8:3 When I look up at the heavens, which your fingers made,
and see the moon and the stars, which you set in place, 1
22:9 Yes, you are the one who brought me out 2 from the womb
and made me feel secure on my mother’s breasts.
33:6 By the Lord’s decree 3 the heavens were made;
by a mere word from his mouth all the stars in the sky were created. 4
56:12 I am obligated to fulfill the vows I made to you, O God; 5
I will give you the thank-offerings you deserve, 6
For the music director; a psalm of David, a song.
65:1 Praise awaits you, 8 O God, in Zion.
Vows made to you are fulfilled.
78:71 He took him away from following the mother sheep, 9
and made him the shepherd of Jacob, his people,
and of Israel, his chosen nation. 10
92:4 For you, O Lord, have made me happy by your work.
I will sing for joy because of what you have done. 11
95:11 So I made a vow in my anger,
‘They will never enter into the resting place I had set aside for them.’” 12
99:4 The king is strong;
he loves justice. 13
You ensure that legal decisions will be made fairly; 14
you promote justice and equity in Jacob.
100:3 Acknowledge that the Lord is God!
He made us and we belong to him; 15
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
103:22 Praise the Lord, all that he has made, 16
in all the regions 17 of his kingdom!
Praise the Lord, O my soul!
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
132:11 The Lord made a reliable promise to David; 20
he will not go back on his word. 21
He said, 22 “I will place one of your descendants 23 on your throne.
139:15 my bones were not hidden from you,
when 24 I was made in secret
and sewed together in the depths of the earth. 25
148:14 He has made his people victorious, 26
and given all his loyal followers reason to praise –
the Israelites, the people who are close to him. 27
Praise the Lord!
1 tn Heb “when I see your heavens, the works of your fingers, the moon and stars which you established.” The verb “[and] see” is understood by ellipsis in the second half of the verse.
2 tn Or “the one who pulled me.” The verb is derived from either גָחָה (gakhah; see HALOT 187 s.v. גחה) or גִּיחַ (giyakh; see BDB 161 s.v. גִּיחַ) and seems to carry the nuance “burst forth” or “pull out.”
3 tn Heb “word.”
4 tn Heb “and by the breath of his mouth all their host.” The words “were created” are added in the translation for stylistic reasons; they are understood by ellipsis (note “were made” in the preceding line). The description is consistent with Gen 1:16, which indicates that God spoke the heavenly luminaries into existence.
5 tn Heb “upon me, O God, [are] your vows.”
6 tn Heb “I will repay thank-offerings to you.”
7 sn Psalm 65. The psalmist praises God because he forgives sin and blesses his people with an abundant harvest.
8 tn Heb “for you, silence, praise.” Many prefer to emend the noun דֻּמִיָּה (dumiyyah, “silence”) to a participle דּוֹמִיָּה (domiyyah), from the root דָּמָה (damah, “be silent”), understood here in the sense of “wait.”
9 tn Heb “from after the ewes he brought him.”
10 tn Heb “to shepherd Jacob, his people, and Israel, his inheritance.”
11 tn Heb “the works of your hands.”
12 tn Heb “my resting place.” The promised land of Canaan is here viewed metaphorically as a place of rest for God’s people, who are compared to sheep (see v. 7).
13 tn Heb “and strength, a king, justice he loves.” The syntax of the Hebrew text is difficult here. The translation assumes that two affirmations are made about the king, the
14 tn Heb “you establish fairness.”
15 tn The present translation (like most modern translations) follows the Qere (marginal reading), which reads literally, “and to him [are] we.” The Kethib (consonantal text) has “and not we.” The suffixed preposition לו (“to him”) was confused aurally with the negative particle לא because the two sound identical.
16 tn Heb “all his works,” which includes mankind.
17 tn Heb “places.”
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 “the
21 tn Heb “he will not turn back from it.”
22 tn The words “he said” are supplied in the translation to clarify that what follows are the
23 tn Heb “the fruit of your body.”
24 tc The Hebrew term אֲשֶׁר (’asher, “which”) should probably be emended to כֲּאַשֶׁר (ka’asher, “when”). The kaf (כ) may have been lost by haplography (note the kaf at the end of the preceding form).
25 sn The phrase depths of the earth may be metaphorical (euphemistic) or it may reflect a prescientific belief about the origins of the embryo deep beneath the earth’s surface (see H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament, 96-97). Job 1:21 also closely associates the mother’s womb with the earth.
26 tn Heb “and he lifted up a horn for his people.” The horn of an ox underlies the metaphor (see Deut 33:17; 1 Kgs 22:11; Ps 92:10). The horn of the wild ox is frequently a metaphor for military strength; the idiom “exalt/lift up the horn” signifies military victory (see 1 Sam 2:10; Pss 75:10; 89:17, 24; 92:10; Lam 2:17). Another option is to take the “horn” as a symbol for the Davidic king, through whom the
27 tn “[there is] praise for all his loyal followers, to the sons of Israel, the people near him.” Here “praise” stands by metonymy for the victory that prompts it.