23 When you sit down to eat with a ruler, consider who and what are before you;

² For you will put a knife to your throat if you are a man given to desire.

³ Be not desirous of his dainties, for it is deceitful food [offered with questionable motives].

⁴ Weary not yourself to be rich; cease from your own [human] wisdom.^(A)

⁵ Will you set your eyes upon wealth, when [suddenly] it is gone? For riches certainly make themselves wings, like an eagle that flies toward the heavens.

⁶ Eat not the bread of him who has a hard, grudging, and envious eye, neither desire his dainty foods;

⁷ For as he thinks in his heart, so is he. As one who reckons, he says to you, eat and drink, yet his heart is not with you [but is grudging the cost].

⁸ The morsel which you have eaten you will vomit up, and your complimentary words will be wasted.

⁹ Speak not in the ears of a [self-confident] fool, for he will despise the [godly] Wisdom of your words.^(B)

¹⁰ Remove not the ancient landmark and enter not into the fields of the fatherless,^(C)

¹¹ For their Redeemer is mighty; He will plead their cause against you.

¹² Apply your mind to instruction and correction and your ears to words of knowledge.

¹³ Withhold not discipline from the child; for if you strike and punish him with the [reedlike] rod, he will not die.

¹⁴ You shall whip him with the rod and deliver his life from Sheol (Hades, the place of the dead).

¹⁵ My son, if your heart is wise, my heart will be glad, even mine;

¹⁶ Yes, my heart will rejoice when your lips speak right things.

¹⁷ Let not your heart envy sinners, but continue in the reverent and worshipful fear of the Lord all the day long.

¹⁸ For surely there is a latter end [a future and a reward], and your hope and expectation shall not be cut off.

¹⁹ Hear, my son, and be wise, and direct your mind in the way [of the Lord].

²⁰ Do not associate with winebibbers; be not among them nor among gluttonous eaters of meat,^(D)

²¹ For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty, and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags.

²² Hearken to your father, who begot you, and despise not your mother when she is old.

²³ Buy the truth and sell it not; not only that, but also get discernment and judgment, instruction and understanding.

²⁴ The father of the [uncompromisingly] righteous (the upright, in right standing with God) shall greatly rejoice, and he who becomes the father of a wise child shall have joy in him.

²⁵ Let your father and your mother be glad, and let her who bore you rejoice.

²⁶ My son, give me your heart and let your eyes observe and delight in my ways,

²⁷ For a harlot is a deep ditch, and a loose woman is a narrow pit.

²⁸ She also lies in wait as a robber or as one waits for prey, and she increases the treacherous among men.

²⁹ Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has strife? Who has complaining? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness and dimness of eyes?

³⁰ Those who tarry long at the wine, those who go to seek and try mixed wine.^(E)

³¹ Do not look at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the wineglass, when it goes down smoothly.

³² At the last it bites like a serpent and stings like an adder.

³³ [Under the influence of wine] your eyes will behold strange things [and loose women] and your mind will utter things turned the wrong way [untrue, incorrect, and petulant].

³⁴ Yes, you will be [as unsteady] as he who lies down in the midst of the sea, and [as open to disaster] as he who lies upon the top of a mast.

³⁵ You will say, They struck me, but I was not hurt! They beat me [as with a hammer], but I did not feel it! When shall I awake? I will crave and seek more wine again [and escape reality].