16:11 Seek the Lord and the strength he gives!
Seek his presence 1 continually!
28:9 “And you, Solomon my son, obey 2 the God of your father and serve him with a submissive attitude and a willing spirit, 3 for the Lord examines all minds and understands every motive of one’s thoughts. If you seek him, he will let you find him, 4 but if you abandon him, he will reject you permanently.
27:4 I have asked the Lord for one thing –
this is what I desire!
I want to live 6 in the Lord’s house 7 all the days of my life,
so I can gaze at the splendor 8 of the Lord
and contemplate in his temple.
27:2 When evil men attack me 9
to devour my flesh, 10
when my adversaries and enemies attack me, 11
they stumble and fall. 12
20:3 May he take notice 13 of your offerings;
may he accept 14 your burnt sacrifice! (Selah)
1 tn Heb “face.”
2 tn Heb “know.”
3 tn Heb “with a complete heart and a willing being.”
4 tn Heb “he will allow himself to be found by you.”
5 tn Or “mind and being.” See Deut 6:5.
6 tn Heb “my living.”
7 sn The
8 tn Or “beauty.”
9 tn Heb “draw near to me.”
10 sn To devour my flesh. The psalmist compares his enemies to dangerous, hungry predators (see 2 Kgs 9:36; Ezek 39:17).
11 tn Heb “my adversaries and my enemies against me.” The verb “draw near” (that is, “attack”) is understood by ellipsis; see the previous line.
12 tn The Hebrew verbal forms are perfects. The translation assumes the psalmist is generalizing here, but another option is to take this as a report of past experience, “when evil men attacked me…they stumbled and fell.”
13 tn Or “remember.” For other examples of the verb זָכַר (zakhar) carrying the nuance “take notice of,” see Pss 8:4 and 9:12.
14 tc Heb “consider as fat.” The verbal form should probably be emended to יְדַשְּׁנֶהָ (yÿdashÿneha), the final he (ה) being understood as a third feminine singular pronominal suffix referring back to the feminine noun “burnt sacrifice.”
15 tn Heb “face.”
16 tn The Hebrew phrase translated “Lord God” here is אֲדֹנָי הָאֱלֹהִים (’adonay ha’elohim).
17 sn When lamenting, ancient Israelites would fast, wear sackcloth, and put ashes on their heads to show their sorrow and contrition.
18 tn Heb “Set your heart upon your ways” (see 2:15, 18); traditionally “Consider your ways” (so KJV, ASV, NAB, NASB).
19 tn Grk “Antioch, who when.” The relative pronoun was omitted and a new sentence was begun in the translation at this point to improve the English style, due to the length of the sentence in Greek.
20 tn BDAG 883 s.v. προσμένω 1.a.β has “remain true to the Lord” for προσμένειν (prosmenein) in this verse.
21 tn Grk “with purpose of heart”; BDAG 869 s.v. πρόθεσις 2.a translates this phrase “purpose of heart, i.e. devotion” here.