Proverbs 6:20–35

Warning About Adultery

²⁰My son, keep your father’s commands,

and don’t forget your mother’s teaching.

²¹Keep their words in mind forever

as though you had them tied around your neck.

²²They will guide you when you walk.

They will guard you when you sleep.

They will speak to you when you are awake.

²³These commands are like a lamp;

this teaching is like a light.

And the correction that comes from them

will help you have life.

²⁴They will keep you from sinful women

and from the pleasing words of another man’s unfaithful wife.

²⁵Don’t desire her because she is beautiful.

Don’t let her capture you by the way she looks at you.

²⁶A prostitute will treat you like a loaf of bread,

and a woman who takes part in adultery may cost you your life.

²⁷You cannot carry hot coals against your chest

without burning your clothes,

²⁸and you cannot walk on hot coals

without burning your feet.

²⁹The same is true if you have sexual relations with another man’s wife.

Anyone who does so will be punished.

³⁰People don’t hate a thief

when he steals because he is hungry.

³¹But if he is caught, he must pay back seven times what he stole,

and it may cost him everything he owns.

³²A man who takes part in adultery has no sense;

he will destroy himself.

³³He will be beaten up and disgraced,

and his shame will never go away.

³⁴Jealousy makes a husband very angry,

and he will have no pity when he gets revenge.

³⁵He will accept no payment for the wrong;

he will take no amount of money.