19 “aAnd Yahweh saw this and spurned them
bBecause of the provocation of His sons and daughters.
20 Then He said, ‘I will hide My face from them;
aI will see what their end shall be;
bFor they are a perverse generation,
cSons in whom is no faithfulness.
21 aThey have made Me jealous with what is not God;
They have provoked Me to anger with their bidols.
cSo I will make them jealous with those who are not a people;
I will provoke them to anger with a wickedly foolish nation,
22 aFor a fire is kindled in My anger,
And it burns to the lowest part of Sheol,
bAnd it consumes the earth with its produce,
And it sets on fire the foundations of the mountains.
23 ‘aI will heap calamities on them;
bI will exhaust My arrows on them.
24 aThey will be wasted by famine, and consumed by plague
bAnd bitter destruction;
cAnd the teeth of beasts I will send upon them,
dWith the venom of crawling things of the dust.
25 aOutside the sword will bereave,
And inside terror—
bBoth choice man and virgin,
The nursing baby with the man of gray hair.
26 I would have said, “aI will cut them to pieces;
bI will cause the memory of them to cease from men,”
27 Had I not feared the provocation by the enemy,
Lest their adversaries misjudge,
Lest they say, “aOur hand is triumphant,
And Yahweh has not done all this.”’
28 “aFor they are a nation where counsel perishes,
And there is no discernment in them.
29 aWould that they were wise, that they had insight into this,
bThat they would understand their future!
30 aHow could one pursue one thousand,
And two put ten thousand to flight,
Unless their bRock had sold them,
And Yahweh had handed them over?
31 Indeed their rock is not like our Rock,
aEven our enemies themselves judge this.
32 For their vine is from the vine of Sodom,
And from the fields of Gomorrah;
Their grapes are grapes of apoison,
Their clusters, bitter.
33 Their wine is the venom of serpents,
And the deadly poison of cobras.