Chapter 78

  {An instruction. Of Asaph.} Give ear, O my people, to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth.  

  I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter riddles from of old,  

  Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us:  

  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.  

  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;  

  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,  

  And that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of ùGod, but observe his commandments;  

  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 ùGod.  

  The sons of Ephraim, armed bowmen, turned back in the day of battle.  

  They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law;  

  And forgot his doings, and his marvellous works which he had shewn them.  

  In the sight of their fathers had he done wonders, in the land of Egypt, the field of Zoan.  

  He clave the sea, and caused them to pass through; and made the waters to stand as a heap;  

  And he led them with a cloud in the daytime, and all the night with the light of fire.  

  He clave rocks in the wilderness, and gave [them] drink as out of the depths, abundantly;  

  And he brought streams out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers.  

  Yet they still went on sinning against him, provoking the Most High in the desert;  

  And they tempted ùGod in their heart, by asking meat for their lust;  

  And they spoke against God: they said, Is ùGod able to prepare a table in the wilderness?  

  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?  

  Therefore Jehovah heard, and was wroth; and fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger also went up against Israel:  

  Because they believed not in God, and confided not in his salvation;  

  Though he had commanded the clouds from above, and had opened the doors of the heavens,  

  And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them the corn of the heavens.  

  Man did eat the bread of the mighty; he sent them provision to the full.  

  He caused the east wind to rise in the heavens, and by his strength he brought the south wind;  

  And he rained flesh upon them as dust, and feathered fowl as the sand of the seas,  

  And he let it fall in the midst of their camp, round about their habitations:  

  And they did eat, and were well filled; for that they lusted after, he brought to them.  

  They were not alienated from their lust, their meat was yet in their mouths,  

  When the anger of God went up against them; and he slew the fattest of them, and smote down the chosen men of Israel.  

  For all this, they sinned still, and believed not in his marvellous works;  

  And he consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror.  

  When he slew them, then they sought him, and returned and sought early after ùGod;  

  And they remembered that God was their rock, and ùGod, the Most High, their redeemer.  

  But they flattered him with their mouth, and lied unto him with their tongue;  

  For their heart was not firm toward him, neither were they stedfast in his covenant.  

  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:  

  And he remembered that they were flesh, a breath that passeth away and cometh not again.  

  How oft did they provoke him in the wilderness, and grieve him in the desert!  

  And they turned again and tempted ùGod, and grieved the Holy One of Israel.  

  They remembered not his hand, the day when he delivered them from the oppressor,  

  How he set his signs in Egypt, and his miracles in the field of Zoan;  

  And turned their rivers into blood, and their streams, that they could not drink;  

  He sent dog-flies among them, which devoured them, and frogs, which destroyed them;  

  And he gave their increase unto the caterpillar, and their labour unto the locust;  

  He killed their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with hail-stones;  

  And he delivered up their cattle to the hail, and their flocks to thunderbolts.  

  He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, and indignation, and distress, -- a mission of angels of woes.  

  He made a way for his anger; he spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence;  

  And he smote all the firstborn in Egypt, the first-fruits of their vigour in the tents of Ham.  

  And he made his own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock;  

  And he led them safely, so that they were without fear; and the sea covered their enemies.  

  And he brought them to his holy border, this mountain, which his right hand purchased;  

  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.  

  But they tempted and provoked God, the Most High, and kept not his testimonies,  

  And they drew back and dealt treacherously like their fathers: they turned like a deceitful bow.  

  And they provoked him to anger with their high places, and moved him to jealousy with their graven images.  

  God heard, and was wroth, and greatly abhorred Israel:  

  And he forsook the tabernacle at Shiloh, the tent where he had dwelt among men,  

  And gave his strength into captivity, and his glory into the hand of the oppressor;  

  And delivered up his people unto the sword, and was very wroth with his inheritance:  

  The fire consumed their young men, and their maidens were not praised in [nuptial] song;  

  Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation.  

  Then the Lord awoke as one out of sleep, like a mighty man that shouteth aloud by reason of wine;  

  And he smote his adversaries in the hinder part, and put them to everlasting reproach.  

  And he rejected the tent of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of Ephraim,  

  But chose the tribe of Judah, the mount Zion which he loved;  

  And he built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which he hath founded for ever.  

  And he chose David his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds:  

  From following the suckling-ewes, he brought him to feed Jacob his people, and Israel his inheritance.  

  And he fed them according to the integrity of his heart, and led them by the skilfulness of his hands.