5 My child, be attentive to my wisdom,

and to my understanding incline your ear;

2 in order to keep prudence,

and knowledge will guard your lips.

3 For the lips of the strange woman will drip honey,

and smoother than oil is her mouth.a

4 But her end is bitter as the wormwood,

sharp as a two-edged sword.

5 Her feet go down to death;

her steps take hold of Sheol.b

6 She does not observec the path of life;

her ways wander, and she does not know it.

Do Not Commit Adultery Against Wisdom

7 Now, O children, listen to me;

do not depart from the sayings of my mouth.

8 Keep your paths far from her,

and do not go near to the door of her house,

9 lest you give your honor to the others,

and your years to the merciless,

10 lest strangers take their fill of your strength,

and your labors go to the house of a foreigner,

11 and you groan at your end,

when your flesh and body are consumed,

12 and say “How I hated discipline,

and I despised reproof!”

13 and “I did not listen to the voice of my teachers,

and I did not incline my ear to my instructors!

14 I was almost at utterd ruine

in the midst of the assembly and congregation.”

15 Drink water from your own cistern

and flowing waters from inside your own well.

16 Shall your springs be scattered outward?

In the streets, shall there be streams of water?

17 May they be yours alone,

and not for strangers who are with you.

18 May your fountain be blessed,

and rejoice in the wifef of your youth.

19 She is a deer of love and a doe of grace;

may her breasts satisfy you ⌊always⌋;g

by her love may you be intoxicated continually.

20 Why should you be intoxicated, my child, by a strange woman,

and embrace the bosom of a foreigner?

21 For before the eyes of Yahweh are ⌊human ways⌋,h

and all his paths he examines.

22 His iniquities shall ensnare him, the evildoer,

and in the vanity of his sin he shall be caught.

23 He shall die ⌊for lack of⌋i discipline,

and in the greatness of his folly he shall be lost.