Lord, you have heard ¹  the request ²  of the oppressed; you make them feel secure because you listen to their prayer. ³ 

For the music director; a psalm of David. How blessed ²  is the one who treats the poor properly! ³  When trouble comes, ⁴  the Lord delivers him. ⁵ 

Their insults are painful ¹  and make me lose heart; ²  I look ³  for sympathy, but receive none, ⁴  for comforters, but find none.

The bravehearted ¹  were plundered; ²  they “fell asleep.” ³  All the warriors were helpless. ⁴ 

and your poverty will come like a robber, ¹  and your need like an armed man. ² 

Daughter Zion ¹  is left isolated, like a hut in a vineyard, or a shelter in a cucumber field; she is a besieged city. ² 

Their arrows will cut young men to ribbons; ¹  they have no compassion on a person’s offspring, ²  they will not ³  look with pity on children.

No resident of Zion ¹  will say, “I am ill”; the people who live there will have their sin forgiven.

Her towns ¹  will be captured. Her fortresses will be taken. At that time the soldiers of Moab will be frightened like a woman in labor. ² 

The people of Damascus will lose heart and turn to flee. Panic will grip them. Pain and anguish will seize them like a woman in labor.

oppresses the poor and the needy, ¹  commits robbery, does not give back what was given in pledge, prays to ²  idols, performs abominable acts,

I will knock your bow out of your left hand and make your arrows fall from your right hand.

Soon ¹  I will expose her lewd nakedness ²  in front of her lovers, and no one will be able to rescue her from me! ³ 

Israel has rebelled ¹  like a stubborn heifer! Soon ²  the Lord will put them out to pasture like a lamb in a broad field! ³ 

We’re eager to trade silver for the poor, ¹  a pair of sandals ²  for the needy! We want to mix in some chaff with the grain!” ³ 

You should not have stood at the fork in the road ¹  to slaughter ²  those trying to escape. ³  You should not have captured their refugees when they suffered adversity. ⁴ 

Your creditors will suddenly attack; ¹  those who terrify you will spring into action, ²  and they will rob you. ³ 

Then ¹  he said to them, “Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath, or evil, to save a life or destroy it?” But they were silent.

When Jesus saw him lying there and when he realized ¹  that the man ²  had been disabled a long time already, he said to him, “Do you want to become well?”

And now, though we share the same flesh and blood as our fellow countrymen, ¹  and our children are just like their children, ²  still we have found it necessary to subject our sons and daughters to slavery. ³  Some of our daughters have been subjected to slavery, while we are powerless to help, ⁴  since our fields and vineyards now belong to other people.” ⁵