^78:1 Listen, O my people, to my law. Incline your^* ears to the words of my mouth. ^78:2 I will open my mouth in parables. I will pour out dark sayings of long-ago, ^78:3 which we have heard and known and our fathers have told us.

    ^78:4 We will not hide them from their sons, telling to the generation to come the praises of Jehovah and his strength and his wondrous works that he has done.

    ^78:5 For he established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their sons, ^78:6 that the generation to come might know, even the sons who should be born, who should arise and tell to their sons, ^78:7 that they might set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments, ^78:8 and might not be as their fathers: a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not set their heart aright and whose spirit was not steadfast with God.

    ^78:9 The sons of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle.

    ^78:10 They did not keep the covenant of God and refused to walk in his law. ^78:11 And they forgot his deeds and his wondrous works that he had shown them.

    ^78:12 He did marvelous things in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan. ^78:13He divided the sea and caused them to pass through. And he made the waters to stand as a heap.

    ^78:14 He led them with a cloud in the daytime also and all the night with a light of fire. ^78:15 He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them to drink abundantly as out of the depths.

    ^78:16 He brought streams also out of the rock and caused waters to run down like rivers. ^78:17 Yet they went on to still sin against him, to rebel against the Most High in the desert.

    ^78:18 And they challenged God in their heart by asking food according to their desire. ^78:19 Yes, they spoke against God. They said, Can God arrange a table in the wilderness?

    ^78:20 Behold, he struck the rock, so that waters gushed out and streams overflowed. Can he give bread also? Will he provide meat for his people?

    ^78:21 Therefore Jehovah heard and was angry. And a fire was kindled against Jacob and anger also went up against Israel, ^78:22 because they did not believe in God and did not trust in his salvation.

    ^78:23 Yet he commanded the skies above and opened the doors of heaven, ^78:24 and he rained down manna upon them to eat and gave them food from heaven.

    ^78:25 Man ate the bread of the mighty. He sent them food to the full.

    ^78:26 He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens and by his power he guided the south wind.^78:27 He also rained meat upon them as the dust and winged birds as the sand of the seas.

    ^78:28 And he let it fall in the midst of their camp all around their dwellings. ^78:29 So they ate and were well filled and he gave them their own desire.

    ^78:30 They were not estranged from what they desired. Their food was yet in their mouths ^78:31 when the anger of God went up against them and killed of the fattest of them and struck down the young men of Israel.

    ^78:32 For all this, they still sinned and did not believe in his wondrous works. ^78:33 Therefore he consumed their days in vanity and their years in terror.

    ^78:34 When he killed them, then they inquired after him and they returned and sought God earnestly. ^78:35 And they remembered that God was their rock and the Most High God their redeemer.

    ^78:36 But they deceived him with their mouth and lied to him with their tongue. ^78:37 For their heart was not right with him, nor were they faithful in his covenant.

    ^78:38 But he, being merciful, forgave iniquity and did not destroy. Yes, he turned his anger away much and did not stir up all his wrath. ^78:39 And he remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes away and does not come again.

    ^78:40 How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert! ^78:41 And they turned again and challenged God and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

    ^78:42 They did not remember his hand, nor the day when he redeemed them from the adversary, ^78:43how he set his signs in Egypt and his wonders in the field of Zoan, ^78:44 and turned their rivers into blood and their streams, so that they could not drink.

    ^78:45 He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them and frogs, which destroyed them. ^78:46He also gave their increase to the caterpillar and their labor to the locust.

    ^78:47 He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamore trees with frost. ^78:48 He also gave over their cattle to the hail and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.

    ^78:49 He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath and indignation and trouble, a discharge of messengers of evil.

    ^78:50 He made a path for his anger. He spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence, ^78:51 and struck all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.

    ^78:52 But he led forth his own people like sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

    ^78:53 And he led them safely, so that they did not fear, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

    ^78:54 And he brought them to the border of his sanctuary, to this mountain, which his right hand had gained. ^78:55 He also drove out the nations before them and allotted them for an inheritance by line and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.

    ^78:56 Yet they challenged and rebelled against the Most High God and did not keep his testimonies, ^78:57 but turned-back and dealt treacherously like their fathers. They were turned aside like a deceitful bow. ^78:58 For they provoked him to anger with their high places and moved him to jealousy with their graven images.

    ^78:59 When God heard, he was angry and greatly rejected Israel, ^78:60 so that he forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent which he placed among men, ^78:61and delivered their strength into captivity and their glory into the adversary's hand.

    ^78:62 He also gave his people over to the sword and was angry with his inheritance. ^78:63 Fire devoured their young men and their virgins had no marriage-song. ^78:64 Their priests fell by the sword and their widows made no lamentation.

    ^78:65 Then the Lord awoke as out of sleep, like a mighty man who shouts because of wine. ^78:66 And he struck his adversaries backward. He put them to a everlasting reproach.

    ^78:67 Moreover he refused the tent of Joseph and chose not the tribe of Ephraim, ^78:68 but chose the tribe of Judah, the Mount Zion which he loved. ^78:69And he built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which he has established everlasting.

    ^78:70 He also chose David his servant and took him from the sheepfolds. ^78:71 He brought him from following the ewe-lambs that have their young, to be the shepherd of Jacob his people and Israel his inheritance.

    ^78:72 So he was their shepherd according to the integrity of his heart and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.