Psalm 56. All on one page: text of Psalm 56 in Russian, audio.

Text of prayer Psalm 56

King David lived during the Old Testament, so many of the songs are written in Hebrew. Over time, when Christianity penetrated into Rus', the prayer was translated into Church Slavonic and became canonical within the framework of Orthodoxy. Actually, the service is conducted in this language.

But there is also a version adapted for the Russian language. If you have difficulty understanding the meaning of the chant, read this text first, and only then proceed to the traditional version.

In Church Slavonic

In Russian

How to read and how Psalm 56 helps

no comments

The text of Orthodox Psalm 56 is preceded by the inscription “Do not destroy.” This is the appeal of the psalmist, who was in exile at the time of writing the psalm, to God. The song is an appeal to the Lord to shelter its author from the persecution of enemies, and to grant them the same fate that they have prepared for him. The following phrase explains to us what causes such a desperate mood of the author of “The Writing of David, when he fled from Saul into the cave.” So, according to the interpretation of Psalm 56, it was written by a man who was far from his home, surrounded by enemies who were looking for him to destroy him.

Help from Orthodox prayer Psalm 56

The state of the prophet David, described in the text of the Christian Psalm 56, can be compared with the state of the soul of a believer. Surrounded by demons and demons trying to drag her along and destroy her, she is forced to hide in a cave of prayer and repentance, and the Lord remains her only hope. In gratitude for his protection and patronage, King David promises God to bless and glorify Him not only among the Jewish people, but also among the pagans. Listening online, reading and watching videos with the text of Psalm 56 is recommended for people who are prone to frequent anxiety and therefore suffer from migraines.

Listen to the video of the Orthodox prayer Psalm 56 in Russian

Reading the Orthodox text of Psalm 56 in Russian

To the head of the choir. Don't destroy it. Scripture of David when he ran away from Saul into the cave.

Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me, for my soul trusts in You, and in the shadow of Your wings I will hide until the troubles pass. I will cry to the Most High God, the God who benefits me; He will send from heaven and save me; He will put to shame the one who seeks to devour me; God will send His mercy and His truth. My soul is among the lions; I lie among those who breathe fire, among the sons of men, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and whose tongue is a sharp sword. Be exalted above the heavens, O God, and let your glory be above all the earth! They have prepared a net for my feet; my soul is drooping; They dug a hole in front of me, and they themselves fell into it. My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready: I ​​will sing and praise. Arise, my glory, arise, psalter and harp! I'll get up early. I will praise You, O Lord, among the nations; I will sing praises to You among the nations, for Your mercy reaches to the heavens and Your truth reaches to the clouds. Be exalted above the heavens, O God, and let your glory be above all the earth!

Russian Psalter, text of Psalm 56 in Church Slavonic language

Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me; for my soul trusts in you, and I hope in the shadow of your wing, until lawlessness passes away. I will cry to God on high, the God who has done good to me. Sent from heaven and saved me, giving reproach to those who trampled on me; God has sent His mercy and His truth, and deliver my soul from the midst of the Skimni. Pospach is confused; sons of humanity, their teeth are weapons and arrows, and their tongue is a sharp sword. Ascend into heaven, O God, and throughout all the earth be your glory. You have prepared a net for my feet, and a slush for my soul; dug a hole in front of me, and fell into the nude. My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready; I will sing and sing in my glory. Arise, my glory, arise, psaltery and harp; I'll get up early. Let us confess to you among the people, O Lord, I will sing to you among the nations; for your mercy is magnified to the heavens, and even to the clouds your truth. Ascend into heaven, O God, and throughout all the earth be your glory.

History of writing

The events within which the song was written cannot be considered happy. At this moment, the author was hiding from the Jewish king Saul, who wanted to kill him.

David's despair was indescribable. There were traitors and traitors all around, King Saul searched day and night for the former shepherd, it seemed that the end of his life was near.

But he did not lose heart and sincerely believed in the righteous power of God, which would protect him from all misfortunes and adversity. He had to wander for many months in the Adollam cave. And only the support of the Lord was able to protect the future king from danger.

And again - David is on the run. Now from Saul. His shelter is a cave, trust in God and the opportunity to reflect. What is David thinking about? About the comfort in which he would like to live and the royal palaces? About a lot of gold, cattle, servants, beautiful maidens? No. David reflects on the fact that God will certainly send him His mercy and truth: his aspirations and thoughts are about the justice of God. David does not like this age - the age of accidents and injustice. He dreams of the future, of God's world order, where no one will be afraid of scoundrels. It is only in the wicked age that they often oppress God's servants. But times of change will come for everyone.

56:5 My soul is among the lions; I lie among those who breathe fire, among the sons of men, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and whose tongue is a sharp sword.

David, saying that his soul is among the lions, means himself surrounded by enemies, hunters for his life, for they too are essentially predators. Only their teeth are in the form of spears and arrows, and the tongue with which they wound David is like a sharp sword. All “hunters” of lives will wait for their time from God.

56:6,7 Be exalted above the heavens, O God, and let your glory be above all the earth! 7 They have prepared a net for my feet; my soul is drooping; They dug a hole in front of me, and [themselves] fell into it.

David is so sure of this that he already seems to see the very hole that they are digging for him, but it will be filled with David’s enemies. Although at the moment it is very difficult for him to endure the circumstances of the trap. Hope for liberation is a great force, and it doesn’t matter when this liberation comes, the main thing is that it will certainly come.

56:8 My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready: I ​​will sing and praise.

David's heart was ready to sing to the Lord and praise Him - despite the difficult circumstances. As we see, song and praise to God does not pour out from an unprepared heart: it must be a believer and a lover of God, filled with a song to God, so that there is something to pour out. But even difficult circumstances are not an obstacle to filling the heart and overflowing it with love for God.

56:9,10 Arise, my glory, arise, psalter and harp! I'll get up early. 10 I will praise You, O Lord, among the nations; I will sing Your praises among the nations,

David gives himself the command to perk up and cheer up: in order to endure everything and at the same time praise God not only with the words of the song, but also with resistance to trials, you need an optimistic attitude and a cheerful spirit. A depressed spirit is incapable of anything useful.

56:11,12 for Thy mercy is great unto the heavens, and Thy truth unto the clouds. 12 Be exalted above the heavens, O God, and let your glory be over all the earth!

David wants the God of mercy and truth to be known throughout the entire earth, and this will certainly happen one day. But not only will they learn about Him, the God of David will be exalted above heaven: everyone who should live in the world order of God will recognize that he alone is worthy of honor, praise and glory.

Interpretation of Psalm 56

The text of the chants is difficult to understand even in the adapted version. Now we will try to fix this problem.

• Verses 1-3. The Lord will help any believer. The main thing is to be firm in your decisions and never turn away from God. Only in this case will victory be on your side.
• Verses 4-6. The condescension and truth of the Almighty will always be with the believer. This happened to David when he prayed to the Lord for his salvation. Expelled by order of the king, but without committing a serious crime... this circumstance greatly worried the former shepherd. He trusts in the Lord that he will carry out righteous judgment on his offenders and show him the truly true path to a good life.
• Verses 7-8. In these verses David finds peace of mind. The Lord softened his stormy heart and improved his mood.
• Verses 10-11. The joy of the future king is indescribable. He praises God for his miracles and commits to praising him in his songs and dedicating his life to him.

We read the Psalter. Psalm 56

Conversation with Archpriest Alexy Ladygin about the Psalter.
– Dear brothers and sisters, today we will analyze the 56th Psalm. In its inscription the following lines are inscribed: “In the end, let him not be corrupted, for David to write down the pillars, never to run away from the face of Saul into the cave.” The psalm tells us about the biblical story: when David was persecuted by Saul, he hid in one of the caves in En-Gaddi. This is a huge cave; 400 soldiers who were with David could fit there. When David hid with his soldiers in this cave, Saul came there (Scripture tells us) to remedy his need. He went in alone, took off his outer clothing, walked away into the distance, and David’s soldiers saw that Saul was alone, and they told David to strike him - God Himself sent Saul into the hands of David in order to abolish this enmity and confrontation. But David said that this cannot be done, because Saul is God’s anointed: if we kill God’s anointed, God’s wrath will be on us. David did only one thing: he cut off the outer part of Saul’s outer garment as evidence that he had love for him and could have killed him, but did not. This psalm is very important, which is why it has the inscription “in the pillars.” What is table writing? We told you that these are like writings that are inscribed on stone tablets or on copper tablets: the material is eternal, so these writings remain from generation to generation, reminding a person of what he should and should not do. This is where the psalmist David says that we must fight our memory of malice, and not with specific people: the reason is not in people, but in ourselves. If anger is born, it means that we have not yet overcome this vice in ourselves, and people only expose our vices, and they are not so much our enemies as those who show our own shortcomings.

This psalm just shows how meek the psalmist David was, how highly spiritual he was. He could have done evil, but the truth of God, the truth of God, always stopped him. And he preferred his own suffering, his own patience with all these life circumstances, than if he caused some kind of evil through his unrighteousness and violated the law of God.

“Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me.” If in the previous psalm the psalmist David says only once: “Have mercy on me,” then here he repeats these words several times, so strong is the sorrow in his heart, so deep is he in the most difficult situation in life: no one can help him. Such is his intense impulse towards God, so that the Lord will show His mercy: pain and suffering overwhelm his heart.

“For my soul trusts in You, and I hope for the shadow of Your wing” - all my trust is only in You, Lord, my whole life is in Your hands. “And I trust in the shadow of Your wing,” that is, I am ready to hide under the shadow of Your wing. Just as a person always hides in the shadows during the heat in order to get relief and the sun does not bake him, so, he says, in the heat of suffering and pain nothing will help, only Your shadow, Lord, under which I can hide - only it will protect me .

"Iniquity will pass away." Lawlessness is a nuisance that comes from people of unrighteousness. And here again we must talk about the spiritual meaning: annoyance to a person always comes from the enemy of the human race. And only in the shadow of the Lord’s wing can we hide from it - directly through prayer and spiritual struggle, which we can do when we are together with God and next to God.

“I will cry to God Most High, God who has done good to me.” Who else should we call on? Only to God. Why to the Most High? He speaks about the height of God, about the truth of God, and God always shows His mercy, because the Lord never leaves a person, He always hears him when he turns to Him in prayer.

“God sent His mercy and His truth as a reproach to those who trampled on me.” Again, Who sends salvation? Only the Lord. Here we can say that the Lord helped us all to defeat the enemy of the human race only through the fact that He sent His only begotten Son from Heaven, so that whoever believes in Him would not perish, but have eternal life. And the one who brings us evil can only be defeated by the Lord Himself; if we turn to the Lord in prayer, the Lord will show us both His mercy and His truth. His mercy is to protect, the holy fathers tell us, and truth is the truth that always reveals and shows who is right and who is wrong. And when truth and untruth are visible, this is the Judgment of God over man.

“And deliver my soul from the midst of the Skimni.” Skimny, we talked to you in previous interpretations, are young lions, lion cubs. By skimni here the Psalmist also means Saul's soldiers. After all, Saul’s warriors are young, and strong, and brave, but at the same time they are bloodthirsty; they cannot yet carry out an analysis: why and why they are doing this, for them the main thing is the success and fulfillment of the task that has been entrusted to them; they do not yet have the gift of reasoning. The enemy of the human race is also called skimn, who also wants to steal the human soul, causing him a lot of harm.

"Pospach is confused." How confused are we? In various thoughts. This is our confusion when we begin to think: what is happening in our lives, how to get out of this situation, what to apply, what can the people who rebelled against us today do? After all, today they are still in power, in strength, and in any case they can cause us even more pain than they have already caused. As a result, a person loses the ability to sleep, his entire nervous system is shaken, and he is confused.

“Sons of humanity, their teeth are weapons and arrows, and their tongue is a sharp sword.” Man has no weapons or arrows instead of teeth, and his tongue cannot be a sword. But in this case, it really is a weapon that does not protect, but causes pain to a person. In what case do teeth become a weapon and the tongue become a sharp sword? Of course, when a person commits a lie, he slanderes another person. What constitutes slander? Due to anger. And anger is born because a person does not fight his passions, his sins. And little by little, instead of kindness, anger appears in him, which approaches everything without any mercy, condescension, or understanding. Anger gives birth to the appearance of a beast in a person, that is, a person does not rise due to passions, but degrades, becomes a beast, and then his teeth already become like the teeth of an animal. Their teeth are like weapons and arrows, and their tongue is like a sharp sword: in this malice, slander rises. David more than once complained about Saul, who spoke vile, insulting words to him - Saul’s entourage slandered David and gave birth to lies, which led to Saul insulting the innocent David.

It can be said that here the Psalmist also prophesies about Judas Iscariot, who was next to Christ, but who laid all untruths on Him, slandered him, because malice was born in his heart from the love of money and envy, and it already gave birth to slander and betrayal, which Judas then committed Iscariot.

“Ascend into Heaven, O God, and Thy glory be throughout all the earth.” What does it mean for God to ascend to Heaven? So that the Lord would rise, so that they could see Him, see His truth and kindness. God is Light, and when God ascends to Heaven, then He will illuminate all people. What is insight? A person will see all his untruths, his vices, he will see those deeds that are unworthy of him. When we walk in the dark, all the stains on our clothes and on our body are not visible. And when the light turns on, we see how unclean we ourselves are, we see our dirty spots. And then we no longer have the task of showing that someone did not come in clean clothes, but we think about how to quickly wash off the stains from our clothes so as not to appear dirty and unclean in front of other people. And this, of course, is the greatest strength and truth of this psalm. And then the glory of God will be throughout the whole earth.

The Holy Fathers say that here the psalmist David also prophesies about the Ascension of our Lord after His Coming. After that, the Lord sends the Holy Spirit to His disciples and apostles, and they go and preach the glory of God throughout the entire earth.

“You have prepared a net for my feet, and muddied my soul, digging a pit before my face, and falling into the nude.” Here the Psalmist is talking about those atrocities that are being prepared against him, they are setting nets to catch David and himself, and to humiliate his soul, turn it face down, to catch him in something. They dig a hole to expose him. But the Lord, always seeing the untruth and the desire of people to cause pain and evil, makes it so that they then fall into the hands of those whom they persecute - just as Saul once fell into the hands of David and suffered, so do the people who slander and commit lies. , then fall into the hands of those against whom they persecute, just as the enemy of the human race is always defeated: he wants to harm the soul of a person, set snares, but by the grace of God, prayer, all this is destroyed. Thus, the enemy of the human race falls into the hands of God and remains disgraced.

“My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready: I ​​will sing and sing to my glory.” The Holy Fathers say that when David pronounced these words, he said: “Seeing such mercy, love from You, Lord, seeing that You cover me from all evil, I am ready to accept great sorrow and bear it” - all this is possible to overcome with that glory, or that glorification that we can show to God - and “I sing in my glory,” that is, according to the grace that the Lord gives. The fathers also say that the prophet David is ready to accept because the prophetic gift was his glory, for the sake of which he is ready to bear a lot in his life.

And at the same time, the holy fathers say, when the grace of God has appeared, we can also say: my heart is ready, ready, God, to receive the grace of Your Holy Spirit so much as to glorify Your most holy name, or to abide in glory. Christians abide in the glory of the manifestation of God's truth to the whole world - that light that is visible from Christians through their good deeds.

“Arise, my glory, arise, I sing psalms and harps: I will arise early.” Here the psalmist David says: I will glorify God in the Psalter and harp, not only with my soul, but also with my body, and I will rise early. What do you mean early? Morning prayer is the most fruitful: a person is not yet burdened with the worries of the day, vanity, and unnecessary thoughts. Therefore, night or very early prayer at dawn shows that a person is not overcome by laziness - whoever sleeps late is a lazy person, and whoever gets up early can, on the one hand, show his hard work, and on the other hand, present to God the purity of his mind in glorifying Him. In purity, in inner mental tension, I will glorify God, I will sing to Him. And not just the words will be sung to Him, but the harps will also sound, that is, I will glorify God in all its fullness.

“Let us confess to You among the people, Lord, I will sing to You among the nations”: I will glorify You, Lord, before all people, before my people, I will sing about You among the pagans. And this is the reality that the psalmist David not only spoke about - he really always glorified God not only with his words, but also with his deeds. Of course, the Psalmist, having prophetically given his Psalter to people, speaks about God not only to the chosen people, but now to all humanity, the entire Christian world. And not only the Christian world, because the Psalter is the holy Book for world religions. Therefore, to this day he proclaims about God and about the mercy that God shows to the entire human race.

“For Thy mercy is magnified to the heavens, and even to the clouds of Thy truth.” Deepest words! It is very important that the Lord shows His mercy, and that it is visible to all mankind. What does pillar of fire mean? The pillar of fire is what is visible from earth to heaven, and we understand that when the pillar of fire ascends, it is visible from all sides of the earth: so that the mercy of God may be revealed to the entire human race, so that they can see what the Lord can give to those who are faithful to Him . Why is this needed? Everything depends on the extent to which God’s mercy is revealed on earth: both our lives and our human relationships. And we must understand this very clearly - without the mercy of God, truth will not be revealed on earth, without it there will be the most cruel relationships among people on earth, and then humanity will destroy itself. This is the worst thing.

And when the mercy of God is visible, when a person clearly understands that without it he cannot build anything in his life (neither relationships with people, nor any technical, political, economic things), then there will be truth on earth, poverty will be abolished both wealth and man will live in abundance: God did not create either poverty or wealth on earth, but gave man the opportunity to live and enjoy this earth, use it and be in perfect abundance. And only the incorrect building of some economic relations, human relations, revealed to a person poverty and conditions that do not allow not only to fully enjoy this life, but even to have the minimum necessary for it.

Therefore, seeing all the untruths, we are constantly faced with wars that destroy very, very many people, we are faced with famine - not because it cannot be avoided (especially in modern conditions, when those who have a lot can share little so that people had the most necessary income), but only because they did not have mercy and compassion for those in need. That is why the psalmist David says: “For Thy mercy is magnified to the heavens, and even to the clouds of Thy truth.”

Here we can talk about the spiritual ascension that the Lord revealed through Christ who came to earth. Indeed, the Lord elevated Christianity to such a degree through His Ascension that He is known throughout the entire earth, as is the mercy that the Lord has shown and continues to show to this day through Christ and Christianity. We know that through Christianity civilization came to this earth; and it does not lie in wealth, but in good relationships, when the rich can share with the poor, when the haves can give to the have-nots, when there is compassion for those who need our help. And as this pillar from earth to Heaven fades away, good human relationships fade away.

The psalmist David ends his psalm with amazing, simply wonderful words, which are repeated once again and which we have already encountered in the middle of this psalm: “Be exalted into heaven, O God, and Thy glory be throughout all the earth.” He calls again and again for the Lord to Ascend into Heaven, so that He will sanctify the earth with His teaching. We just told you that this is very important for us: if there is no Christ on earth, everything good will fade away, and then life will not be able to live on earth, we will face more and more suffering. We will see the poor, oppressed, hungry, abused and humiliated due to the hostilities that are now abundantly taking place on earth. Then those who suffer from natural disasters will not see help.

But if the name of God is exalted, if Christianity is again glorified on earth as a religion given to us by God and suffered by God Himself, then those good relations will return to us, which at present can truly be called civilized: every civilized relation is from God. But the civilization that man is now trying to create with his own hands is madness, from which we now, at the beginning of this path, are beginning to shudder, and then, of course, there will be an increasingly stronger departure from the truth, from the truth, which will bring unimaginable suffering to all of humanity.

This is the psalm, dear brothers and sisters, that we discussed with you today. He is very joyful and at the same time sets us the task of doing everything, imitating the holy apostles in spreading the name and glory of God throughout the entire earth.

God bless you all! And see you again!

Recorded by Nina Kirsanova