1When youⁱ sit to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what [is] before youⁱ:

2And put a knife to youⁱ throat, if youⁱ [be] a man given to appetite.

3Be not desirous of his dainties: for they [are] deceitful meat.

4Labour not to be rich: cease from youⁱ own wisdom.

5Will youⁱ set youⁱ eyes upon that which is not? for [riches] certainly make themselves wings; they fly away as an eagle toward heaven.

6Eat youⁱ not the bread of [him that has] an evil eye, neither desire youⁱ his dainty meats:

7For as he thinks in his heart, so [is] he: Eat and drink, says he to youⁱ; but his heart [is] not with youⁱ.

8The morsel [which] youⁱ have eaten shall youⁱ vomit up, and lose youⁱ sweet words.

9Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of youⁱ words.

10Remove not the old landmark; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless:

11For their redeemer [is] mighty; he shall plead their cause with youⁱ.

12Apply youⁱ heart unto instruction, and youⁱ ears to the words of knowledge.

13Withhold not correction from the child: for [if] youⁱ beat him with the rod, he shall not die.

14youⁱ shall beat him with the rod, and shall deliver his soul from hell.

15My son, if youⁱ heart be wise, my heart shall rejoice, even mine.

16Yea, my reins (literally, kidneys; figuratively, seat of emotion) shall rejoice, when youⁱ lips speak right things.

17Let not youⁱ heart envy sinners: but [be youⁱ] in the fear of the LORD-Yehovah [Messiah Pre-Incarnate] all the day long.

18For surely there is an end; and youⁱ expectation shall not be cut off.

19Hear youⁱ, my son, and be wise, and guide youⁱ heart in the way.

20Be not among winebibbers; among riotous eaters of flesh:

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

22Hearken unto youⁱ father that begat (to be father of; be ancestor of) youⁱ, and despise not youⁱ mother when she is old.

23Buy the truth, and sell [it] not; [also] wisdom, and instruction, and understanding.

24The father of the righteous shall greatly rejoice: and he that begets a wise [child] shall have joy of him.

25You1s father and youⁱ mother shall be glad, and she that bare youⁱ shall rejoice.

26My son, give me youⁱ heart, and let youⁱ eyes observe my ways.

27For a whore [is] a deep ditch; and a strange woman [is] a narrow pit.

28She also lies in wait as [for] a prey, and increases the transgressors among men.

29Who has woe? who has sorrow? who has contentions? who has babbling? who has wounds without cause? who has redness of eyes?

30They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek mixed wine.

31Look not youⁱ upon the wine when it is red, when it gives his colour in the cup, [when] it moves itself aright (in the right way).

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

33You1s eyes shall behold strange women, and youⁱ heart shall utter perverse things.

34Yea, youⁱ shall be as he that lies down in the midst of the sea, or as he that lies upon the top of a mast.

35They have stricken me, [shall youⁱ say, and] I was not sick; they have beaten me, [and] I felt [it] not: when shall I awake? I will seek it yet again.