”A wise servant shall have rule over a son that causeth shame, And shall have part of the inheritance among the brethren.“
Proverbs 17:2
In essence, the passage is both a warning and an admonition. My mind is drawn to the parable of the Prodigal Son in the New Testament book of Luke chapter 15.
A young man asks his father for his inheritance and leaves home to travel and experience all the world has to offer. He wastes his inheritance and finally has no money to even buy food. He takes a job feeding pigs and wishes he could eat the pigs food. He finally reaches the point of realizing the servants in his Father’s house have it much better off than he does. He goes home to ask his father if he can work as a servant. The Father is overjoyed his son has come home and accepts him with open arms.
This next piece is not part of scripture, I am employing a large amount of creative license. I wonder if the Father placed the Son under the authority of a hired Servant, perhaps a Project Manager or Foreman, and the Son worked for this Servant. When it came time for the Father’s goods to be handed out, that Foreman may have received part of the inheritance, after putting in 30 years of service, while the Son received nothing. His inheritance was already spent.
Back to the warning and admonition: If we are a Son, we need to take care we are not living in such a way as to cause shame to our families and squander a good name.
If we are a Servant we should strive to be a wise Servant that can be trusted. We may end up becoming part of the family.