1 The righteous die, and no one lays my fear to heart; and the men who show mercy are taken away, and they do not consider that the righteous are taken away on account of the evil that is to come. 2 They will enter into peace; they will rest in the place of their beds, those who keep His Torah. 3 But you, come near here, people of a generation whose works are evil, whose planting was of a holy planting, but who are adulterers and the sexually immoral. 4 At whom do you make your sport? At whom do you open your mouth and keep speaking great things? Are you not rebellious children, a lying seed? 5 you who worship idols beneath every green tree, who sacrifice the children in the valleys under the clefts of the rocks? 6 Among the smooth stones of the valley is your portion; yes, they are your lot; even to them you have poured out drink-offerings, you have offered sacrifices. Ah, for these things my Memra will bring retribution. 7 Upon a lofty and high mountain you have set the place of the house of your dwelling; even there you went up to offer sacrifice. 8 Behind the doors and the doorposts you have set up the memorial of your idols; you have been like a woman who is loved by her husband but goes astray after strangers; you have enlarged your bed, you have made a covenant with some of them; you loved the place, the place of their beds, the place you have chosen. 9 When you kept the Torah, you prospered in the kingdom; and when you multiplied good works for yourself, your camp was enlarged, and you sent your messengers to a distant land; and you brought down mighty nations to hades. 10 You wearied yourself in the greatness of your way, yet you did not think to give back the many treasures you had multiplied; therefore you did not think to repent. 11 Of whom have you been afraid? And on account of whom have you feared? For you have surely multiplied speaking lies, and you have not remembered my service, nor laid my fear to your heart. I would have given you the ends of the world if you had returned to my Torah; but you have not returned to me. 12 I have shown you those good works that would have been your righteousness; but you have multiplied evil works that did not profit you. 13 Proclaim aloud whether your deceitful works will save you, in which you have been occupied from your youth; the wind will carry them all away, they will be as nothing; but he who puts his trust in my Memra will possess the earth and inherit my holy mountain. 14 And He will say, “Teach and admonish, turn the heart of this people to the right way; remove the stumbling-block of the wicked out of the way of the congregation of my people.” 15 For thus says the high and lofty One who dwells in the heavens, and whose name is Holy, who inhabits the height; yes, His holy Shekinah has promised to save the contrite of heart and the humble of spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble and to support the heart of the contrite. 16 “For I will not take the vengeance of judgment forever, neither will my wrath be eternal; for I will revive the spirits of the dead, and the souls I have created. 17 My wrath was upon them on account of their robbed riches, and I struck them; I removed my Shekinah from them and cast them out; I scattered their captives, because they went astray after the imagination of their hearts. 18 The way of their repentance is revealed before me, and I will forgive them, and I will have compassion on them, and grant consolations to them and to those who mourn with them.”⁠a 19 The prophet said, “He who creates the speech on the lips of every man, peace will be made for the righteous who have kept my Torah of old, and peace will be made for the penitent who return to my Torah. It is at hand that I will pardon them, says the LORD.” 20 But the wicked are like the troubled sea that seeks to rest but cannot, and its waters bring forth mire and dirt. 21 There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked.