Proverbs 2:5 · World English Bible
Proverbs 2:5 Meaning Then You Will Understand the Fear
then you will understand the fear of Yahweh, and find the knowledge of God.
What does Proverbs 2:5 mean?
When a mind has leaned toward love with its whole desire, what was called the fear of the Lord is finally understood, and it turns out to have been reverence all along, not terror. The mind that dreaded God was only meeting its own guilt projected onto Him; the honest seeker discovers there was never anything to fear.
From the Christian Psychology reading below.
Proverbs 2:5 through 1 lens
The same verse, read by one tradition.
Christian Psychology
CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY
Christian Psychology
When a mind has leaned toward love with its whole desire, what was called the fear of the Lord is finally understood, and it turns out to have been reverence all along, not terror. The mind that dreaded God was only meeting its own guilt projected onto Him; the honest seeker discovers there was never anything to fear.
And past the dissolving of that fear lies knowledge, which is not information but the direct remembering of what a mind is and where it belongs. This is found, not achieved, because it was never truly lost. A mind that seeks in earnest does not earn God; it simply stops hiding from Him.
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Live Proverbs 2:5 today
- Sit with whatever you have been avoiding thinking about, the thing you flinch from when your mind goes quiet in the shower or on the walk to the car. Stay with it a minute longer than is comfortable and see if it is really as dangerous as the flinch suggests.
- Tell one person something true about yourself that you usually keep hidden, something small is fine. Watch how much lighter the room feels once you are not managing what they might find out.
- When you get the email or the message that makes your stomach drop, before you reply, ask yourself whether you are afraid of the person or afraid of being found out. Answer the real thing, not the panic.
What do you think would happen if nothing about you had to be hidden?
The same truth in other traditions
Tao Te Ching 16
When you return to stillness and stop struggling, you come back to a source that was never gone. Knowing it is not a discovery of something new but a remembering of what you already are.
Upanishads
The self you search for is not far off and does not need to be built. You were looking everywhere except at the one who was doing the looking.
Sufism · Rumi
What you fear in the divine is often your own hiding, your own shame throwing a shadow. Step out of the hiding and the dread turns out to be awe.
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