The Book of Psalms

⭑ Catholic Public Domain Version 2009 ⭑

- Chapter 69 -

The water is up to my neck

Unto the end. For those who will be changed: of David.(a)

Save me, O God, for the waters have entered, even to my soul.(b)

I have become stuck in a deep quagmire, and there is no firm footing. I have arrived at the height of the sea, and a tempest has overwhelmed me.

I have endured hardships, while crying out. My jaws have become hoarse; my eyes have failed. Meanwhile, I hope in my God.

Those who hate me without cause have been multiplied beyond the hairs of my head. My enemies, who persecuted me unjustly, have been strengthened. Then I was required to pay for what I did not take.(c)

O God, you know my foolishness, and my offenses have not been hidden from you.(d)

Let those who wait for you, O Lord, the Lord of hosts, not be shamed in me. Let those who seek you, O God of Israel, not be confounded over me.

For because of you, I have endured reproach; confusion has covered my face.

I have become a stranger to my brothers and a sojourner to the sons of my mother.

For zeal for your house has consumed me, and the reproaches of those who reproached you have fallen upon me.

And I covered my soul with fasting, and it has become a reproach to me.

And I put on a haircloth as my garment, and I became a parable to them.

Those who sat at the gate spoke against me, and those who drank wine made me their song.

But as for me, truly, my prayer is to you, O Lord. This time has pleased you well, O God. In the multitude of your mercy, in the truth of your salvation, hear me.

Rescue me from the quagmire, so that I may not become trapped. Free me from those who hate me and from deep waters.

Do not allow the tempest of water to submerge me, nor the deep to absorb me. And do not allow the well to close in on me.

Hear me, O Lord, for your mercy is kind. Look upon me, according to the fullness of your compassion.

And do not turn your face away from your servant, for I am in trouble: heed me quickly.

Attend to my soul, and free it. Rescue me, because of my enemies.

You know my reproach, and my confusion, and my reverence.

All those who trouble me are in your sight; my heart has anticipated reproach and misery. And I sought for one who might grieve together with me, but there was no one, and for one who might console me, and I found no one.

And they gave me gall for my food. And in my thirst, they gave me vinegar to drink.

Let their table be a snare before them, and a retribution, and a scandal.(e)

Let their eyes be darkened, so that they may not see, and may their back always be crooked.

Pour out your indignation upon them, and may the fury of your anger take hold of them.

May their dwelling place be deserted, and may there be no one who dwells in their tabernacles.

For they persecuted whomever you struck. And they have added to the grief of my wounds.

Assign an iniquity upon their iniquity, and may they not enter into your justice.

Delete them from the Book of the Living, and let them not be written down with the just.

I am poor and sorrowful, but your salvation, O God, has taken me up.

I will praise the name of God with a canticle, and I will magnify him with praise.

And it will please God more than a new calf producing horns and hoofs.

Let the poor see and rejoice. Seek God, and your soul will live.

For the Lord has heard the poor, and he has not despised his prisoners.

Let the heavens and the earth praise him: the sea, and everything that crawls in it.

For God will save Zion, and the cities of Judah will be built up. And they will dwell there, and they will acquire it by inheritance.(f)

And the offspring of his servants will possess it; and those who love his name will dwell in it.

Footnotes

(a)68:1 For them that shall be changed:A psalm for Christian converts, to remember the passion of Christ.(Challoner)

(b)68:2 The waters:Of afflictions and sorrows. My soul is sorrowful even unto death. Matt. 26:38.(Challoner)

(c)68:5 I pay that which I took not away:Christ in his passion made restitution of what he had not taken away, by suffering the punishment due to our sins, and so repairing the injury we had done to God.(Challoner)

(d)68:6 My foolishness and my offences:which my enemies impute to me: or the follies and sins of men, which I have taken upon myself.(Challoner)

(e)68:23 Let their table, etc:What here follows in the style of an imprecation, is a prophecy of the wretched state to which the Jews should be reduced in punishment of their wilful obstinacy.(Challoner)

(f)68:36 Sion:The catholic church. The cities of Juda, etc., her places of worship, which shall be established throughout the world. And there, viz., in this church of Christ, shall his servants dwell, etc.(Challoner)