Old/New Testament
3 My son, forget not my law or teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments;
2 For length of days and years of a life [worth living] and tranquility [inward and outward and continuing through old age till death], these shall they add to you.
3 Let not mercy and kindness [shutting out all hatred and selfishness] and truth [shutting out all deliberate hypocrisy or falsehood] forsake you; bind them about your neck, write them upon the tablet of your heart.(A)
4 So shall you find favor, good understanding, and high esteem in the sight [or judgment] of God and man.(B)
5 Lean on, trust in, and be confident in the Lord with all your heart and mind and do not rely on your own insight or understanding.
6 In all your ways know, recognize, and acknowledge Him, and He will direct and make straight and plain your paths.
7 Be not wise in your own eyes; reverently fear and worship the Lord and turn [entirely] away from evil.(C)
8 It shall be health to your nerves and sinews, and marrow and moistening to your bones.
9 Honor the Lord with your capital and sufficiency [from righteous labors] and with the firstfruits of all your income;(D)
10 So shall your storage places be filled with plenty, and your vats shall be overflowing with new wine.(E)
11 My son, do not despise or shrink from the chastening of the Lord [His correction by punishment or by subjection to suffering or trial]; neither be weary of or impatient about or loathe or abhor His reproof,(F)
12 For whom the Lord loves He corrects, even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights.
13 Happy (blessed, fortunate, enviable) is the man who finds skillful and godly Wisdom, and the man who gets understanding [drawing it forth from God’s Word and life’s experiences],
14 For the gaining of it is better than the gaining of silver, and the profit of it better than fine gold.
15 Skillful and godly [a]Wisdom is more precious than rubies; and nothing you can wish for is to be compared to her.(G)
16 Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left hand are riches and honor.(H)
17 Her ways are highways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.
18 She is a tree of life to those who lay hold on her; and happy (blessed, fortunate, to be envied) is everyone who holds her fast.
19 The Lord by skillful and godly Wisdom has founded the earth; by understanding He has established the heavens.(I)
20 By His knowledge the deeps were broken up, and the skies distill the dew.
21 My son, let them not escape from your sight, but keep sound and godly Wisdom and discretion,
22 And they will be life to your inner self, and a gracious ornament to your neck (your outer self).
23 Then you will walk in your way securely and in confident trust, and you shall not dash your foot or stumble.(J)
24 When you lie down, you shall not be afraid; yes, you shall lie down, and your sleep shall be sweet.
25 Be not afraid of sudden terror and panic, nor of the stormy blast or the storm and ruin of the wicked when it comes [for you will be guiltless],
26 For the Lord shall be your confidence, firm and strong, and shall keep your foot from being caught [in a trap or some hidden danger].
27 Withhold not good from those to whom it is due [its rightful owners], when it is in the power of your hand to do it.(K)
28 Do not say to your neighbor, Go, and come again; and tomorrow I will give it—when you have it with you.(L)
29 Do not contrive or dig up or cultivate evil against your neighbor, who dwells trustingly and confidently beside you.
30 Contend not with a man for no reason—when he has done you no wrong.(M)
31 Do not resentfully envy and be jealous of an unscrupulous, grasping man, and choose none of his ways.(N)
32 For the perverse are an abomination [extremely disgusting and detestable] to the Lord; but His confidential communion and secret counsel are with the [uncompromisingly] righteous (those who are upright and in right standing with Him).(O)
33 The curse of the Lord is in and on the house of the wicked, but He declares blessed (joyful and favored with blessings) the home of the just and consistently righteous.(P)
34 Though He scoffs at the scoffers and scorns the scorners, yet He gives His undeserved favor to the low [in rank], the humble, and the afflicted.(Q)
35 The wise shall inherit glory (all honor and good) but shame is the highest rank conferred on [self-confident] fools.(R)
4 Hear, my sons, the instruction of a father, and pay attention in order to gain and to know intelligent discernment, comprehension, and interpretation [of spiritual matters].
2 For I give you good doctrine [what is to be received]; do not forsake my teaching.
3 When I [Solomon] was a son with my father [David], tender and the only son in the sight of my mother [Bathsheba],
4 He taught me and said to me, Let your heart hold fast my words; keep my commandments and live.(S)
5 Get skillful and godly Wisdom, get understanding (discernment, comprehension, and interpretation); do not forget and do not turn back from the words of my mouth.
6 Forsake not [Wisdom], and she will keep, defend, and protect you; love her, and she will guard you.
7 The beginning of Wisdom is: get Wisdom (skillful and godly Wisdom)! [For skillful and godly Wisdom is the principal thing.] And with all you have gotten, get understanding (discernment, comprehension, and interpretation).(T)
8 Prize Wisdom highly and exalt her, and she will exalt and promote you; she will bring you to honor when you embrace her.
9 She shall give to your head a wreath of gracefulness; a crown of beauty and glory will she deliver to you.
10 Hear, O my son, and receive my sayings, and the years of your life shall be many.
11 I have taught you in the way of skillful and godly Wisdom [which is comprehensive insight into the ways and purposes of God]; I have led you in paths of uprightness.
12 When you walk, your steps shall not be hampered [your path will be clear and open]; and when you run, you shall not stumble.
13 Take firm hold of instruction, do not let go; guard her, for she is your life.
14 Enter not into the path of the wicked, and go not in the way of evil men.
15 Avoid it, do not go on it; turn from it and pass on.
16 For they cannot sleep unless they have caused trouble or vexation; their sleep is taken away unless they have caused someone to fall.
17 For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence.
18 But the path of the [uncompromisingly] just and righteous is like the light of dawn, that shines more and more (brighter and clearer) until [it reaches its full strength and glory in] the perfect day [to be prepared].(U)
19 The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.(V)
20 My son, attend to my words; consent and submit to my sayings.
21 Let them not depart from your sight; keep them in the center of your heart.
22 For they are life to those who find them, healing and health to all their flesh.
23 Keep and guard your heart with all vigilance and above all that you guard, for out of it flow the springs of life.
24 Put away from you false and dishonest speech, and willful and contrary talk put far from you.
25 Let your eyes look right on [with fixed purpose], and let your gaze be straight before you.
26 Consider well the path of your feet, and let all your ways be established and ordered aright.
27 Turn not aside to the right hand or to the left; remove your foot from evil.
5 My son, be attentive to my Wisdom [godly Wisdom learned by actual and costly experience], and incline your ear to my understanding [of what is becoming and prudent for you],
2 That you may exercise proper discrimination and discretion and your lips may guard and keep knowledge and the wise answer [to temptation].
3 For the lips of a loose woman drip honey as a honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil;(W)
4 But in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged and devouring sword.
5 Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold of Sheol (Hades, the place of the dead).
6 She loses sight of and walks not in the path of life; her ways wind about aimlessly, and you cannot know them.
7 Now therefore, my sons, listen to me, and depart not from the words of my mouth.
8 Let your way in life be far from her, and come not near the door of her house [avoid the very scenes of temptation],(X)
9 Lest you give your honor to others and your years to those without mercy,
10 Lest strangers [and false teachings] take their fill of your strength and wealth and your labors go to the house of an alien [from God]—
11 And you groan and mourn when your end comes, when your flesh and body are consumed,
12 And you say, How I hated instruction and discipline, and my heart despised reproof!
13 I have not obeyed the voice of my teachers nor submitted and consented to those who instructed me.
14 [The extent and boldness of] my sin involved almost all evil [in the estimation] of the congregation and the community.
15 [b]Drink waters out of your own cistern [of a pure marriage relationship], and fresh running waters out of your own well.
16 Should your offspring be dispersed abroad as water brooks in the streets?
17 [Confine yourself to your own wife] let your children be for you alone, and not the children of strangers with you.
18 Let your fountain [of human life] be blessed [with the rewards of fidelity], and rejoice in the wife of your youth.
19 Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant doe [tender, gentle, attractive]—let her bosom satisfy you at all times, and always be transported with delight in her love.
20 Why should you, my son, be infatuated with a loose woman, embrace the bosom of an outsider, and go astray?
21 For the ways of man are directly before the eyes of the Lord, and He [Who would have us live soberly, chastely, and godly] carefully weighs all man’s goings.(Y)
22 His own iniquities shall ensnare the wicked man, and he shall be held with the cords of his sin.
23 He will die for lack of discipline and instruction, and in the greatness of his folly he will go astray and be lost.
1 Paul, an apostle (a special messenger) of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy [our] brother, to the church (assembly) of God which is at Corinth, and to all the saints (the people of God) throughout Achaia (most of Greece):
2 Grace (favor and spiritual blessing) to you and [heart] peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of sympathy (pity and mercy) and the God [Who is the Source] of every comfort (consolation and encouragement),
4 Who comforts (consoles and encourages) us in every trouble (calamity and affliction), so that we may also be able to comfort (console and encourage) those who are in any kind of trouble or distress, with the comfort (consolation and encouragement) with which we ourselves are comforted (consoled and encouraged) by God.
5 For just as Christ’s [[a]own] sufferings fall to our lot [b][as they overflow upon His disciples, and we share and experience them] abundantly, so through Christ comfort (consolation and encouragement) is also [shared and experienced] abundantly by us.
6 But if we are troubled (afflicted and distressed), it is for your comfort (consolation and encouragement) and [for your] salvation; and if we are comforted (consoled and encouraged), it is for your comfort (consolation and encouragement), which works [in you] when you patiently endure the same evils (misfortunes and calamities) that we also suffer and undergo.
7 And our hope for you [our joyful and confident expectation of good for you] is ever unwavering (assured and unshaken); for we know that just as you share and are partners in [our] sufferings and calamities, you also share and are partners in [our] comfort (consolation and encouragement).
8 For we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about the affliction and oppressing distress which befell us in [the province of] Asia, how we were so utterly and unbearably weighed down and crushed that we despaired even of life [itself].
9 Indeed, we felt within ourselves that we had received the [very] sentence of death, but that was to keep us from trusting in and depending on ourselves instead of on God Who raises the dead.
10 [For it is He] Who rescued and saved us from such a perilous death, and He will still rescue and save us; in and on Him we have set our hope (our joyful and confident expectation) that He will again deliver us [from danger and destruction and [c]draw us to Himself],
11 While you also cooperate by your prayers for us [helping and laboring together with us]. Thus [the lips of] many persons [turned toward God will eventually] give thanks on our behalf for the grace (the blessing of deliverance) granted us at the request of the many who have prayed.
12 It is a reason for pride and exultation to which our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world [generally] and especially toward you, with devout and pure motives and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God (the unmerited favor and [d]merciful kindness by which God, exerting His holy influence upon souls, turns them to Christ, and keeps, strengthens, and increases them in Christian virtues).
13 For we write you nothing else but simply what you can read and understand [there is no double meaning to what we say], and I hope that you will become thoroughly acquainted [with [e]divine things] and know and understand [them] accurately and well to the end,
14 [Just] as you have [already] partially known and understood and acknowledged us and recognized that you can [honestly] be proud of us, even as we [can be proud] of you on the day of our Lord Jesus.
15 It was with assurance of this that I wanted and planned to visit you first [of all], so that you might have a double favor and token of grace (goodwill).
16 [I wanted] to visit you on my way to Macedonia, and [then] to come again to you [on my return trip] from Macedonia and have you send me forward on my way to Judea.
17 Now because I changed my original plan, was I being unstable and capricious? Or what I plan, do I plan according to the flesh [like a worldly man], ready to say Yes, yes, [when it may mean] No, no?
18 As surely as God is trustworthy and faithful and means what He says, our speech and message to you have not been Yes [that might mean] No.
19 For the Son of God, Christ Jesus (the Messiah), Who has been preached among you by us, by myself, Silvanus, and Timothy, was not Yes and No; but in Him it is [always the divine] Yes.
20 For as many as are the promises of God, they all find their Yes [answer] in Him [Christ]. For this reason we also utter the Amen (so be it) to God through Him [in His Person and by His agency] to the glory of God.
21 But it is God Who confirms and makes us steadfast and establishes us [in joint fellowship] with you in Christ, and has consecrated and anointed us [[f]enduing us with the gifts of the Holy Spirit];
22 [He has also appropriated and acknowledged us as His by] putting His seal upon us and giving us His [Holy] Spirit in our hearts as the security deposit and guarantee [of the fulfillment of His promise].
23 But I call upon God as my soul’s witness: it was to avoid hurting you that I refrained from coming to Corinth—
24 Not that we have dominion [over you] and lord it over your faith, but [rather that we work with you as] fellow laborers [to promote] your joy, for in [your] faith ([g]in your strong and welcome conviction or belief that Jesus is the Messiah, through Whom we obtain eternal salvation in the kingdom of God) you stand firm.
Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation