The Lord judges the nations. Declare me righteous, O Lord, for I am innocent, O Most High!
Parallel translations
- WEB Yahweh administers judgment to the peoples. Judge me, Yahweh, according to my righteousness, and to my integrity that is in me.
- KJV The LORD shall judge the people: judge me, O LORD, according to my righteousness, and according to mine integrity that is in me.
- BSB The LORD judges the peoples; vindicate me, O LORD, according to my righteousness and integrity.
- NKJV The Lord shall judge the peoples; Judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness, And according to my integrity within me.
- NASB The Lord judges the peoples; Vindicate me, Lord, according to my righteousness and my integrity that is in me.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
As God judges the peoples, David asks to be judged according to his righteousness and integrity. He confidently submits his cause to the righteous Judge.
Overview
David asks the Judge of all the earth to vindicate him on the merits of his integrity in this matter. His plea is for a just verdict, not a claim of total sinlessness. Believers ultimately stand before God not on their own righteousness but on the perfect righteousness of Christ credited to them by faith (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 23
- Ps 96:13before Yahweh; for he comes, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, the peoples with his truth.
- Rom 14:10–12But you, why do you judge your brother? Or you again, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.
- 2 Cor 1:12For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience, that in holiness and sincerity of God, not in fleshly wisdom but in the grace of God we behaved ourselves in the world, and more abundantly toward you.
- Ps 43:1Vindicate me, God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation. Oh, deliver me from deceitful and wicked men.
- 1 Th 2:10You are witnesses with God, how holy, righteously, and blamelessly we behaved ourselves toward you who believe.
- Ps 98:9Let them sing before Yahweh, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with equity.
- Ps 26:1By David. Judge me, Yahweh, for I have walked in my integrity. I have trusted also in Yahweh without wavering.
- Ps 78:72So he was their shepherd according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.
- 1 Cor 4:4–5For I know nothing against myself. Yet I am not justified by this, but he who judges me is the Lord.
- Ps 35:24–27Vindicate me, Yahweh my God, according to your righteousness. Don’t let them gloat over me.
- Ps 9:8He will judge the world in righteousness. He will administer judgment to the peoples in uprightness.
- Ps 11:4Yahweh is in his holy temple. Yahweh is on his throne in heaven. His eyes observe. His eyes examine the children of men.
- 2 Chr 20:12Our God, will you not judge them? For we have no might against this great company that comes against us. We don’t know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”
- Ps 26:11But as for me, I will walk in my integrity. Redeem me, and be merciful to me.
- Gen 18:25Be it far from you to do things like that, to kill the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous should be like the wicked. May that be far from you. Shouldn’t the Judge of all the earth do right?”
- Ps 25:21Let integrity and uprightness preserve me, for I wait for you.
- Ps 41:12As for me, you uphold me in my integrity, and set me in your presence forever.
- Gen 31:53The God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.” Then Jacob swore by the fear of his father, Isaac.
- Ps 17:2–3Let my sentence come out of your presence. Let your eyes look on equity.
- Ps 18:20–24Yahweh has rewarded me according to my righteousness. According to the cleanness of my hands has he recompensed me.
- Acts 17:31because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; of which he has given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the dead.”
- Prov 19:1Better is the poor who walks in his integrity than he who is perverse in his lips and is a fool.
- Ps 82:1A Psalm by Asaph. God presides in the great assembly. He judges among the gods.
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Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 7:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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