The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,
For His compassions never fail.

He has caused my flesh and my skin to waste away,
He has broken my bones.

He has besieged and encompassed me with bitterness and hardship.

In dark places He has made me dwell,
Like those who have long been dead.

He has walled me in so that I cannot go out;
He has made my chain heavy.

He has blocked my ways with hewn stone;
He has made my paths crooked.

Even when I cry out and call for help,
He shuts out my prayer.

He has turned aside my ways and torn me to pieces;
He has made me desolate.

He is to me like a bear lying in wait,
Like a lion in secret places.

He bent His bow
And set me as a target for the arrow.

I am the man who has seen affliction
Because of the rod of His wrath.

Remember my affliction and my wandering, the wormwood and bitterness.

I have become a laughingstock to all my people,
Their mocking song all the day.

My soul has been rejected from peace;
I have forgotten happiness.

He made the arrows of His quiver
To enter into my inward parts.

The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
To the person who seeks Him.

They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.

So I say, “My strength has perished,
And so has my hope from the Lord.”

He has broken my teeth with gravel;
He has made me cower in the dust.

Surely my soul remembers
And is bowed down within me.

He has filled me with bitterness,
He has made me drunk with wormwood.

It is good that he waits silently
For the salvation of the Lord.

For the Lord will not reject forever,

“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I have hope in Him.”

He has driven me and made me walk
In darkness and not in light.

Surely against me He has turned His hand
Repeatedly all the day.

Let him give his cheek to the smiter,
Let him be filled with reproach.

It is good for a man that he should bear
The yoke in his youth.

Let him sit alone and be silent
Since He has laid it on him.

Let him put his mouth in the dust,
Perhaps there is hope.

This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.

Who is there who speaks and it comes to pass,
Unless the Lord has commanded it?

Let us examine and probe our ways,
And let us return to the Lord.

Is it not from the mouth of the Most High
That both good and ill go forth?

For if He causes grief,
Then He will have compassion
According to His abundant lovingkindness.

To crush under His feet
All the prisoners of the land,

For He does not afflict willingly
Or grieve the sons of men.

Why should any living mortal, or any man,
Offer complaint in view of his sins?

We lift up our heart and hands
Toward God in heaven;

To deprive a man of justice
In the presence of the Most High,

I called on Your name, O Lord,
Out of the lowest pit.

You drew near when I called on You;
You said, “Do not fear!”

To defraud a man in his lawsuit—
Of these things the Lord does not approve.

You have covered Yourself with anger
And pursued us;
You have slain and have not spared.

You have made us mere offscouring and refuse
In the midst of the peoples.

My eyes bring pain to my soul
Because of all the daughters of my city.

My eyes run down with streams of water
Because of the destruction of the daughter of my people.

O Lord, You have pleaded my soul’s cause;
You have redeemed my life.

My enemies without cause
Hunted me down like a bird;

We have transgressed and rebelled,
You have not pardoned.

My eyes pour down unceasingly,
Without stopping,

You have covered Yourself with a cloud
So that no prayer can pass through.

All our enemies have opened their mouths against us.

Panic and pitfall have befallen us,
Devastation and destruction;

They have silenced me in the pit
And have placed a stone on me.

You will recompense them, O Lord,
According to the work of their hands.

The lips of my assailants and their whispering
Are against me all day long.

You have heard my voice,
“Do not hide Your ear from my prayer for relief,
From my cry for help.”

You will pursue them in anger and destroy them
From under the heavens of the Lord!

Waters flowed over my head;
I said, “I am cut off!”

Until the Lord looks down
And sees from heaven.

You have heard their reproach, O Lord,
All their schemes against me.

Look on their sitting and their rising;
I am their mocking song.

You have seen all their vengeance,
All their schemes against me.

You will give them hardness of heart,
Your curse will be on them.

O Lord, You have seen my oppression;
Judge my case.