2:1 My son, if you will receive my words And treasure my commandments within you, |
2:2 Make your ear attentive to wisdom, Incline your heart to understanding; |
2:3 For if you cry for discernment, Lift your voice for understanding; |
2:4 If you seek her as silver And search for her as for hidden treasures; |
2:5 Then you will discern the fear of the LORD And discover the knowledge of God. |
2:6 For the LORD gives wisdom; From His mouth {come} knowledge and understanding. |
2:7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright; {He is} a shield to those who walk in integrity, |
2:8 Guarding the paths of justice, And He preserves the way of His godly ones. |
2:9 Then you will discern righteousness and justice And equity {and} every good course. |
2:10 For wisdom will enter your heart And knowledge will be pleasant to your soul; |
2:11 Discretion will guard you, Understanding will watch over you, |
2:12 To deliver you from the way of evil, From the man who speaks perverse things; |
2:13 From those who leave the paths of uprightness To walk in the ways of darkness; |
2:14 Who delight in doing evil And rejoice in the perversity of evil; |
2:15 Whose paths are crooked, And who are devious in their ways; |
2:16 To deliver you from the strange woman, From the adulteress who flatters with her words; |
2:17 That leaves the companion of her youth And forgets the covenant of her God; |
2:18 For her house sinks down to death And her tracks {lead} to the dead; |
2:19 None who go to her return again, Nor do they reach the paths of life. |
2:20 So you will walk in the way of good men And keep to the paths of the righteous. |
2:21 For the upright will live in the land And the blameless will remain in it; |
2:22 But the wicked will be cut off from the land And the treacherous will be uprooted from it. |