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Proverbs 23:4–5, King James Version
Italic words were supplied in the English translation for clarity.
Proverbs 23:4–5
Wealth, poverty, provision, and economic power — Labour not to be rich: cease from thine own wisdom
The chase after riches is told to stop, not to try harder
Do not labor to be rich; cease from your own wisdom. Will you set your eyes on that which is not? For riches certainly make themselves wings; they fly away as an eagle toward heaven.
The command is against making wealth the project of your life. Cease from your own wisdom means stop the clever plan that treats money as the thing that will finally make you safe. Wings and the eagle are the proverb's picture of how quickly a hoard can leave, not a forecast of every bank account.
Provision is still work; the target of the work is what changes
This line does not bless laziness, and it does not curse a household that needs wages. It refuses the restless campaign to become rich as if that were wisdom. What flies is the fortune you stared at as if it were solid ground.
Poverty is not a virtue prize, and sudden loss is not proof that someone loved money. The moral load sits on the labor that treats riches as the one necessary achievement.
How this should shape us
Work for enough. Do not spend your life hunting a pile that can grow wings. If money leaves, grieve the loss without calling the proverb a verdict on the sufferer.
Teach it back
Explain Proverbs 23:4–5 in your own words. Identify its form and collection, trace one line from role through contextual meaning and enduring truth to application, name one uncertainty, and reject one misuse explicitly.
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Go deeper
The explanation above is meant to stand on its own. Open these notes only if you want language, history, disagreements, or source locations.
Research trail and exact locationsThe source record behind this section
Supports: Exact displayed KJV words, canonical order, paragraph flags, supplied-word markup, and complete unit coverage.
Proverbs 23:4–5, repository-pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM-derived corpus
Supports: Masoretic Hebrew wording and morphology used only for the exact unit's lexical, grammatical, parallel, superscription, number-saying, and acrostic questions.
Open Scriptures MorphHB v2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Prov.xml, OSIS 23:4-23:5
Supports: Verse-attached textual, lexical, grammatical, syntactic, parallelism, and older-English controls for the exact range.
NET Bible Proverbs PDF, printed pp. 1152-1156, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 23:4–5
Supports: Whole-book and collection orientation, local commentary, social-setting proposals, and named interpretation limits.
Aitken, ‘Proverbs,’ Oxford Bible Commentary, printed pp. 405-422, subsection covering 23:4–5 and the Sayings of the wise outline
Supports: Abstract-level control for the dispute over individual-saying, small-cluster, and collection context; no uninspected detailed claim.
Weeks, ‘Context in the Sayings Collections,’ Early Israelite Wisdom (2000), official abstract and chapter pp. 20-40; methodological question applied to Proverbs 23:4–5
Supports: One historical-social account of poverty, wealth, interest, oppression, labor, and differing evaluations within the collection.
Wittenberg, ‘Situational context of statements concerning poverty and wealth,’ Scriptura 21, pp. 1-23, especially the sayings and redactional comparison relevant to Proverbs 23:4–5
Sources for This Section
These records identify the source, the claim it supports, and the exact location used. A source remains evidence to evaluate; it does not replace the biblical text.
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 23:4–5, 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 23:4-23:5
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. 1152-1156, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 23:4–5
Open source ↗modern critical commentary
Proverbs
K. T. Aitken
Oxford University Press, in The Oxford Bible Commentary, 2001
Supports: Whole-book and collection orientation, local commentary, social-setting proposals, and named interpretation limits.
Exact location: Aitken, ‘Proverbs,’ Oxford Bible Commentary, printed pp. 405-422, subsection covering 23:4–5 and the Sayings of the wise outline
Open source ↗scholarly monograph chapter abstract and metadata
Context in the Sayings Collections
Stuart Weeks
Oxford University Press, in Early Israelite Wisdom, 2000
Supports: Abstract-level control for the dispute over individual-saying, small-cluster, and collection context; no uninspected detailed claim.
Exact location: Weeks, ‘Context in the Sayings Collections,’ Early Israelite Wisdom (2000), official abstract and chapter pp. 20-40; methodological question applied to Proverbs 23:4–5
Open source ↗peer reviewed open access journal article
The situational context of statements concerning poverty and wealth in the Book of Proverbs
G. H. Wittenberg
Scriptura 21, 1987; open archive 2020
Supports: One historical-social account of poverty, wealth, interest, oppression, labor, and differing evaluations within the collection.
Exact location: Wittenberg, ‘Situational context of statements concerning poverty and wealth,’ Scriptura 21, pp. 1-23, especially the sayings and redactional comparison relevant to Proverbs 23:4–5
Open source ↗