For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence.
Parallel Translations
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For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence.
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For they eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of violence.
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For they eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of violence.
Cross-references (12)
Passages linked to Proverbs 4:17 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Psalms 14:4 Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and don’t call on Yahweh?
- Proverbs 9:17 “Stolen water is sweet. Food eaten in secret is pleasant.”
- Proverbs 20:17 Fraudulent food is sweet to a man, but afterwards his mouth is filled with gravel.
- Micah 6:12 Her rich men are full of violence, her inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their speech.
- James 5:4-5 Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you have kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of those who reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Armies. You have lived in luxury on the earth, and taken your pleasure. You have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter.
- Job 24:5-6 Behold, as wild donkeys in the desert, they go out to their work, seeking diligently for food. The wilderness yields them bread for their children. They cut their food in the field. They glean the vineyard of the wicked.
- Jeremiah 5:26-28 For wicked men are found among my people. They watch, as fowlers lie in wait. They set a trap. They catch men. As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit. Therefore they have become great, and grew rich. They have grown fat. They shine; yes, they excel in deeds of wickedness. They don’t plead the cause, the cause of the fatherless, that they may prosper; and they don’t defend the rights of the needy.
- Ezekiel 22:25-29 There is a conspiracy of her prophets within it, like a roaring lion ravening the prey. They have devoured souls. They take treasure and precious things. They have made many widows within it. Her priests have done violence to my law, and have profaned my holy things. They have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they caused men to discern between the unclean and the clean, and have hidden their eyes from my Sabbaths. So I am profaned among them. Her princes within it are like wolves ravening the prey, to shed blood, and to destroy souls, that they may get dishonest gain. Her prophets have plastered for them with whitewash, seeing false visions, and divining lies to them, saying, ‘The Lord Yahweh says,’ when Yahweh has not spoken. The people of the land have used oppression and exercised robbery. Yes, they have troubled the poor and needy, and have oppressed the foreigner wrongfully.
- Amos 8:4-6 Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail, Saying, ‘When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, that we may market wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel large, and dealing falsely with balances of deceit; that we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals, and sell the sweepings with the wheat?’ ”
- Micah 3:5 Yahweh says concerning the prophets who lead my people astray; for those who feed their teeth, they proclaim, “Peace!” and whoever doesn’t provide for their mouths, they prepare war against him:
- Zephaniah 3:3 Her princes within her are roaring lions. Her judges are evening wolves. They leave nothing until the next day.
- Matthew 23:13 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and as a pretense you make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (12 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Gotten by wicked means and cruel oppression.
Gotten by wicked means and cruel oppression.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Pro 4:17 For they eat the bread of wickedness,…
Pro 4:17 For they eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of violence.
Ver. 17. For they eat the bread of wickedness.] As Tartarians feed upon dead carcasses of horses, asses, cats, dogs, yea, when they stink, and are full of maggots, and hold them as dainty as we do venison. {a} As spiders feed upon aconite; {b} as Mithridates, and the maid in Pliny, upon spiders; or as the Turkish galley slaves upon opium - they will eat near an ounce at a time, as if it were bread (the tithe whereof would kill him that is not accustomed to it), and can neither sleep nor live without it.
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{a} Petcham’s Valley of Vanity.
{b} A genus of poisonous plants, belonging to the family Ranunculaceae. esp. the common European species Aconitum Napellus, called also Monk’s-hood and Wolf’s-bane. Also applied loosely or erroneously to other poisonous plants.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain They eat the bread of wickedness: the sense is…
They eat the bread of wickedness: the sense is either,
1. Wickedness is as necessary and as pleasant to them as their bread; which suits well with the former verse. Or,
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2. They live wholly upon what they get by wicked courses; which gives the reason of what he last said, why they could not sleep without prey.
The wine of violence, i.e. gotten by violence. See on the former clause.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain For they eat the bread of wickedness,.... Either that…
For they eat the bread of wickedness,.... Either that is gotten by wicked and unlawful means, or wickedness itself is bread unto them; it is that to their minds as bread is to their bodies; they feed upon it with as much eagerness, appetite, gust, and pleasure; it is a sweet morsel to them; it is meat, drink, sleep, and everything to them; they take the highest satisfaction and the utmost delight in it;
and drink the wine of violence: either that which is obtained by rapine and violence; or they as greedily commit such acts of oppression and injury as a man drinks a glass of wine; they do not drink up iniquity like water only, but even like wine, the most generous and delicious. Wherefore all society with such men should be avoided.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain For - Wickedness is as pleasant to them as…
For - Wickedness is as pleasant to them as their bread.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 17. For they eat the bread of wickedness]…
Verse 17. For they eat the bread of wickedness] By privately stealing.
And drink the wine of violence.] By highway robbery.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Wickedness. Acquired thereby, or they make sin their food,…
Wickedness. Acquired thereby, or they make sin their food, chap. xxvi. 6.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 17. Eat… bread of wickedness — The same sentiment…
17. Eat… bread of wickedness — The same sentiment in another form. They have as strong an appetite for wickedness and violence as for food and intoxicating drink. Bishop Patrick’s paraphrase is: “They live by robbery and spoil, having no other meat and drink but what is the fruit of rapine and violence, and not of their honest labours.”
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 17. This verse may be taken either (1) literally,…
17. This verse may be taken either (1) literally, they procure their bread and wine, get their living, by wickedness and violence, or (2) figuratively, wickedness and violence are to them as meat and drink. Comp. Job_15:16; Job_34:7; Joh_4:34.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (17) The bread of wickedness.—i.e., acquired by wickedness, as…
(17) The bread of wickedness.—i.e., acquired by wickedness, as (Pro_10:2) “treasures of wickedness.”
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain For (ki, equivalent to the Greek gar ) is…
For (ki, equivalent to the Greek gar ) is here explanatory. It serves not so much to introduce another independent statement, as one which accounts for the statement made in the preceding verse, that the wicked sleep not unless they have done mischief, i.e. it states the reason why they are so conditioned. There is no comparison expressed in the original, as the rendering adopted by Schultens and others implies, "For wickedness do they eat as bread, and violence do they drink as wine," which is evidently based on Job_15:16, "Which drinketh up iniquity like water," and Job_34:7, "Who drinketh up scorning like water." The literal rendering is, for they eat the bread of wickedness, and the wine of violence do they drink. The bread of wickedness (lekhem resha) is not bread which consists in wickedness, but bread which is obtained by wickedness, just as the wine of violence (yiyin khamasim) is not the wine which produces violence, but the wine that is procured by violent deep. Their support, what they eat and drink, is obtained by wickedness and injustice. They live by wrong. For such expressions as "the bread of wickedness" and "the wine of violence," cf. Deu_16:3, "the bread of affliction;" Psa_127:2, "the bread of sorrows;" and Amo_2:8, "the wine of the condemned." There is a charade of tense in the verbs, the first being perfect, "they have eaten," and the second future, "they shall drink," which Delitzsch explains as representing the twofold act first eating the bread, and then washing it down with wine.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 4:17 To eat . . . wickedness and drink…
4:17 To eat . . . wickedness and drink . . . violence means that those attributes are at the very center of someone’s life. Just as we eat and drink to stay alive, evil people sustain themselves by committing evil acts.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.