¹ sn In the morning is here viewed as the time of prayer (Pss 59:16; 88:13) and/or of deliverance (Ps 30:5).

² tn The imperfect is here understood in a specific future sense; the psalmist is expressing his confidence that God will be willing to hear his request. Another option is to understand the imperfect as expressing the psalmist’s wish or request. In this case one could translate, “Lord, in the morning hear me.”

³ tn Heb “my voice.”

⁴ tn Heb “I will arrange for you.” Some understand a sacrifice or offering as the implied object (cf. NEB “I set out my morning sacrifice”). The present translation assumes that the implied object is the psalmist’s case/request. See Isa 44:7.

⁵ tn Heb “and I will watch.”

⁶ sn The earth heaved and shook. The imagery pictures an earthquake in which the earth’s surface rises and falls. The earthquake motif is common in OT theophanies of God as warrior and in ancient Near Eastern literary descriptions of warring gods and kings. See R. B. Chisholm, “An Exegetical and Theological Study of Psalm 18/2 Samuel 22” (Th.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary, 1983), 160-62.

⁷ tn 2 Sam 22:8 has “heavens” which forms a merism with “earth” in the preceding line. The “foundations of the heavens” would be the mountains. However, the reading “foundations of the mountains” has a parallel in Deut 32:22.

⁸ tn In this poetic narrative context the prefixed verbal form is best understood as a preterite indicating past tense, not an imperfect. Note the three prefixed verbal forms with vav (ו) consecutive in the verse.

⁹ tn Heb “I pulverize them like dust upon the face of the wind.” The phrase “upon the face of” here means “before.” 2 Sam 22:43 reads, “like dust of the earth.”

¹⁰ tc Ps 18:42 reads, “I empty them out” (Hiphil of ריק), while 2 Sam 22:43 reads, “I crush them, I stomp on them” (juxtaposing the synonyms דקק and רקע). It is likely that the latter is a conflation of variants. One, but not both, of the verbs in 2 Sam 22:43 is probably original; “empty out” does not form as good a parallel with “grind, pulverize” in the parallel line.

¹¹ tn Or “mud.”

¹² tn Heb “from with you [is] my praise.”

¹³ tn Heb “my vows I will fulfill before those who fear him.” When asking the Lord for help, the psalmists would typically promise to praise the Lord publicly if he intervened and delivered them.

¹⁴ sn I lift my hands. Lifting one’s hands toward God was a gesture of prayer.

¹⁵ tn The Hebrew term דְּבִיר (dÿvir, “temple”) actually refers to the most holy place within the sanctuary.

¹⁶ tn Or “my life.”

¹⁷ tn Heb “you kept me alive from those descending into the pit.” The Hebrew noun בוֹר (bor, “pit, cistern”) is sometimes used of the grave and/or the realm of the dead. The translation follows the consonantal Hebrew text (Kethib); the marginal reading (Qere) has, “you kept me alive so that I did not go down into the pit.”

¹⁸ tn A “faithful follower” (חָסִיד, khasid) is one who does what is right in God’s eyes and remains faithful to God (see Pss 4:3; 12:1; 16:10; 31:23; 37:28; 86:2; 97:10).

¹⁹ tn The participial forms in the second and third lines characterize the Lord as one who typically protects the faithful and judges the proud.

²⁰ tn Heb “[why] do you hide your face from me?”