1 Do you indeed speak righteousness, you silent ones?

Do you judge uprightly, you sons of men?

2 No, in heart you work wickedness;

You weigh out the violence of your hands in the earth.

3 *The wicked are estranged from the womb;

They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.

4 *Their poison is like the poison of a serpent;

Theyare like the deaf cobra that stops its ear,

5 Which will not *heed the voice of charmers,

Charming ever so skillfully.

6 *Break their teeth in their mouth, O God!

Break out the fangs of the young lions, O Lord!

7 *Let them flow away as waters which run continually;

When he bends hisbow,

Let his arrows be as if cut in pieces.

8 Letthembe like a snail which melts away as it goes,

*Like a stillborn child of a woman, that they may not see the sun.

9 Before your *pots can feel theburning thorns,

He shall take them away *as with a whirlwind,

As in His living and burning wrath.

10 The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the *vengeance;

*He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked,

11 *So that men will say,

"Surely thereis a reward for the righteous;

Surely He is God who *judges in the earth."