12:3 May the Lord cut off 1 all flattering lips,
and the tongue that boasts! 2
59:12 They speak sinful words. 3
So let them be trapped by their own pride
and by the curses and lies they speak!
63:11 But the king 4 will rejoice in God;
everyone who takes oaths in his name 5 will boast,
for the mouths of those who speak lies will be shut up. 6
140:9 As for the heads of those who surround me –
may the harm done by 7 their lips overwhelm them!
140:10 May he rain down 8 fiery coals upon them!
May he throw them into the fire!
From bottomless pits they will not escape. 9
140:11 A slanderer 10 will not endure on 11 the earth;
calamity will hunt down a violent man and strike him down. 12
12:19 The one who tells the truth 13 will endure forever,
but the one who lies 14 will last only for a moment. 15
54:17 No weapon forged to be used against you will succeed;
you will refute everyone who tries to accuse you. 16
This is what the Lord will do for his servants –
I will vindicate them,” 17
says the Lord.
1 tn The verb form is a jussive, indicating that the statement is imprecatory (“May the
2 tn Heb “a tongue speaking great [things].”
3 tn Heb “the sin of their mouth [is] the word of their lips.”
4 sn The psalmist probably refers to himself in the third person here.
5 tn Heb “who swears [an oath] by him.”
6 tn The Niphal of this verb occurs only here and in Gen 8:2, where it is used of God “stopping” or “damming up” the great deep as he brought the flood to an end.
7 tn Heb “harm of their lips.” The genitive here indicates the source or agent of the harm.
8 tn The verb form in the Kethib (consonantal Hebrew text) appears to be a Hiphil imperfect from the root מוּט (mut, “to sway”), but the Hiphil occurs only here and in Ps 55:3, where it is preferable to read יַמְטִירוּ (yamtiru, “they rain down”). In Ps 140:10 the form יַמְטֵר (yamter, “let him rain down”) should probably be read.
9 tn Heb “into bottomless pits, they will not arise.” The translation assumes that the preposition -בְּ (bet) has the nuance “from” here. Another option is to connect the line with what precedes, take the final clause as an asyndetic relative clause, and translate, “into bottomless pits [from which] they cannot arise.” The Hebrew noun מַהֲמֹרָה (mahamorah, “bottomless pit”) occurs only here in the OT.
10 tn Heb “a man of a tongue.”
11 tn Heb “be established in.”
12 tn Heb “for blows.” The Hebrew noun מַדְחֵפֹה (madkhefoh, “blow”) occurs only here in the OT.
13 tn Heb “a lip of truth.” The genitive אֱמֶת (’emet, “truth”) functions as an attributive adjective: “truthful lip.” The term שְׂפַת (sÿfat, “lip”) functions as a synecdoche of part (= lip) for the whole (= person): “truthful person.” The contrast is between “the lip of truth” and the “tongue of lying.”
14 tn Heb “a tongue of deceit.” The genitive שָׁקֶר (shaqer, “deceit”) functions as an attributive genitive. The noun לָשׁוֹן (lashon, “tongue”) functions as a synecdoche of part (= tongue) for the whole (= person): “lying person.”
15 tn Heb “while I would twinkle.” This expression is an idiom meaning “only for a moment.” The twinkling of the eye, the slightest movement, signals the brevity of the life of a lie (hyperbole). But truth will be established (תִּכּוֹן, tikon), that is, be made firm and endure.
16 tn Heb “and every tongue that rises up for judgment with you will prove to be guilty.”
17 tn Heb “this is the inheritance of the servants of the Lord, and their vindication from me.”
18 tn The word “people” is supplied in the translation to clarify that the Greek pronoun and verb are plural.
19 tn Many translations read “You are of your father the devil” (KJV, ASV, RSV, NASB) or “You belong to your father, the devil” (NIV), but the Greek preposition ἐκ (ek) emphasizes the idea of source or origin. Jesus said his opponents were the devil’s very offspring (a statement which would certainly infuriate them).
20 tn Grk “the desires of your father you want to do.”
21 tn Grk “That one” (referring to the devil).
22 tn Grk “he does not stand in the truth” (in the sense of maintaining, upholding, or accepting the validity of it).
23 tn Grk “Whenever he speaks the lie.”
24 tn Grk “he speaks from his own.”
25 tn Grk “because he is a liar and the father of it.”
26 tn On the term φαρμακεία (farmakeia, “magic spells”) see L&N 53.100: “the use of magic, often involving drugs and the casting of spells upon people – ‘to practice magic, to cast spells upon, to engage in sorcery, magic, sorcery.’ φαρμακεία: ἐν τῇ φαρμακείᾳ σου ἐπλανήθησαν πάντα τὰ ἔθνη ‘with your magic spells you deceived all the peoples (of the world)’ Re 18:23.”
27 tn Grk “idolaters.”
28 tn Grk “their share.”
29 tn Traditionally, “brimstone.”
30 tn Grk “sulfur, which is.” The relative pronoun has been translated as “that” to indicate its connection to the previous clause. The nearest logical antecedent is “the lake [that burns with fire and sulfur],” although “lake” (λίμνη, limnh) is feminine gender, while the pronoun “which” (ὅ, Jo) is neuter gender. This means that (1) the proper antecedent could be “their place” (Grk “their share,”) agreeing with the relative pronoun in number and gender, or (2) the neuter pronoun still has as its antecedent the feminine noun “lake,” since agreement in gender between pronoun and antecedent was not always maintained, with an explanatory phrase occurring with a neuter pronoun regardless of the case of the antecedent. In favor of the latter explanation is Rev 20:14, where the phrase “the lake of fire” is in apposition to the phrase “the second death.”
31 tn On the term φάρμακοι (farmakoi) see L&N 53.101.
32 tn Or “lying,” “deceit.”