Please remember them, O my God, because they have defiled the priesthood, the covenant of the priesthood, ¹  and the Levites.

Then I said, “Please, O LORD God of heaven, great and awesome God, who keeps his loving covenant ¹  with those who love him and obey ²  his commandments,

When you perceived that his heart was faithful toward you, you established a ¹  covenant with him to give his descendants ²  the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, and the Girgashites. You have fulfilled your promise, ³  for you are righteous.

“So now, our God – the great, powerful, and awesome God, who keeps covenant fidelity ¹  – do not regard as inconsequential ²  all the hardship that has befallen us – our kings, our leaders, our priests, our prophets, our ancestors, and all your people – from the days of the kings of Assyria until this very day!