Vol. 06 · Misquoted ·Scripture ·248 of 348
"Spare the rod and spoil the child."
They never said that.
What people say
"Spare the rod and spoil the child."
What was actually said
"He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes." Solomon (traditional attribution) — Proverbs 13:24 (KJV, 1611)
Why it stuck
The Bible never uses the word "spoil." The modern proverb "Spare the rod, and spoil the child" comes from Samuel Butler's Hudibras (1663) — a satirical couplet, not scripture.
Butler's actual couplet: "Love is a boy, by poets styl'd, / Then spare the rod, and spoil the child."
Know another line by heart?
Play the duel and see how many you can spot. Or browse the whole shelf.