6:1 My son, if you have become surety for your neighbor, have given your pledge for a stranger; |
6:2 if you are snared in the utterance of your lips, caught in the words of your mouth; |
6:3 then do this, my son, and save yourself, for you have come into your neighbor's power: go, hasten, and importune your neighbor. |
6:4 Give your eyes no sleep and your eyelids no slumber; |
6:5 save yourself like a gazelle from the hunter, like a bird from the hand of the fowler. |
6:6 Go to the ant, O sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise. |
6:7 Without having any chief, officer or ruler, |
6:8 she prepares her food in summer, and gathers her sustenance in harvest. |
6:9 How long will you lie there, O sluggard? When will you arise from your sleep? |
6:10 A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, |
6:11 and poverty will come upon you like a vagabond, and want like an armed man. |
6:12 A worthless person, a wicked man, goes about with crooked speech, |
6:13 winks with his eyes, scrapes with his feet, points with his finger, |
6:14 with perverted heart devises evil, continually sowing discord; |
6:15 therefore calamity will come upon him suddenly; in a moment he will be broken beyond healing. |
6:16 There are six things which the LORD hates, seven which are an abomination to him: |
6:17 haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, |
6:18 a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, |
6:19 a false witness who breathes out lies, and a man who sows discord among brothers. |
6:20 My son, keep your father's commandment, and forsake not your mother's teaching. |
6:21 Bind them upon your heart always; tie them about your neck. |
6:22 When you walk, they will lead you; when you lie down, they will watch over you; and when you awake, they will talk with you. |
6:23 For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life, |
6:24 to preserve you from the evil woman, from the smooth tongue of the adventuress. |
6:25 Do not desire her beauty in your heart, and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes; |
6:26 for a harlot may be hired for a loaf of bread, but an adulteress stalks a man's very life. |
6:27 Can a man carry fire in his bosom and his clothes not be burned? |
6:28 Or can one walk upon hot coals and his feet not be scorched? |
6:29 So is he who goes in to his neighbor's wife; none who touches her will go unpunished. |
6:30 Do not men despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his appetite when he is hungry? |
6:31 And if he is caught, he will pay sevenfold; he will give all the goods of his house. |
6:32 He who commits adultery has no sense; he who does it destroys himself. |
6:33 Wounds and dishonor will he get, and his disgrace will not be wiped away. |
6:34 For jealousy makes a man furious, and he will not spare when he takes revenge. |
6:35 He will accept no compensation, nor be appeased though you multiply gifts. |