| 1
| Do you indeed decree righteousness, you rulers?
*
do you judge the peoples with equity?
|
| 2
| No; you devise evil in your hearts, *
and your hands deal out violence in the land.
|
| 3
| The wicked are perverse from the womb; *
liars go astray from their birth.
|
| 4
| They are as venomous as a serpent, *
they are like the deaf adder which stops its ears,
|
| 5
| Which does not heed the voice of the charmer,
*
no matter how skillful his charming.
|
| 6
| O God, break their teeth in their mouths;
*
pull the fangs of the young lions, O LORD.
|
| 7
| Let them vanish like water that runs off;
*
let them wither like trodden grass.
|
| 8
| Let them be like the snail that melts away,
*
like a stillborn child that never sees the sun.
|
| 9
| Before they bear fruit, let them be cut down
like a brier; *
like thorns and thistles let them be swept away.
|
| 10
| The righteous will be glad when they see
the vengeance; *
they will bathe their feet in the blood of the wicked.
|
| 11
| And they will say,
"Surely, there is a reward for the righteous; *
surely, there is a God who rules in the earth."
|
