Proverbs 13:8 - Meaning and Application

We often judge a person’s happiness in this world by how much wealth he has. We think people are blessed in proportion to the goods they own. But Solomon shows how mistaken that idea is. This should help us accept a poor condition, and keep us from craving riches or envying those who have plenty.

Rich people may be honored by some because of their wealth, but that same wealth also makes them targets. Others envy them, attack them, and even put their lives in danger, so they are sometimes forced to buy safety with their riches. “Do not kill us, for we have stores of treasure in the field” (Jeremiah 41:8). Under some tyrants, being rich was enough to be treated as a crime, and wealth is little help when it only serves to ransom a life that would otherwise have been spared.

Poor people, on the other hand, may be ignored and looked down on by those who should be their friends. Yet they are also often overlooked by those who would have been their enemies, if they had anything to gain by harming them. “The poor hear no rebuke,” meaning they are not scolded, blamed, insulted, or dragged into trouble the way rich people often are. No one thinks it worthwhile to notice them.

When the wealthy Jews were taken captive to Babylon, the poor people of the land were left behind (2 Kings 25:12). A man with nothing can sometimes count that as a kind of protection. As the old saying goes, a traveler will be glad when a robber meets him and finds little worth taking.