Psalm 58
NET Bible
Chapter overview
Psalm 58 denounces rulers who manufacture injustice and remain deaf to correction. Its severe poetic images demand an end to entrenched harm, so communities can see that righteous judgment truly matters.
JusticeCorrupt rulersJudgmentCommunity
1Do you rulers really pronounce just decisions? Do you judge people fairly?
2No! You plan how to do what is unjust; you deal out violence in the earth.
3The wicked turn aside from birth; liars go astray as soon as they are born.
4Their venom is like that of a snake, like a deaf serpent that does not hear,
5that does not respond to the magicians, or to a skilled snake-charmer.
6O God, break the teeth in their mouths! Smash the jawbones of the lions, O Lord!
7Let them disappear like water that flows away! Let them wither like grass!
8Let them be like a snail that melts away as it moves along! Let them be like stillborn babies that never see the sun!
9Before the kindling is even placed under your pots, he will sweep it away along with both the raw and cooked meat.
10The godly will rejoice when they see vengeance carried out; they will bathe their feet in the blood of the wicked.
11Then observers will say, “Yes indeed, the godly are rewarded! Yes indeed, there is a God who judges in the earth!”
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