Mazmur 85:4-11

85:4 Restore us, O God our deliverer!

Do not be displeased with us! ¹ 

85:5 Will you stay mad at us forever?

Will you remain angry throughout future generations? ² 

85:6 Will you not revive us once more?

Then your people will rejoice in you!

85:7 O Lord, show us your loyal love!

Bestow on us your deliverance!

85:8 I will listen to what God the Lord says. ³ 

For he will make ⁴  peace with his people, his faithful followers. ⁵ 

Yet they must not ⁶  return to their foolish ways.

85:9 Certainly his loyal followers will soon experience his deliverance; ⁷ 

then his splendor will again appear in our land. ⁸ 

85:10 Loyal love and faithfulness meet; ⁹ 

deliverance and peace greet each other with a kiss. ¹⁰ 

85:11 Faithfulness grows from the ground,

and deliverance looks down from the sky. ¹¹ 

[85:4]  ¹ tn Heb “break your displeasure with us.” Some prefer to emend הָפֵר (hafer, “break”) to הָסֵר (haser, “turn aside”).

[85:5]  ² tn Heb “Will your anger stretch to a generation and a generation?”

[85:8]  ³ sn I will listen. Having asked for the Lord’s favor, the psalmist (who here represents the nation) anticipates a divine word of assurance.

[85:8]  ⁴ tn Heb “speak.” The idiom “speak peace” refers to establishing or maintaining peaceful relations with someone (see Gen 37:4; Zech 9:10; cf. Ps 122:8).

[85:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “to his people and to his faithful followers.” The translation assumes that “his people” and “his faithful followers” are viewed as identical here.

[85:8]  ⁶ tn Or “yet let them not.” After the negative particle אֵל (’el), the prefixed verbal form is jussive, indicating the speaker’s desire or wish.

[85:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “certainly his deliverance [is] near to those who fear him.”

[85:9]  ⁸ tn Heb “to dwell, glory, in our land.” “Glory” is the subject of the infinitive. The infinitive with -לְ (lÿ), “to dwell,” probably indicates result here (“then”). When God delivers his people and renews his relationship with them, he will once more reveal his royal splendor in the land.

[85:10]  ⁹ tn The psalmist probably uses the perfect verbal forms in v. 10 in a dramatic or rhetorical manner, describing what he anticipates as if it were already occurring or had already occurred.

[85:10]  ¹⁰ sn Deliverance and peace greet each other with a kiss. The psalmist personifies these abstract qualities to emphasize that God’s loyal love and faithfulness will yield deliverance and peace for his people.

[85:11]  ¹¹ sn The psalmist already sees undeniable signs of God’s faithfulness and expects deliverance to arrive soon.