Proverbs 25:19

Like a bad tooth or a foot out of joint, ¹  so is confidence ²  in an unfaithful person at the time of trouble. ³ 

Like a bad tooth or a lame foot is reliance on the unfaithful in times of trouble.

Like a bad tooth and an unsteady foot Is confidence in a faithless man in time of trouble.

Putting confidence in an unreliable person is like chewing with a toothache or walking on a broken foot.

Trusting a double-crosser when you're in trouble is like biting down on an abscessed tooth.

Putting one’s faith in a false man in time of trouble is like a broken tooth and a shaking foot.

Like a bad tooth or a lame foot is trust in a faithless person in time of trouble.

Confidence in an unfaithful man in time of trouble Is like a bad tooth and a foot out of joint.

Like a bad tooth or a foot out of joint, ¹  so is confidence ²  in an unfaithful person at the time of trouble. ³ 

¹ sn The similes in this emblematic parallelism focus on things that are incapable of performing certain activities – they are either too painful to use or are ineffective.

² tn Since there is no preposition to clarify the construction, there are two ways to take the term מִבְטָח (mivtakh, “confidence”) in the context. It can either refer (1) to reliance on an unfaithful person, or it can refer (2) to that on which the unfaithful person relies. C. H. Toy argues for the second, that what the faithless person relies on will fail him in the time of trouble (Proverbs [ICC], 466). This view requires a slight change in the MT to make “confidence” a construct noun (i.e., the confidence of the faithless); the first view, which fits better the MT as it stands, says that “confidence [in] a faithless person” is like relying on a decaying tooth or a lame foot. This is the view preferred in most English versions, including the present one.

³ tn Heb “in the day of trouble”; KJV, NASB “in time of trouble.”