What Does Proverbs 24:10 Mean in the King James?
If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.
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 Hebrew “faint” is הִתְרַפִּיתָ (hitrapita, “you slacken or let drop”), while “adversity” is צָרָה (tsarah, “distress” in the image of narrowness): dropped hands meet a narrowing day.
THE MEANING
When a day of distress narrows around you, your response reveals the measure of strength available in that moment. The verse names that limit plainly: your strength is small.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that the hard day alone accounts for fainting: the verse names the strength present within that day as small.
THE ROOT
הִתְרַפִּיתָ
hitrapita
GROWS FROM
רפה
raphah
To slacken, loosen, or let drop; release.
The word rendered “faint” carries the image of slackening or letting go. Its root also appears in a command to “be still,” so the same loosening can describe collapse under pressure or release of a grip.
ALSO GROWS
harpu: Release; “be still” (Psalm 46:10).
הַרְפּוּ
The same root shows that “faint” involves slackening, though the Psalm uses that loosening as a call to release.
yirpu: They slacken; their hands grow weak (2 Chronicles 15:7).
יִרְפּוּ
This form makes the dropped-hands image explicit, bringing the verse’s hidden physical picture into view.
צָרָה
tsarah
GROWS FROM
צרר
tsarar
To bind, press, or make narrow.
English “adversity” sounds like an event; צָרָה (tsarah, “distress”) carries the image of being pressed into a narrow place. The verse sets slackening against constriction: the hands loosen as the day presses in.
ALSO GROWS
tsar: Narrow, tight, constricted.
צַר
This branch reveals the spatial image inside the word for distress: adversity is a narrowing.
metzar: A narrow place or strait; distress (Psalm 118:5).
מֵצַר
The Psalm uses this related word for distress, preserving the sense of being pressed into a narrow place.
THE PATTERN
Pressure reveals the measure of human strength, while scripture holds weakness open to strength beyond the self.
He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.THE THREAD
Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.The verb behind “faint” is הִתְרַפִּיתָ (hitrapita, “you slacken”), from רפה (raphah, “slacken or release”). Psalm 46:10 uses the same root in הַרְפּוּ (harpu, “release,” rendered “Be still”): the root can name slackening under pressure here and release in the Psalm.
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