¹Don’t wish for a multitude

of worthless children,

and don’t be glad about sons and daughters if they are ungodly.

²If they have children,

don’t rejoice over them

unless they respect the Lord.

³Don’t be confident that they will live,

and don’t rely on their great number.

One is better than a thousand,

and it’s better to die childless

than to have ungodly children.

⁴A city will be populated

through one intelligent person,

but a tribe of lawless people

can transform it into a desert.

⁵My eye has seen many such things,

and my ear has heard more extraordinary matters than these.

⁶A fire will be kindled

in an assembly of sinners,

and wrath will flash forth

in a disobedient nation.

⁷The Lord didn’t seek reconciliation

with the ancient giants

who rebelled in their might.

⁸He didn’t spare Lot’s neighbors,

whom he detested

because of their arrogance.

⁹He showed no mercy on a nation

doomed to destruction,

on people who were driven off

because of their sins.

¹⁰So also he showed no mercy

to the six hundred thousand

foot soldiers

who gathered together

in their stubbornness.

¹¹Even if there was one

stiff-necked person,

it would be amazing

if that one would go unpunished,

because mercy and wrath are with him,

the Lord who reconciles

and who pours out wrath.

¹²His scrutiny is as severe

as his mercy is abundant;

he will judge people

according to their deeds.

¹³A sinner won’t escape with plunder,

and the endurance of the godly

will never fail.

¹⁴He will make allowance

for every act of charity;

everyone will receive their just reward.

¹⁷Don’t say, “I’ll be hidden from the Lord,”

and “Who from on high

will call me to mind?

Among a great many people,

I’ll never be recognized;

for what am I in such a vast creation?

¹⁸Look at the heavens,

indeed the highest heavens;

the abyss and the earth

will tremble at the Lord’s visitation.

¹⁹All at once the mountains

and the foundations of the earth

will shake together, quaking,

when he looks upon them.

²⁰The mind cannot even think

about these things.

Who can ponder his ways?

²¹Most of his deeds are hidden

like a hurricane that no one can see.

²²Who will announce just actions?

Or who will endure,

since God’s covenant is far off?”

²³Those who lack sense think this way;

a foolish and misguided person

thinks foolish things.

Wisdom and the creation of humans

²⁴Listen to me, my child: gain knowledge

and apply your mind to my words.

²⁵I will disclose instruction accurately,[#16.25 LXX by weight]

and with precision

I will declare knowledge.

²⁶The Lord’s works in creation

existed from the beginning,

and he defined their exact stations

when he made them.

²⁷He set their works in order forever,

and arranged their spheres of authority

for as long as they last.

They have never gotten hungry

or grown weary,

and they have never

abandoned their tasks.

²⁸None of them crowd out their neighbor,

and none will ever disobey his word.

²⁹Afterward, the Lord looked at the earth

and filled it with his good things.

³⁰He covered its surface

with every living being,

and they return into it.