1 Paul, a servant of God, and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God's elect, and the acknowledging of the truth which is after godliness;

² In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began;

³ But hath in due times manifested his word through preaching, which is committed unto me according to the commandment of God our Saviour;

⁴ To Titus, mine own son after the common faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour.

⁵ For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city, as I had appointed thee:

⁶ If any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children not accused of riot or unruly.

⁷ For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre;

⁸ But a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, temperate;

⁹ Holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers.

¹⁰ For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision:

¹¹ Whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake.

¹² One of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, the Cretians are alway liars, evil beasts, slow bellies.

¹³ This witness is true. Wherefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith;

¹⁴ Not giving heed to Jewish fables, and commandments of men, that turn from the truth.

¹⁵ Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure; but even their mind and conscience is defiled.

¹⁶ They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate.

5 My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding:

² That thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.

³ For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil:

⁴ But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.

⁵ Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.

⁶ Lest thou shouldest ponder the path of life, her ways are moveable, that thou canst not know them.

⁷ Hear me now therefore, O ye children, and depart not from the words of my mouth.

⁸ Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house:

⁹ Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel:

¹⁰ Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth; and thy labours be in the house of a stranger;

¹¹ And thou mourn at the last, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed,

¹² And say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof;

¹³ And have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me!

¹⁴ I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.

¹⁵ Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.

¹⁶ Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.

¹⁷ Let them be only thine own, and not strangers' with thee.

¹⁸ Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.

¹⁹ Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love.

²⁰ And why wilt thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?

²¹ For the ways of man are before the eyes of the Lord, and he pondereth all his goings.

²² His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins.

²³ He shall die without instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.