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Wisdom 11
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Chapter 11
1
At the hand of a holy prophet[*a] she gave their actions success.
2
They journeyed through an unpeopled wilderness and pitched their tents in inaccessible places.
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They stood firm against their enemies, fought off their foes.
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On you[*b] they called when they were thirsty, and from the rocky cliff water was given them, from hard stone their thirst was quenched.
How water proved the ruin of Egypt and the saving of Israel
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Thus, what served to punish their enemies became a benefit for them in their distress.
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You gave them not that ever-flowing source of river water turbid with defiling floods,
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stern answer for their decree of infanticide,[*c] but, against all hope, water in abundance,
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showing by the thirst that then was raging how severely you punished their enemies.
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From their ordeals, which were no more than the reproofs of Mercy, they learned what tortures a sentence of wrath inflicts on the godless;
10
you tested them indeed, correcting them like a father, but the others you strictly examined, like a severe king who condemns.
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Near or far away,[*d] they were equally worn down,
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double indeed was the grief that seized on them, double the groaning at the memory of the past;
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hearing that what punished them[*e] had set the others rejoicing, they saw the Lord in it,
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and for him whom long ago they had cast out, exposed, and later mockingly rebuffed,[*f] they felt only amazement when all was done; the thirst of the virtuous and theirs had worked so differently.
God’s forbearance with Egypt
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As their foolish and wicked notions led them astray into worshipping mindless reptiles and contemptible beasts, you sent hordes of mindless creatures to punish them
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and teach them that the instruments of sin are instruments of punishment.
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And indeed your all-powerful hand did not lack means – the hand that from formless matter created the world – to unleash a horde of bears or savage lions on them
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or unknown beasts, newly created, full of rage, exhaling fiery breath, ejecting swirls of stinking smoke or flashing fearful sparks from their eyes,
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beasts not only able to crush them with a blow, but also to destroy them by their terrifying appearance.
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But even without these, they could have dropped dead at a single breath, pursued by your justice, whirled away by the breath of your power. But no, you ordered all things by measure, number, weight.
This forbearance explained
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For your great strength is always at your call; who can withstand the might of your arm?
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In your sight the whole world is like a grain of dust that tips the scales, like a drop of morning dew falling on the ground.
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Yet you are merciful to all, because you can do all things and overlook men’s sins so that they can repent.
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Yes, you love all that exists, you hold nothing of what you have made in abhorrence, for had you hated anything, you would not have formed it.
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And how, had you not willed it, could a thing persist, how be conserved if not called forth by you?
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You spare all things because all things are yours, Lord, lover of life,
Chapters of Wisdom
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
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