This verse draws our attention to the fact that men’s injustice towards their fellows serves to impede the development of potential in others, causing them to stay poor. How wonderful it will be when all such sinful obstructions are removed by the Lord!
But the verse may also be translated so as to indicate that a man’s own lack of judgment keeps him from developing his own potential. He thinks he lacks the materials to succeed, when really it is his own sinful neglect, distraction, and laziness which prevent him from using that which he does have, to his advantage.
Finally, the verse may also be commenting on the blessing of the Lord, which enables the humble poor to produce abundantly from the field which, if attained by injustice, would be cursed by God so as to yield nothing. We may truly say that the heart of a field’s owner determines the harvest. Read Haggai 1:5–11.
23 The fallow ground of the poor would yield much food, but it is swept away through injustice.