Old/New Testament

8 Does not skillful and godly Wisdom cry out, and understanding raise her voice [in contrast to the loose woman]?

² On the top of the heights beside the way, where the paths meet, stands Wisdom [skillful and godly];

³ At the gates at the entrance of the town, at the coming in at the doors, she cries out:

⁴ To you, O men, I call, and my voice is directed to the sons of men.

⁵ O you simple and thoughtless ones, understand prudence; you [self-confident] fools, be of an understanding heart.^(A)

⁶ Hear, for I will speak excellent and princely things; and the opening of my lips shall be for right things.

⁷ For my mouth shall utter truth, and wrongdoing is detestable and loathsome to my lips.

⁸ All the words of my mouth are righteous (upright and in right standing with God); there is nothing contrary to truth or crooked in them.

⁹ They are all plain to him who understands [and opens his heart], and right to those who find knowledge [and live by it].

¹⁰ Receive my instruction in preference to [striving for] silver, and knowledge rather than choice gold,

¹¹ For skillful and godly Wisdom is better than rubies or pearls, and all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it.^(B)

¹² I, Wisdom [from God], make prudence my dwelling, and I find out knowledge and discretion.^(C)

¹³ The reverent fear and worshipful awe of the Lord [includes] the hatred of evil; pride, arrogance, the evil way, and perverted and twisted speech I hate.

¹⁴ I have counsel and sound knowledge, I have understanding, I have might and power.

¹⁵ By me kings reign and rulers decree justice.^(D)

¹⁶ By me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges and governors of the earth.

¹⁷ I love those who love me, and those who seek me early and diligently shall find me.^(E)

¹⁸ Riches and honor are with me, enduring wealth and righteousness (uprightness in every area and relation, and right standing with God).^(F)

¹⁹ My fruit is better than gold, yes, than refined gold, and my increase than choice silver.

²⁰ I [Wisdom] walk in the way of righteousness (moral and spiritual rectitude in every area and relation), in the midst of the paths of justice,

²¹ That I may cause those who love me to inherit [true] riches and that I may fill their treasuries.

²² The Lord formed and brought me [Wisdom] forth at the beginning of His way, before His acts of old.

²³ I [Wisdom] was inaugurated and ordained from everlasting, from the beginning, before ever the earth existed.^(G)

²⁴ When there were no deeps, I was brought forth, when there were no fountains laden with water.

²⁵ Before the mountains were settled, before the hills, I was brought forth,^(H)

²⁶ While as yet He had not made the land or the fields or the first of the dust of the earth.

²⁷ When He prepared the heavens, I [Wisdom] was there; when He drew a circle upon the face of the deep and stretched out the firmament over it,

²⁸ When He made firm the skies above, when He established the fountains of the deep,

²⁹ When He gave to the sea its limit and His decree that the waters should not transgress [across the boundaries set by] His command, when He appointed the foundations of the earth—^(I)

³⁰ Then I [Wisdom] was ^[a]beside Him as a master and director of the work; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing before Him always,^(J)

³¹ Rejoicing in His inhabited earth and delighting in the sons of men.^(K)

³² Now therefore listen to me, O you sons; for blessed (happy, fortunate, to be envied) are those who keep my ways.^(L)

³³ Hear instruction and be wise, and do not refuse or neglect it.

³⁴ Blessed (happy, fortunate, to be envied) is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors.

³⁵ For whoever finds me [Wisdom] finds life and draws forth and obtains favor from the Lord.

³⁶ But he who misses me or sins against me wrongs and injures himself; all who hate me love and court death.

9 Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn out and set up her seven [perfect number of] pillars.

² She has killed her beasts, she has mixed her [spiritual] wine; she has also set her table.^(M)

³ She has sent out her maids to cry from the highest places of the town:

⁴ Whoever is simple (easily led astray and wavering), let him turn in here! As for him who lacks understanding, [God’s] Wisdom says to him,

⁵ Come, eat of my bread and drink of the [spiritual] wine which I have mixed.^(N)

⁶ Leave off, simple ones [forsake the foolish and simpleminded] and live! And walk in the way of insight and understanding.

⁷ He who rebukes a scorner heaps upon himself abuse, and he who reproves a wicked man gets for himself bruises.

⁸ Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate you; reprove a wise man, and he will love you.^(O)

⁹ Give instruction to a wise man and he will be yet wiser; teach a righteous man (one upright and in right standing with God) and he will increase in learning.

¹⁰ The reverent and worshipful fear of the Lord is the beginning (the chief and choice part) of Wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight and understanding.

¹¹ For by me [Wisdom from God] your days shall be multiplied, and the years of your life shall be increased.

¹² If you are wise, you are wise for yourself; if you scorn, you alone will bear it and pay the penalty.

¹³ The foolish woman is noisy; she is simple and open to all forms of evil, she [willfully and recklessly] knows nothing whatever [of eternal value].

¹⁴ For she sits at the door of her house or on a seat in the conspicuous places of the town,

¹⁵ Calling to those who pass by, who go uprightly on their way:

¹⁶ Whoever is simple (wavering and easily led astray), let him turn in here! And as for him who lacks understanding, she says to him,

¹⁷ Stolen waters (pleasures) are sweet [because they are forbidden]; and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.^(P)

¹⁸ But he knows not that the shades of the dead are there [specters haunting the scene of past transgressions], and that her invited guests are [already sunk] in the depths of Sheol (the lower world, Hades, the place of the dead).

3 Are we starting to commend ourselves again? Or we do not, like some [false teachers], need written credentials or letters of recommendation to you or from you, [do we]?

² [No] you yourselves are our letter of recommendation (our credentials), written in ^[a]your hearts, to be known (perceived, recognized) and read by everybody.

³ You show and make obvious that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, not written with ink but with [the] Spirit of [the] living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.^(A)

⁴ Such is the reliance and confidence that we have through Christ toward and with reference to God.

⁵ Not that we are fit (qualified and sufficient in ability) of ourselves to form personal judgments or to claim or count anything as coming from us, but our power and ability and sufficiency are from God.

⁶ [It is He] Who has qualified us [making us to be fit and worthy and sufficient] as ministers and dispensers of a new covenant [of salvation through Christ], not [ministers] of the letter (of legally written code) but of the Spirit; for the code [of the Law] kills, but the [Holy] Spirit makes alive.^(B)

⁷ Now if the dispensation of death engraved in letters on stone [the ministration of the Law], was inaugurated with such glory and splendor that the Israelites were not able to look steadily at the face of Moses because of its brilliance, [a glory] that was to fade and pass away,^(C)

⁸ Why should not the dispensation of the Spirit [this spiritual ^[b]ministry whose task it is to cause men to obtain and be governed by the Holy Spirit] be attended with much greater and more splendid glory?

⁹ For if the service that condemns [the ministration of doom] had glory, how infinitely more abounding in splendor and glory must be the service that makes righteous [the ministry that produces and fosters righteous living and right standing with God]!

¹⁰ Indeed, in view of this fact, what once had splendor [^[c]the glory of the Law in the face of Moses] has come to have no splendor at all, because of the overwhelming glory that exceeds and excels it [^[d]the glory of the Gospel in the face of Jesus Christ].

¹¹ For if that which was but passing and fading away came with splendor, how much more must that which remains and is permanent abide in glory and splendor!

¹² Since we have such [glorious] hope (such joyful and confident expectation), we speak very freely and openly and fearlessly.

¹³ Nor [do we act] like Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze upon the finish of the vanishing [splendor which had been upon it].

¹⁴ In fact, their minds were grown hard and calloused [they had become dull and had lost the power of understanding]; for until this present day, when the Old Testament (the old covenant) is being read, that same veil still lies [on their hearts], not being lifted [to reveal] that in Christ it is made void and done away.

¹⁵ Yes, down to this [very] day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies upon their minds and hearts.

¹⁶ But whenever a person turns [in repentance] to the Lord, the veil is stripped off and taken away.

¹⁷ Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (emancipation from bondage, freedom).^(D)

¹⁸ And all of us, as with unveiled face, [because we] continued to behold [in the Word of God] as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are constantly being transfigured into His very own image in ever increasing splendor and from one degree of glory to another; [for this comes] from the Lord [Who is] the Spirit.