BSB
Whoever conceals an offense promotes love, but he who brings it up separates friends.
WEB
He who covers an offense promotes love; but he who repeats a matter separates best friends.
KJV
He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.
Matthew Henry
Hebrew interlinear
Bible49 app
Translation compare, commentary, and interlinear study, local-first on iPhone and Mac.
See Bible49
Verse 9
Proverbs 17:9
Note, 1. The way to preserve peace among relations and neighbours is to make the best of every thing, not to tell others what has been said or done against them when it is not at all necessary to their safety, nor to take notice of what has been said or done against them when it is not at all necessary to their safety, nor to take notice of what has been said or done against ourselves, but to excuse both, and put the best construction upon them. "It was an oversight; therefore overlook it. It was done through forgetfulness; therefore forget it. It perhaps made nothing of you; do you make nothing of it." 2. The ripping up of faults is the ripping out of love, and nothing tends more to the separating of friends, and setting them at variance, than the repeating of matters that have been in variance; for they commonly lose nothing in the repetition, but the things themselves are aggravated and the passions about them revived and exasperated. The best method of peace is by an amnesty or act of oblivion.