30:30 My skin has turned dark on me; 1
my body 2 is hot with fever. 3
33:19 Or a person is chastened 4 by pain on his bed,
and with the continual strife of his bones, 5
33:20 so that his life loathes food,
and his soul rejects appetizing fare. 6
33:21 His flesh wastes away from sight,
and his bones, which were not seen,
are easily visible. 7
33:22 He 8 draws near to the place of corruption,
and his life to the messengers of death. 9
22:14 My strength drains away like water; 10
all my bones are dislocated;
my heart 11 is like wax;
it melts away inside me.
22:15 The roof of my mouth 12 is as dry as a piece of pottery;
my tongue sticks to my gums. 13
You 14 set me in the dust of death. 15
22:16 Yes, 16 wild dogs surround me –
a gang of evil men crowd around me;
like a lion they pin my hands and feet. 17
22:17 I can count 18 all my bones;
my enemies 19 are gloating over me in triumph. 20
32:3 When I refused to confess my sin, 21
my whole body wasted away, 22
while I groaned in pain all day long.
32:4 For day and night you tormented me; 23
you tried to destroy me 24 in the intense heat 25 of summer. 26 (Selah)
38:3 My whole body is sick because of your judgment; 27
I am deprived of health because of my sin. 28
102:3 For my days go up in smoke, 29
and my bones are charred like a fireplace. 30
102:5 Because of the anxiety that makes me groan,
my bones protrude from my skin. 31
ח (Khet)
4:8 Now their appearance 32 is darker than soot;
they are not recognized in the streets.
Their skin has shriveled on their bones;
it is dried up, like tree bark.
1 tn The MT has “become dark from upon me,” prompting some editions to supply the verb “falls from me” (RSV, NRSV), or “peels” (NIV).
2 tn The word “my bones” may be taken as a metonymy of subject, the bony framework indicating the whole body.
3 tn The word חֹרֶב (khorev) also means “heat.” The heat in this line is not that of the sun, but obviously a fever.
4 tc The MT has the passive form, and so a subject has to be added: “[a man] is chastened.” The LXX has the active form, indicating “[God] chastens,” but the object “a man” has to be added. It is understandable why the LXX thought this was active, within this sequence of verbs; and that is why it is the inferior reading.
5 tc The Kethib “the strife of his bones is continual,” whereas the Qere has “the multitude of his bones are firm.” The former is the better reading in this passage. It indicates that the pain is caused by the ongoing strife.
6 tn Heb “food of desire.” The word “rejects” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.
7 tc Heb “are laid bare.” This is the Qere reading; the Kethib means “bare height.” Gordis reverses the word order: “his bones are bare [i.e., crushed] so that they cannot be looked upon.” But the sense of that is not clear.
8 tn Heb “his soul [נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh, “life”] draws near.”
9 tn The MT uses the Hiphil participle, “to those who cause death.” This seems to be a reference to the belief in demons that brought about death, an idea not mentioned in the Bible itself. Thus many proposals have been made for this expression. Hoffmann and Budde divide the word into לְמוֹ מֵתִּים (lÿmo metim) and simply read “to the dead.” Dhorme adds a couple of letters to get לִמְקוֹם מֵתִּים (limqom metim, “to the place [or abode] of the dead”).
10 tn Heb “like water I am poured out.”
11 sn The heart is viewed here as the seat of the psalmist’s strength and courage.
12 tc Heb “my strength” (כֹּחִי, kokhiy), but many prefer to emend the text to חִכִּי (khikiy, “my palate”; cf. NEB, NRSV “my mouth”) assuming that an error of transposition has occurred in the traditional Hebrew text.
13 tn Cf. NEB “my jaw”; NASB, NRSV “my jaws”; NIV “the roof of my mouth.”
14 sn Here the psalmist addresses God and suggests that God is ultimately responsible for what is happening because of his failure to intervene (see vv. 1-2, 11).
15 sn The imperfect verbal form draws attention to the progressive nature of the action. The psalmist is in the process of dying.
16 tn Or “for.”
17 tn Heb “like a lion, my hands and my feet.” This reading is often emended because it is grammatically awkward, but perhaps its awkwardness is by rhetorical design. Its broken syntax may be intended to convey the panic and terror felt by the psalmist. The psalmist may envision a lion pinning the hands and feet of its victim to the ground with its paws (a scene depicted in ancient Near Eastern art), or a lion biting the hands and feet. The line has been traditionally translated, “they pierce my hands and feet,” and then taken as foreshadowing the crucifixion of Christ. Though Jesus does appropriate the language of this psalm while on the cross (compare v. 1 with Matt 27:46 and Mark 15:34), the NT does not cite this verse in describing the death of Jesus. (It does refer to vv. 7-8 and 18, however. See Matt 27:35, 39, 43; Mark 15:24, 29; Luke 23:34; John 19:23-24.) If one were to insist on an emendation of כָּאֲרִי (ka’ariy, “like a lion”) to a verb, the most likely verbal root would be כָּרָה (karah, “dig”; see the LXX). In this context this verb could refer to the gnawing and tearing of wild dogs (cf. NCV, TEV, CEV). The ancient Greek version produced by Symmachus reads “bind” here, perhaps understanding a verbal root כרך, which is attested in later Hebrew and Aramaic and means “to encircle, entwine, embrace” (see HALOT 497-98 s.v. כרך and Jastrow 668 s.v. כָּרַךְ). Neither one of these proposed verbs can yield a meaning “bore, pierce.”
18 tn The imperfect verbal forms in vv. 17-18 draw attention to the progressive nature of the action.
19 tn Heb “they.” The masculine form indicates the enemies are in view. The referent (the psalmist’s enemies) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
20 tn Heb “they gaze, they look upon me.”
21 tn Heb “when I was silent.”
22 tn Heb “my bones became brittle.” The psalmist pictures himself as aging and growing physically weak. Trying to cover up his sin brought severe physical consequences.
23 tn Heb “your hand was heavy upon me.”
24 tc Heb “my [?] was turned.” The meaning of the Hebrew term לְשַׁד (lÿshad) is uncertain. A noun לָשָׁד (lashad, “cake”) is attested in Num 11:8, but it would make no sense to understand that word in this context. It is better to emend the form to לְשֻׁדִּי (lÿshuddiy, “to my destruction”) and understand “your hand” as the subject of the verb “was turned.” In this case the text reads, “[your hand] was turned to my destruction.” In Lam 3:3 the author laments that God’s “hand” was “turned” (הָפַךְ, hafakh) against him in a hostile sense.
25 tn The translation assumes that the plural form indicates degree. If one understands the form as a true plural, then one might translate, “in the times of drought.”
26 sn Summer. Perhaps the psalmist suffered during the hot season and perceived the very weather as being an instrument of divine judgment. Another option is that he compares his time of suffering to the uncomfortable and oppressive heat of summer.
27 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.
28 tn Heb “there is no health in my bones from before my sin.”
29 tn Heb “for my days come to an end in smoke.”
30 tn The Hebrew noun מוֹ־קֵד (mo-qed, “fireplace”) occurs only here, in Isa 33:14 (where it refers to the fire itself), and perhaps in Lev 6:2.
31 tn Heb “from the sound of my groaning my bone[s] stick to my flesh.” The preposition at the beginning of the verse is causal; the phrase “sound of my groaning” is metonymic for the anxiety that causes the groaning. The point seems to be this: Anxiety (which causes the psalmist to groan) keeps him from eating (v. 4). This physical deprivation in turn makes him emaciated – he is turned to “skin and bones,” so to speak.
32 tn Heb “their outline” or “their form.” The Hebrew noun תֹּאַר (to’ar, “outline, form”) is related to the Phoenician noun תֹּאַר (to’ar, “something gazed at”), and Aramaic verb תָּאַר (ta’ar, “to gaze at”). It is used in reference to the form of a woman (Gen 29:17; Deut 21:11; 1 Sam 25:3; Esth 2:7) and of a man (Gen 39:11; Judg 8:18; 1 Sam 16:18; 28:14; 1 Kgs 1:6; 1 Chr 17:17; Isa 52:14; 53:2). Here it is used in a metonymical sense: “appearance.”