“Are you acquainted with the way ¹  the mountain goats ²  give birth? Do you watch as the wild deer give birth to their young?

Yes, ¹  wild dogs surround me – a gang of evil men crowd around me; like a lion they pin my hands and feet. ² 

Yet you have battered us, leaving us a heap of ruins overrun by wild dogs; ¹  you have covered us with darkness. ² 

For every wild animal in the forest belongs to me, as well as the cattle that graze on a thousand hills. ¹ 

Do not hand the life of your dove ¹  over to a wild animal! Do not continue to disregard ²  the lives of your oppressed people!

Like one who grabs a wild dog by the ears, ¹  so is the person passing by who becomes furious ²  over a quarrel not his own.

Wild dogs will yip in her ruined fortresses, jackals will yelp in the once-splendid palaces. ¹  Her time is almost up, ²  her days will not be prolonged. ³ 

For the fortress is neglected; the once-crowded ¹  city is abandoned. Hill ²  and watchtower are permanently uninhabited. ³  Wild donkeys love to go there, and flocks graze there. ⁴ 

Wild oxen will be slaughtered ¹  along with them, as well as strong bulls. ²  Their land is drenched with blood, their soil is covered with fat.

No lions will be there, no ferocious wild animals will be on it ¹  – they will not be found there. Those delivered from bondage will travel on it,

Wild donkeys stand on the hilltops and pant for breath like jackals. Their eyes are strained looking for food, because there is none to be found.” ¹ 

I will hand them over to their enemies who want to kill them. Their dead bodies will become food for the birds and the wild animals. ¹ 

On its ruins all the birds of the sky will live, and all the wild animals ¹  will walk ²  on its branches.

They will no longer be prey for the nations and the wild beasts will not devour them. They will live securely and no one will make them afraid.

The priests will not eat any bird or animal that has died a natural death or was torn to pieces by a wild animal. ¹ 

Therefore the land will mourn, and all its inhabitants will perish. ¹  The wild animals, ²  the birds of the sky, and even the fish in the sea will perish.

Even the wild animals ¹  cry out to you; ²  for the river beds ³  have dried up; fire has destroyed ⁴  the grassy pastures. ⁵ 

and rejected Esau. ¹  I turned Esau’s ²  mountains into a deserted wasteland ³  and gave his territory ⁴  to the wild jackals.”

God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the cattle according to their kinds, and all the creatures that creep along the ground according to their kinds. God saw that it was good.

Now ¹  the serpent ²  was more shrewd ³  than any of the wild animals ⁴  that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Is it really true that ⁵  God ⁶  said, ‘You must not eat from any tree of the orchard’?” ⁷