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“O Lord, God of my ancestor Simeon,
    you have armed him with a sword
so that he could exact vengeance on those foreigners
    who had torn off a virgin’s girdle to defile her,
exposed her thighs to cause her to be ashamed,
    and violated her womb to dishonor her.
“Even though you had warned them,
    ‘This must not happen,’
they proceeded to do so.[a]
As a result, you turned over their rulers
    to be slaughtered,
and you covered with their blood
    the bed that they had defiled with their treachery.
You struck down slaves as well as their princes,
    even princes as they sat on their thrones.
You handed over their wives as booty
    and sent their daughters into captivity,
and all the spoils you apportioned among your beloved sons
    who had burned with zeal for you
and who in their abhorrence at the defilement of their kinswoman
    called on you for help.

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Footnotes

  1. Judith 9:2 The virgin referred to was Dinah, daughter of Jacob, who was victimized by the Hivite Shechem (Gen 34:2). In revenge, Dinah’s brothers, Simeon and Levi, persuaded Shechem and the men of his city into being circumcised and then slew them while they lay weak in bed (see Gen 34:13-29).