23:1
If you take your seat at a great man's table, take careful note of what you have before you;
23:2
if you have a big appetite put a knife to your throat.
23:3
Do not hanker for his delicacies, for they are deceptive food.
23:4
Do not wear yourself out in quest of wealth, stop applying your mind to this.
23:5
Fix your gaze on it, and it is there no longer, for it is able to sprout wings like an eagle that flies off to the sky.
23:6
Do not eat the food of anyone whose eye is jealous, do not hanker for his delicacies.
23:7
For what he is really thinking about is himself: 'Eat and drink,' he tells you, but his heart is not with you.
23:8
You will spit out whatever you have eaten and find your compliments wasted.
23:9
Do not waste words on a fool, who will not appreciate the shrewdness of your remarks.
23:10
Do not displace the ancient boundary-stone, or encroach on orphans' lands,
23:11
for they have a powerful avenger, and he will take up their cause against you.
23:12
Apply your heart to discipline, and your ears to instructive sayings.
23:13
Do not be chary of correcting a child, a stroke of the cane is not likely to be fatal.
23:14
Give him a stroke of the cane, you will save his soul from Sheol.
23:15
My child, if your heart is wise, then my own heart is glad,
23:16
and my inmost self rejoices when from your lips come honest words.
23:17
Do not let your heart be envious of sinners but remain steady every day in the fear of Yahweh;
23:18
for there is a future, and your hope will not come to nothing.
23:19
Listen, my child, and be wise, and guide your heart in the way.
23:20
Do not be one of those forever tippling wine nor one of those who gorge themselves with meat;
23:21
for the drunkard and glutton impoverish themselves, and sleepiness is clothed in rags.
23:22
Listen to your father from whom you are sprung, do not despise your mother in her old age.
23:23
Purchase truth -- never sell it-wisdom, discipline, and discernment.
23:24
The father of the upright will rejoice indeed, he who fathers a wise child will have joy of it.
23:25
Your father and mother will be happy, and she who bore you joyful.
23:26
My child, pay attention to me, let your eyes take pleasure in my way:
23:27
a prostitute is a deep pit, a narrow well, the woman who belongs to another.
23:28
Yes, like a brigand, she lies in wait, increasing the number of law-breakers.
23:29
For whom is pity, for whom contempt, for whom is strife, for whom complaint, for whom blows struck at random, for whom the clouded eye?
23:30
For those who linger over wine too long, ever on the look-out for the blended liquors.
23:31
Do not gaze at wine, how red it is, how it sparkles in the cup! How smoothly it slips down the throat!
23:32
In the end its bite is like a serpent's, its sting as sharp as an adder's.
23:33
Your eyes will see peculiar things, you will talk nonsense from your heart.
23:34
You will be like someone sleeping in mid-ocean, like one asleep at the mast-head.
23:35
'Struck me, have they? But I'm not hurt. Beaten me? I don't feel anything. When shall I wake up? . . I'll ask for more of it!'
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