Sitting in the Gate
Gates? Walls?
Proverbs 31:23 "Her husband is known in the gates, When he sitteth among the elders of the land."
Proverbs 31:31 "Give her of the fruit of her hands; And let her works praise her in the gates."
What do these things have in common?
Gates and walls go together...
Proverbs 31 deals with, 'the worthy woman who can find?' And her husband is known in the gates.
The second picture is of a huge Roman building. This is an example of the type of construction they used, but is much larger than a normal residence.
In the time of Ecclesiastes many towns were 'walled'. They used the walls to keep out marauders and thieves. which were common in a time when there wasn't a wide spread way to control them. The walls kept evil people out and protected the peaceful people in.
The worthy woman's husband wasn't known at a gate like the picture of the gate at the top, nor did he sit in a gate like this. The gate he was known in would have been similar in construction as the Roman picture, but not usually as tall and there would be the gate, and a wall would have enclosed the entire town.
The worthy woman's husband was known for being wise because he had a wise, good wife and her good works. The town gate was where the town elders sat to judge quarrels and make judgments. Many towns in the ancient world, had this kind of government.
She was also known in the gate, and her works praised her to other people. We still have her on record, but who was she?
Some people have tried to put flowers in her hair, but plain and simple, she as the wife of an important man was a household manager. She managed her maidens, and gave them their tasks. She gardened for provisions for her household, and had fields, orchards, and farm land. Anything leftover after their daily needs were met could be sold at the market along with merchandise she and her maidens made at home, such as clothing.
She was a busy woman—in and about her home and in her sphere. She worked at home. If you imagine running an English country manor and all of its problems in a world without conveniences that's what managing her home encapsulated.
I've been in countries where every property along the street was individually walled with a gate. Often along the top of the seven foot wall, broken glass was embedded in the the concrete to prevent robbers and thieves from scaling the wall and robbing the owners.
Throughout America, you can drive down nice streets and see properties with nice houses, landscaped lawns as well as same type of apartment buildings. Yes, there are such things as 'gated communities', but even in those communities, I assume every house
and property isn't walled as in other countries.
We live in a wide open land. We talk about freedom. We complain that we have had a decrease in that freedom. This is true, but the reason we have a decrease in freedom is because we've had a decrease in moral people.
Freedom as we have it is not attainable in an immoral people. Or as it has been phrased, self rule is impossible without self-control. Some people try to call this a democracy, but this is a democratic Republic, not a mob-rule democracy.
We are a country that was established upon not just laws, but established as a people who brought themselves under God's law first and thus, to self-control first.
If you put a hot pot full of hot water into a tub of ice water, the pot of hot water will cool quickly. It is important to acknowledge the obvious.
