My son, fear Yahweh and the king. Don’t join those who are rebellious:
⛓ Read Proverbs 24 forward — the whole chapter and its afterlife →Where this passage surfaces again, sorted by the strength of the link. Each kind of reuse — formal quotation, deliberate allusion, faint echo, figural pattern — carries its own mark. Follow any reference to read it in place.
Allusion3
A deliberate verbal borrowing without a citation formula.
"Fear God. Honor the king" (2:17) closely mirrors Proverbs 24:21 LXX, 'Fear God, my son, and the king (phobou ton theon... kai basilea)' — the paired imperatives toward God and king are a near-verbatim wisdom borrowing structuring the closing quatrain.
Medium confidence'My son, fear the LORD and the king' pairs reverence for God with honor due the ruler — directly behind the closing exhortation to render 'respect to whom respect, honor to whom honor' (v.7).
Medium confidenceThe charge to fear the LORD and the king, and not to join with the rebellious, stands behind Paul's instruction to be subject to rulers and authorities. The wisdom tradition links reverence for God with submission to civic authority, the same dual loyalty Titus urges.
Medium confidenceEcho2
A fainter, low-volume reuse, carried by recurrence or thematic coherence.
'Fear the LORD and the king' supplies a wisdom precedent for distinguishing yet ordering obligations to God and to civil authority, coherent with 'give to Caesar... and to God.' Volume is low and the connection is inferential, hence contested.
Low confidenceProverbs' counsel to 'fear the Lord and the king, and do not associate with those who change' offers a wisdom precedent for distinguishing honor due to God from honor due to the sovereign. The conceptual parallel to 'render to Caesar and to God' is real but diffuse, with no verbal overlap.
Low confidence