23 When thou sittest to eat with a ruler,
Consider diligently ^[a]him that is before thee;
^2 [b]And put a knife to thy throat,
If thou be a man given to appetite.
³ Be not desirous of his dainties;
Seeing they are deceitful food.
⁴ Weary not thyself to be rich;
Cease ^[c]from thine own wisdom.
^5 [d]Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not?
For riches certainly make themselves wings,
Like an eagle that flieth toward heaven.
⁶ Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye,
Neither desire thou his dainties:
⁷ For ^[e]as he thinketh within himself, so is he:
Eat and drink, saith he to thee;
But his heart is not with thee.
⁸ The morsel which thou hast eaten shalt thou vomit up,
And lose thy sweet words.
⁹ Speak not in the hearing of a fool;
For he will despise the wisdom of thy words.
¹⁰ Remove not the ancient landmark;
And enter not into the fields of the fatherless:
¹¹ For their Redeemer is strong;
He will plead their cause against thee.
¹² Apply thy heart unto ^[f]instruction,
And thine ears to the words of knowledge.
¹³ Withhold not correction from the child;
For ^[g]if thou beat him with the rod, he will not die.
¹⁴ Thou shalt beat him with the rod,
And shalt deliver his soul from Sheol.
¹⁵ My son, if thy heart be wise,
My heart will be glad, even mine:
¹⁶ Yea, my ^[h]heart will rejoice,
When thy lips speak right things.
¹⁷ Let not thy heart envy sinners;
But be thou in the fear of Jehovah all the day long:
¹⁸ For surely there is a ^[i]reward;
And thy hope shall not be cut off.
¹⁹ Hear thou, my son, and be wise,
And guide thy heart in the way.
²⁰ Be not among winebibbers,
Among gluttonous eaters of flesh:
²¹ For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty;
And drowsiness will clothe a man with rags.
²² Hearken unto thy father that begat thee,
And despise not thy mother when she is old.
²³ Buy the truth, and sell it not;
Yea, wisdom, and instruction, and understanding.
²⁴ The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice;
And he that begetteth a wise child will have joy of him.
²⁵ Let thy father and thy mother be glad,
And let her that bare thee rejoice.
²⁶ My son, give me thy heart;
And let thine eyes ^[j]delight in my ways.
²⁷ For a harlot is a deep ditch;
And a foreign woman is a narrow pit.
²⁸ Yea, she lieth in wait ^[k]as a robber,
And increaseth the treacherous among men.
²⁹ Who hath ^[l]woe? who hath ^[m]sorrow? who hath contentions?
Who hath complaining? who hath wounds without cause?
Who hath ^[n]redness of eyes?
³⁰ They that tarry long at the wine;
They that go to ^[o]seek out mixed wine.
³¹ Look not thou upon the wine when it is red,
When it sparkleth in the cup,
When it ^[p]goeth down smoothly:
³² At the last it biteth like a serpent,
And stingeth like an adder.
³³ Thine eyes shall behold ^[q]strange things,
And thy heart shall utter perverse things.
³⁴ Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth down in the midst of the sea,
Or as he that lieth upon the top of a mast.
³⁵ They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not hurt;
They have beaten me, and I felt it not:
When shall I awake? I will seek it yet again.