2 - The Praise Of God (Hymns and Psalms)

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My soul thirsteth for Thee; my flesh longeth for Thee,
in a dry and weary land, where no water is.

Psalm 63.1

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Introduction

The chanting of psalms was one of the basic elements of worship in the Second Temple, and continued as a main feature of public devotions in the synagogue and church. In course of time, however, the Biblical repertoire was supplemented by more 'modern' compositions in the same style.

I

The Brotherhood possessed its own Book of Hymns written in this vein. It is contained in one of the scrolls discovered by the Bedouin boys in 1947 and extends to eighteen columns plus a large number of fragments too disjointed to translate. The end of each hymn was marked carefully by a blank space, but since the lower portion of each column has been eaten away, this indication must often have occurred in places where it is no longer evident.

Hence, we cannot tell how many compositions even the main portion of the scroll originally contained, nor is it always possible to distinguish any one of them from the next This is especially the case in the latter part of the manuscript, where the best that can be done in a translation is simply to indicate where a new column begins.

In cases where their beginnings can still be recognized, the hymns often open with the words, 'I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord'. For this reason they have come to be known as the Psalms (or Hymns) of Thanksgiving—a title which is all the more appropriate when it is remembered that in the early synagogue and church, 'thanksgiving' was a technical term for a clearly defined type of liturgical composition.

Some of the pieces, however, begin with the alternative formula, 'Blessed art Thou', and this is equally significant in view of the fact that 'blessing' seems likewise to have denoted in antiquity not only a formula of benediction but also a specific type of hymn. Accordingly, the joint title, Blessings and Thanksgivings (Hebrew, Bera-choth we-Hodayoth) would appear to be the most adequate.

The hymns represent the most original literary creation in the Dead Sea Scriptures. It is true that they are, in the main, mosaics of Biblical quotations and that they often exhibit all the learned and tortured exploitation of Scripture that we find later in the medieval poetasters (payye-tanim) of the synagogue. This, however, is merely the trammel of literary convention, and it should no more dull our ears to the underlying passion and authenticity of feeling than do the mannered conceits of a Donne or a Herbert or a Vaughan.

Especially noteworthy is the prevalence in these hymns of the vocabulary which Evelyn Underhill and others have recognized as the standard and characteristic idiom of mystical experience. There is the same harping on the wilderness of isolation; the same reference to the 'ascent' to God and to 'the height of eternal things'; the same metaphor (particularly in Hymn No. 5) of the New Birth and the 'travail of the world'; the same intensive apprehension of Divine providence, communion and 'enlightenment'; and the same sense of nursing a precious secret against the day of revelation. Apprehension of these notes is of the essence in understanding the spirit of the hymns in particular and of the Brotherhood in general.

It has been suggested that some of the hymns, which speak of deliverance from froward assailants ('the company of Belial' or 'the men of corruption'), were designed for the use of soldiers who had escaped their adversaries or defeated them. To the present writer, such a view seems singularly and unperceptively overliteral; it confuses the 'slings and arrows of outrageous fortune' with concrete bazookas and guided missiles. Similarly, there seems no good

reason for assuming, as has been done, that Hymn No. {8} must necessarily have been written by 'the teacher of Righteousness' simply because it speaks of one who sought to impart God's law to his brethren but was constantly thwarted and abused by 'preachers of lies' and 'prophets of deceit'. What the text is describing is the normal and typical frustration of the mystic—the experience of every man who believes that he has seen God and that he is burning a small candle in the darkness of a world unredeemed.

To the main body of hymns we have here prefixed another, which the ancient librarians of Qumran attached to a copy of the Manual of Discipline. If one reads it carefully, one will find that it repeats almost verbatim the list of obligations and the basic oath of allegiance laid down in that document for new members of the Brotherhood.

It may therefore be regarded as a hymn chanted by Initiants when they were formally received into the community; and this would in turn explain why the ancient librarians considered it an appropriate liturgical 'appendix' to the Manual. On this hypothesis we have called it The Hymn of the Initiants. The Scrolls themselves, it may be added, bear no titles; those assigned by modern scholars are therefore in any case quite arbitrary.

II

Several further hymns are included in a compendium (preserved in several incomplete copies) the major part of which contains portions of the Biblical Book of Psalms. This compendium, which has been somewhat tendentiously called The Dead Sea Psalm Scroll', and presumed to be a variant form of the canonical collection, was probably compiled for liturgical purposes. (1)

Three of the extracanonical hymns have been known hitherto from late Syriac manuscripts—none earlier than the fourteenth century. Evidently once current in the services of the Eastern Orthodox Church, they are part of a group of five fancifully attributed to David, (2) who is indeed credited, in a kind of colophon to our scroll, with no less than 4050 effusions! (3)

a. David (Psalm 151). The first of these three 'Davidic' compositions to be here presented (though in fact the last in the manuscript) is an old acquaintance: it is the poem appended to the Greek (Septuagint) Version of the canonical Psalter and there entitled, A genuine, though supernumerary, Psalm of David, composed when he engaged Goliath in single combat. (4) There are, however, some variations and additions, and that the latter were part of the original text, and no mere interpolations by some Qum-ramte redactor, is evident from the fact that they complete the chain of ideas and give coherence to what in the Greek Version appears as a string of somewhat inconsequential sentences. To put it mildly, the translator was something of a clod.

The psalm relates, in the first person and in an artless style characteristic more of folk poetry than of sophisticated literary invention, the story of how David, the youngest son of Jesse, was relegated by his father to the humble task of tending sheep and goats (v. 1); how he made a Panpipe and lyre in order to pay honor thereon to God (v. 2); how he was inwardly aware all the while that the mute mountains and hills were incapable of conveying to God what they had witnessed of his piety, and the rustling leaves of relaying his praises, and the sheep of reporting how well he was tending them (v. 3); how, though he was himself left wondering who or what could possibly bring word of his activities, God, Lord of the Universe, nevertheless saw and heard all, without need of intermediaries (v. 4); and how, in consequence, he was selected by God's envoy, the prophet Samuel, to be the future leader of Israel and was anointed with sacred oil, in preference to his older and seemingly more attractive brothers (vv. 5-7).

This, to be sure, is but one interpretation of the text, but it is supported by the fact that echoes of it are indeed to be heard in later Jewish legend (midrash), where we are told that God chose David to shepherd His people precisely because He saw how well he shepherded his father's flocks, (5) and also—a notion repeated in the Koran—that when He heard his songs of praise, He commanded birds and sheep thenceforth to join in. (6)

There is, however, an interesting alternative. By reading a single word somewhat differently, (7) some scholars have extracted the sense that, though mountains and hills were indeed inarticulate and seemingly unresponsive, trees and flocks 'recognized the excellence' of David's words and music. (8) On this basis it has then been suggested that the poet was influenced by a popular fancy of his day which assimilated the 'sweet singer of Israel' to the classical Orpheus who, as Shakespeare puts it, With his lute made trees/ And the mountain-tops that freeze/ Bow themselves when he did sing'.

In support of this suggestion it is pointed out that in a prominent position in the synagogue at Dura-Europus there is a fresco depicting an Orpheus-like figure by some identified as David; (9) that a representation of the same scene occurs in a Jewish catacomb at Rome; (10) and that in various manuscripts of the Psalter David is indeed portrayed as Orpheus. (11) Though all of them considerably later than our Qumran scroll, these representations are taken to attest the persistence of an ancient tradition.

In my opinion, this interpretation overshoots the mark. In the first place, there is no solid evidence that David was ever identified with Orpheus at an earlier date. (12) Secondly, the notion that inanimate things or nature in general can be charmed by music in fact occurs in folktales from several parts of the world, (13) so that, even if this is what our text means, it by no means implies a specific identification of David with Orpheus.

Thirdly, this interpretation overlooks the essential distinction between the inability of the rustling leaves to repeat David's words—that is, his songs of praise—and that of the sheep to apprise God of his acts —that is, his proficiency and solicitude as a shepherd. It is just this combination, as later midrash insists, that fitted him for the leadership of Israel. Fourthly, the proposed rendering, The hills do not tell forth (God's glory), involves the grammatical anomaly of making a feminine noun govern a verb with masculine form.

There is also a difference of opinion about the meaning of the succeeding verse (v. 4). In the editio princeps this is rendered:

For who can proclaim and who can bespeak
and who can recount the deeds of the Lord?
Everything has God seen,
everything has He heard
and He has heeded. (14)

This, I think, misses the sense. The words are a continuation of David's inner thought, and what they say is, quite simply, that although he was initially left wondering who or what could ever report his activities, God as Lord of All nevertheless saw and heard everything without any such mediation. In support of this interpretation a number of points can be made. First: as several scholars have pointed out, (15) the Hebrew word 'adon, which has been rendered 'the Lord', is nowhere else used in this absolute form in reference to God, the usual style being Adonai. Second: our author elsewhere employs the Tetragrammaton (YHWH), which, to boot, he writes reverently in archaic script (vv. 2, 6).

Third: by construing the word all as part of the title, viz., Lord of All, rather than as the object of the verb saw, we recover an expression which indeed occurs elsewhere in intertestamental literati -e (16) and which is also found in precisely the same Hebrew form in the famous 'Alenu-prayer, commonly regarded as of pre-Christian origin. (17) Fourthly, the rendering, He has heeded, misses the specific point of the Hebrew word, which means properly, gave ear and thus states that God was able all by Himself (Heb. He—emphatic) to hear what David was singing, even though it was not reported to Him.

It is perhaps worth suggesting that our author wrote under the influence of secular Hellenistic poetry. Thus the reference to David's making a Panpipe and lyre (v. 2), though obviously based on the Scriptural allusions to his musical skill (I Sam. 16.18, 23), may be intended at the same time to depict him as the typical shepherd of Greek pastoral idyl. (18) Pious David, however, plies his instruments to the glory of God—not, as do the Greek swains, merely for diversion or in order to sing 'amorous ditties all a summer's day'.

Again, when nature is here portrayed as unresponsive to his warblings, this is perhaps a sly jibe at the conventional cliche, common in Theocritus (and later imitated by Vergil), that the whole woodland responds to the sounds of the flute. (19) So too, when it is said of David's brothers (v. 6) that they were not only tall and handsome, but also 'graced with comely locks' (a detail absent from the Septuagint Version!), may we not detect a Hellenic note, for this is quite frequently mentioned in Greek poetry, (20) whereas—as my friend and former student, Mr. Murray Lichtenstein, has pointed out to me—in Ancient Near Eastern verse the big thing in descriptions of bodily beauty is usually the eyes.

It should be observed, however, in connection with this last point, that later midrash does indeed make much of the seductive properties of Joseph's locks, (21) and it is possible that our author had some earlier form of this legend specifically in mind, seeing that he describes the brothers in terms which the Bible applies to Joseph (Gen. 39.6).

Finally, it should be noted that the encounter with Goliath, which is incorporated into the Greek Version and which gives it its title, is, in the Qumran scroll, made the subject of a separate psalm, with its own superscription. Only a few fragments of the initial verses, however, have survived.

b. Invitation. The second of the extracanonical hymns is a summons to join in acclaiming the glory of God in public assembly and in imparting to the ignorant a knowledge of His majesty and power. This, it is said, is the true role of wisdom, and whoever is responsive to this duty is as acceptable to God as one who offers sacrifice or as the savor of incense.

The voice and song of Wisdom ring out from the homes of the godly, but ignorant and intemperate men keep away from it. When the righteous and godly sit at meals, their talk is of wisdom and the Lore (Torah) of God—things of which the wicked and arrogant neither speak nor know. The righteous, however, have their reward: God looks compassionately upon them, and will surely deliver them from 'the evil time'—that is, more specifically, from the period of turmoil and distress which will precede the Messianic Age and which the men of Qumran already saw all around them.

The psalm concludes with a call to bless God as the redeemer of the humble and oppressed, the sure restorer of Israel's glory, and as the One who will govern the world from the midst of Israel, 'spread His tent' in Zion, and be ever at hand in Jerusalem.

The psalm has been read as a call to 'service' addressed specifically to the Qumran Brotherhood, the words join company, which occur in the third verse, being rendered, form a community. (22) I would suggest, however, quite a different interpretation—namely, that this is really what is termed in rabbinic literature a Birkath Zimmun, a call to an assembled company to join in the Grace after Meals, coupled with an invitation to participate in the 'talk about Torah' which was a customary concomitant of such gatherings.

Such an invitation to 'say Grace' is issued by a delegated member of the group whenever three or more persons dine together, the custom being as old, according to the Palestinian Talmud (Berachoth, vii.2) as Simon ben Shetah, who lived during the reigns of Alexander Jannaeus and Salome (104—69 B.C.E.). The meal must be accompanied by 'words of Torah'; otherwise, as later sages put it, (23) it is no better than a 'session of scoffers' (cp. Ps. 1.1) or than 'sacrifices offered to the dead' (cp. Ps. 106.28). (24)

This suggestion derives especially from the explicit reference (v. 3) to the fact that when the godly 'eat their fill and drink', the voice of Wisdom—a common rabbinic synonym for Torah—rings out, and their talk is of the Lore (Torah) of the Most High and is designed to further knowledge of His power.

It finds further support in the fact that all the original elements of the Grace, as they are prescribed in the Talmud (Berachoth, 48a), viz., the reference to 'eating to satiety and blessing God' (a quotation from Deut. 8.10); to the eventual 'raising of the horn', i.e., enhancement of the status, of God's people; and to the establishment of His abode in Zion, find place in this composition; (25) while the statement (v. 12) that the song of

Wisdom rings out may readily be seen as an allusion to the chanting of psalms at meals—a custom familiar especially from the Last Supper (Matt. 26.30; Mark 14.26) and still current in Jewish practise. Moreover, the assertion (vv. 10-11) that he who acclaims the majesty of God (in response to the direct summons in v. 1) is as one who offers oblation accords significantly with a passage in the Hymn of the Initiants (below, p. 138) which says explicitly,

At the common board,
or ever I raise my hand
to enjoy the rich yield of the earth,
with the fruit of my own lips
I will bless Him as with an oblation.

The concluding invocation, Bless ye, likewise accords with the suggestion that our poem was really a prelude to the Grace after Meals, for it is indeed the formula prescribed in the mishnah when many dine together. (26)

Finally, it is perhaps worthy of note that in the Qumran compendium the poem follows Psalm 145, for this may have been due to the occurrence in that psalm of the verses (15-16)

The eyes of all wait upon Thee,
and Thou givest them their food in due season.
Thou openest Thy hand
and givest in full measure to all living
that which they desire;

—the latter of which is actually incorporated into the opening benediction of the traditional Grace.

c. Plea for Grace. The third of the 'psalms' already known from the Syriac manuscripts is composed in the form of an alphabetical acrostic and is a plea for the remission of punishment for sins. Not impossibly, it was designed for recitation in illness, this being regarded as a requital for misdeeds. The hymn is largely a pastiche of Biblical verses, and the original acrostic has occasionally been disturbed (as in the first chapter of Nahum) by later editing or by such distortion as is apt to arise when a poem gains popular currency.

Of the three hymns hitherto unknown, the first (here entitled Supplication) is likewise a prayer for forgiveness of sin and remission of punishment. It belongs, though in a more personal vein, to the liturgical genre known later as Selihoth (or Baqashoth), i.e., Pleas for Pardon.

There is, however, a notable difference between this composition and those which find place in the traditional Jewish prayer book, inasmuch as the latter seek forgiveness for sins actually committed, whereas here the major emphasis is on immunity from the proclivity to sin and from demonic possession. Such immunity is the natural outcome of that enlightenment and insight which accompanies a sense of the divine and which the Qumran Brotherhood claimed as their special endowment.

The second of the entirely new hymns has been called by its first editor An Apostrophe to Zion. (27) It is, however, more than a mere patriotic anthem, such as we find, for instance, in Psalm 87, for while it certainly celebrates the glories of Zion and of her ancient inhabitants, its main thrust is to provide consolation and assurance of deliver-ance from its foes. Indeed, one is tempted to suggest that the poem may have been composed during the time of the First Jewish Revolt, when the Roman troops were closing in.

The last of the 'new' hymns is, without doubt, the gem of the collection.

It is an ancient Jewish belief that every daybreak is a renewal of creation. For this reason, the appropriate moment for the initial devotions of the day is when the glimmer of dawn first appears in the sky, and the world is reborn. (28) The recital of the Shema'—a. cardinal element in the morning and evening services—is preceded in the former by a series of benedictions the first of which cele-brates the creation of daylight and is known as Yoser because God is specifically described in it as yôser 'ôr, 'creator of light'.

The traditional form of this prayer has been attributed by some authorities to the Essenes, and in subsequent generations hymnodic elaborations of the central theme formed a distinct genre of Hebrew liturgical poetry. What we have here entitled Morning Hymn is a composition of this type.

The hymn is perhaps the most imaginative in the entire Qumran repertoire. It plays successively on the several features of daybreak—the rising of the sun, the dissipation of darkness, the increased movement of the sea, the growing intensity of the light, the lifting of mists from the mountains, the gradual emergence to view of the green and dew-drenched meadows. Each of these features is regarded as a manifestation at once of God's power and grace.

The all-seeing sun was envisaged in remoter Semitic antiquity as the god of justice and was said to be attended by twin sons, Right and Equity, who stood respectively on his right and left. This ancient concept was later developed into a description of essential qualities associated with God (cp. Ps. 85.11). In our text, Loving-kindness and Truth are said to encompass Him, and Justice and Right to be the mainstays of His throne.

Similarly, in the traditional form of the Yoser-hymn, Purity and Rectitude stand before His throne, Loving-kindness and Compassion before His glory, while Knowledge and Understanding surround Him. (29) The notion is then in turn developed in kabbalistic lore, where such qualities (arranged in pairs) are regarded as constituent elements of a pluralistic Deity.

The idea need not be discarded in our own times as a mere outworn fantasy. It is susceptible of still further development. The assertion that Knowledge and Understanding circle around God may be understood today not in the sense that He is enveloped by them, but rather that all empirical perception and science can at best but skirt His essence.

Similarly, the affirmation that Loving-kindness and Compassion stand before His glory may mean for us today that the benevolence and compassion revealed (one might say, inbuilt) in the order of Nature—such factors as the inevitable return of spring, the instinctive love of mother for child, the ability both to remember and to forget—take precedence over its outward majesty as manifestations of God, and that He attaches more importance to them than to the physical display of His splendor.

The association of daybreak with creation is brought out in our poem by a direct reference to a passage in the Book of Job (38.7) where it is said that at the dawn of the world all the celestial hosts (styled 'sons of God') and all the morning stars burst into song. The verse is exquisitely chosen, for the earthly counterparts of those 'sons of God' are the faithful and sensitive among men, while those of the morning stars are the illumined 'children of light' whom the men of Qumran claimed (or, at least, aspired) to be. The implication is, therefore, that in their daily matins the latter are in fact emulating what their heavenly archetypes did at the first dayspring.

III

The Lament for Zion is not part of the 'psalmodic' compendium, but has been pieced together out of two separate fragments retrieved from another cave. (30) In style and content it is the forerunner of the dirges which came later to be chanted in the synagogue on the Fast of Ab, the anniversary of the destruction of the Temple.

Like those compositions, it draws heavily on the Biblical Book of Lamentations (likewise part of the service), and punctuates the several stanzas with the refrain, Woe unto us (31) The archaeological evidence makes it clear that the poem was composed before 68 C.E., the year in which the Qumran 'monastery' was abandoned. The Temple which the poem mourns is therefore the First Temple, destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 B.C.E., and if it be asked why such mourning should have continued when a second temple was in fact standing, the answer is that, by reason of the venality of the Jerusalemitan priests, the men of Qumran regarded the latter as polluted and no longer recognized its sanctity.

At first, no doubt, dirges of this kind were inspired more immediately by nostalgia on the part of those who had actually witnessed the disaster and by despair at the loss of relatives and friends—an intense personal trauma like that experienced in our own day by survivors of the Nazi holocaust.

In course of time, however, Zion came to take on a wider meaning. Just as the Temple was, while it stood, the outward symbol of God's presence among His people and of their own reciprocal devotion to Hun, so its destruction became that of His seeming withdrawal (or 'exile') and of their own defection from Him. The dirges then tended to become stereotyped in the form of literary cliches and imitations of the Biblical Book of Lamentations, and this is what we find in our poem.

It can scarcely be described as either a spontaneous cri du coeur or as a literary masterpiece; it lacks both the artistry and inventiveness of (say) the great lament in The Apocalypse of Baruch (32)and the simple pathos of (say) Jane Elliot's famous Lament for Flodden. (33) Indeed, the sound of tears seems to have degenerated into little more than a liturgical bleat

Just the opposite note is sounded in two short poems contained in a fragmentary hymnal retrieved from Cave 4. These are songs of consolation, holding out the hope of an imminent era of prosperity, the rout of the wicked (Belial), and the restoration of past glories. They are little more than pastiches of Biblical verses and lack any real creative originality.

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Notes

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1. I see no reason for assuming that the Qumran com-pendium represents an alternative canonical Psalter. A crucial objection to this view (which no one seems yet to have pointed out) is that, while there are no less than 154 quotations from our standard Psalter in The Book of Hymns and other Qumran writings (see be-low, pp. 144fE.), there is nary a one from the 'extra' hymns included in the present collection. This surely proves that the latter were not 'familiar in men's mouths' as words of Scripture.

2. For details, see J. A. Sanders, ed., DSD IV: The Psalms Scroll from Cave 11 (1965), pp. 53f. The standard edition is that of Martin Noth, in Zeitschrift fur die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 48 (1930), pp 1-23, which includes a retroversion into Hebrew.

3. Such attribution has nothing whatsoever to do with the question of canonization. Nor is it of any real im-portance that there are differences between the Qum-ran text, the Masoretic recension, and the Greek (Septuagint) Version concerning the Davidic authorship of certain psalms. Such variant ascriptions were not uncommon in antiquity, even as they are today among classical scholars. Some rabbis, for instance, even attributed the Book of Job to Moses! Moreover, the Talmud (Baba Bathra, 14b) records a tradition that David put together a vast corpus of psalms, some of which went back to Abraham!

4. Pseudo-Philo, Biblical Antiquities, 59.4, quotes another psalm which David is said to have indited when he fought Goliath. The title, A Hallelujah, found in the Qumran scroll, recalls the later statement by R. Arika ('Rab'; c. 220 C.E.), cited in Midrash Tehillim, 1, that this is the most appropriate designation of the Psalter as a whole.

5. Midrash Tehillim, 78.20; Exodus Rabba, ii.2.

6. Koran, Suras xxi.79; xxxiv.10.

7. For <ale ha-'esim, 'the leaves of the trees', they read 'illu ha-'esim, giving to the former word the meaning which it bears in post-Biblical Hebrew.

8. Cp. Sanders, op. cit., p. 62.

9. Cp. E. R. Goodenough, Jewish Symbols in the Graeco-Roman Period, iii (1953), fig. 604; v (1956), figs. 117-19. For the identification with David cp. C. H. Kraeling, The Excavations at Dura-Europus, Sixth Season (1936), p. 370; Rachel Wischnitzer, The Messianic Theme in the Paintings of the Dura Synagogue (1948), p. 95.

10. In the Vigna Randanini, on the Via Appia; cp. Robert Eisler, Orphisch-Dionysische Mysteriengedanken (1925), pp. 4-5.

11. Cp. Eisler, op. cit., p. 11.

12. In later midrash he is sometimes identified with Hermes, as inventor of the lyre, and it is even said that he sits in heaven twanging his harp under the name of Hermesiel!

13. Cp. Stith Thompson, Motif-Index of Folk Literature, D.I275.1; T. H. Gaster, The Oldest Stories in the World (1952), pp. 13If. One thinks, for instance, of Wanaimoinen's music in the Finnish Kalevala.

14. The Greek Version substitutes, And who will report (this) to my Lord? The Syriac, with no less lack of sequence, has, Who will show me my Lord? He, the Lord, has become my God. Neither translator could read poetry.

15. E.g., S. Rabbinowitz, in Zeitschrift fur die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 76 (1964), pp. 193ff.

16. E.g., II Maccabees, 9.5; 12.22; 15.2; III Mace. 2.21; Sibylline Oracles, frag, i.4, ed. Geffcken.

17. S. Singer, ed., The Authorized Daily Prayerbook (1890), p. 76.

18. Cp. Theocritus, Id., iv, 28; vii, 71.

19. Cp. Theocritus, Id., vi, 43-44; vii, 74; Vergil, Eel, v, 62f.; vii, 2.22f.; x, 9.

20. E.g., Theocritus, Id., v, 91; cp. also Horace, Odes, hi, 20, 14.

21. Cf. L. Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, ii, 5, 44, 48. This detail finds place also in the retelling of the story in the Persian poet Jami's Yusuf and Zuleikha; see J. D. Yohannan, ed., Joseph and Potiphar's Wife in World Literature (1968), pp. 176, 180.

22. This rendering depends on taking the Hebrew word yahad, 'together', as the noun which elsewhere designates the Qumran Brotherhood. But this is forced, since the expression is modelled directly on Psalm 122.3.

23. Mishnah, Aboth iii, 3, 4. The sayings are attributed respectively to Hananiah b. Teradion (martyred, 135 C.E.) and Simeon b. Yohai (c. 100-70 C.E.).

24. In the Mishnaic context, the reference is probably to the Roman feriae novendiales, a sacrifice and funeral repast on the ninth day after burial (cp. Juvenal, Sat., v, 85; Servius, on Vergil, Aen., v, 64) or to the silicernium, a meal near the grave (cp. Terence, Adelphi, iv, 2, 48; Servius, on Vergil, Aen., v, 92).

25. The elements of 'building Jerusalem' (cp. Ps. 147.2) and of 'causing the horn of David to flourish' (cp. Ps. 132.17) occur in succession in the Eighteen Benedictions (xiv, xv) in the Jewish liturgy, while references to 'deliverance in the day of trouble', the redemption of Israel, the building of the City, the flourishing of the horn' both of David and of Israel, and God's choice of Zion appear also in the hymn which is inserted in the Genizah text of Sirach, after 51.12.

26. The Mishnah (Berachoth, vii.3) says that if three, or a hundred, or a thousand, or a myriad others be present, the formula must begin, Bless ye, rather than Let us bless, as when there are but three persons in all. R. Akiba and R. Ishmael assert, however, that Bless ye is the formula in all cases. This corresponds to the Christian Benedicite. To 'say Grace' is still called colloquially 'to bensh', i.e., a Judaeo-German (Yiddish) corruption of that word.

27. A second copy has now been identified in a fragmentary scroll from another cave at Qumran.

28. Mishnah, Berachoth, i.l; cp. Wisdom of Solomon, 16.28. 29 S. Singer, ed., Authorized Daily Prayerbook (1962), p.39.

30. There are also sundry minor scraps too fragmentary to translate.

31. Most of these compositions are, to be sure, medieval, and many of them commemorate later catastrophes. For those of the Ashkenazic rite, see S. Baer, ed., Seder ha-Qinoth (Rodelheim, 1913). Those of the Sephardic rite derive mainly from the Spanish school of Jewish poets and are of far superior literary quality. For representative translations see T. H. Gaster, Festivals of the Jewish Year (1953), pp. 207ff.; Nina Davis, Songs of Exile (1901). An interesting specimen of the same genre is the Judaeo-Greek lament published by Benjamin Schwartz in The Joshua Bloch Memorial Volume (New York, 1960), pp. 107-44.

32. x.6-9.

33. Richard Aldington, ed., The Viking Book of Poetry of the English-speaking World (1941), pp. 582f.

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The Hymn Of The Initiants

[Manual of Discipline, cols, x-xi]

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{1} [Day and night will I offer my praise]
and at all the appointed times which God has prescribed.

When daylight begins its rule,
when it reaches its turning-point, (1)
and when it again withdraws to its appointed abode;

When the watches of darkness begin,
when God opens the storehouse thereof, (2)
when He sets that darkness against the light, (3)
when it reaches its turning-point, (4)
and when it again withdraws in face of the light;

When sun and moon shine forth from the holy Height,
and when they again withdraw to the
glorious Abode; (5)

When the formal seasons come on the days of new
moon, (6)
when they reach their turning-points, (7)
and when they yield place to one another,
as each comes round anew; (*)

----

[*] The text here incorporates a series of esoteric glosses which have been omitted from the translation.

----

{5} When the natural seasons come, at whatever time
may be;
when, too, the months begin;
on their feasts and on holy days,
as they come in order due,
each as a memorial in its season (8)—
I shall hold it as one of the laws
engraven of old on the tablets (9)
to render to God as my tribute
—the blessings of my lips. (10)

When the (natural) years begin;
at the turning-points of their seasons,
and when each completes its term
on its natural day,
yielding each to each—
reaping-time to summer,
sowing-time to verdure;

In the (formal) years of weeks,
in the several seasons thereof,
and when, at the jubilee,
the series of weeks begins (11)—
yea, throughout my life,
I shall hold it as one of the laws
engraven of old on the tablets
to offer to God as my fruits—
the praises of my tongue,
and to cull for him as my tithe
—the skilled melody of my lips. (12)

All my music shall be for the glory of God;
my lyre and my harp shall be devoted
to tell of His holy dispensation;
I shall put the flute to my lips
to rehearse the due poise of His judgments.

{10} With the coming of day and night
I shall come ever anew
into God's covenant;
and when evening and morning depart,
shall ob<ser>ve how He sets their bounds. (13)

Only where God sets bounds
—the unchangeable bounds of His Law-
will I too set my domain. (14)
I shall hold it as one of the laws
engraven of old on the tablets
to face my sin and transgression
and avouch the justice of God.

I shall say unto God:
Thou, for me, art the Right!'
and unto the Most High:
'For me Thou art cause of all good!'

Fountain of all knowledge,
Spring of holiness,
Zenith of all glory,
Might omnipotent,
Beauty that never fades,

I will choose the path He shows me,
and be content with His judgments.

Whenever I first put forth my hand or foot,
I will bless His name; (15)
when first I go or come,
when I sit and when I rise, (16)
when I lie down on my couch,
I will sing unto Him.
At the common board,
or ever I raise my hand
to enjoy the rich yield of the earth,
with the fruit of my own lips
I will bless Him as with an oblation. (17)

At the onset of fear and alarm,
or when trouble and stress are at hand,
I will bless him with special thanksgiving
and muse upon His power,
and rely on His mercies always,
and come thereby to know
that in His hand lies the judgment of all living,
and that all His works are truth. (18)

Whenever distress breaks out,
I still will praise Him;
and when His salvation comes,
join the chorus of praise. (19)

I will heap no evil on any,
but pursue all men with good, (20)
knowing that only with God
lies the judgment of all living,
and He it is will award
each man his deserts.

I will not be envious
of the profit of wickedness;
for wealth unrighteously gotten my soul shall not lust (21)

I will not engage in strife
with reprobate men, (22)
forestalling the Day of Requital. (23)

I will not turn back my wrath
from froward men,
nor rest content until justice be affirmed.

I will harbor no angry grudge
against those that indeed repent, (24)
but neither will I show compassion
to any that turn from the way.

I will not console the smitten
until they amend their course.

I will cherish no baseness in my heart,
nor shall there be heard in my mouth
coarseness (25) or wanton deceit;
neither shall there be found upon my lips
deception and lies. (26)
The fruit of holiness shall be on my tongue,
and no heathen filth be found thereon.

I will open my mouth with thanksgiving,
and my tongue shall ever relate
the righteousness of God
and the perfidy of men
until men's transgressions be ended.

Empty words will I banish from my lips;
filth and perverseness from my mind.

I will hedge in knowledge with sound counsel,
{25} and protect [it] with shrewdness of mind.

I will [set] a sober limit
to all defending of faith
and exacting of justice by force.
I will bound God's righteousness
by the measuring-line of occasion.
[I will temper] justice [with mercy],
will show kindness to men downtrodden,
(xi,1) bring firmness to fearful hearts,
discernment to spirits that stray,
enlighten the bowed with sound doctrine,
reply to the proud with meekness,
with humility answer the base
—men rich in worldly goods,
who point the finger of scorn
and utter iniquitous thoughts.

To God I commit my cause.
It is His to perfect my way,
His to make straight my heart
He, in His charity,
will wipe away my transgression.

For He from the Wellspring of Knowledge
has made His light to burst forth,
and mine eye has gazed on His wonders;
and the light that is in my heart
has pierced the deep things of existence.

He is ever the stay of my right hand. (27)
The path beneath my feet
is set on a mighty rock (28)
unshaken before all things.
For that rock beneath my feet
{5} is the truth of God,
and His power is the stay of my right hand;
from the fount of His charity
my vindication goes forth.

Through His mysterious wonder
light is come into my heart;
mine eye has set its gaze
on everlasting things.
A virtue hidden from man,
a knowledge and subtle lore
concealed from human kind;
a fount of righteousness,
a reservoir of strength,
a Wellspring of all glory
wherewith no flesh has converse—
these has God bestowed
on them that He has chosen,
to possess them for ever.
He has given them an inheritance
in the lot of the Holy Beings,
and joined them in communion with the Sons of Heaven, (29)
to form one congregation,
one single communion,
a fabric of holiness,
a plant evergreen, (30)
for all time to come.

But I—-I belong to wicked mankind,
to the communion of sinful flesh.
My transgressions, my iniquities and sins,
and the waywardness of my heart
{10} condemn me to communion with the worm
and with all that walk in darkness.

For a mortal's way is [not] of himself,
neither can a man direct his own steps.
The judgment lies with God,
and 'tis His to perfect man's way.

Only through His knowledge
have all things come to be,
and all that is, is ordained by His thought;
and apart from Him is nothing wrought. (31)

Behold, if I should totter,
God's mercies will be my salvation.
If I stumble in the waywardness of flesh,
I shall be set aright
through God's righteousness ever-enduring.
If distress break out,
He will snatch my soul from perdition,
and set my foot on the path.
For He, in His compassion,
has drawn me near unto Him, (32)
and His judgment upon me shall be rendered in His mercy.

In his righteous truth He has judged me,
and in His abundant goodness
will shrive my iniquities,
and in His righteousness cleanse me
from all the pollution of man
{15} and the sin of human kind,
that I may acknowledge unto God His righteousness,
and unto the Most High His majestic splendor.

Blessed art Thou, O my God,
Who hast opened the heart of Thy servant unto knowledge.
Direct all his works in righteousness,
and vouchsafe unto the son of Thine handmaid
the favor which Thou hast assured to all the mortal elect,
to stand in Thy presence for ever.

For apart from Thee no man's way can be perfect,
and without Thy will is nothing wrought.
Thou it is that hast taught all knowledge,
and all things exist by Thy will;
and there is none beside Thee
to controvert Thy plan;
none to understand all Thy holy thought,
none to gaze into the depths of Thy secrets,
none to perceive all Thy wonders and the might of
Thy power.

{20} Who can compass the sum of Thy glory?
And what is mere mortal man
amid Thy wondrous works?
And what the child of woman
to sit in Thy presence?
For, behold, he is kneaded of dust,
and his [ ] is the food of worms.
He is but a molded shape, (33)
a thing nipped out of clay, (34)
whose attachment is but to the dust.

What can such clay reply,
or that which is molded by hand?

What thought can it comprehend?

=======

The Book Of Hymns
Or
Psalms Of Thanksgiving

1 (1) - 1,5-39

. . . . . .

{5} [Thou art the source of all might]
and the Wellspring of all power;
[yet art Thou also rich in wisdom]
[and] great in counsel. (2)

Thy fury [is vented] in the presence of [ ];
[yet are Thy mercies] beyond number.

[Thou art a God that visits wrongdoing;]
[yet also a God] longsuffering in judgment (3)

In whatsoever Thou doest,
Thou hast ever done justly.

In Thy wisdom didst [Thou call into being]
[spirits] immortal,
and ere Thou didst create them,
didst foreknow their works for all time.

[Apart from Thee] can naught be done,
and naught apprehended save by Thy will. (4)

Thou it is formed every spirit,
[and set due rule] and role for all their works.

{10} When Thou didst stretch out the heavens
for Thy glory,
and [command] all [their host] to do Thy will, (5)
Thou didst also make potent spirits
to keep them in bounds.

Or ever spirits immortal
took on the form of ho[ly] angels, (6)
Thou didst assign them to bear rule
over divers domains:
over the sun and moon,
to govern their hidden powers;
over the stars,
to hold them to their courses;
over [rain and snow,]
to make them fulfill their functions;
over meteors and lightnings,
to make them discharge their tasks; (7)
[and Thou didst set them in] promptuaries (8)
[whence Thou didst cause them to issue]
for their several purposes,
to govern the mysteries of these things. (9)
When, too, in Thy power Thou didst create
earth and seas and deeps,
in Thy wisdom (10) didst Thou set [with] in them
[spirits immortal],

{15} thereby to dispose to Thy will
all that therein is.
[So hast Thou made (his) flesh
a promptuary] in (this) world
for that spirit of man which Thou didst create (11)
to last throughout all time
and for ages infinite,
that it might gov[ern his deeds].
Thou hast assigned the tasks of men's spirits
duly, moment by moment, (12)
throughout their generations;
and Thou hast determined the mode
in which they shall wield their sway,
season by season;
yea, [Thou hast prescribed] their [works,]
age after age-
alike when they shall be visited with peace
and when they shall suffer affliction. (13)

Thou hast [ man's spirit]
and duly assigned its role
for all his offspring
throughout the generations of time;
and [Thou hast ] it
for all years of eternity.
And in Thy knowing wisdom
Thou hast ordained its fate,
or ever it came into being.

{20} By [Thy will all things exi]st,
and without Thee is nothing wrought. (14)

Shapen of clay and kneaded with water,
a bedrock of shame and a source of pollution,
a cauldron of iniquity and a fabric of sin,
a spirit errant and wayward, (15)
distraught by every just judgment—
what can I say that hath not been foreknown,
or what disclose that hath not been foretold?
All things are inscribed before Thee
in a recording script, (16)
for every moment of time,
for the infinite cycles of years,
in their several appointed times.
{25} No single thing is hidden,
naught missing from Thy presence.

How can man say aught
to account for his sins?
How argue in excuse of his misdeeds?
How can he enter reply
to any just sentence upon him?
Thine, O God of all knowledge, (17)
are all works of righteousness
and the secret of truth;
while man's is but thralldom to wrongdoing,
and works of deceit.
The spirit that lies in man's speech,
Thou didst create.
Thou hast known all the words of man's tongue
and determined the fruit of his lips, (18)
ere those lips themselves had being.
It is Thou that disposeth all words in due sequence (19)
and giveth to the spirit of the lips
ordered mode of expression; (20)
that bringeth forth their secrets
in measured utterances, (21)
and granteth unto spirits
means to express their thoughts,
that Thy glory may be made known,

{30} and Thy wonders told forth
in all Thine unerring works,
and that Thy righteousness [may be proclaimed,]
and Thy name be praised in the mouth of all things,
and that all creatures may know Thee,
each to the meed of his insight,
and bless Thee alway.
Moreover, in Thy mercy and great lovingkindness
Thou hast given man's spirit the strength
to endure afflictions,
and the power to come forth clean,
though never so great its transgressions;
showing thereby unto all Thy works
what wonders Thou canst perform.
[So, for my own part,
what I tell is, to sim]ple minds,
but a tale of my sufferings
and how just they are;
but to the world at large
'tis a tale of miracles
which Thou hast evinced through me
in the sight of all mankind.

Hear, then, ye that are wise,
and sanely reflect;
Ye that are simple-minded, (22)
learn to think with more depth! (23)
Ye that are righteous
put an end to perversity!
Ye that are blameless of conduct
keep a firm stance!
Be patient and spurn not correction!
Though men that are foolish at heart
cannot understand these things,
God's ways are ever just;
while men who behave unbridled
will (be left to) gnash their teeth. (24)

=======

2 - II, 2-19

. . . . . .

[I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,]
for Thou art my strength and [my stronghold, (1)]
and Thou hast delivered my soul
from all works of unrighteousness.
[For Thou hast] put [truth in my heart]
and righteousness [in my spirit,]
along with all gifts of Thy wisd[om;]
{5} and hast crushed the loins [of them]
[that have risen up against me. (2)]

Thou bringest me cheer, O Lord, (3)
amid the sorrow of mourning,
words of peace amid havoc,
stoutness of heart when I faint, fortitude in the face of affliction.

Thou hast given free flow of speech
to my stammering lips;
stayed my drooping spirit
with vigor and strength;
made my feet to stand firm
when they stood where wickedness reigns. (4)

To transgressors I am a snare,
but healing to them that repent,
prudence to the unwary,
temperance to the rash.

{10} Thou hast made me a reproach and a derision
to them that live by deceit,
but a symbol of truth and understanding
to all whose way is straight

I am become an eyesore unto the wicked,
a slander on the lips of the unbridled; (5)
scoffers gnash their teeth.
A song am I unto transgressors, (6)
and the hordes of the wicked rage against me; (7)
like ocean gales they storm which,
when their billows rage, cast up mire and dirt. (8)

Yet, Thou hast set me as a banner
in the vanguard (9) of Righteousness,
as one who interprets with knowledge
deep, mysterious things;
as a touchstone for them that seek the truth,
a standard for them that love correction. (10)

To them that preach misguidance
I am but a man of strife; (11)

{15} but to them that see straight, (12)
[a very symbol of pe]ace.

To them that pursue del fusion]
I am but a gust of zeal; (13)
men that live by deceit
roar against me like the roar of many waters.

Naught is there in their thoughts
save mischievous designs.
When, opening the fount of knowledge
to all that have understanding,
Thou hast set a man's life to rights
by the words of my mouth,
and hast taught unto him Thy lesson
and put understanding in his heart
—they thrust him back into the pit.
In place of these Thy gifts
they offer a witless folk— (14)
stammering lips and barbarous tongue, (15)
that, wandering astray,
they rush headlong to their doom. (16)

=======

3 - II, 20-30

. . . . .

{20} I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast put my soul in the bundle of life (1)
and hedged me (2) against all the snares of corruption.

Because I clung to Thy covenant,
fierce men sought after my life. (3)
But they—a league of Falsehood, a congregation of Belial-

they knew not that through Thee I would stand.
For Thou in Thy mercy dost save my life;
for by Thee are my footsteps guided.

Of Thy doing it was that they assailed me,
to the end that by Thy judgment on the wicked
Thy glory might stand revealed,
and that Thou mightest show forth through me

{25} Thy power over mankind;
for by Thy mercy I have stood.

Mighty men, I said, have pitched their camp against me;
their weapons have compassed me,
their shafts have been loosed unceasing;
the flash of their spears is like fire devouring timber,
and the roar of their voices like the roar of many waters.
Like a floodburst bringing ruin far and wide, (4)
all weak things and frail
they crush in a pounding cascade. (5)

Yet, while my heart was dissolving like water,
my soul held firm to Thy covenant,
and they—their own foot was caught
in the net they had spread for me;
in the traps they had hidden for my soul
themselves they fell. (6)

'Now that my foot on level ground doth rest,

{30} Far from the madding crowd, I call Thee blest'. (7)

=======

4 - II, 31-36

. . . . .

I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thine eye is ever awake,
watching over my soul.
Thou hast delivered me
from envy of them that preach falsehood,
and hast freed this hapless soul (1)
from the congregation of them
that seek smooth things
—men who sought to destroy me
and spill my blood in Thy service.

Little did they know
that my steps were ordered of Thee,
when they made me a mock and a reproach
in the mouths of all men of deceit.
But ever, O my God,
hast Thou holpen the soul
of the needy and weak
and snatched him from the grasp

{35} of him that was stronger than he. (2)

So hast Thou freed my soul
from the grasp of mighty men,
nor suffered me so to be crushed by their taunts
that for fear of the mischief which the wicked might wreak
I should forsake Thy service,
or change for wild delusion
the sound spirit which Thou hast vouchsafed me.

=======

5 - III, 3-18

. . . . .

[I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,]
for Thou hast illumined [my face]
[with the vision of Thy truth;]
[wherefore I yet shall wa]lk in glory everlasting
along with all [the holy that hear the words of] Thy mouth;

{5} and Thou wilt deliver me from [the pit and the slough.]

Howbeit, at this hour
my soul is [sore dism]ayed.
Men deem me a [worthless shard]
and render my life like a ship stormtossed on the deep,
or like a bastion city1 beleaguered by the [foe.]

Yea, I am in distress
as a woman in travail
bringing forth her firstborn, (2)
when, as her time draws near,
the pangs come swiftly upon her (3)
and all the racking pains (4)
in the crucible of conception.

For now, amid throes of death,
new life is coming to birth, (5)
and the pangs of travail set in,
as at last there enters the world
the man-child long conceived.
Now, amid throes of death,
that man-child long foretold
is about to be brought forth. (6)

{10} Now, 'mid the pangs of hell, (7)
there will burst forth from the womb
that marvel of mind and might, (8)
and that man-child will spring from the throes! (9)

From the moment that he was conceived
pangs have been sweeping apace
over the whole wide world; (10)
new things have been coming to birth
amid racking pains,
and tremors have beset
the wombs in which they lie.

And when he comes to birth,
all those pangs of travail
that rack the world's great womb (11)
—that crucible of conception-
will take a sudden turn; (12)
what has been conceived
with all the bale of a viper (13)
will end, at the moment of birth,
in mere racking pain,
and all the tremors be but labor lost (14)
For lo, the wall shall rock
unto its prime foundation,
even as rocks a ship
stormtossed on the waters.

The heavens shall thunder loud,
and they that now do dwell
on the crumbling dust of the earth
be as sailors on the seas,
aghast at the roaring of the waters;
and all the wise men thereof
be as mariners on the deep

{15} when all their skill is confounded (15)
by the surging of the seas,
the seething of the depths, (16)
as high o'er the swirling tides (17)
the billows [surge], the breakers roar,
while the gates of Hell (18) burst open,
and at every step they take,
they face Perdition's shafts, (19)
and only the raging deep
hears their cries. (20)
Yet anon shall the gates of [salvation] (21) be opened;
all baleful deeds [will cease], (22)
while the doors of Perdition shall close
on all that Perverseness has conceived,
and everlasting bars
(23) shut in all baleful spirits.

=======

6 - III, 19-36

. . . . .

I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast freed my soul from the pit (1)
and drawn me up from the slough of hell (2)

{20} to the crest of the world.

So walk I on uplands unbounded
and know that there is hope (3)
for that which Thou didst mold out of dust
to have consort with things eternal.

For lo, Thou hast taken a spirit distorted by sin, (4)
and purged it of the taint of much transgression, (5)
and given it a place
in the host of the holy beings,
and brought it into communion
with the sons of heaven.

Thou hast made a mere man to share
the lot of the Spirits of Knowledge, (6)
to praise Thy name in their chorus (7)
and rehearse Thy wondrous deeds
before all Thy works. (8)

I, that am molded of clay,
what am I?
I, that am kneaded with water,
what is my worth?

I, that have taken my stand
where wickedness reigns, (9)

{25} that have cast my lot with the froward;
whose soul has lodged like a beggar
in a place of wild unrest; (10)
I, whose every step
has been amid ruin and rout (11)—
on what strength of mine own may I count

when Corruption's snares are laid,
and the nets of Wickedness spread,
when far and wide on the waters
Frowardness sets her drags, (12)
when the shafts of Corruption fly (13)
with none to turn them back,
when they are hurled apace
with no hope of escape;

when the hour of judgment strikes, (*)
when the lot of God's anger is cast
upon the abandoned,
when His fury is poured forth (14) upon dissemblers, (15)
when the final doom of His rage
falls on all worthless things;

----

[*] Heb. 'When the line falls upon judgment'; cf. Isa. 28.27.

----

when the torrents of Death do swirl, (16)
and there is none escape; when the rivers of Belial (17)
burst their high banks
—rivers that are like fire devouring all ...,
rivers whose runnels destroy

{30} green tree and dry tree alike, (18)
rivers that are like fire
which sweeps with flaming sparks
devouring all that drink their waters
—a fire which consumes
all foundations of clay,
every solid bedrock;

when the foundations of the mountains
become a raging blaze, (19)
when granite roots are turned
to streams of pitch, (20)
when the flame devours
down to the great abyss, (21)
when the floods of Belial burst forth
unto hell itself;

when the depths of the abyss are in turmoil,
cast up mire in abundance, (22)
when the earth cries out in anguish
for the havoc wrought in the world,
when all its depths are aquake,
and all that is on it quails
and quivers in [mighty] havoc;
when with His mighty roar

God thunders forth, (23)
and His holy welkin (24) trembles
as His glorious truth is revealed,

{35} and the hosts of heaven give forth their voice,
and the world's foundations rock and reel;
when warfare waged by the soldiers of heaven
sweeps through the world (25)
and turns not back until final doom (26)
—warfare the like of which
has never been?

=======

7 - III, 37-IV, 4

[Fragment]

I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast been unto me a strong wall (1)
against all that would destroy me
and all that would [traduce me.]
Thou dost shelter me from the disasters
of a turbulent time,
[ ] that it come not [ ]

. . . . .

(iv,3) [Thou hast set] my foot upon a rock (2)
[I will walk] the age-old way
and the paths which Thou hast chosen.

=======

8 - IV, 5-V, 5

{5} I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast illumined my face
with the light of Thy covenant
[Day by day] I seek Thee,
and ever Thou shinest upon me
bright as the perfect dawn. (1)

But as for them—
they have [dealt treacherously] with Thee,
have made smooth their words. (2)
Garblers of truth are [they all,]
witlessly stumbling along. (3)
They [have turned] all their deeds to folly;
they have become abhorrent unto themselves.

Though Thou show Thy power through me,
they regard me not,
but thrust me forth from my land
like a sparrow from its nest;
all my friends and familiars
are thrust away from me,
and deem me a broken pot. (4)

Preachers of lies are they,

{10} prophets of deceit.
They have plotted mischief against me,
to make Thy people exchange for smooth words
Thy teaching which Thou hast engraven on my heart.
They have kept the draught of knowledge
from them that are athirst,
and given them in their thirst
vinegar to drink, (5)
to feast their eyes upon them
as they wander astray, (6)
make sport of them as they falter
and are caught in their snares.

But Thou, O God, wilt spurn
all the schemes of Belial.
Thy plan it is will prevail, (7)
and the thought of Thy heart endure for ever.

Crafty men are they; (8)
they think base thoughts,
seek Thee with heart divided,
stand not firm in Thy truth.
In their every thought is a root
which blossoms to wormwood and gall. (9)

{15} In the stubbornness of their hearts
they wander astray
and go seeking Thee through idols.
They make their iniquity
a stumbling-block before them, (10)
and come to inquire of Thee
from the mouths of lying prophets,
men by error seduced.

Then, with stammering tongue
and with alien lips (11)
they speak unto Thy people,
seeking guilefully
to turn their deeds to delusion.

They have [paid no heed to] Thy teaching,
nor given ear to Thy word,
but have said of the vision of knowledge,
'It is not sure',
and of the way Thou desirest,
There is no such thing'.

But Thou, O God, wilt give them their answer,
judging them in Thy power
for all their idolatrous acts
and their manifold transgressions,
to the end that they shall be caught
in their own designs (12)
who have turned away from Thy covenant

{20} Thou wilt sentence all men of deceit
to be cut off, (13)
and all the prophets of error
will be found no more.

For in all Thou doest there is no delusion,
and in all Thou thinkest no deceit
And they that are pleasing to Thee
shall stand in Thy presence for ever,
and they that walk in the way Thou desirest
rest firm for all time.

So, for mine own part,
because I have clung unto Thee,
I shall yet arise and stand upright (14)
against them that revile me;
and my hand shall yet be upon all
that hold me in contempt.

Though Thou show Thy power through me,
they regard me not
Howbeit, Thou in Thy might
hast shed upon me the Perfect Light,
and bedaubed not their faces with shame (15)
that have let themselves be found
when that I sought them out;
who, in a common accord,
have pledged themselves to Thee.

They that walked in the way Thou desirest
have hearkened unto me
and rallied to Thy cause

{25} in the legion of the saints. (16)
And Thou wilt vindicate them
and plainly show forth the truth; (17)
and suffer them not to stray
at the hand of froward men,
what tune these plot against them.

Thou wilt yet cause Thy people
to stand in awe of them.

But for them that transgress Thy word
Thou shalt ordain dispersal
among all the peoples on earth,
passing sentence on them
that they be cut off.

Through me hast Thou illumined
the faces of full many,
and countless be the times
Thou hast shown Thy power through me.

For Thou hast made known unto me
Thy deep, mysterious things,
hast shared Thy secret with me
and so shown forth Thy power;
and before the eyes of full many
this token stands revealed,
that Thy glory may be shown forth,
and all living know of Thy power.

Yet, never could flesh alone
attain unto this,
nor that which is molded of clay
do wonders so great

{30} —steeped in sin from the womb
and in guilt of perfidy unto old age.

Verily I know
that righteousness lies not with man,
nor perfection of conduct with mortals.

Only with God On High
are all works of righteousness;
and ne'er can the way of man
be stablished save by the spirit
which God has fashioned for him,
to bring unto perfection
the life of mortal man;
that all His works may know
how mighty is His power,
how plenteous His love
to all who do His will.

When I called to mind
all my guilty deeds
and the perfidy of my sires
—when wicked men
opposed Thy covenant,

{35} and froward men Thy word-
trembling seized hold on me and quaking,
all my bones were a-quiver;
my heart became like wax
melting before a fire,
my knees were like to water (18)
pouring over a steep; (19)

and I said: 'Because of my transgressions
I have been abandoned,
that Thy covenant holds not with me'.

But then, when I remembered
the strength of Thy hand
and Thy multitudinous mercies,
I rose again and stood upright,
and my spirit was fortified
to stand against affliction;
for I was stayed by Thy grace.
Thou in Thy plenteous compassion

dost wipe out sin, (20)
and with Thy righteousness
purge away man's guilt
Man alone cannot do
as Thou hast done;
for Thou it is didst create
both the righteous and the wicked.

And I said: Through Thy covenant
I shall go strengthened for ever,

. . . . .

[and on Thy gra]ce [be stayed.]

{40} For Thou Thyself art truth,
and all Thy works are righteousness'.

. . . . .

=======

9 - V, 5-19

{5} I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast not forsaken me
though I dwell as a sojourner
among an alien people, (1)
[nor cast me forth from Thy sight,]
[nor] judged me according to my guilt,
nor abandoned me to my lusts;

but hast rescued my life from the pit

Though Thou hast set [my soul] amid lions (2)
prompt to spring on the guilty
—fearful lions that break men's bones,
mighty lions that drink their blood—
and though Thou hast placed me full oft
in ready reach of their haul
who spread their nets for the froward
like fishers upon the waters,
or seek, like hunters, to trap them, (3)

yet, when Thou hast placed me there,
Thou hast dealt justly with me. (4)

For Thou hast set firm in my heart
Thy deep, deep truth;
and to them that seek after that truth
Thou bindest Thyself in pledge.

So hast Thou put a lock
upon the mouths of those lions,

{10} whose teeth are like a sword, (5)
whose fangs like a sharp spear, (6)
<whose breath> is the venom of serpents. (7)
Though ever they seek to raven,
and though ever they lie in wait,

they have opened not their jaws against me.

Thou hast sheltered me, O my God,
in the face of all mankind,
and hidden Thy teaching [within me],
until it be shown unto me
that the hour of Thy triumph is come. (8)

In all the distress of my soul
Thou hast not abandoned me.

In the bitterness of my spirit
Thou hast heard my cry,
and in my sighing discerned
the song of my pain.

When I have found myself
in a very den of lions, (9)
whetting their tongues like a sword, (10)
Thou hast rescued me in my plight
Yea, O my God, Thou hast locked their teeth
lest they rend a hapless man apart;
and Thou hast drawn back their tongue

{15} like a sword into its sheath, (11)
lest it [do hurt] to Thy servant

Moreover, to show forth Thy power
in the sight of all men,
Thou hast singled me out, a hapless wretch,
and worked a wonder in me,
passing me [like gold] through a furn[ace,]
even through the action of fire,
and like silver that is refined
in the crucible of the smith,
to come forth sevenfold pure. (12)

The wicked rush wildly upon me
to [grasp] me in their vice,
and they crush my spirit all day,
but Thou, O my God, dost turn the storm to a calm. (13)

From the jaws of very lions
Thou hast snatched a poor lost soul,
[when it was nigh] to be rent

=======

10 - V, 20-VI, 35

{20} Blessed art Thou, O Lord,
for Thou hast never abandoned the orphan
neither despised the poor.

[Unbounded is] Thy power,
and Thy glory hath no measure.

Angels of wondrous strength
minister unto Thee,

and [they walk] at the side of the meek
and of them that are eager for right-doing, (1)
and of all the lost and lorn
that stand in need of mercy,
lifting them out of the slough (2)
when that their feet are mired. (3)

So, for mine own part,
to them that were once my [familiars]
I am become [a reproach],
an object of strife and discord (4)
unto my friends;
an occasion of fury and anger
unto my fellows;
of murmuring and complaint
to all mine acquaintances.

[All] that ate of my bread (5)
have lifted their heels against me; (6)
all that shared my board
have mouthed distortions about me; (7)
and they with whom I [consorted]
have turned their backs upon me
and defamed me up and down.

{25} By reason of the secret
which Thou hast hidden within me
they have spread slander against me
to men that were bent on mischief.

Because they have he[mmed in my w]ay (8)
and because they are laden with guilt,
Thou hast (perforce) kept hidden (from them)
the fount of understanding
and the secret of truth,
while they—they go on contriving
the mischief of their hearts,
opening their shameless [mouths,]
unleashing their lying tongues
which are like the venom of adders (9)
fitfully spurting forth; (10)
like reptiles they shoot forth their his[sing]
—vipers that cannot be charmed. (11)

It becomes like a constant pain, (12)
a fretting wound (13)
in the body of Thy servant,
causing his spirit to droop,
wearing down his strength, (14)
until he cannot withstand.

They have o'ertaken me between the straits, (15)
and I have no escape.

. . . . .

{30} They have thundered abuse
of me to the tune of the harp,
and in jingles chorused their jeers.

Confusion and panic beset me, (16)
horrendous anguish (17) and pain,
like to the throes of travail.
My heart is distraught within me;
I clothe me in mourning garb; (18)
my tongue cleaves to the roof of my mouth. (19)
[In] their hearts they rev[ile me,]
and openly vented their spleen.

The light of my face is turned to darkness,
my radiance to gl[oom].

Thou, O my God,
hast enlarged my heart,
but ever they seek to constrict it
They have hedged me about with thick darkness.

I eat my bread amid sighs,
and my drink is mingled with tears (20)
which have none end.
Mine eyes are dimmed with anguish, (21)
and with all that beclouds the daylight (22)
my soul is over [cast.]
Sorrow and sighing are all about me,

{35} and the pall of shame o'er my face.
The very bre[ad] that I eat
seems to be quarreling with me,
the very drink that I drink
to be at odds with me.

They purpose to trammel my spirit,
to wear down all my strength
with blasphemous mystic lore,
converting the works of God
into that which they guiltily imagine.

I am bound with unbreakable cords,
with fetters that cannot be sundered.
A strong wall [is upreared against me;]
bars of iron [restrain me]
and doors of brass. (23)

. . . . .

Over my soul swirl the torrents of hell. (24)

. . . . .

(vi,2) My heart [is sore distraught]
because of their obloquy
which they have heaped upon me.

. . . . .

[Ruin encompasses me,]

disaster which knows no bound,
destruction which hath no [end.]

. . . . .

[Howbeit, O my God,]
Thou hast opened mine ear withal
to the lessons which they impart
who reprove with justice, (25)
[and hast thereby delivered me]

{5} from company with the vain
from fellowship with crime
and hast brought me into communion
[with Thy holy truth],
[purging my soul of] guilt

So am I come to know
that in [Thy] lovingkindness]
lies hope for them that repent
and for them that abandon sin,
[and confidence for him]
who walks in the way of Thy heart
without perversity.

Therefore, though peoples roar,
though kingdoms rage, (26)
when that they gather together,
I shall go comforted.
I shall [not] be dismayed,
knowing that in a space
Thou wilt raise a reviving for Thy people
and grant to Thine inheritance a remnant, (27)
and refine them, to purge them of guilt

Whenas in all their deeds
they have done as Thy truth (†) enjoined,
Thou wilt judge them with lovingkindness,
with plenteous compassion
and abundance of forgiveness,
guiding them according to Thy word,

{10} stablishing them by Thy counsel, (‡)
by Thine unswerving truth.

----

[†] I e., the Scriptures.
[‡] Or, 'in Thy council'.

----

Thou hast acted for Thyself and for Thy glory,
that the Law may come to [fruition,]
and hast [sent] among mankind
men that be schooled in Thy counsel
to tell forth Thy wonders through the ages,
world without end,
to [rehea]rse Thy deeds of power
without surcease,
that all nations may know Thy truth,
and all peoples Thy glory.

All them that follow Thy counsel
hast Thou brought into [com]munion with Thee,
and hast given them common estate
with the Angels of Thy Presence. (28)
There stands no intermediary among them
to appr[oach Thee in their behalf
and] bring them back Thy word (29)
filtered through his mind (?); (30)
for they themselves are answered
from out of Thy glorious mouth.
They are Thy courtiers, (§)
sharing the high estate
of [all the heavenly beings.]

----

[§] Heb. 'princes'. The word is commonly used in post-Biblical Hebrew to denote angels.

----

{15} [For these hast Thou planted a tree]
which blooms with flowers unfading,
whose boughs put forth thick leaves,
which stands firm-planted for ever,
and gives shade to all [ ];
[whose branches tower] to hea[ven],
whose roots sink down to the abyss. (31)

All the rivers of Eden
[water] its boughs; (32)
it thrives beyond [all bounds],
[burgeons beyond all] measure.
[Its branches stretch] endless across the world,
[and its roots go down] to the nethermost depths.

Moreover, there shall well forth for them
a fountain of light

a perpetual spring unfailing.
Howbeit, in its [fiery] sparks
all [infamous] men shall be burned;
it shall be as a flame devouring the guilty,
until they are destroyed.

These men who were once my comrades,
pledged to the selfsame task
of bearing witness to Thee,
have let themselves be seduced
by garbl[ers of truth],
[that they are concerned no more]
with working for righteousness.

{20} Thou hadst given them commandments, O God,
that they might have profit of their lives
by walking Thy ho[ly way,]
whereon the uncircumcised and unclean
and profane may not pass. (33)

But they veered from the way of Thy heart
and ensnared themselves in their lusts.

Belial has been counseling their hearts (34)
and, through their wicked devisings,
they have been wallowing in guilt.

Wherefore on their account
I was as a sailor in a ship
when the seas do froth and foam.

All the breakers thereof
kept pounding against me,
and the whirlwind (35) blew about me,
[and there was no] moment of calm
wherein to catch my breath,
neither could I steer
a course upon the waters.

The deeps echoed my groaning,
and I [came near] to the gates of death. (36)

But now I am as one

{25} that hath reached a fortified city,
found refuge behind a high wall
until deliverance come.

For I have stayed myself on Thy truth, O my God
knowing full well
that Thou foundest Thy structure on a rock,
that Righteousness is the line
by which Thou layest its bricks,
that Justice is the gauge
Thou usest to set its footing,
that of solid stone (37) is its wall,
unshakeable;
that all who repair unto it
shall never be moved,
for there shall no stranger invade it
Its doors are a sheet of protection
which none may force,
and its bars are strong bars
which cannot be broken.

No armed band can storm it,
neither all the war hosts of wickedness together.

But anon, in the Moment of Judgment,
the sword of God will be swift
and all who acknowledge His truth
will rouse themselves to [do battle]

{30} [against the forces of] wickedness,
and all the sons of guilt
will be no more.

The Warrior (38) will bend his bow,
and lift the siege for ever,
and open the gates everlasting
to bring forth His weapons of war;
and His legions shall go marching
from end to [end of the earth,]
[and there shall be no es]cape
for the guilty impulse of men.

They shall trample it to destruction,
that naught re [main thereof.]

[There shall be no] hope for it
in [weapons] never so many,
neither any escape
for all that fight in its cause.

For the [victory] shall
belong unto God on High,

. . . . .

and though they that lie in the dust
will have raised their flag, (39)
and though this worm which is man (40)
will have lifted up his banner
to do [battle against the truth,]
[yet shall they be] cut off

{35} when battle is joined with the presumptuous;
and he that sought to bring
the scourge of a flood overflowing (41)
will never reach that stronghold.

. . . . .

=======

10a - VII, 1-5

Lo, I am stricken dumb,
[for naught comes out of men's mouths
but] swearing [and lying].

My arm is wrenched from its socket; (1)
my foot is sunken in mire;
mine eyes are dimmed (2) from looking on evil;
mine ears are deafened from hearing of bloodshed;
my heart is numbed with thinking on evil;
for wheresoever men show
the temper of their being,
there is the spirit of baseness.

The structure of my being
is rocked to its very foundation;
my bones are out of joint; (3)
mine inwards heave like a ship
{5} when the searing eastwind soughs; (4)
my heart is sore distraught.

In the havoc of their transgression
a whirlwind swallows me up.

=======

11 - VII, 6-25

I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for by Thine own strength hast Thou stayed me,
and hast wafted o'er me Thy holy spirit
that I cannot be moved.

Thou hast braced me for all the battles
that Wickedness wages against me,
and hast let not the havoc dismay me
to break faith with Thee.

Thou hast made me like a strong tower
upon a lofty wall, (1)
founded upon a rock, (2)
reared on eternal foundations,
whose walls are a proven bulwark
that cannot be shaken
{10} —a tower which Thou hast provided, O my God,
for (this) holy community
—these men that rise as on wings. (3)

[Thou hast brought me into] Thy covenant
Words flow free on my tongue,
as it were trained by Thee, (4)
while the Spirit of Havoc stays speechless,
and the reprobate ope not their mouth.

Through me Thou hast kept Thy pledge:
'False lips shall be stricken dumb'. (**)

----

[**] Ps. 31.18.

----

All them that challenge me
Thou makest to stand condemned,
distinguishing through me
the right from the wrong.

Thou knowest the impulse of every act,
and discernest the purport of every speech,

yet, by Thy guidance (††) and truth
Thou hast directed my heart,
to set my steps straight forward
on paths of righteousness,
and walk where Thy Presence is,

----

[††] Heb. Torah.

----

{15} within bounds of [holiness],
on roads of infinite glory and peace,
ending all [waywardness] for ever.

Thou knowest also the nature
of this Thy servant,
how that I have not relied
[upon the things of the world,]
lifting [my heart] in pride,
vaunting my strength.

No refuge have I in flesh,
nor righteousness [in my soul,]
that I may be saved from the snare
except by Thy pardon.

On [Thy mercy alone] I rely,
and for Thy grace I hope,
to bring [what I have plan]ted to flower,
to make the shoot to grow,
to find cause for vaunting strength,
for [lifting heart.]

And Thou, O God of mercy,
hast in Thy bounty given me place

{20} among those to whom Thou art pledged; (5)
and unto Thy truth will I cling.

Thou hast [shown me Thy grace] and set me
as a father to them Thou holdest dear, (6)
and as a nurse unto them
whom Thou hast made exemplars of men. (7)

They open their mouths for my words,
like sucklings [at the breast,]
and like as a babe that plays
on the bosom of its nurse.

Thou hast raised high my horn (8)
over all that revile me,
and all who wage battle against me
are rou[ted without remnant,]
and all that contend with me
are as chaff before the wind; (9)
and all impiety bows to my sway.
For Thou, O my God, hast holpen my soul
and raised high my horn.

I am lit with a light sevenfold,
with that same [lustre] of glory
which Thou didst create for Thyself. (10)

{25} For Thou art unto me as a light eternal (11)
guiding my feet upon [the way.]

=======

12 - VII, 26-33

I give [thanks unto Thee, O Lord,]
for Thou hast given me insight into Thy truth
and knowledge of Thy wondrous secrets.

In lovingkindness to [lowly] man,
in abundance of mercy to wayward hearts,
who is like Thee among the gods, O Lord, (1)
and what truth is like Thine?

Who can prove righteous in Thy sight
when Thou bringest him unto judgment?
Not even a spirit can answer Thy charge,
and none can withstand Thy wrath.

Yet, all that are children of Thy truth

{30} Thou bringest before Thee with forgiveness,
[clean] sing them of their transgressions
through Thine abundant goodness,
and, through Thy plenteous mercies,
causing them to stand in Thy presence for ever.

For Thou art a God everlasting,
and all Thy ways hold firm for all time; (2)
and there is none else beside Thee.
But what is man—vain, empty man,
that he should understand Thy great wondrous works?

=======

13 - VII, 34-VIII, 3

[I give thanks] unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast cast not my lot in the congregation of the false,
nor set my portion in the company of dissemblers.

{35} Behold, in Thy mercy [I trust],
in Thy pardon [confide],
and on Thine abundant mercies [I lean],
when all [just] judgments are passed upon me.

[For Thou dost tend me as a mother tendeth] her babe,
and [like a child] on the bosom of [its nurse dost Thou sustain me].

. . . . .

Thy justice holdeth firm for ever,
for [Thou dost] not [abandon them that seek Thee]. (1)

=======

14 - VIII,4-36

I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
because, in a dry place, thou hast set me beside a fountain;
in an arid land, beside a spring; (1)

{5} in a de[sert], beside an oasis;
like one of those evergreen trees-
fir or pine or cypress-
planted together to Thy glory, (2)
which, hidden 'mid other trees-
trees that stand beside water-
are fed from a secret spring,
and which put forth blossom unfading
upon an eternal trunk,
striking firm root ere they burgeon,
spreading their roots to the stream; (3)
a tree whose stem is exposed to living waters,
and whose stock lies beside a perpetual fount;
a tree on whose flowering leaves
all the beasts of the woodland can feed;
whose roots are so widespread
that all wayfarers cannot but tread them; (4)
upon whose dangling boughs
there is room for every bird. (5)

All those other trees—
those trees that stand beside water-
keep railing against it, (6)
because they grow entangled in their plantations, (7)

{10} and can send not their roots to the stream,
while this one,
which puts forth the shoot of Holiness upon the stock
of Truth,
keeps its secret hidden, unknown,
sealed and unsuspected.

Moreover, O God, Thou has hedged in its fruit
by the mystic power of stalwart angels, (8)
by holy spirits,
and by a flaming sword turning this way and that; (9)
that [the wicked] may not [drink]
from the Fountain of Life
nor, like those evergreens,
imbibe the waters of Holiness; (10)
that he never may bring his fruit to blossom
through the [sho]wers of heaven, (11)
because, though indeed he has seen it,
he has never sensed what it was, (12)
nor, though he has had notion thereof, (13)
has he ever believed in the Fountain of Life,
but, instead, keeps la[ying violent hands]
on what is really a flower unfading.
Behold, I was (aforetime)
like lands which torrents have ravaged, (14)

{15} casting their silt upon me, (15)
but Thou, O my God, hast, as it were, put in my mouth
early and latter rain
(falling) all [the year round],
an outpouring of living waters,
which never fail,
opening the heavens without surcease, (16)
so that (those waters) are become
like a river in flood, (17)
spilling over its banks, (18)
and like seas un[fathomable]
which, long hidden in secret,
suddenly burst forth [ ], (19)
and quicken [every tree],
green and dry alike, (20)
and serve as a pool for wild beasts.

The tr[ees of the wicked shall fall]
like lead in mighty waters, (21)

{20} and a fire [shall break out], and they shall wither,
and the planting of that fruit [prove in vain].
[But the trees of the righteous]
shall [bloom fa]ir for ever,
a glorious richness, a flower of beauty.
At my hands hast Thou opened a Wellspring for them,
yielding runnels of water,
that their roots may be firmly set
and their trees planted in line of the sun, (22)
in light [unfailing;]
that their [boughs] may yield glorious foliage.

When I apply my hand
to dig the furrows thereof, (23)
its roots strike even on granite,
its stocks are firm-grounded in the earth, (24)
and in the time of heat it secures protection.

But if I relax my hand,
it becomes like a [heath in the desert,] (25)
and its stocks like nettles in a salt-marsh,

{25} and out of its furrows grow thorns and thistles; (26)
[it turns] to briars and brambles, (27)
and its [ ] change to stinking weeds, (28)
its leaves fade before the heat;
it is not exposed to water.

It suffers mishap and disease
and becomes a [target] for all manner of blight.

Then I become like a man
abandoned in [a desert];
no refuge have I,
for then whatever I planted
blossoms but into wormwood.

Constant is my pain, (29)
and cannot be stayed.
[My soul is disqui]eted, (30)
like them that go down to Sheol;
my spirit sinks low (31) among the dead.
My life has as good as reached the Pit, (32)
and my soul waxes faint (33) day and night without rest

{30} There bursts forth, as it were a blazing fire
held in my [bones,] (34)
the flame whereof devours unto the nethermost seas,
exhausting my strength every moment,
consuming my flesh every minute.

Disasters hover about me,
and my soul is utterly bowed down. (35)

For all my strength has ceased from my body,
and my heart is poured out like water,
and my flesh melts like wax,
and the strength of my loins is turned to confusion,
and my arm is wrenched from the shoulder. (36)

I [cannot] move my hand,
and my [foot] is caught in a shackle,
and my knees dissolve like water.

I can take neither pace nor step;
[heaviness] replaces my fleetness of foot;
{35} [my steps] are trammeled.

Once Thou didst put into my mouth
a powerful tongue,
but now it is taken away.

I cannot lift my voice
in any articulate [speech]
to revive the spirit of the stumbling
or encourage the faint with a word. (37)

Lips which were once so fluent (38)
are now stricken dumb.

. . . . .

=======

15 - IX, 2-X, 12

. . . . .

Though [mine eye] sleep [not] at night,
[though Belial assail me] without mercy,
though in anger He stir up His fury (1)
[and pursue me] unto destruction;
though the breakers of death swirl around me, (2)
though Sheol (‡‡) be upon my couch;
though my bed take up a lament, (3)
and [my couch] a cry of anguish;

----

[‡‡] Ie., the netherworld.

----

{5} though mine eye smart as through the smoke of an oven, (4)
though my tears flow like rivers; (5)
though mine eyes fail, (6) and I have no rest;
though [my strength] stand afar off,
and my life be put aside;
though I go from rout to ruin, (7)
from pain to plague,
from pangs to throes.

Yet will I muse on Thy wonders;
for Thou, in Thy lovingkindness,
hast at no time cast me off.

My soul will delight every moment
in the abundance of Thy mercies,
and I shall have wherewith to reply
to him that would confound me,
and to gainsay him that would abase me.

I shall refute his case,
and vindicate Thy judgment.

{10} For I have come to know Thy truth;
I accept Thy judgments upon me,
and am content with my afflictions.

I have learned to put hope in Thy mercy;
for Thou hast placed in the mouth of Thy servant
the power to win Thy grace, (8)
and hast not mortally rebuked him,
neither renounced his wellbeing,
neither frustrated his hope.

Rather hast Thou braced his spirit
to withstand affliction.

Thou it is emplanted (§§) my spirit,
and Thou knowest its every intent;
and so in my straitness
Thou hast given me reassurance.

----

[§§] Heb. 'founded'.

----

I delight in the promise of pardon,
and repent my former transgression;
for I know that in Thy mercy lies hope,
and confidence in Thine abundant power.

{15} For none can prove himself righteous
when Thou bringest him unto judgment,
neither can [any prevail]
when Thou enterest suit against him.
Though man may prove more righteous than man,
though a human may prove wiser than [a beast,]
though flesh may rank higher than dumb [clay,] (*)

----

(*) Literally, 'than that which is molded out of clay'.

----

though one spirit may prove mightier than another,
yet naught can match [Thy power] in strength.
Thy glory hath no equal,
Thy wisdom no measure,
Thy tr[uth no bound;]
and all that have forfeited them
[are doomed to perdition.]

Behold, for my own part,
through Thee have I prospered my way,]
[through Thee maintained] my stand;
for Thou hast not [abandoned me]
[unto them that se]ek my hurt.

{20} Whenever they plot against me,
Thou [savest me from their grasp,]
and if they are bent to disgrace me,
Thou in Thy mer[cy dost confound] them.

If mine enemy vaunt himself against me,
it proves to his own undoing; (†)
and they that battle against me
[are overwhelmed] with disgrace,
and shame overtakes them that revile me.

----

[†] Literally, 'stumbling'.

----

For at [every] time, O my God,
Thou dost fight my fight. (9)
Though now, in Thine inscrutable wisdom, Thou rebuke me,
yet art Thou but hiding the truth until [its time]
and [Thy glory] until its season.

Then will Thy rebuking of me
be turned into gladness and joy;
{25} my plague shall be turned to perpetual health,
the scorn of my foes to a diadem of glory, (10)
my halting steps to enduring strength.

Lo, through Thy Name and through Thy glory
light has shone forth upon me.
Thou hast brought me light out of darkness,
hast given me [health] in place of plague, (11)

wondrous strength in place of stumbling,
and abiding enlargement for the straitness of my soul.

[Thou art] my refuge and my tower,
my rock of retreat and my stronghold;
in Thee do I take refuge from all that [pursue me,]
[and Thou art] mine escape evermore.

Or ever my father begat me,

{30} Thou didst know me;
from the womb of my mother Thou didst shower me
with Thy grace (‡)
and from the breasts of her that conceived me
Thy mercies have been shed upon me.

----

[‡] The Hebrew word can also mean Thou didst wean me'. There is thus a double-entetidre.

----

On the bosom of my nurse [Thou didst sustain me,]
and from my youth up
Thou hast enlightened me with understanding of Thy judgments,
held me firm by Thy truth,
and caused me to delight in Thy holy spirit:
and even unto this day
Thou dost stay my goings.

Though Thy just rebuke be with my body,
yet will my soul be saved
by Thy watch over my wellbeing.

With every step I take
Thine abundant forgiveness enfolds me,
and when Thou arraignest me,
Thy mercies overwhelm me.

Even unto old age
Thou wilt yet sustain me.

{35} For my father hath renounced me,
and my mother hath abandoned me to Thee; (12)
yet Thou art a father to all that [know] Thy truth,
and Thou wilt rejoice over them
like a mother who pitieth her babe,

and Thou wilt feed all Thy works
as a nurse feeds her charge at the bosom. (13)

. . . . .

[Who can fathom the des]igns of Thy heart?
Apart from Thee hath nothing existed,
and without Thy will will nothing be;
yet can none understand Thy wis[dom]
nor gaze upon Thy [sec]rets.

What is man, mere earth,
kneaded out of [clay,]
destined to return unto the dust, (14)
that Thou shouldst give him insight into such wonders
and make him privy to things divine?

(x,5) As for me,
I am but dust and ashes.

What can I devise except Thou hast desired it?
And what can I think apart from Thy will?
And how be strong except Thou hast stayed me,
or use my mind, (15) except Thou hast created it?
How speak except Thou hast opened my mouth?
How reply except Thou hast given me sense?
Lo, Thou art the Prince of the angels,
and the King of all that are in glory,
and the Lord of every spirit,
and the Ruler of every deed.

Without thee nothing is wrought,
and without Thy will can nothing be known. (16)
None there is beside Thee,

{10} and none to share Thy might,
and none to match Thy glory,
and Thy power is beyond price.

Which among all Thy great wondrous works
has power to stand before Thy glory?
How much less, then, can he who returns to his dust attain to [such power.]

Only for Thine own glory hast Thou done all these things.

=======

16 - X, 14-XI, 2

----

Blessed art Thou, O Lord,
Thou God of compassion and mercy,
for giving me knowledge [of Thy truth]

{15} and [insight] to [tell forth] Thy wonders,
unhushed day and night.

. . . . .

Because I have come to rely
on that truth of Thine,
[I will put my trust] in Thy mercy,
[my hope] in Thy great goodness
[and in Thine abundant] compassion.

. . . . .

Except Thou [keep hold,] there is no standing;
and except [Thou let go, no falling];
except Thou rebuke, no stumbling;
no affliction, but Thou hast foreknown it;
[no healing but] by Thy [will].

{20} Now that I know [Thy tru]th,
that I clearly behold Thy glory,
now that I understand
[the mysteries of Thy ways],
[I now will put my trust]
in the moving (§) of Thy compassion,
[my hope] in Thine acts of forgiveness.

----

[§] Or, abundance.

----

The high and mighty draw their strength
from abundance of (worldly) delights;
in profusion of corn and wine and oil
[they find their joy],

{25} and pride themselves in goods and possessions. (1)

Cho[osing] mortal delights
and thinking to glut themselves
on earthly things,
[they picture themselves] as trees
green beside running streams, (2)
which cannot but put forth leaves
and branches full many. (3)

But the joy and the bliss which Thou hast given
to these lowly servants of Thine (4)
is a joy and a bliss unending,
and only by the measure of his knowledge
does one outrank another. (5)

So, in (this) knowledge of Thy truth
hast Thou bestowed on me,
a lowly servant of Thine,
a rich inheritance;
and by virtue of that knowledge
he now is come to ho [nor]. (6)

{30} The soul of (this) Thy servant
abhors all wealth and gain;
in abundance of (worldly) delights
his heart has no pleasure. (7)
Nay, in Thy covenant
does my heart rejoice,
and Thy truth it is that regales my soul.

Wherefore, with heart exposed
to a spring unfailing,
drawing my strength from on high, (8)
I shall blossom like a lily, (9)
[while all the fruit of the wicked
shall be but travail] and woe;
they shall wither like a flower before [the heat].

{35} Howbeit, when I hear tell
how Thou wilt yet come to judgment
along with Thy stalwart angels, (10)
how Thou wilt yet enter suit
in company with Thy host of Holy Beings, (11)
my heart is sorely racked,
my loins are all a-quake,
my groans reach down to the nethermost depths
and penetrate withal
into the chambers of Hell; (12)
and I am full stricken with terror.

For [judgment Thou surely wilt wr]eak
[over the whole wide earth],
justice on all that Thou hast made;
and [Thy] righteousness] wilt Thou evince
over the hordes of Belial. (13)

[My soul is com]moved with ter[ror];
[tr]ouble [is not hidden] from mine eyes; (14)
Gri[ef and sorrow o'erwhelm]
the musing of my heart.

=======

17 - XI, 3-14

----

I give thanks unto Thee, O my God,
for Thou hast wrought a wonder with dust
and hast shown forth Thy power
in that which is molded of clay.
For Thou hast made me to know Thy deep, deep truth,
and to divine Thy wondrous works,
and hast put in my mouth the power to praise,
and psalmody on my tongue,

{5} and hast given me lips unmarred (1)
and readiness of song,
that I may sing of Thy lovingkindness
and rehearse Thy might all the day
and continually bless Thy name.

I will show forth Thy glory
in the midst of the sons of men,
and in Thine abundant goodness
my soul will delight.

For I know that Thy mouth is truth,
and in Thy hand is bounty,
and in Thy thought all knowledge,
and in Thy power all might,
and that all glory is with Thee.

In Thine anger come all judgments of affliction,
but in Thy goodness pardon abounding;
and Thy mercies are shed upon all
who do Thy will.

For Thou hast made them to know Thy deep, deep truth

{10} and divine Thine inscrutable wonders;
and, for Thy glory's sake,
Thou hast granted it unto man
to be purged of transgression,
that he may hallow himself unto Thee
and be free from all taint of filth
and all guilt of perfidy,
to be one with them that possess Thy truth
and to share the lot of Thy Holy Beings,
to the end that this worm which is man (2)
may be lifted out of the dust
to the height of eternal things,
and rise from a spirit perverse
to an holy understanding,
and stand in one company before Thee
with the host everlasting and the spirits of knowledge
and the choir invisible, (3)
to be for ever renewed
with all things that are. (4)

=======

18 - XI, 15-27

----

{15} I give thanks unto Thee, O my God,
I extol Thee, O my Rock, (1)
and because Thou hast wrought wonders with me
[I bless Thy name.]

For Thou hast made me to know Thy deep, deep truth;
Thy wonders hast Thou revealed unto me,
and I have beholden [Thy truth]
[and witnessed Thy] deeds of loving kindness.

So am I come to know
that though Thou art ever just,
yet in Thy loving kindness
lies salivation for men],
and that without Thy mercy
[theirs is but doo]m and perdition.

{20} Lo, for mine own part,
when I mark the nature of man,
how he ever reverts [to perversity and wrongdoing],
to sin and anguish of guilt,
a fountain of bitter mourning
wells up within me;
[my tears flow like rivers], (2)
and sorrow is not hidden from mine eyes. (3)

These things go to my heart
and touch me to the bone,
that I raise a bitter lament
and make doleful moan and groan,
and keep plying my harp in mournful dirge
and bitter lamentation,
till wrongdoing be brought to an end,
and men have no more to suffer
punishing plague and stroke.

But when that time shall come,
then shall I play my harp
with music of salvation,
and my lyre to tune of joy;
I shall ply the pipe and flute
in praise without cease.

Though none there be among all Thy works
can rehearse the full tale of Thy [wonders],
yet then, in the mouths of them all
shall Thy name be praised;

{25} then with mouth of [ ]
they shall go blessing Thee for ever,
and along with the [Holy Being]s
chorus their song of joy. (4)

For sorrow and sighing shall be no more; (5)
wrongdoing shall be [at an end],
and Thy truth shall burst forth as the dayspring
in never-ending glory
and peace perpetual.

=======

19 - XI, 27-XII, 35

----

Blessed art Thou, [O Lord,]
Who hast given unto man the insight of knowledge,
to understand Thy wonders,
[discern Thy truth,]
tell forth Thine abundant mercies.

Blessed art Thou, O God of compassion and grace,
for the greatness of [Thy] power,
the abundance of Thy truth,
the profusion of Thy mercies

{30} over all Thy works.

Rejoice the soul of Thy servant in Thy truth,
and in Thy righteousness make me clean,
even as when [aforetime] I waited on Thy bounty
and hoped on Thy mercies,
and Thou didst bring release to my travail, (1)
and even as when I leaned on Thy compassion,
and Thou didst comfort me in my sorrow.

Blessed art Thou, O Lord,
for Thou it is hast wrought these things,
and placed in the mouth of Thy servant

[power to pray] and to win Thy grace,
and all readiness of tongue;
and hast prepared for me the guerdon of [righteousness]
[and the reward of devotion],

{35} that I may attain to [stand in Thy presence].

. . . . .

[ ] my soul will exult (2)
[because it hath come to abide in Thy presence]
[and to dwell] secure in [Thy] ho[ly] abode,
in calm and quietude.
[In] my tent [I will chant]
[songs of joy] and salvation, (3)
and in the midst of them that fear Thee
tell forth the praise of Thy name
to all ages to come,
pouring forth prayer and supplication (4)
always, at all times and seasons; (5)
when daylight comes forth from [its abode];

(xii,5) when, in its ordered course,
day reaches its turning-point,
in accordance with the rules of the sun;
and again at the turn of the evening,
when daylight departs,
as the rule of darkness begins;
and again in the season of night,
when it reaches its turning-point,
and when the morning breaks;
and when, in the presence of the daylight,
night withdraws to its abode;
when night departs and day comes in,
alway, at all the birthdays of time,
at the moments when seasons begin; (6)
when they reach their turning-points;
when they come in order due
according to their several signs, (7)
as these have dominion in due order assured,
[decreed] by the mouth of God
and by the law of existence
—that law which shall ever be

{10} and beside which is none else,
for the God of Knowledge it is
that hath determined it,
and along with Him there never hath been
nor ever shall be another.

Behold, for mine own part,
I have reached the inner vision,
and through the spirit Thou hast placed within me,
come to know Thee, my God.

I have heard Thy wondrous secret,
nor heard it amiss. (8)

Through Thy holy spirit,
through Thy mystic insight,
Thou hast caused a spring of knowledge to well up within me,
a fountain of strength,
pouring forth waters unstinted,
a floodtide of lovingkindness and of all-consuming zeal.

Thou hast put an end to [my darkness],

{15} and the splendor of Thy glory has become unto me as a light ev[erlasting].

Wickedness hath been [consumed] altogether,
and deceit [existeth] no more.
[Perverseness is gone down] to perdition,
for [ ] existeth no more [ ]
Bluster (9) is at an end,
for it [cannot withstand] Thine anger.

[The sins which I committed aforetime]
[I committed in] overhaste;
for [now am I come to know that] no man is righteous with Thee.

{20} For there is none can understand all Thy hidden things,
nor answer Thy charge against him;
but all must needs wait upon Thy goodness,
for Thou, in [Thy] lovingkindness [wilt reveal to them Thy truth,]
that they may come to know Thee;
and when Thy glory bursts upon them, they shall rejoice.

Only to the measure of each man's knowledge
and to the meed of his understanding
hast Thou given men access [to Thee],
to serve Thee in their several domains,
even as Thou hast assigned their roles,
[but] never to overstep Thy word.

And I—I was taken from dust,
nipped out of clay;
I was but a source of filth

{25} and of shameful nakedness,
a heap of dust,
a thing kneaded with water,
a dwellingplace of darkness,
a shape moulded of clay,
which must needs revert to dust in due season
[and lie once more] in the dust
whence it was taken.

And how can (such) dust and [clay]
give answer to [Him who shapes] it;
or how understand what He doeth,
or how stand before its Accuser?

Even the holy [angels,]
the everlasting [spirits,]
the reservoirs of glory,
the wellsprings of knowledge and power,
{30} —even they [cannot] tell forth all Thy glory,
nor stand against Thine anger,
nor answer Thy charge.

For Thou art ever righteous,
and none can gainsay Thee.

How much less, then, he who returns to his dust?

Lo, I am stricken dumb.

What can I say against this?

I have spoken but according to my knowledge
and only with such sense of right
as a creature of clay may possess.

But how can I speak except Thou open my mouth,
and how understand, if Thou give me not insight;
or how contend, save Thou open my heart;
or how walk straight save Thou gu[ide my feet?]
{35} How can [my] fo[ot] stand,
how can I be strong in power,
how can I endure [save by Thy grace?]

. . . . .

(From this point it becomes impossible to distinguish the separate hymns.)

=======

XIII, 1-21

----

When first the world began
[Thou didst shed an] holy [sp]irit
[on all Thou didst bring into being,]
and make them all to attest
Thy wondrous mysteries. (1)

. . . . .

[Thou didst show Thy] handiwork
in all that [Thou] didst make.
[Thou didst reveal Thy glory
in all their varied shapes,]
[Thy] truth [in all] their works.

. . . . .

On all that [keep Thy charge]
[Thou bestowest grace abounding]

{5} and mercies never failing;
but upon all things that defy Thee
Thou bringest perdition eternal.

[So, if mortal men
keep faith with Thee,
behold, Thou crownest their he]ads
with glory everlasting (2)
and [compassest their] works
with perennial joy;
but [the face of] the wicked
[Thou coverest with shame.]

On those whom Thou hast set [in] glory (3)
[to show forth] the full measure of Thy works,
yea, on the hosts of Thy spirits,
the congregation of [Thy Holy Beings,]
[the heavens] with all their array,
the earth with all its produce,
all things in lakes and seas
—on those, ere Thou didst create them,
Thou didst impose a task

{10} and a perpetual charge.
For when first the world began
Thou didst so order them
and appoint the work of each
that they would spell out Thy glory
throughout Thy dominion,
making known thereby
what none would else have seen,
how ancient things pass over,
and new things are ever created, (4)
how Thou doest away with outworn forms,
yet [main]tainest eternal nature, (5)
for Thou art a God everlasting,
and Thou wilt endure for all time.

In Thine inscrutable wisdom
Thou hast assigned to all these
natures diverse and varied
wherein to show forth Thy glory.

But how can a spirit of flesh
understand of these things?
How can it conceive
Thy so great mystery?
Yea, how can one born of woman
attest Thy tremendous plan?

{15} Creature of dust that he is,
moulded of sodden clay,
[a heap of filth],
whose foundation is naked shame,
and who is ruled by a spirit perverse,
through his constant misdeeds (*)
does he not (rather) serve
as a thing of unending [revulsion],
a portent for all generations, (6)
an object of abhorrence to all flesh? (7)
Nay, it is only through Thy goodness
and through Thy mercies abundant
that Man can ever do right.

----

[*] Heb. 'If he do wrong'.

----

For it is with Thine own beauty
that Thou dost beautify him,
and only of Thy free bounty
dost Thou shower him with delights
and grant him peace unending
and length of days.

And [Lord,] when once Thou hast spoken
ne'er is Thy word revoked. (8)

So, for mine own part,
through the spirit Thou hast planted within me,
I, Thy servant, am come to know
that [all Thy judgments are truth,]
and righteousness all Thy works,
and ne'er is Thy word revoked.

{20} None of the terms and times
which Thou hast foreordained
[hath failed to come to pass]
—all of them duly chosen
for their appointed ends. (9)
Therefore I know full surely
[that yet the tune will come]
[when Thou wilt reward the righteous,]
and the wicked be utterly [doomed.]

=======

XIV, 1-27

----

[I give thanks unto Thee, O Lord,
for Thou hast granted a remnant]
unto Thy people
and a re[vival]
[unto Thine inheritance.] (1)

[Thou hast raised up among them]
men of truth
and sons [of light,] (2)

. . . . .

men of abundant compassion,
men of stalwart spirit,
men of tempered [soul,]
men steeled to [sustain] Thy judgments.

[Through them hast Thou kept Thy covenant]

{5} and fulfilled Thy pledge,
to render us unto Thee
[a kingdom of priests and] an holy [nation] (3)
for all generations of time
and for all the [ages to come.]

[Verily, O Lord, Thou dost sustain]
them that have vision of Thee.

Blessed art Thou, O Lord,
Who puttest the sense of discernment
into the heart of Thy servants, (4)
[that they may walk blamelessly before Thee,]
and be steeled against all the dev[ices] of wickedness,
and that they may bless [Thy name,]

{10} [loving] all that Thou lovest
and abhorring all that [Thou hatest,] (5)
[and stray not in the waywardness of men,
but, through the spirit of [discernment which is theirs,
[distinguish] the good from the wicked
[and keep] their deeds undefiled.

Behold, for mine own part,
through that discernment which Thou hast bestowed,
I have indeed attained to such knowledge;
from by virtue of Thy good pleasure
have been granted a share in Thy holy spirit,
and Thou hast brought me close
to an understanding of Thee.

The nearer I draw to Thee, (6)
the more am I filled with zeal
against all that do wickedness
and against all men of deceit.

For none that draws near to Thee
can see Thy commandments defied,

{15} and none that hath knowledge of Thee
can brook change of Thy words,
seeing that Thou art the essence of right,
and in all Thine elect Thy truth is engrained.

Thou wilt bring eternal doom
on all frowardness and transgression,
and Thy righteousness will stand revealed
in the sight of all Thou hast made.

Lo, through Thy great goodness
I have come to know these things,
and committed myself by oath
never to sin against Thee
nor do aught that is evil in Thy sight;
and I have been granted admittance
to [this] community.

So, for mine own part,
I will admit no comrade
into fellowship with me
save by the measure of his understanding,
and only to the degree
of his share in this common lot
will I show friendship to him.

I will not countenance evil,
neither recognize fraud.

{20} I will not barter Thy truth for wealth,
nor all Thy judgments for a bribe.

Only as Thou drawest a man unto Thee
will I draw him unto myself,
and as Thou keepest him afar,
so too will I abhor him;
and I will enter not into communion
with them that turn their back upon Thy covenant (7)

Blessed art Thou, O Lord,
Who, in the greatness of Thy power,
in Thy manifold, infinite wonders
and in the greatness of Thy forbearance
forgivest them that repent their transgression,
but visitest the iniquity of the wicked.

Verily, [on the righteous]
Thou bestowest freely [Thy love,]

{25} but perversity Thou hatest for ever. (8)
So hast Thou graced me, Thy servant,
with the spirit of knowledge and truth, (9)
that I should cherish the paths of righteousness
and abhor all froward ways.
So, for mine own part,
I in turn will love Thee freely (10)
and with all my heart will I [choose]
[to walk in] Thy paths.
For by Thy hand has this thing been wrought,
and without [Thy will can naught be done].

. . . . .

=======

XV, 9-26

----

. . . . .

[ ] they love Thee alway.

So, for mine own part,
[I will] [ ]

{10} and love Thee right freely
with all my heart and soul. (1)

Yea, I have cleansed [my heart]
[to adhere to Thy] ho[ly Law]
[and never to] turn aside
from aught that Thou hast commanded;
and I have made Thy commandments
to take firm hold upon many
that they abandon not
any of Thy statutes.

Moreover, through the discernment
which Thou hast bestowed upon me
I am come to know
that not by means of the flesh
can a mortal order his way
neither can any man
direct his own steps. (2)

I know that in Thy hand
is the shaping of each man's spirit,
and ere Thou didst create him
Thou didst ordain his works. (3)

And how can any man
change what Thou hast decreed?

{15} Thou alone it is
that hast created the righteous,
conditioning him from the womb
to rank among the favored
at the end of days, (4)
to be safeguarded ever by covenant with Thee,
to walk alway [undaunted]
through the moving of Thy compassion,
to open all the straitness of his soul
to everlasting salvation (5)
and perpetual peace unfailing.

Thou hast raised his inner glory
out of the flesh.

But the wicked hast Thou created
for the tune of Thy [wr]ath, (6)
reserving them from the womb
for the day of slaughter,
because they walk in the way of the bad
and spurn Thy covenant,
and their soul abhors Thy [statutes],
and they take no pleasure in all Thou hast commanded,
but choose that which Thou hatest.

All [them that hate Thee] hast Thou destined
to the wreaking of great judgments upon them
{20} in the sight of all Thou hast made,
to serve as a sign [and a token] for ever,
that all may have knowledge how great
is Thy glory and strength.

How can flesh have reason,
or the earth-bound direct his steps,
except that Thou hast created spirit (*)
and ordained the working thereof?
By Thee is the way of all the living ordained.

So am I come to know
that no wealth can equal Thy truth,
and Thy holiness hath no match;
and I know that Thou preferest these things to all else,
and that They attend on Thee alway.

Thou wilt accept no bribe [for wrongdoing],
and Thou wilt accept no ransom
for deeds of wickedness.

{25} For Thou art a God of truth
and [hatest] (†) all perverseness;
[and no iniquity]
shall endure in Thy presence.
And I am come also to know
that [righteousness] is Thine,
[and a]ll [Thy works are truth.]

----

[*] Heb Thou it is that createdest spirit', etc.
[†] Or, 'wilt destroy'.

----

=======

XVI, 1-19

----

[Thou hast shed] Thy holy spirit
on righteous and [wicked alike,]
[and Thou wilt judge all men]
[according to their deeds.]

Thy holy spirit can [pass] not [away.]
The fulness of heaven and earth [attests it,]
and the sum of all things
[stands witness to] Thy glory. (1)

I know that through [Thy] good wi[ll] towards man
Thou hast bestowed upon him
a rich heritage in Thy Law]
[that he may walk] in all [his ways]
as Thy truth [instructs;
and (Thou hast vouchsafed unto him)

{5} to maintain a proper stance
through Thy [truth] which Thou hast entrusted to him,
lest he go as[tr]ay [ ],
and Thou [hast lain hold on him]
that he stumble not in any of [his steps]. (2)

Because that all these things
are present in my mind,
I would put into words
my prayer and confession of sin,
my constant search for Thy spirit,
the inner strength which is mine
through the holy spirit,
my devotion to the truth of Thy covenant,
the truth and sincerity
in which I walk,
my love of Thy name:

Blessed art Thou, O Lord,
creator of all things,
mighty in deed, (3)
by Whom all things are wrought.

Behold, Thou hast granted mercy to Thy servant
and shed upon him in Thy grace
Thine ever-compassionate spirit
and the splendor of Thy glory.

Thine, Thine alone, is righteousness,
for Thou it is hast done all these things.

{10} Moreover, because I know
that Thou dost keep a record
of every righteous spirit, (4)
therefore have I chosen
to keep my hands unstained,
according to Thy will;
and the soul of Thy servant has abhorred
all unrighteous deeds.

Nevertheless I know
that no man can be righteous
without Thy help.

Wherefore I entreat Thee,
through the spirit which Thou hast put [within me,]
to bring unto completion
the mercies Thou hast shown unto Thy servant,
cleansing him with Thy holy spirit,
drawing him to Thee in Thy good pleasure,
[ ] him in Thine abundant lovingkindness,
granting to him that place of favor
which Thou hast chosen for them that love Thee
and observe Thy commandments,
that they may stand in Thy presence for ever.

[Suffer not Beli]al [to ari]se
and immerse himself in Thy servant's spirit,

{15} neither let [a spirit] perverse
[rule over] any of his deeds. (5)
Let not affliction confront him
to make him to falter from the statutes of Thy covenant,
but [crown him] with glory and truth.

[For Thou art a God gracious] and merciful,
longsuffering and abounding in lovingkindness and truth,
forgiving transgression [ ]
and relenting of [evil]
[unto them that love Him] and keep His command[ments] (6)
—even unto them that return unto Thee
in faithfulness and wholeness of heart
to serve Thee [and do what is] good in Thy sight.

So turn not away the face of Thy servant
neither [reject] the son of [Thine] handmaid;
[for to Thee, O Lord, belongeth forgiven]ess,
and by Thine own words have I call[ed upon Thee.] (7)

. . . . .

=======

XVII - 1-XVIII, 30

----

(Eleven lines too fragmentary to translate seem to describe the doom which awaits the wicked.)

[For divine forgiveness]

In Thine [abundant] mercy
Thou hast said by the hand of Moses
that Thou wouldst [forgive all] iniquity and sin
and shrive all [guilt] and treason. (1)
And verily, though the roots of the mountains [have blazed]
and though the fire [has devoured]
to nethermost hell, (2)
yet, whensoever Thou hast wrought Thy judgments
them hast Thou ever [redeemed]
that were fa[ithful to Thee],
that they might serve Thee in constancy
and that their seed might be ever in Thy presence; (3)
and Thou hast ever confirmed unto them Thine o[ath]

{15} [to pass over all transgression (4)
and to cast away all their iniquities, (5)
and to give them for their inheritance
every mortal glory
and abundance of days.

So, for mine own part,
by virtue of the spirits (6)
which Thou hast set within me,
I will give free rein to my tongue
to tell forth Thy bounteous acts
and Thy forbearance towards me
and the deeds of Thy strong right hand,
and to [confess] my former transgressions
and to make prayer and supplication (7) before Thee
concerning mine [evil] deeds
and the waywardness of [my heart.]
For I have been wallowing in filth,
and [turned] from communion with Thee,
and I have not att[ach]ed myself
[unto Thy congregation.]

{20} Thou—with Thee lies bounty,
and of Thy nature it is
ever to dower blessing. (8)
[Proffer,] then, Thy bounty
and redeem [my soul,]
and let the wicked be brought to an end!

[For spiritual strength]

Moreover, I have come to understand
that Thou hast ever directed the course
of such as Thou hast chosen,
bestowing insight upon him
to spare him from shining against Thee,
repaying unto him
all his affliction of heart
in Thy chastisements and Thy [trials].

Thou hast delivered Thy servant
from sinning against Thee
and from stumbling in doing Thy will.
Strengthen, then, the stand of this Thy servant
against all spirits of perverseness,
that he walk in all the ways which Thou lovest,
reject all that Thou hatest,
and do what is good in Thy sight
Yea, [ ] within me,
for of flesh is the spirit of Thy servant

[For inner enlightenment]

[I am come also to know]

{25} Thou hast ever wafted Thy holy spirit
on him who is Thy servant,
i[llumi]ning for him
the [dark places] of his heart
[with light like the sun.]
But I-behold, I look
to all covenants made by man,
[and all are nothing worth;] (9)
[while they that seek after Thy truth]
do surely find it,
[for on them Thy light] shineth;
and they that love it [are illumined]
[and walk in the glow of] Thy light for ever, (10)
and Thou raisest [their hearts] out of the dark[ness].

. . . . .

Let, then, Thy light [shine ever on Thy servant]

. . . . .

for with Thee is light everlasting.

[For divine protection]

[I am come also to know]
that once Thou didst [ ]
and open the ear of one
who was but dust
[that He might hear Thy teaching]
[and deliver Thy chosen people]
[from folly] and delusion
(xviii,5) and from the uncleanness which [ .]

And Thou didst [ ] Thy [ ],
and [the hands] of Thy servant were steadied by Thy tr[uth,]
and have remained so for ever,
that he might announce Thy wondrous tidings
and reveal them to all who would hear.

[Thou didst strengthen him] by Thy strong right hand to lead [ ]
and Thou didst [ ] [him] by Thy mighty strength,
[that he might achieve renown] for Thy name
and triumph in glory. (11)

Withdraw not now Thy hand [from Thy people,]
that now too there might be among (*) them
men (†) that hold firm to Thy covenant,

----

[*] Heb. 'unto'.
[†] Heb. sg., viz. 'a man' that holds firm, etc.

----

{10} that stand [blameless] before Thee!

[For power of speech]

Moreover, in the mouth of Thy servant
Thou didst open, as it were, a fount
and duly set [‡] on his tongue
[the words of Thy Law,]
that through the understanding which Thou givest to him
he might proclaim them to human mold,
and serve as the interpreter of these things
to dust like myself.

----

[‡] Or, 'engrave' (despite the mixed metaphor!).

----

That fount didst Thou open also
that he might reprove what is molded of clay
concerning its way
and that which is born of woman
concerning its guiltiness,
every man according to his deeds.

[Thanksgiving for divine grace]

But lo, that fount serves also
as a Wellspring of Thy truth
for every man whose spirit
Thou hast stayed by Thine own strength,
that he [may walk] in Thy truth,
a herald of Thy good tidings, (12)
bringing cheer to the humble
through Thine abundant compassion,

{15} sat[ing] from that fount
them that are [wounded] in spirit,
bringing to them that mourn
everlasting joy. (13)

. . . . .
. . . . .

[Were it not for Thy grace,]
I could not have seen this thing.
[For how can] I look on [Thy glory]
except Thou open mine eyes?
How hear [the words of Thy truth]
[except Thou unstop mine ears?]

{20} Behold, my heart was amazed
that thus the Word was revealed
to one with ears unattuned,
and that a [wayward] heart
[was suffered to grasp these things.]
But now have I come to know
that for Thyself, O my God,
hast Thou done these things.

For what is mortal flesh
[that Thou shouldst so exalt it]
and work such wonders with it?

Howbeit, Thou wast minded (§)
to consummate all things
and ordain them unto Thy glory,
[and hast therefore called into being]
a host endowed with knowledge
to tell forth Thy mighty acts
unto mortal flesh,
and Thy sure ordinances
to that which is born [of woman.]
And Thou hast brought [Thine elect]
into covenant with Thee
and opened their heart of dust
that, through Thy compassionate Presence,
they may be guarded from [ ]

{25} [and escape] the traps of judgment.

So, for mine own part,
molded [of clay] that I am,
with an heart of stone, (14)
lo, of what worth am I,
that I should attain unto this?
Yet, behold, Thou hast set [Thy word]
in this ear of dust,
and graven upon this heart
eternal verities; (**)
and Thou hast brought to an end
[all of my frowardness,]
to bring me into covenant with Thee,
that I may stand [before Thee]
evermore unshaken (††)
in the glow of the Perfect Light, (15)
till the end of time,
where [no] darkness is for ever,
{30} and where all is peace unbounded
until the end of time.

----

[§] Heb. 'it was in Thy thought'.
[**] Heb. 'realities'.
[††] Heb. 'in an eternal station'.

----

=======

Fragments

1

[The ho]ly [angels] (1) which are in heaven—
[even they do not know Thy gr]eat name,
for it is a mystery; (2)
neither can they ever [recount all] Thy [wonders] (3)
nor claim knowledge (4) of all [Thy secrets].

[How much less, then, can one
who is destined to re]vert
to the dust whence he came? (5)

{5} Rebellious that I was,
wallowing [in filth], (6)
[tain]ted with the guilt
of wickedness, (7)
I had been [living, as it were],
through more than one Day of Wrath, (8)
[fearful how I could with]stand
the blows that were raining upon me, (9)
how I might be protected
[from the punishing stroke].

Yet, [through that inner discernment
which Thou hast vouchsafed to us,
we of this brotherhood]
have been [made awa]re of these things:
that there (always) is hope for a man (10)
[who turns back from sin
that Thou wilt cleanse him] of taint
Wherefore, O my God,
mere creature of clay though I be, (11)
now have I placed my reliance
[on Thy mercy and faithfulness],

{10} knowing full well
that [what comes from Thy mouth] is truth, (12)
[that Thy word is never re]voked. (13)

So, throughout the time
that is yet allotted to me (14)

I shall hold firm [to Thy judgments],
and I shall maintain my stance
in the station wherein Thou dost set me;
for [Thou, a God of mercy,
dealest mercifully with all] men
and Thou dost provide for them
a way of return.

. . . . .

=======

2

[None is there in Thy heavens
neither upon] Thine earth,
none among angels or m[en
can] render Thee [fitting] praise
or tell forth all of Thy glory.
How much less, then, can I
who was taken from dust?

{5} Howbeit, O my God,
'tis but to attest Thy glory
that Thou hast made all of these.

Wherefore, in accordance
with Thine abundant mercy, (1)
grant that the sense for rightdoing
which issues from Thee
may serve ever as a safeguard [to Thy servant]
to deliver him from doom, (2)
and that, at his every step,
there may be men about him
to interpret to him what he should know (3)
and, [in all of his ways,]
men to impress upon him
the lessons of truth. (4)
For, [do whatever he may,]
how else can man achieve aught,
who is but dust,
in whose ineffectual hands
lies nothing but ashes?

Yet lo, [on such a creature of] clay
[hast Thou shed Thy grace,
giving him Thy] command[ments
in] Thy good will.
Thou hast shaped that clay on the wheel (5)
and passed it through Thy test,
that it may find its way
into Thy lot; (6)
and when cracks appear in it,
Thou mendest them. (7)

{10} Yea, over mere dust
hast Thou wafted Thy [holy] spirit,
[and hast so molded that] clay
that [it can have converse with] angels
and be in communion
with beings celestial.

[Mere flesh hast Thou lit
with a light] perpetual,
that there be no reversion to darkness,
for [ ],
and a light hast Thou revealed
that it never can be turned back.

. . . . .

Thou hast wafted Thy ho[ly spirit
o'er these humble servants of Thine], (8)
clearing away all guilt (9)
[and purifying them],
that, along with Thine (heavenly) host,
they too [may minis]ter to Thee,
and, stayed upon Thy truth,

{15} walk [upon level ground
and str]ay [not] from Thy presence.
These men hast Thou singled out, [O my God,]
(to bear witness) to Thy glory,
and through that sense for rightdoing
[which Thou hast vouchsafed to them
Thou hast delivered them from sin
and purged away from them
a]ll the frowardness
of their tainted mold.

=======

3

[Unto the children of light]
a way has indeed been opened
[that they may walk upon] peaceful paths (1)
and show how miraculously (2)
[God rescues human] flesh
[from thralldom to sin].

My own feet had been [falling]
into all manner of hidden traps (3)
which Sin (4) had been laying,
and into all manner of nets
which it had been spreading. (5)

{5} [How, thought I,] will I (ever) preserve
(this) fabric of dust from crumbling,
this waxen mold [from dissolving]?

Mere heap of ash that I am,
how will I (ever) withstand
the stormy blast? (6)

Howbeit, God has been keeping it
for His mysterious ends;
because He has been aware
[of how frail it is,
He has not suffered it (?)]
to be wholly destroyed. (7)
Though men keep laying (for it)
traps never so many,
and [tightening all about it]
the toils of frowardness, (8)
yet will all guileful bent
be brought to an end,

{10} [and all wickedness] come to naught
and every deceitful intent (9)
and all the works of guile
cease to exist

I am but a creature [of clay,
a fabric of dust;]
and what strength does such possess?
Thine, O God of [all knowledge] (10)
is [the power and the might]; (11)
Thou it is didst make all things,
and but for Thee [can naught exist],

[Yet, creature] of dust though I be,
by virtue of the spirit
which Thou hast set within me,
I have now come to know
that [Thou wilt yet call to account
all guil]ty (men) (12)
that flock unto (13) frowardness and guile,
and the Wellspring of sin will be dammed. (14)
[For] that which is wrought in uncleanness
can bring naught else but disease, (15)
condign plague (16) and decay.

. . . . .

Thine, [O my God,] is a blazing wrath
and a ven[geful] passion. (17)

. . . . .

=======

4

[The sons of Thy covenant
are come to know
that alway, at every moment,
continually, ev]ening and morning,
[Thou dost vouchsafe unto them
the blessing of salvation]
and [heal]ing [from all the afflic]tions of men
and pa[ins of humankind].

{5} Wherefore they stand as sentinels,
[posted] upon their watch, (1)
[knowing that] Thou wilt exorcize
every noisome devil (2)
and [every evil spirit].

Moreover, Thou hast unstopped mine ear
(and made me aware)
that through such spirits as these (*)
[men who have bound themselves
to](human) [pledge] and pact
have (ofttimes) been seduced
and will (someday) come before Thee
to face Thy charge.

----

(*) Heb. 'through them'.

----

Wherefore, I for my part
have been living in terror of Thy judgment
{10} [for who can prove innocent be]fore Thee,
and who can gain acquittal
when Thy sentence is passed? (3)
To what will man amount
when Thou arraignest him,
and to what he that turns back to his dust [ ]?

Howbeit, O my God,
Thou hast opened mine heart
to the insight which comes from Thee,
and unstopped mine ear [to Thy teaching],
that, although my mind be unquiet (4)
[on account of hidden wrongdoings],
and although my heart has been melting like wax (5)
because of transgression and sin
which I have kept [concealed],
(6) I am come to rely upon Thy goodness.

{15} Blessed be Thou,
Thou God of (all) knowledge, (7)
Who hast (so) ordained,
and vouchsafed, for Thine own sake,
that this fortune should fall upon Thy servant.
For now that I am come to (this) knowledge,
so long as I have being
I will put my hopes in Thy [mercy].

Confirm, then, [Thy word] unto Thy [ser]vant
Forsake us not in (these) times [of trial, (8)
that so we may bear witness alway
to Thy grace] and Thy glory and [Thy] go[odness],

. . . . .

=======

5

With a wondrous shew of [Thy power
Thou wilt visit upon them
Thy] righteous [judg]ment, (1)
[sundering and] severing them for ever
from standing among [Thy] sa[ints] (2)
[and from all] communion
with Thy Holy Beings. (3)

The spirits of wickedness (4)
wilt Thou ba<ni>sh from the ear[th], (5)

{5} [and they that incite to] evil
shall exist no more.

Thou wilt appoint a place of un[rest (6)
for all] spirits of frowardness, (7)
the which shall be brought to their ruin,
(doomed) to [perpetual] mourning
and everlasting grief. (8)

When wickedness reaches its height
in a climax of mighty uphea[val], (9)
there shall come upon them
anguish absolute. (10)

Howbeit, that all may take knowledge of Thy glory
and s[ee] how soothfast is Thy judgment, (11)

[Thou wilt also shew forth]
in the sight of all Thou hast made
how wondrous Thy mercies can be. (12)
Thou hast opened human ears (13)
[and imparted unto them
the designs of] Thy heart, (14)
and hast given to [mortal] minds
the means to understand
that a time is yet to come
when 'witness will be borne'. (15)

(Here) on earth wilt Thou enter suit (16)
with them that dwell thereon, (17)
and [Thou wilt] also [wreak vengeance
on the children of] darkness, (18)
vindica[ting the ri]ghteous
and condemning the wicked], (19)
and suffering not [the children of light] (20)
to be sundered [from bl]essing [evermore].

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Poems From A Qumran Hymnal

Sing unto the Lord a new song

I - David (PSALM 151)

A Halleluiah; ascribed to David, the son of Jesse

(v.l) Smaller (1) was I than my brothers
and the youngest (2) of my father's sons.
So he set me as herdsman of his sheep
and ruler over his kids. (3)

(v.2) My hands fashioned a Panpipe,
and my fingers a lyre
that I might pay honor to the LORD. (*)

----

(*) Written in archaic script (YHWH?)

----

(v.3) I kept saying within myself:
"The mountains cannot tell Him
what indeed they witness, (4)
neither can the hills.
The leaves of the trees have no speech for my words, (5)
nor the sheep for my acts. (6)

(v.4) Nay, who is there that can tell,
who is there that hath speech and can relate
what it is that I am doing?"

Yet, He Who is the Lord of All Things
saw it indeed;
He Who is the God of All Things—
He heard and Himself gave ear.

(v.5) So He sent His prophet to anoint me,
even Samuel to bring me to greatness. (7)

My brothers went out to meet him, (8)
handsome and comely withal, (9)

(v.6) tall of stature, (10) with splendid locks;
but them the LORD God did not choose.

(v.7) I it was He sent for and fetched
from behind the sheep, (11)
and He had me anointed with holy oil,
and made me the leader (12) of His people
and the ruler of the Children of His covenant.

----

Note:

It may be of interest here to reprint a curious and forgotten version of Psalm 151 quoted in Holland's Psalmists (1848) as the work of a certain 'R.B.', said to be Richard Braithwait, whose versified rendering of I Samuel, ch. 17, in no less than sixty four-line stanzas, appeared in London in 1628. Holland says that the Psalm is included in Arabic, Anglo-Saxon, and Greek liturgies and was recognized as canonical by Athanasius. Actually, what is presented is, at best, an abbreviation of 'R.B.'s' version, and it has been suggested that it may in fact have been composed by William Tennant, who held the Chair of Hebrew at St. Andrew's University, Scotland, in the middle of the nineteenth century; see Notes and Queries, VI, v (1882), p. 357.

1. Among my brethren I was least,
And of my father's stock
I was the youngest in his house-
The shepherd of his flock.

2. Rare instruments of music oft
My hands, well-practised, made;
And on the sacred psaltery
My skilful fingers play'd.

3. But who of me shall speak to God,
and tell him of my care?
The Lord himself, lo, even now,
Doth hearken to my prayer.

4. He sent his messenger and took
Me from the shepherd's toil;
And on my head—sweet unction!—pour'd
His own anointing oil.

5. My brethren, beautiful and tall,
Held theirs a happy lot;
But in them and their comeliness
The Lord delighted not.

6. To meet the boasting alien chief
I went forth on their part;
He cursed me by his idols and
Despised me from his heart

7. But having slain, I with his sword
Cut off his head at once.
And took away the foul reproach
Of Israel's daunted sons.

----

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II Invitation To Grace After Meals

1 [Loudly acclaim
the majesty of God;
where many are foregathered
Let His majesty resound!

2 Amid the throng (1) of the upright
proclaim how majestic He is, (2)
and along with the faithful
tell stories of His greatness! (3)

3 [Join company] (4) with the good and the blameless
in confessing the majesty transcendent; (5)

4 unite (6) in making known
His saving power,
nor be laggard in showing to the mindless
His might and majesty!

5 For it is that the glory of the LORD (*) may be made
known that wisdom has been given,

----

(*) Written in archaic script.

----

6 and that the richness (7) of His works may be told
has it been imparted to man,

7 to the end that the witless may have knowledge of
His power,
and the mindless a sense of His greatness—

8 men who keep far from her doors,
remote from all access to her.

9 Although the Most High, forsooth,
is Jacob's special Lord, (8)
yet does His majesty reach out
over all that He has made,

{10} and a mortal who avows it (9)
is no less pleasing to Him
than one who brings offerings of grain,

{11} or presents to Him he-goats and bullocks,
or fills the altar with ashes
of burnt-offerings never so many (10)—
yea, than fragrant incense
proffered by righteous men.

{12} Wisdom's voice rings out
from behind the doors of the righteous;
wherever the godly foregather
(is heard) her song.

{13} Whenso they eat and are filled, (11)
the word is of her;
when they drink in fellowship together,

{14} their talk is of the lore (†) of the Most High;
the aim of their discourse is to further
the knowledge of His power.

----

[†] Heb. Torah'.

----

{15} (But oh, how far from the wicked
is any word of her;
how far from all the proud
any wish to have knowledge of her!)

{16} Behold, the eye (12) of the LORD
looks with compassion on the good,

{17} and great is His tenderness to them
that avow His majesty;
He will save them from the time of trouble. (13)

{18} [Bless ye] the LORD,
Who redeems the humble
from the grasp of the proud,
[and delivers [the blameless]
[from the hand of the wicked;]

{19} [Who will yet raise Ja]cob [to honor], (14)
and [from Israel] govern [the world]; (15)

{20} [Who will spread His tent in Zion
and be present in Jerusalem for ever!] (16)

=======

III - Plea For Grace (*)

LORD, (†) I have called on Thee;
pay heed unto me. (1)
I have (duly) spread forth my palms
toward Thy holy abode. (2)
Bend Thou, (then,) Thine ear (3)
and grant me what I ask, (4)
nor withhold from me what I seek.

{5} Build up my soul,
and cast it not down,
neither be it left naked (5)
in face of the wicked.

Let the evil that I have earned (6)
be turned away (7) from me,
O Thou Who judgest right truly. (8)
Sentence me not, O LORD,
according to my sin,
for there is no man living
can be justified in Thy presence. (9)

Cause me, O LORD,
to understand what Thou teachest; (‡) (10)
school me in Thy rules, (11)
that men far and wide may hear tell of how Thou actest,
and peoples acknowledge how illustrious is Thy glory. (12)

{10} Remember me; do not forget me,
neither involve me
in things too hard for me.

----

[*] In the Hebrew, this poem is an alphabetical acrostic.
[†] Written in archaic script
[‡] Heb. Thy Torah'.

----

The sins of my youth put far from me,
and let not my transgressions
be remembered against me. (13)

Cleanse me, O LORD, of noisome plague, (14)
and let it never return (15) unto me.
Let its root wither from me, (16)
and its l[ea]ves blossom not upon me.

{15} Mighty (17) art Thou, O LORD;
wherefore by Thine own power
fulfil (18) what I ask;
(for) unto whom (else) can I cry
that He might grant it to me,
and what pow[er] more (than Thine)
do mere mortals possess? (19)

From Thee comes my confidence, O LORD.
Whenso I have called upon the LORD,
He (alway) has answered me (20)
[and mended] my broken heart;
whenso I have slumbered or [sl]ept or dreamed,
[(alway) Have I awoken; (§) (21)
whenso my heart has been smitten, (22)
LORD, Thou hast (ever) upheld me, (23)
and I have had cause to cry out!]
"'Tis Thou, LORD,
[hast rescued me!]" (24)

{20} [So, at this present time,
I shall yet behold
the hopes of the wicked confounded; (**) (25)
but no such confounding will be mine
because it is in Thee
that I have taken refuge.] (26)

----

[§] Passages in smaller type are supplied from the Syriac version.
(**) Heb., simply, 1 shall yet behold their disappointment'.

----

[Ransom Israel, O LORD, (27)
to whom Thou art pledged, (28)
even the house of Jacob
whom Thou hast chosen.]

=======

IV - Supplication

<Poor am I and weak,> (*)
for the worm cannot confess Thee,
nor the maggot rehearse Thy lovingkindness;
the living alone can do so,
the living alone. (1)
Whenever Thou showest men Thy kindness,
what time their foot has slipped,
they needs must confess Thee (and own)
that in Thy hand it is
that the souls of all living lie,
and that Thou it is hast given
breath to all flesh. (2)

{5} Deal with us, then, O LORD, (†)
after the manner of Thy goodness,
Thine abundant compassion and Thy justice. (3)
The LORD hath (alway) heard the voice
of them that love His name, (4)
and ne'er hath He abandoned
His lovingkindness (5) toward them.

----

[*] Supplied from another fragmentary copy.
[†] Written in archaic script

----

"Blessed is the LORD,
Who dealeth bountifully. (6)
Who crowneth with loyal love and compassion
them that are loyal to Him." (7)
(So) hath mine own soul
come to acclaim Thy name
in a roar of praise,
confessing Thy loyal love
in joyous song,
telling forth the tale
of Thy constancy. (8)
(Endless, indeed, is the praise
that is due unto Thee!)

{10} I too had been marked for death
on account of my sins,
my wrongdoings had sold me to Sheol; (‡) (9)
but Thou, in accord with Thine abundant compassion,
Thou, in accord with Thy bounteous ways,
didst rescue me, O LORD.

----

[‡] That is, the netherworld.

----

I too have loved Thy name,
sought shelter in Thy shade; (10)
in calling to mind Thy power
my heart finds strength, (11)
and upon Thy loyal love
have I come to lean.

Wherefore forgive Thou my sin, O LORD, (12)
and purge me of my wrongdoing. (13)
Vouchsafe Thou unto me
a spirit of constancy
and knowledge (of Thy truth). (14)
Let me not stumble in waywardness. (15)

{15} Suffer no devil (16) nor spirit unclean (17)
to bear sway over me;
let not pain or evil bent
gain mastery over my body.
For Thou, O LORD, it is
from Whom comes (all) my worth, (18)
and on Thee have I alway pinned my hopes. (19)
Let my brethren and father's house
who now are desolate
rejoice along with me
in the dowering of Thy grace.

Let me find in Thee
an [everl]asting joy.

=======

V - The City Of God

I will call down a blessing, O Zion,
on the memory of thee; (1)
with all my might have I loved thee: (2)

'Blessed for evermore
be the memory of thee!' (3)

Great has been thy hope, O Zion,
thy quiet, longing hope (4)
that salvation would come to thee; (5)
that men would be dwelling in thee
till the end of time; (6)
that successions (7) of godly men
would be there for thine ornament;
that men who now are yearning
for the day of thy salvation,
who find joy in thy manifold glory,
would yet drink in that glory of thine
like mother's milk, (8)

and stroll through thy beautiful squares
to the jingling of bells; (9)
that thou wouldst yet conjure up
the godly devotion of thy prophets
and find thy pride in the things
wrought by thy saints—

in the purging of all violence from within thee,
with (all) falsehood and frowardness cut off;
that thy children would make merry in thy midst,
and thy friends who have allied themselves with thee. (10)

(How have they been hoping
for thy salvation, (11)
and mourning over thee!) (12)

This hope of thine, O Zion,
shall prove not a hope forlorn, (13)
nor shall this yearning of thine
become a forgotten thing.

Who ever perished, being righteous, (14)
or whom in his frowardness
has God ever allowed to go free?
Nay, there is never a man
that is not brought to trial
for the way he has trod,
and none but receives his deserts
for the deeds he has done.

Nevertheless, O Zion,
no foe ever compassed thee (15)
but was (in the end) cut down,
and none has nursed hate for thee
but was put to rout! (16)

A scent (17) unto the nostrils
is the fame of thee, O Zion,
(diffused) (18) over all the world!

Over and over again
will I call down a blessing
upon the memory of thee:
with all my heart (19) invoke
(this) benediction upon thee:
'Mayest thou yet attain
the triumph of righteousness
world without end, (20)
and receive the blessings shed
on men marked out for honor! (21)

Reap thou the harvest (22) of that vision (23)
that once was spoken of thee,
and may there ensue for thee
what the prophets dreamed!' (24)

Grow high and wide, O Zion!
Praise the Most High, thy Redeemer!
When thou art brought to honor
my soul will rejoice. (25)

=======

VI - Morning Hymn

Great and holy is the LORD, (*) (1)
the holiest of the holy for all time. (2)

Before Him goes a splendor; (3)
behind Him a surge of many waters. (4)

Lovingkindness and Truth
are round about His presence; (5)
Justice and Right
are the mainstay of His throne; (6)

Who has parted light from darkness (7)
and, through His discerning wisdom, (8)
turned the glimmer of dawn
into bright day. (9))

(When first all His angels saw it,
they sang for joy, (10)
for what He was showing them
was a thing they had known not erst); (11)

Who crowns the hillsides with produce (12)—
choice food for all the living.

Blessed be He (13)
Who by His power made the earth,
by His wisdom founded the world,
by His understanding spread out the skies;
Who (first) brought forth [the wind]
out of His promptu[aries], (14)
made [lightnings for the ra]in, (15)
and lifted the mist[s from the] hori[zon]. (16)

----

(*) Written in archaic script.

----

=======

Lament For Zion

I, i

[God warned us that He would pu]nish
all our iniquities,
but because [we] did not listen to [the warning (1)
that all these things would befall us,
now is there naught we can do. (2)
By the evil of [our deeds (3)
we have cancelled] His covenant (with us). (4)

Woe unto us!

{5} [Our temple] has gone up in flames; (5)
the [shrine] which was our pride (6)
has been turned into [rubble];
no more is there within it
the sweet savor of sacrifices.

[Men have come trampling] in [their sandals] (7)
the courts of our sanctuary.

[All the sacred] ve[ssels] have been [carried away] (?). (8)

Jerusalem, which was once
a [joyous] city,
is made over to wild beasts, (9)
with no one to [rescue her]. (10)
[Deserted] are her squares,

{10} her mansions all [abandoned],
[her highways] desolate,
with never a pilgrim upon them. (11)

All the cities of [Judah
have been laid waste; (12)
the land of] our heritage
has become like a wilderness,
an un[inhabited] tract. (13)

No sound of merriment
is heard anymore within it,
[No one] seeks [our welfare, (14)
nor is there] any man
[who has carried the lo]ad of our pain; (15)
and (all the while) our foes
[have been lolling at ease]. (16)

{15} Our transgressions [are past all counting],
and our sins [have denounced us]. (17)

I, ii

Woe unto us!
God's anger flared [against us], (18)
and we shared the defilement of the dead, (19)
Is[rael became]
like a wife grown loathsome,
[Our mothers showed no pity] for their babes;
Our womenfolk were turned into harpies, (20)
{5} [shorn of all the charm of] their youth. (21)

Our sons were undone; (22)
[numbed] by winter's cold,
our daughters, instead of dwelling
[secure] in [their fathers'] homes,
[hugged] the dunghills (23) with wizened hands;
when they begged for water,
no one pou[red it for them].

They that were worth their weight in gold
{10} [were deemed but] worthless [shards], (24)
reared though they were in purple, (25)
decked in fine gold,
garbed in [linen] and lawn,
man [tied] in blue and brocade. (26)
The (once) tender maidens of Zion [became ].

II

[Ah, how she sits] alone,
[the city once full of people!] (27)

{5} Once the princess of all nati[ons], (28)
now is she desolate,
like a woman abandoned!
....... all her daughters too
like a woman abandoned,
like a woman cast down and cast off. (29)

Her mansions all and [her] wal[ls],
(empty of all life,)
are become like a barren wife, (30)
and all [her] roads like one
left destitute. (31)

Her ......... are like a woman
in bitter grief, (32)
and all her daughters like those
who mourn their mates;
...her [matrons] are like (mothers)
bereaved of an only child. (33)

Bitterly Jeru[salem] weeps,
[and her tears run] down her cheeks; (34)
on account of her sons [ ]

. . . . .

{10} she [has been wa]il[ing] and moaning. (35)

=======

Hymns Of Triumph

I

Let the [righteous] hail the LORD
in wild acclaim, (1)
for He is (even now) on His way
to pass judgment on all deeds,
to wipe out the wicked from the earth, (2)
that the froward exist no more.

The skies will [drop] their dew, (3)
and blight shall come no more
within their borders, (4)
The soil will yield its tilth in due season, (5)
and its produce shall not be lacking.

Fruit trees will [burgeon and blossom],
and springs will not fail.

{5} The poor will have to eat, (6)
and they that fear the LORD will be sated.

II

Let heaven and earth unite
in a chorus of praise! (1)
Let all the stars of evening
break out in hymns! (2)

Be right joyful, O Judah,
right merry and gay!
Make thy pilgrimages;
pay (in a purified Temple)
the offerings thou hast vowed,
for Belial shall no more be in thy midst! (3)

Victory and triumph shall be thine;
for lo, thine enemies shall perish,
and all evildoers be scattered; (4)
{5} but Thou, O LORD, art eternal
and Thine is a glory which endureth
world without end. (5)

Hallelujah.

=======

Notes

The Hymn of the Initiants

1. I.e., at noon.

2. 'Storehouses of darkness' are mentioned (metaphorically) in Isa. 45.3.

3. Literally, 'and sets against it (?)'; the text is somewhat obscure.

4. I.e., at midnight. The reference in these lines is to the three statutory tunes of daily prayer; cf. Mishnah, Berachoth, iv.l.

5. On the basis of such Biblical passages as Hab. 3.11; Deut. 26.15; Jer. 25.30 and II Chron. 30.27, the terms 'Height' (Heb. Zebul) and 'Abode' (Heb. Ma'on) came to be used in rabbinic literature as names of two of the seven heavens.

6. In the calendrical system underlying the pseudepigraphic books of Jubilees and Enoch, seasons formally begin at new moon.

7. I.e., at solstice and equinox.

8. Cp. Ex. 12.14; Lev. 23.24; Num. 10.10.

9. An allusion to the belief, still maintained by the Samaritans, that all the commandments given to Moses were engraven by God on tablets. Cp. Ex. 32.16. 10. An allusion to the obligation of bringing tribute at seasonal festivals; cp. Num. 15.19-20. Jewish tradition declares that prayer now substitutes for offerings, and the statutory services are still named for those offerings. The Essenes, says Josephus (War, I, iii, 5) did not make offerings but 'offered sacrifices within themselves'. This was also the attitude of the early Church. The Didascalia Apostolorum declare expressly that 'instead of sacrifices which then were, offer now prayers and petitions and thanksgivings' (p. 86 ed Conolly).

11. Cp. Lev. 25.8ff.

12. The expression occurs also in the Psalms of Solomon 15.3: 'The fruit of the lips with the well-tuned instru-ment of the tongue, the first-fruits of the lips from a pious and righteous heart—he that offereth these shall never be shaken by evil'. There is a subtle play on words in the original, for the Hebrew word azam-merah means at once 'cull' (strictly, trim vines'; cp. Lev. 25.3) and 'sing'. The concept of 'fruit of the lips' is derived from Isa. 57.19, and more especially from a variant reading of Hos. 14.3(2) preserved in the Greek (Septuagint) and Syriac (Peshitta) translation (and adopted by the Revised Standard Version).

13. Cp. Jer. 31.35-36. The point is that the Hebrew word for 'bound' also means 'statute, ordinance'. In observing the fixed order of day and night, the psalmist will be inspired likewise to abide by God's rules.

14. Literally, 'and where they [i.e., God's bounds, statutes] are will I set my boundary'.

15. The pious Jew offers a blessing every morning as soon as he takes his first steps, viz. 'Blessed art Thou, O Lord, our God, King of the Universe, Who directest the steps of man'.

16. An adaptation of the words, 'when thou liest down and when thou risest up', in Deut. 6.7. The pious Jew recites the Shema' (Deut. 6.4-9, etc.) when he lies down to sleep and when he wakes up in the morning —in the former case, in a recumbent position, in the latter standing up; cp. Mishnah, Berachoth, i.3.

17. An allusion to the benediction pronounced before meals, viz. 'Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, Who bringest forth food (bread) from the earth'.

18. An allusion to the blessing offered by Jews on hearing bad news, viz. 'Blessed is He, the truthful Judge' (Mishnah, Berachoth, ix.2). Cp. Mishnah, Ber. ix.5: 'Man is obliged to offer blessing for evil as well as for good'.

19. An allusion to the blessing offered by Jews on deliver-ance from danger, viz. 'Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God ... Who bestowest good things on the undeserving, and Who hast bestowed a good thing upon me'.

20. An adaptation of Ps. 23.6.

21. Cp. Manual, ix.22.

22. Cp. Manual, ix.16.

23 The expression is derived from Deut. 32.35, accord-ing to the reading found in the Samaritan recension and in the Greek (Septuagint) Version, viz. 'Is not this stored up with Me ... against the Day of Requital?' This reading is actually found in a fragment of Deuteronomy discovered at Qumran. See also Isa. 34.8; 61.2. 'Day of Requital' is the technical term among the Samaritans for Doomsday.

24. Cp. Manual, vii.8.

25. Cp. Manual, vii.9.

26. Cp. Manual, vii. 5ff.

27. Pss. 16.8; 121.5.

28. Ps. 40.3(2).

29. Cp. Eph. 1.3; II Thess. 1.5. A similar expression occurs at the beginning of the Apostolic Constitutions.

30. Based on Isa. 60.21; 61.3. The Apostolic Constitutions speaks of 'God's planting and the holy vineyard, the church catholic, the elect', and so too does Epiphanius, Haer., xiv.4.

31. Cp. John 1.3.

32. The word, I suggest, has a technical nuance, for Josephus (War, II, viii, 7) speaks of one who was admitted to the communion after the first year of probation as 'one who comes nearer'. I would therefore make a distinction between 'coming near' as indicating the first stage, and 'coming nearer' as indicating the second. The former is here intended, since the psalmist virtually repeats the preliminary oath described in Manual, col. i.

33. The Hebrew text is doubtful. Others read, 'a draining of spittle', but I find this meaningless, because spittle is ejected, not drained. 34. Job 33.6.

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The Book of Hymns

~~1~~

1. This is perhaps the most intricate hymn in the collection, and in order to bring out the nexus of though I have had to resort to a certain amount of expansion and paraphrase. The central idea appears to be that God has appointed sentient spirits to inform and govern the various elements of the universe.

The functions and operations of such spirits were determined even before they were created. Man too is endowed with such a spirit Hence, God knows and determined all that man will ever do, think or say. But since God's power is matched by His benevolence, He also fortifies that spirit against the trials and afflictions of human existence; and when it gets tainted by worldly corruption, He constantly cleanses it. Man can save himself from error and profanation by adopting a sober and temperate mode of life.

The doctrine of controlling spirits may owe some-thing to Iranian ideas about the yazatas, who likewise 'animate' phenomena and bestow help upon men.

2. Cp. Jer. 32.19.

3. Cp. Ex. 34.6. The psalmist resorts to the common rabbinic device of contrasting, or juxtaposing, the vari-ous attributes of God.

4. Cp. John 1.3.

5. Restored from Isa. 45.12.

6. The rabbinic tradition was that angels were created only on the second or fifth day; cp. Genesis Rabbah, i.3.

7. The language is borrowed from Num. 4.27.

8. The concept is based on such Scriptural passages as Jer. 10.13; 51.16; Ps. 135.7 (promptuaries of winds); Ps. 33.7 (of waters); Job 38.22 (of hail); and Isa, 45..3 (of darkness). It is elaborated in Enoch 17.3; 18.1; 41.4ff.; 60.12-24; 69.23; 71.4.

9. Cp. Enoch 41.3; 59.1; 71.4.

10. Note the contrast between the power and the wisdom of God, exemplifying the general statement made in the opening lines. The restoration is imposed by the basic theme of the psalm.

11. Cp. Zech. 12.1.

12. Literally, 'at their fixed times'.

13. Cp. Manual of Discipline, iii. 14—15.

14. Cp. John 1.3.

15. Cp. Isa. 29.24; Ps. 95.10; I John 4.6 ('the spirit of error').

16. Cp. Hymns, xvi.10; Slavonic Enoch, 50.1. See also T.H. Gaster, Thespis2 (1961), pp. 288f.

17. Cp. I Sam. 2.3.

18. The phrase is based on Hos. 14.3, read as in the Greek (Septuagint) and Syriac (Peshitta) Versions.

19. Literally, 'settest words upon a line'.

20. Literally, 'and the expression of the spirit of the lips in due measure'.

21. Literally, 'and Thou producest lines for their secrets'.

22. Literally, 'ye of low intellect'.

23. Literally, 'increase prudence (subtlety)'.

24. Cp. Hymns, ii.11; Pss. 35.16; 37.12; 112.10; Job 16.9; Lam. 2.16.

~~2~~

1. Restored from Jer. 16.19.

2. Deut. 33.11.

3. Ps. 51.10.

4. Mal. 1.4.

5. Ezek. 36.3.

6. Job 30.9; Lam. 3.14.

7. Cp. Isa. 17.12.

8. Isa. 57.20.

9. Literally, 'the elect of righteousness' or 'the rightfully chosen'. But there is a play on words, for 'elect' was the technical term in Hebrew (and already in the cuneiform documents from Mari, of the 18th cent., B.C.) for 'picked troops'. This explains the reference to the 'banner', which is understood in the sense of a military ensign.

10. Prov. 12.1.

11. Judges 12.2; Jer. 15.10.

12. Isa. 30.10. (RSV: 'Prophesy not unto us what is right'. But the word rendered 'prophesy' really means 'see, envision', and that rendered 'what is right' really means 'straight things'.)

13. Num. 5.14, 30. The poet gives his own interpretation of the words usually rendered 'spirit of jealousy' (or, 'zeal').

14. Isa. 27.11.

15. Isa. 28.11.

16. Cp. Hos. 4.14.

~~3~~

1. I Sam. 25.29. These famous words are usually rendered, The soul of my lord shall be bound up in the bundle of life [or, the living]', and it is in this sense that they are commonly inscribed on Jewish tombstones. But the word rendered 'bundle' can also mean 'pouch, wallet', and the poet evidently understood the sentence—as did several medieval Jewish commentators—to imply that God will keep the faithful, like a treasure in a wallet, safe from Death.

2. Job 1.10.

3. Pss. 54.5; 86.14.

4. Cp. Isa. 30.30.

5. A fanciful interpretation of the Hebrew text of Isa. 59.5 (American Jewish Version: 'And that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper'). By construing the words differently, the poet obtained the sense, 'By repeated crushings they split all trivial things'.

6. Pss. 9.16; 35.7-8.

7. An adaptation of Ps. 26.12.

~~4~~

1. Ps. 82.3.

2. Jer. 31.11.

~~5~~

1. I Sam. 6.18; II Kings 10.2; Jer. 1.18; Ps. 108.11.

2. Jer. 4.31.

3. I Sam. 4.19; Dan. 10.16.

4. A play on Mic. 2.10, for the Hebrew words which in that context mean 'grievous destruction' can also be construed in the sense of 'grievous throes'.

5. Cf. II Kings 19.3; Isa. 37.3.

6. Isa. 66.7.

7. II Sam. 22.6 (Ps. 18.6).

8. Literally, 'One who is wonderful in counsel, a hero divine', alluding to Isa. 9.5.

9. Cp. Job 38.8.

10. Literally, 'all the birth-throes are hastening'.

11. This line has here been inserted in order to clarify the expression 'crucible of conception'.

12. The Hebrew word which normally describes the onset of labor means properly 'turn, change', and the poet here plays on that sense.

13. The poet has in mind the words of Isa. 42.14, 'Like a woman in travail will I gasp', but he takes the Hebrew word for 'gasp', viz. ef'eh, in the sense of the noun ef'eh meaning 'viper'.

14. The pun has been introduced into the rendering in order to bring out the meaning.

15. Ps. 107.27 (RSV: 'They are at their wits' end').

16. Job 41.23(31).

17. A play on Job 38.16, where (by changing the vowels) the Hebrew words for 'springs of the sea' can be interpreted to mean 'eddies of the sea'. This, it may be added, is the way in which the ancient Aramaic translation (Targum) understood them, and our poet had the same tradition.

18. Isa. 38.10.

19. Disaster was often portrayed in antiquity as the loosing of divine or demonic arrows; cp. Ps. 91.5; Job 6.4 In the Iliad (i, 51), the plague which besets the Greeks before Troy is attributed to the arrows of Apollo, and in the Middle Ages, a man who was diseased was said to be 'elf-shot'. In later Jewish folklore, punishment in the grave includes the shooting of 'arrows of iron and fire'; cf. Zohar, Wayaqhel (§199.2); Hibbut ha-Qeber, in Masseketh Simhah, ed. M. Higger (1931), p. 259; A. Jellinek, Beth ha-Midrash, v. 49; J. Eisenstein, Osar ha-Midrashim (1915), p. 94.

20. 'To cry to the deep' seems to have been a proverbial expression for futile screams; cf. Hymns, vi.24; x.33. Here, in the context of a storm at sea, the picture is somewhat more literal, and I have therefore rendered it by a paraphrase designed to bring this out

21. The restoration is due to L. Silberman.

22. Cp. Jonah 2.6.

23. See above, n. 13.

~~6~~

1. Isa. 38.17.

2. Prov. 15.11; 27.20. The term rendered 'Perdition' was sometimes used as a synonym for 'hell' (Ps. 88.12; Job 26.6, etc.). It is the Hebrew Abbadon, which occurs in Rev. 9.11 as the name of the demon of the abyss.

3. Ezra 10.2.

4. The expression is based on Isa. 19.14 (RSV: 'spirit of confusion', literally, 'of distortions').

5. Ps. 19.14.

6. Cp. Manual of Discipline ii, 25; iv, 22; Eph. 2.19.

7. Cp. Isa. 52.8; Ps. 98.9; Job 38.7-all of which passages show that the Hebrew words mean simply 'sing together, in chorus', not 'sing in the Community', as some scholars have mistakenly rendered.

We may perhaps compare Plotinus, Enneads, vi, 9: 'When we behold Him, we attain the end of our existence and our rest. Then we no longer sing out of tune, but form a truly divine chorus about Him'.

8. Pss. 9.2; 26.7; 75.2.

9. Mal. 1.4.

10. Amos 3.9.

11. This is simply an approximate rendering. The Hebrew word occurs only once in the Bible (Isa. 14.4)—and even there the reading is uncertain—and its meaning is not yet definitely determined (RSV: 'insolent fury'; Moffatt: 'mad rage').

12. Based on Isa. 19.8.

13. See note 15 to Hymn No. 5.

14. Jer. 42.18; Nah. 1.6, etc.

15. The Hebrew word occurs only at Ps. 26.4. It is apparently derived from a verbal root meaning 'hide, conceal', and is therefore usually rendered 'dissemblers' (Moffatt: 'hypocrites'). However, it is quite common in the dialect of the Samaritans in the general sense of 'wrongdoers'.

16. Pss. 18.5; 116.3.

17. Ps. 18.5.

18. Ezek. 21.3(20.47).

19. Cp. Deut. 32.22.

20. Cp. Isa. 34.9.

21. Suggested by Amos 7.4.

22. Isa. 57.20.

23. I Sam. 2.10; II Sam. 22.14; Ps. 18.14; Job 37.4.

24. Isa. 63.15. The archaic 'welkin' conveys the effect of the Hebrew word, which really means 'eminence, lofty structure', but came in post-Biblical Jewish literature to be the name of one of the seven heavens.

25. Cp. Zech., ch. 14. The idea is fully developed in the War of the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness. Armed soldiers of heaven are mentioned in Slavonic Enoch 17.1, and in rabbinic literature, the heavenly hosts are sometimes described as an 'army'.

26. Dan. 9.27.

~~7~~

1. Cp. Isa. 26.1.

2. Restored from Ps. 40.3.

~~8~~

1. Hos. 6.3 (which the poet construed in the light of a similar expression in Prov. 4.18).

2. Prov. 2.16; 7.5.

3. Hos. 4.14.

4. Ps. 31.13(12). Compare 'crackpot'.

5. Ps. 69.22.

6. The phrase is suggested by Hab. 2.15. The traditional ('Masoretic') text reads: 'Woe to him that plies his neighbor with drink ... so as to gaze on his [Heb. 'their'] nakedness' (me'orehem). However, in the Dead Sea Commentary on Habakkuk the last word is read slightly differently (viz. me'odehem), to yield the meaning 'their staggerings', and it is this reading that the poet follows.

7. Prov. 19.21.

8. See note 15 to Hymn No. 6.

9. Deut. 29.17(18).

10. Ezek. 14.3, 4, 7.

11. Isa. 28.11.

12. Ps. 10.2.

13. Extirpation from the community was the statutory punishment in Jewish law for blasphemy or idolatry; cf. Num. 15.30; Mishnah, Kerithoth ('Extirpations'), i, 1.

14. Ps. 20.9(8).

15. Cp. Isa. 44.18.

16. Heb. 'in the council of the holy beings' (cp. Ps. 89.7). Since the Hebrew word here rendered 'rallied' refers specifically to the marshalling of troops, and since the expression, 'have hearkened unto me' may very well allude to the Roman practise of reciting the military oath to new recruits, it seems permissible to recognize a military metaphor, and for that reason the term 'legion' has been used.

17. Hab. 1.4.

18. Ezek. 7.17; 21.12(7).

19. Mic. 1.4.

20. Ps. 65.4.

~~9~~

1. Ex. 21.8.

2. Ps. 57.5.

3. Literally, 'And Thou hast placed me in the drag [Heb. magor; cf. Hab. 1.15], with many fishermen spreading their nets on the face of the waters [cp. Isa. 19.8] and (with) huntsmen (hunting) after wrongdoers'.

4. An interpretation of Hab. 1.12.

5. Pss. 57.3; 59.8.

6. Ps. 57.5.

7. Deut. 32.33. A word has evidently fallen out of the Hebrew text.

8. Cp. Isa. 56.1.

9. Nah. 2.12.

10. Pss. 64.4; 120.4; 140.4.

11. Jer. 47.6.

12. Ps. 12.7.

13. Ps. 107.29.

~~10~~

1. An interpretation of a word which in Isa. 32.4 and 35.4 is usually rendered 'rash'. It comes from a root meaning 'be hasty'.

2. An interpretation of Ps. 40.3(2) which is usually rendered, somewhat incongruously, 'He brought me up from the pit of tumult'. The poet understood the Hebrew word 'tumult', viz. shaon, in the sense of the like-sounding Aramaic seyan, 'mud'—an interpretation which, it may be added, was proposed independently by the present writer many years ago.

3. Literally, 'in the mirings of [their] feet'. The poet employs a very rare term which occurs only in Isa. 14.23 and there means 'broom, besom'. However, ancient commentators and lexicographers connected it (perhaps correctly) with the like-sounding Hebrew word for 'mud'—the very word used in Ps. 40.3, which the poet has just quoted. It is evident that he had the same tradition.

4. Prov. 6.19; 10.12.

5. Obadiah 7; Ps. 41.10. Cp. 'com-pani-on'.

6. Ps. 41.10(9).

7. Cp. Prov. 4.24, where similar Hebrew words are rendered 'devious speech'.

8. Restored after Lam. 3.9.

9. Deut. 32.33.

10. The Hebrew expression is a clever adaptation of Hab. 2.3 which the poet read according to the text preserved in the Greek Septuagint Version rather than in the traditional Jewish recension.

11. Ps. 58.6(5).

12. Isa. 17.11.

13. Lev. 13.51.

14. An adaptation of Lam. 1.14.

15. Lam. 1.3.

16. Zeph. 1.15; Job 30.3; 38.27. The words may also be rendered 'ruin and devastation'.

17. Ps. 11.6 (interpreted metaphorically).

18. Isa. 50.3.

19. Ps. 137.6; Job 29.10.

20. Ps. 102.10(9).

21. Pss. 6.8(7); 31.10(9).

22. Job 3.5. I read bi-merire yom in place of bi-merode yom of the editio princeps.

23. Isa. 45.2; Ps. 107.16.

24. Ps. 18.4.

25. I Sam. 9.15; 20.12-13; II Sam. 7.27, etc.

26. Cp. Isa. 13.4; Ps. 46.7.

27. Ezra 9.8-9.

28. A common expression in post-Biblical Hebrew for the ministering angels who stand before God.

29. The Hebrew text is here faint and fragmentary, so that the rendering is largely a guess. (For banim of the transcription, which makes no sense, I have emended benam, after Gen. 42.23.)

30. The Hebrew text is here virtually illegible.

31. Suggested by Ezek. 31.3ff. and Dan. 4.8(11).

32. Inspired by Ezek. 31.4, 7.

33. Cp. Isa. 52.1.

34. Adapted from Nah. 1.11.

35. Isa. 19.14 (where the term is used figuratively).

36. Ps. 107.18.

37. Isa. 28.16.

38. I.e., God; cp. Isa. 42.13; Zeph. 3.17.

39. Military ensigns were certainly used in Israelite war-fare (cp. Isa. 5.26; Jer. 4.6), but perhaps the poet is thinking more specifically of the Roman technical expression, signa tollere, to lift the ensigns', in the sense of 'to set the army on the march'.

40. Cp. Job 25.6.

41. Isa. 28.15, 18.

~~10a~~

1. Job 31.22.

2. Isa. 6.10.

3. Ps. 22.15(14).

4. An interpretation of an obscure term in Jonah 4.8, usually rendered 'sultry wind'.

~~11~~

1. Isa. 26.6; 30.13; Ps. 139.6; Prov. 18.19.

2. For the sake of clarity, I have slightly altered the structure of this sentence. In the original it reads: Thou hast set me as a strong tower on a high wall, and hast planted my structure firmly on a rock, and eternal foundations serve as my basis, and all my walls are a tested bastion that cannot be shaken'.

3. Scholars differ about the meaning of these lines. The Hebrew says literally, 'And Thou, O my God, hast given (provided) it for the 'afim to the holy council'. The most natural meaning of 'afim is 'those that wing their way'. In that case the picture would be that of the spirit soaring to transcendental heights and alighting at last atop a high tower. One may compare the great sentence in The Mirror of Simple Souls (Div. iv, ch, 1): 'This [soul] is the eagle that flies high, so right high and yet more high than doth any bird, for she is feathered with fine Love'. Cp. also Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology ("Lydia Humphrey"): 'I knew of the eagle souls that flew high in the sunlight/ Above the spire of the church'.

4. Cf. Isa. 50.4.

5. Literally, 'in Thy covenant".

6. In the Didascalia Apostolorum (p. 45, ed. Achelis-Fleming), the bishop is called 'Father in God'.

7. Zech. 3.8.

8. Ps. 92.11, etc.

9. Isa. 17.13; Pss. 1.4; 35.5.

10. Cp. Isa. 60.19; Rev. 21.23, 25; 22.6. The Talmud says that the light of the Messianic sun will be sevenfold strong; TB Sanhedrin, 91b.

11. Isa. 60.20.

~~12~~

1. Ex. 15.11.

2. Prov. 4.26.

~~13~~

1. Restored on the basis of Ps. 9.11(10).

~~14~~

1. Isa. 35.7; 49.10.

2. Isa. 41.19.

3. Jer. 17.8.

4 Cp. Dan. 4.9(12); Ezek. 31.6. Literally, 'Its stock (stump) is trampled by wayfarers'.

5 These lines may also be understood in the sense that the holy tree is now being ravaged and despoiled by birds and beasts (i.e., by the impious), and its roots are being carelessly trampled.

6. Cp. Ezek. 31.9.

7. Cp. Isa. 17.11, where RSV renders the verb as 'make them grow'. Our poet, however, took it, as did later Jewish commentators, to be a variant of the common word for 'entangle'.

8. Ps. 103.20.

9. Gen. 3.24.

10. Cp. Enoch 24.4-25.5; 28.1-3; 30.1; 35.3ff.

11. I restore: 'im [shef]'a shehaqim.

12. Literally, 'without recognizing (it)'.

13. Literally, 'though he has thoughts (about it)?'

14. Cp. Isa. 18.2, 7, where the versions so render the rare word b-z-', which is probably to be read here.

15. Isa. 57.20.

16. Cp. Deut. 28.12. Literally, 'that they (i.e., the rains) depart not'.

17. Jer. 47.2.

18. Cp. Isa. 8.7.

19. The reference is to the subterranean springs which suddenly burst forth at the foot of the hills to relieve the summer drought; see G. A. Smith, Historical Geography of the Holy Land, p. 77.

20. Ezek. 21.3 (20.47).

21. Ex. 15.10. Cp. also Enoch 4.89.

22. For the Hebrew idiom, cp. Isa. 28.17.

23. Isa. 5.2.

24. Isa. 40.24.

25. Jer. 17.6; 48.6.

26. Hos. 10.8.

27. Isa. 5.6.

28. Isa. 5.2, 4 (commonly rendered 'wild grapes').

29. Isa. 17.11.

30. Pss. 42.6, 12(11); 43.5.

31. In the Hebrew, this is a combination of Ps. 77.7(6) and Ps. 88.6(5). In both passages, a word h-p-s is employed. In the first, it actually means 'search out' (happes); in the second, 'free, quit' (hophshi). But our author evidently equated it in both instances with a root akin to Arabic hafatha, 'be low, sordid'. In the Ras Shamra texts, of the fourteenth century B.C., the cognate term h-p-sh-t denotes the 'charnel house' of the netherworld.

32. Ps. 88.4(3).

33. Ps. 107.5; Jonah 2.8.

34. Jer. 20.9.

35. Pss. 42.7(6); 43.5.

36. Job 31.22.

37. Isa. 50.4.

38. Literally, 'my circumcised lips'; see note 1 to Hymn 17.

~~15~~

1. Cp. Isa. 42.13.

2. II Sam. 22.5.

3. Cp. Ps. 6.7(6).

4. There is a slight error in the text: for k'sh we must read k'shn; cp. Ex. 19.18.

5. Lam. 2.18.

6. Ps. 31.11; Lam. 2.11.

7. Cp. Zeph. 1.15; Job 30.3; 38.27.

8. Literally, 'supplication'; but the Hebrew word is connected with the idea of grace.

9. Jer. 50.34; 51.36.

10. Cp. Manual of Discipline, iv, 7; I Peter 5.4.

11. I restore the Hebrew to read: [marpe' le-mah] as makkati; cp. Isa. 30.26.

12. Ps. 27.10.

13. Cp. Num. 11.12.

14. Job 34.15; Eccl. 3.20.

15. The text reads, 'How can I stumble' (Heb. ekshol), which makes no sense. A slight emendation (viz. askil) yields the meaning given in the translation; cp. Hymns, xi.28; xii.13.

16. John 1.3.

~~16~~

1. Ezek. 38.12, 13.

2. Jer. 17.8; Ps. 1.3.

3. Ezek. 17.8, 23; 36.8, 30.

4. The Hebrew words could also mean, 'those that espouse (lit. the sons of) Thy truth', but it seems to me that a pointed contrast is intended between the lowly estate of the Brotherhood and the worldly wealth of the impious. For the Hebrew expression, cp. Pss. 86.16; 116.16.

5. Cf. Manual, v.20-24.

6. Restoring yk[bd]. This supplies the necessary contrast between the 'lowly servant' and the 'high and mighty'.

7. Philo (Quod Omnis Probus Liber, 11) says of the Essenes, a group akin to, or identical with, the Qumran Brotherhood: 'They do not lay up treasure of gold and silver, nor acquire real estate out of a desire for revenues, but provide themselves only with the bare necessities of life'. Similarly, Josephus observes (War, II, viii, 2) that 'they despise riches', and Pliny (Natural History, v. 17) that 'they live without money'.

8. I.e., in contrast to the 'running streams' and produce

of the earth on which the impious rely. 9 Hos. 14.6.

10. Cp. Ps. 103.20; Hymns, viii.11.

11. Final judgment with the aid of the angels is foretold in the Book of Enoch (e.g., 53.3; 63.1; 93.15) and in the Qumran Sermon on the Last Jubilee; cf. also Hymns iii.3; vi.29f.; War, xv.14. Based on Zech. 14.3, 5.

12. Cp. Prov. 7.27.

13. Restored simply ad sensum.

14. Job 3.10.

~~17~~

1. Literally, 'circumcision of lips'. The expression is modelled on the Biblical 'one of uncircumcised lips'= 'stammerer' (Ex. 6.12, 30).

2. Isa. 41.14.

3. Literally, 'those versed in concerted song'. The Jewish Daily Morning Service speaks of the angelic choir as 'all of them opening their mouths in holiness and purity, in song and chant, blessing, praising, glorifying, and proclaiming both the awe and the holiness and the sovereignty of God ... all of them giving accord to one another to praise their Creator in tranquillity of spirit and with holy chant; all of them taking up word as one and saying, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts; the fullness of the whole earth is His glory'.

4. On regeneration as a mystical experience, see E. Underhill, Mysticism (ed. 1955), pp. 53f.

~~18~~

1. II Sam. 22.3, 47; Pss. 19.15(14); 28.1; 62.3, 7(2, 6); 144.1, etc.

2. Lam. 2.18.

3. Job 3.10.

4. Cp. Avesta, Yasht 31.20, etc.

5. Cp. Isa. 35.10; 51.11.

~~19~~

1. The metaphor is taken from childbirth.

2. Cp. Ps. 138.3.

3. Restored from Ps. 118.15.

4. Cp. note 7 to Column XVII.

5-6. Cp. Hymn of the Initiants, 1-10.

7. I.e., their several governing constellations.

8. Literally, 'I have heard faithfully (reliably)'.

9. Cp. Note 11 to Hymn 6.

[From this point it becomes impossible to distinguish the separate hymns. The notes are therefore geared to the columns of the original text.]

~~ Column XIII ~~

1. The restoration is tentative, but it is obvious from the sequel that these lines must have recited the doctrine that all things have been endowed with spirit and intelligence wherewith to perceive the truth and reality of God. This is scarcely to be confused with the later more elaborate doctrine of the Gnostics.

2. Cp. Manual of Discipline, iv.7; I Peter 5.4.

3. I.e., the angels. For this term, cp. Hymns, x.28; Enoch 24.6.

4. The reference is to the doctrine of the eschatological renewal of the world; see Analytical Index, E. 3, Rewards (a).

5. Literally, 'Abolishing ancient existences and [es-tabli]shing the things that (currently) obtain in the world'.

6. Cp. Zech. 3.8. In rabbinic usage, the term is applied to a great scholar, i.e., a 'prodigy' of learning or piety.

7. Isa. 66.24. (Cp. also Dan. 12.2.)

8. Restored on the basis of Jos. 23.14.

9. Cp. Ps. 111.2 (which the author must have understood to mean 'sought out for their several purposes', rather than 'sought out [or, studied] by all who have pleasure in them', as usually rendered).

~~ Column XIV ~~

1. Restored on the basis of Ezra 9.8.

2. Another possible restoration is: 'men of truth and discernment]'.

3. Restored from Ex. 19.6.

4. The fourth of the Eighteen Benedictions which form a staple element of all Jewish devotions ends: 'Blessed art Thou, O Lord, Who gracest man with knowledge'.

5. Cp. Manual of Discipline, i.3—4.

6. Probably in the technical sense of admission to the Brotherhood; cp. Hymn of the Initiants, note 32.

7. Cp. Manual, ix.20.

8. Cp. Manual, iv.l.

9. See above, note 4.

10. Hos. 14.5.

~~ Column XV ~~

1. Hos. 14.5.

2. Ps. 37.23; Prov. 20.24.

3. Josephus (Ant., Xlll, 5, 9) says of the Essenes that they believed all things were pre-ordained.

4. Literally, Thou hast prepared him for the Era of Favor'; see Analytical Index, E. 1 (c).

5. Isa. 45.17.

6. See Analytical Index, E. 1 (a).

~~ Column XVI ~~

1. Isa. 6.3.

2. In general, I here follow the restorations suggested by J. Licht (The Thanksgiving Scroll [1957], p. 202), except that in line 4 I read be-Toratechdh for his be-goralechah ('in Thy lot') and in line 5 I read [wa-te'ammesehu] for his [wa-teyasserehu] and, at the end, be-kol mi[s'adaw] for his be-kol mi[shpatechah] ('in all Thy judgments').

3. Jer. 32.19.

4. On this concept, cf. T.H. Gaster, Thespis2 (1961), pp. 288f.

5. Cp. Manual, iii.20ff.

6. Exod. 34.5, 7-9.

7. The reference is to Ex. 34.53., just quoted. According to the Talmud (Rosh Ha-Shanah, 17b), this formula was prescribed by God as that which Israel was to repeat when entreating forgiveness of sins. For that reason, it runs like a refrain through the Confessions on the Day of Atonement.

~~ Columns XVII-XVIII ~~

1. Ex. 34.5ff.

2. Deut. 32.22.

3. Cp. Ps. 102.29(28).

4. Ex. 34.6.

5. Cp. Mic. 7.19, and see T. H. Gaster, Festivals of the Jewish Year (1953), pp. 121-23.

6. The reference is to the two spirits described in the Manual of Discipline, cols, iii-iv.

7. The terms employed in the Hebrew (viz. tefillah and tahanun) denote in Jewish usage statutory and spontaneous prayer.

8. An adaptation of Dan. 9.7, the Hebrew word zeda-qah, which there means 'righteousness', being taken in in its later sense of 'charity, bounty'. Similarly, the common phrase, To Thy name pertains blessing', is taken to mean 'And of Thy nature it is to bestow blessing'.

9. The restoration is based on the obviously implied contrast between covenants made by men and those made by God.

10. Isa. 60.19-20.

11. The clue to this very difficult passage is to be found, I think, in the sequence of the phrases, The hands of Thy servant were steadied' and 'that he might triumph in glory'; for these expressions hark back to the incident related in Ex. 17.8-13. During the battle against Amalek at Rephidim, 'when Moses held up his hand, Israel triumphed; and when he let down his hand, Amalek triumphed. But Moses' hands grew heavy ... so Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands on either side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun'. The allusion, therefore, is to Moses, though the poet obviously uses the Biblical expressions in an extended sense.

12. Isa. 61.1. (The prototype of the term 'gospel'!)

13. Isa. 61.2-3.

14. Ezek. 11.19; 36.26.

15. Heb. Or-Tom; cp. Introduction, p. 21.

=======

Fragments

~~1~~

1. For this designation, cp. Manual, vii.6; xii; MFC ii.8; Blessings, iii.6; Oration, ii.8; War, vii.6; x.ii; AL(a).

2. Cp. Judges 13.18.

3. Cp. Hymns i.30, 33; iii.23; vi.ii; x.20.

4. Cp. Hymns xii.12; frag. x.3.

5. Cp. Hymns x.12; xii.31; frag. iv.ii

6. Cp. Hymns iv.19; vi.22.

7. Literally, 'in guilt of wickedness', cp. Hymns vi.22.

8. Literally, 'through Eras of Wrath'. For this eschatological term, cp. Analytical Index, E. 1 (a).

9. Cp. Hymns i.18, 32; ii.7; iv.36; ix.10, 12; xi.8, 12.

10. Cp. Hymns iii.30; vi.6; ix.14.

11. Cp. Hymns i.21; iii.24; iv.29; xii.26, 32; frag, xi.7 (?).

12. Cp. Hymns xi.7.

13. Cp. Hymns xhi.18-19.

14. Literally, 'in my time(s)'; cf. Analytical Index, E. 1.

~~2~~

1. Literally, 'in conformity with the abundance of Thy mercies'.

2. In the Hebrew, the image appears to be that of a city under siege.

3. Literally, 'mediators of knowledge (gnosis)'; cp. Hymns ii.13.

4. Literally, 'men who reprimand them in accordance with truth'.

5. For this use of the Hebrew word ('abnayim), cp. Jer, 18.3.

6. The picture is that of a craftsman inspecting his products and giving them the stamp of his approval; cp. T. H. Gaster, Myth, Legend, and Custom in the Old Testament (1969), §6.

7. The restoration is due to J. Licht, though he understands the Hebrew words in the sense of 'bandage his wound(s)', which misses the metaphor.

8. Cp. Lev. 12.8; 16.30; Num. 8.21.

9. See Analytical Index, F. 2 (c).

~~3~~

1. Prov. 3.17.

2. Cp. Joel 2.26.

3. Cp. Jer. 18.22; Pss. 140.6; 142.4.

4. The subject is supplied from the subsequent reference to 'its traps ... its net'.

5. Cp. Ps. 35.7; Prov. 29.5; Lam. 1.3.

6. Cp. Pss. 55.9; 107.25; 148.8.

7. The restoration is a mere guess.

8. Cp. Job 18.9.

9. Literally, 'every inclination to deceit'.

10. I Sam. 2.3; cp. Manual, iii.15; Hymns i.26; xii.10.

11. Cp. II Chron. 20.6.

12. Tentative restoration: [lifqod kol bene 'asha]mah; cp. Hymns v.7; vi.30; vii.11.

13. Cp. Ps. 59.4.

14. Reading (with Yadin) we-hadal zadon. The rendering attempts to reproduce the imagery of the latter word; commonly rendered 'arrogance, presumption', it actually derives from the root z-y-d, 'seethe, bubble up', and refers to the seething of wickedness within the soul.

15. For the sentiment, cp. HabC, xi.l. The metaphor is taken from the fact that filth and insanitary conditions (niddah) lead to symptoms of disease (tahalu'im).

16. Literally, 'judgments of plague/stroke'; cp. Hymns i.33; xi.8.

17. Cp. 'Zadokite' Document, ii.4.

~~4~~

1. Restored from Hab. 2.1.

2. Zech. 3.2. The word here rendered 'rebuke' carries the meaning 'exorcize', as in the incident in The Memoirs of the Patriarchs where Abram expels Pharaoh's sickness. The word rendered 'devil' is satan, here used generically, as in Hymns frag, xiv.3; Blessings, L8.

3. Cp. Hymns ix.14-15.

4. Cp. Jer. 4.19; 48.26.

5. Ps. 22.15.

6. Restoring tentatively, [kissi]timoh.

7. I Sam. 2.3; cp. Manual, iii.15; Hymns 126; xii.10.

8. A probable supplement is qisse [haron], lit. 'the times of (Divine) Wrath'. For this eschatological term, cp. Analytical Index, E. 1 (a).

~~5~~

1. Cp. Hymns i.23, 26, 30.

2. Cp. Hymns iii.21; frag, vii.11 (?).

3. Cp. War, xii.7; Hymns frag, xxiv.2; HFCi 9.12; Bless-ings, i.5. I

4. War, x.14.

5. The manuscript's unintelligible tbw/yt is, I think, a scribal error for t<sh>byt; cp. Ezek. 23.48.

6. Restoring ro[gez], after Job 3.19. An alternative, suggested by J. Licht, is ri[sh'ah], when the meaning will be, "Thou wilt lay waste (every) place of wickedness',

7. Cp. Manual, iv.13; Hymns ii.15; xi.22.

8. Literally, 'for the generations of eternity'; cp. Hymns i.16.

9. Tentatively restored: li-me[humah] rabbah; cp. Hymns xii.8.

10. The obscure word 'ninam is here interpreted from the Heb. '-n-n (and Arabic cognate) meaning 'to feel inner grief, le-chalah being regarded as adverbial, as in, e.g., Exod. 11.1.

11. Restoring, with J. Licht, we-lif[hod]; cp. Manual, iv.2; Hymns x.34; frag. iv.9.

12. Ps. 31.22; cp. War, xiv.9.

13. Literally, 'an ear of flesh ... a mind of flesh'. Perhaps the poet is referring to a personal, not a general, revelation.

14. Cp. Hymns iv.13, 21.

15. Literally, Thou hast given to the heart of ... an understanding of the Time (Era) of Witness'. For this eschatological term, cp. Hymns, frag, lix.3. For the concept, cp. Enoch, xcvii.4; xcix.8; c.10-11. The missing word may be be-[hirechah], Thine elect, chosen ones'.

16. Cp. Hymns x.35.

17. The expression is adapted from Isa. 24.21.

18. Cp. War, iii.6. See also Analytical Index, D. 3.

19. Restored after 'Zadokite' Document, iv.7.

20. See Analytical Index, A. 7.

=======

Poems From A Qumran Hymnal

1. David

1. Cp. I Sam. 16.11. But here the word has special point, because kings were commonly required to be taller than any of their subjects. This is said explicitly of Saul (I Sam. 10.23), of Xerxes (Herodotus, vii, 187) and of the kings of Ethiopia (Athenaeus, xiii, 20). In the Akkadian 'Epic of Creation' (Enuma elish, i.99), Marduk, who assumes sovereignty over the gods, is said to be of exceptional stature. Conversely, in the Canaanite Poem of Baal (II AB, ii.59-60), the young Ashtar is rejected as successor to Baal because he is too small. See T. H. Gaster, Myth, Legend, and Custom in the Old Testament (1969), §127.

2. The Hebrew word combines the notions of youngest and least significant. Indeed, a late midrash asserts that David was the latter only, the youngest son of Jesse having been Elihu, mentioned in I Chron. 27.18. See L. Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, vi.249, n. 23.

3. David is here described as the shepherd and 'ruler' of Jesse's lambs and kids (not even full-grown goats !) in contemptuous contradistinction to his eventual role as shepherd and ruler of God's flock. For 'shepherd's 'king', cp., in the Old Testament, II Sam. 5.2; 7.7; Jer. 3.15. Mesopotamian and Homeric kings likewise affected this title.

4. Literally, 'cannot testify1, but the word has the connotation of oral deposition; and that is here the point.

5. That is, my songs of praise.

6. That is, my proficiency in tending the sheep. (The word does not mean simply 'my works' in the sense of 'my compositions'.)

7. Cp. I Sam. 16.12.

8. Cp. I Sam. 16.7ff.

9. Cp. Gen. 39.6.

10. Cp. I Sam. 16.7.

11. Cp. I Sam. 16.8; Ps. 78.70-71.

12. For this title cp. I Sam. 9.16; 13.14; 25.30; Isa. 55.4.

=======

II. Invitation to Grace After Meals

1. Literally, 'multitude'.

2. Literally, 'confess the majesty of His name'. The 'name' in Hebrew signifies also the outward manifestation.

3. Verses 1-2, missing in the Qumran manuscript, are here supplied from the Syriac version.

4. Literally, 'unite your (individual) selves'.

5. Literally, 'of the Most High'. The meaning is that there is a supernal power which works salvation.

6. The Hebrew means simply, 'join in fellowship together', the expression being modelled (as again in v.13) on Ps. 122.3. To render, 'form a community', and to draw therefrom a reference to the Qumran Brotherhood, strains the syntax.

7. Literally, 'multitude'.

8. The word, 'Lord' (Heb. 'Adon), has special point: the meaning is that although the Most High is the particular Lord of Israel, His sovereignty is universal.

9. Literally, 'avow the majesty of the Most High'.

10. For the Hebrew expression (though in a slightly different sense), cp. Num. 4.3; Ps. 20.4.

11. Cp. Deut. 8.10.

12. The manuscript has 'eyes', but the verb is in the singular. Hence the text must be corrected in accordance with the Syriac version.

13. For this expression cp. Isa. 32.2; Jer. 14.8; 15.11; 30.7; Ps. 37.39. In the Qumran texts it has a quasi-eschatological meaning, as in Dan. 12.1.

14. Literally, 'establish/upraise the horn'—a common Biblical expression for 'triumph'. It is not clear whether this refers to the triumph of Israel in general (as in Ezek. 29.21; Ps. 148.14) or, more specifically, to the raising up of a future Messianic King (as in Ps. 132.17). I think the former is more probable; see next note.

15. Literally 'and from Israel a judge of peoples'. It is not clear whether this means that God will raise up from Israel one who will be judge of all peoples, or that He Himself is such a judge. In light of Ps. 67.4, whence the expression is taken and where it refers to God, I think the latter more probable, the strict translation then being, '(Bless the Lord) ... Who judges (all) peoples from Israel'. Nor do I think that 'judges' here refers to the Final Judgment; the Hebrew word means simply 'governs'. The sentiment is that of Isa. 2.3.

16. This expression echoes Exod. 33.7. The verse, missing from the manuscript, is here supplied from the Syriac version.

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III. Plea for Grace

1. Jer. 18.19.

2. From v. 13 it is apparent that the poet is praying for relief from sickness, albeit only metaphorical. The verse therefore harks back to the words of I Kings 8.38f. (=II Chron. 6.29): 'If plague or sickness befall them, then hear the prayer or supplication of every man ... as each one spreads out his hands (lit. palms) towards this house; hear it in heaven Thy dwelling and forgive, and act' (NEB). For the expression, 'Thy holy abode', cp. also Deut. 26.15; Jer. 25.30; Zech 2.17; Ps. 68.6; II Chron. 30.27.

3. Cp. Isa. 37.17; Pss. 17.6; 31.3; 86.1.

4. Cp. I Sam. 1.27; Ps. 106.15.

5. Reading tippare'a (3rd sg. fern.), and taking the subject to be nafshi ('my soul') in the preceding line. Cp. Wolsey's 'If I had served my God with half the zeal/I served my king, He would not in mine age/ have left me naked to mine enemies': Shakespeare Henry VIII, iii,2.

6. Vocalizing gemuli, rather than gemule, as in the editio Princeps,

7. Reading yashub, rather than yashib, as in the editio Princeps.

8. This is the epithet applied to God in the traditional blessing on hearing bad news; cf. Mishnah, Berachoth, ix.2.

9. Cp. Ps. 143.2.

10. Cp. Ps. 119.34.

11. Cp. Ps. 119.7, 108.

12. The expression is suggested by Ps. 145.5.

13. Cp. Ps. 25.7.

14. The expression is borrowed from the law concerning persons afflicted with skin diseases: Lev. 13.6, 17; 14.48. The words rendered 'noisome plague' there mean specifically 'foul blot, blotch'. Here they may be understood either literally or metaphorically.

15. Cp. Lev. 14.43.

16. Cp. Hos. 9.16; Job 18.16.

17. Emending after the Syriac version, kabbir for the kabod of the Qumran text. The point is that the might of God is contrasted with the ineffective power of men.

18. Vocalizing shallemah (imperat., with 3rd sg. fem. objective suffix), rather than shelemah (adj. 'complete'), as in the editio princeps.

19. Cp. Job 17.9.

20. Cp. Pss. 3.5; 120.1; Job 9.16.

21. Cp. Ps. 3.6.

22. Cp. Ps. 102.5.

23. Cp. Ps. 3.6.

24. Cp. Pss. 40.18; 70.16; 144.2, etc.

25. The Hebrew word bosheth, usually rendered 'shame', also means 'disappointment', and this is the meaning here, in contrast to the preceding affirmation (v. 17), 'From Thee comes my confidence, O Lord'.

26. Cp. Ps. 25.20.

27. Cp. Ps. 25.22.

28. Heb. hasidecha, usually rendered 'Thy devout ones'; but hesed also denotes the mutual loyalty involved in a covenantal relationship.

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IV. Supplication

1. For the sentiment, cp. Isa. 38.18-19, The netherworld cannot confess Thee; Death cannot shout Thy praise ... The living, the living it is who (alone) can confess Thee'.

2. Job 12.10.

3. Literally, 'acts of sedaqah'. This word, which normally means 'righteousness', is here used in the post-Biblical sense of 'charity, benevolence'.

4. Cp. Pss. 5.12; 69.37; 119.132.

5. Ruth 2.20.

6. Ps. 103.6.

7. Ps. 103.4.

8. Ps. 92.3.

9. Cp. Isa. 50.1.

10. Cp. Isa. 30.2; Pss. 368; 57.2(1). 11- Cp. Targums to Deut. 15.7; Pss. 27.14; 31.25. For an analogous expression, cp. 'Zadokite' Document, iii.3. 12. Num. 14.9; Jer. 33.8; Ps. 51.4. 13 Jer. 33.8; Ezek. 36.3.

14. Cp. in the 'Eighteen Benedictions' of the Jewish liturgy: 'Thou hast vouchsafed knowledge to man'. Here, the 'knowledge' is virtually gnosis.

15. For the quasi-Aramaic phrasing in the original, cp. Targum to Hos. 5.5; 14.2.

16. Heb. satan, but here probably in the sense of a, rather than the, satan, i.e., an adversary spirit. For this usage, common in later magical texts, cp. Hymns frags, iv.6; xiv.3; Blessings, ii.8. For the sentiment, cp. Ps. 119.113.

17. This expression, familiar especially from the New Testament (Mat. 10.1; 12.43; Mark 1.23ff.; 3.11, 30; 5.2, 8, 13; 6.7; 9.25; Luke 4.33, 36; 6.18; 8.29; 9.42-, 11.24; Acts 5.16) and from later rabbinic writings, is not found elsewhere in the Dead Sea Scrolls thus far published.

18. Literally, Thou, O Lord, art (the object of) my praise'. What this means is not simply that the writer extols God, but that the indwelling spirit of God is the source of his human worth and esteem. This contrasts with the notion of demonic possession.

19. Ps. 25.5.

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V. The City of God

1. Cp. Prov. 10.1.

2. Deut. 6.5.

3. Ps. 112.6.

4. Heb., by hendiadys, 'peace and longing hope'. Possibly, however, the meaning is that Zion hopes for peace; cp. Jer. 8.15; 14.19.

5. Isa. 56.1; Lam. 3.22.

6. Literally, 'for generation upon generation'.

7. Literally, 'generations'.

8. Literally, 'would suck the teat of thy glory'; cp. Isa. 66.11.

9. Suggested by the meaning traditionally assigned to a rare word ('-k-s) in Isa. 3.16.

10. The reference is to gentiles; cf. Manual, v.6; 'Zadokite' Document, iv.3; Isa. 14.1; 50.5; 56.3; Zeph. 2.15.

11. Gen. 49.18.

12. Isa. 66.10. For tmyk, at the end of the line (which cannot mean 'thy perfect ones', since this would require tmymyk), I emend to the very similar tmyd, 'always'. The scribe evidently miscopied.

13. For the wording, cp. Ezek. 19.5; 37.11; Ps. 9.9; Prov. 10.28; 11.7; Job 8.13; 14.19.

14. Imitated from Job 4.7. (Possibly, 'righteousness' [sdq] is a scribal error for 'a righteous man' [sdyk].)

15. Literally, 'roundabout, on all sides'.

16. Cp. Targum Onqelos to Num. 10.35.

17. Literally, 'pleasant in ...'

18. The causative form of the verb (if indeed it is a verb rather than simply the adverb meaning 'above') indicates that the image is that of an incense-offering whose aroma rises.

19. Deut. 6.5—the complement to 'with all my might' in v.l.

20. Cp. Dan. 9.24.

21. Literally 'blessings of men held in honor'. I take the genitive to be objective, rather than subjective. Zion is envisaged as a conquering hero receiving plaudits.

22. Literally, 'receive the vision'. This, I think, means 'receive what has been envisaged', rather than 'comprehend the prophecy'.

23. The reference is more specifically to Dan. 9.24.

24. This line is obscure, involving a word—ttb'k—of uncertain meaning and seemingly anomalous form. My translation (which is provisional) is reached by taking it as a parallel to qh 'receive', rather than to dubar, 'spoken', in the preceding line, by parsing it as a noun (on the pattern of talmud, takrik, etc.), and by deriving it from a root akin to Arabic t-b-', 'follow', in the sense of 'consequence'.

25. Literally, 'in thy glory/honor my soul will rejoice'. I take the 'glory/honor' to be that which will eventually be restored.

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VI. Morning Hymn

1. Cp. Ezek. 28.23 and the opening words of the Jewish Kaddish-prayer.

2. Literally, 'from one generation to another'. 3. Cp. Ps. 96.6; I Chron. 16.27. Here the reference is, more specifically, to the splendor of sunrise.

4. The reference is to the swelling of tides at daybreak— an interpretation which I owe to my daughter, Corinna. The glow of dawn forms the foreground, the rush of the tides the background, of the daily theophany, when the sun seems to rise out of the ocean.

5. The image is that of courtiers in attendance on a king. For the wording, cp. Ps. 89.15. The unfolding scene at daybreak attests both the beneficence of God and His constancy (truth; Heb. 'emeth) in maintaining His creation.

6. The manifestation of God's presence in the sunrise bespeaks His sovereignty over the world, but—in contrast to that of earthly monarchs—His is a sovereignty founded on Justice and Right. For the wording, cp. Ps. 97.2. (The manuscript reads, 'Truth and Justice and Right', but the word Truth overloads the meter; it is simply vertical dittography from the preceding line.)

7. Gen. 1.4, 18; Enoch 41.8.

8. Literally, 'by the knowledge of His heart/mind'.

9. At first blush, this line might be rendered, 'established the dawn'; but the Hebrew word for 'established' (viz. hekin) here bears a technical sense, attested in Prov. 4.18 and Hos. 6.3 (which many modern scholars needlessly emend), and refers to the sun's eventually standing at the meridian. (The cognate Akkadian kanu is similarly employed of a celestial body's reaching its zenith.)

10. Cp. Job 38.7. The reason why the poet here introduces parenthetically a 'flashback' to the original creation is that, in Jewish belief, the birth of each new day is in fact a repetition of that primordial event. Says the Yoser-hymn for sabbaths and festivals: 'He reneweth every day continually the work of the Creation'.

11. For the wording, cp. Hymns xiii.11.

12. Cp. Ps. 65.12 (where, incidentally, for the anomalous shenath, 'year', we should perhaps read, ma'anoth, 'furrows'). Again a picture suggested by the landscape revealed at sunrise.

13. The following verses are taken from Jer. 10.12-13; 51.15-16; Ps. 135.7. Note that knowledge and understanding are mentioned in Exod. 31.3 as the special qualities of the human artisan, Bezalel.

14. Cp. also Enoch 41.3. The reference is here more specifically to the cool breezes at dawn—especially welcome in the torrid heat of the Dead Sea area!

15. The reference is more specifically to the electric storms which, in the Holy Land and in Syria, presage the onset of the 'early rains' in late September. Native Arabs have a saying, 'The lightning is a token of rain'; cp. T. H. Gaster, Myth, Legend, and Custom in the Old Testament (1969, 1975), §201.

16. A picture suggested more specifically by the rising of mountain mists in the early morning.

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Lament for Zion

1. Reading [dibre ha-te'u]dah, with reference especially to Deut. 30.19; 31.28.

2. Cp. Deut. 28.32.

3. Again a reference to the wording of the 'Great Com-mination'; cp. Deut. 28.20.

4. Restoring, [hefarnu] et berito; cp. Deut. 31.14, 26.

5. Isa. 64.10.

6. Ibidem.

7. A tentative restoration, after Psalms of Solomon 2.2. This detail is mentioned likewise in the medieval dirge, Zechor asher 'asah sar, chanted in the synagogue on the Fast of Ab (verse 6).

8. Or, ['meal-offering and libation have been cut off']; cp. Joel 1.8.

9. Cp. Zeph. 2.15.

10. Restoring we'en ma[ssil]; cp. Isa. 5.29; Pss. 7.3; 50.22. 11. Cp. Lam. 1.4.

12. Cp. Jer. 9.10; 1022; 34.22.

13. Restored after Jer. 6.8.

14. Cp. Jer. 38.4; similar is Ps. 142.5.

15. Tentatively restored after Isa, 53.4.

16. Literally, 'and all our foes [ ]'. Restored after Lam. 1.15.

17. Cp. Isa. 59.12.

18. Ps. 78.21.

19. I.e., the corpses of the slain defile the holiness of the city. Cp. Baruch 3.10. Cp. also Isa. 59.10.

20. Literally, 'cruel women'; cp. Lam. 4.3.

21. Restored ad sensum; cp. I Maccabees 1.26.

22. Cp. Lam. 1.16.
23. Restoring, [hibbequ] 'ashpotot (= 'ashpatot); cp. Lam. 4.5.

24. Cp. Lam. 4.2.

25. Cp. Lam. 4.5.

26. Cp. Ezek. 16.10-13. (The reading in the editio prin-ceps is egregiously wrong!)

27. Cp. Lam. 1.1.

28. Ibidem.

29. Cp. Isa. 54.6. My rendering seeks to reproduce a play on words ('azubah-'asubah) in the Hebrew.

30. There is a double entente in the original, the Hebrew word '-q-r denoting both the razing of a structure and the barrenness of a woman. The words inserted in parentheses are designed to bring out the point. The same metaphor is employed in the Babylonian recension of a traditional dirge for the Fast of Ab: S. Baer, ed., 'Abodat Israel, 96, line 8.

31. Allegro's reading, u-kmskkt, could mean only 'like a woman -who plaits, inter-weaves', but this makes no sense, and his interpretation of the word as a passive participle meaning who is shut away is impossible. It seems to me that the correct reading is u-kmsknt, 'like a woman left beggared', i.e. dispossessed.

32. Cp. Gen. 26.35; I Sam. 1.10; Isa. 22.4; Ezek. 21.11-

33. Cp. Jer. 6.26; Amos 8.10; Zech. 12.10.

34. Lam. 1.2.

35. Restoring [heli]la[h] we-hagetah; cp. Isa. 16.7; Jer. 48.31.

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Hymns of Triumph

~~I~~

1. Cp. Ps. 148.13. Literally, 'sing hallelujahs to the name of the Lord'. The name is the visible presence.

2. Cp. Pss. 104.39; 144.20.

3. Cp. Deut. 33.28; Prov. 3.20.

4. Cp. Isa. 60.18. 'Their' refers to the righteous.

5. Cp. Lev. 26.4; Deut 11.17; Ezek. 34.27; Ps. 67.7.

6. Cp. Ps. 22.7.

~~II~~

1. Cp. Ps. 69.35.

2. There may be a subtle point in this phrase: in Job 38.7 it is said that the stars of morning chanted in chorus at the dawn of creation. Now it will be the stars that have been glimmering through Israel's dark night that will do the same.

3. Cp. Nahum 2.1.

4. Cp. Ps. 92.10.

5. Cp. Ps. 104.31.

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