¹ For the music director: “Do Not Destroy,” a Michtam of David.
² Do you really speak of justice, O “gods”?
Do you judge with fairness, sons of man?
³ No, in heart you devise injustice.
Your hands weigh out violence on earth.
⁴ The wicked are strangers from the womb.
Speaking lies, they go astray from birth.
⁵ Their venom is like a serpent’s venom,
like a deaf cobra shutting its ear—
⁶ not hearing the voice of charmers,
    or a cunning spell binder.
⁷ O God, break their teeth in their mouths.
Tear out the fangs of young lions, Adonai.
⁸ Let them flow away like water that runs off.
When he bends his bow, let the arrows be cut off.
⁹ Like a slug melting away as it slithers,
like a woman’s miscarriage,
may they never see the sun.
¹⁰ Even before your pots can feel a thorn
—whether alive or ablaze—
He will sweep the wicked away.
¹¹ The righteous one will rejoice
when he beholds vengeance,
when he washes his feet in the blood of the wicked.
¹² Then men will say:
“There really is a reward for the righteous.
There really is a God who judges on earth!”