Sirach 16

Common English Bible

16 Don’t wish for a multitude
of worthless children,
    and don’t be glad about sons and daughters if they are ungodly.
² If they have children,
don’t rejoice over them
    unless they respect the Lord.
³ Don’t be confident that they will live,
    and don’t rely on their great number.^[a]
    One is better than a thousand,
    and it’s better to die childless
    than to have ungodly children.
⁴ A city will be populated
through one intelligent person,
    but a tribe of lawless people
    can transform it into a desert.

⁵ My eye has seen many such things,
    and my ear has heard more extraordinary matters than these.
⁶ A fire will be kindled
in an assembly of sinners,
    and wrath will flash forth
    in a disobedient nation.
⁷ The Lord didn’t seek reconciliation
with the ancient giants^[b]
    who rebelled in their might.
⁸ He didn’t spare Lot’s neighbors,
    whom he detested
    because of their arrogance.
⁹ He showed no mercy on a nation
doomed to destruction,
    on people who were driven off
    because of their sins.^[c]
10 So also he showed no mercy
to the six hundred thousand
foot soldiers
    who gathered together
    in their stubbornness.^[d]

¹¹ Even 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.
¹² His scrutiny is as severe
as his mercy is abundant;
    he will judge people
    according to their deeds.
¹³ A sinner won’t escape with plunder,
    and the endurance of the godly
    will never fail.
¹⁴ He will make allowance
for every act of charity;
    everyone will receive their just reward.^[e]

¹⁷ Don’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?
¹⁸ Look at the heavens,
indeed the highest heavens;
    the abyss and the earth
    will tremble at the Lord’s visitation.^[f]
19 All at once the mountains
and the foundations of the earth
    will shake together, quaking,
    when he looks upon them.
²⁰ The mind cannot even think
about these things.
    Who can ponder his ways?
²¹ Most of his deeds are hidden
like a hurricane that no one can see.^[g]
22 Who will announce just actions?
    Or who will endure,
    since God’s covenant is far off?”^[h]
23 Those who lack sense think this way;
    a foolish and misguided person
    thinks foolish things.

²⁶ The Lord’s works in creation
existed from the beginning,
    and he defined their exact stations
    when he made them.
²⁷ He 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.
²⁸ None of them crowd out their neighbor,
    and none will ever disobey his word.
²⁹ Afterward, the Lord looked at the earth
    and filled it with his good things.
³⁰ He covered its surface
with every living being,
    and they return into it.