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78:1  A maskil of Asaph. My people, hear my teaching; listen to the words of my mouth.
78:2  I will open my mouth with a parable; I will utter hidden things, things from of old –
78:3  things we have heard and known, things our ancestors have told us.
78:4  We will not hide them from their descendants; we will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done.
78:5  He decreed statutes for Jacob and established the law in Israel, which he commanded our ancestors to teach their children,
78:6  so that the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children.
78:7  Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds but would keep his commands.
78:8  They would not be like their ancestors – a stubborn and rebellious generation, whose hearts were not loyal to God, whose spirits were not faithful to him.
78:9  The men of Ephraim, though armed with bows, turned back on the day of battle;
78:10  they did not keep God’s covenant and refused to live by his law.
78:11  They forgot what he had done, the wonders he had shown them.
78:12  He did miracles in the sight of their ancestors in the land of Egypt, in the region of Zoan.
78:13  He divided the sea and led them through; he made the water stand up like a wall.
78:14  He guided them with the cloud by day and with light from the fire all night.
78:15  He split the rocks in the wilderness and gave them water as abundant as the seas;
78:16  he brought streams out of a rocky crag and made water flow down like rivers.
78:17  But they continued to sin against him, rebelling in the wilderness against the Most High.
78:18  They wilfully put God to the test by demanding the food they craved.
78:19  They spoke against God; they said, ‘Can God really spread a table in the wilderness?
78:20  True, he struck the rock, and water gushed out, streams flowed abundantly, but can he also give us bread? Can he supply meat for his people?’
78:21  When the Lord heard them, he was furious; his fire broke out against Jacob, and his wrath rose against Israel,
78:22  for they did not believe in God or trust in his deliverance.
78:23  Yet he gave a command to the skies above and opened the doors of the heavens;
78:24  he rained down manna for the people to eat, he gave them the grain of heaven.
78:25  Human beings ate the bread of angels; he sent them all the food they could eat.
78:26  He let loose the east wind from the heavens and by his power made the south wind blow.
78:27  He rained meat down on them like dust, birds like sand on the seashore.
78:28  He made them come down inside their camp, all around their tents.
78:29  They ate till they were gorged – he had given them what they craved.
78:30  But before they turned from what they craved, even while the food was still in their mouths,
78:31  God’s anger rose against them; he put to death the sturdiest among them, cutting down the young men of Israel.
78:32  In spite of all this, they kept on sinning; in spite of his wonders, they did not believe.
78:33  So he ended their days in futility and their years in terror.
78:34  Whenever God slew them, they would seek him; they eagerly turned to him again.
78:35  They remembered that God was their Rock, that God Most High was their Redeemer.
78:36  But then they would flatter him with their mouths, lying to him with their tongues;
78:37  their hearts were not loyal to him, they were not faithful to his covenant.
78:38  Yet he was merciful; he forgave their iniquities and did not destroy them. Time after time he restrained his anger and did not stir up his full wrath.
78:39  He remembered that they were but flesh, a passing breeze that does not return.
78:40  How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the wasteland!
78:41  Again and again they put God to the test; they vexed the Holy One of Israel.
78:42  They did not remember his power – the day he redeemed them from the oppressor,
78:43  the day he displayed his signs in Egypt, his wonders in the region of Zoan.
78:44  He turned their river into blood; they could not drink from their streams.
78:45  He sent swarms of flies that devoured them, and frogs that devastated them.
78:46  He gave their crops to the grasshopper, their produce to the locust.
78:47  He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamore-figs with sleet.
78:48  He gave over their cattle to the hail, their livestock to bolts of lightning.
78:49  He unleashed against them his hot anger, his wrath, indignation and hostility – a band of destroying angels.
78:50  He prepared a path for his anger; he did not spare them from death but gave them over to the plague.
78:51  He struck down all the firstborn of Egypt, the firstfruits of manhood in the tents of Ham.
78:52  But he brought his people out like a flock; he led them like sheep through the wilderness.
78:53  He guided them safely, so they were unafraid; but the sea engulfed their enemies.
78:54  And so he brought them to the border of his holy land, to the hill country his right hand had taken.
78:55  He drove out nations before them and allotted their lands to them as an inheritance; he settled the tribes of Israel in their homes.
78:56  But they put God to the test and rebelled against the Most High; they did not keep his statutes.
78:57  Like their ancestors they were disloyal and faithless, as unreliable as a faulty bow.
78:58  They angered him with their high places; they aroused his jealousy with their idols.
78:59  When God heard them, he was furious; he rejected Israel completely.
78:60  He abandoned the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent he had set up among humans.
78:61  He sent the ark of his might into captivity, his splendour into the hands of the enemy.
78:62  He gave his people over to the sword; he was furious with his inheritance.
78:63  Fire consumed their young men, and their young women had no wedding songs;
78:64  their priests were put to the sword, and their widows could not weep.
78:65  Then the Lord awoke as from sleep, as a warrior wakes from the stupor of wine.
78:66  He beat back his enemies; he put them to everlasting shame.
78:67  Then he rejected the tents of Joseph, he did not choose the tribe of Ephraim;
78:68  but he chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion, which he loved.
78:69  He built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth that he established for ever.
78:70  He chose David his servant and took him from the sheepfolds;
78:71  from tending the sheep he brought him to be the shepherd of his people Jacob, of Israel his inheritance.
78:72  And David shepherded them with integrity of heart; with skilful hands he led them.