Bible Strands
Proverbs 20:26
A wise king separates out the wicked and drives the threshing wheel over them.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The wisdom writer addresses a governing authority, contrasting the danger of rash vows with the ruler’s duty to purify the community.
The words — מֶלֶךְ (Me.lekh) means “a king,” and מְזָרֶ֣ה (me.za.Reh) translates “[is] winnowing,” describing the agricultural process of separating grain from chaff.
The thread — The same judicial imagery appears in Proverbs 20:8, where a king on a throne sifts out evil, and aligns with the enforced labor and judgment in 2 Samuel 12:31.
Why it lands — It requires leaders to actively identify and remove corrupt elements, treating governance as a decisive separation rather than a passive administration.
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
A wise king scattereth the wicked, and bringeth the wheel over them.
Cross-references
- Proverbs 20:8 A king who sits on a throne to judge sifts out all evil with his eyes.
- 2 Samuel 12:31 David brought out the people who were there and put them to work with saws, iron picks, and axes, and he made them work at the brick kilns. He did the same to all the Ammonite cities. Then David and all his troops returned to Jerusalem.
- 2 Samuel 4:9 But David answered Rechab and his brother Baanah, the sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, “As surely as the LORD lives, who has redeemed my life from all distress,
- Psalms 101:5 Whoever slanders his neighbor in secret, I will put to silence; the one with haughty eyes and a proud heart, I will not endure.
- Isaiah 28:27 Surely caraway is not threshed with a sledge, and the wheel of a cart is not rolled over the cumin. But caraway is beaten out with a stick, and cumin with a rod.