turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding—

By wisdom the Lord laid the earth’s foundations, by understanding he set the heavens in place;

My son, pay attention to what I say; turn your ear to my words.

Warning Against Adultery

My son, pay attention to my wisdom, turn your ear to my words of insight,

I would not obey my teachers or turn my ear to my instructors.

by me princes govern, and nobles—all who rule on earth.

before he made the world or its fields or any of the dust of the earth.

when he gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command, and when he marked out the foundations of the earth.

The wages of the righteous is life, but the earnings of the wicked are sin and death.

A wicked person earns deceptive wages, but the one who sows righteousness reaps a sure reward.

If the righteous receive their due on earth, how much more the ungodly and the sinner!

A discerning person keeps wisdom in view, but a fool’s eyes wander to the ends of the earth.

The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, for the ears of the wise seek it out.

Ears that hear and eyes that see— the Lord has made them both.

Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor will also cry out and not be answered.

Thirty Sayings of the Wise

Saying 1

Pay attention and turn your ear to the sayings of the wise; apply your heart to what I teach,

Saying 12

Apply your heart to instruction and your ears to words of knowledge.

As the heavens are high and the earth is deep, so the hearts of kings are unsearchable.

Like an earring of gold or an ornament of fine gold is the rebuke of a wise judge to a listening ear.

Like one who grabs a stray dog by the ears is someone who rushes into a quarrel not their own.

Like a coating of silver dross on earthenware are fervent lips with an evil heart.

If anyone loudly blesses their neighbor early in the morning, it will be taken as a curse.

If anyone turns a deaf ear to my instruction, even their prayers are detestable.

Who has gone up to heaven and come down? Whose hands have gathered up the wind? Who has wrapped up the waters in a cloak? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is the name of his son? Surely you know!

those whose teeth are swords and whose jaws are set with knives to devour the poor from the earth and the needy from among mankind.