Psalms 10

Chapter context

What is happening in Psalms 10?

prayerpraiselamentkingship

Psalms 10 belongs to the early movement of the book, especially the section often described as Book I. Psalms is the Bible’s great book of sung prayer, teaching the full range of faithful speech from anguish and repentance to jubilation and doxology. Read this chapter with the wider themes of prayer, praise, and lament in view so the individual verses keep their proper weight.

¹ Why standest thou afar off, O LORD? why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble? ² The wicked in his pride doth persecute the poor: let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined. ³ For the wicked boasteth of his heart’s desire, and blesseth the covetous, whom the LORD abhorreth. ⁴ The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts. ⁵ His ways are always grievous; thy judgments are far above out of his sight: as for all his enemies, he puffeth at them. ⁶ He hath said in his heart, I shall not be moved: for I shall never be in adversity. ⁷ His mouth is full of cursing and deceit and fraud: under his tongue is mischief and vanity. ⁸ He sitteth in the lurking places of the villages: in the secret places doth he murder the innocent: his eyes are privily set against the poor. ⁹ He lieth in wait secretly as a lion in his den: he lieth in wait to catch the poor: he doth catch the poor, when he draweth him into his net. ¹⁰ He croucheth, and humbleth himself, that the poor may fall by his strong ones. ¹¹ He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten: he hideth his face; he will never see it. ¹² Arise, O LORD; O God, lift up thine hand: forget not the humble. ¹³ Wherefore doth the wicked contemn God? he hath said in his heart, Thou wilt not require it. ¹⁴ Thou hast seen it; for thou beholdest mischief and spite, to requite it with thy hand: the poor committeth himself unto thee; thou art the helper of the fatherless. ¹⁵ Break thou the arm of the wicked and the evil man: seek out his wickedness till thou find none. ¹⁶ The LORD is King for ever and ever: the heathen are perished out of his land. ¹⁷ LORD, thou hast heard the desire of the humble: thou wilt prepare their heart, thou wilt cause thine ear to hear: ¹⁸ To judge the fatherless and the oppressed, that the man of the earth may no more oppress.