Psalms 58

A Prayer for God to Punish the Wicked

¹Do you rulers ever give a just decision?[#58.1 ; or gods.]

Do you judge everyone fairly?

²No! You think only of the evil you can do,

and commit crimes of violence in the land.

³Evildoers go wrong all their lives;

they tell lies from the day they are born.

⁴They are full of poison like snakes;

they stop up their ears like a deaf cobra,

⁵which does not hear the voice of the snake charmer,

or the chant of the clever magician.

⁶Break the teeth of these fierce lions, O God.

⁷May they disappear like water draining away;

may they be crushed like weeds on a path.

⁸May they be like snails that dissolve into slime;

may they be like a baby born dead that never sees the light.

⁹Before they know it, they are cut down like weeds;

in his fierce anger God will blow them away

while they are still living.

¹⁰The righteous will be glad when they see sinners punished;

they will wade through the blood of the wicked.

¹¹People will say, “The righteous are indeed rewarded;

there is indeed a God who judges the world.”