Why read Psalm 88?
Psalm 88 offers words for remaining faithful when God's promises are hard to understand. Praise for His mercy and remembrance of the covenant with David are followed by honest, painful questions.
You can read this psalm when its themes speak to your circumstances, or as part of your regular reading of the Psalter. This explanation draws on the text itself; the psalm is not reserved for one particular need.
Psalm 88 opens the heart with the call “Your mercies, Lord, forever...”. It is one of the 51-verse psalms in Kathisma 12 and is recited both in church services and in prayer at home — the Psalter being the Orthodox Christian’s essential book.
Text of Psalm 88
1. Your mercies, Lord, I will sing forever.
2. From generation to generation I will proclaim Your truth with my mouth,
3. For You said: “Mercy will be built forever; in the heavens Your truth will be strengthened.
4. I made a covenant with My chosen ones; I swore to David, My servant:
5. Forever I will strengthen your offspring and build your throne from generation to generation.”
6. The heavens will praise Your wonders, Lord, and Your truth in the assembly of the saints.
7. For who in the clouds will be like the Lord, and who among the sons of God will resemble the Lord?
8. God, glorified in the council of the saints, is great and fearsome above those around Him.
9. Lord, God of powers, who is like You? You are mighty, Lord, and Your truth surrounds You.
10. You rule the power of the sea, and You calm the movement of its waves.
11. You humbled the proud one like a wounded man; with the arm of Your power You scattered Your enemies.
12. Yours are the heavens, and Yours is the earth; You founded the world and its fullness.
13. You created north and south; Tabor and Hermon will rejoice in Your name. Your arm has power.
14. Let Your hand grow strong, let Your right hand be raised. Righteousness and judgment are the foundation of Your throne.
15. Mercy and truth will go before Your face. Blessed is the people who know the shout of joy;
16. Lord, they will walk in the light of Your face, and in Your name they will rejoice all day, and in Your righteousness they will be exalted.
17. For You are the praise of their power, and in Your good will our power will be exalted.
18. For the support belongs to the Lord and to the Holy One of Israel, our King.
19. Then You spoke in visions to Your devout ones and said: I gave help to the mighty one; I exalted the chosen one from My people.
20. I found David, My servant; with My holy oil I anointed him;
21. For My hand will help him, and My arm will strengthen him.
22. No enemy will succeed against him, and the son of lawlessness will no longer harm him.
23. And I will cut away his enemies from before him, and overcome those who hate him.
24. And My truth and My mercy will be with him, and in My name his power will be exalted.
25. And I will place his hand over the sea, and his right hand over the rivers;
26. He will call to Me: You are my Father, my God and the supporter of my salvation.
27. And I will make him firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth;
28. Forever I will preserve My mercy for him, and My covenant will be faithful to him.
29. And I will establish his offspring forever and ever, and his throne like the days of heaven;
30. If his sons forsake My law and do not walk according to My ordinances,
31. If they disregard My righteous decrees and do not keep My commandments,
32. I will visit their lawlessness with a rod and their sins with blows.
33. But I will not take My mercy away from him, nor act unjustly in My truth,
34. Nor will I break My covenant, nor change what comes from My lips.
35. Once I swore by My holiness: Would I lie to David? His offspring will remain forever
36. And his throne like the sun before Me, and like the moon established forever, and a faithful witness in heaven.
37. But You rejected, despised and cast away Your anointed.
38. You destroyed the covenant of Your servant; You mocked his holiness upon the earth.
39. You brought down all his fences and made his fortifications a ruin.
40. All who passed along the way plundered him; he became a reproach to his neighbors.
41. You exalted the right hand of his enemies and gladdened all his foes.
42. You took away the power of his sword and did not help him in time of war.
43. You destroyed his purity and brought his throne down to the ground.
44. You shortened the days of his life and filled him with shame.
45. How long, Lord, will You turn away? How long will Your anger burn like fire?
46. Remember me; have You created all the sons of men in vain?
47. Who is the man who can live and not see death, and deliver his soul from the hand of hell?
48. Where are Your mercies of old, Lord, which You swore to David in Your truth?
49. Remember, Lord, the reproach of Your servants, which I bear in my bosom, from many nations.
50. Remember, Lord, the reproach with which Your enemies reproached me, with which they reproached the steps of Your anointed.
51. Blessed is the Lord forever. Amen. Amen.
When Psalm 88 is read
- when the covenant seems broken — “who will tell of Your power?”.
- At the end of each psalm, the tradition adds: "Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, both now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen."
Neighboring psalms
The numbering follows the Orthodox Psalter (Septuagint). The same psalm may have a different number in other Bible editions.
