Proverbs 5:16

Proverbs 5:16, in plain English

Why would you throw away what should be private and sacred, sharing it publicly with strangers as if it means nothing?

Why it's here

The father is asking a rhetorical question that cuts to the heart of the matter. He's not asking because he doesn't know the answer; he's asking to make his son think. What's yours to enjoy, why would you scatter it like water in the streets where everyone can access it?

Who's speaking

The father, challenging his son to think clearly about the choice

Where it sits in the story

This shows that biblical sexuality has always been about both exclusive covenant and about dignity. What's meant to be sacred between husband and wife becomes degraded when it's thrown open to strangers. That degradation is part of why it's destructive.

The scholarly reading

The rhetorical question challenges: Why would you squander your vital energies in the public sphere when they should be reserved for your own wife?

Language and setting

The 'springs' and 'streams' flowing 'in the streets' and 'public squares' (מַעְיְנוֹתֶיךָ בַּחוּץ...בִּרְחֹבוֹת, ma'aynotecha ba-chutz...birhobim) represent the dissipation of marital and sexual resources into promiscuity. The question form here is not seeking information but invoking shame—a rhetorical device common in wisdom literature to make the listener recognize the irrationality of his temptation. Why would a man squander what is properly his own, in his own household, by scattering it publicly where others can partake? This verse employs what biblical scholars call 'reductio ad absurdum'—it exposes the foolishness of the temptation by articulating its logical conclusion.

Voice

The father-teacher, now employing rhetorical questioning to challenge the son's potential rationalization.

Significance

This principle of stewardship and appropriate use appears in Jesus's Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30), where the servant who fails to invest what is entrusted to him faces judgment.

14I am on the brink of utter ruin in the midst of the whole assembly.”

15Drink water from your own cistern, and running water from your own well.

16Why should your springs flow in the streets, your streams of water in the public squares?

17Let them be yours alone, never to be shared with strangers.

18May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth:

Read all of Proverbs 5 — The lips of a forbidden woman drip honey — but her end is bitter as wormwood. A warning that sounds ancient but arrives fresh every generation.