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Proverbs 21:28 meaning

A false witness's voice is silenced, while the man who listens to the truth has a voice that endures.

Two ways of using speech get contrasted in Proverbs 21:28: A false witness will perish, But the man who listens to the truth will speak forever (v. 28). The contrast is between two ways of using speech.

The false witness speaks with an authority that does not belong to him, and is eventually silenced. The man who listens to the truth—who lets truth shape what he says before he says it—has a voice that endures.

This is the long view of speech in God's economy. Lies have a half-life; truth, sustained over time, builds a witness that does not stop speaking after the witness has stopped breathing.