- Proverbs 5 BSB ↗
Anyone who has bought something expensive on impulse knows the pattern: the advert is glossy, the first moment is thrilling, and the bill arrives later. Proverbs 5 applies that pattern to the most private part of a life. A father sits with his son and talks, frankly and without embarrassment, about sexual temptation. The forbidden woman's words drip like honey and are smoother than oil, he says, but the aftertaste is as bitter as wormwood. Then, instead of only saying no, he paints a warm picture of yes: a well of your own, fresh water, and a marriage that stays joyful long after youth has gone.
Where it sits in the story: In Act 3, Israel's story, the covenant has already said 'do not commit adultery'. Proverbs 5 shows what that command looks like from the inside, as practical wisdom a parent passes on. Chapters 5–7 return to this theme three times, because for these teachers faithfulness in marriage is a test case of the whole wise life. Later the prophets use marriage as a picture of God's faithfulness to Israel, and Jesus takes the command down to the heart.
What this chapter is doing: To warn a young man that adultery costs far more than it promises, and to present faithful married love not as a restriction but as a source of lasting joy, lived before the eyes of the LORD.
- 5:1–6 — Pay attention, my son. The forbidden woman's speech is sweet and smooth, but where it leads is bitter and sharp as a two-edged sword. Her path goes down toward death, and she herself does not notice how unsteady it is.
- 5:7–14 — Keep far from her door. Otherwise your strength, your years and your earnings will end up with strangers, and at the end of your life you will groan: why did I hate correction and ignore my teachers? The ruin, he adds, happens in public, in front of the whole community.
- 5:15–20 — Drink water from your own cistern. Let your fountain be blessed, rejoice in the wife of your youth, and be captivated by her love always. Why, the father asks, would you go looking for someone else's?
- 5:21–23 — A person's ways are in full view of the LORD, who weighs every path. The wicked are trapped by their own sins, held by cords they tied themselves, and they die for lack of discipline.
Key verse: Proverbs 5:21 · So what: Temptation rarely advertises its cost; it sells the first moment and hides the last. This chapter asks readers to think to the end of the story, and it does something many warnings forget: it celebrates the good thing that faithfulness protects. Its closing point applies to everyone, married or not: nothing is truly hidden, and the habits we choose become the ropes that hold us.