Proverbs 6:20–35

A Warning Against Committing Adultery

²⁰My son, keep your father’s commands.

Don’t turn away from your mother’s teaching.

²¹Tie them to your heart forever.

Put them around your neck.

²²When you walk, they will guide you.

When you sleep, they will watch over you.

When you wake up, they will speak to you.

²³Your father’s commands are like a lamp.

Your mother’s teaching is like a light.

And the training that corrects you

leads to life.

²⁴It keeps you from a sinful woman.

It keeps you from the smooth tongue of a woman who commits adultery.

²⁵Don’t hunger in your heart after her beauty.

Don’t let her eyes capture you.

²⁶A prostitute leaves you with only a loaf of bread.

Another man’s wife hunts your very life.

²⁷You can’t shovel fire into your lap

without burning your clothes.

²⁸You can’t walk on hot coals

without burning your feet.

²⁹It’s the same for anyone who has sex with another man’s wife.

Anyone who touches her will be punished.

³⁰People don’t hate a thief who steals

to fill his empty stomach.

³¹But when he is caught, he must pay seven times as much as he stole.

It may even cost him everything he has.

³²A man who commits adultery has no sense.

Anyone who does it destroys himself.

³³He will be beaten up and dishonored.

His shame will never be wiped away.

³⁴Jealousy stirs up a husband’s anger.

He will show no mercy when he gets even.

³⁵He won’t accept any payment.

He won’t take any money, no matter how much he is offered.