For the Chief Musician; set to Al-tashheth. A Psalm of David. Michtam.
{Or, Is the righteousness ye should speak dumb?}Do ye indeed {Or, as otherwise read, O ye gods Or, O ye mighty ones}in silence speak righteousness?
Do ye {Or, judge uprightly the sons of men}judge uprightly, O ye sons of men?
Nay, in heart ye work wickedness;
Ye weigh out the violence of your hands in the earth.
The wicked are estranged from the womb:
They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.
Their poison is like the poison of a serpent:
They are like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear,
Which hearkeneth not to the voice of {Or, enchanters}charmers,
Charming never so wisely.
Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth:
Break out the great teeth of the young lions, O Jehovah.
Let them melt away as water that runneth apace:
When he aimeth his arrows, let them be as though they were cut off.
Let them be as a snail which melteth and passeth away,
Like the untimely birth of a woman, {Or, like them that have not seen the sun}that hath not seen the sun.
Before your pots can feel the thorns,
{Or, Wrath shall take them away while living as with a whirlwind}He will take them away with a whirlwind, the green and the burning alike.
The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance:
He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked;
So that men shall say, Verily there is {Hebrew: fruit.}a reward for the righteous:
Verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth.
Querverweise zu Psalm 58,2 Ps 58,2
For they intended evil against thee;They conceived a device which they are not able to perform.
Shall the {Or, seat}throne of wickedness have fellowship with thee,Which frameth mischief by statute?
And moreover I saw under the sun, in the place of justice, that wickedness was there; and in the place of righteousness, that wickedness was there.
Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and to the writers that write perverseness;
None {Hebrew: called.}sueth in righteousness, and none pleadeth in truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity.
They hatch adders' eggs, and weave the spider's web: he that eateth of their eggs dieth; and that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper.
Their webs shall not become garments, neither shall they cover themselves with their works: their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands.
The way of the just is {Or, a right way; the path of the just thou directest alright}uprightness: thou that art upright dost {Or, level}direct the path of the just.
He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Was not this to know me? saith Jehovah.
But thine eyes and thy heart are not but for thy {Or, dishonest gain}covetousness, and for shedding innocent blood, and for oppression, and for violence, to do it.
In thee have they taken bribes to shed blood; thou hast taken interest and increase, and thou hast greedily gained of thy neighbors by oppression, and hast forgotten me, saith the Lord Jehovah.
Her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey, to shed blood, and to destroy souls, that they may get dishonest gain.
And I said, Hear, I pray you, ye heads of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel: is it not for you to know justice?
ye who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones;
who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them, and break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron.
Hear this, I pray you, ye heads of the house of Jacob, and rulers of the house of Israel, that abhor justice, and pervert all equity.
They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.
The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet they lean upon Jehovah, and say, Is not Jehovah in the midst of us? no evil shall come upon us.
Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of a forest.
The chief priests therefore and the Pharisees gathered a council, and said, What do we? for this man doeth many signs.
If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him: and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.
But a certain one of them, Caiaphas, being high priest that year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at all,
nor do ye take account that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not.
Now this he said not of himself: but, being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation;
and not for the nation only, but that he might also gather together into one the children of God that are scattered abroad.
So from that day forth they took counsel that they might put him to death.