NET Bible

Admonition to Avoid Seduction to Evil1

^5:1 My child, be attentive to my wisdom; pay close attention to my understanding, ^5:2 in order to safeguard discretion and that your lips may guard knowledge. ^5:3 For the lips of the adulterous woman drip honey, and her seductive words are smoother than olive oil, ^5:4 but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. ^5:5 Her feet go down to death; her steps lead straight to the grave. ^5:6 Lest she should make level the path leading to life, her paths have wandered, but she is not able to discern it. ^5:7 So now, children, listen to me; do not turn aside from the words I speak. ^5:8 Keep yourself far from her, and do not go near the door of her house, ^5:9 lest you give your vigor to others and your years to a cruel person, ^5:10 lest strangers devour your strength and your labor benefit another man’s house. ^5:11 And at the end of your life you will groan when your flesh and your body are wasted away. ^5:12 And you will say, “How I hated discipline! My heart spurned reproof! ^5:13 For I did not obey my teachers, and I did not heed my instructors. ^5:14 I almost came to complete ruin in the midst of the whole congregation!” ^5:15 Drink water from your own cistern and running water from your own well. ^5:16 Should your springs be dispersed outside, your streams of water in the wide plazas? ^5:17 Let them be for yourself alone and not for strangers with you. ^5:18 May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife you married in your youth — ^5:19 a loving doe, a graceful deer; may her breasts satisfy you at all times; may you be captivated by her love always. ^5:20 But why should you be captivated, my son, by an adulteress, and embrace the bosom of a different woman? ^5:21 For the ways of a person are in front of the Lord’s eyes, and the Lord weighs all that person’s paths. ^5:22 The wicked will be captured by his own iniquities, and he will be held by the cords of his own sin. ^5:23 He will die because there was no discipline; because of the greatness of his folly he will reel.