Proverbs 5
1 My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow your ear to my understanding:
My son, pay attention to my wisdom, listen carefully as I explain what makes sense,
2 That you may regard discretion, and that your lips may keep knowledge.
so you can make good decisions and protect knowledge with your lips.
3 For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil:
For the lips of an immoral woman may taste as sweet as honey, the kisses of her mouth may be as smooth as oil,
4 But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.
but in the end what you get from her is the bitterness of wormwood and the sharp pain of being cut with a two-edged sword.
She leads you down to death; she takes you down to the grave. (Sheol h7585)
6 Lest you should ponder the path of life, her ways are moveable, that you can not know them.
She doesn't follow the path that leads to life—she wanders away and doesn't even know she's lost.
7 Hear me now therefore, O all of you children, and depart not from the words of my mouth.
Now, my son, listen to me; don't reject what I have taught you.
8 Remove your way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house:
Stay far away from her! Don't go near the door of her house!
9 Lest you give your honour unto others, and your years unto the cruel:
Otherwise you'll surrender your honor to others, and your character to cruel people.
10 Lest strangers be filled with your wealth; and your labours be in the house of a stranger;
Strangers will spend your wealth; everything you've worked for will go to someone else.
11 And you mourn at the last, when your flesh and your body are consumed,
When you come to the end of your life you'll moan in pain as disease destroys your body.
12 And say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof;
You'll say, “How I used to hate discipline, and my mind rebelled against being corrected!
13 And have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me!
I didn't listen to what my teacher said. I didn't pay attention to my instructors.
14 I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.
Now I'm on the verge of being completely disgraced before everyone in the community.”
15 Drink waters out of your own cistern, and running waters out of your own well.
Drink water from your own cistern, flowing water from your own well.
16 Let your fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.
Why should your springs be spilled outside, your streams of water poured out in the streets?
17 Let them be only your own, and not strangers' with you.
Keep them for yourselves alone. They're not for you to share with strangers.
18 Let your fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of your youth.
May your spring of water be blessed, and may you enjoy the wife you married when you were young.
19 Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy you at all times; and be you ravished always with her love.
May she be to you a loving deer, a graceful doe. May her breasts always be intoxicating to you; may you be drunk on her love forever.
20 And why will you, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?
Why, my son, become intoxicated with an immoral woman? Why embrace the breasts of a woman who acts like a prostitute?
21 For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and he ponders all his activities.
For the Lord sees everything people do, the Lord investigates everywhere they go.
22 His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be held with the cords of his sins.
The wicked are trapped by their evil actions; the cords of their sins tie them up.
23 He shall die without instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.
They will die because they lack self-control, lost because of their great stupidity.
