World English Bible

1 For this cause werethese menworthily punished throughcreatureslikethose which they worship,

And tormented through a multitude of vermin.

2 Instead of which punishment, you, bestowing benefits on your people,

Preparedst quails for food,

Food ofrare taste, tosatisfythe desire oftheirappetite;

3 To the end thatyour enemies, desiring food,

Might for the hideousness of thecreaturessent among them

Loathe even the necessary appetite;

But these,your people,having for a short space suffered lack,

Might even partake offood ofrare taste.

4 For it was needful that upon those should come inexorable lack in their tyrannous dealing,

But that to these it should only be showed how their enemies were tormented.

5 For even when terrible raging of wild beasts came uponyour people,

And they were perishing by the bites of crooked serpents,

Your wrath continued not to the uttermost;

6 But for admonition were they troubled for a short space,

Having a token of salvation,

To put them in remembrance of the commandment of your law:

7 For he that turned toward it was not saved because of that which was seen,

But because of you, the Saviour of all.

8 Yes, and in this did you persuade our enemies,

That you are he that delivers out of every evil.

9 For them verily the bites of locusts and flies did kill,

And there was not found a healing for their life,

Because they were worthy to be punished by suchas these;

10 But your sons not the very teeth of venomous dragons overcame,

For your mercy passed by where they were, and healed them.

11 For they werebitten, to put them in remembrance of your oracles;

And were quickly saved, lest, falling into deep forgetfulness,

They should becomeunable to beroused by your beneficence:

12 For of a truth it was neither herb nor mollifying plaister that cured them,

But your word, O Lord, which heals all things;

13 For you have authority over life and death,

And you lead down to the gates of Hades, and lead up again.

14 But though a manmaykill by hiswickedness,

Yet the spirit that is gone forth he turns not again,

Neither gives release to the soul thatHadeshas received.

15 But your hand it is not possible to escape;

16 For ungodly men,refusing to know you, were scourged in the strength of your arm,

Pursued with strange rains and hails and showers inexorable,

And utterly consumed with fire;

17 For, what was most marvelousof all,

In the water which quenches all things the fire wrought yet more mightily;

For the world fights for the righteous.

18 For at one time the flame lost its fierceness,

That it might not burn up the creatures sent against the ungodly,

But thatthesethemselves as they looked mightsee that they were chased through the judgement of God:

19 And at another time even in the midst of water it burns above the power of fire,

That it may destroy thefruits of an unrighteous land.

20 Instead whereof you gave your people angels’ food to eat,

And bread readyfor their usedid you provide for them from heaven withouttheirtoil,

Breadhaving the virtue of every pleasant savor,

And agreeing to every taste;

21 Foryournature manifested your sweetness towardyourchildren;

Whilethat bread,ministering to the desire of the eater,

Tempered itself according to every man’s choice.

22 But snow and ice endured fire, and melted not,

Thatmenmight know that fire was destroying the fruits of the enemies,

Burning in the hail and flashing in the rains;

23 Andthat thiselementagain, in order that righteous men may be nourished,

Hath even forgotten its own power.

24 For the creation, ministering to you its maker,

Straineth its force against the unrighteous, for punishment,

And slackeneth it in behalf of them that trust in you, for beneficence.

25 Therefore at that time also, converting itself into all forms,

It ministered to your all-nourishing bounty,

According to the desire of them thatmade supplication;

26 That your sons, whom you loved, O Lord, might learn

That it is not thegrowth ofthe earth’sfruits that nourishes a man,

But that your word preserves them that trust you.

27 For that which was not marred by fire,

When it was simply warmed by a faint sunbeam melted away;

28 That it might be known thatwemust rise before the sun to give you thanks,

And must plead with you at the dawning of the light:

29 For the hope of the unthankful shall melt as the winter’s hoar frost,

And shall flow away as water that has no use.

1 For great are your judgements, and hard tointerpret;

Therefore souls undisciplined went astray.

2 For when lawless men had supposed that they held a holy nation in their power,

They,themselves,prisoners of darkness, and bound in the fetters of a long night,

Close kept beneath their roofs,

Lay exiled from the eternal providence.

3 For while they thought that they were unseen intheirsecret sins,

They weresundered one from another by a dark curtain of forgetfulness,

Stricken with terrible awe, and sore troubled by spectral forms.

4 For neither didthe dark recesses that held them guard them from fears,

But soundsrushing down rang around them,

And phantoms appeared, cheerless with unsmiling faces.

5 And no force of fire prevailed to givethemlight,

Neither were the brightest flames of the stars strong enough to illumine that gloomy night:

6 But only there appeared to them the glimmering of a fire self-kindled, full of fear;

And in terror they deemed the things which they saw

To be worse than that sight, on which they could not gaze.

7 And they layhelpless,made the sport of magic are,

And a shameful rebuke of their vaunts of understanding:

8 For they that promised to drive away terrors and troublings from a sick soul,

These werethemselvessick with a ludicrous fearfulness:

9 For even if no troublous thing affrighted them,

Yet, scared with the creepings of vermin and hissings of serpents,

10 they perishedfor very trembling,

Refusing even to look on the air, which could on no side be escaped.

11 For wickedness, condemned by a witness within, is a coward thing,

And, being pressed hard by conscience, alwaysforecasts the worstlot:

12 For fear is nothing else but a surrender of the help which reason offers;

13 And from withinthe heartthe expectationof thembeing less

Maketh of greater account the ignorance of the cause that brings the torment.

14 But they, all through the night which was powerless indeed,

And which came upon them out of the recesses of powerless Hades,

Allsleeping the same sleep,

15 Now were haunted by monstrous apparitions,

And now were paralysed by their soul’s surrendering;

For fear sudden and unlooked forcame upon them.

16 So thenevery man,whoever it might be, sinking downin his place,

Was kept in ward shut up in that prison which was barred not with iron:

17 For whether he were a husbandman, or a shepherd,

Or a labourer whose toils were in the wilderness,

He was overtaken, and endured that inevitable necessity,

For with one chain of darkness were they all bound.

18 Whether there were a whistling wind,

Or a melodious noise of birds among the spreading branches,

Or a measured fall of water running violently,

19 Or a harsh crashing of rocks hurled down,

Or the swift course of animals bounding along unseen,

Or the voice of wild beasts harshly roaring,

Or an echo rebounding fromthe hollows of the mountains,

All these thingsparalysed them with terror.

20 For the whole worldbesidewas enlightened with clear light,

And was occupied with unhindered works;

21 While over them alone was spread a heavy night,

An image of the darkness that should afterward receive them;

But yet heavier than darkness were they to themselves.

1 But for your holy ones there was great light;

Andthe Egyptians,hearing their voice but seeing not their form,

Counted it a happy thing that they too had suffered,

2 Yet for that they do not hurt themnow,though wrongedby thembefore, they are thankful;

And because they had been at variancewith them,they made supplicationto them.

3 Whereas you did providefor your peoplea burning pillar of fire,

To be a guide fortheirunknown journey,

And withal akindly sun fortheirproud exile.

4 For well didthe Egyptians deserve to be deprived of light and imprisoned by darkness,

They who had kept in close ward your sons,

Through whom the incorruptible light of the law was to be given tothe race of men.

5 After they had taken counsel to kill the babes of the holy ones,

And when a single child had been cast forth and savedto convictthem of their sin,

You took away from them their multitude of children,

And destroyed alltheir hosttogether in a mighty flood.

6 Of that night were our fathers made aware beforehand,

That, having sure knowledge, they might be cheered by the oaths which they had trusted:

7 Soby your people was expected salvation of the righteous and destruction of the enemies;

8 For as you did take vengeance on the adversaries,

By the same means, calling us to yourself, you did glorify us.

9 For holy childrenof good men offered sacrifice in secret,

And with one consent they took upon themselves the covenant of thedivine law,

Thatthey would partake alike in the same good things and the same perils;

The fathers already leading the sacred songs of praise.

10 But there sounded back in discord the cry of the enemies,

And a piteous voice of lamentation for children was borne abroad.

11 And servant along with master punished with a like just doom,

And commoner suffering the same as king,

12 Yes, allthe peopletogether, under one form of death,

Hadwith themcorpses without number;

For the living were not sufficient even to bury them,

Since at a singlestroke theirnobler offspring was consumed.

13 For while they were disbelieving all things by reason of the enchantments,

Upon the destruction of the firstborn they confessed the people to be God’s son.

14 For while peaceful silence enwrapped all things,

And night in her own swiftness was in mid course,

15 Your all-powerful word leaped from heaven out oftheroyalthrone,

A stern warrior, into the midst of thedoomed land,

16 Bearing as a sharp sword your unfeigned commandment;

And standing it filled all things with death;

And while it touched the heaven it trode upon the earth.

17 Then forthwith apparitions in dreams terribly troubled them,

And fears came upon them unlooked for.

18 Andeach,one thrown here half dead, another there,

Made manifest wherefore he was dying:

19 For the dreams, perturbing them, did foreshew this,

That they might not perish without knowing why they were afflicted.

20 But itbefell the righteous also to make trial of death,

And a multitude were stricken in the wilderness:

Howbeit the wrath endured not for long.

21 For a blameless man hasted to be their champion:

Bringing the weapon of his own ministry,

Evenprayer and the propitiation of incense,

He withstood the indignation, and set an end to the calamity,

Shewing that he was your servant.

22 And he overcame theanger,

Not by strength of body, not by efficacy of weapons;

Butby word did he subduethe minister of punishment,

By bringing to remembrance oaths and covenants made with the fathers.

23 For when the dead were already fallen in heaps one upon another,

Standing between he stopped theadvancingwrath,

Andcut off the way to the living.

24 For uponhislonghigh-priestlyrobe was the whole world,

And the glories of the fatherswereupon the graving of the four rows ofprecious stones,

And your majestywasupon the diadem of his head.

25 To these the destroyer gave place, and thesethe peoplefeared;

For it was enough only to make trial of the wrath.

1 But upon the ungodly there came to the end indignation without mercy;

For their future alsoGodforeknew,

2 How that, having changed their minds tolet your peoplego,

And having speeded them eagerly on their way,

They would repent themselves and pursue them.

3 For while they were yet in the midst of their mourning,

And making lamentation at the graves of the dead,

They drew upon themselves another counsel of folly,

And pursued as fugitives those whom with intreaties they had cast out.

4 Forthe doom which they deserved was drawing themto this end,

And it made them forget the things that had befallen them,

That they might fill up the punishment which was yet lacking to their torments,

5 And that your people mightjourney on by a marvelous road,

But theythemselvesmight find a strange death.

6 For the whole creation,each partin its several kind, was fashioned again anew,

Ministering toyourseveral commandments,

That yourservants might be guarded free from hurt.

7 Thenthe cloud that shadowed the camp was seen,

And dry land rising up out of what before was water,

Out of the Red sea an unhindered highway,

And a grassy plain out of the violent surge;

8 By which they passed over with all their hosts,

These that were covered with your hand,

Having seen strange marvels.

9 For like horses they roamed at large,

And they skipped about like lambs,

Praising you, O Lord, who was their deliverer.

10 For they still remembered the things that came to pass in the time of their sojourning,

How that instead ofbearingcattle the land brought forthlice,

And instead offish the river cast up a multitude of frogs.

11 But afterwards they saw also a newrace of birds,

When, led on by desire, they asked for luxurious dainties;

12 For, to solace them, there came up for them quails from the sea.

13 And upon the sinners came the punishments

Not without the tokens that were givenbeforehand by the force of the thunders;

For justly did they suffer through their own wickednesses,

Forgrievous indeed was the hatred which they practised toward guests.

14 For whereas themen of Sodomreceived notthe strangers when they came amongthem;

The Egyptians made slaves of guests who were their benefactors.

15 And not only so,but Godshallvisitthe men of Sodom after another sort,

Since they received as enemies them that were aliens;

16 Whereas thesefirstwelcomed with feastings,

Andthenafflicted with dreadful toils,

Them that had already sharedwith themin the same rights.

17 And moreover they were stricken with loss of sight

(Even as were thoseothersat the righteous man’s doors),

When, being compassed about with yawning darkness,

They sought every one the passage through his own door.

18 For as the notes of a lute vary the character of the rhythm,

Even sodidthe elements, changing their order one with another,

Continuing alwaysthe same, eachin itsseveralsound;

As may clearly bedivined from the sight of the things that are come to pass.

19 For creatures of the dry land were turned into creatures of the waters,

And creatures that swim trodenowupon the earth:

20 Fire kept the mastery of its own power inthe midst ofwater,

And water forgat its quenching nature:

21 Contrariwise, flames wasted not the flesh of perishable creatures that walked among them;

Neithermelted they theice-like grains of ambrosial food, that wereof natureapt to melt.

22 For in all things, O Lord, you did magnify your people,

And you did glorify them and not lightly regard them;

Standing by their side in every time and place.