[143:6] 1 tn The words “in prayer” are supplied in the translation to clarify that the psalmist is referring to a posture of prayer.
[143:6] 2 tn Heb “faint” or “weary.” See Ps 63:1.
[143:6] 3 tc Heb “my soul like a faint land for you.” A verb (perhaps “thirsts”) is implied (see Ps 63:1). The translation assumes an emendation of the preposition -כְּ (kÿ, “like”) to -בְּ (bÿ, “in,” see Ps 63:1; cf. NEB “athirst for thee in a thirsty land”). If the MT is retained, one might translate, “my soul thirsts for you, as a parched land does for water/rain” (cf. NIV, NRSV).
[143:8] 4 tn Heb “cause me to hear in the morning your loyal love.” Here “loyal love” probably stands metonymically for an oracle of assurance promising God’s intervention as an expression of his loyal love.
[143:8] sn The morning is sometimes viewed as the time of divine intervention (see Pss 30:5; 59:16; 90:14).
[143:8] 5 sn The way probably refers here to God’s moral and ethical standards and requirements (see v. 10).
[143:8] 6 tn Heb “for to you I lift up my life.” The Hebrew expression נָאָשׂ נֶפֶשׁ (na’as nefesh, “to lift up [one’s] life”) means “to desire; to long for” (see Deut 24:15; Prov 19:18; Jer 22:27; 44:14; Hos 4:8, as well as H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament, 16).