Psalm 44:1-26
(Of the Director; of the sons of Korah; meditative.)
44 God, we have heard with our ears,our fathers have told us the story,Of work you did in their days,in the days of old.
2 You with your own hand dispossessed nations and planted them, broke down many a folk and gave them free play.
3 For it was not by their swords that they got possession of a country,nor was it their arm that saved them,But your right hand and your armand the light of your face because you took them into favor.
4 You are my king, my God,the ordainer of Jacob’s salvations,
5 By you we gore our foes,by your name we tread down our adversaries;
6 For not in my bow will I put confidence,and my sword shall not save me,
7 But you have saved us from our foesand disappointed those who hated us.
8 Of God we boast all dayand thankfully acknowledge your name forever. (Selah)
9 And you have repudiated and humiliated us,you do not go out on our campaigns,
10 You turn us back from a foe,and our haters have their pillaging.
11 You make us like sheep to be eatenand you have scattered us among the nations.
12 You sell your people for no great richesand do not charge a high price for them.
13 You make us the butt of our neighbors’ taunts,of the quips and gibes of those who live around us;
14 You make us a byword among the nations,a thing that they shake their heads at in every folk.
15 All day I face my humiliationand the consciousness of shame covers me
16 At the voices of taunter and vituperator,at the faces of enemy and avenger.
17 All this has come to us, and we have not forgotten younor been false to your covenant,
18 Our hearts have not shrunk backnor our steps swerved from your path,
19 That you have felled us in a place of jackalsand covered us over with gloom.
20 If we had forgotten the name of our Godand spread out our hands to a strange God,
21 Would not God look into this?for he knows the secrets of hearts.
22 But it is on your account we have been killed all day,thought of like slaughtering sheep.
23 Rouse up! why are you sleeping, Lord?wake up! do not repudiate us permanently!
24 Why do you veil your face,forget our wretched and oppressed condition?
25 For our souls are down to the earth,our bodies flattened on the ground.
26 Stand up for our help,and redeem us for your friendship’s sake!
