Book of Proverbs Trivia
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
7correct to beat the crowd
99 free Book of Proverbs trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Proverbs is the Bible's book of one-liners: short sayings about money, speech, laziness, friendship and temper, collected under Solomon's name but written, as its own headings admit, by several hands over centuries. It is also stranger than its reputation, with a personified Wisdom who was present at creation, numbered lists of things that are never satisfied, and a closing portrait of a wife who buys fields and runs a textile business. These 99 questions cover the sayings everyone half-remembers, the structure scholars argue about, the voices besides Solomon, the creatures and cautionary figures that fill its pages, and the afterlife of its lines in book titles, plays and theology. They stay inside the biblical book; English folk sayings have a quiz of their own. It suits a church quiz night, a Bible study group or anyone who wants to find out how much of Proverbs they actually know. Play on your phone with instant answers and explanations, or print it and read it aloud.
30 of 99 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which word completes Proverbs 1:7, 'The fear of the LORD is the beginning of ___'?
Knowledge
Knowledge is the word in the book's motto verse, which goes straight on to say that fools despise wisdom and instruction. The better-known 'beginning of wisdom' wording is Proverbs 9:10.
Q 02Proverbs 11:29 says he that troubleth his own house shall inherit what, the title of a play about the Scopes trial?
The wind
The wind is the troubler's inheritance, and in Inherit the Wind the prosecutor Brady hurls the verse at a preacher who is condemning the accused teacher from the pulpit.
Q 03How many pillars has Wisdom 'hewn out' in Proverbs 9, a number T. E. Lawrence borrowed for his book title?
Seven
Seven pillars hold up the house Wisdom builds at the start of Proverbs 9, before she sends her maidens out to invite the simple to her feast. T. E. Lawrence took Seven Pillars of Wisdom from the verse.
Q 04Which creature does Proverbs 6 tell the sluggard to 'go to' and consider, since she works with no overseer or ruler?
The ant
The ant 'provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest' with nobody in charge, which is why the sluggard is sent to study her ways.
Q 05A fair woman without discretion is likened in Proverbs 11 to a jewel of gold in which animal's snout?
A pig
A pig is the 'swine' of the King James wording, and its gold nose-ring stands for good looks wasted on a woman with no judgement. The same chapter promises that 'the liberal soul shall be made fat'.
Q 061 Kings 4 credits Solomon with 3,000 proverbs and with 1,005 of what?
Songs
Songs numbered 'a thousand and five', and the passage adds that men came 'from all kings of the earth' to hear the king who could speak on everything from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop on the wall.
Q 07Who taught King Lemuel the 'prophecy' that opens Proverbs 31, warning him that wine is 'not for kings'?
His mother
His mother is the teacher named in the chapter's first verse, and her lesson moves from the dangers of women and wine to a command to 'open thy mouth for the dumb' and plead the cause of the poor.
Q 08'Who can find a virtuous woman?' asks Proverbs 31:10; her price is said to be 'far above' what?
Rubies
Rubies are the benchmark, the same gem that Proverbs 3 and 8 rank below wisdom itself. The Hebrew 'eshet chayil' behind 'virtuous woman' is closer to 'woman of valour'.
Q 09To what does a fool return in Proverbs 26:11, as a dog returns to its vomit, a line 2 Peter quotes?
His folly
His folly is where the fool goes back, and 2 Peter 2:22 pairs the dog with 'the sow that was washed' returning to the mire, aimed at converts who slide back into old ways.
Q 10Which King James verb completes Proverbs 22:6: a child trained 'in the way he should go' will not ___ 'from it'?
Depart
Depart is the verb, and the verse is one of the most quoted in Christian parenting, read by some as a guarantee and by others as a rule of thumb. It sits among the 'proverbs of Solomon' collected in chapters 10 to 22.
Q 11What does 'a soft answer' turn away in Proverbs 15:1, whose second half says 'grievous words stir up anger'?
Wrath
Wrath is turned away by the soft answer, and the chapter comes back to the point: 'A wrathful man stirreth up strife: but he that is slow to anger appeaseth strife'.
Q 12Which verb completes Proverbs 29:18, 'Where there is no vision, the people ___'?
Perish
Perish is the King James verb, though the Hebrew is closer to 'cast off restraint', and the verse ends 'but he that keepeth the law, happy is he'.
Q 13Proverbs 17:22 says a merry heart 'doeth good like' what, while 'a broken spirit drieth the bones'?
A medicine
A medicine is the comparison, which is why 'laughter is the best medicine' gets pinned on the Bible even though no verse says it. The same chapter says a friend 'loveth at all times'.
Q 21Proverbs 18:24 says there is a friend 'that sticketh closer than' whom, a line Christians often apply to Jesus?
A brother
A brother is the comparison, and the first half, 'a man that hath friends must shew himself friendly', is often quoted alone; chapter 17 adds that 'a brother is born for adversity'.
Q 22What holds 'the power' of death and life in Proverbs 18:21, where 'they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof'?
The tongue
The tongue holds that power, and the book keeps circling back to speech: the same chapter says 'a fool's mouth is his destruction' and that a man's belly is filled by 'the fruit of his mouth'.
Q 23What 'exalteth a nation' in Proverbs 14:34, whose second half warns that 'sin is a reproach to any people'?
Righteousness
Q 14'Hope deferred maketh the heart sick,' says Proverbs 13:12, 'but when the desire cometh, it is' what?
A tree of life
A tree of life is the tree Genesis puts out of reach when Adam is driven from Eden, and Proverbs brings it back as a figure for fulfilled desire and, in chapter 3, for wisdom itself.
Q 15In Proverbs 31:28 the virtuous woman's children 'arise up' and call her what, while her husband 'praiseth her'?
Blessed
Blessed is the children's word, and the poem ends by letting her own works praise her 'in the gates'; this portrait is what the 'Proverbs 31 woman' of Christian womanhood books is built on.
Q 16Proverbs 3:5 tells readers to trust in the LORD 'with all thine heart' and 'lean not unto thine own' what?
Understanding
Understanding is what the verse says not to lean on, and the next line promises that whoever acknowledges God 'in all thy ways' will have his paths directed. The pair is among the best-known lines in the book.
Q 17'The wicked flee when no man pursueth,' says Proverbs 28:1, 'but the righteous are bold as' which animal?
A lion
A lion is the righteous man's model, the animal Proverbs 30 later calls 'strongest among beasts' that 'turneth not away for any'. The slothful man, says chapter 26, claims there is one in the streets as an excuse to stay home.
Q 18Proverbs 22:1 says a good name is 'rather to be chosen' than what, and loving favour 'rather than silver and gold'?
Great riches
Great riches lose to a good name in the verse that opens a chapter which also holds 'train up a child' and the warning to 'remove not the ancient landmark'.
Q 19Proverbs 27:1 says 'boast not thyself of' what, 'for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth'?
Tomorrow
Tomorrow is off limits for boasting, and the very next verse keeps the theme of humility: 'Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth; a stranger, and not thine own lips'.
Q 20Proverbs 16:32 ranks the slow to anger above the mighty, and 'he that ruleth his spirit' above him that taketh what?
A city
A city is the conquest outranked by self-command, a verse that turns the usual praise of conquest on its head. Chapter 16 also says 'the lot is cast into the lap' but the outcome is the LORD's.
Righteousness is what lifts a nation, and the same chapter holds each person to the test too: 'he that oppresseth the poor reproacheth his Maker'.
Q 24Which metal sharpens itself in Proverbs 27:17, the image for how a man 'sharpeneth the countenance of his friend'?
Iron
Iron sharpeneth iron, a line that has become shorthand for friends who challenge each other, and the same chapter also rates 'open rebuke' above 'secret love'.
Q 25Proverbs 31:30 says 'favour is deceitful' and what 'is vain', before praising 'a woman that feareth the LORD'?
Beauty
Beauty is vain in the King James wording, 'fleeting' in the NIV, and the line is the moral of the whole 'virtuous woman' poem, placed just before its closing call to 'give her of the fruit of her hands'.
Q 26'Wine is a mocker,' says Proverbs 20:1, 'strong drink is' what, 'and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise'?
Raging
Raging is the King James adjective, 'a brawler' in modern versions, and chapter 23 finishes the warning: wine 'at the last biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder'.
Q 27Proverbs 31's virtuous woman 'considereth a field, and buyeth it', then plants what 'with the fruit of her hands'?
A vineyard
A vineyard is what she plants, one line in a portrait of a woman who trades in linen and girdles, rises 'while it is yet night' and keeps her candle burning after dark.
Q 28Whose 'words' fill Proverbs 30, the chapter confessing 'I am more brutish than any man' that is not Solomon's?
Agur
Agur son of Jakeh is the speaker, addressing Ithiel and Ucal, and he opens by admitting 'I neither learned wisdom', an unexpected start to a chapter in a book of wisdom.
Q 29Which 'way' does Proverbs 30 call too wonderful, after an eagle's, a serpent's and a ship's?
A man with a maid
A man with a maid completes the list of four things the speaker says he 'know[s] not', and it is followed at once by the adulterous woman who 'wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done no wickedness'.
Q 30Which creature 'taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings' palaces', among Proverbs 30's small but wise things?
The spider
The spider is the King James reading, where modern versions have a lizard; its companions in the list include the conies who build 'in the rocks' and the locusts who have no king, 'yet go they forth all of them by bands'.