Judith - Chapter 9

Passage

And when they were gone, Judith went into her oratory: and putting on haircloth, laid ashes on her head: and falling down prostrate before the Lord, she cried to the Lord, saying: Lord God of my father Simeon, who gavest him a sword to execute vengeance against strangers, who had defiled by their uncleanness, and uncovered the virgin to confusion: And who gavest their wives to be made a prey, and their daughters into captivity: and all their spoils to be divided to the servants, who were zealous with your zeal: assist, I beseech you, O Lord God, me a widow. For you have done the things of old, and have devised one thing after another: and what you have designed has been done. For all your ways are prepared, and in your providence you have placed your judgments. Look upon the camp of the Assyrians now, as you were pleased to look upon the camp of the Egyptians, when they pursued armed after your servants, trusting in their chariots, and in their horsemen, and in a multitude of warriors. But you looked over their camp, and darkness wearied them. The deep held their feet, and the waters overwhelmed them. So may it be with these also, O Lord, who trust in their multitude, and in their chariots, and in their pikes, and in their shields, and in their arrows, and glory in their spears, And know not that you are our God, who destroy wars from the beginning, and the Lord is your name. Lift up your arm as from the beginning, and crush their power with your power: let their power fall in their wrath, who promise themselves to violate your sanctuary, and defile the dwelling place of your name, and to beat down with their sword the horn of your altar. Bring to pass, O Lord, that his pride may be cut off with his own sword. Let him be caught in the net of his own eyes in my regard, and do you strike him by the graces of the words of my lips. Give me constancy in my mind, that I may despise him: and fortitude that I may overthrow him. For this will be a glorious monument for your name, when he shall fall by the hand of a woman. For your power, O Lord, is not in a multitude, nor is your pleasure in the strength of horses, nor from the beginning have the proud been acceptable to you: but the prayer of the humble and the meek has always pleased you. O God of the heavens, creator of the waters, and Lord of the whole creation, hear me a poor wretch, making supplication to you, and presuming of your mercy. Remember, O Lord, your covenant, and put you words in my mouth, and strengthen the resolution in my heart, that your house may continue in your holiness: And all nations may acknowledge that you are God, and there is no other besides you.