Mishlĕ (Proverbs) 2

¹My son, if you accept my words, And treasure up my commands with you,

²So that you make your ear attend to wisdom, Incline your heart to understanding;

³For if you cry for discernment, Lift up your voice for understanding,

⁴If you seek her as silver, And search for her as hidden treasures,

⁵Then you would understand the fear of יהוה, And find the knowledge of Elohim.

⁶For יהוה gives wisdom; Out of His mouth come knowledge and understanding.

⁷And He treasures up stability for the straight, A shield to those walking blamelessly,

⁸To watch over the paths of right-ruling, And the way of His lovingly-commited ones He guards.

⁹Then you would understand righteousness And right-ruling, and straightness – Every good path.

¹⁰For wisdom would enter your heart, And knowledge be pleasant to your being,

¹¹Discretion would guard you; Understanding would watch over you,

¹²To deliver you from the evil way, From the man who speaks perversities,

¹³Those who leave the paths of straightness To walk in the ways of darkness;

¹⁴Who rejoice to do evil; They delight in the perversities of evil;

¹⁵Whose paths are crooked, And they are perverted in their ways;

¹⁶To deliver you from the strange woman, From the foreigner who flatters with her words,

¹⁷Who forsakes the companion of her youth, And has forgotten the covenant of her Elohim.

¹⁸For her house has sunk down to death, And her paths to the dead;

¹⁹None going in to her does return, Nor do they reach the paths of life –

²⁰So walk in the way of goodness, And guard the paths of righteousness.

²¹For the straight shall dwell in the earth, And the perfect be left in it;

²²But the wrong shall be cut off from the earth, And the treacherous ones plucked out of it.