Verse Lens · Concise explanation
Proverbs 18:20 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 20. 20A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth; and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled.
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Quick Meaning
This verse uses two-part parallelism to place “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his...” beside “and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled”.
Read It With
- Proverbs 18:17–20
Proverbs 18:20 belongs to “Friendship, neighbor-love, loyalty, and boundaries — He that is first in his own cause seemeth just; but his....” It uses two-part parallelism to place “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his...” beside “and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled”. Read the adjacent sayings and the collection heading before moving from observation to application.
Why This Verse Appears Here
This line follows the unit's earlier saying and prepares its later turn; it uses two-part parallelism to place “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his...” beside “and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled”. Its value is contextual rather than slogan-like.
Phrase-by-Phrase Explanation
“A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth;...”
In plain language: wealth, poverty, provision, and economic power
This verse uses two-part parallelism to place “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his...” beside “and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled”.
Why it matters: This wording gives the verse its distinct role inside the cluster.
How certain? strongWhat Remains True
Proverbs treats resources as morally consequential but never reduces wealth to virtue or poverty to personal failure. In Proverbs 18:20, that bounded truth is expressed through “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth;...,” not through a promise detached from its literary form.
How It Can Shape Life
- Examine how money was obtained, who bears the cost, whether basic needs are met, and how resources can serve justice and durable care. For Proverbs 18:20, preserve the sequence: verse role (uses two-part parallelism to place “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his...” beside “and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled”) -> contextual meaning in Proverbs 18:17–20 -> proportionate truth -> this accountable response.
Continue in Context
The full thought-unit study remains the final contextual authority for this Verse Lens.
Read Proverbs 18:17–20 — Friendship, neighbor-love, loyalty, and boundaries — He that is first in his own cause seemeth just; but his...Sources used for this Verse Lens
How certain is this explanation? strong
Where care is needed
This sentence saying states a context-shaped moral pattern. Its small-cluster boundary and degree of generality remain reviewable; exceptional outcomes do not make the observation meaningless or turn it into a guarantee.
These are the sources used directly for this lens. Language, grammar, disagreements, and the complete source shelf remain attached to the full thought-unit research record.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact displayed KJV words, canonical order, paragraph flags, supplied-word markup, and complete unit coverage.
Exact location: Proverbs 18:17–20, repository-pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM-derived corpus
Open source ↗hebrew text and morphology
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible: Proverbs
Open Scriptures
Open Scriptures, release 2.2
Supports: Masoretic Hebrew wording and morphology used only for the exact unit's lexical, grammatical, parallel, superscription, number-saying, and acrostic questions.
Exact location: Open Scriptures MorphHB v2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Prov.xml, OSIS 18:17-18:20
Open source ↗translation and translator notes
NET Bible: Proverbs with translators' notes
Biblical Studies Press
Biblical Studies Press, 2006
Supports: Verse-attached textual, lexical, grammatical, syntactic, parallelism, and older-English controls for the exact range.
Exact location: NET Bible Proverbs PDF, printed pp. 1133-1136, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 18:17–20
Open source ↗