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
28:5 For they do not understand the Lord’s actions,
or the way he carries out justice. 4
The Lord 5 will permanently demolish them. 6
79:8 Do not hold us accountable for the sins of earlier generations! 7
Quickly send your compassion our way, 8
for we are in serious trouble! 9
89:50 Take note, O Lord, 10 of the way your servants are taunted, 11
and of how I must bear so many insults from people! 12
101:2 I will walk in 13 the way of integrity.
When will you come to me?
I will conduct my business with integrity in the midst of my palace. 14
101:6 I will favor the honest people of the land, 15
and allow them to live with me. 16
Those who walk in the way of integrity will attend me. 17
109:18 He made cursing a way of life, 18
so curses poured into his stomach like water
and seeped into his bones like oil. 19
140:8 O Lord, do not let the wicked have their way! 20
Do not allow their 21 plan to succeed when they attack! 22 (Selah)
143:8 May I hear about your loyal love in the morning, 23
for I trust in you.
Show me the way I should go, 24
because I long for you. 25
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.
2 tn Heb “because of those who watch me [with evil intent].” See also Pss 27:11; 56:2.
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).
4 tn Heb “or the work of his hands.” In this context “the
5 tn Heb “he”; the referent (the
6 tn Heb “will tear them down and not rebuild them.” The ungodly are compared to a structure that is permanently demolished.
7 tn Heb “do not remember against us sins, former.” Some understand “former” as an attributive adjective modifying sins, “former [i.e., chronologically prior] sins” (see BDB 911 s.v. רִאשׁוֹן). The present translation assumes that ראשׁנים (“former”) here refers to those who lived formerly, that is, the people’s ancestors (see Lam 5:7). The word is used in this way in Lev 26:45; Deut 19:14 and Eccl 1:11.
8 tn Heb “may your compassion quickly confront us.” The prefixed verbal form is understood as a jussive, indicating a tone of prayer.
9 tn Heb “for we are very low.”
10 tc Many medieval Hebrew
11 tn Heb “remember, O Lord, the taunt against your servants.” Many medieval Hebrew
12 tn Heb “my lifting up in my arms [or “against my chest”] all of the many, peoples.” The term רַבִּים (rabbim, “many”) makes no apparent sense here. For this reason some emend the text to רִבֵי (rivey, “attacks by”), a defectively written plural construct form of רִיב (riv, “dispute; quarrel”).
13 tn Heb “take notice of.”
14 tn Heb “I will walk about in the integrity of my heart in the midst of my house.”
15 tn Heb “my eyes [are] on the faithful of the land.”
16 tn The Hebrew text simply reads, “in order to live with me.”
17 tn Heb “one who walks in the way of integrity, he will minister to me.”
18 tn Heb “he put on a curse as [if it were] his garment.”
19 tn Heb “and it came like water into his inner being, and like oil into his bones.” This may refer to this individual’s appetite for cursing. For him cursing was as refreshing as drinking water or massaging oneself with oil. Another option is that the destructive effects of a curse are in view. In this case a destructive curse invades his very being, like water or oil. Some who interpret the verse this way prefer to repoint the vav (ו) on “it came” to a conjunctive vav and interpret the prefixed verb as a jussive, “may it come!”
20 tn Heb “do not grant the desires of the wicked.”
21 tn Heb “his.” The singular is used in a representative sense (see v. 1).
22 tn Heb “his plot do not promote, they rise up.” The translation understands the final verb as being an unmarked temporal clause. Another option is to revocalize the verb as a Hiphil and take the verb with the next verse, “those who surround me lift up [their] head,” which could refer to their proud attitude as they anticipate victory (see Ps 27:6).
23 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.
sn The morning is sometimes viewed as the time of divine intervention (see Pss 30:5; 59:16; 90:14).
24 sn The way probably refers here to God’s moral and ethical standards and requirements (see v. 10).
25 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).