- [Maschil of Asaph.]
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- Giue eare, O my people, to my Lawe: incline your eares to the wordes of my mouth.
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- I will open my mouth in a parable: I wil vtter darke sayings of old:
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- Which we haue heard, & knowen: and our fathers haue told vs.
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- We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come, the praises of the Lord: and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done.
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- For he established a Testimony in Iacob, and appointed a Law in Israel, which he commaunded our fathers: that they should make them knowen to their children.
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- That the generation to come might know them, euen the children which should be borne: who should arise and declare them to their children:
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- That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God: but keepe his Commandements,
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- And might not bee as their fathers, a stubborne and rebellious generation, a generation that set not their heart aright: and whose spirit was not stedfast with God.
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- The children of Ephraim being armed, and carying bowes, turned backe in the day of battell.
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- They kept not the couenant of God: and refused to walke in his Law:
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- And forgat his workes: and his wonders that he had shewed them.
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- Marueilous things did he in the sight of their fathers: in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.
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- Hee diuided the Sea, and caused them to passe through: and he made the waters to stand as an heape.
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- In the day time also he led them with a cloud: and all the night with a light of fire.
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- Hee claue the rockes in the wildernes: and gaue them drinke as out of the great depthes.
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- Hee brought streames also out of the rocke, and caused waters to runne downe like riuers.
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- And they sinned yet more against him: by prouoking the most High in the wildernes.
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- And they tempted God in their heart: by asking meat for their lust.
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- Yea, they spake against God: they said, Can God furnish a table in the wildernes?
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- Behold, he smote the rocke, that the waters gushed out, & the streames ouerflowed;
can he giue bread also? Can he prouide flesh for his people?
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- Therefore the Lord heard this, and was wroth, so a fire was kindled against Iacob: and anger also came vp against Israel.
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- Because they beleeued not in God: and trusted not in his saluation:
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- Though he had commanded the cloudes from aboue: and opened the doores of heauen:
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- And had rained downe Manna vpon them to eate, and had giuen them of the corne of heauen.
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- Man did eate Angels food: hee sent them meat to the full.
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- He caused an East wind to blow in the heauen: and by his power hee brought in the South wind.
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- He rained flesh also vpon them as dust: and feathered soules like as the sand of the sea.
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- And hee let it fall in the midst of their campe, round about their habitations.
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- So they did eate, & were well filled: for he gaue them their owne desire.
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- They were not estranged from their lust: but while their meate was yet in their mouthes,
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- The wrath of God came vpon them, and slew the fattest of them: and smote downe the chosen men of Israel.
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- For all this they sinned still: and beleeued not for his wondrous works.
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- Therefore their dayes did he consume in vanitie, and their yeeres in trouble.
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- When hee slew them, then they sought him: and they returned, and inquired early after God.
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- And they remembred that God was their rocke: and the high God, their redeemer.
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- Neuerthelesse they did flatter him with their mouth: and they lyed vnto him with their tongues.
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- For their heart was not right with him: neither were they stedfast in his couenant.
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- But hee being full of compassion, forgaue their iniquity, and destroyed them not;
yea many a time turned he his anger away, and did not stirre vp all his wrath.
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- For he remembred that they were but flesh;
a wind that passeth away, and commeth not againe.
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- How oft did they prouoke him in the wildernesse: and grieue him in the desert?
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- Yea they turned backe and tempted God: and limited the holy one of Israel.
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- They remembred not his hand: nor the day when hee deliuered them from the enemie:
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- How he had wrought his signes in Egypt: and his wonders in the field of Zoan:
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- And had turned their riuers into blood: and their flouds, that they could not drinke.
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- Hee sent diuers sorts of flies among them, which deuoured them: and frogges which destroyed them.
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- He gaue also their increase vnto the caterpiller: and their labour vnto the locust.
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- He destroyed their vines with haile: and their Sycomore trees with frost.
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- He gaue vp their cattel also to the haile: and their flockes to hot thunder-bolts.
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- He cast vpon them the fiercenesse of his anger, wrath and indignation, and trouble: by sending euill angels among them.
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- He made a way to his anger, hee spared not their soule from death: but gaue their life ouer to the pestilence.
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- And smote all the first borne in Egypt: the chiefe of their strength in the tabernacles of Ham:
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- But made his owne people to goe forth like sheepe: and guided them in the wildernesse like a flocke.
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- And he led them on safely, so that they feared not: but the sea ouerwhelmed their enemies.
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- And he brought them to the border of his sanctuarie: euen to this mountaine which his right hand had purchased.
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- He cast out the heathen also before them, and diuided them an inheritance by line: and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.
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- Yet they tempted and prouoked the most high God: and kept not his testimonies:
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- But turned backe, and dealt vnfaithfully like their fathers: they were turned aside like a deceitfull bowe.
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- For they prouoked him to anger with their high places: and moued him to ielousie with their grauen images.
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- When God heard this, hee was wroth, and greatly abhorred Israel:
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- So that he forsooke the tabernacle of Shiloh: the tent which he placed among men,
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- And deliuered his strength into captiuitie: and his glory into the enemies hand.
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- He gaue his people ouer also vnto the sword: and was wroth with his inheritance.
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- The fire consumed their young men: and their maidens were not giuen to mariage.
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- Their priests fell by the sword: and their widowes made no lamentation.
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- Then the Lord awaked as one out of sleepe: and like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine.
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- And he smote his enemies in the hinder parts: he put them to a perpetuall reproch.
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- Moreouer he refused the tabernacle of Ioseph: and chose not the tribe of Ephraim.
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- But chose the tribe of Iudah: the mount Sion which he loued.
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- And he built his sanctuarie like high palaces: like the earth which he hath established for euer.
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- He chose Dauid also his seruant, and tooke him from the sheepe-folds:
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- From following the ewes great with young, hee brought him to feed Iacob his people, and Israel his inheritance.
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- So he fed them according to the integritie of his heart: and guided them by the skilfulnesse of his hands.
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