1. Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; nor his ear heavy, that it cannot hear:
2. But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.
3. For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips pronounce lies; your tongue speaks evil.
4. No one calls for righteousness, nor do any judge by the truth; they trust in vanity, and speak vanities; they conceive trouble and bring forth iniquity.
5. They hatch cockatrice’ eggs and weave the spider’s web; whosoever shall eat of their eggs shall die, and if they should squeeze them, a viper shall come out.
6. Their cloth is unfit to be a garment, neither shall they cover themselves with their works; their works are works of violence, and the work of iniquity is in their hands.
7. Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood; their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and destruction are their paths.
8. The way of peace they did not know; nor is there anything straight about their ways; they have wilfully made themselves crooked paths; whosoever goes therein shall not know peace.
9. Therefore judgment has withdrawn from us, and righteousness has never overtaken us: we wait for light, but behold obscurity; for brightness, but we walk in darkness.
10. We grope for the wall like the blind, and as if we had no eyes we walk by touch; we stumble at noonday as in the night; we are in graves as dead men.
11. We all roar like bears and mourn sore like doves: we look for judgment, but there is none; for saving health, but it has withdrawn from us.
12. For our rebellions are multiplied before thee, and our sins have testified against us; for our iniquities are with us; and we know our sins: