^1. MY son, if you will receive my words And treasure my commandments within you,

^2. Make your ear attentive to wisdom, Incline your heart to understanding;

^3. For if you cry for discernment, [1] Lift your voice for understanding;

^4. If you seek her as silver And search for her as for hidden treasures;

^5. Then you will discern the fear of the LORD And discover the knowledge of God.

^6. For the LORD gives wisdom; From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.

^7. He stores up sound wisdom for the upright; He is a shield to those who walk in integrity,

^8. Guarding the paths of justice, And He preserves the way of His godly ones.

^9. Then you will discern righteousness and justice And equity and every good course.

^10. For wisdom will enter your heart And knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;

^11. Discretion will guard you, Understanding will watch over you,

^12. To deliver you from the way of evil, From the man who speaks perverse things;

^13. From those who leave the paths of uprightness To walk in the ways of darkness;

^14. Who delight in doing evil And rejoice in the perversity of evil;

^15. Whose paths are crooked, And who are devious in their ways;

^16. To deliver you from the strange woman, From the [2] adulteress who flatters with her words;

^17. That leaves the companion of her youth And forgets the covenant of her God;

^18. For her house [4] sinks down to death And her tracks lead to the [3] dead;

^19. None who go to her return again, Nor do they reach the paths of life.

^20. So you will walk in the way of good men And keep to the paths of the righteous.

^21. For the upright will [5] live in the land And the blameless will remain in it;

^22. But the wicked will be cut off from the land And the treacherous will be uprooted from it.