What Does Proverbs 26:24 Mean?
He who hates makes himself a stranger with his lips, and lays deceit within him.
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
He that hateth dissembleth with his lips, and layeth up deceit within him;THE KEY
A concealed hater does more than hide: the lips make him seem like a stranger while deceit is set within.
THE MEANING
You can encounter speech that presents one face while hatred and deceit are held beneath it. The verse holds the two together: the lips disguise the speaker, while deceit is deliberately set within.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that smooth or agreeable speech proves goodwill: the lips can disguise hatred while deceit is held within.
THE ROOT
יִנָּכֵר
yinnaker
GROWS FROM
נכר
To recognize or mark as foreign; in this form, to make oneself seem strange.
“makes himself a stranger” in this verse is yinnaker. This verb comes from a root that holds both recognition and foreignness. Its form here pictures the speaker making himself strange through his lips, changing how he is recognized while the next clause exposes what he keeps within.
ALSO GROWS
nokhri: A foreigner or stranger.
נָכְרִי
This branch makes the disguise concrete: the speaker’s lips present someone unfamiliar or unlike the person within.
hikkir: To recognize or identify.
הִכִּיר
The same root can describe recognition, so dissembling works by altering what another person recognizes in the speaker.
מִרְמָה
mirmāh
GROWS FROM
רמה
To deceive or deal treacherously.
The word for deceit grows from the verb for deceiving: the act of misleading becomes what is held inside. The verse presents deceit as an inward store, not just a stray false word.
ALSO GROWS
rāmāh: To deceive or betray.
רָמָה
This verb names the act that becomes the concealed inner content in the verse.
rĕmiyyāh: Deceit or treachery; in some contexts, slackness.
רְמִיָּה
This related form carries deception as a quality or condition, echoing the verse’s picture of deceit stored within.
THE PATTERN
The mouth can wear a smooth surface while the inner store holds another intention.
The words of his mouth are smoother than butter, but war is in his heart. His words are softer than oil, yet they are opened swords.Their tongue is a slaughtering arrow, and it speaks deceit. One speaks wholeness to his neighbor with his mouth, but in his heart he sets his ambush.A good human brings out good from the good treasure of the heart, and an evil human brings out evil from the evil treasure of the heart, for from the overflow of the heart his mouth speaks.THE THREAD
And Joseph saw his brothers, and he recognized them, but he made himself a stranger to them and spoke hard words to them. And he said to them, From where have you come? And they said, From the land of Canaan, to buy food.Proverbs uses נכר (n-k-r; nakar, “to recognize or mark as foreign”) for dissembling with the lips; Genesis uses the same root when Joseph “made himself strange” to his brothers. The shared root makes the disguise concrete: the speaker’s mouth presents a stranger’s face while deceit is set within.
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