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¹ Give ear, you heavens, and I will speak; And let the earth hear the words of my mouth.² My doctrine shall drop as the rain; My speech shall distill as the dew, As the small rain on the tender grass, And as the showers on the herb.³ For I will proclaim the name of Yahweh: Ascribe greatness to our God.⁴ The Rock, his work is perfect; For all his ways are justice: A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, Just and right is he.⁵ They have dealt corruptly with him, [they are] not his sons, [it is] their blemish; [They are] a perverse and crooked generation.⁶ Do you thus requite Yahweh, O foolish people and unwise? Isn't he your father that has bought you? He has made you, and established you.

⁷ Remember the days of old, Consider the years of many generations: Ask your father, and he will show you; Your elders, and they will tell you.⁸ When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, When he separated the sons of man, he set the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God.⁹ For Yahweh's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.¹⁰ He found him in a desert land, And in the waste howling wilderness; He compassed him about, he cared for him, He kept him as the apple of his eye.¹¹ As an eagle that stirs up her nest, That hovers over her young, He spread abroad his wings, he took them, He bore them on his pinions.¹² Yahweh alone led him, And there was no foreign god with him.¹³ He made him ride on the high places of the earth, And he ate the increase of the field; And he made him to suck honey out of the rock, And oil out of the flinty rock;¹⁴ Butter of the herd, and milk of the flock, With fat of lambs, And rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, With the finest of the wheat; And of the blood of the grape you drank wine.

¹⁵ Jacob ate and had his fill, Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: You have waxed fat, you have grown thick, you have become sleek; Then he forsook God who made him, And lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.¹⁶ They moved him to jealousy with strange [gods]; With disgusting things they provoked him to anger.¹⁷ They sacrificed to demons, [which were] not God, To gods that they did not know, To new [gods] that came up of late, Which your fathers did not dread.¹⁸ Of the Rock that begot you you are unmindful, And have forgotten God that gave you birth.

¹⁹ And Yahweh saw [it], and abhorred [them], Because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters.²⁰ And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: For they are a very perverse generation, sons in whom is no faithfulness.²¹ They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; They have provoked me to anger with their vanities: And I will move them to jealousy with those that are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.²² For a fire is kindled in my anger, And burns to the lowest Sheol, And devours the earth with its increase, And sets on fire the foundations of the mountains.²³ I will heap evils on them; I will spend my arrows on them:²⁴ [They shall be] wasted with hunger, and devoured with burning heat And bitter destruction; And the teeth of beasts I will send on them, With the poison of crawling things of the dust.²⁵ Outside shall the sword bereave, And in the chambers terror; [It shall destroy] both young man and virgin, The suckling with the man of gray hairs.

²⁶ I said, I would scatter them far, I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among common man;²⁷ Were it not that I feared the provocation of the enemy, or else their adversaries should judge amiss, and they should say, Our hand is exalted, And Yahweh has not done all this.²⁸ For they are a nation void of counsel, And there is no understanding in them.²⁹ Oh that they were wise, that they understood this, That they would consider their latter end!³⁰ How should one chase a thousand, And two put ten thousand to flight, Except their Rock had sold them, And Yahweh had delivered them up?³¹ For their rock is not as our Rock, Even our enemies themselves being judges.³² For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, And of the fields of Gomorrah: Their grapes are grapes of gall, Their clusters are bitter:³³ Their wine is the poison of serpents, And the cruel venom of cobras.³⁴ Isn't this laid up in store with me, Sealed up among my treasures?³⁵ For the day of vengeance and recompense will come in time. Their foot shall slide, for the day of their calamity is near. And the things that are to come on them shall hurry.³⁶ For Yahweh will judge his people, And repent himself for his slaves; When he sees that [their] power is gone, And there is none [remaining], shut up or left at large.³⁷ And he will say, Where are their gods, The rock in which they took refuge;³⁸ Which ate the fat of their sacrifices, [And] drank the wine of their drink-offering? Let them rise up and help you, Let them be your protection.

³⁹ See now that I, even I, am he, And there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal; And there is none that can deliver out of my hand.⁴⁰ For I lift up my hand to heaven, And say, As I live forever,⁴¹ If I whet my glittering sword, And my hand takes hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to my adversaries, And will recompense those that hate me.⁴² I will make my arrows drunk with blood, And my sword shall devour flesh; With the blood of the slain and the captives, From the head of the leaders of the enemy.⁴³ Rejoice with him, [you] heavens. And bow down before him, all [you] gods. For he will avenge the blood of his sons, And will render vengeance to his adversaries, And will pay back those who hate him, And will make expiation for the land of his people.

⁴⁴ And Moses came and spoke all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he, and Hoshea the son of Nun.⁴⁵ And Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel;⁴⁶ And he said to them, Set your heart to all the words which I testify to you this day, which you shall command your sons to observe to do, [even] all the words of this law.⁴⁷ For it is no vain thing for you; because it is your life, and through this thing you shall prolong your days in the land, where you go over the Jordan to possess it.⁴⁸ And Yahweh spoke to Moses that very same day, saying,⁴⁹ Go up into this mountain of Abarim, to mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is across from Jericho; and look at the land of Canaan, which I give to the sons of Israel for a possession;⁵⁰ and die in the mount where you go up, and be gathered to your people, as Aaron your brother died in mount Hor, and was gathered to his people:⁵¹ because you trespassed against me in the midst of the sons of Israel at the waters of Meribah of Kadesh, in the wilderness of Zin; because you did not sanctify me in the midst of the sons of Israel.⁵² For you shall see the land before you; but you shall not go there into the land which I give the sons of Israel.