Verse Lens · Concise explanation
Proverbs 24:15 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 15. 15Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the righteous; spoil not his resting place:
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Quick Meaning
This verse uses two-part parallelism to place “Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…” beside “spoil not his resting place”.
Read It With
- Proverbs 24:15–16
Read Proverbs 24:15 with 24:15–16. Read alone, “Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…” could turn a compressed observation, warning, comparison, or command into a guarantee or complete policy. The full unit establishes: uses two-part parallelism to place “Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…” beside “spoil not his resting place”; by 24:16, it uses contrastive parallelism to place “For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again” against “the wicked shall fall into mischief”. Together the unit concentrates on justice, truthful judgment, and protection from exploitation within “Sayings of the wise.”
Why This Verse Appears Here
Proverbs 24:15–16 contrasts with “Honey becomes an analogy for wisdom and future hope” by carrying “Justice, truthful judgment, and protection from exploitation — Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…” within the same sustained discourse, admonition, numbered form, or poem. Within that relationship, this verse uses two-part parallelism to place “Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…” beside “spoil not his resting place”.
What Remains True
Wisdom requires honest judgment and active regard for people who can be exploited, ignored, or misrepresented. In Proverbs 24:15, that bounded truth is expressed through “Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…,” not through a promise detached from its literary form.
How It Can Shape Life
- Use verifiable evidence, fair procedure, proportionate response, and meaningful access for the person with less power. Proverbs 24:15 names that responsibility through “Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…,” so the response must remain accountable to the person, action, comparison, or consequence in this line.
Continue in Context
The full thought-unit study remains the final contextual authority for this Verse Lens.
Read Proverbs 24:15–16 — Justice, truthful judgment, and protection from exploitation — Lay not wait, O wicked man, against the dwelling of the…Sources used for this Verse Lens
How certain is this explanation? probable
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 24:15–16, 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 24:15-24:16
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. 1156-1161, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 24:15–16
Open source ↗