Proverbs 5
1 My son, pay attention to my wisdom; incline your ear to my insight,
My son, attend unto my wisdom; incline thine ear to my understanding;
2 that you may maintain discretion and your lips may preserve knowledge.
That thou mayest preserve discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.
3 Though the lips of the forbidden woman drip honey and her speech is smoother than oil,
For the lips of a strange woman drop honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil;
4 in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a double-edged sword.
But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.
Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on the nether-world; (Sheol h7585)
6 She does not consider the path of life; she does not know that her ways are unstable.
Lest she should walk the even path of life, her ways wander, but she knoweth it not.
7 So now, my sons, listen to me, and do not turn aside from the words of my mouth.
Now therefore, O ye children, hearken unto me, and depart not from the words of my mouth.
8 Keep your path far from her; do not go near the door of her house,
Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house;
9 lest you concede your vigor to others, and your years to one who is cruel;
Lest thou give thy vigour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel;
10 lest strangers feast on your wealth, and your labors enrich the house of a foreigner.
Lest strangers be filled with thy strength, and thy labours be in the house of an alien;
11 At the end of your life you will groan when your flesh and your body are spent,
And thou moan, when thine end cometh, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed,
12 and you will say, “How I hated discipline, and my heart despised reproof!
And say: 'How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof;
13 I did not listen to the voice of my teachers or incline my ear to my mentors.
Neither have I hearkened to the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me!
14 I am on the brink of utter ruin in the midst of the whole assembly.”
I was well nigh in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.'
15 Drink water from your own cistern, and running water from your own well.
Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.
16 Why should your springs flow in the streets, your streams of water in the public squares?
Let thy springs be dispersed abroad, and courses of water in the streets.
17 Let them be yours alone, never to be shared with strangers.
Let them be only thine own, and not strangers' with thee.
18 May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth:
Let thy fountain be blessed; and have joy of the wife of thy youth.
19 A loving doe, a graceful fawn— may her breasts satisfy you always; may you be captivated by her love forever.
A lovely hind and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; with her love be thou ravished always.
20 Why be captivated, my son, by an adulteress, or embrace the bosom of a stranger?
Why then wilt thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of an alien?
21 For a man’s ways are before the eyes of the LORD, and the LORD examines all his paths.
For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and He maketh even all his paths.
22 The iniquities of a wicked man entrap him; the cords of his sin entangle him.
His own iniquities shall ensnare the wicked, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sin.
23 He dies for lack of discipline, led astray by his own great folly.
He shall die for lack of instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall reel.
