Why Should I Fear in Times of Trouble?

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah.

¹Hear this, all peoples!

Give ear, all inhabitants of the world,

²both low and high,

rich and poor together!

³My mouth shall speak wisdom;

the meditation of my heart shall be understanding.

⁴I will incline my ear to a proverb;

I will solve my riddle to the music of the lyre.

⁵Why should I fear in times of trouble,

when the iniquity of those who cheat me surrounds me,

⁶those who trust in their wealth

and boast of the abundance of their riches?

⁷Truly no man can ransom another,

or give to God the price of his life,

⁸for the ransom of their life is costly

and can never suffice,

⁹that he should live on forever

and never see the pit.

¹⁰For he sees that even the wise die;

the fool and the stupid alike must perish

and leave their wealth to others.

¹¹Their graves are their homes forever,1

their dwelling places to all generations,

though they called lands by their own names.

¹²Man in his pomp will not remain;

he is like the beasts that perish.

¹³This is the path of those who have foolish confidence;

yet after them people approve of their boasts.2 Selah

¹⁴Like sheep they are appointed for Sheol;

death shall be their shepherd,

and the upright shall rule over them in the morning.

Their form shall be consumed in Sheol, with no place to dwell.

¹⁵But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol,

for he will receive me. Selah

¹⁶Be not afraid when a man becomes rich,

when the glory of his house increases.

¹⁷For when he dies he will carry nothing away;

his glory will not go down after him.

¹⁸For though, while he lives, he counts himself blessed

—and though you get praise when you do well for yourself—

¹⁹his soul will go to the generation of his fathers,

who will never again see light.

²⁰Man in his pomp yet without understanding is like the beasts that perish.