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¹ O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, the work which thou wroughtest in their days, in the days of old. ² Thine hand utterly destroyed the heathen, and thou didst plant them: thou didst afflict the nations, and cast them out. ³ For they inherited not the land by their own sword, and their own arm did not deliver them; but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou wert well pleased in them. ⁴ Thou art indeed my King and my God, who commandest deliverances for Jacob. ⁵ In thee will we push down our enemies, and in thy name will we bring to nought them that rise up against us. ⁶ For I will not trust in my bow, and my sword shall not save me. ⁷ For thou hast saved us from them that afflicted us, and hast put to shame them that hated us. ⁸ In God will we make our boast all the day, and to thy name will we give thanks for ever. Pause.

⁹ But now thou hast cast off, and put us to shame; and thou wilt not go forth with our hosts. ¹⁰ Thou hast turned us back before our enemies; and they that hated us spoiled for themselves. ¹¹ Thou madest us as sheep for meat; and thou scatteredst us among the nations. ¹² Thou hast sold thy people without price, and there was no profit by their exchange. ¹³ Thou hast made us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and derision them that are round about us. ¹⁴ Thou hast made us a proverb among the Gentiles, a shaking of the head among the nations. ¹⁵ All the day my shame is before me, and the confusion of my face has covered me, ¹⁶ because of the voice of the slanderer and reviler; because of the enemy and avenger.

¹⁷ All these things are come upon us: but we have not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt unrighteously in thy covenant. ¹⁸ And our heart has not gone back; but thou hast turned aside our paths from thy way. ¹⁹ For thou hast laid us low in a place of affliction, and the shadow of death has covered us. ²⁰ If we have forgotten the name of our God, and if we have spread out our hands to a strange god; shall not God search these things out? ²¹ for he knows the secrets of the heart. ²² For, for thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep for slaughter. ²³ Awake, wherefore sleepest thou, O Lord? arise, and do not cast us off for ever. ²⁴ Wherefore turnest thou thy face away, and forgettest our poverty and our affliction? ²⁵ For our soul has been brought down to the dust; our belly has cleaved to the earth. ²⁶ Arise, O Lord, help us, and redeem us for thy name’s sake.