Psalms 38 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
~1000 BC, David's reign, within the temple songbook assembled over later centuries
Location
Israel, sung in the sanctuary during the presentation of an offering
Audience
Worshippers bringing offerings, and anyone praying through illness or public disgrace
Situation
The singer describes a body breaking down, sores, fever, exhaustion, deafness to his accusers, and links his suffering to his own sin. Friends keep their distance while enemies gather and plot.
Key Background
The heading says the psalm is for the memorial offering, a portion of a grain offering burned at the sanctuary to bring the worshipper to God's attention, so the words were meant to be spoken while that ritual was performed. Serious skin disease and wasting illness carried social consequences in Israel, since a person judged unclean was kept outside normal community life, which explains why friends stand far off. This is counted as one of the seven penitential psalms in later Christian tradition, prayed during Lent and at deathbeds for well over a thousand years.
A psalm of David. For remembrance. Yahweh, don't me while you're burning with anger. Don't me in the heat of your fury.
Because your have already pierced deep into me, and your is down hard.
There's no health left in my body because of your fury. There's no strength left in my bones because of my
My have risen over my head. They're like a crushing weight — too heavy for me to carry.
My are infected and rotting because of my own
I'm completely broken down. All day long I walk around consumed by
My insides are with fever. There's no health left in my body.
I'm and completely crushed. I from the anguish tearing through my heart.
you already know every I have. My sighing is no secret to you.
My heart is pounding. My strength has left me. Even the in my — it's fading.
The people who love me and my closest friends keep their distance from my suffering. Even my own family stays far away.
People who want me dead set their traps. Those who want to destroy me talk about it all day, plotting from morning to night.
But I'm like someone who — I don't respond. Like someone who speak — I don't open my mouth.
I've become like someone who doesn't hear, who has no argument to make in his own defense.
Because it's you I'm for, Yahweh. You will answer, Master — my God.
Because I said, "Don't let them over me. Don't let them use my as an excuse to feel superior."
Because I'm on the of collapse, and my pain is always right in front of me.
So I'll lay it all out — every failed. I'm by what done wrong.
Meanwhile my are alive and thriving. The people who hate me for no reason keep multiplying.
People who repay my with evil attack me for trying to do what's right.
Don't me, Yahweh. My God, don't be from me.
to help me, Master — the one who me.