They failed to keep God’s covenant and refused to live by His law.
Parallel translations
- WEB They didn’t keep God’s covenant, and refused to walk in his law.
- KJV They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law;
- NKJV They did not keep the covenant of God; They refused to walk in His law,
- NASB They did not keep the covenant of God And refused to walk in His Law;
- NLT They did not keep God’s covenant and refused to live by his instructions.
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
They did not keep God's covenant and refused to walk in His law.
Overview
The root of Israel's failure was covenant unfaithfulness and unwillingness to obey God's instruction. Their disobedience was a deliberate refusal, not mere weakness. This diagnosis of rebellion sets the pattern the psalm traces, highlighting the constant tension between God's faithfulness and His people's faithlessness.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Deut 31:20When I have brought them into the land that I swore to give their fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey, they will eat their fill and prosper. Then they will turn to other gods and worship them, and they will reject Me and break My covenant.
- Judg 2:10–12After that whole generation had also been gathered to their fathers, another generation rose up who did not know the LORD or the works that He had done for Israel.
- Deut 31:16And the LORD said to Moses, “You will soon rest with your fathers, and these people will rise up and prostitute themselves with the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake Me and break the covenant I have made with them.
- Neh 9:26–29But they were disobedient and rebelled against You; they flung Your law behind their backs. They killed Your prophets, who had admonished them to return to You. They committed terrible blasphemies.
- Jer 31:32It will not be like the covenant I made with their fathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant they broke, though I was a husband to them,” declares the LORD.
- 2 Kgs 17:14–15But they would not listen, and they stiffened their necks like their fathers, who did not believe the LORD their God.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 78:10 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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