.... These are not the words of David to Solomon continued from Proverbs 4:4; but the words of Solomon to his son; and not to his son only, in a strict natural relation, but to everyone that came to him for and put himself under his instruction; and to everyone that stood in such a relation to a religious father; for not the divine Being, the Father of all, is here meant, according to some Jewish writers; though the commandment no doubt is the commandment of God taught by godly parents; or such a system of precepts that is founded upon and agrees unto the revealed will of God, and which being so should be laid up and kept in the heart, and not forgotten; and should be observed and attended to and obeyed throughout the whole course of life, as if it was the commandment of God himself; and indeed it is no other than that which pious parents train up their children in the knowledge of, instil into them, and urge upon them the observance of;

and forsake not the law of thy mother; the same as before, and which is mentioned to show that the same respect is to be had to a mother as to a father, the commandment and law of them being the same, and they standing in the same relation; which yet children are apt to make a difference in, and while they stand in awe of their father and his precepts, slight their mother and her directions, which ought not to be. Some understand this of the congregation of Israel, as some Jewish writers; and others of the church of God, the mother of us all.

Geneva Study Bible

My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother:

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Fourteenth Address. Chap. 6. Proverbs 6:20-35. The Evil Woman

The holy memories and sanctions of the family are invoked (Proverbs 6:20-23) to give weight to another earnest warning against the sin which destroys the purity and saps the foundations of family life (Proverbs 6:24-35).

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 20-35. - 12. Twelfth admonitory discourse. In this the teacher returns again to the subject which he has already treated in the eighth discourse. The extreme tendency of men, and especially young men, to sins of impurity is no doubt, as Delitzsch remarks, the reason why this subject is again resumed. The subject is gradually worked up to the preceding admonitions in vers. 20-23, pointing out that the way of life, the way of safety, is to be secured by obedience to the precepts of parents, whose commandment and law illumine the perilous road of life, and whose reproofs are salutary to the soul. The arguments against the sin of adultery are cogent in their dissuasiveness, and none stronger of a purely temporal nature could be devised. It may be objected that the sin is not put forward in the higher light, as an offence before God. and that the appeal is made simply on the lines of self-interest; but who will deny that the scope of the teaching is distinctly moral, or that mankind is not influenced and dissuaded from sin by such a category of evils as includes personal beggary, dishonour, and death? Verse 20. - The first part of this verse is couched in almost the same terms as that of Proverbs 1:8, except that mitz'rath, "precept," preceptum, is here used instead of musar, eruditio, or "disciplinary instruction," while the latter part of the two verses are identical. Proverbs 6:20

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

After these three smaller sections, the teacher of wisdom returns here to the theme of the eighth: Warning against sins of the flesh, whose power and prevalence among men is so immeasurably great, that their terrible consequences cannot sufficiently be held up before them, particularly before youth.

20 Keep, my son, the commandment of thy father,

     And reject not the instruction of thy mother.

21 Bind them to thy heart evermore,

     Fasten them about thy neck.

The suff. -ēm refers to the good doctrine (cf. Proverbs 7:3) pointed out by מצוה and תּורה; the masc. stands, as is usual (e.g., Proverbs 1:16; Proverbs 5:2), instead of the fem. Regarding the figure, reminding us of the Tefillin and of Amuletes for perpetual representation, vid., under Proverbs 3:3. Similarly of persons, Sol 8:6. The verb ענד (only here and Job 31:36) signifies to bend, particularly to bend aside (Arab. 'ind, bending off, going aside; accus. as adv., aside, apud), and to bend up, to wind about, circumplicare.