The Complete Jewish Bible CJB
The Message Bible MSG
1 For the leader. Set to "Do Not Destroy." By David, a mikhtam: [Rulers,] does your silence really speak justice? Are you judging people fairly?
1
Is this any way to run a country? Is there an honest politician in the house?
2 [No!] In your hearts you devise wrongs, your hands dispense violence in the land.
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Behind the scenes you brew cauldrons of evil, behind closed doors you make deals with demons.
3 From the womb, the wicked are estranged, liars on the wrong path since birth.
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The wicked crawl from the wrong side of the cradle; their first words out of the womb are lies.
4 Their venom is like snake's venom; they are like a serpent that stops its ears,
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Poison, lethal rattlesnake poison, drips from their forked tongues -
5 so as not to hear the voice of the charmer, no matter how well he plays.
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Deaf to threats, deaf to charm, decades of wax built up in their ears.
6 God, break their teeth in their mouth! Shatter the fangs of these lions, ADONAI!
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God, smash their teeth to bits, leave them toothless tigers.
7 May they vanish like water that drains away. May their arrows be blunted when they aim their bows.
7
Let their lives be buckets of water spilled, all that's left, a damp stain in the sand. Let them be trampled grass worn smooth by the traffic.
8 May they be like a slug that melts as it moves, like a stillborn baby that never sees the sun.
8
Let them dissolve into snail slime, be a miscarried fetus that never sees sunlight.
9 Before your cook-pots feel the heat of the burning thorns, may he blow them away, green and blazing alike.
9
Before what they cook up is half-done, God, throw it out with the garbage!
10 The righteous will rejoice to see vengeance done, they will wash their feet in the blood of the wicked;
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The righteous will call up their friends when they see the wicked get their reward, Serve up their blood in goblets as they toast one another,
11 and people will say, "Yes, the righteous are rewarded; there is, after all, a God who judges the earth."
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Everyone cheering, "It's worth it to play by the rules! God's handing out trophies and tending the earth!"
Complete Jewish Bible Copyright 1998 by David H. Stern. Published by Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.