“They struck me,” you will say, “but I was not hurt; they beat me, but I did not feel it. When shall I awake? I must have another drink.”
Solomon here gives fair warning against the sin of drunkenness, to confirm what he had said, Pro 23:20. I. He cautions all people to keep out of the way of temptations to this sin (Pro 23:31): Look not thou upon the wine when it is red. Red wine was in Canaan looked upon as the best wine, it is therefore called the blood of the grape.
Commenting on Proverbs 23:29-35
They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not sick,.... Or "grieved not" (x); or was not wounded or skin broken (y); see Jer 5:3. The drunken man is here represented as saying, that though his companions, with whom he quarrelled and fought in his drunken frolics, beat him very much, yet he was not sensible of the pain and smart; and it...
awake--that is, from drunkenness (Gen 9:24). This is the language rather of acts than of the tongue. Next: Proverbs Chapter 24