2 For they reasoned unsoundly, saying to themselves,
“Short and sorrowful is our life,
and there is no remedy when a life comes to its end,
and no one has been known to return from Hades.

¹² “Let us lie in wait for the righteous man,
because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions;
he reproaches us for sins against the law
and accuses us of sins against our training.^(A)
13 He professes to have knowledge of God
and calls himself a child of the Lord.
¹⁴ He became to us a reproof of our thoughts;
the very sight of him is a burden to us,
¹⁵ because his manner of life is unlike that of others,
and his ways are strange.^(B)
16 We are considered by him as something base,
and he avoids our ways as unclean;
he calls the last end of the righteous happy
and boasts that God is his father.^(C)
17 Let us see if his words are true,
and let us test what will happen at the end of his life,
¹⁸ for if the righteous man is God’s child, he will help him
and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries.^(D)
19 Let us test him with insult and torture,
so that we may find out how reasonable he is
and make trial of his forbearance.^(E)
20 Let us condemn him to a shameful death,
for, according to what he says, he will be protected.”