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Human Faithlessness and God’s Faithfulness

For the music director; on the Sheminith.[a] A psalm of David.[b]

12 Save, O Yahweh, for the pious have ceased to be;
for the faithful have vanished
from among the children of humankind.
They speak falseness to each other.[c]
With flattering lips,
with a double heart[d] they speak.
May Yahweh cut off all flattering lips,
the tongue speaking great boasts—
those who say, “With our tongue we will prevail.
Our lips are on our side.
Who is master over us?”
“Because of the oppression of the afflicted,
because of the groaning of the poor,
now I will rise up,” Yahweh says.
“I shall put them in the safety for which they[e] long.”
The words of Yahweh are pure words
like silver refined in the crucible on the ground,
refined seven times.
You, O Yahweh, will protect them.
You will preserve him[f]
from this generation always.
The wicked prowl about
when vileness is exalted among the children of humankind.

Footnotes

  1. Psalm 12:1 Meaning uncertain
  2. Psalm 12:1 The Hebrew Bible counts the superscription as the first verse of the psalm; the English verse number is reduced by one
  3. Psalm 12:2 Literally “each with his companion”
  4. Psalm 12:2 Literally “a heart and a heart”
  5. Psalm 12:5 Hebrew “he”
  6. Psalm 12:7 Or “us”