Proverbs 6:24-29

24 They will protect you from an evil woman,^[a] from the flattering^[b] tongue of a stranger.^[c]

25 Don't lust in your heart for her beauty or let her captivate you with her eyelashes.

26 For a prostitute's fee is only a loaf of bread,^[d] but an adulteress^[e] goes after [your] very life.^[f]

27 Can a man embrace fire^[g] and his clothes not be burned?

28 Can a man walk on coals without scorching his feet?

29 So it is with the one who sleeps with another man's wife; no one who touches her will go unpunished.

Proverbs 6:24-29 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PROVERBS 6

In this chapter the wise man dissuades from rash suretyship; exposes the sin of idleness; describes a wicked man; makes mention of seven things hateful to God; exhorts to attend to parental instructions and precepts, and cautions against adultery. Suretyship is described, Pr 6:1; and represented as a snare and a net, in which men are taken, Pr 6:2; and advice is given what to do in such a case, for safety in it, and deliverance from it, Pr 6:3-5; The sin of slothfulness is exposed, by observing the industry of the ant, Pr 6:6-8; by expostulating with the sluggard for his continuance in sloth, and by mimicking him, Pr 6:9,10; and by the poverty it brings upon him, Pr 6:11. Then a naughty wicked man is described, by his mouth, eyes, feet, fingers, and heart, whose ruin is sudden and inevitable, Pr 6:11-15. The seven things hateful to God are particularly named, Pr 6:16-19. And next the exhortation in some preceding chapters is reassumed, to attend to the instructions of parents; which will be found ornamental, pleasant, and useful, Pr 6:20-23. Especially to preserve from the lewd woman cautioned against, Pr 6:24,25; whose company is dissuaded from; on account of the extreme poverty and distress she brings persons to, and even danger of life, Pr 6:26; from the unavoidable ruin such come into, Pr 6:27-29; from the sin of uncleanness being greater than that of theft, Pr 6:30,31; from the folly the adulterer betrays; from the destruction of his soul, and the disgrace he brings on himself, Pr 6:32,33; and from the rage and irreconcilable offence of the husband of the adulteress, Pr 6:34,35.

Footnotes

• [a] LXX reads from a married woman
• [b] Lit smooth
• [c] Pr 7:5
• [d] Or On account of a prostitute, [one is left with] only a loaf of bread
• [e] Lit but a wife of a man
• [f] Pr 2:18-19; 7:21-23,27; 23:27-28
• [g] Lit man take fire to his bosom