When they were few in number, just a very few, and foreign residents within it,

Will your idle talk ¹  reduce people to silence, ²  and will no one rebuke ³  you when you mock? ⁴ 

When they were few in number, just a very few, and resident aliens within it,

Your ¹  men will fall by the sword, your strong men will die in battle. ² 

Lord, use your power to deliver me from these murderers, ¹  from the murderers of this world! ²  They enjoy prosperity; ³  you overwhelm them with the riches they desire. ⁴  They have many children, and leave their wealth to their offspring. ⁵ 

May Reuben live and not die, and may his people multiply. ¹ 

All my closest friends ¹  detest me; and those whom ²  I love have turned against me. ³ 

Will you keep to the old path ¹  that evil men have walked –

For he ¹  knows deceitful ²  men; when he sees evil, will he not ³  consider it? ⁴ 

From the city the dying ¹  groan, and the wounded ²  cry out for help, but God charges no one with wrongdoing. ³ 

if ¹  the members of my household ²  have never said, ³  ‘If only there were ⁴  someone who has not been satisfied from Job’s ⁵  meat!’ –

I do not associate ¹  with deceitful men, or consort ²  with those who are dishonest. ³ 

Therefore my ¹  people will be deported ²  because of their lack of understanding. Their ³  leaders will have nothing to eat, ⁴  their ⁵  masses will have nothing to drink. ⁶ 

At that time we seized all his cities and put every one of them ¹  under divine judgment, ²  including even the women and children; we left no survivors.

We put all of these under divine judgment ¹  just as we had done to King Sihon of Heshbon – every occupied city, ²  including women and children.

Then the Lord will scatter you among the peoples and there will be very few of you ¹  among the nations where the Lord will drive you.

There will be very few of you left, though at one time you were as numerous as the stars in the sky, ¹  because you will have disobeyed ²  the Lord your God.

Don’t be afraid, despised insignificant Jacob, ¹  men of ²  Israel. I am helping you,” says the Lord, your protector, ³  the Holy One of Israel. ⁴ 

Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought ruin ¹  on me by making me a foul odor ²  among the inhabitants of the land – among the Canaanites and the Perizzites. I ³  am few in number; they will join forces against me and attack me, and both I and my family will be destroyed!”

Some who survive in battle will return to the land of Judah from the land of Egypt. But they will be very few indeed! ¹  Then the Judean remnant who have come to live in the land of Egypt will know whose word proves true, ²  mine or theirs.’