Expert: Edward Bode - 9/23/2011

Question
QUESTION: Given these verses:
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BIBLOS:AKJV:MATTHEW04[4But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.]
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BIBLOS:AKJV:PROVERBS01[25But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof: 26I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh; 27When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. 28Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me: 29For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD:]
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(1) From Proverbs 1:26, Should Christians laugh at the calamity of others rejecting God's Council?  (2) From Proverbs 1:26, Should jews before Christ's first arrival laugh at the calamity of others rejecting God's Council?  (3) In Proverbs 1:26, Is this the way of the LORD, or of Solomon teaching of God's Ways?  (4) And if Christians should not laugh at the calamity of others rejecting God's Council from ((1)), is this Proverbs 1:26 of God, a case of "follow what God says, but not what God does", because Christians in some cases, follow a different law than the laws that God has?

ANSWER: Two basic rules of interpreting scripture:  Determine the literary genre [the type of writing, of which there are many in the bible]; check all the texts that relate to the topic -- God does not contradict Himself, so one must seek an answer that melds in with all the other passages.
To your question:  In the Proverb, Lady Wisdom is warning the people to repent; now is the time, since some calamity may befall in the future.  The proverbial language heightens the urgency of the issue.  We know that God want all to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth [1 Tim 2:4].  In the final analysis, death is the final point of no return.
So, I see the fanciful language of the proverb to teach a meaning about repentance and not wording that needs to be parsed literally, as you have attempted to do.
So, we join God and do not rejoice over evil but work for the conversion of sinners and their repentance; that is the message of the bible.  God does not speak one way and act another.

Best wishes, Shawn

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: In taking a devil's advocate approach, I am glad to hear that Christians ought not laugh in other's calamity, who reject God, as that actually matches my sentiments.
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However, it is disturbing, hearing on american "Christian Radio" recently, a preacher talking on Proverbs, with God laughing, at rejetors' calamities.  The preacher even focussed on the word "laughed", the preacher breaking it back into the Hebrew, enhancing the verse, by saying God will laugh to scornful mocking derision, those rejectors' in their calamity.  Talk about a little leaven on Christian Radio leavening the whole validity of Christian Radio.  You would be disappointed in the frequency of such american broadcast media corruption leavenings.
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However, it is disturbing that God's Inspired Word, called Infallible and Inerrant, in print, has this Proverb verse set from Solomon's archtype of a Wise Godly Man, put into the Nicene canon, and the word does mean what the preacher revealed on Proverbs 1:25-29.  It does sound almost like Old Soviet Union ways, that americans used to say in the 1970's in the Cold War, how they laugh at other's misfortunes.  And hypocritically, also quite common in american social culture, especially in schools.
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BIBLOS:STRONGS:7832:Sachaq (laugh)
Deride, have in derision, laugh, make merry, mocker, play, rejoice, laugh to scorn.
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A primitive root; to laugh (in pleasure or detraction); by implication, to play -- deride, have in derision, laugh, make merry, mock(-er), play, rejoice, (laugh to) scorn, be in (make) sport.

Answer
I was not aware of the preacher.
God's inspired word teaches infallibly and inerrantly.  He is all-knowing and does not lie or contradict His final revelation.  The task, as I have said, is to understand what God is saying through human words -- their context, their literary genre, the whole teaching of God, etc.
I am not sure what the reference to the "Nicene canon."  Could you be more specific?
Thanks.