Proverbs 5:6

Lest thou shouldest ponder the path of life,.... Consider and meditate which is the way to get out of her hands and ways, and escape death, and obtain eternal life; lest those she has drawn into her wicked course of life should be religiously inclined, and think of quitting such a course, and inquire after the way of life and salvation; and be weighing in their minds which is most eligible, to continue with her whose feet lead to death, or to take the path of life: to prevent all this, if possible,

her ways are movable: she appears in different shapes; changes her dress and habitation; makes use of a thousand arts to ensnare men, to entangle their affections, and retain them in her nets; she first puts them upon one thing, and then on another; she leads them into various mazes and labyrinths of sin, till they have lost all sense of religion, and sight of the path of life;

[that] thou canst not know [them]; her ways, arts, and devices. Or, "thou canst not know" k; that is, the way of life, or how to get out of her ways into that. Or, "thou knowest not"; where she goes, whither she leads thee, and what will be the end and issue of such a course of life. The Targum understands it, and so some other interpreters, of the harlot herself, paraphrasing the whole thus;

"in the way of life she walks not; her ways are unstable, and she knows not''

the way of life, nor where her ways will end; or, "cares not" l what becomes of her. And so, in like manner, the former part of the verse is understood and interpreted, "lest she ponder the path of life" m; or as others, "she does not ponder the path of life" n; The ways of the antichristian harlot are with all deceivableness of unrighteousness; and her chief care is to keep persons in ignorance, and from pondering the path of life or true religion, and to retain them in her idolatry, 2 Thessalonians 2:9.

k לא תדע "non scires", Cocceius; "non cognosces", Baynus. l "Haud curat", Schultens. m ארח חיים פן תפלס "iter vitae ne forte libraverit", Schultens. n "Viam vitae non appendit, vel ponderat", Gejerus; so Luther; "iter vitae non expandit", Noldius, p. 249. No. 2008.