Bible verses about words
Proverbs counts what speech costs, and the letter of James ends its most severe passage by conceding that the tongue cannot be tamed by trying harder. These passages — on gossip, on flattery, on saying less — are set out with a sentence on each.
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, Yahweh, my rock, and my redeemer. — Psalm 19:14 · WEB
Two witnesses to God, one silent and worldwide and one worded and particular, and the psalm ends asking to be cleared of what it cannot see.
Set a watch, Yahweh, before my mouth. Keep the door of my lips. — Psalm 141:3 · WEB
A man asks for a sentry on his own lips, and says he would rather be hit by a good man than flattered by a bad one.
In the multitude of words there is no lack of disobedience, but he who restrains his lips does wisely. — Proverbs 10:19 · WEB
Half of this run is about the mouth, and its most practical saying is that the quantity of words is itself the problem.
There is one who speaks rashly like the piercing of a sword, but the tongue of the wise heals. — Proverbs 12:18 · WEB
The run gathers around the mouth and the temper, and its best-known line is about how long a lie lasts.
A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. — Proverbs 15:1 · WEB
The chapter opens with the most practical sentence in the book and ends by pricing a dinner.
Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones. — Proverbs 16:24 · WEB
Death and life are in the power of the tongue; those who love it will eat its fruit. — Proverbs 18:21 · WEB
He who goes about as a tale-bearer reveals secrets; therefore don’t keep company with him who opens wide his lips. — Proverbs 20:19 · WEB
Read the comment on Differing Weights and Differing Measures
For lack of wood a fire goes out. Without gossip, a quarrel dies down. — Proverbs 26:20 · WEB
The chapter closes on the man who makes trouble by talking, and the fire he starts is shown to have a fuel supply.
Read the comment on Where There Is No Wood, the Fire Goes Out
Don’t be rash with your mouth, and don’t let your heart be hasty to utter anything before God; for God is in heaven, and you on earth. Therefore let your words be few. — Ecclesiastes 5:2 · WEB
Every instruction in the book's only passage on worship restrains the mouth, and the one positive command is to fear God.
I tell you that every idle word that men speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. — Matthew 12:36 · WEB
The tree and its fruit applied to speech — because what a person says under no pressure is the most honest evidence there is.
Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth, but only what is good for building others up as the need may be, that it may give grace to those who hear. — Ephesians 4:29 · WEB
Speech is measured by whether it builds someone, and the sin the Spirit is said to grieve over is bitterness among believers.
Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one. — Colossians 4:6 · WEB
Two verses on how to deal with people outside the church, and the standard is that the answer be fitted to the person.
So, then, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger; — James 1:19 · WEB
Three instructions about speech open the letter's longest running subject, and the reason given is what anger fails to produce.
So the tongue is also a little member, and boasts great things. See how a small fire can spread to a large forest! — James 3:5 · WEB
Two illustrations make the same point about size and control, and the third breaks the pattern deliberately.
but nobody can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. — James 3:8 · WEB
The most severe description in the letter, and it ends by conceding that the problem it has described cannot be solved by effort.
For, “He who would love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. — 1 Peter 3:10 · WEB
The refusal to retaliate is not presented as restraint but as the thing the readers were called to do, and a psalm is quoted to say that the outcome is not their business.