Bible Strands
Proverbs 10:15
The wealth of the rich man is his fortified city, but poverty is the ruin of the poor.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The author addresses a general audience within a collection of antithetical proverbs contrasting the practical outcomes of wisdom and folly.
The words — קִרְיַת עֻזּוֹ (kir.Yat u.Z/o) = fortified city/strength; מְחִתַּת דַּלִּים (me.chi.Tat da.Lim) = ruin of the poor.
The thread — Proverbs 18:11 repeats the fortified city metaphor for wealth. Proverbs 19:7 documents the social isolation of poverty. Psalms 52:7 contrasts trusting in material abundance with trusting in God.
Why it lands — The text observes that wealth functions as a perceived defense for the rich while poverty operates as a destructive force for the poor. It demands a reader evaluate whether to trust in material security or recognize its limits.
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
The rich man’s wealth is his strong city: the destruction of the poor is their poverty.
Cross-references
- Proverbs 18:11 A rich man’s wealth is his fortified city; it is like a high wall in his imagination.
- Proverbs 19:7 All the brothers of a poor man hate him—how much more do his friends avoid him! He may pursue them with pleading, but they are nowhere to be found.
- Psalms 52:7 “Look at the man who did not make God his refuge, but trusted in the abundance of his wealth and strengthened himself by destruction.”
- Proverbs 14:20 The poor man is hated even by his neighbor, but many are those who love the rich.
- Proverbs 22:22 Do not rob a poor man because he is poor, and do not crush the afflicted at the gate,
- Ecclesiastes 7:12 For wisdom, like money, is a shelter, and the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of its owner.
- Job 31:24 If I have put my trust in gold or called pure gold my security,
- Psalms 49:6 They trust in their wealth and boast in their great riches.
- Jeremiah 9:23 This is what the LORD says: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, nor the strong man in his strength, nor the wealthy man in his riches.
- Micah 2:1 Woe to those who devise iniquity and plot evil on their beds! At morning’s light they accomplish it because the power is in their hands.