The wisdom of women buildeth their house; but folly plucketh it down with her hands.
Solomon puts two women side by side. What separates them is not strength or money but wisdom: one builds a home up, the other pulls the same home apart. So what does "building" a house actually mean?
The House Is Her Family
Both halves of the verse are about family life. Scripture even gives a real case of a house pulled down from the inside.
"The wisest of women builds her house" (v. 1). Of course, this is not literal building. It is the building up of her family in the ways of the Lord, so that in the end her children rise up and bless her. But a foolish woman has hands that do evil work, with the result that her house (her family life) sadly falls apart. Look at what came of Jezebel's conduct. Her daughter Athaliah murdered her own grandchildren (2 Kings 11:1), destroying her own house in terrible wickedness. For the contrast, look at the virtuous woman of Proverbs 31:10-31.
Her Sphere and Its Foundation
The woman's place is as real as the man's, and the home is where she holds it. Yet the house still needs a foundation she cannot lay herself.
Man has his place in authority and public work. The woman's place is just as real, above all in the "home," of which she is the chief bond. Yet even there the home needs a better foundation than man can lay. Without it the home will fail, and it cannot be the house that a woman's wisdom builds. Keeping at home is good. Working at home, which is the better-attested reading of Titus 2:5, is better still. And how true it is that folly pulls down the house with her hands!
One writer explains what "keepers at home" in Titus does and does not mean.
"Keepers at home" does not mean shut up in the home. It means keeping home life in good order, and this is a wife's special sphere.
Folly's Empty House
Earlier in Proverbs, wisdom and folly are both pictured as women calling people to their houses. Only one of them has anything to offer.
Wisdom stands out in the open by the road, a cheerful giver who knows she has plenty for everyone who comes. Not so the foolish woman. What house had she built? She had cut out no pillars. She had killed no animals, mixed no wine, spread no table. Wisdom does all this with a heart that delights in good, and in doing good where the need is great, the dangers endless, and the evil beyond measure.
The Mother's Influence
One writer counts how often the records of Israel's kings pause to name the king's mother.
But it is in the home, as a wife and a "happy mother of children," that a woman finds her special place for glorifying God. Here she shines brightest, and here, we may add, she has the greatest influence. Another writer has pointed out a remarkable fact. In the books of Kings and Chronicles, where the reigning kings carried such weight with the people and in God's testimony at the time, some thirty times the record gives us "his mother's name." The Spirit of God is showing us what was probably the greatest factor in shaping the character of the men who ruled His people Israel. Eternity alone will fully reveal how much Timothy owed to the early training he received from his mother Eunice, and to the influence of his grandmother Lois (see 2 Timothy 1:5).
What gives this work its weight is timing: a mother shapes a child while the child is still soft.
Home training lays the foundation of a child's character, and the mother's hand is the tool God delights to use in this work... What children learn from their mothers in their early years, while their feelings are still tender, shapes their whole later life. It leaves a mark on their young, soft, open minds and hearts that nothing can erase.
The Finished House
Proverbs closes with this woman at the end of her work. The verdict comes from those who lived with her.
Her reward: "Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her. Many women have done excellently, but you surpass them all. Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her works praise her in the gates."
Summary
- Hands. The same hands can build or tear down. The wise woman builds her family in the ways of the Lord. The foolish one pulls her own house apart.
- Foundation. Her wisdom needs a foundation better than man can lay, or the house fails however well she runs it.
- Sphere. The home is where she shines brightest. That is not being shut in; it is keeping the home in good order.
- Influence. The mother's hand lays the foundation of a child's character, and that mark never fades.
- Reward. The house she built speaks for her at the end. Her children rise up and call her blessed, and her works praise her in the gates.