Wisdom calls out again
8
📚✭Does not wisdom call out,and understanding raise her voice?
2 📚She stands on top of the heights✭,
beside the way where the paths meet✭.
3 📚She cries out at the gates✭,
at the entrance of the city,
at the entry of the doors:
4 📚✭“To you, O men, I call,
and my voice is to the sons of men.
5 📚O you simple ones,
obtain wisdom! And you fools,
obtain an understanding heart!
6 📚Listen, for I will speak of excellent things,
and right things will come from
the opening of my lips.
7 📚For my mouth will speak truth,
and wickedness is an abomination
to my lips.
8 📚All the words of my mouth are
in righteousness.
There is nothing crooked
or perverse in them.
9 📚They are all plain to the one
who understands,
and right to those who find knowledge.
10 📚“Receive my instruction, and not silver;
and knowledge rather than choice gold.
11 📚For wisdom is better than rubies,
and all the things that may be desired are not
to be compared with it.
12 📚✭I, wisdom, dwell with prudence,
and am the discoverer of knowledge
and discretion.
13 📚✭“The fear of the LORD is
to hate evil.
I hate pride and arrogance and the evil way
and the perverse mouth.
14 📚Counsel is mine, and sound judgment.
I am understanding. I have strength.
15 📚✭By me kings reign, and princes decree justice.
16 By me rulers govern, and nobles,
all who judge righteously.
17 📚I love those who love me,
and those who search for me will find✭ me.
18 📚Riches and honour are with me,
yes, lasting riches and righteousness.
19 📚My fruit is better than gold,
yes, than fine gold;
and my revenue is better than choice silver.
20 📚I lead in the way of righteousness,
in the midst of the paths of justice,
Wisdom is eternal
21 📚That I may bestow riches on those
who love me; and I will fill their treasuries.
22 📚✭“The LORD possessed me✭ in the beginning
of his way, before his works of old.
23 📚✭I was established from everlasting,
from the beginning, before the earth was.
24 📚When there were no depths,
I was brought forth, when there were
no springs abounding with water.
25 📚Before the mountains were settled,
before the hills, I was brought forth,
26 📚While he still had not made the earth,
or the fields, or the first dust of the world.
27 📚✭When he prepared the heavens,
I was there.
When he drew a circle on the face of the deep,
28 When he established the clouds above,
when he firmly set the springs of the deep,
29 📚When he appointed to the sea its boundary,
that the waters would not pass
over his command,
when he marked out the foundations
of the earth,
30 📚Then I was beside him,
as one brought up with him, and
I was daily his delight,
rejoicing always in his presence,
31 📚Rejoicing in the inhabited world, his earth,
and my delight was in the sons of men.
Life and death
32 📚✭Now, therefore, listen to me,
you children! For blessed✭ are those who
keep my ways.
33 📚Listen to instruction, and be wise,
and do not refuse it.
34 📚✭Blessed is the man
who hears me,
watching daily at my gates,
waiting at the posts of my doors.
35 📚For whoever finds me finds life,
and will obtain favour from the LORD.
36 📚But he who sins against me harms
his own soul✭.
All those who hate me love death”.