Proverbs 6

1 My son! If you have been guarantor for your friend, Have struck your hand for a stranger,

2 Have been snared with sayings of your mouth, Have been captured with sayings of your mouth,

3 Do this now, my son, and be delivered, For you have come into the hand of your friend. Go, trample on yourself, and strengthen your friend,

4 Do not give sleep to your eyes, And slumber to your eyelids,

5 Be delivered as a roe from the hand, And as a bird from the hand of a fowler.

6 Go to the ant, O slothful one, See her ways and be wise;

7 Which has no captain, overseer, and ruler,

8 She prepares her bread in summer, She has gathered her food in harvest.

9 Until when, O slothful one, do you lie? When do you arise from your sleep?

10 A little sleep, a little slumber, A little clasping of the hands to rest,

11 And your poverty has come as a traveler, And your want as an armed man.

12 A man of worthlessness, a man of iniquity, Walking [with] perverseness of mouth,

13 Winking with his eyes, speaking with his feet, Directing with his fingers,

14 Contrariness [is] in his heart, devising evil at all times, He sends forth contentions.

15 Therefore his calamity comes suddenly, He is broken instantly—and no healing.

16 These six has YHWH hated, Indeed, seven [are] abominations to His soul:

17 High eyes, False tongues, And hands shedding innocent blood,

18 A heart devising thoughts of vanity, Feet hastening to run to evil,

19 A false witness [who] breathes out lies, And one sending forth contentions between brothers.

20 Keep, my son, the command of your father, And do not leave the law of your mother.

21 Bind them on your heart continually, Tie them on your neck.

22 In your going up and down, it leads you, In your lying down, it watches over you, And you have awoken—it talks [with] you.

23 For the command [is] a lamp, And the Law a light, And a way of life [are] reproofs of instruction,

24 To preserve you from an evil woman, From the flattery of the tongue of a strange woman.

25 Do not desire her beauty in your heart, And do not let her take you with her eyelids.

26 For a harlot consumes to a cake of bread, And an adulteress hunts the precious soul.

27 Does a man take fire into his bosom, And are his garments not burned?

28 Does a man walk on the hot coals, And are his feet not scorched?

29 So [is] he who has gone in to the wife of his neighbor, None who touches her is innocent.

30 They do not despise the thief, When he steals to fill his soul when he is hungry,

31 And being found he repays sevenfold, He gives all the substance of his house.

32 He who commits adultery [with] a woman lacks heart, He who does it is destroying his soul.

33 He finds a stroke and shame, And his reproach is not wiped away,

34 For jealousy [is] the fury of a man, And he does not spare in a day of vengeance.

35 He does not accept the appearance of any atonement, Indeed, he does not consent, Though you multiply bribes!