He counsels against wine and lust as twin evils. "For he who is drunken reverenceth no man." (Verse 13).
AND now I command you, my children, hearken to Judah your father, and keep my sayings to perform all the ordinances of the Lord, and to obey the commands of God.
2 And walk not after your lusts, nor in the imaginations of your thoughts in haughtiness of heart; and glory not in the deeds and strength of your youth, for this also is evil in the eyes of the Lord.
3 Since I also gloried that in wars no comely woman's face ever enticed me, and reproved Reuben my brother concerning Bilhah, the wife of my father, the spirits of jealousy and of fornication arrayed themselves against me, until I lay with Bathshua the Canaanite, and Tamar, who was espoused to my sons.
4 For I said to my father-in-law: I will take counsel with my father, and so will I take thy daughter.
5 And he was unwilling but he showed me a boundless store of gold in his daughter's behalf; for be was a king.
6 And he adorned her with gold and pearls, and caused her to pour out wine for us at the feast with the beauty of women.
7 And the wine turned aside my eyes, and pleasure blinded my heart.
8 And I became enamoured of and I lay with her, and transgressed the commandment of the Lord and the commandment of my fathers, and I took her to wife.
9 And the Lord rewarded me according to the imagination of my heart, inasmuch as I had no joy in her children.
10 And now, my children, I say unto you, be not drunk with wine; for wine turneth the mind away from, the truth, and inspires the passion of lust, and leadeth the eyes into error.
11 For the spirit of fornication hath wine as a minister to give pleasure to the mind; for these two also take away the mind of man.
12 For if a man drink wine to drunkenness, it disturbeth the mind with filthy thoughts leading to fornication, and heateth the body to carnal union; and if the occasion of the lust be present, he worketh the sin, and is not ashamed.
13 Such is the inebriated man, my children; for he who is drunken reverenceth no man.
14 For, lo, it made me also to err, so that I was not ashamed of the multitude in the city, in that before the eyes of all I turned aside unto Tamar, and I wrought a great sin, and I uncovered the covering of my sons' shame.
15 After I had drunk wine I
reverenced not the commandment of God, and I took a woman of Canaan to wife.
16 For much discretion needeth the man who drinketh wine, my children; and herein is discretion in drinking wine, a man may drink so long as he preserveth modesty.
17 But if he go beyond this limit the spirit of deceit attacketh his mind, and it maketh the drunkard to talk filthily, and to transgress and not to be ashamed, but even to glory in his shame, and to account himself honourable.
18 He that committeth fornication is not aware when he suffers loss, and is not ashamed when put to dishonour.
19 For even though a man be a king and commit fornication, he is stripped of his kingship by becoming the slave of fornication, as I myself also suffered.
20 For I gave my staff, that is, the stay of my tribe; and my girdle, that is, my power; and my diadem, that is, the glory of my kingdom.
21 And indeed I repented of these things; wine and flesh I eat not until my old age, nor did I behold any joy.
22 And the angel of God showed me that for ever do women bear rule over king and beggar alike.
23 And from the king they take away his glory, and from the valiant man his might, and from the beggar even that little which is the stay of his poverty.
24 Observe, therefore, my children, the right limit in wine; for there are in it four evil spirits--of lust, of hot desire, of profligacy, of filthy lucre.
25 If ye drink wine in gladness, be ye modest in the fear of God.
26 For if in your gladness the fear of God departeth, then drunkenness ariseth and shamelessness stealeth in.
27 But if ye would live soberly do not touch wine at all, lest ye sin in words of outrage, and in fightings and slanders, and transgressions of the commandments of God, and ye perish before your time.
28 Moreover, wine revealeth the mysteries of God and men, even as I also revealed the commandments of God and the mysteries of Jacob my father to the Canaanitish woman Bathshua, which God bade me not to reveal.
29 And wine is a cause both of war and confusion.
30 And now, I command you, my children, not to love money, nor to gaze upon the beauty of women; because for the sake of money and beauty I was led astray to Bathshua the Canaanite.
31 For I know that because of these two things shall my race fall into wickedness.
32 For even wise men among my sons shall they mar, and shall cause the kingdom of Judah to be diminished, which the Lord gave me because of my obedience to my father.
33 For I never caused grief to Jacob, my father; for all things whatsoever he commanded I did.
34 And Isaac, the father of my father, blessed me to be king in Israel, and Jacob further blessed me in like manner.
35 And I know that from me shall the kingdom be established.
36 And I know what evils ye will do in the last days.
37 Beware, therefore, my children, of fornication, and the love of money, and hearken to Judah your father.
38 For these things withdraw au from the law of God, and blind the inclination of the soul, and teach arrogance, and suffer not a man to have compassion upon his neighbour.
39 They rob his soul of all
goodness, and oppress him with toils and troubles, and drive away sleep from him, and devour his flesh.
40 And he hindereth the sacrifices of God; and he remembereth not the blessing of God, he hearkeneth not to a prophet when he speaketh, and resenteth the words of godliness.
41 For he is a slave to two contrary passions, and cannot obey God, because they have blinded his soul, and he walketh in the day as in the night.
42 My children, the love of money leadeth to idolatry; because, when led astray through money, men name as gods those who are not gods, and it causeth him who hath it to fall into madness.
43 For the sake of money I lost my children, and had not my repentance, and my humiliation, and the prayers of my father been accepted, I should have died childless.
44 But the God of my fathers had mercy on me, because I did it in ignorance.
45 And the prince of deceit blinded me, and I sinned as a man and as flesh, being corrupted through sins; and I learnt my own weakness while thinking myself invincible.
46 Know, therefore, my children, that two spirits wait upon man-the spirit of truth and the spirit of deceit.
47 And in the midst is the spirit of understanding of the mind, to which it belongeth to turn whithersoever it will.
And the works of truth and the works of deceit are written upon the hearts of men, and each one of them the Lord knoweth.
49 And there is no time at which the works of men can be hid; for on the heart itself have they been written down before the Lord.
50 And the spirit of truth testifieth all things, and accuseth all; and the sinner is burnt up by his own heart, and cannot raise his face to the judge.