A partner to a thief hates his own soul; he receives the oath, but does not testify.
Parallel translations
- WEB Whoever is an accomplice of a thief is an enemy of his own soul. He takes an oath, but dares not testify.
- KJV Whoso is partner with a thief hateth his own soul: he heareth cursing, and bewrayeth it not.
- NKJV Whoever is a partner with a thief hates his own life; He swears to tell the truth, but reveals nothing.
- NASB One who is a partner with a thief hates his own life; He hears the oath but tells nothing.
- NLT If you assist a thief, you only hurt yourself. You are sworn to tell the truth, but you dare not testify.
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
Partnering with a thief is self-destructive; bound by oath, the accomplice dares not testify and ruins himself.
Overview
The accomplice shares the criminal's guilt and is trapped: an oath of silence, or the fear of self-incrimination under a public charge, keeps him from telling the truth. Such complicity hates one's own soul, entangling a person in another's sin and its judgment. The verse urges integrity and warns that shared guilt brings shared ruin, pointing to the need for a clean conscience that only Christ can give.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Lev 5:1“If someone sins by failing to testify when he hears a public charge about something he has witnessed, whether he has seen it or learned of it, he shall bear the iniquity.
- Prov 8:36But he who fails to find me harms himself; all who hate me love death.”
- Prov 1:11–19If they say, “Come along, let us lie in wait for blood, let us ambush the innocent without cause,
- Ps 50:18–22When you see a thief, you befriend him, and throw in your lot with adulterers.
- Isa 1:23Your rulers are rebels, friends of thieves. They all love bribes and chasing after rewards. They do not defend the fatherless, and the plea of the widow never comes before them.
- Prov 15:32He who ignores discipline despises himself, but whoever heeds correction gains understanding.
- Judg 17:2said to his mother, “The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were taken from you and about which I heard you utter a curse—I have the silver here with me; I took it.” Then his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the LORD!”
- Prov 6:32He who commits adultery lacks judgment; whoever does so destroys himself.
- Mark 11:17Then Jesus began to teach them, and He declared, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it ‘a den of robbers.’”
- Prov 20:2The terror of a king is like the roar of a lion; whoever provokes him forfeits his own life.
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 29:24 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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