- My God, why have you forsaken me? My God, hear the words of my roaring. You are far from helping me. O my God, I cry in the daytime, but you answer not, and in the night season, and am not silent. But you are holy that inhabit the Heavens. You are worthy of the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in you. They trusted and you did deliver them. They cried unto you and were delivered. They trusted in you and were not confounded.
- But I am a worm, and loved of no man, a reproach of man and despised of the people. All they that see me laugh me to scorn. They shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord, that he would deliver him; let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.
- But you are he that took me out of the womb. You did make me hope when I was upon my mother’s breasts. I was cast upon you from the womb. You were my God from my mother’s breasts.
- Be not far from me — for trouble is near — for there is none to help. Many armies have encompassed me; strong armies of Bashan have beset me around. They gaped upon me with their mouths like a ravening and roaring lion. I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, it is melted in the midst of my inward parts. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaves to my jaws, and you have brought me into the dust of death. For dogs have encompassed me, the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me. They pierced my hands and my feet. I may tally all my bones. They look and stare upon me. They part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture. But be not far from me, O Lord. O my strength, hasten to help me. Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from the power of the dog. Save me from the lion’s mouth, for you have heard me speak from the secret places of the wilderness through the horns of the re’em.
- I will declare your name unto my brethren. In the midst of the congregation will I praise you. You that fear the Lord, praise him; all you, the seed of Jacob, glorify him; and fear him, all you, the seed of Israel. For he has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted. Neither has he hidden his face from him, but when he cried unto him, he heard. My praise shall be of you in the great congregation. I will pay my vows before them that fear him. The meek shall eat and be satisfied. They shall praise the Lord that seek him. Your heart shall live for ever. All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord, and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before you. For the kingdom is the Lord’s and he is the governor among the nations. All they that are fat upon earth shall eat and worship. All they that go down to the dust shall bow before him, and none can keep alive his own soul. A seed shall serve him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation. They shall come and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that shall be born — what he has done.
Psalm 22
To the chief musician upon Aijeleth Shahar, a psalm of David.