Proverbs 6:20-35 (New International Version)

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Proverbs 6:20-35

New International Version (NIV)

Warning Against Adultery

²⁰My son, keep your father’s command
    and do not forsake your mother’s teaching.
²¹Bind them always on your heart;
    fasten them around your neck.
²²When you walk, they will guide you;
    when you sleep, they will watch over you;
    when you awake, they will speak to you.
²³For this command is a lamp,
    this teaching is a light,
and correction and instruction
    are the way to life,
²⁴keeping you from your neighbor’s wife,
    from the smooth talk of a wayward woman.

²⁵Do not lust in your heart after her beauty
or let her captivate you with her eyes.

²⁶For a prostitute can be had for a loaf of bread,
    but another man’s wife preys on your very life.
²⁷Can a man scoop fire into his lap
    without his clothes being burned?
²⁸Can a man walk on hot coals
    without his feet being scorched?
²⁹So is he who sleeps with another man’s wife;
    no one who touches her will go unpunished.

³⁰People do not despise a thief if he steals
    to satisfy his hunger when he is starving.
³¹Yet if he is caught, he must pay sevenfold,
    though it costs him all the wealth of his house.
³²But a man who commits adultery has no sense;
    whoever does so destroys himself.
³³Blows and disgrace are his lot,
    and his shame will never be wiped away.

³⁴For jealousy arouses a husband’s fury,
and he will show no mercy when he takes revenge.
³⁵He will not accept any compensation;
he will refuse a bribe, however great it is.