Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

¹ For the music director, a psalm of the sons of Korah, a contemplative song.
² We have heard with our ears, O God
—our fathers have told us—
of a work You did in their days, in days of old.
³ With Your hand You displaced nations, but You planted them.
You afflicted peoples, and You drove them out.
⁴ For it was not by their own sword that they took possession of the land,
nor did their own arm save them.
But it was Your right hand, Your arm, and the light of Your face—
    for You favored them.
⁵ You are my King, O God—
command victories for Jacob!
⁶ Through You we push back our foes.
Through Your Name we trample those rising up against us.
⁷ For I do not trust in my bow,
nor can my sword save me.
⁸ For You saved us from our oppressors
and put to shame those who hated us.
⁹ In God we make our boast all day
and Your Name we praise forever. Selah
¹⁰ Yet You have spurned and humiliated us,
and no longer go out with our armies.
¹¹ You make us retreat before the enemy.
Those who hate us have plundered us.
¹² You gave us to be devoured like sheep^[a]
and have scattered us among the nations.
¹³ You are selling Your people cheaply—
not even getting a great price for them.
¹⁴ You made us a taunt for our neighbors,
a scorn and ridicule for those around us.
¹⁵ You have made us a byword among the nations,
head-wagging among the peoples.
¹⁶ All day my disgrace is before me,
and my face is covered with shame—
¹⁷ because of the sound of taunting and reviling
from the face of a vengeful enemy.
¹⁸ All this came upon us, though we did not forget You,
nor were we false to Your covenant.
¹⁹ Our heart did not turn back,
nor did our steps stray from Your path.
²⁰ Yet You crushed us in a place of jackals,
covered us with the shadow of death.
²¹ If we had forgotten the Name of our God
or stretched our hands to a foreign god,
²² would God not have discovered it?
For He knows the secrets of the heart.
²³ But for Your sake we are slain all day.
We are counted as sheep for slaughter.^[b]
24 Awake! Why do you sleep, my Lord?
Wake up! Do not cast us off forever.
²⁵ Why do You hide Your face
and forget our misery and oppression?
²⁶ For our soul sinks down to the dust.
Our belly cleaves to the earth.
²⁷ Arise, be our help,
and redeem us
for Your mercy’s sake.

6 Come, let us return to Adonai.
For He has torn, but He will heal us.
He has smitten, but He will bind us up.
² After two days He will revive us.
On the third day He will raise us up,
and we will live in His presence.^[a]
3 So let us know, let us strive to know Adonai.
Like dawn His going forth is certain.
He will come to us like the rain,
    like the latter rain watering the earth.

⁴ “O Ephraim, what shall I do for you?
O Judah, what will I do for you?
For your loyalty is like a morning cloud
    or like dew rising early, vanishing.
⁵ Therefore I cut them down by the prophets.
I slew them by the words of My mouth.
Now the judgments pronounced against you:
    light will go forth.
⁶ For I delight in loyalty^[b] and not sacrifice,
knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.
⁷ But like Adam, they transgressed a covenant.
There they dealt treacherously with Me.
⁸ Gilead is a city of evildoers,
tracked with bloody footprints.
⁹ Like marauding bands waiting for a man,
so a company of priests murders
    on the way toward Shechem.
For they have committed crime.
¹⁰ In the house of Israel
I have seen a horrible thing:
Ephraim’s prostitution is there,
Israel has become unclean.