NRSV Proverbs 2 Chapter
2:1
My child, if you accept my words and treasure up my commandments within you,
2:2
making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding;
2:3
if you indeed cry out for insight, and raise your voice for understanding;
2:4
if you seek it like silver, and search for it as for hidden treasures--
2:5
then you will understand the fear of the LORD and find the knowledge of God.
2:6
For the LORD gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
2:7
he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk blamelessly,
2:8
guarding the paths of justice and preserving the way of his faithful ones.
2:9
Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path;
2:10
for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;
2:11
prudence will watch over you; and understanding will guard you.
2:12
It will save you from the way of evil, from those who speak perversely,
2:13
who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness,
2:14
who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil;
2:15
those whose paths are crooked, and who are devious in their ways.
2:16
You will be saved from the loose woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words,
2:17
who forsakes the partner of her youth and forgets her sacred covenant;
2:18
for her way leads down to death, and her paths to the shades;
2:19
those who go to her never come back, nor do they regain the paths of life.
2:20
Therefore walk in the way of the good, and keep to the paths of the just.
2:21
For the upright will abide in the land, and the innocent will remain in it;
2:22
but the wicked will be cut off from the land, and the treacherous will be rooted out of it.