“But the wicked will be cut off from the land”: This contrasts the consequences for the wicked with those for the upright. “The wicked”, used here in Proverbs for the first time, generally refers in the Old Testament to those who refuse to acknowledge or obey God. In the book of Proverbs it is a term used for people who are foolish in that they disobey the teaching of divine wisdom. The “wicked” are often referred to in translation as “bad people,” “people who do wrong,” and sometimes figuratively as “people who do not walk on God’s road” or “people who throw God’s wisdom aside.”

“Cut off” refers to the action taken against people who because of their wickedness have no place or claim in the land God promised to Israel, and therefore do not belong to the community in life. “Cut off” is figurative language, and its meaning may be expressed as “removed” or “taken away.” In some languages a different figure is more natural, such as “thrown out” or “wiped out.” For those languages that are not able to use a passive construction, Good News Translation “God will snatch” is a good model.

“And the treacherous will be rooted out of it”: “Treacherous” is used in Job 6.15 to refer to a stream bed that goes dry and betrays the thirsty traveler who expects to drink from it. See also Jer 15.18. It matches “the wicked” in the first line and refers to deceitful, undependable, and untrustworthy people. “Rooted out” means to be violently uprooted or snatched away. “It” refers to the land of promise, the same as in the first line. In some languages the garden metaphor is expanded to say “pulled out just as someone pulls out weeds from a garden.”

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 .