However, due to your abundant mercy you did not do away with them altogether; you did not abandon them. For you are a merciful and compassionate God.

Then I said, “Please, O LORD God of heaven, great and awesome God, who keeps his loving covenant ¹  with those who love him and obey ²  his commandments,

And now, though we share the same flesh and blood as our fellow countrymen, ¹  and our children are just like their children, ²  still we have found it necessary to subject our sons and daughters to slavery. ³  Some of our daughters have been subjected to slavery, while we are powerless to help, ⁴  since our fields and vineyards now belong to other people.” ⁵ 

“So now, our God – the great, powerful, and awesome God, who keeps covenant fidelity ¹  – do not regard as inconsequential ²  all the hardship that has befallen us – our kings, our leaders, our priests, our prophets, our ancestors, and all your people – from the days of the kings of Assyria until this very day!