2 Esdras 8:55-57

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

⁵⁵ Therefore do not ask any more questions about the great number of those who perish. ⁵⁶ For when they had opportunity to choose, they despised the Most High and were contemptuous of his law and abandoned his ways.^{(A) 57} Moreover, they have even trampled on his righteous ones