27:6 Now I will triumph
over my enemies who surround me! 1
I will offer sacrifices in his dwelling place and shout for joy! 2
I will sing praises to the Lord!
A psalm – a song used at the dedication of the temple; 4 by David.
30:1 I will praise you, O Lord, for you lifted me up, 5
and did not allow my enemies to gloat 6 over me.
31:11 Because of all my enemies, people disdain me; 7
my neighbors are appalled by my suffering 8 –
those who know me are horrified by my condition; 9
those who see me in the street run away from me.
69:4 Those who hate me without cause are more numerous than the hairs of my head.
Those who want to destroy me, my enemies for no reason, 10 outnumber me. 11
They make me repay what I did not steal! 12
1 tn Heb “and now my head will be lifted up over my enemies all around me.”
sn In vv. 1-3 the psalmist generalizes, but here we discover that he is facing a crisis and is under attack from enemies (see vv. 11-12).
2 tn Heb “I will sacrifice in his tent sacrifices of a shout for joy” (that is, “sacrifices accompanied by a joyful shout”).
3 sn Psalm 30. The author thanks the Lord for delivering him from death and urges others to join him in praise. The psalmist experienced divine discipline for a brief time, but when he cried out for help the Lord intervened and restored his favor.
4 tn Heb “a song of the dedication of the house.” The referent of “house” is unclear. It is possible that David wrote this psalm for the dedication ceremony of Solomon’s temple. Another possibility is that the psalm was used on the occasion of the dedication of the second temple following the return from exile, or on the occasion of the rededication of the temple in Maccabean times.
5 tn Elsewhere the verb דָּלָה (dalah) is used of drawing water from a well (Exod 2:16, 19; Prov 20:5). The psalmist was trapped in the pit leading to Sheol (see v. 3), but the
6 tn Or “rejoice.”
7 tn Heb “because of all my enemies I am a reproach.”
8 tc Heb “and to my neighbors, exceedingly.” If the MT is retained, then these words probably go with what precedes. However the syntactical awkwardness of the text suggests it is textually corrupt. P. C. Craigie (Psalms 1-50 [WBC], 258) suggests that the initial mem (מ) on מְאֹד (me’od, “exceedingly”) be understood as an enclitic mem (ם) which was originally suffixed to the preceding form and then later misinterpreted. The resulting form אֵד (’ed) can then be taken as a defectively written form of אֵיד (’ed, “calamity”). If one follows this emendation, then the text reads literally, “and to my neighbors [I am one who experiences] calamity.” The noun פַחַד (fakhad, “[object of] horror”) occurs in the next line; אֵיד and פַחַד appear in parallelism elsewhere (see Prov 1:26-27).
9 tn Heb “and [an object of ] horror to those known by me.”
10 tn Heb “[with] a lie.” The Hebrew noun שֶׁקֶר (sheqer, “lie”) is used here as an adverb, “falsely, wrongfully” (see Pss 35:19; 38:19).
11 tn The Hebrew verb עָצַם (’atsam) can sometimes mean “are strong,” but here it probably focuses on numerical superiority; note the parallel verb רָבַב (ravav, “be many”).
12 tn Heb “that which I did not steal, then I restore.” Apparently אָז (’az, “then”) is used here to emphasize the verb that follows.
sn They make me repay what I did not steal. The psalmist’s enemies falsely accuse him and hold him accountable for alleged crimes he did not even commit.