Verse Lens · Expanded explanation
Proverbs 27:16 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 16. 16Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself.
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Quick Meaning
This verse contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself”.
Read It With
- Proverbs 27:15–16
Read Proverbs 27:16 inside Proverbs 27:15–16: it contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself”. The unit then locates that line within gendered imagery, sexual fidelity, consent, and household agency rather than treating it as a free-standing formula.
Why This Verse Appears Here
This line follows the unit's earlier saying and prepares its later turn; it contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself”. Its value is contextual rather than slogan-like.
Follow the Context
- Opening (27:15): the unit contributes the claim, image, or instruction “A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike”.
- Development (27:15–16): adjacent lines test gendered imagery, sexual fidelity, consent, and household agency through parallelism, contrast, motive, image, or consequence.
- Close (27:16): the unit contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself”, creating the next supported pause.
Phrase-by-Phrase Explanation
“Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his...”
In plain language: gendered imagery, sexual fidelity, consent, and household agency
This verse contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself”.
Why it matters: This wording carries interpretive, pastoral, or misuse risk requiring the full unit and explicit limits.
How certain? probableWhat This Verse Is Not Saying
The verse does not command controlling, confining, silencing, or exposing a spouse, and it does not excuse domestic abuse.
What Remains True
The gendered sayings address fidelity, desire, agency, speech, and household life within an androcentric ancient setting; they must not be generalized into contempt for women. In Proverbs 27:16, that bounded truth is expressed through “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his...,” not through a promise detached from its literary form.
How It Can Shape Life
- Practice consent, mutual fidelity, truthful boundaries, economic respect, and accountability for the person who holds greater social power. For Proverbs 27:16, preserve the sequence: verse role (contributes the claim, image, or instruction “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and the ointment of his right hand, which bewrayeth itself”) -> contextual meaning in Proverbs 27:15–16 -> proportionate truth -> this accountable response.
Teach It Back
Explain Proverbs 27:16's exact role in Proverbs 27:15–16. Distinguish pattern from guarantee, include “Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind, and...,” name one uncertainty, and explicitly reject one harmful use.
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Continue in Context
The full thought-unit study remains the final contextual authority for this Verse Lens.
Read Proverbs 27:15–16 — Gendered imagery, sexual fidelity, consent, and household agency — A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a...Sources used for this Verse Lens
How certain is this explanation? probable
Where care is needed
Wind and perfumed-oil imagery continues the preceding comparison: coercive concealment cannot resolve entrenched contention. The Hebrew and exact force of the oil image are difficult.
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 27:15–16, 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 27:15-27:16
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. 1168-1171, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 27:15–16
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 27:15–16 and the Solomonic sayings copied by Hezekiah's men 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 27:15–16
Open source ↗open access doctoral thesis
Wisdom, strange or somewhere in between: in search of a real woman in the Book of Proverbs
Jeanette May Hartwell
University of Birmingham, 2017
Supports: Feminist and literary review of Wisdom, Folly, Strange Woman, mothers, wives, women in sentence sayings, and the closing woman of strength.
Exact location: Hartwell, Wisdom, strange or somewhere in between (Birmingham PhD, 2017), pp. 13-25, 132-171, 172-204, 205-244, and 245-260 as relevant to the gendered figures and sayings in Proverbs 27:15–16
Open source ↗