Psalms 55

Psalm 55

Complaint about a Friend’s Treachery

¹Give ear to my prayer, O God;[#Ps 27.9; 61.1]

do not hide yourself from my supplication.

²Attend to me and answer me;[#Ps 66.19; 77.3; Isa 38.14]

I am troubled in my complaint.

I am distraught

³by the noise of the enemy,[#2 Sam 16.7, 8; Ps 17.9; 71.11]

because of the clamor of the wicked.

For they bring trouble upon me,

and in anger they bear a grudge against me.

⁴My heart is in anguish within me;[#Ps 116.3]

the terrors of death have fallen upon me.

⁵Fear and trembling come upon me,[#Job 21.6; Ps 119.120]

and horror overwhelms me.

⁶And I say, “O that I had wings like a dove![#Job 3.13]

I would fly away and be at rest;

⁷truly, I would flee far away;

I would lodge in the wilderness; Selah

⁸I would hurry to find a shelter for myself[#Isa 4.6]

from the raging wind and tempest.”

⁹Confuse, O Lord, confound their speech,[#Jer 6.7]

for I see violence and strife in the city.

¹⁰Day and night they go around it

on its walls,

and iniquity and trouble are within it;

¹¹ruin is in its midst;[#Ps 5.9; 10.7]

oppression and fraud

do not depart from its marketplace.

¹²It is not enemies who taunt me—[#Ps 41.9]

I could bear that;

it is not adversaries who deal insolently with me—

I could hide from them.

¹³But it is you, my equal,[#2 Sam 15.12; Jer 9.4]

my companion, my familiar friend,

¹⁴with whom I kept pleasant company;[#Ps 42.4]

we walked in the house of God with the throng.

¹⁵Let death come upon them;[#Num 16.30, 33; Ps 64.7]

let them go down alive to Sheol,

for evil is in their homes and in their hearts.

¹⁶But I call upon God,[#Ps 57.2, 3]

and the Lord will save me.

¹⁷Evening and morning and at noon[#Ps 141.2; Dan 6.10]

I utter my complaint and moan,

and he will hear my voice.

¹⁸He will redeem me unharmed[#2 Chr 32.7, 8; Ps 103.4]

from the battle that I wage,

for many are arrayed against me.

¹⁹God, who is enthroned from of old, Selah[#Deut 33.27; Ps 78.59]

will hear and will humble them,

because they do not change

and do not fear God.

²⁰My companion laid hands on a friend[#Ps 7.4; 89.34]

and violated a covenant with me

²¹with speech smoother than butter[#Ps 59.7; Prov 5.3]

but with a heart set on war,

with words that were softer than oil

but in fact were drawn swords.

²²Cast your burden on the Lord ,[#Ps 37.24; Mt 6.25; #55.22 Or Cast what he has given you]

and he will sustain you;

he will never permit

the righteous to be moved.

²³But you, O God, will cast them down[#Job 15.32; Ps 5.6; 73.18]

into the lowest pit;

the bloodthirsty and treacherous

shall not live out half their days.

But I will trust in you.