Mazmur 27:8

27:8 My heart tells me to pray to you, ¹ 

and I do pray to you, O Lord. ² 

Mazmur 35:8

35:8 Let destruction take them by surprise! ³ 

Let the net they hid catch them!

Let them fall into destruction! ⁴ 

Mazmur 38:15

38:15 Yet ⁵  I wait for you, O Lord!

You will respond, O Lord, my God!

Mazmur 48:6

48:6 Look at them shake uncontrollably, ⁶ 

like a woman writhing in childbirth. ⁷ 

Mazmur 80:14

80:14 O God, invincible warrior, ⁸  come back!

Look down from heaven and take notice!

Take care of this vine,

Mazmur 81:3

81:3 Sound the ram’s horn on the day of the new moon, ⁹ 

and on the day of the full moon when our festival begins. ¹⁰ 

Mazmur 88:13

88:13 As for me, I cry out to you, O Lord;

in the morning my prayer confronts you.

Mazmur 108:6

108:6 Deliver by your power ¹¹  and answer me,

so that the ones you love may be safe. ¹² 

Mazmur 119:176

119:176 I have wandered off like a lost sheep. ¹³ 

Come looking for your servant,

for I do not forget your commands.

Mazmur 132:8

132:8 Ascend, O Lord, to your resting place,

you and the ark of your strength!

Mazmur 141:1

Psalm 141 ¹⁴ 

A psalm of David.

141:1 O Lord, I cry out to you. Come quickly to me!

Pay attention to me when I cry out to you!

[27:8]  ¹ tc Heb “concerning you my heart says, ‘Seek my face.’” The verb form “seek” is plural, but this makes no sense here, for the psalmist is addressed. The verb should be emended to a singular form. The first person pronominal suffix on “face” also makes little sense, unless it is the voice of the Lord he hears. His “heart” is viewed as speaking, however, so it is better to emend the form to פָּנָיו (panayv, “his face”).

[27:8]  ² tn Heb “your face, O Lord, I seek.” To “seek the Lord’s face” means to seek his favor through prayer (see 2 Sam 21:1; Pss 24:6; 105:4).

[35:8]  ³ tn Heb “let destruction [which] he does not know come to him.” The singular is used of the enemy in v. 8, probably in a representative or collective sense. The psalmist has more than one enemy, as vv. 1-7 make clear.

[35:8]  ⁴ tn The psalmist’s prayer for his enemies’ demise continues. See vv. 4-6.

[38:15]  ⁵ tn Or perhaps “surely.”

[48:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “trembling seizes them there.” The adverb שָׁם (sham, “there”) is used here, as often in poetic texts, to point “to a spot in which a scene is localized vividly in the imagination” (BDB 1027 s.v.).

[48:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “[with] writhing like one giving birth.”

[48:6]  sn The language of vv. 5-6 is reminiscent of Exod 15:15.

[80:14]  ⁸ tn Heb “O God, hosts.” One expects the construct form אֱלֹהֵי before צְבָאוֹת (tsÿva’ot, “hosts”; see Ps 89:9), but יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים (yehvah ’elohim) precedes צְבָאוֹת (tsÿva’ot) in Pss 59:5 and 84:8 as well. See also vv. 4, 7 for a similar construction.

[81:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “at the new moon.”

[81:3]  sn New moon festivals were a monthly ritual in Israel (see R. de Vaux, Ancient Israel, 469-70). In this context the New Moon festival of the seventh month, when the Feast of Tabernacles was celebrated (note the reference to a “festival” in the next line), may be in view.

[81:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “at the full moon on the day of our festival.” The Hebrew word כֶּסֶה (keseh) is an alternate spelling of כֶּסֶא (kese’, “full moon”).

[81:3]  sn The festival in view is probably the Feast of Tabernacles (Booths), which began on the fifteenth day of the seventh month when the moon was full. See Lev 23:34; Num 29:12.

[108:6]  ¹¹ tn Heb “right hand.”

[108:6]  ¹² tn Or “may be rescued.” The lines are actually reversed in the Hebrew text: “So that the ones you love may be rescued, deliver by your power and answer me.”

[119:176]  ¹³ tn Heb “I stray like a lost sheep.” It is possible that the point of the metaphor is vulnerability: The psalmist, who is threatened by his enemies, feels as vulnerable as a straying, lost sheep. This would not suggest, however, that he has wandered from God’s path (see the second half of the verse, as well as v. 110).

[141:1]  ¹⁴ sn Psalm 141. The psalmist asks God to protect him from sin and from sinful men.