Psalm 124

Psalm 124
"If it had not been the LORD who was on our side"
Song of Ascents
Psalm 124 in the Erfurt Enchiridion
Other name	Psalm 123 (Vulgate) Nisi quia Dominus
Related	"Wo Gott der Herr nicht bei uns hält" "Wär Gott nicht mit uns diese Zeit"
Language	Hebrew (original)

Psalm 124 is the 124th psalm of the Book of Psalms, beginning in the English of the King James Version: "If it had not been the LORD who was on our side, now may Israel say". The Book of Psalms is part of the third section of the Hebrew Bible, and a book of the Christian Old Testament. In Latin it is known as "Nisi quia Dominus".^[1] It is one of fifteen psalms that begin with the words "A song of ascents" (Shir Hama'alot). Using "conventional metaphors",^[2] it recalls the dangers faced by Israel from which the nation has been rescued.

In the slightly different numbering system used in the Greek Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate, this psalm is Psalm 123.

The psalm forms a regular part of Jewish, Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican and other Protestant liturgies. Marc-Antoine Charpentier set the psalm in the 1690s as Nisi quia Dominus erat, H. 217, for soloists, chorus and continuo, and it was paraphrased in two psalm songs by Protestant Reformers which were set as chorale cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach.