21:1

This proverb teaches that the LORD controls the king’s mind or thinking and directs it wherever he wants. The verse illustrates this truth with the metaphor of a watercourse (literally “channels of water”). The New International Version changed the metaphor to a simile by supplying the word “like.” It has:

1a The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord ;

1b he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases.

21:1a–b

In Hebrew, the topic and image of the metaphor both occur in the first line, as in the Berean Standard Bible and English Standard Version. For example:

1a The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord ;

1b he turns it wherever he will. (English Standard Version)

There are two ways to interpret what the LORD controls and “directs/turns”:

(1) The LORD controls the king’s heart and directs it wherever he wants. He directs it like ⌊people direct⌋ the course of irrigation channels. For example:

The king’s heart is like channels of water in the hand of the Lord ; He turns it wherever He wishes. (New American Standard Bible)

(2) The LORD controls the king’s heart like he (the LORD) directs the course of a stream. For example:

The Lord controls the mind of a king as easily as he directs the course of a stream. (Good News Translation)

It is recommended that you follow interpretation (1), along with most scholars. The word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as “waterway” refers to man-made irrigation channels or canals. It does not refer to natural streams or rivers.

For other ways to translate the metaphor in this verse, see the General Comment on 21:1a–b after the note on 21:1b.

21:1a

The king’s heart is a waterway in the hand of the LORD: In the OT, the word heart refers primarily to the mind or thoughts. The phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as waterway is literally “channels/canals of water” in Hebrew. It refers to a system of irrigation that uses man-made dams and canals. Here it is part of a figure of speech that describes the king’s heart. The parallel line (21:1b) explains more about how a king’s heart is like a waterway.

The phrase in the hand of the LORD is also a figure of speech. It represents the power or control which the LORD holds. The whole clause indicates that the LORD controls the thinking and decisions of the king as he rules. Here is another way to translate The king’s heart is…in the hand of the LORD :

The Lord controls the mind of a king (Good News Translation)

21:1b

He directs it where He pleases: Here, the pronoun it refers to the king’s heart, which the previous line identified as a “waterway.” A farmer regulates the flow of water to his garden by damming up some water channels and opening others. In this way he directs the water wherever he wants it to go. Similarly, the LORD directs the mind of a king so that the king makes decisions that accomplish the purposes of the LORD.

General Comment on 21:1a–b

Some ways to translate the metaphor in this verse are:

• Change the metaphor to a simile and make explicit some of the implied information. For example:

The LORD holds the king’s mind in his hand so that ⌊the king does⌋ what the LORD wants. He directs ⌊the king’s decisions⌋ like ⌊a farmer directs⌋ the water in his irrigation canals.

• Reorder and/or combine some of the information in these two lines. For example:

The mind of a king is like water in irrigation ditches. The LORD directs his thoughts wherever he wants.

© 2012, 2016, 2020 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.