11:1 She made their affairs prosper through the holy prophet.
11:2 They journeyed through the uninhabited desert, and in solitudes they pitched their tents;
11:3 they withstood enemies and took vengeance on their foes.
11:4 When they thirsted, they called upon you, and water was given them from the sheer rock, assuagement for their thirst from the hard stone.
11:5 For by the things through which their foes were punished they in their need were benefited.
11:6 NO CONTENT
11:7 Instead of a spring, when the perennial river was troubled with impure blood
11:8 as a rebuke to the decree for the slaying of infants, You gave them abundant water in an unhoped-for way,
11:9 once you had shown by the thirst they then had how you punished their adversaries.
11:10 For when they had been tried, though only mildly chastised, they recognized how the wicked, condemned in anger, were being tormented.
11:11 Both those afar off and those close by were afflicted:
11:12 the latter you tested, admonishing them as a father; the former as a stern king you probed and condemned.
11:13 For a twofold grief took hold of them and a groaning at the remembrance of the ones who had departed.
11:14 For when they heard that the cause of their own torments was a benefit to these others, they recognized the Lord.
11:15 Him who of old had been cast out in exposure they indeed mockingly rejected; but in the end of events, they marveled at him, since their thirst proved unlike that of the just.
11:16 And in return for their senseless, wicked thoughts, which misled them into worshiping dumb serpents and worthless insects, You sent upon them swarms of dumb creatures for vengeance;
11:17 that they might recognize that a man is punished by the very things through which he sins.
11:18 For not without means was your almighty hand, that had fashioned the universe from formless matter, to send upon them a drove of bears or fierce lions,
11:19 Or new-created, wrathful, unknown beasts to breathe forth fiery breath, Or pour out roaring smoke, or flash terrible sparks from their eyes.
11:20 Not only could these attack and completely destroy them; even their frightful appearance itself could slay.
11:21 Even without these, they could have been killed at a single blast, pursued by retribution and winnowed out by your mighty spirit; But you have disposed all things by measure and number and weight.
11:22 For with you great strength abides always; who can resist the might of your arm?
11:23 Indeed, before you the whole universe is as a grain from a balance, or a drop of morning dew come down upon the earth.
11:24 But you have mercy on all, because you can do all things; and you overlook the sins of men that they may repent.
11:25 For you love all things that are and loathe nothing that you have made; for what you hated, you would not have fashioned.
11:26 And how could a thing remain, unless you willed it; or be preserved, had it not been called forth by you?
11:27 But you spare all things, because they are yours, O LORD and lover of souls,