Psalms 74 / 150
- 1
(Arise, O God, Defend Your Cause)A Maskil of Asaph.
O God, why do you cast us off forever?
Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?
- 2
Remember your congregation, which you have purchased of old,
which you have redeemed to be the tribe of your heritage!
Remember Mount Zion, where you have dwelt.
- 3
Direct your steps to the perpetual ruins;
the enemy has destroyed everything in the sanctuary!
- 4
Your foes have roared in the midst of your meeting place;
they set up their own signs for signs.
- 5
They were like those who swing axes
in a forest of trees.
- 6
And all its carved wood
they broke down with hatchets and hammers.
- 7
They set your sanctuary on fire;
they profaned the dwelling place of your name,
bringing it down to the ground.
- 8
They said to themselves, "We will utterly subdue them";
they burned all the meeting places of God in the land.
- 9
We do not see our signs;
there is no longer any prophet,
and there is none among us who knows how long.
- 10
How long, O God, is the foe to scoff?
Is the enemy to revile your name forever?
- 11
Why do you hold back your hand, your right hand?
Take it from the fold of your garment and destroy them!
- 12
Yet God my King is from of old,
working salvation in the midst of the earth.
- 13
You divided the sea by your might;
you broke the heads of the sea monsters on the waters.
- 14
You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
- 15
You split open springs and brooks;
you dried up ever-flowing streams.
- 16
Yours is the day, yours also the night;
you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.
- 17
You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth;
you have made summer and winter.
- 18
Remember this, O Lord, how the enemy scoffs,
and a foolish people reviles your name.
- 19
Do not deliver the soul of your dove to the wild beasts;
do not forget the life of your poor forever.
- 20
Have regard for the covenant,
for the dark places of the land are full of the habitations of violence.
- 21
Let not the downtrodden turn back in shame;
let the poor and needy praise your name.
- 22
Arise, O God, defend your cause;
remember how the foolish scoff at you all the day!
- 23
Do not forget the clamor of your foes,
the uproar of those who rise against you, which goes up continually!