The interpretation timeline

Prov 20:25

How this passage has been read — the sources, oldest to newest.

From the early Church Fathers to now.

Prov 20:25 · Douay-Rheims
“It is ruin to a man to devour holy ones, and after vows to retract.”
Patristic before A.D. 750
735
A.D.
Bede Patristic
A.D. 673–735
“It is ruin for a man to devour the holy, etc. Since it is a sin to harm any man, how much more so when it is he who has sinned? How forty men in the Acts of the Apostles vowed that they would neither eat nor drink until they had killed Paul; and pagans often, as we read, devoted the blood of Christians to their gods. This verse the ancient edition set in another sense, saying: It is a snare for a man to dedicate something quickly of his own; afterwards, when he has made a vow, he repents. And because to both those who, to complete their vows, persecute the holy, eternal damnation remains, it is rightly added:”
Source
Modern · 1953 →

The in-app commentary runs from the Fathers to the early-modern record, then stops — that's where the public-domain sources end, not where the reading does. For the modern reading, follow the sources directly.