New Living Translation | NET Bible |
1My child, listen to what I say, and treasure my commands. | 1My child, if you receive my words, and store up my commands within you, |
2Tune your ears to wisdom, and concentrate on understanding. | 2by making your ear attentive to wisdom, and by turning your heart to understanding, |
3Cry out for insight, and ask for understanding. | 3indeed, if you call out for discernment--raise your voice for understanding-- |
4Search for them as you would for silver; seek them like hidden treasures. | 4if you seek it like silver, and search for it like hidden treasure, |
5Then you will understand what it means to fear the LORD, and you will gain knowledge of God. | 5then you will understand how to fear the LORD, and you will discover knowledge about God. |
6For the LORD grants wisdom! From his mouth come knowledge and understanding. | 6For the LORD gives wisdom, and from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding. |
7He grants a treasure of common sense to the honest. He is a shield to those who walk with integrity. | 7He stores up effective counsel for the upright, and is like a shield for those who live with integrity, |
8He guards the paths of the just and protects those who are faithful to him. | 8to guard the paths of the righteous and to protect the way of his pious ones. |
9Then you will understand what is right, just, and fair, and you will find the right way to go. | 9Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity--every good way. |
10For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will fill you with joy. | 10For wisdom will enter your heart, and moral knowledge will be attractive to you. |
11Wise choices will watch over you. Understanding will keep you safe. | 11Discretion will protect you, understanding will guard you, |
12Wisdom will save you from evil people, from those whose words are twisted. | 12to deliver you from the way of the wicked, from those speaking perversity, |
13These men turn from the right way to walk down dark paths. | 13who leave the upright paths to walk on the dark ways, |
14They take pleasure in doing wrong, and they enjoy the twisted ways of evil. | 14who delight in doing evil, they rejoice in perverse evil; |
15Their actions are crooked, and their ways are wrong. | 15whose paths are morally crooked, and who are devious in their ways; |
16Wisdom will save you from the immoral woman, from the seductive words of the promiscuous woman. | 16to deliver you from the adulteress, from the sexually loose woman who speaks flattering words; |
17She has abandoned her husband and ignores the covenant she made before God. | 17who leaves the husband from her younger days, and forgets her marriage covenant made before God. |
18Entering her house leads to death; it is the road to the grave. | 18For her house sinks down to death, and her paths lead to the place of the departed spirits. |
19The man who visits her is doomed. He will never reach the paths of life. | 19None who go in to her will return, nor will they reach the paths of life. |
20So follow the steps of the good, and stay on the paths of the righteous. | 20So you will walk in the way of good people, and will keep on the paths of the righteous. |
21For only the godly will live in the land, and those with integrity will remain in it. | 21For the upright will reside in the land, and those with integrity will remain in it, |
22But the wicked will be removed from the land, and the treacherous will be uprooted. | 22but the wicked will be removed from the land, and the treacherous will be torn away from it. |
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