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Proverbs 11:7 · World English Bible

Proverbs 11:7 Meaning When a Wicked Man Dies

When a wicked man dies, hope perishes, and expectation of power comes to nothing.

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What does Proverbs 11:7 mean?

Everything the ego builds itself upon is a hope in the unreal, a future it expects the world to deliver so the self may at last feel whole. When that self is seen through, its whole expectation falls with it, for it was resting on a foundation that was never there.

From the Christian Psychology reading below.

Proverbs 11:7 through 1 lens

The same verse, read by one tradition.

CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY

Christian Psychology

Everything the ego builds itself upon is a hope in the unreal, a future it expects the world to deliver so the self may at last feel whole. When that self is seen through, its whole expectation falls with it, for it was resting on a foundation that was never there.

Nothing is lost in this but an illusion. What seemed like the death of a hope is only the ending of a demand the world could never meet, and the mind is left free to want what is true, which cannot perish because it was never a bargain in the first place.

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Christian Psychology lens

Live Proverbs 11:7 today

  1. Think of the thing you are waiting for to finally make you feel settled. Sit with the chance it arrives and nothing changes, and feel how that is almost a relief.
  2. Let a plan with someone fall through today without quietly keeping score. The evening is still yours, just a different one than you ordered.
  3. When a decision at work goes the way you did not want, feel the drop and then ask what you were actually expecting it to fix in you.

What have I been asking the future to deliver that it was never able to carry?

The same truth in other traditions

Buddhism · the second noble truth

Suffering grows out of clinging, out of needing things to turn out a certain way. Loosen the grip and the ache loosens with it.

Tao Te Ching 29

Trying to make the world match your plan is like trying to carve water. Let go of the design and things move freely again.

Stoicism · Epictetus

Stop asking life to come out the way you want it. Want it the way it comes, and you are never disappointed.

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