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The Value of Work

16 How terrible it will be for a country
    if its king is a child.
How terrible it will be for that country
    if its leaders have parties all the time.
17 A country is well off
    if its king comes from a good family.
It is good for a country
    if its leaders control their eating and drinking.
They should eat and drink for strength,
    not to get drunk.

18 If a person is lazy and doesn’t repair the roof,
    it will begin to fall.
If he refuses to fix it,
    the house will leak.

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16 Woe to the land whose king was a servant[a](A)
    and whose princes feast in the morning.
17 Blessed is the land whose king is of noble birth
    and whose princes eat at a proper time—
    for strength and not for drunkenness.(B)

18 Through laziness, the rafters sag;
    because of idle hands, the house leaks.(C)

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Footnotes

  1. Ecclesiastes 10:16 Or king is a child