1 Why, O God, hast Thou cast us off for ever? [Why] smokes Thine anger against the flock of Thy pasture? 2 Remember Thy congregation [which] Thou didst acquire of old, Didst redeem [to be] the tribe of Thine inheritance, Mount Zion, on which Thou hast dwelt. 3 Lift up Thy steps to the everlasting ruins, The enemy has marred everything in the sanctuary.
4 Thine adversaries roared in the midst of the place where Thou dost meet [us], They set up their signs as signs. 5 They seem like one who heaves on high Axes against a thicket of trees. 6 And now--its carved work altogether With hatchet and hammers they break down. 7 They have set on fire Thy sanctuary, [Rasing it] to the ground, they have profaned the dwelling-place of Thy name. 8 They have said in their heart, Let us crush them altogether. They have burned all meeting-places of God in the land. 9 Our signs we see not, There is no prophet any more, And there is no one who knows how long.
10 How long, O God, shall the adversary reproach? Shall the enemy despise Thy name for ever? 11 Why dost Thou draw back Thy hand, even Thy right hand? From the midst of Thy bosom [pluck it and] consume [them].
12 Yet God is my king from of old, Working salvations in the midst of the earth. 13 Thou, Thou didst divide the sea by Thy strength, Didst break the heads of monsters on the waters. 14 Thou, Thou didst crush the heads of Leviathan, That Thou mightest give him [to be] meat for a people--the desert beasts. 15 Thou, Thou didst cleave [a way for] fountain and torrent; Thou, Thou didst dry up perennial streams. 16 Thine is day, Thine also is night, Thou, Thou didst establish light and sun. 17 Thou, Thou didst set all the bounds of the earth; Summer and winter, Thou, Thou didst form them.
18 Remember this--the enemy reviles Jehovah, And a foolish people despises Thy name. 19 Give not up to the company of greed Thy turtle dove, The company of Thine afflicted forget not for ever. 20 Look upon the covenant, For the dark places of the land are full of habitations of violence. 21 Let not the oppressed turn back ashamed, Let the afflicted and needy praise Thy name. 22 Rise, O God, plead Thine own cause, Remember Thy reproach from the foolish all the day. 23 Forget not the voice of Thine adversaries, The tumult of them which rise against Thee goes up continually.
Two periods only correspond to the circumstances described in this psalm and its companion (lxxix.)--namely, the Chaldean invasion and sack of Jerusalem, and the persecution under Antiochus Epiphanes. The general situation outlined in the psalm fits either of these; but, of its details, some are more applicable to the former and others to the later period. The later date is strongly supported by such complaints as those of the cessation of prophecy (ver. 9), the flaunting of the invaders' signs in the sanctuary (ver. 4), and the destruction by fire of all the "meeting-places of God in the land" (ver. 8). On the other hand, the earlier date better fits other features of the psalm--since Antiochus did not destroy or burn, but simply profaned the Temple, though he did, indeed, set fire to the gates and porch, but to these only. It would appear that, on either hypothesis, something must be allowed for poetical colouring. Calvin, whom Cheyne follows in this, accounts for the introduction of the burning of the Temple into a psalm referring to the desolation wrought by Antiochus, by the supposition that the psalmist speaks in the name of the "faithful, who, looking on the horrid devastation of the Temple, and being warned by so sad a sight, carried back their thoughts to that conflagration by which it had been destroyed by the Chaldeans, and wove the two calamities together into one." It is less difficult to pare down the statement as to the burning of the Temple so as to suit the later date, than that as to the silence of prophecy and the other characteristics mentioned, so as to fit the earlier. The question is still further complicated by the similarities between the two psalms and Jeremiah (compare ver. 4 with Lam. ii. 7, and ver. 9 with Lam. ii. 9). The prophet's well-known fondness for quotations gives probability, other things being equal, to the supposition that he is quoting the psalm, which would, in that case, be older than Lamentations. But this inference scarcely holds good, if there are other grounds on which the later date of the psalm is established. It would be very natural in a singer of the Maccabean period to go back to the prophet whose sad strains had risen at another black hour. On the whole, the balance is in favour of the later date.