Chapter 78

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