Arise, O God, Defend Your Cause

A Maskil1 of rAsaph.

¹O God, why do you scast us off forever?

Why does your anger tsmoke against uthe sheep of your pasture?

²vRemember your congregation, which you have wpurchased of old,

which you have xredeemed to be ythe tribe of your heritage!

Remember Mount Zion, zwhere you have dwelt.

³Direct your steps to athe perpetual ruins;

the enemy has destroyed everything in the sanctuary!

⁴Your foes have broared in the midst of your meeting place;

cthey set up their down signs for esigns.

⁵They were like those who swing faxes

in a forest of trees.2

⁶And all its gcarved wood

they broke down with hatchets and hammers.

⁷They hset your sanctuary on fire;

they iprofaned jthe dwelling place of your name,

bringing it down to the ground.

⁸They ksaid to themselves, “We will utterly subdue them”;

they burned all the meeting places of God in the land.

⁹We do not see our lsigns;

mthere is no longer any prophet,

and there is none among us who knows how long.

¹⁰How long, O God, nis the foe to scoff?

Is the enemy to revile your name forever?

¹¹Why odo you hold back your hand, your right hand?

Take it from the fold of your garment3 and destroy them!

¹²Yet pGod my King is from of old,

working salvation in the midst of the earth.

¹³You qdivided the sea by your might;

you rbroke the heads of sthe sea monsters4 on the waters.

¹⁴You crushed the heads of tLeviathan;

you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.

¹⁵You usplit open springs and brooks;

you vdried up ever-flowing streams.

¹⁶Yours is the day, yours also the night;

you have established wthe heavenly lights and the sun.

¹⁷You have xfixed all the boundaries of the earth;

you have made ysummer and winter.

¹⁸zRemember this, O Lord, how the enemy scoffs,

and aa foolish people reviles your name.

¹⁹Do not deliver the soul of your bdove to the wild beasts;

cdo not forget the life of your poor forever.

²⁰Have regard for dthe covenant,

for ethe dark places of the land are full of the habitations of violence.

²¹Let not fthe downtrodden gturn back in shame;

let hthe poor and needy praise your name.

²²Arise, O God, idefend your cause;

jremember how the foolish scoff at you all the day!

²³Do not forget the clamor of your foes,

kthe uproar of those who rise against you, which goes up continually!