may the wise hear and increase learning, and the one who understands gain direction,

to understand a proverb and an expression, words of wisdom and their riddles.

If they say, "Come with us! We shall lie in wait for blood; we shall ambush the innocent without cause.

you shall throw your lot in our midst, there will be one purse for all of us."

My child, do not walk in their way. Keep your foot from their paths,

for "in vain is the net scattered, in the sight of any {winged bird}."

They lie in wait for their [own] blood. They ambush their [own] lives.

Wisdom calls out in the streets, in the squares she raises her voice.

On a {busy corner} she cries out, at the entrances of the gates in the city, she speaks her sayings:

"{How long}, O simple ones, will you love simplicity? And [how long] will scoffers delight in their scoffing, and fools hate knowledge?

I will also laugh at your calamity; I will mock when panic comes [upon] you.

When your panic comes like a storm, and your calamity arrives like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you,

They shall eat from the fruit of their way, and they shall be sated from their own schemes,

Whoever listens to me will dwell in security and rest securely from dread and disaster."

[in order] to incline your ear toward wisdom, [then] you shall apply your heart to understanding.

[in order] to guard paths of justice and keep the way of his faithful [ones].

[in order] to deliver you from the way of evil, from a man who speaks devious things--

those who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in ways of darkness,

those who are happy to do evil, [for] they delight in [the] deviousness of evil,

{who are crooked in their ways}, and devious in their paths;

[in order] to deliver you from a strange woman, from a foreign woman [who] flatters [with] her sayings,

So that you will walk on the road of those who are good, and the paths of those who are righteous you shall keep.

For those who are upright will dwell [in the] land, and those who are blameless will remain in it.

And you shall find favor and good sense in the eyes of God and humankind.

{Trust Yahweh} with all your heart; do not lean toward your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will straighten your paths.

Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear Yahweh and retreat from evil.

and your barns shall be full of plenty, and your vats shall burst [with] new wine.

because whomever Yahweh will love, he will rebuke, as a father delights in his son.

Happy [is] {the one} who finds wisdom, and one who obtains understanding.

Length of days [is] in her right hand; in her left hand [are] riches and honor.

Yahweh in wisdom founded the earth; he established the heavens in understanding.

Then you will walk in the confidence of your ways, and your foot will not stumble.

Do not withhold good from its owner when it is in the power of your hand to do.

Do not say to your neighbor, "Go and return and tomorrow I will give [it]," {when it is with you}.

Do not plot harm against your neighbor [who] dwells in confidence beside you.

Do not quarrel with anyone without cause, when he did not do you harm.

for he who is perverse [is] an abomination of Yahweh, but those who are upright [are] his confidence.

The curse of Yahweh [is] on the house of the wicked, and the abode of the righteous ones he blesses.

Children, listen [to the] instruction of a father, and be attentive [in order] to know insight.

When I was a son to my father, tender and alone before my mother,

The beginning of wisdom: Get wisdom! With all [that is in] your possession, gain insight.

In the way of wisdom I have instructed you; I have led you in the path of uprightness.

{When you walk}, your step will not be hampered, and if you run, you will not stumble.

In the path of the wicked do not go; do not walk in the way of those who do evil.

For they ate the bread of wickedness, and they drank the wine of violence.

May they not escape from your {sight}; keep them in [the] midst of your heart.

[in order] to keep prudence, and knowledge will guard your lips.

and you groan at your end, when your flesh and body are consumed,

I was almost at utter ruin in the midst of the assembly and congregation."

Drink water from your [own] cistern and flowing waters from inside your own well.

Shall your springs be scattered outward? In the streets, [shall there be] streams of water?

May your fountain be blessed, and rejoice in the wife of your youth.

His iniquities shall ensnare him, the evildoer, and in the vanity of his sin he shall be caught.

He shall die {for lack of} discipline, and in the greatness of his folly he shall be lost.

In the summer, it prepares its food; in the harvest, it gathers its sustenance.

How long will you lie down, lazy? When will you rise up from your sleep?

like a {robber} shall your poverty come, and what you lack like an armed man.

A worthless man, an evil man, goes around with {deceitful speech}.

Winking in his eye, shuffling in his foot, pointing in his fingers,

perversion in his heart, he devises evil; at all times he will send out discord.

Upon {such a man}, suddenly shall his calamity come; in a moment he will be damaged and there is no healing.

Bind them on your heart continually; tie them upon your neck.

{When you walk}, she will lead you, {When you lie down}, she will watch over you, and [when] you awake, she will converse [with] you.

[in order] to preserve you from an evil woman, from the smoothness of [the] tongue of {an adulteress}.

Do not desire her beauty in your heart; may she not capture you with her eyelashes.

Can a man carry fire in his lap, and his clothes not burn?

[People] do not despise a thief when he steals to fill himself when he is hungry.

For jealousy [is the] fury of a husband, and he will not show restraint on the day of revenge.

Bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart.

[In order] to guard yourself from {an adulteress}, from the foreigner who {makes her words smooth}.

passing on the street {at} her corner, and he takes the road [to] her house,

at twilight, at [the] day's evening, in [the] midst of night and the darkness.

Now in the street, now in the square, {at} every corner she lies in wait.

Come, let us take [our] fill of love making, until the morning let us delight in love.

For there is no man in his home; he has gone on a {long journey}.

The bag of money he took in his hand, for [on] the day of the full moon he will come home."

He goes after her suddenly; like an ox to the slaughter he goes, and like a stag to the instruction of a fool,

until an arrow pierces his {entrails}, like a bird rushing into a snare, but he does not know that {it will cost him his life}.

My mouth will utter truth, and wickedness [is] an abomination to my lips.

All sayings of my mouth [are] in righteousness; none of them are twisted and crooked.

The fear of Yahweh [is] hatred of evil, pride, and arrogance and an evil way. And I hate a mouth of perversity.

In the way of righteousness I walk, in the midst of paths of justice,

[in order] to endow those who love me [with] wealth, and I will fill their treasuries.

When there were no depths, I was brought forth, when there were no springs of {abounding} water.

When he had not yet made earth and fields, or the first dust of the world,

{when he established} the heavens, there I [was], {when he drew} a circle upon the face of the deep,

{when he made} skies from above, when he founded fountains of the deep,

{when he assigned} his limits to the sea, that waters shall not transgress his {command}, {when he marked} the foundations of the earth,

rejoicing in the world of his earth, and my delight [was] with the children of humankind.

Happy [is the] person who listens to me, [in order] to keep watch at my doors day by day, [in order] to guard the frames of my entrances.

She has slaughtered her slaughtering, mixed her wine, [and] also set her table.

"Whoever [is] simple, let him turn here." As for the one who lacks {sense}, she says to him,

"Come, eat with my bread; drink with the wine I have mixed.

Lay aside simplicity and live; walk in the way of understanding."

Give to a wise one and he will become more wise; {teach} a righteous one and he will increase learning.

The start of wisdom is fear of Yahweh, and knowledge of the Holy One, insight.

[in order] to call to those who pass by the road, those who go straight [on] their way:

But he does not know that the dead [are] there, in the depths of Sheol [are] her guests.

He who gathers in the summer [is] a child who is prudent; he who sleeps at the harvest [is] a child who brings shame.