A psalm that expresses sadness, written for the choir director by Zerah’s son Heman, one of the descendants of Korah

88 Yahweh God, you who rescues me, all during each day I call out to you to help me,

and I cry out to you during each night also.

2 Listen [IDM] to my prayer [DOU],

while I cry out to you for help!

3 I have experienced many troubles/difficulties,

and I am about to die [MTY] and go where dead people are.

4 Because I have no more strength,

other people also consider that I will soon die.

5 I am like a corpse that has been abandoned;

I am like dead people who lie in their graves,

people who have been completely forgotten,

because you do not take care of them any more.

6 It is as though you have thrown me into a deep, dark pit,

into a place where they throw corpses.

7 It seems like you are very angry with me,

and it is as though you have crushed me like ocean waves crash down on people [MET].

(Think about that!)

8 You have caused my friends to ◄avoid/stay away from► me;

I have become repulsive to them.

It is as though I am in a prison and cannot escape.

9 My eyes cannot see well because I cry very much.

Yahweh, every day I call out to you to help me;

I lift up my hands to you while I pray.

10 You certainly do not [RHQ] perform miracles for dead people!

Their spirits do not [RHQ] arise to praise you!

(Think about that!)

11 Corpses in the grave certainly do not tell about your faithfully loving us [RHQ],

and in the place where people are finally destroyed,

no one tells about what you faithfully do for us [RHQ].

12 No one in the deep dark pit ever sees the miracles that you perform [RHQ],

and no one in the place where people have been completely forgotten tells about your being good to us.

13 But as for me, Yahweh, I cry out to you to help me;

each morning I pray to you.

14 Yahweh, why do you reject me [RHQ]?

Why do you turn away from me [RHQ]?

15 All the time since I was young, I have suffered and have often almost died;

I am ◄in despair/very discouraged► because of enduring the terrible things that you have done to me.

16 I feel that you have crushed me because of your being angry with me;

the terrible things that you are doing to me are almost destroying me.

17 I feel as though they surround me like a flood [SIM];

they are ◄closing in on/crushing► me from all sides.

18 You have caused even my friends and others whom I love to avoid me,

and it is as though the only friend that I have is darkness.