Today’s proverb echoes an earlier proverb of Solomon that states, “the way of transgressors is hard” (Proverbs 13:15). A transgressor is an habitual offender of God’s Law. He is by nature a schemer, deceiver, disobedient and unfaithful. His way, journey and path is often beguiling and he is spiritually shortsighted, blind to his journey’s end—which Solomon describes as hard…rough and full of sorrow.
Proverbs 22:5 identify two opposing ways– “the way of the froward” and “the way of the righteous” [who put a distance between themselves and the forward].
Proverbs 22:5 – “Thorns [barbs; pricks]and snares [trap; spring net; i.e. “bird trap”] are in the way [road; path; journey] of the forward [crooked; perverse; devious]: he that doth keep[guard; preserve; put a hedge about] his soul [life] shall be far [distant; removed] from them [the forward].”
The froward are willful, rebellious sinners. They are Lawbreakers who set themselves against God and His authority. They are deaf to God’s appeal to turn from their wicked ways and repent. Their journey invariably takes them down the path of sorrows and entrapment from which they are unable to deliver themselves.
The righteous shuns the way of the wicked and avoids the sorrows that befall them.
What way or path are you walking? The world glamorizes the temporal pleasures of sin…but hides the ugly reality…it leads a soul down a path of sorrow and ends in death.