Mazmur 9:17

9:17 The wicked are turned back and sent to Sheol; ¹ 

this is the destiny of ²  all the nations that ignore ³  God,

Mazmur 21:8

21:8 You ⁴  prevail over ⁵  all your enemies;

your power is too great for those who hate you. ⁶ 

Mazmur 22:16

22:16 Yes, ⁷  wild dogs surround me –

a gang of evil men crowd around me;

like a lion they pin my hands and feet. ⁸ 

Mazmur 34:15

34:15 The Lord pays attention to the godly

and hears their cry for help. ⁹ 

Mazmur 37:20

37:20 But ¹⁰  evil men will die;

the Lord’s enemies will be incinerated ¹¹  –

they will go up in smoke. ¹² 

Mazmur 40:4

40:4 How blessed ¹³  is the one ¹⁴  who trusts in the Lord ¹⁵ 

and does not seek help from ¹⁶  the proud or from liars! ¹⁷ 

Mazmur 68:2

68:2 As smoke is driven away by the wind, so you drive them away. ¹⁸ 

As wax melts before fire,

so the wicked are destroyed before God.

Mazmur 69:9

69:9 Certainly ¹⁹  zeal for ²⁰  your house ²¹  consumes me;

I endure the insults of those who insult you. ²² 

Mazmur 69:12

69:12 Those who sit at the city gate gossip about me;

drunkards mock me in their songs. ²³ 

Mazmur 94:16

94:16 Who will rise up to defend me ²⁴  against the wicked?

Who will stand up for me against the evildoers? ²⁵ 

Mazmur 97:10

97:10 You who love the Lord, hate evil!

He protects ²⁶  the lives of his faithful followers;

he delivers them from the power ²⁷  of the wicked.

Mazmur 111:6

111:6 He announced that he would do mighty deeds for his people,

giving them a land that belonged to other nations. ²⁸ 

[9:17]  ¹ tn Heb “the wicked turn back to Sheol.” The imperfect verbal form either emphasizes what typically happens or describes vividly the aftermath of the Lord’s victory over the psalmist’s enemies. See v. 3.

[9:17]  ² tn The words “this is the destiny of” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons. The verb “are turned back” is understood by ellipsis (see the preceding line).

[9:17]  ³ tn Heb “forget.” “Forgetting God” refers here to worshiping false gods and thereby refusing to recognize his sovereignty (see also Deut 8:19; Judg 3:7; 1 Sam 12:9; Isa 17:10; Jer 3:21; Ps 44:20). The nations’ refusal to acknowledge God’s sovereignty accounts for their brazen attempt to attack and destroy his people.

[21:8]  ⁴ tn The king is now addressed. One could argue that the Lord is still being addressed, but v. 9 militates against this proposal, for there the Lord is mentioned in the third person and appears to be distinct from the addressee (unless, of course, one takes “Lord” in v. 9 as vocative; see the note on “them” in v. 9b). Verse 7 begins this transition to a new addressee by referring to both the king and the Lord in the third person (in vv. 1-6 the Lord is addressed and only the king referred to in the third person).

[21:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “your hand finds.” The idiom pictures the king grabbing hold of his enemies and defeating them (see 1 Sam 23:17). The imperfect verbal forms in vv. 8-12 may be translated with the future tense, as long as the future is understood as generalizing.

[21:8]  ⁶ tn Heb “your right hand finds those who hate you.”

[22:16]  ⁷ tn Or “for.”

[22:16]  ⁸ tn Heb “like a lion, my hands and my feet.” This reading is often emended because it is grammatically awkward, but perhaps its awkwardness is by rhetorical design. Its broken syntax may be intended to convey the panic and terror felt by the psalmist. The psalmist may envision a lion pinning the hands and feet of its victim to the ground with its paws (a scene depicted in ancient Near Eastern art), or a lion biting the hands and feet. The line has been traditionally translated, “they pierce my hands and feet,” and then taken as foreshadowing the crucifixion of Christ. Though Jesus does appropriate the language of this psalm while on the cross (compare v. 1 with Matt 27:46 and Mark 15:34), the NT does not cite this verse in describing the death of Jesus. (It does refer to vv. 7-8 and 18, however. See Matt 27:35, 39, 43; Mark 15:24, 29; Luke 23:34; John 19:23-24.) If one were to insist on an emendation of כָּאֲרִי (ka’ariy, “like a lion”) to a verb, the most likely verbal root would be כָּרָה (karah, “dig”; see the LXX). In this context this verb could refer to the gnawing and tearing of wild dogs (cf. NCV, TEV, CEV). The ancient Greek version produced by Symmachus reads “bind” here, perhaps understanding a verbal root כרך, which is attested in later Hebrew and Aramaic and means “to encircle, entwine, embrace” (see HALOT 497-98 s.v. כרך and Jastrow 668 s.v. כָּרַךְ). Neither one of these proposed verbs can yield a meaning “bore, pierce.”

[34:15]  ⁹ tn Heb “the eyes of the Lord [are] toward the godly, and his ears [are] toward their cry for help.”

[37:20]  ¹⁰ tn Or “for,” but Hebrew כי in this case would have to extend all the way back to v. 17a. Another option is to understand the particle as asseverative, “surely” (see v. 22).

[37:20]  ¹¹ tc The meaning of the MT (כִּיקַר כָּרִים [kiqar karim], “like what is precious among the pastures/rams”) is uncertain. One possibility is to take the noun כָּרִים as “pastures” and interpret “what is precious” as referring to flowers that blossom but then quickly disappear (see v. 2 and BDB 430 s.v. יָקָר 3). If כָּרִים is taken as “rams,” then “what is precious” might refer to the choicest portions of rams. The present translation follows a reading in the Dead Sea Scrolls (4QpPs37), כיקוד כורם (“like the burning of an oven”). The next line, which pictures the Lord’s enemies being consumed in smoke, supports this reading, which assumes confusion of the Hebrew letters resh (ר) and dalet (ד) at the end of the first word in the sequence.

[37:20]  ¹² tn Heb “they perish in smoke, they perish.” In addition to repeating the verb for emphasis, the psalmist uses the perfect form of the verb to picture the enemies’ demise as if it had already taken place. In this way he draws attention to the certitude of their judgment.

[40:4]  ¹³ tn The Hebrew noun is an abstract plural. The word often refers metonymically to the happiness that God-given security and prosperity produce (see Pss 1:1, 3; 2:12; 34:9; 41:1; 65:4; 84:12; 89:15; 106:3; 112:1; 127:5; 128:1; 144:15).

[40:4]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “man.” See the note on the word “one” in Ps 1:1.

[40:4]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “who has made the Lord his [object of] trust.”

[40:4]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and does not turn toward.”

[40:4]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “those falling away toward a lie.”

[68:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “as smoke is scattered, you scatter [them].”

[69:9]  ¹⁹ tn Or “for.” This verse explains that the psalmist’s suffering is due to his allegiance to God.

[69:9]  ²⁰ tn Or “devotion to.”

[69:9]  ²¹ sn God’s house, the temple, here represents by metonymy God himself.

[69:9]  ²² tn Heb “the insults of those who insult you fall upon me.”

[69:9]  sn Jn 2:17 applies the first half of this verse to Jesus’ ministry in the context of John’s account of Jesus cleansing the temple.

[69:12]  ²³ tn Heb “the mocking songs of the drinkers of beer.”

[94:16]  ²⁴ tn Heb “for me.”

[94:16]  ²⁵ sn Who will stand up for me…? The questions anticipate the answer, “No one except God” (see v. 17).

[97:10]  ²⁶ tn The participle may be verbal, though it might also be understood as substantival and appositional to “the Lord.” In this case one could translate, “Hate evil, you who love the Lord, the one who protects the lives…and delivers them.”

[97:10]  ²⁷ tn Heb “hand.”

[111:6]  ²⁸ tn Heb “the strength of his deeds he proclaimed to his people, to give to them an inheritance of nations.”