Bible Strands
Isaiah 5:21
Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The prophet Isaiah pronounces this oracle to Judah amid a series of judgments, positioned directly between warnings against moral inversion and condemnation of drunken excess.
The words — The verse hinges on חֲכָמִים (chachamim, "wise") and נְבֹנִים (nevonim, "discerning"), both qualified by בְּעֵינֵיהֶם (be'eineihem, "in their own eyes") and נֶגֶד פְּנֵיהֶם (neged pneihem, "before their own faces") to denote self-referential evaluation.
The thread — The text explicitly warns against self-deceived wisdom, a theme that resurfaces in Proverbs 3:7 as a command to fear the Lord, and is echoed in 1 Corinthians 3:18 and Romans 12:16 to caution against conceit.
Why it lands — The passage requires readers to measure their confidence against divine authority rather than personal perception, demanding the abandonment of intellectual pride.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!
Cross-references
- 1 Corinthians 3:18 Let no one deceive himself. If any of you thinks he is wise in this age, he should become a fool, so that he may become wise.
- Proverbs 3:7 Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and turn away from evil.
- Romans 12:16 Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but associate with the lowly. Do not be conceited.
- Proverbs 26:12 Do you see a man who is wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.
- Proverbs 26:16 The slacker is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who answer discreetly.
- Job 11:12 But a witless man can no more become wise than the colt of a wild donkey can be born a man!
- John 9:41 “If you were blind,” Jesus replied, “you would not be guilty of sin. But since you claim you can see, your guilt remains.”
- Romans 1:22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools,
- Romans 11:25 I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you will not be conceited: A hardening in part has come to Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles has come in.