Mazmur 18:48

18:48 He delivers me ¹  from my enemies;

you snatch me away ²  from those who attack me; ³ 

you rescue me from violent men.

Mazmur 22:27-31

22:27 Let all the people of the earth acknowledge the Lord and turn to him! ⁴ 

Let all the nations ⁵  worship you! ⁶ 

22:28 For the Lord is king ⁷ 

and rules over the nations.

22:29 All of the thriving people ⁸  of the earth will join the celebration and worship; ⁹ 

all those who are descending into the grave ¹⁰  will bow before him,

including those who cannot preserve their lives. ¹¹ 

22:30 A whole generation ¹²  will serve him;

they will tell the next generation about the sovereign Lord. ¹³ 

22:31 They will come and tell about his saving deeds; ¹⁴ 

they will tell a future generation what he has accomplished. ¹⁵ 

Mazmur 89:26-27

89:26 He will call out to me,

‘You are my father, ¹⁶  my God, and the protector who delivers me.’ ¹⁷ 

89:27 I will appoint him to be my firstborn son, ¹⁸ 

the most exalted of the earth’s kings.

Mazmur 91:14-16

91:14 The Lord says, ¹⁹ 

“Because he is devoted to me, I will deliver him;

I will protect him ²⁰  because he is loyal to me. ²¹ 

91:15 When he calls out to me, I will answer him.

I will be with him when he is in trouble;

I will rescue him and bring him honor.

91:16 I will satisfy him with long life, ²² 

and will let him see my salvation.

[18:48]  ¹ tn Heb “[the one who] delivers me.” 2 Sam 22:49 reads “and [the one who] brings me out.”

[18:48]  ² tn Heb “lifts me up.” In light of the preceding and following references to deliverance, the verb רום probably here refers to being rescued from danger (see Ps 9:13). However, it could mean “exalt, elevate” here, indicating that the Lord has given the psalmist victory over his enemies and forced them to acknowledge the psalmist’s superiority (cf. NIV, NRSV).

[18:48]  ³ tn Heb “from those who rise against me.”

[22:27]  ⁴ tn Heb “may all the ends of the earth remember and turn to the Lord.” The prefixed verbal forms in v. 27 are understood as jussives (cf. NEB). Another option (cf. NIV, NRSV) is to take the forms as imperfects and translate, “all the people of the earth will acknowledge and turn…and worship.” See vv. 29-32.

[22:27]  ⁵ tn Heb “families of the nations.”

[22:27]  ⁶ tn Heb “before you.”

[22:28]  ⁷ tn Heb “for to the Lord [is] dominion.”

[22:29]  ⁸ tn Heb “fat [ones].” This apparently refers to those who are healthy and robust, i.e., thriving. In light of the parallelism, some prefer to emend the form to יְשֵׁנֵי (yÿsheney, “those who sleep [in the earth]”; cf. NAB, NRSV), but דִּשְׁנֵי (dishney, “fat [ones]”) seems to form a merism with “all who descend into the grave” in the following line. The psalmist envisions all people, whether healthy or dying, joining in worship of the Lord.

[22:29]  ⁹ tn Heb “eat and worship.” The verb forms (a perfect followed by a prefixed form with vav [ו] consecutive) are normally used in narrative to relate completed actions. Here the psalmist uses the forms rhetorically as he envisions a time when the Lord will receive universal worship. The mood is one of wishful thinking and anticipation; this is not prophecy in the strict sense.

[22:29]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “all of the ones going down [into] the dust.” This group stands in contrast to those mentioned in the previous line. Together the two form a merism encompassing all human beings – the healthy, the dying, and everyone in between.

[22:29]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and his life he does not revive.”

[22:30]  ¹² tn Heb “offspring.”

[22:30]  ¹³ tn Heb “it will be told concerning the Lord to the generation.” The Hebrew term translated “Lord” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

[22:31]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “his righteousness.” Here the noun צִדָקָה (tsidaqah) refers to the Lord’s saving deeds whereby he vindicates the oppressed.

[22:31]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “to a people [to be] born that he has acted.” The words “they will tell” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[89:26]  ¹⁶ sn You are my father. The Davidic king was viewed as God’s “son” (see 2 Sam 7:14; Ps 2:7). The idiom reflects ancient Near Eastern adoption language associated with covenants of grant, by which a lord would reward a faithful subject by elevating him to special status, referred to as “sonship.” Like a son, the faithful subject received an “inheritance,” viewed as an unconditional, eternal gift. Such gifts usually took the form of land and/or an enduring dynasty. See M. Weinfeld, “The Covenant of Grant in the Old Testament and in the Ancient Near East,” JAOS 90 (1970): 184-203, for general discussion and some striking extra-biblical parallels.

[89:26]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “the rocky summit of my deliverance.”

[89:27]  ¹⁸ sn The firstborn son typically had special status and received special privileges.

[91:14]  ¹⁹ tn The words “the Lord says” are supplied in the translation to clarify that the words which follow are the Lord’s oracle of assurance.

[91:14]  ²⁰ tn Or “make him secure” (Heb “set him on high”).

[91:14]  ²¹ tn Heb “because he knows my name” (see Ps 9:10).

[91:16]  ²² tn Heb “length of days.”