How long will you lie there, O slacker? When will you get up from your sleep?
Parallel translations
- WEB How long will you sleep, sluggard? When will you arise out of your sleep?
- KJV How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep?
- NKJV How long will you slumber, O sluggard? When will you rise from your sleep?
- NASB How long will you lie down, you lazy one? When will you arise from your sleep?
- NLT But you, lazybones, how long will you sleep? When will you wake up?
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 father confronts the sluggard's endless drowsiness with a pointed question. Laziness must be roused to action.
Overview
With a sharp rhetorical question, Solomon calls the sluggard to wake from his habitual rest. The repetition exposes how laziness lulls a person into delay and inaction. The verse presses the reader to honest self-examination about wasted time and unused opportunity.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Prov 24:33–34A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest,
- Ps 94:8Take notice, O senseless among the people! O fools, when will you be wise?
- Jer 4:14Wash the evil from your heart, O Jerusalem, so that you may be saved. How long will you harbor wicked thoughts within you?
- Eph 5:14So it is said: “Wake up, O sleeper, rise up from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
- Prov 1:22“How long, O simple ones, will you love your simple ways? How long will scoffers delight in their scorn and fools hate knowledge?
- 1 Th 5:2–7For you are fully aware that the Day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.
- Rom 13:11And do this, understanding the occasion. The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, for our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed.
- John 1:6There came a man who was sent from God. His name was John.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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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 6:9 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.