Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Proverbs 27:8

As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so [is] a man that wandereth from his place.

8. “The true bird-life is the life of the woods, of the toilsomely-woven nest, of the mate and the brood and the fledglings. True human life is the life of our fellows, of the diligent laborious housebuilding, of the home, of the young, of the rising nestlings which are to form the next link in the long chain of the generations.” Horton.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Change of place is thought of as in itself an evil. It is not easy for the man to find another home or the bird another nest. The maxim is characteristic of the earlier stages of Hebrew history, before exile and travel had made change of country a more familiar thing. Compare the feeling which made the thought of being a fugitive and a vagabond Gen 4:12-13 the most terrible of all punishments.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Pro 27:8

As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place.

The inconvenience and danger of persons being long absent from home

Nothing that affects our religious interests can, properly speaking, be called little. Everything that can influence the present temper and future state of the soul is weighty and important This text is a caution against a rambling spirit in general. A bird that wandereth from her nest leaves her eggs unhatched, or starves her young ones, or exposes them to peril. The evil consequences of restless and prolonged wanderings from home are–

1. They who wander lose many relative comforts. A heathen philosopher observes that wanderers about have many acquaintances, but few friends.

2. The domestic affairs of wanderers greatly suffer. Their work either stands still, or goes on very indifferently.

3. Precious time is lost in wandering from home. Many whose lawful business leads them abroad stay much longer than is needful. They trifle at every place where they come, and must chat with every person who hath as little prudence as themselves.

4. Wanderers are exposed to many temptations which ought to be avoided.

5. This habit is a great hindrance to family religion. Apply these thoughts to ourselves, and inquire how far we are concerned in this admonition. It is important for young people to cultivate a habit of staying at home. It is peculiarly bad in servants to wander from their place. Relations should endeavour to make home agreeable to one another. It is especially bad to wander from the house of God. (J. Orton.)

Wandering birds

Some people are always restless; they must move about. They are like wandering birds. Such people do not know that the right place is always the best place for them. Whatever is our calling in life, let us not be in a hurry to leave it. Depend upon it, where God has placed us is the best for us after all. The right place for us all is where we can best serve Jesus, and where we can glorify Him. A bird that wanders from its nest is one that will get into danger and trouble. A bird that wanders from its nest will lose its nest. Three counsels–

1. Love your own nest, and stay in it.

2. Keep the nest clean, and make your home happy.

3. No nest is so good for you as your own, and therefore do not seek to change it. (J. J. Ellis.)

The wanderer

I. As the bird has its nest, so man has his place. And both are of Divine appointment. Behind the instinct of the bird and the social nature of man we must recognise the purpose of God. Mans place is in–

1. The home. God setteth the solitary in families.

2. In society. Let every soul be subject to the higher powers, for the powers that be are ordained of God.

3. In the Church, its fellowship, worship, work.

II. As the bird needs the nest, so the man needs the place.

III. As the nest needs the bird, so the place needs the man.

IV. Wandering.

V. The consequences of wandering.

VI. Appeal to wanderers. Come back! the place waits for you. Your own heart echoes its cry. (Homiletic Review.)

Unnaturalness

Sin reverses Divine arrangements. It is consequently the most unnatural thing in Gods universe. We speak of natural depravity; it is, properly speaking, un-natural depravity. Sin is earths exotic; the souls nightshade; it has turned the world upside down, and thrust man out of his proper place.

I. Man in his wrong place. Here called a wanderer. Where art thou? God asked Adam; intimating that he was not where he ought to have been. Sin had turned him out of his place. Some things concerning mans original state–the place from which he had wandered.

1. It was a state of conscious Divine approval. Conscience was at rest.

2. A state of Divine illumination. The creature enjoyed the high privilege of companionship with his Creator. Sin has both stained the conscience and darkened the understanding.

3. A state of Divine sympathies. His supreme affections were centred in his Maker. Towards Him his emotions moved like bright constellations round the sun. The fatal mistake sin has introduced into the hearts of men is the vain attempt to meet the wants of the spiritual in the supplies of the material.

II. Man in his right place. Man is as his heart is. The evils which have been enumerated arise from the moral derangement of the affections. The gospel comes to restore the forfeited place by restoring lost confidence. It does so by revealing God in such a way as to inspire confidence. The gospel is the revelation of Divine love putting away sin, and bringing the sinner near to Himself. The souls resting-place is faith and love. (G. Hunt Jackson.)

The wandering bird

Persons of the vagrant kind seldom, if ever, prosper.

1. In the common affairs of life Solomon was correct. The unrest of that mans mind, and the instability of his conduct, who is constantly making a change of his position and purpose, augurs no success for any of his adventures. See cases of eagerness to leave the native country; changing occupation; changing situation and acquaintance. And it is certainly true in changing ones religious service in the cause of God.

2. In spiritual things. There is a tendency in us all to be looking for evidences, signs, marks, experiences, graces, and coincidences of one kind or another. When a Christian wanders from his place–from the simplicity of his faith in Jesus–that moment he departs from his safe shelter in the solid rock. Many believers wander out of their place. A believers place is in the bosom of his Lord, or at the right hand of his Master, or sitting at His feet with Mary. Wandering habits imply a lack of watchfulness. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The wandering bird

The teaching of the proverb may be, that a man who leaves his own home, his own proper sphere, situation, calling, is strange, awkward, lonely, exposed–he has got away from duty and into danger, and is forlorn as a lost bird that has got away from its nest and cannot find its way back. Our subject is that men, institutions, Churches, are most useful when faithful to their own particular calling, and when true to their own distinctive characteristics. There is some danger lest Christian Churches should wander from their place. Far be it from me to depreciate the importance of social questions and social work. But we are told that we are strong in the degree in which we take in hand social questions, and play the part of social reformers. But our work is supremely spiritual; our work is to the soul of man. To us, the main cause of the misery which is in this world is to be found in the spiritual condition of men, in their alienation from God. The Church of Christ is not to be a food-supply association, nor a banking company, nor a society for the reform of manners. Our work is to bring men to God. The monition of the text may be applied to individuals. There are few things more common than for men to forsake the sphere in which their own peculiar powers have ample scope for a sphere in which those powers are scarcely required at all. An infatuation sometimes leads men to seek positions to which they are not called, and for which they are manifestly unfit. Some of us are not allowed to remain in one place. We are compelled to be wanderers on the face of the earth. The determination to abide in ones own lot, and to be true to ones own gifts and aptitudes, is the secret of power. If a man will prove his own work, he shall have rejoicing in himself. Cultivate a vivid sense of personality and a solemn conviction of our own individual significance. You will not best serve your generation by becoming a washed-out reproduction of some stronger character. If a man honestly does the best with his own powers in his own place, he will not live in vain. We cannot escape from our personal limitations, but we may do good work, and minister much blessing notwithstanding. We also wander from our place when we neglect the things that are about us, and strain after strange and distant things, for satisfaction. The highest and best things are possible to us where we are. In our own place the highest culture of character is possible. Our place has no limitations for spiritual growth. We can be men in Christ Jesus where we are. So let there be no repining and no wandering. He orders our lot; let us stand in it. (James Lewis.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 8. As a bird that wandereth from her nest] Leaving her own brood, places of retreat, and feeding-ground behind, and going into strange countries, where she is exposed to every kind of danger. So is the man who leaves his family connections and country, and goes into strange parts to find employment, better his circumstances, make a fortune, c. I have seen multitudes of such wanderers from their place come to great misery and wretchedness. God’s general advice is, “Do good, and dwell in the land and verily thou shalt be fed.”

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

That wandereth from her nest; that flies very much abroad from place to place, whereby she is exposed to all the arts of fowlers, and to birds of prey, from which she is safe whilst she keeps her nest.

That wandereth from his place; that through vanity or lightness changeth the place of his abode, or his calling and course of life, the ill effects whereof have been frequently observed and noted, even in vulgar proverbs, as when we say, A rolling stone gathers no moss.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

8. Such are not only out ofplace, but out of duty and in danger.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

As a bird that wandereth from her nest,…. To seek for food for herself and her young; or that leaves it without returning to it, and so her eggs or her young are exposed, and she herself liable to fall into the hands of birds of prey, or of the fowler, when she would be safe in her nest; as there was a law in Israel in her favour,

De 22:6; or as one that is forced out and obliged to wander from place to place, Isa 16:2;

so [is] a man that wandereth from his place; who, in time of famine and distress, goes into other parts for bread, as Jacob’s sons went down into Egypt; and such are they in a spiritual sense who leave all, and follow Christ for food for their souls; or who are forced to flee from place to place, and wander about in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth, because of the persecution of their enemies; or rather it is to be taken in an ill sense and applied to such who abide not in the calling whereunto they are called; dislike, and are unsatisfied with, their present business of life, and seek new employments, which oftentimes is to the hurt and detriment of themselves and families; and also to such who wander from the way of spiritual understanding, from the place of divine worship, from the word, ordinances, and commandments of the Lord; see Pr 21:16.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

8 As a bird that wandereth from her nest,

So is a man that wandereth from his home.

It is not a flying out that is meant, from which at any moment a return is possible, but an unwilling taking to flight (lxx 8b: ; Venet.: … ); for , Isa 16:2, cf. Jer 4:25, birds that have been frightened; and , Pro 21:15., designates the fugitive; cf. , Gen 4:14, and above, Pro 26:2, where designates aimless roving about. Otherwise Fleischer: “warning against unnecessary roaming about, in journeyings and wanderings far from home: as a bird far from its nest is easily wounded, caught, or killed, so, on such excursions, one easily comes to injury and want. One may think of a journey in the East. The Arabs say, in one of their proverbs: alsafar kat’at man alklyym (= journeying is a part of the pains of hell).” But here is not to be understood in the sense of a libere vagari . Rightly C. B. Michaelis: qui vagatur extorris et exul a loco suo sc. natali vel habitationis ordinariae . This proverb mediately recommends the love of one’s fatherland, i.e., “love to the land in which our father has his home; on which our paternal mansion stands; in which we have spent the years of our childhood, so significant a part of one’s whole life; from which we have derived our bodily and intellectual nourishment; and in which home we recognise bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh.”

(Note: Gustave Baur’s article “Vaterlandsliebe,” in Schmid’s Pdagogischer Encyklopdie.)

But next it says, that to be in a strange land must be an unhappiness, because a man never feels better than at home, as the bird in its nest. We say: Heimat [home] – this beautiful word becomes the German language, which has also coined the expressive idea of Heimweh [longing for home]; the Heb. uses, to express the idea of home, the word ; and of fatherland, the word or . The Heb. corresponds

(Note: The translators transfer to this place a note from vol. ii. p. 191f. of the author’s larger Comm. . den Psalter, to which Delitzsch refers the reader: – “The modern High German adj. elend , middle High German ellende , old High German alilandi, elilendi , or elilenti , is composed of ali and land . The adj. ali occurs only in old High German in composition. In the Gothic it is found as an independent adj., in the sense of alius and ( vid., Ulfilas, Gal 5:10). The primary meaning of elilenti is consequently: of another country, foreign. In glosses and translations it is rendered by the Lat. words peregrinus, exul, advena , also captivus . In these meanings it occurs very frequently. In the old High German translation of Ammonius, Diatessaron, sive Harmoniae in quatuor Evangelica, the word proselytism, occurring in Mat 23:15, is rendered by elilantan . To the adj. the old High German subst. corresponds. This has the meaning exilium, transmigratio, captivitas . The connection in elilenti or elilentes , used adverbially, is rendered by the Lat. peregre . In the middle High German, however, the proper signification of both words greatly predominates. But as, in the old High German, the idea of miser is often at the same time comprehended in the proper signification: he who is miserable through banishment, imprisonment, or through sojourning in a strange land; thus, in several places of the middle High German, this derived idea begins to separate itself from the fundamental conception, so that ellende comes in general to be called miser . In the new High German this derived conception is almost alone maintained. Yet here also, in certain connections, there are found traces of the original idea, e.g., in’s Elend schicken , for to banish. Very early also the word came to be used, in a spiritual sense, to denote our present abode, in contrast to paradise or the heavenly kingdom…. Thus, e.g., in one of Luther’s hymns, when we pray to the Holy Ghost:

Das er vns behte, an vnserm ende,

Wenn wir heim farn aus diesem elende .”

[That He guard us to our end

When we go home from this world.]

– Rud. von Raumer)

to the German Elend , but = Ellend, elilenti , of another land, strange.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

      8 As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place.

      Note, 1. There are many that do not know when they are well off, but are uneasy with their present condition, and given to change. God, in his providence, has appointed them a place fit for them and has made it comfortable to them; but they affect unsettledness; they love to wander; they are glad of a pretence to go abroad, and do not care for staying long at a place; they needlessly absent themselves from their own work and care, and meddle with that which belongs not to them. 2. Those that thus desert the post assigned to them are like a bird that wanders from her nest. It is an instance of their folly; they are like a silly bird; they are always wavering, like the wandering bird that hops from bough to bough and rests nowhere. It is unsafe; the bird that wanders is exposed; a man’s place is his castle; he that quits it makes himself an easy prey to the fowler. When the bird wanders from her nest the eggs and young ones there are neglected. Those that love to be abroad leave their work at home undone. Let every man therefore, in the calling wherein he is called, therein abide, therein abide with God.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary