1 The mighty Ruler of these worlds beholds as though from close at hand

The man who thinks he acts by stealth: all this God perceives and knows.

2 If a man stands or walks or moves in secret, goes to his lying-down or his uprising,

What two men whisper as they sit together, God knows: He as the third is present.

3 This earth, too, is God's possession, and the high heaven whose ends are far asunder.

Both oceans are His, and even this small drop of water is not hidden from Him.

4 If one should flee afar beyond the heaven, God would still be round about him.

Proceeding hither from the sky His angels look, thousand-eyed, over the earth beneath them.

5 All this the Lord beholdeth, all between heaven and earth and all beyond them.

The twinklings of men's eyelids hath He counted. He settles all things.

6 Those fatal snares of Thine which stand extended, threefold, O God, seven by seven,

May they all catch the man who tells a falsehood, and pass unharmed the man whose words are truthful.

7 O God, snare him with a hundred nooses! Watcher of men! let not him who lies escape Thee.

There let the villain sit with hanging belly and bandaged like a cask whose hoops are broken.

8 God sends, and drives away, diseases: God is Lord of the native and the stranger,

God is Lord of the heavenly and the human.

9 Let him be bound and held fast with all these nooses, the liar, whoever he be.

All these are assigned him as his portion.