Competing Offers

Proverbs 9:1-6,13-18

Wisdom has built her house,
She has hewn out her seven pillars;
² She has prepared her food, she has mixed her wine;
She has also set her table;
³ She has sent out her maidens, she calls
From the tops of the heights of the city:
⁴ “Whoever is naive, let him turn in here!”
To him who lacks understanding she says,
⁵ “Come, eat of my food
And drink of the wine I have mixed.
⁶ “Forsake your folly and live,
And proceed in the way of understanding.”

¹³ The woman of folly is boisterous,
She is naive and knows nothing.
¹⁴ She sits at the doorway of her house,
On a seat by the high places of the city,
¹⁵ Calling to those who pass by,
Who are making their paths straight:
¹⁶ “Whoever is naive, let him turn in here,”
And to him who lacks understanding she says,
¹⁷ “Stolen water is sweet;
And bread eaten in secret is pleasant.”
¹⁸ But he does not know that the dead are there,
That her guests are in the depths of Sheol.