Proverbs 1:8-19 - Lecture Against Gang Behavior

⁸ My son, hear the instruction of your father, and forsake not the law of your mother; ⁹ for they shall be an ornament of grace to your head and chains around your neck. ¹⁰ My son, if sinners lure you, do not be willing. ¹¹ If they say, Come with us, let us lie in wait for blood, we will watch secretly for the innocent without cause; ¹² let us swallow them up alive as the grave, and whole, as those who go down into the pit; ¹³ we shall find all precious goods; we shall fill our houses with plunder; ¹⁴ cast in your lot among us, and let us have one purse. ¹⁵ My son, do not walk in the way with them! Keep back your foot from their path, ¹⁶ for their feet run to evil and make haste to shed blood. ¹⁷ Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird, ¹⁸ And they lie in wait for their own blood; they watch secretly for their own lives. ¹⁹ So are the ways of everyone who gains unjust gain; it takes away its owners' life.