What Does Proverbs 27:10 Mean?
Do not let go of your friend, or your father's friend. Do not come into your brother's house in the day of your calamity. Better is a near neighbor than a brother far off.
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
Thine own friend, and thy father’s friend, forsake not; neither go into thy brother’s house in the day of thy calamity: for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off.THE KEY
Here, nearness is not a family title; it is the person close enough to be present when calamity comes.
THE MEANING
Trusted friendship remains a bond worth keeping, while your own crisis may reveal that the neighbor close at hand is more available than a distant brother. A family tie and the presence that meets your need are not always the same thing.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The assumption that blood relation automatically makes someone your nearest support gives way: in a crisis, actual proximity can matter more than family rank.
THE ROOT
קָרוֹב
qarov
GROWS FROM
קרב
Approach, come near, draw close.
The word for “near” shares its root with the idea of drawing near. The verse presents closeness as something concrete: the person within reach when calamity comes.
ALSO GROWS
qarav: Approach or come near.
קָרַב
This verb shows the movement contained in “near”: closeness is about being within reach.
qorban: Drawing near.
קָרְבָּן
The same root links nearness with drawing near, sharpening the verse’s contrast between actual presence and a distant family bond.
שָׁכֵן
shakhen
GROWS FROM
שכן
Dwell, settle, or remain.
“neighbour” in this verse is shakhen. The Hebrew word for neighbor is a dweller: proximity belongs to the word itself. The nearby person is more than a social category; the word points to someone whose dwelling makes presence possible.
ALSO GROWS
shakan: Dwell, settle, or remain.
שָׁכַן
This verb gives the neighbor’s name its sense of someone who dwells nearby.
mishkan: Dwelling place or tabernacle.
מִשְׁכָּן
The shared root connects the nearby neighbor with the place where someone dwells.
THE PATTERN
In trouble, care becomes visible through the person who can stay near and help, even when formal kinship is distant.
For if they fall, the one raises up the one joined to him. But woe to the one who falls with no second to gird him.And he said, The one who showed faithful love to him. Then Jesus said to him, Go and do likewise.Carry one another's weights, and so you fill up the instruction of the Anointed One.THE THREAD
You shall not avenge, nor hold a grudge against the children of your people; but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.The opening phrase calls a trusted friend רֵעַ (re’a, friend or companion), the same Hebrew noun Leviticus uses for “neighbour.” That word-link lets friendship extend beyond the household: the nearby neighbor stands within the same vocabulary of human relationship.
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