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A false witness[a] will not go unpunished,
and the one who spouts out[b] lies will not escape punishment.[c]

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Footnotes

  1. Proverbs 19:5 tn Heb “a witness of lies.” This expression is an attributive genitive: “a lying witness” (cf. CEV “dishonest witnesses”). This is paralleled by “the one who pours out lies.”
  2. Proverbs 19:5 tn Heb “breathes out”; NAB “utters”; NIV “pours out.”
  3. Proverbs 19:5 tn Heb “will not escape” (so NAB, NASB); NIV “will not go free.” Here “punishment” is implied, and has been supplied in the translation for clarity. sn This proverb is a general statement, because on occasion there are false witnesses who go unpunished in this life (e.g., Prov 6:19; 14:5, 25; 19:9). The Talmud affirms, “False witnesses are contemptible even to those who hire them” (b. Sanhedrin 29b).

A false witness will not go unpunished,
and the one who spouts out[a] lies will perish.[b]

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Footnotes

  1. Proverbs 19:9 tn Heb “breathes out”; NAB “utters”; NIV “pours out.”
  2. Proverbs 19:9 sn The verse is the same as v. 5, except that the last word changes to the verb “will perish” (cf. NCV “will die”; CEV, NLT “will be destroyed”; TEV “is doomed”).

22 What is desirable[a] for a person is to show loyal love,[b]
and a poor person is better than a liar.[c]

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Footnotes

  1. Proverbs 19:22 tn Heb “the desire of a man” (so KJV). The noun in construct is תַּאֲוַת (taʾavat), “desire [of].” Here it refers to “the desire of a man [= person].” Two problems surface here, the connotation of the word and the kind of genitive. “Desire” can also be translated “lust,” and so J. H. Greenstone has “The lust of a man is his shame” (Proverbs, 208). But the sentence is more likely positive in view of the more common uses of the words. “Man” could be a genitive of possession or subjective genitive—the man desires loyal love. It could also be an objective genitive, meaning “what is desired for a man.” The first would be the more natural in the proverb, which is showing that loyal love is better than wealth.
  2. Proverbs 19:22 tn Heb “[is] his loyal love”; NIV “unfailing love”; NRSV “loyalty.”
  3. Proverbs 19:22 sn The second half of the proverb presents the logical inference: The liar would be without “loyal love” entirely, and so poverty would be better than this. A poor person who wishes to do better is preferable to a person who makes promises and does not keep them.

28 A crooked witness[a] scorns justice,
and the mouth of the wicked devours[b] iniquity.

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Footnotes

  1. Proverbs 19:28 tn Heb “a witness who is worthless and wicked” (עֵד בְּלִיַּעַל, ʿed beliyyaʿal). Cf. KJV “an ungodly witness”; NAB “an unprincipled witness”; NCV “an evil witness”; NASB “a rascally witness.”sn These are crooked or corrupt witnesses who willfully distort the facts and make a mockery of the whole legal process.
  2. Proverbs 19:28 tn The parallel line says the mouth of the wicked “gulps down” or “swallows” (יְבַלַּע, yevallaʿ) iniquity. The verb does not seem to fit the line (or the proverb) very well. Some have emended the text to יַבִּיעַ (yabbiaʿ, “gushes”) as in 15:28 (cf. NAB “pours out”). Driver followed an Arabic balaga to get “enunciates,” which works well with the idea of a false witness (W. McKane, Proverbs [OTL], 529). As it stands, however, the line indicates that in what he says the wicked person accepts evil—and that could describe a false witness.