People and actions are often presented in Proverbs in polar extremes—the wise and the foolish, the righteous and the wicked, and actions that lead to honour or shame. A key to understanding the wisdom of the book of Proverbs is to understand the “two ways.” This tendency to express the issues of life and concerns of society in two opposites was the result of factors discussed in this article: the constraints of Hebrew poetry, the nature of a proverb, the use of “way” or “path” as a metaphor for conduct or lifestyle, and finally the didactic purposes of the book.