⁷ and they shall declare: “Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it done.

⁸ The Lord has repaid you for all the blood you shed in the household of Saul, in whose place you have reigned.^(A) The Lord has given the kingdom into the hands of your son Absalom. You have come to ruin because you are a murderer!”^(B)

¹⁹ Then the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, “If no other man has had sexual relations with you and you have not gone astray^(A) and become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water that brings a curse^(B) not harm you. ²⁰ But if you have gone astray^(C) while married to your husband and you have made yourself impure by having sexual relations with a man other than your husband”— ²¹ here the priest is to put the woman under this curse^(D)—“may the Lord cause you to become a curse^[a] among your people when he makes your womb miscarry and your abdomen swell. ²² May this water^(E) that brings a curse^(F) enter your body so that your abdomen swells or your womb miscarries.”

“‘Then the woman is to say, “Amen. So be it.^(G)”

²³ “‘The priest is to write these curses on a scroll^(H) and then wash them off into the bitter water. ²⁴ He shall make the woman drink the bitter water that brings a curse, and this water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering will enter her. ²⁵ The priest is to take from her hands the grain offering for jealousy, wave it before the Lord^(I) and bring it to the altar. ²⁶ The priest is then to take a handful of the grain offering as a memorial^[b] offering^(J) and burn it on the altar; after that, he is to have the woman drink the water. ²⁷ If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse.^{(K) 28} If, however, the woman has not made herself impure, but is clean, she will be cleared of guilt and will be able to have children.