Proverbs 5
1 My son! Give attention to my wisdom, Incline your ear to my understanding,
My son, attend unto my wisdom; to my understanding incline thou thy ear:
2 To observe thoughtfulness, And your lips keep knowledge.
That thou mayest observe discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.
3 For the lips of a strange woman drop honey, And her mouth [is] smoother than oil,
For as of fine honey drop the lips of an adulterous woman, and smoother than oil is her palate;
4 And her latter end [is] bitter as wormwood, Sharp as a sword [with] mouths.
But her end is bitter as wormwood, it is sharp as a two-edged sword.
Her feet go down to death, her steps take firm hold on the nether world: (Sheol h7585)
6 The path of life—lest you ponder, Her paths have moved—you do not know.
So that she cannot balance the path of life; her tracks are unsteady, and she knoweth it not.
7 And now, you sons, listen to me, And do not turn from sayings of my mouth.
And now, O ye children, hearken unto me, and depart not from the sayings of my mouth.
8 Keep your way far from off her, And do not come near to the opening of her house,
Remove far from her thy way, and come not nigh to the door of her house;
9 Lest you give your splendor to others, And your years to the fierce,
That thou mayest not give up unto others thy vigor, and thy years unto the cruel;
10 Lest strangers be filled [with] your power, And your labors in the house of a stranger,
That strangers may not satisfy themselves with thy strength, and with thy exertions, in the house of an alien:
11 And you have howled in your latter end, In the consumption of your flesh and your food,
While thou moanest at thy end, when thy flesh and thy body are coming to their end,
12 And have said, “How I have hated instruction, And my heart has despised reproof,
And thou sayest, How have I hated correction, and how hath my heart rejected reproof;
13 And I have not listened to the voice of my teachers, And have not inclined my ear to my teachers.
While I hearkened not to the voice of my instructors, and to my teachers I inclined not my ear;
14 As a little thing I have been all evil, In the midst of an assembly and a congregation.”
But little more was wanting, and I had been in all [kinds of] unhappiness in the midst of the congregation and assembly.
15 Drink waters out of your own cistern, Even flowing ones out of your own well.
Drink water out of thy own cistern, and running waters out of thy own well.
16 Let your fountains be scattered abroad, In broad places streams of waters.
So will thy springs overflow abroad; and in the open streets will be thy rivulets of water;
17 Let them be to you for yourself, And not to strangers with you.
They will be thy own only, and not those of strangers with thee.
18 Let your fountain be blessed, And rejoice because of the wife of your youth,
Thy fountain will be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth, —
19 A doe of loves, and a roe of grace! Let her loves satisfy you at all times, Magnify yourself in her love continually.
The lovely gazelle and the graceful chamois: let her bosom satisfy thee abundantly at all times; with her love be thou ravished continually.
20 And why do you magnify yourself, My son, with a stranger? And embrace the bosom of a strange woman?
And why wilt thou, my son, be ravished with an adulteress, and embrace the bosom of an alien woman?
21 For the ways of each are before the eyes of YHWH, And He is pondering all his paths.
For before the eyes of the Lord are the ways of man, and all his tracks doth he weigh in the balance.
22 His own iniquities capture the wicked, And he is holden with the ropes of his sin.
His own iniquities will truly catch the wicked, and with the cords of his sin will he be held firmly.
23 He dies without instruction, And magnifies himself in the abundance of his folly!
He will indeed die for want of correction; and through the abundance of his folly will he sink into error.
