Discovery BoxPsalms 50:9-13 
Context50:9 I do not need to take 1 a bull from your household
or goats from your sheepfolds.
50:10 For every wild animal in the forest belongs to me,
as well as the cattle that graze on a thousand hills. 2
50:11 I keep track of 3 every bird in the hills,
and the insects 4 of the field are mine.
50:12 Even if I were hungry, I would not tell you,
for the world and all it contains belong to me.
50:13 Do I eat the flesh of bulls?
Do I drink the blood of goats? 5
1 tn Or “I will not take.”
2 tn Heb “[the] animals on a thousand hills.” The words “that graze” are supplied in the translation for clarification. The term בְּהֵמוֹה (bÿhemot, “animal”) refers here to cattle (see Ps 104:14).
3 tn Heb “I know.”
4 tn The precise referent of the Hebrew word, which occurs only here and in Ps 80:13, is uncertain. Aramaic, Arabic and Akkadian cognates refer to insects, such as locusts or crickets.
5 tn The rhetorical questions assume an emphatic negative response, “Of course not!”
