“For by wise guidance you can wage your war”: The opening “for” indicates that this is the reason or the explanation for the previous verse. For an almost identical statement of the rest of the line, and for comments on it, see 20.18 (line 2). This line clearly establishes the military context for the whole saying.

“And in abundance of counselors there is victory”: This line is identical in Hebrew with the second line of 11.14. See there for comments.

Since “your war” is only a possible future event, in some languages it is best to restructure this verse as a conditional sentence (or two conditional sentences). For example, one translation starts with “If you want to go and make war, you must have a good plan [strategy] first.”

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 .