Psalms 78:52-72

⁵²But he led forth his own people like sheep, And guided them like a flock in the wilderness.

⁵³He led them on safely, so that they feared not, While the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

⁵⁴He brought them to his own sacred border, Even to this mountain which his right hand had gained.

⁵⁵He cast out the nations before them, And divided their land by a measuring-line, as an inheritance, And caused the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.

⁵⁶Yet they tempted and provoked God, the Most High, And kept not his statutes;

⁵⁷Like their fathers they were faithless, and turned back; They turned aside, like a deceitful bow.

⁵⁸They provoked his anger by their high places, And stirred up his jealousy by their graven images.

⁵⁹God saw this, and was wroth, And greatly abhorred Israel;

⁶⁰So that he forsook the habitation at Shiloh, The tabernacle where he dwelt among men,

⁶¹And delivered his strength into captivity, And his glory into the hand of the enemy.

⁶²His own people he gave up to the sword, And was wroth with his own inheritance.

⁶³Fire consumed their young men, And their maidens did not bewail them.

⁶⁴Their priests fell by the sword, And their widows made no lamentation.

⁶⁵But at length the Lord awaked as from sleep, As a hero who had been overpowered by wine;

⁶⁶He smote his enemies, and drove them back, And covered them with everlasting disgrace.

⁶⁷Yet he rejected the tents of Joseph, And chose not the tribe of Ephraim;

⁶⁸But chose the tribe of Judah, The Mount Zion which he loved;

⁶⁹Where he built, like the heavens, his sanctuary; Like the earth, which he hath established for ever.

⁷⁰And he chose David, his servant, And took him from the sheepfolds;

⁷¹From tending the suckling ewes he brought him To feed Jacob his people, And Israel his inheritance.

⁷²He fed them with an upright heart, And guided them with skilful hands.