Proverbs 9:17

Amplified Bible

"Stolen waters (pleasures) are sweet [because they are forbidden]; And bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
“Stolen water is sweet,and bread eaten secretly is tasty!”

Hebrew Names Version
"Stolen water is sweet. Food eaten in secret is pleasant."

King James Version
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

English Standard Version
"Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

New American Standard Bible
"Stolen water is sweet; And bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

New Century Version
Stolen water is sweeter, and food eaten in secret tastes better."

New English Translation
"Stolen waters are sweet, and food obtained in secret is pleasant!"

World English Bible
"Stolen water is sweet. Food eaten in secret is pleasant."

Geneva Bible (1587)
Stollen waters are sweete, and hid bread is pleasant.

Legacy Standard Bible
"Stolen water is sweet;And bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

Berean Standard Bible
"Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is tasty!"

Contemporary English Version
"Stolen water tastes best, and the food you eat in secret tastes best of all."

Complete Jewish Bible
"Stolen water is sweet; food eaten in secret is pleasant."

Darby Translation
Stolen waters are sweet, and the bread of secrecy is pleasant.

Easy-to-Read Version
"Stolen water is sweet. Stolen bread tastes good."

George Lamsa Translation
Stolen waters are sweet and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

Good News Translation
"Stolen water is sweeter. Stolen bread tastes better."

Lexham English Bible
"Stolen waters are sweet, and bread of secrecy is pleasant."

Literal Translation
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
stollen waters are swete, & the bred that is preuely eaten, hath a good taist.

American Standard Version
Stolen waters are sweet, And bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

Bible in Basic English
Drink taken without right is sweet, and food in secret is pleasing.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
'Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.'

King James Version (1611)
Stollen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
Stolen waters are sweete, & the bread that is priuily eaten, hath a good taste.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Take and enjoy secret bread, and the sweet water of theft.

English Revised Version
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Watris of thefte ben swettere, and breed hid is swettere.

Update Bible Version
Stolen waters are sweet, And bread [eaten] in secret is pleasant.

Webster's Bible Translation
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread [eaten] in secret is pleasant.

New King James Version
"Stolen water is sweet, And bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

New Living Translation
"Stolen water is refreshing; food eaten in secret tastes the best!"

New Life Bible
"Stolen water is sweet. And bread eaten in secret is pleasing."

New Revised Standard
"Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Stolen waters, will be sweet, - and a secret meal, will be pleasant;

Douay-Rheims Bible
Stolen waters are sweeter, and hidden bread is more pleasant.

Revised Standard Version
"Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

Young's Literal Translation
`Stolen waters are sweet, And hidden bread is pleasant.'

New American Standard Bible (1995)
"Stolen water is sweet; And bread eaten in secret is pleasant."

Contextual Overview

¹³The foolish woman is restless and noisy; She is naive and easily misled and thoughtless, and knows nothing at all [of eternal value]. ¹⁴She sits at the doorway of her house, On a seat by the high and conspicuous places of the city, ¹⁵Calling to those who pass by, Who are making their paths straight: ¹⁶"Whoever is naive or inexperienced, let him turn in here!" And to him who lacks understanding (common sense), she says, ¹⁷"Stolen waters (pleasures) are sweet [because they are forbidden]; And bread eaten in secret is pleasant." ¹⁸But he does not know that the spirits of the dead are there, And that her guests are [already] in the depths of Sheol (the nether world, the place of the dead).

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Stolen: Proverbs 20:17, Proverbs 23:31, Proverbs 23:32, Genesis 3:6, Romans 7:8, James 1:14, James 1:15

eaten in secret: Heb. of secrecies, Proverbs 7:18-20, Proverbs 30:20, 2 Kings 5:24-27, Ephesians 5:12

Reciprocal: Genesis 39:11 - none of the men 2 Samuel 3:16 - along weeping Job 20:12 - wickedness Proverbs 1:18 - General Proverbs 4:17 - General Proverbs 9:5 - General Romans 6:21 - What

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Stolen waters are sweet,.... Wells and fountains of waters in those hot countries were very valuable, and were the property of particular persons; about which there were sometimes great strife and contention; and they were sometimes sealed and kept from the use of others; see Genesis 26:18; now waters got by stealth from such wells and fountains were sweeter than their own, or what might be had in common and without difficulty, to which the proverb alludes. By which in general is meant, that all prohibited unlawful lusts and pleasures are desirable to men, and sweet in the enjoyment of them; and the pleasure promised by them is what makes them so desirable, and the more so because forbidden: and particularly as adultery, which is a sort of theft r, and a drinking water out of another's cistern, Proverbs 5:15; being forbidden and unlawful, and secretly committed, is sweeter to an unclean person than a lawful enjoyment of his own wife; so false worship, superstition, and idolatry, the inventions of men, and obedience to their commands, which are no other than spiritual adultery, are more grateful and pleasing to a corrupt mind than the true and pure worship of God;

and bread [eaten] in secret is pleasant; or, "bread of secret places" s; hidden bread, as the Targum, Vulgate Latin, and Syriac versions; that which is stolen and is another's t, and is taken and hid in secret places, fetched out from thence, or eaten there: the sweet morsel of sin, rolled in the mouth, and kept under the tongue; secret lusts, private sins, particularly idolatry, to which men are secretly enticed, and which they privately commit, Deuteronomy 13:6; the same thing is designed by this clause as the forager.

r "Furtiva Verus", Ovid de Arte Amandi, l. 1. "Furta Jovis, furtiva munuscula", Catullus ad Mantium, Ep. 66. v. 140, 145. So Propertius, l. 2. eleg. 30. v. 28. γλυκυ τι κλεπτομενον μελημα

κυπριδος, Pindar; for which he was indebted to Solomon, according to Clemens of Alexandria, Paedagog. l. 3. p. 252. s סתרים "latebraram", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Michaelis. t "Quas habeat veneres aliens pecunia nescis", Juvenal. Satyr. 13.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The besetting sin of all times and countries, the one great proof of the inherent corruption of man’s nature. Pleasures are attractive because they are forbidden (compare Romans 7:7).

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Proverbs 9:17. Stolen waters are sweet — I suppose this to be a proverbial mode of expression, importing that illicit pleasures are sweeter than those which are legal. The meaning is easy to be discerned; and the conduct of multitudes shows that they are ruled by this adage. On it are built all the adulterous intercourses in the land.