1: (An instruction. Of Asaph.) Give ear, O my people, to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth. 2: I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter riddles from of old, 3: Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us: 4: We will not hide [them] from their sons, shewing forth to the generation to come the praises of Jehovah, and his strength, and his marvellous works which he hath done. 5: For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children; 6: That the generation to come might know [them], the children that should be born; that they might rise up and tell [them] to their children, 7: And that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but observe his commandments; 8: And might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that prepared not their heart, and whose spirit was not stedfast with God. 9: The sons of Ephraim, armed bowmen, turned back in the day of battle. 10: They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law; 11: And forgot his doings, and his marvellous works which he had shewn them. 12: In the sight of their fathers had he done wonders, in the land of Egypt, the field of Zoan. 13: He clave the sea, and caused them to pass through; and made the waters to stand as a heap; 14: And he led them with a cloud in the daytime, and all the night with the light of fire. 15: He clave rocks in the wilderness, and gave [them] drink as out of the depths, abundantly; 16: And he brought streams out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers. 17: Yet they still went on sinning against him, provoking the Most High in the desert; 18: And they tempted God in their heart, by asking meat for their lust; 19: And they spoke against God: they said, Is God able to prepare a table in the wilderness? 20: Behold, he smote the rock, and waters gushed out, and streams overflowed; is he able to give bread also, or provide flesh for his people? 21: Therefore Jehovah heard, and was wroth; and fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger also went up against Israel: 22: Because they believed not in God, and confided not in his salvation; 23: Though he had commanded the clouds from above, and had opened the doors of the heavens, 24: And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them the corn of the heavens. 25: Man did eat the bread of the mighty; he sent them provision to the full. 26: He caused the east wind to rise in the heavens, and by his strength he brought the south wind; 27: And he rained flesh upon them as dust, and feathered fowl as the sand of the seas, 28: And he let it fall in the midst of their camp, round about their habitations: 29: And they did eat, and were well filled; for that they lusted after, he brought to them. 30: They were not alienated from their lust, their meat was yet in their mouths, 31: When the anger of God went up against them; and he slew the fattest of them, and smote down the chosen men of Israel. 32: For all this, they sinned still, and believed not in his marvellous works; 33: And he consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror. 34: When he slew them, then they sought him, and returned and sought early after God; 35: And they remembered that God was their rock, and God, the Most High, their redeemer. 36: But they flattered him with their mouth, and lied unto him with their tongue; 37: For their heart was not firm toward him, neither were they stedfast in his covenant. 38: But he was merciful: he forgave the iniquity, and destroyed [them] not; but many a time turned he his anger away, and did not stir up all his fury: 39: And he remembered that they were flesh, a breath that passeth away and cometh not again. 40: How oft did they provoke him in the wilderness, and grieve him in the desert! 41: And they turned again and tempted God, and grieved the Holy One of Israel. 42: They remembered not his hand, the day when he delivered them from the oppressor, 43: How he set his signs in Egypt, and his miracles in the field of Zoan; 44: And turned their rivers into blood, and their streams, that they could not drink; 45: He sent dog-flies among them, which devoured them, and frogs, which destroyed them; 46: And he gave their increase unto the caterpillar, and their labour unto the locust; 47: He killed their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with hail-stones; 48: And he delivered up their cattle to the hail, and their flocks to thunderbolts. 49: He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, and indignation, and distress, -- a mission of angels of woes. 50: He made a way for his anger; he spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence; 51: And he smote all the firstborn in Egypt, the first-fruits of their vigour in the tents of Ham. 52: And he made his own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock; 53: And he led them safely, so that they were without fear; and the sea covered their enemies. 54: And he brought them to his holy border, this mountain, which his right hand purchased; 55: And he drove out the nations before them, and allotted them for an inheritance by line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents. 56: But they tempted and provoked God, the Most High, and kept not his testimonies, 57: And they drew back and dealt treacherously like their fathers: they turned like a deceitful bow. 58: And they provoked him to anger with their high places, and moved him to jealousy with their graven images. 59: God heard, and was wroth, and greatly abhorred Israel: 60: And he forsook the tabernacle at Shiloh, the tent where he had dwelt among men, 61: And gave his strength into captivity, and his glory into the hand of the oppressor; 62: And delivered up his people unto the sword, and was very wroth with his inheritance: 63: The fire consumed their young men, and their maidens were not praised in [nuptial] song; 64: Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation. 65: Then the Lord awoke as one out of sleep, like a mighty man that shouteth aloud by reason of wine; 66: And he smote his adversaries in the hinder part, and put them to everlasting reproach. 67: And he rejected the tent of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of Ephraim, 68: But chose the tribe of Judah, the mount Zion which he loved; 69: And he built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which he hath founded for ever. 70: And he chose David his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds: 71: From following the suckling-ewes, he brought him to feed Jacob his people, and Israel his inheritance. 72: And he fed them according to the integrity of his heart, and led them by the skilfulness of his hands.
