Discovery Box| (0.25) | (Psa 71:23) | 2 tn Heb “and my life [or “soul”] which you will have redeemed.” The perfect verbal form functions here as a future perfect. The psalmist anticipates praising God, for God will have rescued him by that time. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 71:3) | 3 sn You are my high ridge. This metaphor pictures God as a rocky, relatively inaccessible summit, where one would be able to find protection from enemies. See 1 Sam 23:25, 28. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 69:18) | 1 tn Heb “come near my life and redeem it.” The verb “redeem” casts the Lord in the role of a leader who protects members of his extended family in times of need and crisis (see Ps 19:14). |
| (0.25) | (Psa 63:9) | 1 tn Heb “but they for destruction seek my life.” The pronoun “they” must refer here to the psalmist’s enemies, referred to at this point for the first time in the psalm. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 63:4) | 2 sn I will lift up my hands. Lifting up one’s hands toward God was a gesture of prayer (see Ps 28:2; Lam 2:19) or respect (Ps 119:48). |
| (0.25) | (Psa 59:11) | 1 sn My people might forget the lesson. Swift, sudden destruction might be quickly forgotten. The psalmist wants God’s judgment to be prolonged so that it might be a continual reminder of divine justice. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 59:9) | 1 tc Heb “his strength, for you I will watch.” “His strength” should be emended to “my strength” (see v. 17). Some also emend אֶשְׁמֹרָה (ʾeshmorah, “I will watch”) to אֱזַמֵּרָה (ʾezammerah, “I will sing praises [to you]”) See v. 17. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 57:4) | 3 tn Heb “my life, in the midst of lions, I lie down, devouring ones, sons of mankind, their teeth a spear and arrows and their tongue a sharp sword.” The syntax of the verse is difficult. Another option is to take “my life” with the preceding verse. For this to make sense, one must add a verb, perhaps “and may he deliver” (cf. the LXX), before the phrase. One might then translate, “May God send his loyal love and faithfulness and deliver my life.” If one does take “my life” with v. 4, then the parallelism of v. 5 is altered and one might translate: “in the midst of lions I lie down, [among] men who want to devour me, whose teeth….” |
| (0.25) | (Psa 57:6) | 2 tn Heb “my life bends low.” The Hebrew term נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) with a pronominal suffix is often equivalent to a pronoun, especially in poetry (see BDB 660 s.v. נֶפֶשׁ 4.a). |
| (0.25) | (Psa 56:9) | 1 tn Heb “then my enemies will turn back in the day I cry out.” The Hebrew particle אָז (ʾaz, “then”) is probably used here to draw attention to the following statement. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 56:13) | 2 tn Heb “are not my feet [kept] from stumbling?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “Of course they are!” The question has been translated as an affirmation for the sake of clarification of meaning. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 42:1) | 5 tn Or “my soul pants [with thirst].” The Hebrew term נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) with a pronominal suffix is often equivalent to a pronoun, especially in poetry (see BDB 660 s.v. נֶפֶשׁ 4.a). |
| (0.25) | (Psa 40:8) | 2 tn Heb “your law [is] in the midst of my inner parts.” The “inner parts” are viewed here as the seat of the psalmist’s thought life and moral decision making. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 39:3) | 2 tn Heb “In my reflection fire burned.” The prefixed verbal form is either a preterite (past tense) or an imperfect being used in a past progressive or customary sense (“fire was burning”). |
| (0.25) | (Psa 39:5) | 1 tn Heb “Look, handbreadths you make my days.” The “handbreadth” (equivalent to the width of four fingers) was one of the smallest measures used by ancient Israelites. See P. C. Craigie, Psalms 1-50 (WBC), 309. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 38:3) | 1 tn Heb “there is no soundness in my flesh from before your anger.” “Anger” here refers metonymically to divine judgment, which is the practical effect of God’s anger at the psalmist’s sin. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 35:13) | 1 tn Heb “as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth.” Sackcloth was worn by mourners. When the psalmist’s enemies were sick, he was sorry for their misfortune and mourned for them. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 28:6) | 2 sn He has heard my plea for mercy. The psalmist’s mood abruptly changes at this point because the Lord responded positively to his petition and assured him that he would deliver him. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 26:6) | 1 tn Heb “I wash my hands in innocence.” The psalmist uses an image from cultic ritual to picture his moral lifestyle. The imperfect verbal emphasizes that this is his habit. |
| (0.25) | (Psa 25:1) | 2 tn Heb “to you, O Lord, my life I lift up.” To “lift up” one’s “life” to the Lord means to express one’s trust in him through prayer. See Pss 86:4; 143:8. |
