“For a righteous man falls seven times, and rises again”: “A righteous man” is the same word as in the previous verse. As elsewhere in Proverbs the emphasis is on the person’s moral character, so that he or she can be described as “good,” “honest,” “honorable.” “Falls” is the word that can mean simply “falls over” or “falls down [from somewhere high].” But it also has a figurative meaning of “experiences disaster or ruin,” and that is the sense here. Likewise “rises again” can mean simply “gets up again after falling down,” but here it has the figurative sense of “overcomes adversity” or “becomes prosperous again.” Many languages use “fall” and “rise” in the same figurative way as Hebrew, so in these languages they may be retained in translation. In some languages, however, other terms must be used to express this meaning; for example, “trouble catches a good person, but he wins [overcomes] it” or “a good person finds trouble, but he comes good again.” Most translations render “seven times” literally, but the figure “seven” probably has its Hebrew symbolic meaning in this context, namely, “completeness.” This means that “seven times” should be rendered as “every time” or “very many times”; so Good News Translation has “No matter how often. . ., they always. . .,” and others say “Even if a righteous person falls down many times, he will always. . ..”

“But the wicked are overthrown by calamity”: This line is parallel to the previous line, but in contrast with it. What happens to “the wicked” is the opposite of what happens to “a righteous man”. “Are overthrown” is literally “they stumble,” which matches the term “falls” in the previous line. The sense here is that when “calamity”, that is, “trouble,” “adversity,” or “misfortune,” comes, they are ruined by it. When they fall, they do not get up, but stay down. Good News Translation translates this line “but disaster destroys the wicked,” and Contemporary English Version “But when trouble strikes the wicked, that’s the end of them.”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Proverbs. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2000. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .