19:15

Notice the parallelism. The underlined parallel parts describe the cause. The parts with bold print describe the result. At the same time, the second line gives the overall result of the first line.

15a
Laziness brings on deep sleep,

15b and the shiftless man goes hungry.

The overall meaning is that a lazy person does nothing but sleep. This idleness leads to hunger.

19:15a

Laziness brings on deep sleep: The phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as brings on deep sleep is more literally “causes to fall into a deep sleep.” The parallel with “an idle soul” in 19:15b implies that the lazy person spends much of his time sleeping rather than working. Some other ways to translate this clause are:

Sloth leads to sleep (Revised English Bible)
-or-
Laziness throws one into a deep sleep (God’s Word)

In some languages, it is better to express an abstract noun such as Laziness in terms of “a person who is lazy.” For example:

Lazy people sleep soundly (New Living Translation (2004))
-or-
Lazy people sleep a lot (New Century Version)

19:15b

and an idle soul will suffer hunger: The phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as an idle soul refers to a person who is negligent or shiftless. If a person remains idle rather than working, he will experience hunger as a result. Some other ways to translate this clause are:

and a negligent person will go hungry (Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures)
-or-
and an idle person will suffer hunger (English Standard Version)
-or-
and a person who never works will starve

General Comment on 19:15a–b

In some languages, it may be more natural to combine and/or reorder the parallel parts. For example:

Go ahead and be lazy; sleep on, but you will go hungry. (Good News Translation)
-or-
If you are lazy and sleep your time away, you will starve. (Contemporary English Version)

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