Psalms

To the Chief Musician. “Do not Destroy.” A precious Psalm of David.

58 Are ye indeed silent [when] righteousness ye should speak? When with equity ye should judge, O ye sons of men?

2 Aye! ye all do work perversity,—Throughout the land your hands weigh out violence.

3 Lawless men have been estranged from birth, They have gone astray from their nativity speaking falsehood;

4 Their poison is like unto the poison of a serpent, Like the deaf adder that stoppeth his ear;

5 That will not hearken to the voice of whisperers, Though the wise one try to bind him with spells.

6 O God! break away their teeth in their mouth, The biters of the young lions knock thou out, O Yahweh!

7 Let such men flow away like waters that disperse themselves: He prepareth his arrow, Like [grass] let them be cut down:

8 Like a snail which melteth away as it goeth, An untimely birth of a woman which hath not seen the sun:

9 Before your kettles can perceive the [kindled] bramble Be he green or be he withered he shall be swept away.

10 The righteous man will rejoice when he hath seen an avenging, His feet will he bathe in the blood of the lawless one:—

11 So that a son of earth may say—Surely there is fruit for the righteous man! Surely there are gods who judge in the earth!