Jeremiah 17:11
“As the partridge that sits on eggs which she has not laid, so is he who gets riches, and not by right. In the middle of his days, they will leave him. At his end, he will be a fool.”
What does Jeremiah 17:11 mean?
Jeremiah uses the image of a partridge trying to hatch eggs that aren't hers to describe what happens when we chase wealth dishonestly or through shortcuts. Just as those eggs will never produce chicks, ill-gotten gains won't bring the security or satisfaction we expect. The prophet is saying that riches gathered through deception, theft, or exploitation may look promising at first, but they slip away and leave us empty, often when we need them most. What remains is the realization that we've wasted our energy and our life on something that was never truly ours to begin with.