Verse Lens · Expanded explanation
Proverbs 6:33 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 33. 33A wound and dishonour shall he get; and his reproach shall not be wiped away.
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Quick Meaning
This verse uses two-part parallelism to place “A wound and dishonour shall he get” beside “and his reproach shall not be wiped away”.
Read It With
- Proverbs 6:20–35
Follow Proverbs 6:20–35, not verse 6:33 alone. This line uses two-part parallelism to place “A wound and dishonour shall he get” beside “and his reproach shall not be wiped away”, while the complete unit distinguishes a normal moral direction from a guaranteed outcome.
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 wound and dishonour shall he get” beside “and his reproach shall not be wiped away”. Its value is contextual rather than slogan-like.
Follow the Context
- Opening (6:20): the unit contributes the claim, image, or instruction “My son, keep thy father’s commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother”.
- Development (6:20–35): adjacent lines test gendered imagery, sexual fidelity, consent, and household agency, instruction, correction, and formation, family teaching, responsibility, and mutual care through parallelism, contrast, motive, image, or consequence.
- Close (6:35): the unit uses two-part parallelism to place “He will not regard any ransom” beside “neither will he rest content, though thou givest many...”, creating the next supported pause.
Phrase-by-Phrase Explanation
“A wound and dishonour shall he get; and his reproach shall not...”
In plain language: humility, teachability, pride, and reputation
This verse uses two-part parallelism to place “A wound and dishonour shall he get” beside “and his reproach shall not be wiped away”.
Why it matters: This wording carries interpretive, pastoral, or misuse risk requiring the full unit and explicit limits.
How certain? strongWhat This Verse Is Not Saying
The saying does not justify humiliation, low self-worth, social erasure, or demanding submission from someone with less power.
What Remains True
Teachability and truthful self-knowledge are safer than status-protection, self-exaltation, or contempt for correction. In Proverbs 6:33, that bounded truth is expressed through “A wound and dishonour shall he get; and his reproach shall not...,” not through a promise detached from its literary form.
How It Can Shape Life
- Invite specific feedback, test your assumptions, share credit, and repair the effects of pride rather than performing modesty. For Proverbs 6:33, preserve the sequence: verse role (uses two-part parallelism to place “A wound and dishonour shall he get” beside “and his reproach shall not be wiped away”) -> contextual meaning in Proverbs 6:20–35 -> proportionate truth -> this accountable response.
Teach It Back
Explain Proverbs 6:33's exact role in Proverbs 6:20–35. Distinguish pattern from guarantee, include “A wound and dishonour shall he get; 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 6:20–35 — Parental instruction exposes adultery's costSources used for this Verse Lens
How certain is this explanation? probable
Where care is needed
The verse belongs to a larger speech, instruction, prayer, number saying, or poem; its voice and complete literary movement control how strongly an isolated line may be stated.
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 6:20–35, 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 6:20-6:35
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. 1093-1096, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 6:20–35
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 6:20–35 and the Purpose, parental discourses, and the rival invitations of Wisdom and Folly outline
Open source ↗peer reviewed journal article
Wisdom and Folly in the city: exploring urban contexts in the book of Proverbs
Katharine J. Dell
Scottish Journal of Theology 69.4, 2016
Supports: One tested account of urban imagery and continuity across the book without inferring one composition setting.
Exact location: Dell, ‘Wisdom and Folly in the city,’ SJT 69.4 (2016), pp. 389-401, sections on maxims, social indicators, Proverbs 1-9, and conclusion relevant to Proverbs 6:20–35
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 6:20–35
Open source ↗peer reviewed open access journal article
Reading selected biblical proverbs in the light of corporal punishment in child upbringing
Helen C. Chukwuma
HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 81.1, 2025
Supports: Literal, metaphorical, ancient-practice, modern-effect, and positive-discipline review without erasing the ancient physical wording.
Exact location: Chukwuma, HTS 81.1 (2025), pp. 3-5 on Proverbs 13:24; 22:15; 23:13-14 and pp. 5-7 on positive discipline and safeguarding, as relevant to Proverbs 6:20–35
Open source ↗