Thy Hands From Egypt Brought a Goodly Vine

A beautiful paraphrase of Psalm 80:8-19 –

8    Thy hands from Egypt brought a goodly vine,
And planted fair in fertile Palestine –
9    Clear’d for its grasping roots th’ unpeopled land,
And gave it high to rise, and firm to stand.
10    Far o’er the eternal hills her shadow spread,
Her tendrils wreath’d the cedar’s towering head;
11    And, as the centre of the land she stood,
Her branches reach’d the sea, her boughs the eastern flood.
12    Why hast thou now her hedges rent away,
And left her bare, the passing traveller’s prey?
13    The field-fed beast devours each tender shoot,
Fierce from the wood the boar assails her root.
14    Return, O God: from heaven thine eyes incline;
Behold, and visit this neglected vine-
15    Regard the plant, thou once didst love so well,
And chief thy pleasant branch, the hope of Israel.
16    Burnt though she be and rent, her haughty foe
The deathful terrors of thy wrath shall know.
17    But on the man, by thee with strength array’d,
The Son of Man by thee for conquest made,
18    Thy hand shall rest: till we thy triumph see,
Resound thy praise, and still remember thee.
19    Turn us again, thou God of heav’n’s high powers,
Beam with thy radiance forth, and peace shall still be ours.
– Mant, quoted in The Treasury of David