What Does Proverbs 22:10 Mean in the King James?
Cast out the scorner, and contention shall go out; yea, strife and reproach shall cease.
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
The verse treats contention as something that can leave with the person who keeps it alive.
THE MEANING
When contempt sustains the quarrel, the scorner’s departure takes contention with it, and strife and reproach cease. The verse describes how removing that presence changes what can continue in the shared space.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the belief that harmony can return while contempt keeps the quarrel alive.
THE ROOT
גָּרֵשׁ
gārēš
GROWS FROM
גרש
gimel
To drive out or expel.
“Cast out” in this verse is gārēš. This root carries the force of expulsion: the scorner is sent out of the shared space. The verse then says contention itself goes out, linking the person’s removal with the quarrel’s departure.
ALSO GROWS
gerushah: A divorced woman; one sent away from a marriage.
גְּרוּשָׁה
The same root describes a formal separation, showing how sharply it can mark someone’s departure from a shared bond.
vegerashtiv: “And I will drive him out.”
וְגֵרַשְׁתִּיו
This form in Exodus 23:31 keeps the root’s concrete force of driving someone from a place.
יֵצֵא
yēṣēʾ
GROWS FROM
יצא
yod
To go out, come forth, or emerge.
“shall go out” in this verse is yēṣēʾ. The verse uses an exit image twice: first for the scorner being cast out, then for contention going out. The dispute is pictured as something that can leave the room along with the person sustaining it.
ALSO GROWS
yetzi’ah: Departure or going out.
יְצִיאָה
This noun makes the verse’s repeated movement outward visible: both the scorner and the contention depart.
motsa: An outlet, issue, or way out.
מוֹצָא
The root can name an outlet; here, the scorner’s departure opens an exit for the contention too.
יִשְׁבֹּת
yishbōt
GROWS FROM
שבת
shin
To cease or rest.
“shall cease” in this verse is yishbōt. The verse ends not with strife being defeated in a contest, but with it ceasing. This root also gives the word for Sabbath, joining the end of contention with the idea of rest.
ALSO GROWS
Shabbat: Sabbath; a day of cessation and rest.
שַׁבָּת
Its shared root lets the verse’s ending resonate with rest after strife stops.
shevitah: Cessation or stoppage.
שְׁבִיתָה
This form names the stopping itself, like the verse’s final movement from contention into quiet.
THE PATTERN
When the source or fuel of strife leaves the shared space, the strife loses its means to continue.
Where no wood is, there the fire goeth out: so where there is no talebearer, the strife ceaseth.Is not the whole land before thee? separate thyself, I pray thee, from me: if thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left.But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.THE THREAD
So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.“Drove out” translates the same Hebrew root, גרש (garash), as “cast out” here. The root connects the scorner’s expulsion with a much larger image of being sent beyond a boundary.
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