That thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.
The verse stands in an intensely practical book giving splendid counsel and a faithful warning from God. It belongs to deep philosophy that must be read more slowly than historical matter and thought over. Discretion is to guide conduct, and the lips and speech are to preserve knowledge. The chapter belongs to wisdom's instruction to choose the path of wisdom, which is the path of life, warning both men and women against the sexual sins it condemns.
Its teaching should take hold on the heart and fill the mind to guard against sexual temptation. Heeding it saves from destruction, while refusing instruction and breaking the laws of spiritual life brings spiritual disease and death. Its maxims guide business and farming and bring prosperity. The latter part of its chapter is not well suited to reading in a mixed assembly of men and women.
The verse stands in an intensely practical book giving splendid counsel and a faithful warning from God. It belongs to deep philosophy that must be read more slowly than historical matter and thought over. Discretion is to guide conduct, and the lips and speech are to preserve knowledge. The chapter belongs to wisdom's instruction to choose the path of wisdom, which is the path of life, warning both men and women against the sexual sins it condemns.
Its teaching should take hold on the heart and fill the mind to guard against sexual temptation. Heeding it saves from destruction, while refusing instruction and breaking the laws of spiritual life brings spiritual disease and death. Its maxims guide business and farming and bring prosperity. The latter part of its chapter is not well suited to reading in a mixed assembly of men and women.