¶When our sons in their youth are like growing plants, And our daughters like corner pillars fashioned for a palace,
Parallel translations
- WEB Then our sons will be like well-nurtured plants, our daughters like pillars carved to adorn a palace.
- KJV That our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth; that our daughters may be as corner stones, polished after the similitude of a palace:
- BSB Then our sons will be like plants nurtured in their youth, our daughters like corner pillars carved to adorn a palace.
- NKJV That our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth; That our daughters may be as pillars, Sculptured in palace style;
- NLT May our sons flourish in their youth like well-nurtured plants. May our daughters be like graceful pillars, carved to beautify a palace.
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
David envisions sons like flourishing plants and daughters like carved palace pillars. It pictures the blessing of a thriving, godly community.
Overview
Turning to the fruit of deliverance, David imagines a blessed society with healthy, well-formed children, sons and daughters strong and beautiful. This depicts the wholeness God's salvation brings to families and nations. Such flourishing foreshadows the abundant life and fruitfulness found in Christ's kingdom (John 15:5).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Ps 128:3Your wife will be as a fruitful vine, in the innermost parts of your house; your children like olive plants, around your table.
- 1 Pet 3:3–6Let your beauty be not just the outward adorning of braiding the hair, and of wearing jewels of gold, or of putting on fine clothing;
- Isa 44:3–5For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, and streams on the dry ground. I will pour my Spirit on your descendants, and my blessing on your offspring:
- Ps 115:14–15May Yahweh increase you more and more, you and your children.
- Job 42:15In all the land were no women found so beautiful as the daughters of Job. Their father gave them an inheritance among their brothers.
- Song 8:8–9We have a little sister. She has no breasts. What shall we do for our sister in the day when she is to be spoken for?
- Lam 4:2The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, How are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!
- Ps 127:4–5As arrows in the hand of a mighty man, so are the children of youth.
- Isa 3:16–24Moreover Yahweh said, “Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with outstretched necks and flirting eyes, walking to trip as they go, jingling ornaments on their feet;
- Prov 31:10–27Who can find a worthy woman? For her price is far above rubies.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 144:12 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.