Proverbs 7 - Modern English Version

The Wiles of an Adulteress

¹ My son, keep my words, and treasure my commandments within you.

² Keep my commandments and live, and my teaching as the 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 understanding your kin,

⁵ that they may keep you from an adulteress, from the foreigner who flatters with her words.

⁶ For at the window of my house I looked out through my lattice,

⁷ and I saw among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man lacking understanding,

⁸ passing through the street near her corner, taking the way to her house

⁹ in the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night.

¹⁰ And behold, a woman met him, with the attire of a prostitute and with crafty intent.

¹¹ She was loud and stubborn; her feet did not stay at home.

¹² Now she is in the streets, now in the markets, lying in wait at every corner.

¹³ She caught him and kissed him, and with an impudent face she said to him:

¹⁴ “I have peace offerings with me; this day I have paid my vows.

¹⁵ Therefore I came out to meet you, to diligently seek you, and I have found you.

¹⁶ I have decked my couch with tapestry, colored linens from Egypt.

¹⁷ I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.

¹⁸ Come, let us take our fill of love until the morning; let us delight ourselves with love.

¹⁹ For my husband is not at home; he has gone on a long journey.

²⁰ He has taken a bag of money with him and will not come home until full moon.”

²¹ With her enticing speech she led him astray; with her flattering lips she seduced him.

²² Immediately he followed her, as an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks,

²³ until an arrow pierces his liver; as a bird darting into the snare, he did not know that it would cost him his life.

²⁴ Now therefore, my sons, listen to me, And be attentive to the words of my mouth.

²⁵ Let not let your heart turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths,

²⁶ for many are the wounded she has laid low, and numerous are all those slain by her.

²⁷ Her house is the way to Sheol, descending to the chambers of death.