Mazmur 42:10-11

42:10 My enemies’ taunts cut into me to the bone, ¹ 

as they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” ² 

42:11 Why are you depressed, ³  O my soul? ⁴ 

Why are you upset? ⁵ 

Wait for God!

For I will again give thanks

to my God for his saving intervention. ⁶ 

Mazmur 55:3

55:3 because of what the enemy says, ⁷ 

and because of how the wicked ⁸  pressure me, ⁹ 

for they hurl trouble ¹⁰  down upon me ¹¹ 

and angrily attack me.

Mazmur 55:5

55:5 Fear and panic overpower me; ¹² 

terror overwhelms ¹³  me.

Mazmur 77:2-3

77:2 In my time of trouble I sought ¹⁴  the Lord.

I kept my hand raised in prayer throughout the night. ¹⁵ 

I ¹⁶  refused to be comforted.

77:3 I said, “I will remember God while I groan;

I will think about him while my strength leaves me.” ¹⁷  (Selah)

Mazmur 88:14-16

88:14 O Lord, why do you reject me,

and pay no attention to me? ¹⁸ 

88:15 I am oppressed and have been on the verge of death since my youth. ¹⁹ 

I have been subjected to your horrors and am numb with pain. ²⁰ 

88:16 Your anger overwhelms me; ²¹ 

your terrors destroy me.

Mazmur 109:22

109:22 For I am oppressed and needy,

and my heart beats violently within me. ²² 

[42:10]  ¹ tc Heb “with a shattering in my bones my enemies taunt me.” A few medieval Hebrew mss and Symmachus’ Greek version read “like” instead of “with.”

[42:10]  ² sn “Where is your God?” The enemies ask this same question in v. 3.

[42:11]  ³ tn Heb “Why do you bow down?”

[42:11]  ⁴ sn For poetic effect the psalmist addresses his soul, or inner self.

[42:11]  ⁵ tn Heb “and why are you in turmoil upon me?”

[42:11]  ⁶ tc Heb “for again I will give him thanks, the saving acts of my face and my God.” The last line should be emended to read יְשׁוּעֹת פְנֵי אֱלֹהָי (yÿshu’ot fÿney ’elohay, “[for] the saving acts of the face of my God”), that is, the saving acts associated with God’s presence/intervention. This refrain is almost identical to the one in v. 5. See also Ps 43:5.

[55:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “because of [the] voice of [the] enemy.”

[55:3]  ⁸ tn The singular forms “enemy” and “wicked” are collective or representative, as the plural verb forms in the second half of the verse indicate.

[55:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “from before the pressure of the wicked.” Some suggest the meaning “screech” (note the parallel “voice”; cf. NEB “shrill clamour”; NRSV “clamor”) for the rare noun עָקָה (’aqah, “pressure”).

[55:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “wickedness,” but here the term refers to the destructive effects of their wicked acts.

[55:3]  ¹¹ tc The verb form in the MT appears to be a Hiphil imperfect from the root מוֹט (mot, “to sway”), but the Hiphil occurs only here and in the Kethib (consonantal text) of Ps 140:10, where the form יַמְטֵר (yamter, “let him rain down”) should probably be read. Here in Ps 55:3 it is preferable to read יַמְטִירוּ (yamtiru, “they rain down”). It is odd for “rain down” to be used with an abstract object like “wickedness,” but in Job 20:23 God “rains down” anger (unless one emends the text there; see BHS).

[55:5]  ¹² tn Heb “fear and trembling enter into me.”

[55:5]  ¹³ tn Heb “covers.” The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) consecutive carries on the descriptive (present progressive) force of the preceding imperfect.

[77:2]  ¹⁴ tn Here the psalmist refers back to the very recent past, when he began to pray for divine help.

[77:2]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “my hand [at] night was extended and was not growing numb.” The verb נָגַר (nagar), which can mean “flow” in certain contexts, here has the nuance “be extended.” The imperfect form (תָפוּג, tafug, “to be numb”) is used here to describe continuous action in the past.

[77:2]  ¹⁶ tn Or “my soul.” The Hebrew term נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) with a pronominal suffix is often equivalent to a pronoun, especially in poetry (see BDB 660 s.v. נֶפֶשׁ 4.a).

[77:3]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “I will remember God and I will groan, I will reflect and my spirit will grow faint.” The first three verbs are cohortatives, the last a perfect with vav (ו) consecutive. The psalmist’s statement in v. 4 could be understood as concurrent with v. 1, or, more likely, as a quotation of what he had said earlier as he prayed to God (see v. 2). The words “I said” are supplied in the translation at the beginning of the verse to reflect this interpretation (see v. 10).

[88:14]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “[why] do you hide your face from me?”

[88:15]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and am dying from youth.”

[88:15]  ²⁰ tn Heb “I carry your horrors [?].” The meaning of the Hebrew form אָפוּנָה (’afunah), which occurs only here in the OT, is unclear. It may be an adverb meaning “very much” (BDB 67 s.v.), though some prefer to emend the text to אָפוּגָה (’afugah, “I am numb”) from the verb פוּג (pug; see Pss 38:8; 77:2).

[88:16]  ²¹ tn Heb “passes over me.”

[109:22]  ²² tc The verb in the Hebrew text (חָלַל, khalal) appears to be a Qal form from the root חלל meaning “pierced; wounded.” However, the Qal of this root is otherwise unattested. The translation assumes an emendation to יָחִיל (yakhil), a Qal imperfect from חוּל (khul, “tremble”) or to חֹלַל (kholal), a polal perfect from חוּל (khul). See Ps 55:4, which reads לִבִּי יָחִיל בְּקִרְבִּי (libbiy yakhil bÿqirbbiy, “my heart trembles [i.e., “beats violently”] within me”).