Proverbs 16:6

Through loyal love and truth ¹  iniquity is appeased; ²  through fearing the Lord ³  one avoids ⁴  evil. ⁵ 

Through love and faithfulness sin is atoned for; through the fear of the LORD a man avoids evil.

By lovingkindness and truth iniquity is atoned for, And by the fear of the LORD one keeps away from evil.

Unfailing love and faithfulness cover sin; evil is avoided by fear of the LORD.

Guilt is banished through love and truth; Fear-of-GOD deflects evil.

By mercy and good faith evil-doing is taken away: and by the fear of the Lord men are turned away from evil.

By loyalty and faithfulness iniquity is atoned for, and by the fear of the LORD one avoids evil.

In mercy and truth Atonement is provided for iniquity; And by the fear of the LORD one departs from evil.

Through loyal love and truth ¹  iniquity is appeased; ²  through fearing the Lord ³  one avoids ⁴  evil. ⁵ 

¹ sn These two words are often found together to form a nominal hendiadys: “faithful loyal love.” The couplet often characterize the Lord, but here in parallel to the fear of the Lord it refers to the faithfulness of the believer. Such faith and faithfulness bring atonement for sin.

² tn Heb “is atoned”; KJV “is purged”; NAB “is expiated.” The verb is from I כָּפַר (kafar, “to atone; to expiate; to pacify; to appease”; HALOT 493-94 s.v. I כפר). This root should not be confused with the identically spelled Homonym II כָּפַר (kafar, “to cover over”; HALOT 494 s.v. II *כפר). Atonement in the OT expiated sins, it did not merely cover them over (cf. NLT). C. H. Toy explains the meaning by saying it affirms that the divine anger against sin is turned away and man’s relation to God is as though he had not sinned (Proverbs [ICC], 322). Genuine repentance, demonstrated by loyalty and truthfulness, appeases the anger of God against one’s sin.

³ tn Heb “fear of the Lord.” The term יְהוָה (yÿhvah, “the Lord”) functions as an objective genitive: “fearing the Lord.”

⁴ tn Heb “turns away from”; NASB “keeps away from.”

⁵ sn The Hebrew word translated “evil” (רַע, ra’) can in some contexts mean “calamity” or “disaster,” but here it seems more likely to mean “evil” in the sense of sin. Faithfulness to the Lord brings freedom from sin. The verse uses synonymous parallelism with a variant: One half speaks of atonement for sin because of the life of faith, and the other of avoidance of sin because of the fear of the Lord.