1 Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth,
the words of my mouth.
2 My
doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the
small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass:
3 Because
I will publish the name of the LORD: ascribe ye greatness unto our God.
4 He is the Rock, his work is perfect:
for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without
iniquity, just and right is he.
5 They
have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children: they are a
perverse and crooked generation.
6 Do
ye thus requite the LORD, O foolish people and unwise? is not he
thy father that hath
bought thee? hath he not made thee, and established thee?
7 Remember
the days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask thy father, and he
will shew thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee.
8 When
the most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the
sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the
children of Israel.
9 For
the LORD'S portion is his people; Jacob is the
lot of his inheritance.
10 He
found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about,
he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.
11 As
an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her
wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings:
12 So the LORD alone did lead him, and there was no
strange god with him.
13 He
made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase
of the fields; and he made him to suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of
the flinty rock;
14 Butter
of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan,
and goats, with the fat of kidneys of wheat; and thou didst drink the pure
blood of the grape.
15 But
Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou
art covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made
him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.
16 They
provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked
they him to anger.
17 They
sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came
newly up, whom your fathers feared not.
18 Of
the Rock that begat
thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.
19 And
when the LORD saw it, he abhorred them, because of the provoking of his sons, and of his
daughters.
20 And
he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very froward generation, children in
whom is no
faith.
21 They
have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to
anger with their vanities: and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not
a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.
22 For
a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall
consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the
mountains.
23 I
will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them.
24 They shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with
burning heat, and with bitter destruction: I will also send the teeth of beasts
upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust.
25 The
sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young man and the virgin,
the suckling also with
the man of gray hairs.
26 I
said, I would scatter them into corners, I would make the remembrance of them
to cease from among men:
27 Were
it not that I feared the wrath of the enemy, lest their adversaries should
behave themselves strangely, and lest they should say, Our hand is high,
and the LORD hath not done all this.
28 For
they are a
nation void of counsel, neither is there any understanding in them.
29 O
that they were wise, that they understood this, that they
would consider their latter end!
30 How
should one chase a thousand, and two put ten thousand to flight, except their
Rock had sold them, and the LORD had shut them up?
31 For
their rock is not as
our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges.
32 For
their vine is of the
vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah: their grapes are grapes
of gall, their clusters are bitter:
33 Their
wine is the
poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps.
34 Is not this laid up in store with me, and sealed
up among my treasures?
35 To
me belongeth vengeance,
and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at
hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste.
36 For
the LORD shall judge his people, and repent himself for his servants, when he
seeth that their power
is gone, and there is none
shut up, or left.
37 And
he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock
in whom they trusted,
38 Which
did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink
offerings? let them rise up and help you, and be your protection.
39 See
now that I, even I, am he,
and there is no
god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that
can deliver out of my hand.
40 For
I lift up my hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever.
41 If
I whet my glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render
vengeance to mine enemies, and will reward them that hate me.
42 I
will make mine arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh; and that with
the blood of the slain and of the captives, from the beginning of revenges upon
the enemy.
43 Rejoice,
O ye nations, with his people: for he will avenge the
blood of his servants, and will render vengeance to his adversaries, and will
be merciful unto his land, and to his people.
44 And
Moses came and spake all the words of this song in the ears of the people, he,
and Hoshea the son of Nun.
45 And
Moses made an end of speaking all these words to all Israel:
46 And
he said unto them, Set your hearts unto all the words which I testify among you
this day, which ye shall command your children to observe to do, all the words
of this law.
47 For
it is not a
vain thing for you; because it is your life: and through this thing ye
shall prolong your days in the land, whither ye go over
Jordan to possess it.
48 And
the LORD spake unto Moses that selfsame day, saying,
49 Get
thee up into this mountain Abarim, unto mount Nebo, which is in the
land of Moab, that is over against Jericho; and behold the
land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel for a possession:
50 And
die in the mount whither thou goest up, and be gathered unto thy people; as
Aaron thy brother died in mount Hor, and was gathered unto his people:
51 Because
ye trespassed against me among the children of Israel at the waters of
Meribah-Kadesh, in the wilderness of Zin; because ye sanctified me not in the
midst of the children of Israel.
