1My son, if someone has borrowed money from a friend or a stranger, and if you have promised that you will pay the money back if that person is unable to pay back the money he borrowed,
2you may be trapped by what you have agreed to do, because if the one who borrowed the money is not able to pay it back, you will have to pay it. What you have said that you will do will be like a snare to you.
3So, my son, I will tell you what you should do to escape from your difficulty, so that the moneylender does not get control over your wealth: Humbly go to your friend and plead with him to cancel the agreement!
4Do not wait until tomorrow; go immediately! Do not rest until you go and talk with him.
5Save yourself, like a deer that escapes from a deer hunter or like a bird that flees from a bird hunter.
6You lazy individual, learn something from watching the ants. Become wise from observing what they do.
7They do not have a king or a governor or any other person who rules them and forces them to work,
8but they work hard all during the summer, gathering and storing food to eat during the winter.
9But, you lazy loafer, how long will you continue to sleep [RHQ]? Are you never going to get up from sleeping and go to work?
10You sleep a for a little time; you say, “I will take just a short nap.” You lie down and fold/lay your hands across your chest and rest;
11and suddenly you will become poor. It will be as though a bandit suddenly comes and takes all that you have.
12I will describe for you what worthless and evil people are like. They constantly lie;
13by winking their eyes and moving their feet and making signs with their fingers, they signal to their friends what they are intending/planning to do.
14They plan to do evil things. They constantly cause strife/trouble.
15But disasters will hit them suddenly; they will be crushed/ruined and nothing will be able to heal them.
16There are six, maybe seven, kinds of people that Yahweh hates. They are:
17People who show by their eyes that they are very proud; people who lie [MTY]; people [SYN] who kill others [SYN] who have done nothing wrong;
18people who plan to do evil deeds; people [SYN] who run quickly to do wrong things;
19people who easily tell lies in court; and people who cause strife between family members.
20My son, obey my commands, and do not ignore what your mother has taught you.
21Remember the things that we have said. Those things should be like a beautiful necklace around your neck.
22If you follow our advice, it will be as though what we have taught you [PRS] will lead you, wherever you go. When you sleep, they will protect you. And when you wake up in the morning, they will teach/instruct you.
23These commands and what we teach you will be like a lamp to light your path [MET]. When we rebuke you and correct/punish you, we will be showing you the road to having a good life.
24Heeding [PRS] these commands and things that we have taught you will enable you to keep away from immoral women and from listening to the enticing words of an adulterous woman.
25Even if such a woman is beautiful and has lovely eyes, do not desire to go with her. Do not let her persuade you to go with her ◄with her eyes/by the way she looks at you►.
26Do not forget that you can hire a prostitute for only a loaf of bread, but if you sleep with another man’s wife, ◄it may cost you/you may lose► your life.
27Can you carry hot coals in your pocket and not be burned [RHQ]?
28Can you walk on burning coals and not scorch/burn your feet?
29No! And in the same way, anyone who ◄sleeps with/has sex with► another man’s wife will suffer for doing that. He will certainly [LIT] be punished severely.
30We do not despise a thief if he steals some food because he is very hungry.
31But if he steals something and then is caught by the police, he will have to pay back ◄seven times as much as/much more than► he stole. He may need to sell everything that is in his house to get enough money to pay it back.
32But a man who commits adultery with some woman is very foolish, because he is destroying his own self/soul by what he is doing.
33That woman’s husband will wound him badly, and other people will despise him. His shame will never end.
34Because that woman’s husband will ◄be jealous/not want anyone else to sleep with her►, he will become furious, and when he gets revenge, he will not act mercifully toward the man who slept with his wife.
35And he will not accept any bribe/money, even if it is a big bribe, to ◄appease him/cause him to stop being angry►.