Catholic Public Domain Version

Baruch 6:37-48 Catholic Public Domain Version (CPDV)

37. They will not have mercy on the widow, nor do good to orphans.

38. Their gods of wood, and of stone, and of gold, and of silver, are like stones from the mountain; and those who worship them will be confounded.

39. In what way, then, is it to be supposed or said that they are gods?

40. For even the Chaldeans themselves do not honor these, who, when they hear about a mute, unable to speak, they offer him to Bel, asking from him that he may speak,

41. as if these, who are unable to move, would be able to perceive. And even they themselves, when they shall understand this, will abandon them, for, having come to their senses, they do not consider them to be gods.

42. Yet the women, wrapped in cords, sit by the roads, burning olive-stones.

43. And when any one of them, having been attracted by someone passing by, would sleep with him, she reproaches her neighbor because she was not found worthy, as she was, nor was her cord broken.

44. But all things that occur with them are false; in what way, then, is it to be considered or said that they are gods?

45. Yet they have been made by the workmen and the goldsmiths. They will be nothing else but what the priests want them to be.

46. For the artisans themselves, who make them, do not exist for a long time. So then, can these things, which have been made by them, be gods?

47. Yet they have bequeathed falsehoods and disgrace after this to the future.

48. For when they are overcome by battle or evil, the priests consider among themselves where they may hide themselves with them.