Psalm 73 :: English Standard Version (ESV)

Book Three

God Is My Strength and Portion Forever

Psa 73:1

Psa 73:1A Psalm of Asaph.
Truly God is good to Israel,
to those who are pure in heart.

Psa 73:2

Psa 73:2But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled,
my steps had nearly slipped.

Psa 73:3

Psa 73:3For I was envious of the arrogant
when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

Psa 73:4

Psa 73:4For they have no pangs until death;
their bodies are fat and sleek.

Psa 73:5

Psa 73:5They are not in trouble as others are;
they are not stricken like the rest of mankind.

Psa 73:6

Psa 73:6Therefore pride is their necklace;
violence covers them as a garment.

Psa 73:7

Psa 73:7Their eyes swell out through fatness;
their hearts overflow with follies.

Psa 73:8

Psa 73:8They scoff and speak with malice;
loftily they threaten oppression.

Psa 73:9

Psa 73:9They set their mouths against the heavens,
and their tongue struts through the earth.

Psa 73:10

Psa 73:10Therefore his people turn back to them,
and find no fault in them.[fn]

Psa 73:11

Psa 73:11And they say, “How can God know?
Is there knowledge in the Most High?”

Psa 73:12

Psa 73:12Behold, these are the wicked;
always at ease, they increase in riches.

Psa 73:13

Psa 73:13All in vain have I kept my heart clean
and washed my hands in innocence.

Psa 73:14

Psa 73:14For all the day long I have been stricken
and rebuked every morning.

Psa 73:15

Psa 73:15If I had said, “I will speak thus,”
I would have betrayed the generation of your children.

Psa 73:16

Psa 73:16But when I thought how to understand this,
it seemed to me a wearisome task,

Psa 73:17

Psa 73:17until I went into the sanctuary of God;
then I discerned their end.

Psa 73:18

Psa 73:18Truly you set them in slippery places;
you make them fall to ruin.

Psa 73:19

Psa 73:19How they are destroyed in a moment,
swept away utterly by terrors!

Psa 73:20

Psa 73:20Like a dream when one awakes,
O Lord, when you rouse yourself, you despise them as phantoms.

Psa 73:21

Psa 73:21When my soul was embittered,
when I was pricked in heart,

Psa 73:22

Psa 73:22I was brutish and ignorant;
I was like a beast toward you.

Psa 73:23

Psa 73:23Nevertheless, I am continually with you;
you hold my right hand.

Psa 73:24

Psa 73:24You guide me with your counsel,
and afterward you will receive me to glory.

Psa 73:25

Psa 73:25Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.

Psa 73:26

Psa 73:26My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength[fn] of my heart and my portion forever.

Psa 73:27

Psa 73:27For behold, those who are far from you shall perish;
you put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to you.

Psa 73:28

Psa 73:28But for me it is good to be near God;
I have made the Lord GOD my refuge,
that I may tell of all your works.

See the ESV Preface (Especially for Parenthesis, Brackets, & Asterisks).

ESV Footnotes

(73:10)

Probable reading; Hebrew the waters of a full cup are drained by them

(73:26)

Hebrew rock

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