Proverbs 5:14

14. In all evil The common interpretation is, The gratification of my lusts by degrees led me into nearly all kinds of wickedness; not merely in secret, but openly; in the assembly of God’s people even, in the presence of the magistrates and judges. Such persons, however sacred the place, have eyes full of adultery, which cannot cease from sin. Compare Numbers 25:7; Numbers 35:12. But very respectable critics interpret differently, namely, that the adulterer was exposed to punishment for his crime, and this punishment usually terminated in his being sold into slavery probably to a cruel master. Proverbs 5:9. If the injured person prosecuted the adulterer, he might insist on the punishment of death, (Deuteronomy 22:22,) but if he chose he might act more leniently, and sell him into bondage, the price obtained being accepted as a mulct for the crime. What a slave earns by his toil goes into the house of his master, and becomes his wealth. Proverbs 5:10. By the assembly (Proverbs 5:14) is understood the magistrates and judges the sanhedrin, which surrounded him to condemn and punish him by stoning to death. Understood thus, the all evil of the verse would mean the great evil, the extreme danger, to which he was exposed. See Stuart in loco; also Zockler, who translates, “Well nigh had I fallen into utter destruction, in the midst of the assembly and the congregation.”