< Proverbs 1 >
1 Proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel:
2 For knowing wisdom and instruction, For understanding sayings of intelligence,
3 For receiving the instruction of wisdom, Righteousness, judgment, and uprightness,
4 For giving to simple ones—prudence, To a youth—knowledge and discretion.
5 (The wise hear and increase learning, And the intelligent obtain counsels.)
6 For understanding a proverb and its sweetness, Words of the wise and their acute sayings.
7 Fear of YHWH [is the] beginning of knowledge, Fools have despised wisdom and instruction!
8 Hear, my son, the instruction of your father, And do not leave the law of your mother,
9 For they [are] a graceful wreath to your head, And chains to your neck.
10 My son, if sinners entice you, do not be willing.
11 If they say, “Come with us, we lay wait for blood, We watch secretly for the innocent without cause,
12 We swallow them as Sheol—alive, And whole—as those going down [to] the pit, (Sheol )
13 We find every precious substance, We fill our houses [with] spoil,
14 You cast your lot among us, One purse is—to all of us.”
15 My son! Do not go in the way with them, Withhold your foot from their path,
16 For their feet run to evil, And they hurry to shed blood.
17 Surely in vain is the net spread out before the eyes of any bird.
18 And they lay wait for their own blood, They watch secretly for their own lives.
19 So [are] the paths of every gainer of dishonest gain, It takes the life of its owners.
20 Wisdom cries aloud in an out-place, She gives forth her voice in broad places,
21 She calls at the head of the multitudes, In the openings of the gates, In the city she says her sayings:
22 “Until when, you simple, do you love simplicity? And have scorners desired their scorning? And do fools hate knowledge?
23 Turn back at my reproof, behold, I pour forth my spirit to you, I make known my words with you.
24 Because I have called, and you refuse, I stretched out my hand, and none is attending,
25 And you slight all my counsel, And you have not desired my reproof.
26 I also laugh in your calamity, I deride when your fear comes,
27 When your fear comes as destruction, And your calamity comes as a windstorm, When adversity and distress come on you.
28 Then they call me, and I do not answer, They seek me earnestly, and do not find me.
29 Because that they have hated knowledge, And have not chosen the fear of YHWH.
30 They have not consented to my counsel, They have despised all my reproof,
31 And they eat of the fruit of their way, And they are filled from their own counsels.
32 For the turning of the simple slays them, And the security of the foolish destroys them.
33 And whoever is listening to me dwells confidently, And [is] quiet from fear of evil!”
