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The Blue Letter Bible

Proverbs 5 :: English Standard Version (ESV)

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Warning Against Adultery

Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:1 - My son, be attentive to my wisdom;
incline your ear to my understanding,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:2 - that you may keep discretion,
and your lips may guard knowledge.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:3 - For the lips of a forbidden[fn] woman drip honey,
and her speech[fn] is smoother than oil,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:4 - but in the end she is bitter as wormwood,
sharp as a two-edged sword.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:5 - Her feet go down to death;
her steps follow the path to[fn] Sheol;
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:6 - she does not ponder the path of life;
her ways wander, and she does not know it.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:7 - And now, O sons, listen to me,
and do not depart from the words of my mouth.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:8 - Keep your way far from her,
and do not go near the door of her house,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:9 - lest you give your honor to others
and your years to the merciless,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:10 - lest strangers take their fill of your strength,
and your labors go to the house of a foreigner,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:11 - and at the end of your life you groan,
when your flesh and body are consumed,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:12 - and you say, “How I hated discipline,
and my heart despised reproof!
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:13 - I did not listen to the voice of my teachers
or incline my ear to my instructors.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:14 - I am at the brink of utter ruin
in the assembled congregation.”
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:15 - Drink water from your own cistern,
flowing water from your own well.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:16 - Should your springs be scattered abroad,
streams of water in the streets?
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:17 - Let them be for yourself alone,
and not for strangers with you.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:18 - Let your fountain be blessed,
and rejoice in the wife of your youth,
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:19 - a lovely deer, a graceful doe.
Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;
be intoxicated[fn] always in her love.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:20 - Why should you be intoxicated, my son, with a forbidden woman
and embrace the bosom of an adulteress?[fn]
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:21 - For a man’s ways are before the eyes of the LORD,
and he ponders[fn] all his paths.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:22 - The iniquities of the wicked ensnare him,
and he is held fast in the cords of his sin.
Unchecked Copy BoxPro 5:23 - He dies for lack of discipline,
and because of his great folly he is led astray.
ESV Footnotes
Hebrew strange; also verse 20
Hebrew palate
Hebrew lay hold of
Hebrew be led astray; also verse 20
Hebrew a foreign woman
Or makes level
ESV

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001, 2007, 2011, 2016 by Crossway Books and Bibles, a Publishing Ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

See detailed copyright information.

For more information on this translation, see the ESV Preface.

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Proverbs Chapter 5 — Additional Translations: