Psalm 78 - American Standard Version 2015 American Standard Version 2015
Psalm 78

¹ {\b Maschil of Asaph.}\par\par\tab Give ear, O my people, to my law:\par\tab Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

² I will open my mouth in a parable;\par\tab I will utter dark sayings of old,

³ Which we have heard and known,\par\tab And our fathers have told us.

⁴ We will not hide them from their children,\par\tab Telling to the generation to come the praises of Jehovah,\par\tab And his strength, and his wondrous works that he hath done.

⁵ For he established a testimony in Jacob,\par\tab And appointed a law in Israel,\par\tab Which he commanded our fathers,\par\tab That they should make them known to their children;

⁶ That the generation to come might know {\i them}, even the children that should be born;\par\tab Who should arise and tell {\i them} to their children,

⁷ That they might set their hope in God,\par\tab And not forget the works of God,\par\tab But keep his commandments,

⁸ And might not be as their fathers,\par\tab A stubborn and rebellious generation,\par\tab A generation that set not their heart aright,\par\tab And whose spirit was not stedfast with God.

⁹ The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows,\par\tab Turned back in the day of battle.

¹⁰ They kept not the covenant of God,\par\tab And refused to walk in his law;

¹¹ And they forgat his doings,\par\tab And his wondrous works that he had showed them.

¹² Marvellous things did he in the sight of their fathers,\par\tab In the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.

¹³ He clave the sea, and caused them to pass through;\par\tab And he made the waters to stand as a heap.

¹⁴ In the day-time also he led them with a cloud,\par\tab And all the night with a light of fire.

¹⁵ He clave rocks in the wilderness,\par\tab And gave them drink abundantly as out of the depths.

¹⁶ He brought streams also out of the rock,\par\tab And caused waters to run down like rivers.

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

¹⁸ And they tempted God in their heart\par\tab By asking food according to their desire.

¹⁹ Yea, they spake against God;\par\tab They said, Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?

²⁰ Behold, he smote the rock, so that waters gushed out,\par\tab And streams overflowed;\par\tab Can he give bread also?\par\tab Will he provide flesh for his people?

²¹ Therefore Jehovah heard, and was wroth;\par\tab And a fire was kindled against Jacob,\par\tab And anger also went up against Israel;

²² Because they believed not in God,\par\tab And trusted not in his salvation.

²³ Yet he commanded the skies above,\par\tab And opened the doors of heaven;

²⁴ And he rained down manna upon them to eat,\par\tab And gave them food from heaven.

²⁵ Man did eat the bread of the mighty:\par\tab He sent them food to the full.

²⁶ He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens;\par\tab And by his power he guided the south wind.

²⁷ He rained flesh also upon them as the dust,\par\tab And winged birds as the sand of the seas:

²⁸ And he let it fall in the midst of their camp,\par\tab Round about their habitations.

²⁹ So they did eat, and were well filled;\par\tab And he gave them their own desire.

³⁰ They were not estranged from that which they desired,\par\tab Their food was yet in their mouths,

³¹ When the anger of God went up against them,\par\tab And slew of the fattest of them,\par\tab And smote down the young men of Israel.

³² For all this they sinned still,\par\tab And believed not in his wondrous works.

³³ Therefore their days did he consume in vanity,\par\tab And their years in terror.

³⁴ When he slew them, then they inquired after him;\par\tab And they returned and sought God earnestly.

³⁵ And they remembered that God was their rock,\par\tab And the Most High God their redeemer.

³⁶ But they flattered him with their mouth,\par\tab And lied unto him with their tongue.

³⁷ For their heart was not right with him,\par\tab Neither were they faithful in his covenant.

³⁸ But he, being merciful, forgave {\i their} iniquity, and destroyed {\i them} not:\par\tab Yea, many a time turned he his anger away,\par\tab And did not stir up all his wrath.

³⁹ And he remembered that they were but flesh,\par\tab A wind that passeth away, and cometh not again.

⁴⁰ How oft did they rebel against him in the wilderness,\par\tab And grieve him in the desert!

⁴¹ And they turned again and tempted God,\par\tab And provoked the Holy One of Israel.

⁴² They remembered not his hand,\par\tab Nor the day when he redeemed them from the adversary;

⁴³ How he set his signs in Egypt,\par\tab And his wonders in the field of Zoan,

⁴⁴ And turned their rivers into blood,\par\tab And their streams, so that they could not drink.

⁴⁵ He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them;\par\tab And frogs, which destroyed them.

⁴⁶ He gave also their increase unto the caterpillar,\par\tab And their labor unto the locust.

⁴⁷ He destroyed their vines with hail,\par\tab And their sycomore-trees with frost.

⁴⁸ He gave over their cattle also to the hail,\par\tab And their flocks to hot thunderbolts.

⁴⁹ He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger,\par\tab Wrath, and indignation, and trouble,\par\tab A band of angels of evil.

⁵⁰ He made a path for his anger;\par\tab He spared not their soul from death,\par\tab But gave their life over to the pestilence,

⁵¹ And smote all the first-born in Egypt,\par\tab The chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.

⁵² But he led forth his own people like sheep,\par\tab And guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

⁵³ And he led them safely, so that they feared not;\par\tab But the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

⁵⁴ And he brought them to the border of his sanctuary,\par\tab To this mountain, which his right hand had gotten.

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

⁵⁶ Yet they tempted and rebelled against the Most High God,\par\tab And kept not his testimonies;

⁵⁷ But turned back, and dealt treacherously like their fathers:\par\tab They were turned aside like a deceitful bow.

⁵⁸ For they provoked him to anger with their high places,\par\tab And moved him to jealousy with their graven images.

⁵⁹ When God heard {\i this}, he was wroth,\par\tab And greatly abhorred Israel;

⁶⁰ So that he forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh,\par\tab The tent which he placed among men;

⁶¹ And delivered his strength into captivity,\par\tab And his glory into the adversary's hand.

⁶² He gave his people over also unto the sword,\par\tab And was wroth with his inheritance.

⁶³ Fire devoured their young men;\par\tab And their virgins had no marriage-song.

⁶⁴ Their priests fell by the sword;\par\tab And their widows made no lamentation.

⁶⁵ Then the Lord awaked as one out of sleep,\par\tab Like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine.

⁶⁶ And he smote his adversaries backward:\par\tab He put them to a perpetual reproach.

⁶⁷ Moreover he refused the tent of Joseph,\par\tab And chose not the tribe of Ephraim,

⁶⁸ But chose the tribe of Judah,\par\tab The mount Zion which he loved.

⁶⁹ And he built his sanctuary like the heights,\par\tab Like the earth which he hath established for ever.

⁷⁰ He chose David also his servant,\par\tab And took him from the sheepfolds:

⁷¹ From following the ewes that have their young he brought him,\par\tab 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,\par\tab And guided them by the skilfulness of his hands.\par