The Imprecation Against the Adversary

6

[They say,] "Appoint a wicked man over him, may an accuser stand at his right.

7

When he is tried, let him be found guilty, may even his plea be counted a sin.

8

May his days be few, may someone else take his position.

9

May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow.

10

May his children be wandering beggars, foraging for food from their ruined homes.

11

May creditors seize all he owns and strangers make off with his earnings.

12

May no one treat him kindly, and may no one take pity on his orphaned children.

13

May his posterity be cut off; may his name be erased within a generation.

14

May the wrongs of his ancestors be remembered by ADONAI, and may the sin of his mother not be erased;

15

may they always be before ADONAI, so he can cut off all memory of them from the earth.

16

For he did not remember to show kindness but hounded the downtrodden, the poor and the brokenhearted to death.

17

He loved cursing; may it recoil on him! He didn't like blessing; may it stay far from him!

18

He clothed himself with cursing as routinely as with his coat; May it enter inside him as easily as water, as easily as oil into his bones.

19

May it cling to him like the coat he wears, like the belt he wraps around himself."

20

This is what my adversaries want ADONAI to do, those who speak evil against me.