For the Chief Musician. A Psalm by David.

• ¹Yahweh, you have searched me,
• and you know me.

• ²You know my sitting down and my rising up.
• You perceive my thoughts from afar.

• ³You search out my path and my lying down,
• and are acquainted with all my ways.

• ⁴For there is not a word on my tongue,
• but, behold, Yahweh, you know it altogether.

• ⁵You hem me in behind and before.
• You laid your hand on me.

• ⁶This knowledge is beyond me.
• It’s lofty.
• I can’t attain it.

• ⁷Where could I go from your Spirit?
• Or where could I flee from your presence?

• ⁸If I ascend up into heaven, you are there.
• If I make my bed in Sheol *Sheol is the place of the dead., behold, you are there!

• ⁹If I take the wings of the dawn,
• and settle in the uttermost parts of the sea;

• ¹⁰Even there your hand will lead me,
• and your right hand will hold me.

• ¹¹If I say, “Surely the darkness will overwhelm me;
• the light around me will be night;”

• ¹²even the darkness doesn’t hide from you,
• but the night shines as the day.
• The darkness is like light to you.

• ¹³For you formed my inmost being.
• You knit me together in my mother’s womb.

• ¹⁴I will give thanks to you,
• for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

• Your works are wonderful.
• My soul knows that very well.

• ¹⁵My frame wasn’t hidden from you,
• when I was made in secret,
• woven together in the depths of the earth.

• ¹⁶Your eyes saw my body.
• In your book they were all written,
• the days that were ordained for me,
• when as yet there were none of them.

• ¹⁷How precious to me are your thoughts, God!
• How vast is their sum!

• ¹⁸If I would count them, they are more in number than the sand.
• When I wake up, I am still with you.

• ¹⁹If only you, God, would kill the wicked.
• Get away from me, you bloodthirsty men!

• ²⁰For they speak against you wickedly.
• Your enemies take your name in vain.

• ²¹Yahweh, don’t I hate those who hate you?
• Am I not grieved with those who rise up against you?

• ²²I hate them with perfect hatred.
• They have become my enemies.

• ²³Search me, God, and know my heart.
• Try me, and know my thoughts.

• ²⁴See if there is any wicked way in me,
• and lead me in the everlasting way.