Psalms 10:1

Psalm 10 ¹ 

10:1 Why, Lord, do you stand far off?

Why do you pay no attention during times of trouble? ² 

Psalms 88:14

88:14 O Lord, why do you reject me,

and pay no attention to me? ³ 

Job 23:9

23:9 In the north ⁴  when he is at work, ⁵ 

I do not see him; ⁶ 

when he turns ⁷  to the south,

I see no trace of him.

Isaiah 8:17

8:17 I will wait patiently for the Lord,

who has rejected the family of Jacob; ⁸ 

I will wait for him.

Isaiah 45:15

45:15 Yes, you are a God who keeps hidden,

O God of Israel, deliverer!

Hosea 5:15

5:15 Then I will return again to my lair

until they have suffered their punishment. ⁹ 

Then they will seek me; ¹⁰ 

in their distress they will earnestly seek me.

¹ sn Psalm 10. Many Hebrew mss and the ancient Greek version (LXX) combine Psalms 9 and 10 into a single psalm. Taken in isolation, Psalm 10 is a petition for help in which the psalmist urges the Lord to deliver him from his dangerous enemies, whom he describes in vivid and terrifying detail. The psalmist concludes with confidence; he is certain that God’s justice will prevail.

² tn Heb “you hide for times in trouble.” The interrogative “why” is understood by ellipsis; note the preceding line. The Hiphil verbal form “hide” has no expressed object. Some supply “your eyes” by ellipsis (see BDB 761 s.v. I עָלַם Hiph and HALOT 835 s.v. I עלם hif) or emend the form to a Niphal (“you hide yourself,” see BHS, note c; cf. NEB, NIV, NRSV).

³ tn Heb “[why] do you hide your face from me?”

⁴ sn The text has “the left hand,” the Semitic idiom for directions. One faces the rising sun, and so left is north, right is south.

⁵ tc The form בַּעֲשֹׂתוֹ (ba’asoto) would be the temporal clause using the infinitive construct with a pronoun (subject genitive). This would be “when he works.” Several follow the Syriac with “I seek him.” The LXX has “[when] he turns.” R. Gordis (Job, 261) notes that there is no need to emend the text; he shows a link to the Arabic cognate ghasa, “to cover.” To him this is a perfect parallel to יַעְטֹף (ya’tof, “covers himself”).

⁶ tn The verb is the apocopated form of the imperfect. The object is supplied.

⁷ tn The MT has “he turns,” but the Syriac and Vulgate have “I turn.”

⁸ tn Heb “who hides his face from the house of Jacob.”

⁹ tn The verb יֶאְשְׁמוּ (ye’shÿmu, Qal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural from אָשַׁם, ’asham, “to be guilty”) means “to bear their punishment” (Ps 34:22-23; Prov 30:10; Isa 24:6; Jer 2:3; Hos 5:15; 10:2; 14:1; Zech 11:5; Ezek 6:6; BDB 79 s.v. אָשַׁם 3). Many English versions translate this as “admit their guilt” (NIV, NLT) or “acknowledge their guilt” (NASB, NRSV), but cf. NAB “pay for their guilt” and TEV “have suffered enough for their sins.”

¹⁰ tn Heb “seek my face” (so KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV); NAB “seek my presence.”