Is it not from the mouth of the Most High That both adversity and good proceed?
Parallel translations
- WEB Doesn’t evil and good come out of the mouth of the Most High?
- KJV Out of the mouth of the most High proceedeth not evil and good?
- BSB Do not both adversity and good come from the mouth of the Most High?
- NKJV Is it not from the mouth of the Most High That woe and well-being proceed?
- NLT Does not the Most High send both calamity and good?
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Both calamity and blessing come ultimately from God's sovereign hand.
Overview
The verse affirms that God governs both 'evil' (calamity, adversity) and 'good,' so that nothing falls outside His rule. This is not to make God the author of moral evil, but to assert His total sovereignty over circumstances (Isa. 45:7; Job 2:10). Such truth calls the sufferer to humble submission rather than complaint.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Isa 45:7I form the light, and create darkness. I make peace, and create calamity. I am Yahweh, who does all these things.
- Amos 3:6Does the trumpet alarm sound in a city, without the people being afraid? Does evil happen to a city, and Yahweh hasn’t done it?
- Jer 32:42For Yahweh says: “Like as I have brought all this great evil on this people, so will I bring on them all the good that I have promised them.
- Job 2:10But he said to her, “You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” In all this Job didn’t sin with his lips.
- Ps 75:7But God is the judge. He puts down one, and lifts up another.
- Prov 29:26Many seek the ruler’s favor, but a man’s justice comes from Yahweh.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The weeping over a ruined city and the steadfast mercies that are new every morning point to the man of sorrows who wept over Jerusalem and whose mercy rises new from the grave.
How Lamentations 3:38 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.