24. I will send wasting famine against them, consuming pestilence and deadly plague; I will send against them the fangs of wild beasts, the venom of vipers that glide in the dust.
25. In the street the sword will make them childless; in their homes terror will reign. The young men and young women will perish, the infants and those with gray hair.
26. I said I would scatter them and erase their name from human memory,
27. but I dreaded the taunt of the enemy, lest the adversary misunderstand and say, ‘Our hand has triumphed; the Lord has not done all this.’ ”
28. They are a nation without sense, there is no discernment in them.
29. If only they were wise and would understand this and discern what their end will be!