Add parallel Print Page Options

25 I decided to study many things
    so that I would become wise.
I wanted to understand the reason why things happen.
I also wanted to know why it is stupid to be wicked,
    and why it is crazy to do foolish things.
26 I learned this:
    Some women are like a trap that catches animals.
Women like that are more dangerous than death.
    They may pretend to love you.
    They may hold you in their arms.
But really their arms are like chains.
They want to catch you,
    as hunters catch animals.
Women like that will easily catch
    a man who has turned away from God.
But a man who pleases God
    will escape from them.

27 This is what I, the Teacher, have learned.

I studied everything very carefully.
    I wanted to know the reason why things happen.

Read full chapter

25 So I turned my mind to understand,
    to investigate and to search out wisdom and the scheme of things(A)
and to understand the stupidity of wickedness
    and the madness of folly.(B)

26 I find more bitter than death
    the woman who is a snare,(C)
whose heart is a trap
    and whose hands are chains.
The man who pleases God will escape her,
    but the sinner she will ensnare.(D)

27 “Look,” says the Teacher,[a](E) “this is what I have discovered:

“Adding one thing to another to discover the scheme of things—

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. Ecclesiastes 7:27 Or the leader of the assembly