What Does Proverbs 13:16 Mean in the King James?
Every prudent man dealeth with knowledge: but a fool layeth open his folly.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
Wisdom shows itself in knowledge shaping your actions, while folly gives itself away by spilling into the open.
THE MEANING
What you truly know takes form in how you act. The word behind “knowledge” carries the sense of knowing by encounter, so this is more than collecting facts. Your conduct reveals what is working within you.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that wisdom is merely having the right information: the verse locates prudence in what knowledge does through you.
THE ROOT
דַּעַת
daʿat
GROWS FROM
ידע
To know or perceive through encounter.
Daʿat comes from yada, knowing through encounter. The prudent person acts within that knowing, while the fool’s folly spreads outward: knowledge takes shape in action, and folly makes itself visible.
ALSO GROWS
yādaʿ: To know, perceive, or recognize.
יָדַע
This verb is the seed beneath “knowledge”; it points to knowing that comes through encounter, not information alone.
yōdēaʿ: One who knows or perceives.
יֹדֵעַ
This form names the person who knows, linking the verse’s knowledge to the way a person acts.
עָרוּם
ʿārûm
GROWS FROM
ערם
ʿ-r-m
To be shrewd or crafty; to act with acuity.
The word for “prudent” shares its consonants with עָרוֹם (ʿārôm, naked or exposed), an echo also heard between the words in Genesis 2:25–3:1. Here that echo meets the fool who lays folly bare: the verse holds acuity and exposure side by side.
ALSO GROWS
ʿormāh: Shrewdness or craftiness.
עָרְמָה
This noun names the acuity behind the prudent person’s measured action.
ʿărummîm: Prudent or shrewd ones; the plural form of עָרוּם (ʿārûm).
עֲרֻמִּים
The plural carries the same quality of acuity into a description of people.
THE PATTERN
What governs a person within becomes visible in speech and action.
The tongue of the wise useth knowledge aright: but the mouth of fools poureth out foolishness.A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom.THE THREAD
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.Hosea repeats daʿat, the same Hebrew word for “knowledge” used here, from the root yada, to know or perceive through encounter. Together, the verses show that knowing is not a neutral store of information: it carries consequences in the life that follows.
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