4:12a And though one may be overpowered,

A ⌊strong⌋ person can overpower another person.
-or-
Someone who is alone can easily be attacked and defeated by another person. (Translation for Translators)

4:12b two can resist.

But two people are able to resist him.
-or-
But two people can help each other and resist the one who attacks them.

4:12a-b (combined)

If one person fights against another, he may win, but not if he fights against two.
-or-
One person can usually defeat another person, but two people together will defeat him.

4:12c Moreover, a cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

⌊Three people together are even better. They are like⌋ a three-stranded rope. It cannot be broken easily.
-or-
And three people are even stronger. They are like a rope that has three parts wrapped together—it is very hard to break. (English Easy-to-Read Version)
-or-

⌊Somebody has said,⌋ “A rope can have three parts rather than one part. If it has three parts, it is difficult to break it.”

© 2006 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.