Psalm 88:1-18

A song, a melody of the sons of Koʹrah. To the director over Maʹha·lath* for making responses. Masʹkil* of Heʹman+ the Ezʹra·hite. 88  O Jehovah, the God of my salvation,+By day I have cried out,+In the night [also] in front of you.+   Before you my prayer will come.+Incline your ear to my entreating cry.+   For my soul has had enough of calamities,+And my very life has come in touch even with Sheʹol.*+   I have been reckoned in among those going down to the pit;+I have become like an able-bodied man without strength,+   Set free among the dead themselves,+Like slain ones lying in the burial place,+Whom you have remembered no longerAnd who have been severed from your own [helping] hand.+   You have put me in a pit of the lowest depths,In dark places, in a large abyss.*+   Upon me your rage has thrown itself,+And with all your breaking waves you have afflicted [me].+ Seʹlah.   You have put my acquaintances far away from me;+You have set me as something very detestable to them.+I am under restraint and cannot go forth.+   My own eye has languished because of my affliction.+I have called on you, O Jehovah, all day long;+To you I have spread out my palms.+ 10  For those who are dead will you do a marvel?+Or will those impotent in death* themselves arise,+Will they laud you?+ Seʹlah. 11  Will your loving-kindness be declared in the burial place* itself,Your faithfulness in [the place of] destruction?*+ 12  Will a marvel by you be known in the darkness itself,+Or your righteousness in the land of oblivion?+ 13  And yet to you, O Jehovah, I myself have cried for help,+And in the morning my own prayer keeps confronting you.+ 14  Why is it, O Jehovah, that you cast off my soul?+Why do you keep your face concealed from me?+ 15  I am afflicted and about to expire from boyhood on;+I have borne frightful things from you very much.*+ 16  Over me your flashes of burning anger have passed;+Terrors from you yourself have brought me to silence.+ 17  They have surrounded me like waters all day long;+They have closed in upon me all at one time. 18  You have put far away from me friend and companion;+My acquaintances are a dark place.+

Footnotes

See 53:Sup ftn, “Mahalath.”
See 32:Sup ftn.
“With Sheol.” Heb., lish·ʼohlʹ; Gr., haiʹdei; Lat., in·ferʹno. See App 4B.
Lit., “abysses,” pl., likely to denote grandioseness.
“Those impotent in death.” Heb., repha·ʼimʹ; T, “bodies dissolved in the dust”; LXXVg, “healers (medical doctors)”; Sy, “mighty ones (giants).” Compare Job 26:5 ftn.
“The grave,” LXX; Vg, “sepulcher.”
“In [the place of] destruction.” Heb., ba·ʼavad·dohnʹ; Syr., baʼv·da·naʼ; LXX, “in destruction”; Lat., in per·di·ti·oʹne, “in perdition.” See Job 26:6 ftn.
“Very much.” Heb., ʼa·phuʹnah, of uncertain meaning; LXXSyVg, “I am embarrassed (confused).”