Chapter 26

1 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:

“We have a strong city;

he sets up salvation

as walls and bulwarks.

2 Open the gates,

that the righteous nation which keeps faith

may enter in.

3 Thou dost keep him in perfect peace,

whose mind is stayed on thee,

because he trusts in thee.

4 Trust in the Lord

for ever, for the Lord GOD

is an everlasting rock.

5 For he has brought low

the inhabitants of the height,

the lofty city.

He lays it low, lays it low to the ground,

casts it to the dust.

6 The foot tramples it,

the feet of the poor,

the steps of the needy.”

7 The way of the righteous is level;

thou dost make smooth the path of the righteous.

8 In the path of thy judgments,

O Lord, we wait for thee;

thy memorial name

is the desire of our soul.

9 My soul yearns for thee in the night,

my spirit within me earnestly seeks thee.

For when thy judgments are in the earth,

the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.

10 If favor is shown to the wicked,

he does not learn righteousness;

in the land of uprightness he deals perversely

and does not see the majesty of the Lord.

11 O Lord, thy hand is lifted up,

but they see it not.

Let them see thy zeal for thy people, and be ashamed.

Let the fire for thy adversaries consume them.

12 O Lord, thou wilt ordain peace for us,

thou hast wrought for us all our works.

13 O Lord our God,

other lords besides thee have ruled over us,

but thy name alone we acknowledge.

14 They are dead, they will not live;

they are shades, they will not arise;

to that end thou hast visited them with destruction

and wiped out all remembrance of them.

15 But thou hast increased the nation, O Lord,

thou hast increased the nation; thou art glorified;

thou hast enlarged all the borders of the land.

16 O Lord, in distress they sought thee,

they poured out a prayer

when thy chastening was upon them.

17 Like a woman with child,

who writhes and cries out in her pangs,

when she is near her time,

so were we because of thee, O Lord;

18 we were with child, we writhed,

we have as it were brought forth wind.

We have wrought no deliverance in the earth,

and the inhabitants of the world have not fallen.

19 Thy dead shall live, their bodies shall rise.

O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy!

For thy dew is a dew of light,

and on the land of the shades thou wilt let it fall.

20 Come, my people, enter your chambers,

and shut your doors behind you;

hide yourselves for a little while

until the wrath is past.

21 For behold, the Lord is coming forth out of his place

to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity,

and the earth will disclose the blood shed upon her,

and will no more cover her slain.