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📚✭The righteous perishes,and no man takes it to heart;
and merciful men are taken away,
no one understanding that
the righteous is taken away
from evil.
2 📚He will enter into peace✭.
They will rest✭ in their beds,
each one having walked
in his uprightness.
3 📚“But come here,
you sons of the sorceress✭,
the offspring of the adulterer✭
and the prostitute.
4 📚At whom do you mock✭?
At whom do you make a wide mouth,
and stick out the tongue?
Are you not children
of transgression,
descendants of falsehood,
5 📚Inflaming yourselves with idols
under every green tree✭,
slaying the children✭ in the valleys,
under the clefts of the rocks?
6 📚Among the smooth stones
of the stream is your portion.
They, they are your lot.
To them you have poured out
a drink offering,
you have offered a grain offering.
Should I relent✭ concerning
these things?
7 📚On a lofty and high mountain
you have made your bed✭;
there you went up to offer sacrifice✭.
8 📚Also behind the doors
and the door posts you have
set up your signs✭.
Away from me you have uncovered
yourself, and have gone up;
you have made your bed wide,
and made a covenant with
those idols;
you loved✭ their bed where you saw it.
9 📚And you went to the king✭
with ointment,
and increased your perfumes,
and sent your messengers far away,
and debased yourself even
to hell✭.
10 📚✭You were wearied by the length
of your road,
but you did not say,
‘There is no hope’.
You found your strength revived,
therefore you were not grieved.
11 📚✭And of whom have you been afraid
or feared,
that you have lied and have not
remembered me,
or taken it to your heart?
Is it because I have kept silent✭
that you did not fear me✭?
12 📚I will declare your righteousness✭,
and your works;
but they will not profit you.
13 📚✭When you cry out,
let your collection of idols
deliver you!
But the wind will carry them all away.
A breath will take them away.
But the one who puts his trust in me
will possess the land✭,
and will inherit my holy mountain.
Comfort for the humble
14 📚✭And it will be said:
‘Raise it up, raise it up!
Prepare the way✭!
Take away the stumbling block
from my people’s path.’
15 📚“For thus says the high and lofty✭
One who inhabits eternity,
whose name is Holy✭:
I dwell in the high and holy place,
and with him who is contrite✭
and humble in spirit,
to revive✭ the spirit of the humble,
and to revive the heart
of the contrite ones.
16 📚✭For I will not contend forever,
and I will not always be angry;
for the spirit would grow faint
before me,
and the souls which I have made.
17 📚✭For the sin of his covetousness
I was angry,
and struck him. I hid myself,
and was angry, and he went on
turning back in the way of his heart.
18 📚I have seen his ways,
and will heal him.
I will also lead✭ him, and restore comforts
to him✭ and to his mourners.
19 📚I create the fruit of the lips:
Peace, peace to the one who is
far✭ away,
and to the one who is near,
says the Lord; and I will heal him.
20 📚✭But the wicked are like
the troubled sea,
when it cannot rest,
whose waters cast up mire and dirt”.
21 📚“There is no peace”,
says my God, “for the wicked”.