Mazmur 44:25

44:25 For we lie in the dirt,

with our bellies pressed to the ground. ¹ 

Mazmur 85:12

85:12 Yes, the Lord will bestow his good blessings, ² 

and our land will yield ³  its crops.

Mazmur 106:6

106:6 We have sinned like ⁴  our ancestors; ⁵ 

we have done wrong, we have done evil.

Mazmur 132:6

132:6 Look, we heard about it ⁶  in Ephrathah, ⁷ 

we found it in the territory of Jaar. ⁸ 

Mazmur 135:5

135:5 Yes, ⁹  I know the Lord is great,

and our Lord is superior to all gods.

[44:25]  ¹ tn Heb “for our being/life sinks down to the dirt, our belly clings to the earth.” The suffixed form of נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, “being, life”) is often equivalent to a pronoun in poetic texts.

[85:12]  ² tn Heb “what is good.”

[85:12]  ³ tn Both “bestow” and “yield” translate the same Hebrew verb (נָתַן, natan). The repetition of the word emphasizes that agricultural prosperity is the direct result of divine blessing.

[106:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “with.”

[106:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “fathers” (also in v. 7).

[132:6]  ⁶ tn Rather than having an antecedent, the third feminine singular pronominal suffix here (and in the next line) appears to refer to the ark of the covenant, mentioned in v. 8. (The Hebrew term אָרוֹן [’aron, “ark”] is sometimes construed as grammatically feminine. See 1 Sam 4:17; 2 Chr 8:11.)

[132:6]  ⁷ sn Some understand Ephrathah as a reference to Kiriath-jearim because of the apparent allusion to this site in the next line (see the note on “Jaar”). The ark was kept in Kiriath-jearim after the Philistines released it (see 1 Sam 6:21-7:2). However, the switch in verbs from “heard about” to “found” suggests that Ephrathah not be equated with Jair. The group who is speaking heard about the ark while they were in Ephrath. They then went to retrieve it from Kiriath-jearim (“Jaar”). It is more likely that Ephrathah refers to a site near Bethel (Gen 35:16, 19; 48:7) or to Bethlehem (Ruth 4:11; Mic 5:2).

[132:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “fields of the forest.” The Hebrew term יָעַר (ya’ad, “forest”) is apparently a shortened alternative name for קִרְיַת יְעָרִים (qiryat yÿ’arim, “Kiriath-jearim”), the place where the ark was kept after it was released by the Philistines and from which David and his men retrieved it (see 1 Chr 13:6).

[135:5]  ⁹ tn Or “for.”