A psalm for Asaph. How good is God to Israel, to them that are of a right heart!

But my feet were almost moved; my steps had well nigh slipped.

Because I had a zeal on occasion of the wicked, seeing the prosperity of sinners.

For there is no regard to their death, nor is there strength in their stripes.

They are not in the labour of men: neither shall they be scourged like other men.

Therefore pride hath held them fast: they are covered with their iniquity and their wickedness.

Their iniquity hath come forth, as it were from fatness: they have passed into the affection of the heart.

They have thought and spoken wickedness: they have spoken iniquity on high.

They have set their mouth against heaven: and their tongue hath passed through the earth.

Therefore will my people return here and full days shall be found in them.

And they said: How doth God know? and is there knowledge in the most High?

Behold these are sinners; and yet, abounding in the world they have obtained riches.

And I said: Then have I in vain justified my heart, and washed my hands among the innocent.

And I have been scourged all the day; and my chastisement hath been in the mornings.

If I said: I will speak thus; behold I should condemn the generation of thy children.

I studied that I might know this thing, it is a labour in my sight:

Until I go into the sanctuary of God, and understand concerning their last ends.

But indeed for deceits thou hast put it to them: when they were lifted up thou hast cast them down.

How are they brought to desolation? they have suddenly ceased to be: they have perished by reason of their iniquity.

As the dream of them that awake, O Lord; so in thy city thou shalt bring their image to nothing.

For my heart hath been inflamed, and my reins have been changed:

And I am brought to nothing, and I knew not.

I am become as a beast before thee: and I am always with thee.

Thou hast held me by my right hand; and by thy will thou hast conducted me, and with thy glory thou hast received me.

For what have I in heaven? and besides thee what do I desire upon earth?

For thee my flesh and my heart hath fainted away: thou art the God of my heart, and the God that is my portion for ever.

For behold they that go far from thee shall perish: thou hast destroyed all them that are disloyal to thee.

But it is good for me to adhere to my God, to put my hope in the Lord God: That I may declare all thy praises, in the gates of the daughter of Sion.

Unto the end, for Idithun, a psalm of Asaph.

I cried to the Lord with my voice; to God with my voice, and he gave ear to me.

In the day of my trouble I sought God, with my hands lifted up to him in the night, and I was not deceived. My soul refused to be comforted:

I remembered God, and was delighted, and was exercised, and my spirit swooned away.

My eyes prevented the watches: I was troubled, and I spoke not.

I thought upon the days of old: and I had in my mind the eternal years.

And I meditated in the night with my own heart: and I was exercised and I swept my spirit.

Will God then cast off for ever? or will he never be more favourable again?

Or will he cut off his mercy for ever, from generation to generation?

Or will God forget to shew mercy? or will he in his anger shut up his mercies?

And I said, Now have I begun: this is the change of the right hand of the most High.

I remembered the works of the Lord: for I will be mindful of thy wonders from the beginning.

And I will meditate on all thy works: and will be employed in thy inventions.

Thy way, O God, is in the holy place: who is the great God like our God?

Thou art the God that dost wonders. Thou hast made thy power known among the nations:

With thy arm thou hast redeemed thy people the children of Jacob and of Joseph.

The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee: and they were afraid, and the depths were troubled.

Great was the noise of the waters: the clouds sent out a sound. For thy arrows pass:

The voice of thy thunder in a wheel. Thy lightnings enlightened the world: the earth shook and trembled.

Thy way is in the sea, and thy paths in many waters: and thy footsteps shall not be known.

Thou hast conducted thy people like sheep, by the hand of Moses and Aaron.

Understanding for Asaph. Attend, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

I will open my mouth in parables: I will utter propositions from the beginning.

How great things have we heard and known, and our fathers have told us.

They have not been hidden from their children, in another generation. Declaring the praises of the Lord, and his powers, and his wonders which he hath done.

And he set up a testimony in Jacob: and made a law in Israel. How great things he commanded our fathers, that they should make the same known to their children:

That another generation might know them. The children that should be born and should rise up, and declare them to their children.

That they may put their hope in God and may not forget the works of God: and may seek his commandments.

That they may not become like their fathers, a perverse and exasperating generation. A generation that set not their heart aright: and whose spirit was not faithful to God.

The sons of Ephraim who bend and shoot with the bow: they have turned back in the day of battle.

They kept not the covenant of God: and in his law they would not walk.

And they forgot his benefits, and his wonders that he had shewn them.

Wonderful things did he do in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Tanis.

He divided the sea and brought them through: and he made the waters to stand as in a vessel.

And he conducted them with a cloud by day: and all the night with a light of fire.

He struck the rock in the wilderness: and gave them to drink, as out of the great deep.

He brought forth water out of the rock: and made streams run down as rivers.

And they added yet more sin against him: they provoked the most High to wrath in the place without water.

And they tempted God in their hearts, by asking meat for their desires.

And they spoke ill of God: they said: Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?

Because he struck the rock, and the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed. Can he also give bread, or provide a table for his people?

Therefore the Lord heard, and was angry: and a fire was kindled against Jacob, and wrath came up against Israel.

Because they believed not in God: and trusted not in his salvation.

And he had commanded the clouds from above, and had opened the doors of heaven.

And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them the bread of heaven.

Man ate the bread of angels: he sent them provisions in abundance.

He removed the south wind from heaven: and by his power brought in the south-west wind.

And he rained upon them flesh as dust: and feathered fowls like as the sand of the sea.

And they fell in the midst of their camp, round about their pavilions.

So they did eat, and were filled exceedingly, and he gave them their desire:

they were not defrauded of that which they craved. As yet their meat was in their mouth:

And the wrath of God came upon them. And he slew the fat ones amongst them, and brought down the chosen men of Israel.

In all these things they sinned still: and they believed not for his wondrous works.

And their days were consumed in vanity, and their years in haste.

When he slew them, then they sought him: and they returned, and came to him early in the morning.

And they remembered that God was their helper: and the most high God their redeemer.

And they loved him with their mouth: and with their tongue they lied unto him:

But their heart was not right with him: nor were they counted faithful in his covenant.

But he is merciful, and will forgive their sins: and will not destroy them. And many a time did he turn away his anger: and did not kindle all his wrath.

And he remembered that they are flesh: a wind that goeth and returneth not.

How often did they provoke him in the desert: and move him to wrath in the place without water?

And they turned back and tempted God: and grieved the holy one of Israel.

They remembered not his hand, in the day that he redeemed them from the hand of him that afflicted them:

How he wrought his signs in Egypt, and his wonders in the field of Tanis.

And he turned their rivers into blood, and their showers that they might not drink.

He sent amongst them divers sorts of flies, which devoured them: and frogs which destroyed them.

And he gave up their fruits to the blast, and their labours to the locust.

And he destroyed their vineyards with hail, and their mulberry trees with hoarfrost.

And he gave up their cattle to the hail, and their stock to the fire.

And he sent upon them the wrath of his indignation: indignation and wrath and trouble, which he sent by evil angels.

He made a way for a path to his anger: he spared not their souls from death, and their cattle he shut up in death.

And he killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt: the firstfruits of all their labour in the tabernacles of Cham.

And he took away his own people as sheep: and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

And he brought them out in hope and they feared not: and the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

And he brought them into the mountain of his sanctuary: the mountain which his right hand had purchased. And he cast out the Gentiles before them: and by lot divided to them their land by a line of distribution.

And he made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tabernacles.

Yet they tempted, and provoked the most high God: and they kept not his testimonies.

And they turned away, and kept not the covenant: even like their fathers they were turned aside as a crooked bow.

They provoked him to anger on their hills: and moved him to jealousy with their graven things.

God heard, and despised them, and he reduced Israel exceedingly as it were to nothing.

And he put away the tabernacle of Silo, his tabernacle where he dwelt among men.

And he delivered their strength into captivity: and their beauty into the hands of the enemy.

And he shut up his people under the sword: and he despised his inheritance.

Fire consumed their young men: and their maidens were not lamented.

Their priests fell by the sword: and their widows did not mourn.

And the Lord was awaked as one out of sleep, and like a mighty man that hath been surfeited with wine.

And he smote his enemies on the hinder parts: he put them to an everlasting reproach.

And he rejected the tabernacle of Joseph: and chose not the tribe of Ephraim:

But he chose the tribe of Juda, mount Sion which he loved.

And he built his sanctuary as of unicorns, in the land which he founded for ever.

And he chose his servant David, and took him from the flocks of sheep: he brought him from following the ewes great with young,

To feed Jacob his servant and Israel his inheritance.

And he fed them in the innocence of his heart: and conducted them by the skilfulness of his hands.

The sons of Levi were Gerson, Caath, and Merari.

The sons of Caath: Amram, Isaar, Hebron, and Oziel.

The children of Amram: Aaron, Moses, and Mary. The sons of Aaron: Nadab and Abiu, Eleazar and Ithamar.

Eleazar begot Phinees, and Phinees begot Abisue,

And Abisue begot Bocci, and Bocci begot Ozi.

Ozi begot Zaraias, and Zaraias begot Maraioth.

And Maraioth begot Amarias, and Amarias begot Achitob.

Achitob begot Sadoc, and Sadoc begot Achimaas.

Achimaas begot Azarias, Azarias begot Johanan,

Johanan begot Azarias. This is he that executed the priestly office in the house which Solomon built in Jerusalem.

And Azarias begot Amarias, and Amarias begot Achitob.

And Achitob begot Sadoc, and Sadoc begot Sellum,

Sellum begot Helcias, and Helcias begot Azarias,

Azarias begot Saraias, and Saraias begot Josedec.

Now Josedec went out, when the Lord carried away Juda, and Jerusalem, by the hands of Nabuchodonosor.

So the sons of Levi were Gerson, Caath, and Merari.

And these are the names of the sons of Gerson: Lobni and Semei.

The sons of Caath: Amram, and Isaar, and Hebron, and Oziel.

The sons of Merari: Moholi and Musi. And these are the kindreds of Levi according to their families.

Of Gerson: Lobni his son, Jahath his son, Zamma his son,

Joah his son, Addo his son, Zara his son, Jethrai his son.

The sons of Caath, Aminadab his son, Core his son, Asir his son,

Elcana his son, Abiasaph his son, Asir his son,

Thahath his son, Uriel his son, Ozias his son, Saul his son.

The sons of Elcana: Amasai, and Achimoth.

And Elcana. The sons of Elcana: Sophai his son, Nahath his son,

Eliab his son, Jeroham his son, Elcana his son.

The sons of Samuel: the firstborn Vasseni, and Abia.

And the sons of Merari, Moholi: Lobni his son, Semei his son, Oza his son,

Sammaa his son, Haggia his son, Asaia his son.

These are they, whom David set over the singing men of the house of the Lord, after that the ark was placed.

And they ministered before the tabernacle of the testimony, with singing, until Solomon built the house of the Lord in Jerusalem, and they stood according to their order in the ministry.

And these are they that stood with their sons, of the sons of Caath, Hemam a singer, the son of Joel, the son of Sammuel,

The son of Elcana, the son of Jeroham, the son of Eliel, the son of Thohu,

The son of Suph, the son of Elcana, the son of Mahath, the son of Amasai,

The son of Elcana, the son of Johel, the son of Azarias, the son of Sophonias,

The son of Thahath, the son of Asir, the son of Abiasaph, the son of Core,

The son of Isaar, the son of Caath, the son of Levi, the son of Israel.

And his brother Asaph, who stood on his right hand, Asaph the son of Barachias, the son of Samaa.

The son of Michael, the son of Basaia, the son of Melchia.

The son of Athanai, the son of Zara, the son of Adaia.

The son of Ethan, the son of Zamma, the son of Semei.

The son of Jeth, the son of Gerson, the son of Levi.

And the sons of Merari their brethren, on the left hand, Ethan the son of Cusi, the son of Abdi, the son of Meloch,

The son of Hasabia, the son of Amasai, the son of Helcias,

The son of Amasai, the son of Boni, the son of Somer,

The son of Moholi, the son of Musi, the son of Merari, the son of Levi.

Their brethren also the Levites, who were appointed for all the ministry of the tabernacle of the house of the Lord.

But Aaron and his sons offered burnt offerings upon the altar of holocausts, and upon the altar of incense, for every work of the holy of holies: and to pray for Israel according to all that Moses the servant of God had commanded.

And these are the sons of Aaron: Eleazar his son, Phinees his son, Abisue his son,

Bocci his son, Ozi his son, Zarahia his son,

Meraioth his son, Amarias his son, Achitob his son,

Sadoc his son, Achimaas his son.

And these are their dwelling places by the towns and confines, to wit, of the sons of Aaron, of the families of the Caathites: for they fell to them by lot.

And they gave them Hebron in the land of Juda, and the suburbs thereof round about:

But the fields of the city, and the villages to Caleb son of Jephone.

And to the sons of Aaron they gave the cities for refuge Hebron, and Lobna, and the suburbs thereof,

And Jether and Esthemo, with their suburbs, and Helon, and Dabir with their suburbs:

Asan also, and Bethsames, with their suburbs.

And out of the tribe of Benjamin: Gabee and its suburbs, Almath with its suburbs, Anathoth also with its suburbs: all their cities throughout their families were thirteen.

And to the sons of Caath that remained of their kindred they gave out of the half tribe of Manasses ten cities in possession.

And to the sons of Gerson by their families out of the tribe of Issachar, and out of the tribe of Aser, and out of the tribe of Nephtali, and out of the tribe of Manasses in Basan, thirteen cities.

And to the sons of Merari by their families out of the tribe of Ruben, and out of the tribe of Gad, and out of the tribe of Zabulon, they gave by lot twelve cities.

And the children of Israel gave to the Levites the cities, and their suburbs.

And they gave them by lot, out of the tribe of the sons of Juda, and out of the tribe of the sons of Simeon, and out of the tribe of the sons of Benjamin, these cities which they called by their names.

And to them that were of the kindred of the sons of Caath, and the cities in their borders were of the tribe of Ephraim.

And they gave the cities of refuge Sichem with its suburbs in mount Ephraim, and Gazer with its suburbs,

Jecmaan also with its suburbs, and Beth-horon in like manner,

Helon also with its suburbs, and Gethremmon in like manner,

And out of the half tribe of Manasses, Aner and its suburbs, Baalam and its suburbs, to wit, to them that were left of the family of the sons of Caath.

And to the sons of Gersom, out of the kindred of the half tribe of Manasses, Gaulon, in Basan, and its suburbs, and Astharoth with its suburbs.

Out of the tribe of Issachar, Cedes and its suburbs, and Dabereth with its suburbs;

Ramoth also and its suburbs, and Anem with its suburbs.

And out of the tribe of Aser: Masal with its suburbs, and Abdon in like manner;

Hucac also and its suburbs, and Rohol with its suburbs.

And out of the tribe of Nephtali, Cedes in Galilee and its suburbs, Hamon with its suburbs, and Cariathaim, and its suburbs.

And to the sons of Merari that remained: out of the tribe of Zabulon, Remmono and its suburbs, and Thabor with its suburbs.

Beyond the Jordan also over against Jericho, on the east side of the Jordan, out of the tribe of Ruben, Bosor in the wilderness with its suburbs, and Jassa with its suburbs;

Cademoth also and its suburbs, and Mephaath with its suburbs;

Moreover also out of the tribe of Gad, Ramoth in Galaad and its suburbs, and Manaim with its suburbs;

Hesebon also with its suburbs, and Jazer with its suburbs.