Proverbs 30:18-31
English Standard Version
18 (A)Three things are (B)too wonderful for me;
(C)four I do not understand:
19 the way of an eagle in the sky,
the way of a serpent on a rock,
the way of a ship on the high seas,
and the way of a man with a virgin.
20 This is the way of an adulteress:
she eats and wipes her mouth
and says, “I have done no wrong.”
21 Under (D)three things (E)the earth trembles;
under (F)four it cannot bear up:
22 (G)a slave when he becomes king,
and a fool when he is (H)filled with food;
23 (I)an unloved woman when she (J)gets a husband,
and a maidservant when she displaces her mistress.
24 (K)Four things on earth are small,
but they are exceedingly wise:
25 (L)the ants are a people not strong,
yet they provide their food in the summer;
26 (M)the rock badgers are a people not mighty,
yet they make their homes in the cliffs;
27 the locusts have no (N)king,
yet all of them march in (O)rank;
28 the lizard you can take in your hands,
yet it is in kings' palaces.
29 (P)Three things are stately in their tread;
(Q)four are stately in their stride:
30 the lion, which is mightiest among beasts
and (R)does not turn back before any;
31 the (S)strutting rooster,[a] the he-goat,
and a king whose army is with him.[b]
Footnotes
- Proverbs 30:31 Or the magpie, or the greyhound; Hebrew girt-of-loins
- Proverbs 30:31 Or against whom there is no rising up
The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. ESV Text Edition: 2025.
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