What Does Proverbs 16:13 Mean?
Lips of alignment are the delight of kings, and they love the one who speaks straight.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Righteous lips are the delight of kings; and they love him that speaketh right.THE KEY
The verse makes royal favor a response to speech that holds its line with justice.
THE MEANING
When words stay aligned with what is just and straight, they become a delight even to those who hold power. The verse places love in the speaker whose words do not bend away from that line.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that truthful speech has no welcome near power: aligned lips are named as a king’s delight.
THE ROOT
צֶדֶק
tsedeq
GROWS FROM
צדק
Justice, rightness, alignment with what is due.
“of alignment” in this verse is tsedeq. The lips are described not simply as morally good but as aligned. English can make “righteous” sound like a private virtue; the Hebrew brings alignment into what is spoken aloud.
ALSO GROWS
tsaddiq: A just or aligned person; righteous.
צַדִּיק
The same seed describes the person whose character and words hold to what is right.
tzedakah: Justice or righteousness expressed in action.
צְדָקָה
It shows alignment taking form in the world, as these lips give alignment a voice.
יְשָׁרִים
yesharim
GROWS FROM
ישר
To be straight, level, or upright.
“speaks straight” in this verse is yesharim. “Speaketh right” is literally speech of straight things. Paired with lips of alignment, it pictures speech that keeps a clear line rather than bending away from what is true.
ALSO GROWS
yashar: Straight or upright.
יָשָׁר
The adjective behind “right” makes the speaker’s words sound like a straight path.
yosher: Straightness or uprightness.
יֹשֶׁר
This related noun names the quality the verse hears in the speaker’s words.
רָצוֹן
ratzon
GROWS FROM
רצה
To accept, favor, or take pleasure in.
The king’s “delight” carries the sense of favor and acceptance. The verse presents straight speech as something welcomed by power, not merely admired from a distance.
ALSO GROWS
ratsah: To accept or take pleasure in.
רָצָה
The verb shows the favorable response contained in the king’s delight.
ratzui: Accepted or favored.
רָצוּי
This branch makes the welcome in the verse explicit: aligned speech finds acceptance.
THE PATTERN
Words that stay aligned with truth become the basis of favor and trustworthy relationships.
Lying lips make the LORD recoil, but those who work in trust are his delight.The one who loves a clean heart, with favor on his lips, has the king for his companion.Therefore, taking off lying, speak truth, each one with his neighbor, for we are limbs of one another.THE THREAD
The lips of the aligned perceive favor; the mouth of the restless speaks twistings.This verse shares the image of lips and the root of “righteous,” then links aligned speech with what is acceptable. Proverbs 16:13 carries that same line into the king’s delight.
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