Psalm 78

A contemplation by Asaph.

¹ Hear my teaching, my people. Turn your ears to the words of my mouth.

² I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings of old,

³ which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.

⁴ We will not hide them from their children, telling to the generation to come the praises of Yahweh, his strength, and his wondrous deeds that he has done.

⁵ For he established a covenant in Jacob, and appointed a teaching in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children;

⁶ that the generation to come might know, even the children who should be born; who should arise and tell their children,

⁷ that they might set their hope in God, and not forget God’s deeds, but keep his commandments,

⁸ and might not be as their fathers— a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that didn’t make their hearts loyal, whose spirit was not steadfast with God.

⁹ The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle.

¹⁰ They didn’t keep God’s covenant, and refused to walk in his law.

¹¹ They forgot his doings, his wondrous deeds that he had shown them.

¹² He did marvelous things in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.

¹³ He split the sea, and caused them to pass through. He made the waters stand as a heap.

¹⁴ In the daytime he also led them with a cloud, and all night with a light of fire.

¹⁵ He split rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink abundantly as out of the depths.

¹⁶ He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers.

¹⁷ Yet they still went on to sin against him, to rebel against the Most High in the desert.

¹⁸ They tempted God in their heart by asking food according to their desire.

¹⁹ Yes, they spoke against God. They said, “Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?

²⁰ Behold, he struck the rock, so that waters gushed out, and streams overflowed. Can he give bread also? Will he provide meat for his people?”

²¹ Therefore Yahweh heard, and was angry. A fire was kindled against Jacob, anger also went up against Israel,

²² because they didn’t believe in God, and didn’t trust in his salvation.

²³ Yet he commanded the skies above, and opened the doors of heaven.

²⁴ He rained down manna on them to eat, and gave them food from the sky.

²⁵ Man ate the bread of angels. He sent them food to the full.

²⁶ He caused the east wind to blow in the sky. By his power he guided the south wind.

²⁷ He also rained meat on them as the dust, winged birds as the sand of the seas.

²⁸ He let them fall in the middle of their camp, around their habitations.

²⁹ So they ate, and were well filled. He gave them their own desire.

³⁰ They didn’t turn from their cravings. Their food was yet in their mouths,

³¹ when the anger of God went up against them, killed some of their strongest, and struck down the young men of Israel.

³² For all this they still sinned, and didn’t believe in his wondrous works.

³³ Therefore he consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror.

³⁴ When he killed them, then they inquired after him. They returned and sought God earnestly.

³⁵ They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God, their redeemer.

³⁶ But they flattered him with their mouth, and lied to him with their tongue.

³⁷ For their heart was not right with him, neither were they faithful in his covenant.

³⁸ But he, being merciful, forgave iniquity, and didn’t destroy them. Yes, many times he turned his anger away, and didn’t stir up all his wrath.

³⁹ He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes away, and doesn’t come again.

⁴⁰ How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness, and grieved him in the desert!

⁴¹ They turned again and tempted God, and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

⁴² They didn’t remember his hand, nor the day when he redeemed them from the adversary;

⁴³ how he set his signs in Egypt, his wonders in the field of Zoan,

⁴⁴ he turned their rivers into blood, and their streams, so that they could not drink.

⁴⁵ He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them; and frogs, which destroyed them.

⁴⁶ He also gave their increase to the caterpillar, and their labor to the locust.

⁴⁷ He destroyed their vines with hail, their sycamore fig trees with frost.

⁴⁸ He also gave over their livestock to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.

⁴⁹ He threw on them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, indignation, and trouble, and a band of angels of evil.

⁵⁰ He made a path for his anger. He didn’t spare their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence,

⁵¹ and struck all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.

⁵² But he led out his own people like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

⁵³ He led them safely, so that they weren’t afraid, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

⁵⁴ He brought them to the border of his sanctuary, to this mountain, which his right hand had taken.

⁵⁵ He also drove out the nations before them, allotted them for an inheritance by line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.

⁵⁶ Yet they tempted and rebelled against the Most High God, and didn’t keep his testimonies,

⁵⁷ but turned back, and dealt treacherously like their fathers. They were twisted like a deceitful bow.

⁵⁸ For they provoked him to anger with their high places, and moved him to jealousy with their engraved images.

⁵⁹ When God heard this, he was angry, and greatly abhorred Israel,

⁶⁰ so that he abandoned the tent of Shiloh, the tent which he placed among men,

⁶¹ and delivered his strength into captivity, his glory into the adversary’s hand.

⁶² He also gave his people over to the sword, and was angry with his inheritance.

⁶³ Fire devoured their young men. Their virgins had no wedding song.

⁶⁴ Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows couldn’t weep.

⁶⁵ Then the Lord awakened as one out of sleep, like a mighty man who shouts by reason of wine.

⁶⁶ He struck his adversaries backward. He put them to a perpetual reproach.

⁶⁷ Moreover he rejected the tent of Joseph, and didn’t choose the tribe of Ephraim,

⁶⁸ But chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which he loved.

⁶⁹ He built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which he has established forever.

⁷⁰ He also chose David his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds;

⁷¹ from following the ewes that have their young, he brought him to be the shepherd of Jacob, his people, and Israel, his inheritance.

⁷² So he was their shepherd according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.