FOLLY (אִוֶּ֫לֶת, H222, badness; כְּסִילוּת, H4070, stupidity; נְבָלָה, H5576, emptiness; סִכְלוּת, H6121, thickheadedness; תָּהֳלָה, H9334, insipidity; ἄνοια, G486, senselessness; ἀφροσύνη, G932, heedlessness.) The above, with their variants, are the words in the Bible commonly tr. “folly.” Other related terms are פֶּ֫תִי֮, H7344, simplicity; ἄσοφος, G831, unwise; μωρία, G3702, foolishness.

1. Old Testament. Folly is the opposite of wisdom. It is not imbecility, insanity, or error. It is wrongheadedness. It has to do with practical insights into the nature of things that lead to success or failure in life. Wisdom and folly in the Bible rest on the principle of adjustment to a higher law for a practical purpose. Folly involves rejection or disregard of the revealed moral and spiritual values on which life is based. The fool sins against his own best interests and rejects God (Ps 14:1). This idea of folly is expressed in various ways.

a. ’Iwwelet is a common word, esp. in Proverbs, conveying the general idea of moral badness. The fool is hasty (Prov 14:29), self-sufficient (12:15), impervious to instruction (15:5), given to unrestrained anger (17:12), and stupid in his persistence in evil (26:11).

b. Kesīluth and its cognates are the most frequent words for folly. They are most common in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. The root indicates thickness, sluggishness, or plumpness. This slow, self-confident person is ignorant (Eccl 2:14), thoughtless (Prov 10:23; 17:24), contentious (18:6), indolent (Eccl 4:5), and brutish (Ps 49:10). Disregarding moral ideals, he is a victim of stupidity.

c. Nebālāh,most common outside the Wisdom Literature, denotes a wicked person as an evil character, shamelessly immoral. The word is often associated with base and unnatural lewdness (Gen 34:7; Deut 22:21; Josh 7:15). Isaiah 32:6 describes in detail the destructive attitudes and conduct of this wicked man. Abigail described her husband, Nabal, as “this man of Belial” or “ill-natured fellow,” “for as his name is, so is he” (1 Sam 25:25).

d. Siklut comes from a root meaning “to be stopped up.” It is generally taken to denote thickheadedness. However, it denotes more than mere foolishness. It is associated with madness (Eccl. 2:12).

e. Toholāh (Job 4:18) is thought to be related to the Ethiopic tahala, “to err.”

f. Tiplāh is from a root that means tasteless, unseasoned, insipid, unseemly. It is used of fish that are not salted. Folly, then, is conceived in terms of that which is absurd and unworthy of human beings (Job 24:12; Jer 23:13).

g. Petī is used of the simple, the impressionable ones, who are easily led into folly because of their lack of wisdom (Prov 1:22).

2. New Testament. Though fewer words are used, the NT has analogies for most of the OT meanings.

a. Anoia basically means “without understanding.” It is sometimes a madness expressing itself in rage (Luke 6:11).

b. Aphrosune also means “ignorant” and “without understanding,” but with a moral as well as an intellectual reference (Mark 7:22).

c. Mōría reflects the moral reprobation of the OT nebālāh (Matt 5:22). It is more than intellectual deficiency.

d. Asophos describes one as lacking in wisdom (Eph 5:15).

As folly in the OT accounts was so deeply rooted in the mind and heart of man that only the revealed law could extirpate it, so in the NT man is a victim of folly until the Gospel dawns on him (Rom 2:20; Titus 3:3-5). The highest wisdom is revealed in the Gospel. Sinful man is so radically wrong in his relation to the moral world that he decries the Gospel as foolishness (1 Cor 1:21-25). Yet it is his only hope of becoming wise.