71:21 Raise me to a position of great honor! 10
Turn and comfort me! 11
A song of ascents. 13
128:1 How blessed is every one of the Lord’s loyal followers, 14
each one who keeps his commands! 15
128:2 You 16 will eat what you worked so hard to grow. 17
You will be blessed and secure. 18
128:3 Your wife will be like a fruitful vine 19
in the inner rooms of your house;
your children 20 will be like olive branches,
as they sit all around your table.
128:4 Yes indeed, the man who fears the Lord
will be blessed in this way. 21
1 tn Heb “and it was from then.”
2 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Potiphar) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
3 sn The Hebrew word translated blessed carries the idea of enrichment, prosperity, success. It is the way believers describe success at the hand of God. The text illustrates the promise made to Abraham that whoever blesses his descendants will be blessed (Gen 12:1-3).
4 tn Heb “in the house and in the field.” The word “both” has been supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.
5 sn The passage gives us a good picture of Joseph as a young man who was responsible and faithful, both to his master and to his God. This happened within a very short time of his being sold into Egypt. It undermines the view that Joseph was a liar, a tattletale, and an arrogant adolescent.
6 tn Heb “come upon you and overtake you” (so NASB, NRSV); NIV “come upon you and accompany you.”
7 tn Or “in the country” (so NAB, NIV, NLT). This expression also occurs in v. 15.
8 tn Heb “the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).
9 sn Come in…go out. To “come in” and “go out” is a figure of speech (merism) indicating all of life and its activities.
10 tn Heb “increase my greatness.” The prefixed verbal form is distinctly jussive, indicating this is a prayer or wish. The psalmist’s request for “greatness” (or “honor”) is not a boastful, self-serving prayer for prominence, but, rather, a request that God would vindicate by elevating him over those who are trying to humiliate him.
11 tn The imperfects are understood here as expressing the psalmist’s prayer or wish. (Note the use of a distinctly jussive form at the beginning of v. 21.)
12 sn Psalm 128. The psalmist observes that the godly individual has genuine happiness because the Lord rewards such a person with prosperity and numerous children.
13 sn The precise significance of this title, which appears in Pss 120-134, is unclear. Perhaps worshipers recited these psalms when they ascended the road to Jerusalem to celebrate annual religious festivals. For a discussion of their background see L. C. Allen, Psalms 101-150 (WBC), 219-21.
14 tn Heb “every fearer of the
15 tn Heb “the one who walks in his ways.”
16 tn The psalmist addresses the representative God-fearing man, as indicated by the references to “your wife” (v. 3) and “the man” (v. 4), as well as the second masculine singular pronominal and verbal forms in vv. 2-6.
17 tn Heb “the work of your hands, indeed you will eat.”
18 tn Heb “how blessed you [will be] and it will be good for you.”
19 sn The metaphor of the fruitful vine pictures the wife as fertile; she will give her husband numerous children (see the next line).
20 tn One could translate “sons” (see Ps 127:3 and the note on the word “sons” there), but here the term seems to refer more generally to children of both genders.
21 tn Heb “look, indeed thus will the man, the fearer of the