2:9 He watches over 1 his holy ones, 2
but the wicked are made speechless in the darkness,
for it is not by one’s own strength that one prevails.
21:30 that the evil man is spared
from the day of his misfortune,
that he is delivered 3
from the day of God’s wrath?
18:29 Indeed, 4 with your help 5 I can charge against 6 an army; 7
by my God’s power 8 I can jump over a wall. 9
1 tn Heb “guards the feet of.” The expression means that God watches over and protects the godly in all of their activities and movements. The imperfect verbal forms in v. 9 are understood as indicating what is typically true. Another option is to translate them with the future tense. See v. 10b.
2 tc The translation follows the Qere and many medieval Hebrew
3 tn The verb means “to be led forth.” To be “led forth in the day of trouble” means to be delivered.
4 tn Or “for.” The translation assumes that כִּי (ki) is asseverative here.
5 tn Heb “by you.”
6 tn Heb “I will run.” The imperfect verbal forms in v. 29 indicate the subject’s potential or capacity to perform an action. Though one might expect a preposition to follow the verb here, this need not be the case with the verb רוּץ (ruts; see 1 Sam 17:22). Some emend the Qal to a Hiphil form of the verb and translate, “I put to flight [Heb “cause to run”] an army.”
7 tn More specifically, the noun גְּדוּד (gÿdud) refers to a raiding party or to a contingent of troops.
sn I can charge against an army. The picture of a divinely empowered warrior charging against an army in almost superhuman fashion appears elsewhere in ancient Near Eastern literature. See R. B. Chisholm, “An Exegetical and Theological Study of Psalm 18/2 Samuel 22” (Th.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary, 1983), 228.
8 tn Heb “and by my God.”
9 sn I can jump over a wall. The psalmist uses hyperbole to emphasize his God-given military superiority.