Mazmur 5:8

5:8 Lord, lead me in your righteousness ¹ 

because of those who wait to ambush me, ² 

remove the obstacles in the way in which you are guiding me! ³ 

Mazmur 9:10

9:10 Your loyal followers trust in you, ⁴ 

for you, Lord, do not abandon those who seek your help. ⁵ 

Mazmur 21:1

Psalm 21 ⁶ 

For the music director; a psalm of David.

21:1 O Lord, the king rejoices in the strength you give; ⁷ 

he takes great delight in the deliverance you provide. ⁸ 

Mazmur 30:12

30:12 So now ⁹  my heart ¹⁰  will sing to you and not be silent;

O Lord my God, I will always ¹¹  give thanks to you.

Mazmur 36:6

36:6 Your justice is like the highest mountains, ¹² 

your fairness like the deepest sea;

you preserve ¹³  mankind and the animal kingdom. ¹⁴ 

Mazmur 36:8

36:8 They are filled with food from your house,

and you allow them to drink from the river of your delicacies.

Mazmur 51:14

51:14 Rescue me from the guilt of murder, ¹⁵  O God, the God who delivers me!

Then my tongue will shout for joy because of your deliverance. ¹⁶ 

Mazmur 61:2

61:2 From the most remote place on earth ¹⁷ 

I call out to you in my despair. ¹⁸ 

Lead me ¹⁹  up to an inaccessible rocky summit! ²⁰ 

Mazmur 66:15

66:15 I will offer up to you fattened animals as burnt sacrifices,

along with the smell of sacrificial rams.

I will offer cattle and goats. (Selah)

Mazmur 102:1

Psalm 102 ²¹ 

The prayer of an oppressed man, as he grows faint and pours out his lament before the Lord.

102:1 O Lord, hear my prayer!

Pay attention to my cry for help! ²² 

Mazmur 108:3

108:3 I will give you thanks before the nations, O Lord!

I will sing praises to you before foreigners! ²³ 

Mazmur 138:7

138:7 Even when I must walk in the midst of danger, ²⁴  you revive me.

You oppose my angry enemies, ²⁵ 

and your right hand delivers me.

Mazmur 139:16

139:16 Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. ²⁶ 

All the days ordained for me

were recorded in your scroll

before one of them came into existence. ²⁷ 

Mazmur 143:8

143:8 May I hear about your loyal love in the morning, ²⁸ 

for I trust in you.

Show me the way I should go, ²⁹ 

because I long for you. ³⁰ 

[5:8]  ¹ tn God’s providential leading is in view. His צְדָקָה (tsÿdaqah, “righteousness”) includes here the deliverance that originates in his righteousness; he protects and vindicates the one whose cause is just. For other examples of this use of the word, see BDB 842 s.v.

[5:8]  ² tn Heb “because of those who watch me [with evil intent].” See also Pss 27:11; 56:2.

[5:8]  ³ tn Heb “make level before me your way.” The imperative “make level” is Hiphil in the Kethib (consonantal text); Piel in the Qere (marginal reading). God’s “way” is here the way in which he leads the psalmist providentially (see the preceding line, where the psalmist asks the Lord to lead him).

[9:10]  ⁴ tn Heb “and the ones who know your name trust in you.” The construction vav (ו) conjunctive + imperfect at the beginning of the verse expresses another consequence of the statement made in v. 8. “To know” the Lord’s “name” means to be his follower, recognizing his authority and maintaining loyalty to him. See Ps 91:14, where “knowing” the Lord’s “name” is associated with loving him.

[9:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “the ones who seek you.”

[21:1]  ⁶ sn Psalm 21. The psalmist praises the Lord for the way he protects and blesses the Davidic king.

[21:1]  ⁷ tn Heb “in your strength.” The translation interprets the pronominal suffix as subjective, rather than merely descriptive (or attributive).

[21:1]  ⁸ tn Heb “and in your deliverance, how greatly he rejoices.”

[30:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “so that”; or “in order that.”

[30:12]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “glory.” Some view כָבוֹד (khavod, “glory”) here as a metonymy for man’s inner being (see BDB 459 s.v. II כָּבוֹד 5), but it is preferable to emend the form to כְּבֵדִי (kÿvediy, “my liver”). Like the heart, the liver is viewed as the seat of one’s emotions. See also Pss 16:9; 57:9; 108:1, as well as H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament, 64, and M. Dahood, Psalms (AB), 1:90. For an Ugaritic example of the heart/liver as the source of joy, see G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 47-48: “her [Anat’s] liver swelled with laughter, her heart was filled with joy, the liver of Anat with triumph.” “Heart” is used in the translation above for the sake of English idiom; the expression “my liver sings” would seem odd indeed to the modern reader.

[30:12]  ¹¹ tn Or “forever.”

[36:6]  ¹² tn Heb “mountains of God.” The divine name אֵל (’el, “God”) is here used in an idiomatic manner to indicate the superlative.

[36:6]  ¹³ tn Or “deliver.”

[36:6]  ¹⁴ sn God’s justice/fairness is firm and reliable like the highest mountains and as abundant as the water in the deepest sea. The psalmist uses a legal metaphor to describe God’s preservation of his creation. Like a just judge who vindicates the innocent, God protects his creation from destructive forces.

[51:14]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “from bloodshed.” “Bloodshed” here stands by metonymy for the guilt which it produces.

[51:14]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “my tongue will shout for joy your deliverance.” Another option is to take the prefixed verbal form as a jussive, “may my tongue shout for joy.” However, the pattern in vv. 12-15 appears to be prayer/request (see vv. 12, 14a, 15a) followed by promise/vow (see vv. 13, 14b, 15b).

[61:2]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “from the end of the earth.” This may indicate (1) the psalmist is exiled in a distant land, or (2) it may be hyperbolic (the psalmist feels alienated from God’s presence, as if he were in a distant land).

[61:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “while my heart faints.”

[61:2]  ¹⁹ tn The imperfect verbal form here expresses the psalmist’s wish or prayer.

[61:2]  ²⁰ tn Heb “on to a rocky summit [that] is higher than I.”

[102:1]  ²¹ sn Psalm 102. The psalmist laments his oppressed state, but longs for a day when the Lord will restore Jerusalem and vindicate his suffering people.

[102:1]  ²² tn Heb “and may my cry for help come to you.”

[108:3]  ²³ tn Or “the peoples.”

[138:7]  ²⁴ tn Or “distress.”

[138:7]  ²⁵ tn Heb “against the anger of my enemies you extend your hand.”

[139:16]  ²⁶ tn Heb “Your eyes saw my shapeless form.” The Hebrew noun גֹּלֶם (golem) occurs only here in the OT. In later Hebrew the word refers to “a lump, a shapeless or lifeless substance,” and to “unfinished matter, a vessel wanting finishing” (Jastrow 222 s.v. גּוֹלֶם). The translation employs the dynamic rendering “when I was inside the womb” to clarify that the speaker was still in his mother’s womb at the time he was “seen” by God.

[139:16]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and on your scroll all of them were written, [the] days [which] were formed, and [there was] not one among them.” This “scroll” may be the “scroll of life” mentioned in Ps 69:28 (see the note on the word “living” there).

[143:8]  ²⁸ 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]  ²⁹ sn The way probably refers here to God’s moral and ethical standards and requirements (see v. 10).

[143:8]  ³⁰ 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).