Proverbs 4:16

16 Wicked people cannot sleep unless they have done something wrong. They lie awake unless they have hurt someone.

Proverbs 4:16 Meaning and Commentary

Proverbs 4:16

For they sleep not, except they have done mischief
Or they cannot sleep, as Jarchi and Gersom interpret it. Oftentimes they cannot sleep on their beds for devising mischief, their thoughts are so intensely set on contriving wicked schemes; and when they have so done, they cannot sleep until they have executed them; they are continually restless and uneasy day and night, like the troubled sea, constantly casting up mire and dirt. Who would keep such company as these? and their sleep is taken away, unless they cause [some] to fall;
into the snares and traps they lay for them, or into sin and calamity by it; the former of which they endeavour by all means to draw men into, and the latter is the unavoidable consequence of it. They imitate their father the devil, both delight in sin, and in the ruin of their fellow creatures; it is a sport to thereto do mischief, and they have no pleasure without it; see ( Proverbs 11:23 ) . What company are such!

Proverbs 4:16 In-Context

14 Do not go where evil people go. Do not follow the example of the wicked.
15 Don't do it! Keep away from evil! Refuse it and go on your way.
16 Wicked people cannot sleep unless they have done something wrong. They lie awake unless they have hurt someone.
17 Wickedness and violence are like food and drink to them.
18 The road the righteous travel is like the sunrise, getting brighter and brighter until daylight has come.
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.