Sinful Men

     My son, if sinful men entice you, do not give in to them. If they say, “Come along with us; let’s lie in wait for innocent blood, let’s ambush some harmless soul; let’s swallow them alive, like the grave, and whole, like those who go down to the pit; we will get all sorts of valuable things and fill our houses with plunder; cast lots with us; we will all share the loot”— my son, do not go along with them, do not set foot on their paths; for their feet rush into evil, they are swift to shed blood. How useless to spread a net where every bird can see it! These men lie in wait for their own blood; they ambush only themselves! Such are the paths of all who go after ill-gotten gain; it takes away the life of those who get it. (Proverbs 1:9-19)

One of the repeated themes of the book of Proverbs is “Don’t hang with bad characters.” It makes perfect, easy sense. You tend to become like those who are the focus of your attention. In today’s passage, the bad characteristic is active hatred. It is seeking the downfall of people, and specifically, the downfall of people who are living their lives and have no clue that they are the intended victim of hatred.  

                The thing that is made clear in this passage is that there are two intended victims. The first intended victim is the one they hope to corrupt. The second is the one they hope to ambush. In both cases, the goal is to harm. There is another similar sort of bad character who is mentioned frequently in Proverbs. She is generally described as the adulterous woman. She also has two victims: her husband, and the lover. I think it is reasonable that we consider the adulterous woman to be someone of either sex who seeks to seduce someone of either sex into an illicit relationship of any sort. In other words, the “adulterous woman” can seduce someone into a lifestyle, into crime, into addictive behavior. Con artists and scammers would fit into this category.

                In both cases, there is an invitation to do something interesting or exciting without regard to anything outside the excitement. I can’t say that reality or what is right, fair, or just doesn’t matter. It matters greatly because it is the thing the person with the bad character is inviting us to reject. If lying in wait for innocent blood or other illicit activity weren’t wrong, it wouldn’t be seductive or exciting. The other thing to keep in mind is that those inviting will always depict what they are doing as somehow justified. The people they’re planning to ambush are rich, or somehow evil, so attacking them is good. The husband “doesn’t understand” her needs or doesn’t love her anymore (if he ever did). The lover is rescuing her from a fate worse than death. Where sheer excitement and hatred aren’t enough, there are excuses for the toxic behavior. These aren’t “normal folks.” They are predators.

                This is why we need to keep ourselves out of situations in which we’re likely to encounter them. Some people complain that they should be able to go to a bar and have a drink or two without running the risk of sexual predators. They should, they say, be able to go where they want, with whom they want, when they want, and with all other conditions being what they want and have everything turn out OK. And they should be able to. But wisdom points out that just because one should be able to doesn’t mean that one is able to. Wisdom points out that spending time with bad characters ends up with you and others being hurt.