In the end it bites like a snake and stings like a viper.
Parallel translations
- WEB In the end, it bites like a snake, and poisons like a viper.
- KJV At the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder.
- NKJV At the last it bites like a serpent, And stings like a viper.
- NASB In the end it bites like a snake And stings like a viper.
- NLT For in the end it bites like a poisonous snake; it stings like a viper.
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
In the end, wine bites and poisons like a venomous snake.
Overview
The smooth pleasure of drink finally turns deadly, striking like a serpent. The contrast between wine's inviting appearance and its venomous end is the heart of the warning. Sin generally works this way, promising delight but delivering death, which is why Scripture urges fleeing its first allurements (James 1:14-15).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 14
- Isa 28:7–8These also stagger from wine and stumble from strong drink: Priests and prophets reel from strong drink and are befuddled by wine. They stumble because of strong drink, muddled in their visions and stumbling in their judgments.
- Luke 16:25–26But Abraham answered, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things. But now he is comforted here, while you are in agony.
- Isa 28:3The majestic crown of Ephraim’s drunkards will be trampled underfoot.
- Jer 8:17“For behold, I will send snakes among you, vipers that cannot be charmed, and they will bite you,” declares the LORD.
- Prov 5:11At the end of your life you will groan when your flesh and your body are spent,
- Isa 59:5They hatch the eggs of vipers and weave a spider’s web. Whoever eats their eggs will die; crack one open, and a viper is hatched.
- Eccl 10:8He who digs a pit may fall into it, and he who breaches a wall may be bitten by a snake.
- Job 20:16He will suck the poison of cobras; the fangs of a viper will kill him.
- Amos 9:3Though they hide themselves atop Carmel, there I will track them and seize them; and though they hide from Me at the bottom of the sea, there I will command the serpent to bite them.
- Amos 5:19It will be like a man who flees from a lion, only to encounter a bear, or who enters his house and rests his hand against the wall, only to be bitten by a snake.
- Exod 7:12Each one threw down his staff, and it became a serpent. But Aaron’s staff swallowed up the other staffs.
- Rom 6:21What fruit did you reap at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? The outcome of those things is death.
- Exod 7:5–6And the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD, when I stretch out My hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out from among them.”
- Jer 5:31The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority. My people love it so, but what will you do in the end?
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Christ at the center
Wisdom personified, with God before creation and the agent of all things, anticipates Christ 'in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom' — the wisdom of God made flesh.
How Proverbs 23:32 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
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