Family Prayer
in the Early Evening

6 My son, if you have put up security for your neighbor,
    have given your pledge for a stranger,
² if you are snared in the words of your mouth,
    caught in the words of your mouth,
³ then do this, my son, and save yourself,
    for you have come into the hand of your neighbor:
    go, hasten, and plead urgently with your neighbor.
⁴ Give your eyes no sleep
    and your eyelids no slumber;
⁵ save yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter,
    like a bird from the hand of the fowler.

²⁰ My son, keep your father's commandment,
    and forsake not your mother's teaching.
²¹ Bind them on your heart always;
    tie them around your neck.
²² When you walk, they will lead you;
    when you lie down, they will watch over you;
    and when you awake, they will talk with you.
²³ For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light,
    and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life,
²⁴ to preserve you from the evil woman,
    from the smooth tongue of the adulteress.
²⁵ Do not desire her beauty in your heart,
    and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes;
²⁶ for the price of a prostitute is only a loaf of bread,
    but a married woman hunts down a precious life.
²⁷ Can a man carry fire next to his chest
    and his clothes not be burned?
²⁸ Or can one walk on hot coals
    and his feet not be scorched?
²⁹ So is he who goes in to his neighbor's wife;
    none who touches her will go unpunished.
³⁰ People do not despise a thief if he steals
    to satisfy his appetite when he is hungry,
³¹ but if he is caught, he will pay sevenfold;
    he will give all the goods of his house.
³² He who commits adultery lacks sense;
    he who does it destroys himself.
³³ He will get wounds and dishonor,
    and his disgrace will not be wiped away.
³⁴ For jealousy makes a man furious,
    and he will not spare when he takes revenge.
³⁵ He will accept no compensation;
    he will refuse though you multiply gifts.