My son, give me thine heart, and let thine eyes observe my ways.
Parallel translations
- WEB My son, give me your heart; and let your eyes keep in my ways.
- BSB My son, give me your heart, and let your eyes delight in my ways.
- NKJV My son, give me your heart, And let your eyes observe my ways.
- NASB ¶Give me your heart, my son, And let your eyes delight in my ways.
- NLT O my son, give me your heart. May your eyes take delight in following my ways.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The teacher pleads, Give me your heart and follow my ways closely.
Overview
Wisdom asks not merely for outward obedience but for the heart, the seat of love and devotion. To keep one's eyes on the right way flows from a heart fully given. Strikingly, this is the same claim God Himself makes, calling for our whole heart, ultimately answered in love for Christ above all (Mark 12:30).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Ps 119:2Blessed are they that keep his testimonies, and that seek him with the whole heart.
- Ps 119:9–11Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word.
- Deut 6:5And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.
- Matt 10:37–38He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
- Prov 4:25–27Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee.
- Prov 4:23Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.
- Prov 3:1My son, forget not my law; but let thine heart keep my commandments:
- 2 Cor 5:14–15For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead:
- Eph 3:17That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
- Prov 4:4He taught me also, and said unto me, Let thine heart retain my words: keep my commandments, and live.
- Hos 14:9Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? prudent, and he shall know them? for the ways of the LORD are right, and the just shall walk in them: but the transgressors shall fall therein.
- Ps 107:43Whoso is wise, and will observe these things, even they shall understand the lovingkindness of the LORD.
- Luke 14:26If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.
- 2 Pet 1:19We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts:
- 2 Cor 8:5And this they did, not as we hoped, but first gave their own selves to the Lord, and unto us by the will of God.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Wisdom personified, with God before creation and the agent of all things, anticipates Christ 'in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom' — the wisdom of God made flesh.
How Proverbs 23:26 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.