ZA MAGAZINE // seek truth.

Proverbs 10:14
The wise lay up knowledge, but the mouth of a fool brings ruin near.

Proverbs 12:23
A prudent man conceals knowledge, but the heart of fools proclaims folly.

In considering the second proverb, I thought it might be funny to create the article title and the tagline and the preview like normal, but have absolutely no body text after these verses. After all, if I’m supposed to conceal knowledge, then what am I doing typing anything?

Well, I decided that the joke was funny enough to tell but not funny enough to execute, because to do so would ultimately not be beneficial for anyone. These two proverbs give a fair bit of insight into the accumulation and storage of knowledge, so they are definitely worth studying.

In today’s English, to “lay up” means to build up a stock of something in case of need (so says the Oxford American Dictionary). The Hebrew word that is rendered as such is “tsaphan,” which can translate as “lay up” as well as “store up,” “hide,” “hoard,” and sometimes even “cherish,” though no translator will put that rendition in this proverb. As I scan these translations, I see storing knowledge as similar to how a farmer stores food in a silo for the winter. Knowledge needs to be accumulated because you’ll need it in your future. That’s why you go to school, and that’s why you read your Bible.

This principle is echoed throughout Scripture. Solomon first makes a statement along these lines only five verses into Proverbs:

Proverbs 1:5
Let the wise hear and increase in learning and the one who understands obtain guidance…

Jesus talks about the benefit of storing up good stuff (like knowledge) in your heart:

Matthew 12:35
The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil.

Lest we forget about the second half of 10:14, let’s look at what’s happening with the fool. Though I find it difficult to tie these two phrases together, it appears to me that whereas the wise man is storing up his knowledge for the right time, the fool is spouting it out right away and bringing ruin in the process. It’d be like one saving money for a rainy day and the other blowing it frivolously, having nothing left when the rainy day comes.

What does the first verse tell us then? Primarily, that one needs to be accumulating and storing knowledge, and also that one shouldn’t be quick to spout it out. This notion is reinforced by the second verse, which flat-out tells us to conceal our knowledge.

Don’t you find this at least a little odd? I mean, if you’ve got something, share it, right? We’re not even talking spiritual here; I love to spout random facts (and some people even like to hear it)! But after reflecting on the proverb for a little and reading about it a bit, it makes perfect sense.

Nobody likes a know-it-all.

Take it from one who knows a bit of random stuff here and there. We can use my knowledge of the auto industry as an example, because, quite frankly, I know more about cars than you do. Not the under the hood stuff, but info about makes and models and who’s going bankrupt and who’s selling well in China and which car has a well-designed interior…heaps of information. And do you know what I’ve found? Most people don’t care. I think the politics of the auto industry are so fascinating, and new features of new cars that pass me by on the road are so cool, but most people just don’t care.

To spout out a load of ultimately irrelevant information can be a bit annoying, but I think that’s not even the bad part. The bad part comes when you use your knowledge to beat down other people. Like if someone has an uneducated opinion about the auto industry and I turn around and shove the right answer down his or her throat…what happened there? Or, if we may progress from a trivial example to a meaningful one, I’ve had multiple situations where people ask me a spiritual question, and if I already have an answer (however correct it may be), I shut off their perspective and throw my own in their face…without even thinking, really!

1 Corinthians 8:1 warns us that “knowledge puffs up,” that when we learn and learn and learn, we face the danger of becoming prideful about our knowledge. This isn’t to say that we shouldn’t learn things (as we’ve clearly established the precedent to lay up knowledge), but it does mean that knowledge can be dangerous.
How can we know that our knowledge hasn’t puffed us up, that as fools our heart proclaims folly, as the second proverb says? Try keeping it to yourself. This isn’t a foolproof answer; after all, someone can be so arrogant that they feel as though no one is worthy of hearing their knowledge, but Solomon does establish this as a worthy indication of prudence.

A person of noble character should have nothing to prove. He or she doesn’t have to jump in at every opportunity and have a say. There may be plenty of opportunities to speak, but, as the rest of verse one in 1 Corinthians 8 indicates, love is the key to building people up. Is your speech out of love and a genuine desire to enrich someone, or is it given to impress someone and make yourself look good? Is your advice or answer unsolicited and/or nosy?

Like the farmer, we’re to store up our goods and save them for when they are necessary. If we don’t store it, conceal it, we’ll be ruined during the time when our goods were actually necessary. Sometimes we’ll learn something and an opportunity to share it comes right away! Sometimes, we need to sit on it, but we definitely need to be attuned to the Spirit so that we know when to share and when to hold our tongue. When we do share, it can never be to make us look good; it must have a purpose, even if that purpose is merely enrichment.

There’s a lot to be learned here, especially for me, someone who consistently shares knowledge on a web site. I have to lay up knowledge to be able to write about it, and I pray that I might always share out of a humble spirit and a loving desire to help people grow.

Grace and peace,
Brendan