Bible Browser

The Value of Wisdom

2My child, if you accept my words
   and treasure up my commandments within you,
² making your ear attentive to wisdom
   and inclining your heart to understanding;
³ if you indeed cry out for insight,
   and raise your voice for understanding;
⁴ if you seek it like silver,
   and search for it as for hidden treasures—
⁵ then you will understand the fear of the Lord
   and find the knowledge of God.
⁶ For the Lord gives wisdom;
   from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
⁷ he stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
   he is a shield to those who walk blamelessly,
⁸ guarding the paths of justice
   and preserving the way of his faithful ones.
⁹ Then you will understand righteousness and justice
   and equity, every good path;
¹⁰ for wisdom will come into your heart,
   and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;
¹¹ prudence will watch over you;
   and understanding will guard you.
¹² It will save you from the way of evil,
   from those who speak perversely,
¹³ who forsake the paths of uprightness
   to walk in the ways of darkness,
¹⁴ who rejoice in doing evil
   and delight in the perverseness of evil;
¹⁵ those whose paths are crooked,
   and who are devious in their ways.

¹⁶ You will be saved from the loose^* woman,
   from the adulteress with her smooth words,
¹⁷ who forsakes the partner of her youth
   and forgets her sacred covenant;
¹⁸ for her way^* leads down to death,
   and her paths to the shades;
¹⁹ those who go to her never come back,
   nor do they regain the paths of life.

²⁰ Therefore walk in the way of the good,
   and keep to the paths of the just.
²¹ For the upright will abide in the land,
   and the innocent will remain in it;
²² but the wicked will be cut off from the land,
   and the treacherous will be rooted out of it.