PSALTERIVM

PSALMVS LXVIII — SALVVM ME FAC

Save Me, O God, For the Waters Are Come In

Salvum me fac, Deus is a long lament of one overwhelmed by suffering and reproach, applied messianically to Christ's Passion. The verse 'They gave me gall for my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink' is fulfilled literally in the Crucifixion. In the 1962 Breviary, it appears at Matins and is particularly prominent during Passiontide.

LATINE
Salvum me fac, Deus: quoniam intraverunt aquae usque ad animam meam.
Infixus sum in limo profundi: et non est substantia.
Veni in altitudinem maris: et tempestas demersit me.
Laboravi clamans, raucae factae sunt fauces meae: defecerunt oculi mei, dum spero in Deum meum.
Multiplicati sunt super capillos capitis mei, qui oderunt me gratis.
Confortati sunt qui persecuti sunt me inimici mei iniuste: quae non rapui, tunc exsolvebam.
Deus, tu scis insipientiam meam: et delicta mea a te non sunt abscondita.
Ego vero egenus, et dolens: salus tua, Deus, suscepit me.
Laudabo nomen Dei cum cantico: et magnificabo eum in laude.
ENGLISH
Save me, O God: for the waters are come in even unto my soul.
I stick fast in the mire of the deep: and there is no sure standing.
I am come into the depth of the sea: and a tempest hath overwhelmed me.
I have laboured with crying; my jaws are become hoarse: my eyes have failed, whilst I hope in my God.
They are multiplied above the hairs of my head, who hate me without cause.
My enemies are grown strong who have wrongfully persecuted me: then did I pay that which I took not away.
O God, thou knowest my foolishness; and my offences are not hidden from thee.
But I am poor and sorrowful: thy salvation, O God, hath set me up.
I will praise the name of God with a canticle: and I will magnify him with praise.
NOTA
FONS
Douay-Rheims (1609) / Vulgata
USUS
Passiontide, Good Friday
CONTEXT
Psalm 69 in Hebrew numbering. V. 22 (vinegar and gall) fulfilled at Crucifixion. V. 26 ('their habitation be desolate') cited for Judas (Acts 1:20).