Proverbs 13:24: “He that spares his rod hates his son: but he that loves him chastens him early.”
Proverbs 23:13: “Withhold not correction from the child: for if you beat him with a rod, he shall not die.”
Recently I was attending a class run by a private organization on caring for foster children. This organization works with the state in providing foster care. In the first class our instructors made it very clear that we were not to administer any type of corporal punishment or as one put it: “You do not hit our children.” I considered this in light of the more than five verses in the Bible which talk of using the rod to discipline. These instructors all had years of experience in raising foster children, all of whom were brought to this organization because of behavior problems. I could not help but feel a sense of respect for these compassionate people who sought and struggled for ways to correct a child’s behavior without resorting to some sort of physical discipline.
I went back to these verses in the Bible found in Proverbs, written by the wisest man who ever lived, who himself was a king and responsible for the discipline of an entire nation and wondered if I should take verses like Proverbs 13:24, 23:13, 22:15,23:14 and 29:15 at face value?
Did the wisest man who ever lived really instruct us to strike a child? Does God Himself use the rod to correct His children? Reflecting on my three score years on this earth I cannot recall a time that God took me to the wood shed and administered the rod of discipline. Usually when I rebel or sin I feel God’s shame upon me and His disappointment. I may suffer some form of pain as a result of my sin, but I never considered the pain and suffering I experienced to be from God but to be the natural consequences of my behavior.
I know I am touching on a very sensitive nerve for many Christians here and I want to point out that this study is a personal study, one to prepare me for being a foster parent and is not intended to be a final statement on how to interpret these passages. Hence I only offer the follow for your consideration, let the peace of God rule your heart (Col. 3:15). Only you can decide what you will believe.
All these verses use the same words for rod, discipline, chasten and/or correct. The word used for rod is one I immediately recognized as the same word that is used in the Aramaic which is the word for a scepter or a magistrate. In fact one use of this word in Hebrew, which in its root form is shavat, is for a scepter. It is the same word used in Esther 5:2 which she approaches the king and he extended or offered his scepter to her as a sign of favor. I searched out the word scepter in the Old Persian cuneiform and found the identical word that we have in the Hebrew and Aramaic, shavat which is always used as a reference to the scepter of a king. I searched out the Phoenician word for rod as well as the Akkadian word which are all sister languages of the Hebrew and they also use the word shavat as a scepter. I realize our lexicons explain the Hebrew word shavat as a rod of discipline and punishment, but the historical roots of this word are really found within the idea of ascepter used to declare a kings authority. A king tried to not do much talking in front of his subjects, the scepter was a means of communicating and how he moved his scepter displayed his desires or wishes. It was universally recognized as a symbol of authority. A scepter was often given to an individual to provide diplomatic immunity. Scepters were carried by not only kings, but priest, judges, military leaders and respected elders. These were not used to administer punishment but to confirm a verdict such as the use of a gavel today to call order in a court or when a judge strikes his gavel to conclude and confirm a verdict. He does not beat the defendant over the head with the gavel; whatever punishment is to be rendered is done outside the court.
All these passages referring to the rod of correction are found in Proverbs written by a king, King Solomon, who himself carried a scepter. I believe it stands to reason when he says that he who spares (Heb. timenai – withholds) the scepter hates his son, he is saying that a father who withholds his authority, refuses to establish boundaries and laws as a king does for his nation, such a father hates his son. The shavat is not a rod to beat a child with but is really a scepter which shows that a person has taken on the responsibility of one who is in authority and is using his authority.
So what about this punishment or chastening? That sounds an awful lot like a beating. The word in every case in the Hebrew is musar which could come from two possible root words, masar which means to change and has nothing to do with physical punishment or yasar which means to correct or instruct and has little to do with any physical action. In fact in other Semitic languages yasar is exclusively used for instruction and has reserved other words to express physical punishment.
The KJV renders takenan in Proverbs 23:13 as beat and shavat as rod to get beat him with a rod. I mean the KJV is really brutal, but it was translated during brutal times and that was most likely the mindset in that day. Conservatives just followed in lockstep with them. The word takenan comes from the root word takan which is a word used to express measuring, examining and weighing out. I have no idea how the KJV arrived at the idea of beating. Using my earlier rendering of the word shavat as scepter or authority, I would not see this as beat him with a rod, but it would be more like examine his behavior with the authority of a wise king.
Ok, you can call me a beating heart liberal, but I have never known God to raise a hand to me to correct my behavior or to strike me down from some infraction. The natural result of breaking His laws usually takes care of that. So if God will not strike me or spank me then I will never strike a child to correct him. Besides if I do that to a foster child, I will face the shavatof a court room judge.
Please understand that I am only offering this to you for your consideration. Maybe one day God will point His shavat(scepter) at me and declare that I am wrong. I can live with the fact that I am wrong, but I do not care to run the risk of hurting a child and having to live with that.
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