Wicked judges reproved -- Judgment of the wicked. (To the chief Musician, Al-taschith, Michtam of David.)

¹⁾Do ye indeed speak righteousness, O congregation? do ye judge uprightly, O ye sons of men?

²⁾Yea, in heart ye work wickedness; ye weigh the violence of your hands in the earth.

³⁾The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies.

⁴⁾Their poison is like the poison of a serpent; they are like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear;

⁵⁾Which will not hearken to the voice of charmers, charming never so wisely.

⁶⁾Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth; break out the great teeth of the young lions, O Lord.

⁷⁾Let them melt away as waters which run continually; when he bendeth his bow to shoot his arrows, let them be as cut in pieces.

⁸⁾As a snail which melteth, let every one of them pass away; like the untimely birth of a woman, that they may not see the sun.

⁹⁾Before your pots can feel the thorns, he shall take them away as with a whirlwind, both living, and in his wrath.

¹⁰⁾The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance; he will wash his feet in the blood of the wicked.

¹¹⁾So that a man shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous; verily he is a God that judgeth in the earth.