Proverbs 13:24 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

He that spareth Hebrew, חושׂךְ, withholdeth; his rod From his son, when it is due to him; or that keeps back that correction which his son's fault requires, and which he, as a father, is required to give him; hateth his son His fond affection is as pernicious to his son as his or another man's hatred could be; but he that loveth him, chasteneth him betimes Either, 1st, In his tender years, as soon as he is capable of being profited by chastisement; or, 2d, Speedily, before he be hardened in sin. Thus, “as the chapter begins,” says Bishop Patrick, “with an admonition to hearken to reproof, especially from parents, which is repeated again in the thirteenth and eighteenth verses, so here again, in the last verse but one, advice is given to parents not to spare the rod, if reproof will not do, some children being so disposed that they must be thus treated. And it seems a wonderful piece of wisdom in the old Lacedemonians, as Plutarch relates, who, out of a universal love and care for each other's good, made it lawful for any man to correct the child of another person, if he saw him do amiss. And if the child complained of it to his father, it was looked upon as a fault in the father if he did not correct him again for making that complaint. For they did not, according to Plutarch, look every man only after his own children, servants, and cattle; but every man looked upon what was his neighbour's as his own, οπως οτι μαλιστα κοινονωσι και φροντιζωσιν ως ιδιων, that there might be, as much as possible, a communion among them; and they might take care of what belonged to others, as if they were their own proper goods.”