Mazmur 34:16

34:16 But the Lord opposes evildoers

and wipes out all memory of them from the earth. ¹ 

Mazmur 37:22

37:22 Surely ²  those favored by the Lord ³  will possess the land,

but those rejected ⁴  by him will be wiped out. ⁵ 

Mazmur 37:35

37:35 I have seen ruthless evil men ⁶ 

growing in influence, like a green tree grows in its native soil. ⁷ 

Mazmur 73:20

73:20 They are like a dream after one wakes up. ⁸ 

O Lord, when you awake ⁹  you will despise them. ¹⁰ 

Mazmur 83:4

83:4 They say, “Come on, let’s annihilate them so they are no longer a nation! ¹¹ 

Then the name of Israel will be remembered no more.”

[34:16]  ¹ tn Heb “the face of the Lord [is] against the doers of evil to cut off from the earth memory of them.”

[37:22]  ² tn The particle כִּי is best understood as asseverative or emphatic here.

[37:22]  ³ tn Heb “those blessed by him.” The pronoun “him” must refer to the Lord (see vv. 20, 23), so the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[37:22]  ⁴ tn Heb “cursed.”

[37:22]  ⁵ tn Or “cut off”; or “removed” (see v. 9).

[37:35]  ⁶ tn The Hebrew uses the representative singular again here.

[37:35]  ⁷ tn Heb “being exposed [?] like a native, luxuriant.” The Hebrew form מִתְעָרֶה (mit’areh) appears to be a Hitpael participle from עָרָה (’arah, “be exposed”), but this makes no sense in this context. Perhaps the form is a dialectal variant of מִתְעָלָה (“giving oneself an air of importance”; see Jer 51:3), from עָלָה (’alah, “go up”; see P. C. Craigie, Psalms 1-50 [WBC], 296). The noun אֶזְרָח (’ezrakh, “native, full citizen”) refers elsewhere to people, but here, where it is collocated with “luxuriant, green,” it probably refers to a tree growing in native soil.

[73:20]  ⁸ tn Heb “like a dream from awakening.” They lack any real substance; their prosperity will last for only a brief time.

[73:20]  ⁹ sn When you awake. The psalmist compares God’s inactivity to sleep and the time of God’s judgment to his awakening from sleep.

[73:20]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “you will despise their form.” The Hebrew term צֶלֶם (tselem, “form; image”) also suggests their short-lived nature. Rather than having real substance, they are like the mere images that populate one’s dreams. Note the similar use of the term in Ps 39:6.

[83:4]  ¹¹ tn Heb “we will cause them to disappear from [being] a nation.”