I saw that it was overgrown with nettles. It was covered with weeds, and its walls were broken down.
Parallel translations
- WEB Behold, it was all grown over with thorns. Its surface was covered with nettles, and its stone wall was broken down.
- KJV And, lo, it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof was broken down.
- BSB Thorns had grown up everywhere, thistles had covered the ground, and the stone wall was broken down.
- NKJV And there it was, all overgrown with thorns; Its surface was covered with nettles; Its stone wall was broken down.
- NASB And behold, it was completely overgrown with weeds; Its surface was covered with weeds, And its stone wall was broken down.
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
The neglected field was overgrown with thorns and its wall broken down. Idleness produces visible ruin.
Overview
The thorns, nettles, and collapsed wall picture the inevitable decay that follows neglect, since what is not tended falls apart. Thorns recall the curse of the ground after the fall (Gen 3:18), portraying sloth as a surrender to disorder. The scene warns that spiritual and practical responsibilities, like a vineyard, require ongoing care.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Isa 5:5Now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away its hedge, and it will be eaten up. I will break down its wall, and it will be trampled down.
- Eccl 10:18By slothfulness the roof sinks in; and through idleness of the hands the house leaks.
- Matt 13:22What was sown among the thorns, this is he who hears the word, but the cares of this age and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.
- Jer 4:3For Yahweh says to the men of Judah and to Jerusalem, “Break up your fallow ground, and don’t sow among thorns.
- Prov 22:13The sluggard says, “There is a lion outside! I will be killed in the streets!”
- Prov 19:23The fear of Yahweh leads to life, then contentment; he rests and will not be touched by trouble.
- Prov 20:4The sluggard will not plow by reason of the winter; therefore he shall beg in harvest, and have nothing.
- Job 31:40let briers grow instead of wheat, and stinkweed instead of barley.” The words of Job are ended.
- Heb 6:8but if it bears thorns and thistles, it is rejected and near being cursed, whose end is to be burned.
- Gen 3:17–19To Adam he said, “Because you have listened to your wife’s voice, and ate from the tree, about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ the ground is cursed for your sake. You will eat from it with much labor all the days of your life.
- Matt 13:7Others fell among thorns. The thorns grew up and choked them.
- Prov 23:21for the drunkard and the glutton shall become poor; and drowsiness clothes them in rags.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 24:31 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.