Proverbs, 27

¹ Do not make your boast about the next day, for you do not know what a day will give birth to.

² May a stranger, and not your own mouth, praise you; may a foreigner, and not your own lips, do so.

³ The heaviness of a stone and a load of sand—but the vexation by someone foolish is heavier than both of them.

⁴ There is the cruelty of rage, also the flood of anger, but who can stand before jealousy?

⁵ Better is a revealed reproof than a concealed love.

⁶ The wounds inflicted by a lover^*1 are faithful, but the kisses of a hater are things to be entreated.^*2

⁷ A soul that is satisfied will tread down comb honey, but to a hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.

⁸ Just like a bird fleeing away from its nest, so is a man fleeing away from his place.

⁹ Oil and incense are what make the heart rejoice, also the sweetness of one’s companion due to the counsel of the soul.

¹⁰ Do not leave your own companion or the companion of your father, and do not enter the house of your own brother on the day of your disaster. Better is a neighbor that is near than a brother that is far away.

¹¹ Be wise, my son, and make my heart rejoice, that I may make a reply to him that is taunting me.

¹² The shrewd one that has seen the calamity has concealed himself; the inexperienced that have passed along have suffered the penalty.

¹³ Take one’s garment, in case one has gone surety for a stranger; and in the instance of a foreign woman, seize from him a pledge.

¹⁴ He that is blessing his fellowman with a loud voice early in the morning, as a malediction it will be accounted on his part.

¹⁵ A leaking roof that drives one away in the day of a steady rain and a contentious wife are comparable.

¹⁶ Anyone sheltering her has sheltered the wind, and oil is what his right hand encounters.^*1

¹⁷ By iron, iron itself is sharpened. So one man^*1 sharpens the face of another.^*2

¹⁸ He that is safeguarding the fig tree will himself eat its fruit, and he that is guarding his master^*1 will be honored.

¹⁹ As in water face corresponds with face, so the heart of a man^*1 with [that of] a man.

²⁰ Sheʹol and [the place of] destruction^*1 themselves do not get satisfied; neither do the eyes of a man get satisfied.

²¹ The refining pot is for silver, and the furnace is for gold; and an individual is according to his praise.

²² Even if you should pound the foolish one fine with a pestle in a mortar, in among cracked grain, his foolishness will not depart from him.

²³ You ought to know positively the appearance of your flock. Set your heart to your droves;

²⁴ for treasure will not be to time indefinite, nor a diadem for all generations.

²⁵ The green grass has departed, and the new grass has appeared, and the vegetation of the mountains has been gathered.

²⁶ The young rams are for your clothing, and the he-goats are the price of the field.

²⁷ And there is a sufficiency of goats’ milk for your food, for the food of your household, and the means of life for your girls.