One morning, as I prepared to read the Bible, I had a curious thought. Now, I don’t recommend this as a regular practice, but I decided to simply open the Bible at random and see what passage might reveal itself. With no attention to where I landed, I let my finger fall upon the page.
Lo, and behold, it fell on Proverbs 7. It’s the story of a woman sometimes called Dame Folly, or Madam Folly. Immediately after that, in chapter 8, we have a portrait of Lady Wisdom, as she’s usually named. Foolishness is followed by wisdom. I read both chapters and concluded, “This might be something to follow up on.”
The opening chapters of the book of Proverbs present a father teaching his son about wisdom. It’s the imparting of knowledge from parent to child.
A scenario is presented in which the father is looking out his window and watching the world go by. He spots “a young man without sense” (v. 7). He’s wandering through the streets, approaching a particular woman’s house. I like the image used: “in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night and darkness” (v. 9). Another version says, “at twilight, as the day faded, at dusk as the night grew dark” (Revised English Bible). To borrow from Shakespeare, “something wicked this way comes.”
What was this young man without sense, this simple boy, doing hanging around in that neighborhood anyway?
When I was young, my mother often spoke pearls of wisdom to me. One of them referred to doing something “accidentally on purpose.” You might know that one. That could apply to meeting a certain someone, maybe a potential boyfriend or girlfriend, “accidentally on purpose.” Perhaps someone will “accidentally on purpose” forget to attend a meeting they want to avoid.
Could it be this young man “accidentally on purpose” wants to encounter this enticing woman? We hear the lines from the hymn, “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing”: “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, / Prone to leave the God I love.” Well, if that was the young man’s wish, as the day faded, then his wish was granted.
Regarding Dame Folly herself, I won’t dwell too long on the less-than-delicate details. Suffice it to say, she wears suggestive clothing and awaits her prey. Upon spotting him, she “seizes him and kisses him” (v. 13). She tells him she has just fulfilled her religious obligations, and she has everything prepared for him. Best of all, she assures him, no one will catch them in the act. Conveniently, her husband is away on a long trip.
Therefore, Dame Folly says, “Come, let us take our fill of love until morning; let us delight ourselves with love” (v. 18). The other version I mentioned says, “Come! Let us drown ourselves in pleasure, let us abandon ourselves to a night of love.” “Abandon” is probably the right word. The father instructs his son to not imitate him, because he “goes like an ox to the slaughter,” “like a bird rushing into a snare” (vv. 22-23). He is a moth drawn to the flame.
[I suppose Betty Boop could be a stand-in for Dame Folly!]
The father concludes his story, “Her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death” (v. 27). Eugene Peterson put it in terms quite colorful in his paraphrase The Message: “She runs a halfway house to hell, fits you out with a shroud and a coffin.”
And that’s why it’s a good idea to bring your girlfriend home to meet the parents!
Now, let’s go from the ridiculous to the sublime.
Lady Wisdom is presented in ways almost parallel to Dame Folly. They’re like twins whose paths in life have radically diverged. They both make their appeals to all, especially to the simple. The two sisters (if I may continue the metaphor), present what they have to offer. Unlike her foolish sibling, Lady Wisdom wishes not to entrap, but to enlighten.
She calls out, “O simple ones, learn prudence; acquire intelligence, you who lack it” (8:5). The Hebrew word for “prudence” is עׇרְמׇה (`armah). It has the connotations of “guile” or “craftiness.” There’s a sense of “trickery”—but it’s a good trickery, one that doesn’t leave you… well, feeling foolish!
Lady Wisdom is able and willing to go where Dame Folly is unable and unwilling to go. Folly—foolishness—can offer short-term excitement, a short-term sense of well-being. Wisdom hangs in for the long haul. Folly is a fair-weather friend. Wisdom is there in both good times and bad.
“Wisdom is better than jewels, and all that you may desire cannot compare with her” (v. 11). All that glitters is not gold. “I, wisdom, live with prudence” (v. 12). There’s our Hebrew friend prudence again! More than we might realize, the Lord surprises us. We think what we want turns out to be less than the best, even positively harmful, but the Lord tricks us (remember, tricks in a good way!)—the Lord amazes us and gives us something beyond belief.
So far, we’ve seen wisdom personified, as Lady Wisdom. With verse 22, wisdom seems to almost leap off the page and be considered as a divine life form. No longer portrayed as a mortal, wisdom is something greater.
She says of herself, “The Lord created me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of long ago. Ages ago I was set up…before the beginning of the earth” (vv. 22-23). We get a story reminiscent of Genesis.
She says she “was daily [the Lord’s] delight, rejoicing before him always, rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race” (vv. 30-31). This is a picture of uninhibited, unrestrained joy. It is the oblivious wonder of children, the abandonment to astonishment.
[“When he established the heavens, I was there”]
Dame Folly urges the young man to join her in drowning themselves in pleasure, in abandoning themselves to a night of love. Of course, there’s no mention of consequences. To modify the tourist slogan, “What happens in Vegas does not stay in Vegas.”
At the end of the chapter, Lady Wisdom says, “Happy is the one who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting beside my doors. For whoever finds me finds life.… all who hate me love death” (vv. 34-36). Whoever hangs around wisdom finds life. How different are the ones who hang around Dame Folly.
In her book, Accessing the Kingdom Realms, musician and prophetic artist Del Hungerford offers a meditation. “I’m standing in a clearing in a forest, looking up at the sky, watching clouds dance to the music in heaven. Everything reacts to the worship, and I love to watch how it all responds.
“After a moment, I sense Wisdom next to me. Together, we enjoy the activity in the atmosphere around us. I think of teachings about getting to know Wisdom.” (Kindle edition, Chapter 13, section 1, paragraphs 1-2.)
She really is listening to wisdom. Earlier, I spoke of thinking about what we want. Wisdom issues a warning. “Remember, the motive is always known. If the motive is incorrect and people are lazy or want it for selfish gain, it won’t do them any good.” (13.1.9) Dame Folly whispers in our ears. Something might be good, in and of itself, but it might not be good for us.
Wisdom continues, “Also, remember that for those constant requests ‘I must have…’ When they get what they ask for but their character doesn’t match, it will destroy them… When people’s motives are not pure, too much of a good thing can have a very devastating effect…”
Ask yourself this question, ‘Do you want something because you’re trying to gain a position in the earthly realm, or are you trying to build relationship with [the Lord] and then out of that relationship, you’re given responsibility?’”
She replies, “I think I’d rather have the second choice since relationship is most important. When you understand true character, you know what to expect.” (13.1.10)
Along with Lady Wisdom, Jesus also speaks as the very voice of divine wisdom. As wisdom incarnate, Jesus is humble, not “loud and wayward,” as is Dame Folly. He presents a model of being teachable, heeding Lady Wisdom’s call to “take my instruction.”
The best teachers always practice the art of teachability. Here’s one example among many that comes to mind: the professor of the one economics course I took in college did not seem to practice that art! He would get visibly irritated if he had to answer more than one or two questions during a class period. His philosophy was to just plow through the material, whether or not the students knew what in the world he was talking about.
It seems our culture increasingly is becoming one in which asking questions is discouraged. A society like that is ruled by fear. Honesty isn’t encouraged; compliance is.
The best teachers remain open to new ideas. That’s especially evident in Jesus’ encounters with society’s outcasts. I think Jesus not only gives benefit, but receives benefit, by his interaction with the poor and the unwanted. In those encounters, he receives the kind of wisdom that remains hidden from the high and mighty—wisdom born not of privilege, but of love and humility.
“What does wisdom look like?” Consider this. What positions have we rethought and changed our minds about in the last few years? What does this say about us and our journey? I can think of a couple of changes I made in recent years, although it wasn’t entirely of my own choosing. At some level, the decision was made for me. I think I just needed to say, “Yes.”
Back to Hungerford’s encounter with Wisdom. Wisdom wondered if she was concerned about gaining worldly position or developing a relationship with God. As you recall, she preferred the relationship.
That is the call of wisdom; wisdom wants to know us. “I love those who love me, and those who seek me diligently find me” (8:17). Wisdom is calling for us. Wisdom is calling our name. We develop our relationship with wisdom. We develop our relationship with the Lord. It is a lifelong quest. Out of that relationship, as noted, we are given responsibility.
We are responsible to each other. We are to speak words that “are righteous,” with “nothing twisted or crooked in them” (v. 8). Whether it’s accidentally on purpose or deliberately on purpose, we are called to lift each other up, to pray for each other and to be a help.
In the end, we all stand at the crossroads between Lady Wisdom and Dame Folly. Both call out to us. One offers the fleeting thrill of self-serving pleasure; the other offers the enduring gift of life rooted in truth, humility, and relationship with God. Wisdom invites us to walk in the Spirit, to be teachable, and to listen with attentive hearts.
Let us be those who linger at her gates, who wait beside her doors, who open ourselves to the divine delight that has been dancing since before the foundation of the world.
And as we seek wisdom—not for status or success, but for relationship—may we discover that she has been seeking us all along.