1: My son, if thou dost accept my sayings, And my commands dost lay up with thee,
2: To cause thine ear to attend to wisdom, Thou inclinest thy heart to understanding,
3: For, if for intelligence thou callest, For understanding givest forth thy voice,
4: If thou dost seek her as silver, And as hid treasures searchest for her,
5: Then understandest thou fear of Jehovah, And knowledge of God thou findest.
6: For Jehovah giveth wisdom, From His mouth knowledge and understanding.
7: Even to lay up for the upright substance, A shield for those walking uprightly.
8: To keep the paths of judgment, And the way of His saints He preserveth.
9: Then understandest thou righteousness, And judgment, and uprightness -- every good path.
10: For wisdom cometh into thy heart, And knowledge to thy soul is pleasant,
11: Thoughtfulness doth watch over thee, Understanding doth keep thee,
12: To deliver thee from an evil way, From any speaking froward things,
13: Who are forsaking paths of uprightness, To walk in ways of darkness,
14: Who are rejoicing to do evil, They delight in frowardness of the wicked,
15: Whose paths [are] crooked, Yea, they are perverted in their ways.
16: To deliver thee from the strange woman, From the stranger who hath made smooth her sayings,
17: Who is forsaking the guide of her youth, And the covenant of her God hath forgotten.
18: For her house hath inclined unto death, And unto Rephaim her paths.
19: None going in unto her turn back, Nor do they reach the paths of life.
20: That thou dost go in the way of the good, And the paths of the righteous dost keep.
21: For the upright do inhabit the earth, And the perfect are left in it,
22: And the wicked from the earth are cut off, And treacherous dealers plucked out of it!