1 The Adulteress’ Trap My son, keep my wordsAnd treasure my commandments within you.
2 Keep my commandments and live,And my 7:2Or instruction law as the 7:2Lit pupil apple of your eye.
3 Bind them on your fingers;Write them on the tablet of your heart.
4 Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,”And call understandingyourintimate friend;
5 In order to keep you from the strange woman,From the foreign woman who 7:5 Lit is smooth flatters with her words.
6 ¶For at the window of my houseI looked out through my lattice,
7 And I saw among the simple,Anddiscerned among the 7:7 Or youths sonsA young man lacking a heartof wisdom,
8 Passing through the street near her corner;And he strides along the way to her house,
9 In the twilight, in the evening ofthatday,In the 7:9Lit pupil (of the eye) middle of the night, andinthe thick darkness.
10 And behold, a womancomesto meet him,Dressed as a harlot and 7:10Lit guarded cunning of heart.
11 She is boisterous and rebellious,Her feet do not dwell at home;
12 Stepping in the streets, stepping in the squares,And near every corner she lies in wait.
13 So she seizes him and kisses him 7:13Lit She makes bold her face and says And with a brazen face she says to him:
14 “The sacrifices of peace offerings are with me;Today I paid my vows.
15 “Therefore I have come out to meet you,To seek your face earnestly, and I have found you.
16 “I have spread my couch with coverings,With colored linens of Egypt.
17 “I have sprinkled my bedWith myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.
18 “Come, then, let us drink our fill as lovers until morning;Let us delight ourselves with the pleasures of love.
19 “For 7:19 Lit the man my husband is not at home,He has gone on a journey far away;
20 He took a bag of silver in his hand,On the day of the full moon he will come home.”
21 With her abundant 7:21 Lit learning persuasions she entices him;With her flattering lips she drives himto herself.
22 He suddenly follows herAs an ox goes to the slaughter,Or 7:22Some ancient versions as a stag goes into a trap asone infetters to the discipline of an ignorant fool,
23 Until an arrow pierces through his liver;As a bird hastens to the snare,And he does not know that itwill cost himhis 7:23 Or life soul.
24 ¶So now,mysons, listen to me,And pay attention to the words of my mouth.
25 Do not let your heart go astray into her ways,Do not wander into her pathways.
26 For many are the slainwhomshe has cast down,And numerous are all those killed by her.
27 The ways to Sheolare inher house,Descending to the chambers of death.