If I wash myself with soap and cleanse my hands with lye,
If I wash myself with snow water, And make my hands never so clean;
If I wash myself with snow and cleanse my hands with lye,
If I wash myself with snow, purify my hands with soap,
If I had been washed with snow-like waters, and my hands were shining like the cleanest thing,
If I be washed as it were with snow-waters, and my hands shall shine ever so clean:
if my step has turned aside from the way, and my heart has followed my eyes, and if any spot has clung to my hands;
If you ask, ‘What advantage have I? How am I better off than if I had sinned?’
yet you will plunge me into filth, and my own clothes will abhor me.
I wash my hands in innocence, and go around your altar, O Lord,
Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities.
No one who conceals transgressions will prosper, but one who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.
Though you wash yourself with lye and use much soap, the stain of your guilt is still before me, says the Lord God.
O Jerusalem, wash your heart clean of wickedness so that you may be saved. How long shall your evil schemes lodge within you?
For, being ignorant of the righteousness that comes from God, and seeking to establish their own, they have not submitted to God's righteousness.
If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.