Get out of Babylonia quickly, you foreign people. ¹  Flee to save your lives. Do not let yourselves be killed because of her sins. For it is time for the Lord to wreak his revenge. He will pay Babylonia ²  back for what she has done. ³ 

while seeing false visions for you and reading lying omens for you ¹  – to place that sword ²  on the necks of the profane wicked, ³  whose day has come, the time of final punishment.

“‘You have shown unrelenting hostility and poured the people of Israel onto the blades of a sword ¹  at the time of their calamity, at the time of their final punishment.

You are too just ¹  to tolerate ²  evil; you are unable to condone ³  wrongdoing. So why do you put up with such treacherous people? ⁴  Why do you say nothing when the wicked devour ⁵  those more righteous than they are? ⁶ 

The just Lord resides ¹  within her; he commits no unjust acts. ²  Every morning he reveals ³  his justice. At dawn he appears without fail. ⁴  Yet the unjust know no shame.

The Israelites who remain ¹  will not act deceitfully. They will not lie, and a deceitful tongue will not be found in their mouth. Indeed, they will graze peacefully like sheep ²  and lie down; no one will terrify them.”

For evil does not come up from the dust, ¹  nor does trouble spring up from the ground,

Relent, ¹  let there be no falsehood; ²  reconsider, ³  for my righteousness is intact! ⁴ 

Who has prescribed his ways for him? Or said to him, ‘You have done what is wicked’?

The words he speaks are sinful and deceitful; he does not care about doing what is wise and right. ¹ 

The righteousness of the upright will deliver them, ¹  but the faithless will be captured ²  by their own desires. ³ 

Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you. Go away from me, you lawbreakers!’ ¹ 

You must be loyal ¹  to your servant, for you have made a covenant with your servant in the Lord’s name. ²  If I am guilty, ³  you yourself kill me! Why bother taking me to your father?”

He said to the king, “Don’t think badly of me, my lord, and don’t recall the sin of your servant on the day when you, my lord the king, left ¹  Jerusalem! ²  Please don’t call it to mind!

(I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh.) ¹  For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.

Perhaps the Lord will notice my affliction ¹  and this day grant me good in place of his curse.” ² 

That person sings ¹  to others, ²  saying: ‘I have sinned and falsified what is right, but I was not punished according to what I deserved. ³ 

Vindicate me, O God! Fight for me ²  against an ungodly nation! Deliver me ³  from deceitful and evil men! ⁴ 

because of what the enemy says, ¹  and because of how the wicked ²  pressure me, ³  for they hurl trouble ⁴  down upon me ⁵  and angrily attack me.

Each morning I will destroy all the wicked people in the land, and remove all evildoers from the city of the Lord.