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Book of Mishlei (Proverbs): Chapter 5

5:1 My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding: 5:2 That thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.

5:3 For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil: 5:4 But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.

5:5 Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.

5:6 Lest thou shouldest ponder the path of life, her ways are moveable, that thou canst not know them.

5:7 Hear me now therefore, O ye children, and depart not from the words of my mouth.

5:8 Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house: 5:9 Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel: 5:10 Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth; and thy labours be in the house of a stranger; 5:11 And thou mourn at the last, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed, 5:12 And say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof; 5:13 And have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me! 5:14 I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.

5:15 Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.

5:16 Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.

5:17 Let them be only thine own, and not strangers' with thee.

5:18 Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.

5:19 Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love.

5:20 And why wilt thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger? 5:21 For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and he pondereth all his goings.

5:22 His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins.

5:23 He shall die without instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.


Sources: Portions copyright © 1997 by Benyamin Pilant, All Rights Reserved
JPS Electronic Edition Copyright © 1998 by Larry Nelson, All Rights Reserved
Jewish Bible