July 2

Psalms 78:1 — 79:13

Maskil. Of Asaph.

78 Do give ear, O my people, to my law;

      Incline YOUR ear to the sayings of my mouth.

 2 In a proverbial saying I will open my mouth;

      I will cause riddles of long ago to bubble forth,

 3 Which we have heard and know,

      And which our own fathers have related to us;

 4 Which we do not hide from their sons,

      Relating [them] even to the generation to come,

      The praises of Jehovah and his strength

      And his wonderful things that he has done.

 5 And he proceeded to raise up a reminder in Jacob,

      And a law he set in Israel,

      Things that he commanded our forefathers,

      To make them known to their sons;

 6 In order that the generation to come, the sons that were to be born, might know [them],

      That they might rise up and relate [them] to their sons,

 7 And that they might set their confidence in God himself

      And not forget the practices of God but observe his own commandments.

 8 And they should not become like their forefathers,

      A generation stubborn and rebellious,

      A generation who had not prepared their heart

      And whose spirit was not trustworthy with God.

 9 The sons of Ephraim, though armed shooters of the bow,

      Retreated in the day of fight.

10 They did not keep the covenant of God,

       And in his law they refused to walk.

11 They also began to forget his dealings

       And his wonderful works that he caused them to see.

12 In front of their forefathers he had done marvelously

       In the land of Egypt, the field of Zoan.

13 He split the sea, that he might let them pass over,

       And he caused the waters to stand like a dam.

14 And he continued to lead them with a cloud by day

       And the whole night with a light of fire.

15 He proceeded to split rocks in the wilderness,

       That he might cause [them] to drink an abundance just like watery deeps.

16 And he went bringing forth streams out of a crag

       And causing waters to descend just like rivers.

17 And they kept sinning still more against him

       By rebelling against the Most High in the waterless region;

18 And they proceeded to test God in their heart

       By asking for something to eat for their soul.

19 So they began to speak against God.

       They said: “Is God able to arrange a table in the wilderness?”

20 Look! He struck a rock

       That waters might flow and torrents themselves might flood forth.

       “Is he able also to give bread itself,

       Or can he prepare sustenance for his people?”

21 That was why Jehovah heard and began to be furious;

       And fire itself was kindled against Jacob,

       And anger also ascended against Israel.

22 For they did not put faith in God,

       And they did not trust in salvation by him.

23 And he proceeded to command the cloudy skies above,

       And he opened the very doors of heaven.

24 And he kept raining upon them manna to eat,

       And the grain of heaven he gave to them.

25 Men ate the very bread of powerful ones;

       Provisions he sent them to satisfaction.

26 He began making an east wind burst forth in the heavens

       And making a south wind blow by his own strength.

27 And he proceeded to make sustenance rain upon them just like dust,

       Even winged flying creatures just like the sand grains of the seas.

28 And he kept making [them] fall in the middle of his camp,

       All around his tabernacles.

29 And they went eating and satisfying themselves very much,

       And what they desired he proceeded to bring to them.

30 They had not turned aside from their desire,

       While their food was yet in their mouth,

31 When God’s wrath itself ascended against them.

       And he went killing among their stout ones;

       And the young men of Israel he made collapse.

32 Despite all this they sinned some more

       And did not put faith in his wonderful works.

33 So he brought their days to an end as if a mere exhalation,

       And their years by the disturbance.

34 As often as he killed them, they also inquired for him,

       And they returned and looked for God.

35 And they began to remember that God was their Rock,

       And that God the Most High was their Avenger.

36 And they tried to fool him with their mouth;

       And with their tongue they tried to lie to him.

37 And their heart was not steadfast with him;

       And they did not prove faithful in his covenant.

38 But he was merciful; he would cover the error and not bring ruin.

       And many times he made his anger turn back,

       And he would not rouse up all his rage.

39 And he kept remembering that they were flesh,

       That the spirit is going forth and does not come back.

40 How often they would rebel against him in the wilderness,

       They would make him feel hurt in the desert!

41 And again and again they would put God to the test,

       And they pained even the Holy One of Israel.

42 They did not remember his hand,

       The day that he redeemed them from the adversary,

43 How he put his signs in Egypt itself

       And his miracles in the field of Zoan;

44 And how he began changing to blood their Nile canals,

       So that they could not drink from their own streams.

45 He proceeded to send upon them gadflies, that these might eat them up;

       And frogs, that these might bring them to ruin.

46 And he began to give to the cockroaches their yield,

       And their toil to the locusts.

47 He went killing their vine even by the hail

       And their sycamore trees by hailstones.

48 And he proceeded to hand over their beasts of burden even to the hail

       And their livestock to the flaming fever.

49 He went sending upon them his burning anger,

       Fury and denunciation and distress,

       Deputations of angels bringing calamity.

50 He proceeded to prepare a pathway for his anger.

       He did not hold back their soul from death itself;

       And their life he handed over even to the pestilence.

51 Finally he struck down all the firstborn in Egypt,

       The beginning of their generative power in the tents of Ham.

52 Afterward he caused his people to depart just like a flock,

       And conducted them like a drove in the wilderness.

53 And he kept leading them in security, and they felt no dread;

       And the sea covered their enemies themselves.

54 And he proceeded to bring them to his holy territory,

       This mountainous region that his right hand acquired.

55 And because of them he gradually drove out the nations,

       And by the measuring line he went allotting them an inheritance,

       So that he caused the tribes of Israel to reside in their own homes.

56 And they began to test and rebel against God the Most High,

       And his reminders they did not keep.

57 They also kept turning back and acting treacherously like their forefathers;

       They turned around like a loose bow.

58 And they kept offending him with their high places,

       And with their graven images they kept inciting him to jealousy.

59 God heard and got to be furious,

       And so he contemned Israel very much.

60 And he finally forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh,

       The tent in which he resided among earthling men.

61 And he proceeded to give his strength even to captivity

       And his beauty into the hand of the adversary.

62 And he kept handing over his people to the sword itself,

       And against his inheritance he became furious.

63 His young men a fire ate up,

       And his virgins were not praised.

64 As for his priests, they fell by the very sword,

       And their own widows did not give way to weeping.

65 Then Jehovah began to awake as from sleeping,

       Like a mighty one sobering up from wine.

66 And he went striking down his adversaries from behind;

       A reproach of indefinite duration he gave to them.

67 And he proceeded to reject the tent of Joseph;

      And the tribe of Ephraim he did not choose.

68 But he chose the tribe of Judah,

       Mount Zion, which he loved.

69 And he began to build his sanctuary just like the heights,

       Like the earth that he has founded to time indefinite.

70 And so he chose David his servant

       And took him from the pens of the flock.

71 From following the females giving suck

       He brought him in to be a shepherd over Jacob his people

       And over Israel his inheritance.

72 And he began to shepherd them according to the integrity of his heart,

       And with the skillfulness of his hands he began leading them.

A melody of Asaph.

79 O God, the nations have come into your inheritance;

      They have defiled your holy temple;

      They have laid Jerusalem in a heap of ruins.

 2 They have given the dead body of your servants as food to the fowls of the heavens,

      The flesh of your loyal ones to the wild beasts of the earth.

 3 They have poured out their blood like water

      All around Jerusalem, and there is no one to do the burying.

 4 We have become a reproach to our neighbors,

      A derision and a jeering to those round about us.

 5 How long, O Jehovah, will you be incensed? Forever?

      How long will your ardor burn just like fire?

 6 Pour out your rage upon the nations that have not known you,

      And upon the kingdoms that have not called upon your own name.

 7 For they have eaten up Jacob,

      And they have caused his own abiding place to be desolated.

 8 Do not remember against us the errors of ancestors.

      Hurry! Let your mercies confront us,

      For we have become greatly impoverished.

 9 Help us, O God of our salvation,

      For the sake of the glory of your name;

      And deliver us and cover over our sins on account of your name.

10 Why should the nations say: “Where is their God?”

       Among the nations let there be known before our eyes

       The avenging of the blood of your servants that has been shed.

11 May the sighing of the prisoner come in even before you.

       According to the greatness of your arm preserve those appointed to death.

12 And repay to our neighbors seven times into their bosom

       Their reproach with which they have reproached you, O Jehovah.

13 As for us your people and the flock of your pasturage,

       We shall give thanks to you to time indefinite;

       From generation to generation we shall declare your praise.