Proverbs - The Old Testament

¹ My child, if you have gone surety for your neighbour, if you have guaranteed the bond of a stranger,

² if you have committed yourself with your lips, if through words of yours you have been entrapped,

³ do this, my child, to extricate yourself -- since you have put yourself in the power of your neighbour: go, humble yourself, plead with your neighbour,

⁴ give your eyes no sleep, your eyelids no rest,

⁵ break free like a gazelle from the trap, like a bird from the fowler's clutches.

⁶ Idler, go to the ant; ponder her ways and grow wise:

⁷ no one gives her orders, no overseer, no master,

⁸ yet all through the summer she gets her food ready, and gathers her supplies at harvest time.

⁹ How long do you intend to lie there, idler? When are you going to rise from your sleep?

¹⁰ A little sleep, a little drowsiness, a little folding of the arms to lie back,

¹¹ and poverty comes like a vagrant and, like a beggar, dearth.

¹² A scoundrel, a vicious man, he goes with a leer on his lips,

¹³ winking his eye, shuffling his foot, beckoning with his finger.

¹⁴ Trickery in his heart, always scheming evil, he sows dissension.

¹⁵ Disaster will overtake him sharply for this, suddenly, irretrievably, he will be broken.

¹⁶ There are six things that Yahweh hates, seven that he abhors:

¹⁷ a haughty look, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood,

¹⁸ a heart that weaves wicked plots, feet that hurry to do evil,

¹⁹ a false witness who lies with every breath, and one who sows dissension among brothers.

²⁰ Keep your father's precept, my child, do not spurn your mother's teaching.

²¹ Bind them ever to your heart, tie them round your neck.

²² While you are active, they will guide you, when you fall asleep, they will watch over you, when you wake up, they will converse with you.

²³ For the precept is a lamp, the teaching is a light; correction and discipline are the way to life,

²⁴ preserving you from the woman of bad character, from the wheedling talk of a woman who belongs to another.

²⁵ Do not covet her beauty in your heart or let her captivate you with the play of her eyes;

²⁶ a prostitute can be bought for a hunk of bread, but a married woman aims to snare a precious life.

²⁷ Can a man carry fire inside his shirt without setting his clothes alight?

²⁸ Can you walk on red-hot coals without burning your feet?

²⁹ Just so, the man who makes love to his neighbour's wife: no one who touches her will get off unpunished.

³⁰ People attach but little blame to a thief who steals only to satisfy his hunger;

³¹ yet even he, if caught, will have to repay sevenfold and hand over all his family resources.

³² But the adulterer has no sense; he works his own destruction.

³³ All he will get is blows and contempt, and dishonour never to be blotted out.

³⁴ For jealousy inflames the husband who will show no mercy when the day comes for revenge;

³⁵ he will not consider any compensation; lavish what gifts you may, he will not be placated.