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78:1  Give ear, O my people, to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
78:2  I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old,
78:3  which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.
78:4  We will not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and His strength, and His wonderful works that He hath done.
78:5  For He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded to our fathers, that they should make them known to their children;
78:6  that the generation to come might know them, even the children who should be born, who should arise and declare them to their children,
78:7  that they might set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments;
78:8  and so might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not steadfast with God.
78:9  The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle.
78:10  They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in His law;
78:11  they forgot His works and His wonders that He had shown them.
78:12  Marvelous things did He in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.
78:13  He divided the sea and caused them to pass through; and He made the waters to stand as a heap.
78:14  In the daytime also He led them with a cloud, and all the night with a light of fire.
78:15  He cleaved the rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink as out of the great depths.
78:16  He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers.
78:17  And they sinned yet more against Him by provoking the Most High in the wilderness.
78:18  And they tempted God in their heart by asking for meat for their lust.
78:19  Yea, they spoke against God: they said, “Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?
78:20  Behold, He smote the rock, that the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed. Can He give bread also? Can He provide flesh for His people?”
78:21  Therefore the Lord heard this and was wroth; so a fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger also rose up against Israel,
78:22  because they believed not in God and trusted not in His salvation,
78:23  though He had commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven,
78:24  and had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven.
78:25  Man ate angels’ food; He sent them meat to the full.
78:26  He caused an east wind to blow in the heaven, and by His power He brought in the south wind.
78:27  He rained flesh also upon them as dust, and feathered fowls as the sand of the sea.
78:28  And He let it fall in the midst of their camp, round about their habitations.
78:29  So they ate and were well filled, for He gave them their own desire.
78:30  But they were not estranged from their lust; but while their meat was yet in their mouths,
78:31  the wrath of God came upon them and slew the fattest of them, and smote down the chosen men of Israel.
78:32  For all this, they sinned still and believed not in His wondrous works.
78:33  Therefore their days did He consume in vanity, and their years in trouble.
78:34  When He slew them, then they sought Him; and they returned and inquired early after God.
78:35  And they remembered that God was their rock, and the high God, their redeemer.
78:36  Nevertheless they flattered Him with their mouth, and they lied unto Him with their tongues.
78:37  For their heart was not right with Him, neither were they steadfast in His covenant.
78:38  But He, being full of compassion, forgave their iniquity and destroyed them not. Yea, many a time turned He His anger away, and did not stir up all His wrath;
78:39  for He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passeth away and cometh not again.
78:40  How oft did they provoke Him in the wilderness, and grieve Him in the desert!
78:41  Yea, they turned back and tested God, and limited the Holy One of Israel.
78:42  They remembered not His hand, nor the day when He delivered them from the enemy,
78:43  how He had wrought His signs in Egypt and His wonders in the field of Zoan,
78:44  and had turned their rivers into blood, and their streams, that they could not drink.
78:45  He sent divers sorts of flies among them which devoured them, and frogs which destroyed them.
78:46  He gave also their harvest unto the caterpillar, and their labor unto the locust.
78:47  He destroyed their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with frost.
78:48  He gave up their cattle also to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.
78:49  He cast upon them the fierceness of His anger, wrath, indignation, and trouble, by sending evil angels among them.
78:50  He made a path to His anger; He spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence,
78:51  and smote all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tabernacles of Ham.
78:52  But He made His own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
78:53  And He led them on safely, so that they feared not; but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
78:54  And He brought them to the border of His sanctuary, even to this mountain, which His right hand had purchased.
78:55  He cast out the heathen also before them, and apportioned them an inheritance by line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.
78:56  Yet they tested and provoked the Most High God and kept not His testimonies,
78:57  but turned back and dealt unfaithfully like their fathers; they were turned aside like a deceitful bow.
78:58  For they provoked Him to anger with their high places, and loved Him to jealousy with their graven images.
78:59  When God heard this, He was wroth and greatly abhorred Israel,
78:60  so that He forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent which He had placed among men,
78:61  and delivered His strength into captivity, and His glory into the enemy’s hand.
78:62  He gave His people over also unto the sword, and was wroth with His inheritance.
78:63  The fire consumed their young men, and their maidens were not given to marriage.
78:64  Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation.
78:65  Then the Lord awakened as one out of sleep, like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine.
78:66  And He smote His enemies in the hinder parts, and laid upon them a perpetual reproach.
78:67  Moreover He refused the tabernacle of Joseph and chose not the tribe of Ephraim,
78:68  but chose the tribe of Judah, the Mount Zion which He loved.
78:69  And He built His sanctuary like high palaces, like the earth which He hath established for ever.
78:70  He also chose David His servant, and took him from the sheepfolds;
78:71  from following the ewes great with young He brought him to feed Jacob His people, and Israel His inheritance.
78:72  So he fed them according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.