Psalm 50–52

PSALM 50

A Psalm of Asaph.

¹The Mighty One, God the Lord,

speaks and summons the earth

from the rising of the sun to its setting.

²Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty,

God shines forth.

³Our God comes, he does not keep silence,

before him is a devouring fire,

round about him a mighty tempest.

⁴He calls to the heavens above

and to the earth, that he may judge his people:

⁵“Gather to me my faithful ones,

who made a covenant with me by sacrifice!”

⁶The heavens declare his righteousness,

for God himself is judge! Selah

⁷“Hear, O my people, and I will speak,

O Israel, I will testify against you.

I am God, your God.

⁸I do not reprove you for your sacrifices;

your burnt offerings are continually before me.

⁹I will accept no bull from your house,

nor he-goat from your folds.

¹⁰For every beast of the forest is mine,

the cattle on a thousand hills.

¹¹I know all the birds of the air,^v

and all that moves in the field is mine.

¹²“If I were hungry, I would not tell you;

for the world and all that is in it is mine.

¹³Do I eat the flesh of bulls,

or drink the blood of goats?

¹⁴Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving,^w

and pay your vows to the Most High;

¹⁵and call upon me in the day of trouble;

I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.”

¹⁶But to the wicked God says:

“What right have you to recite my statutes,

or take my covenant on your lips?

¹⁷For you hate discipline,

and you cast my words behind you.

¹⁸If you see a thief, you are a friend of his;

and you keep company with adulterers.

¹⁹“You give your mouth free rein for evil,

and your tongue frames deceit.

²⁰You sit and speak against your brother;

you slander your own mother’s son.

²¹These things you have done and I have been silent;

you thought that I was one like yourself.

But now I rebuke you, and lay the charge before you.

²²“Mark this, then, you who forget God,

lest I rend, and there be none to deliver!

²³He who brings thanksgiving as his sacrifice honors me;

to him who orders his way aright

I will show the salvation of God!”

PSALM 51

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.

¹Have mercy on me, O God,

according to thy steadfast love;

according to thy abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.

²Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,

and cleanse me from my sin!

³For I know my transgressions,

and my sin is ever before me.

⁴Against thee, thee only, have I sinned,

and done that which is evil in thy sight,

so that thou art justified in thy sentence

and blameless in thy judgment.

⁵Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,

and in sin did my mother conceive me.

⁶Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward being;

therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.

⁷Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;

wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

⁸Fill^x me with joy and gladness;

let the bones which thou hast broken rejoice.

⁹Hide thy face from my sins,

and blot out all my iniquities.

¹⁰Create in me a clean heart, O God,

and put a new and right^y spirit within me.

¹¹Cast me not away from thy presence,

and take not thy holy Spirit from me.

¹²Restore to me the joy of thy salvation,

and uphold me with a willing spirit.

¹³Then I will teach transgressors thy ways,

and sinners will return to thee.

¹⁴Deliver me from bloodguiltiness,^z O God,

thou God of my salvation,

and my tongue will sing aloud of thy deliverance.

¹⁵O Lord, open thou my lips,

and my mouth shall show forth thy praise.

¹⁶For thou hast no delight in sacrifice;

were I to give a burnt offering, thou wouldst not be pleased.

¹⁷The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit;

a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

¹⁸Do good to Zion in thy good pleasure;

rebuild the walls of Jerusalem,

¹⁹then wilt thou delight in right sacrifices,

in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;

then bulls will be offered on thy altar.

PSALM 52

To the choirmaster. A Maskil of David, when Doeg, the Edomite, came and told Saul, “David has come to the house of Ahimelech.”

¹Why do you boast, O mighty man,

of mischief done against the godly?^b

All the day ²you are plotting destruction.

Your tongue is like a sharp razor,

you worker of treachery.

³You love evil more than good,

and lying more than speaking the truth. Selah

⁴You love all words that devour,

O deceitful tongue.

⁵But God will break you down for ever;

he will snatch and tear you from your tent;

he will uproot you from the land of the living. Selah

⁶The righteous shall see, and fear,

and shall laugh at him, saying,

⁷“See the man who would not make God his refuge,

but trusted in the abundance of his riches,

and sought refuge in his wealth!”^c

⁸But I am like a green olive tree

in the house of God.

I trust in the steadfast love of God

for ever and ever.

⁹I will thank thee for ever,

because thou hast done it.

I will proclaim^d thy name, for it is good,

in the presence of the godly.