Psalms 72

1A psalm for Asaph. How good is God to Israel, to them that are of a right heart!● 2But my feet were almost moved; my steps had well nigh slipped.● 3Because I had a zeal on occasion of the wicked, seeing the prosperity of sinners.● 4For there is no regard to their death, nor is there strength in their stripes.● 5They are not in the labour of men: neither shall they be scourged like other men.● 6Therefore pride hath held them fast: they are covered with their iniquity and their wickedness.● 7Their iniquity hath come forth, as it were from fatness: they have passed into the affection of the heart.● 8They have thought and spoken wickedness: they have spoken iniquity on high.● 9They have set their mouth against heaven: and their tongue hath passed through the earth.● 10Therefore will my people return here and full days shall be found in them.● 11And they said: How doth God know? and is there knowledge in the most High?● 12Behold these are sinners; and yet, abounding in the world they have obtained riches.● 13And I said: Then have I in vain justified my heart, and washed my hands among the innocent.● 14And I have been scourged all the day; and my chastisement hath been in the mornings.● 15If I said: I will speak thus; behold I should condemn the generation of thy children.● 16I studied that I might know this thing, it is a labour in my sight:● 17Until I go into the sanctuary of God, and understand concerning their last ends.● 18But indeed for deceits thou hast put it to them: when they were lifted up thou hast cast them down.● 19How are they brought to desolation? they have suddenly ceased to be: they have perished by reason of their iniquity.● 20As the dream of them that awake, O Lord; so in thy city thou shalt bring their image to nothing.● 21For my heart hath been inflamed, and my reins have been changed:● 22And I am brought to nothing, and I knew not.● 23I am become as a beast before thee: and I am always with thee.● 24Thou hast held me by my right hand; and by thy will thou hast conducted me, and with thy glory thou hast received me.● 25For what have I in heaven? and besides thee what do I desire upon earth?● 26For thee my flesh and my heart hath fainted away: thou art the God of my heart, and the God that is my portion for ever.● 27For behold they that go far from thee shall perish: thou hast destroyed all them that are disloyal to thee.● 28But it is good for me to adhere to my God, to put my hope in the Lord God: That I may declare all thy praises, in the gates of the daughter of Sion.●