My son, keep my words and treasure my commandments within you.
Parallel translations
- WEB My son, keep my words. Lay up my commandments within you.
- KJV My son, keep my words, and lay up my commandments with thee.
- NKJV My son, keep my words, And treasure my commands within you.
- NASB My son, keep my words And treasure my commandments within you.
- NLT Follow my advice, my son; always treasure my commands.
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 son is urged to keep his father's words and store up his commandments. Treasure wisdom's teaching within you.
Overview
A new appeal opens the chapter, calling the son to guard and internalize the father's instruction. Storing up commandments pictures wisdom kept safe within the heart, ready to guide. This sets the stage for an extended, vivid warning against the seductress that follows.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Prov 1:8Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction, and do not forsake the teaching of your mother.
- Rev 1:3Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and obey what is written in it, because the time is near.
- Luke 11:28But He replied, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”
- John 14:23Jesus replied, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word. My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.
- Prov 2:1–7My son, if you accept my words and hide my commandments within you,
- Rev 22:9But he said to me, “Do not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God!”
- Job 22:22Receive instruction from His mouth, and lay up His words in your heart.
- John 15:20Remember the word that I spoke to you: ‘No servant is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will persecute you as well; if they kept My word, they will keep yours as well.
- Prov 3:1My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments;
- Deut 11:28but a curse if you disobey the commandments of the LORD your God and turn aside from the path I command you today by following other gods, which you have not known.
- Luke 8:15But the seeds on good soil are those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, cling to it, and by persevering produce a crop.
- Prov 10:14The wise store up knowledge, but the mouth of the fool invites destruction.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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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 7:1 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.