Verse Lens · Expanded explanation
Proverbs 23:21 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 21. 21For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags.
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Quick Meaning
This verse opens with “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty” and develops the line through “and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags”.
Wisdom here is a guided heart that refuses two paired hungers
This verse is one part of that explanation in Proverbs 23:19–21. The complete section carries the connected meaning and how it should shape life.
Read It With
- Proverbs 23:19–21
Read Proverbs 23:21 with 23:19–21. Read alone, “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and…” could turn a compressed observation, warning, comparison, or command into a guarantee or complete policy. The full unit establishes: contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in the way”; by 23:21, it opens with “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty” and develops the line through “and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags”. Together the unit concentrates on appetite, intoxication, desire, and self-government, family teaching, responsibility, and mutual care, wisdom, folly, teachability, and moral perception within “Sayings of the wise.”
Why This Verse Appears Here
Proverbs 23:19–21 continues “Reverent accountability before the LORD — Let not thine heart envy sinners: but be thou in the fear…” by carrying “Appetite, intoxication, desire, and self-government — Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in…” within the same sustained discourse, admonition, numbered form, or poem. Within that relationship, this verse opens with “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty” and develops the line through “and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags”.
Follow the Context
- Opening (23:19): the unit contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in the way”.
- Development (23:19–21): adjacent lines test appetite, intoxication, desire, and self-government, family teaching, responsibility, and mutual care, wisdom, folly, teachability, and moral perception through parallelism, contrast, motive, image, or consequence.
- Close (23:21): the unit opens with “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty” and develops the line through “and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags”, creating the next supported pause.
What This Verse Is Not Saying
Proverbs 23:21 does not allow “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and…” to become a universal promise, complete policy, diagnosis, insult, or authorization detached from Proverbs 23:19–21. The saying does not promise prosperity, blame sufferers or poor people, excuse predatory lending, or make wealth proof of divine approval.
What Remains True
Proverbs treats resources as morally consequential but never reduces wealth to virtue or poverty to personal failure. In Proverbs 23:21, that bounded truth is expressed through “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and…,” 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. Proverbs 23:21 names that responsibility through “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and…,” so the response must remain accountable to the person, action, comparison, or consequence in this line.
Teach It Back
Explain Proverbs 23:21's exact role in Proverbs 23:19–21. Distinguish pattern from guarantee, include “For the drunkard and the glutton shall…,” name one uncertainty, and explicitly reject one harmful use.
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Continue in Context
Read the complete section for the connected explanation and how it should shape life. This verse is a doorway into that passage, not a saying that stands alone.
Read Proverbs 23:19–21 — Appetite, intoxication, desire, and self-government — Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in…Sources used for this Verse Lens
How certain is this explanation? strong
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 23:19–21, 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 23:19-23:21
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 23:19–21
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 23:19–21 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 23:19–21
Open source ↗