122:3 Jerusalem 1 is a city designed
to accommodate an assembly. 2
150:4 Praise him with the tambourine and with dancing!
Praise him with stringed instruments and the flute!
89:34 I will not break 3 my covenant
or go back on what I promised. 4
109:13 May his descendants 5 be cut off! 6
May the memory of them be wiped out by the time the next generation arrives! 7
149:3 Let them praise his name with dancing!
Let them sing praises to him to the accompaniment of the tambourine and harp!
139:16 Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. 8
All the days ordained for me
were recorded in your scroll
before one of them came into existence. 9
84:10 Certainly 10 spending just one day in your temple courts is better
than spending a thousand elsewhere. 11
I would rather stand at the entrance 12 to the temple of my God
than live 13 in the tents of the wicked.
1 map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.
2 tc Heb “Jerusalem, which is built like a city which is joined to her together.” The meaning of the Hebrew text is unclear. Many regard this as a description of the compact way in which the city was designed or constructed. The translation assumes an emendation of the verb חֻבְּרָה (khubbÿrah, “is joined”) to a noun חֶבְרָה (khevrah, “association; company”). The text then reads literally, “Jerusalem, which is built like a city which has a company together.” This in turn can be taken as a reference to Jerusalem’s role as a city where people congregated for religious festivals and other civic occasions (see vv. 4-5).
3 tn Or “desecrate.”
4 tn Heb “and what proceeds out of my lips I will not alter.”
5 tn Or “offspring.”
6 sn On the expression cut off see Ps 37:28.
7 tn Heb “in another generation may their name be wiped out.”
7 tn Heb “Your eyes saw my shapeless form.” The Hebrew noun גֹּלֶם (golem) occurs only here in the OT. In later Hebrew the word refers to “a lump, a shapeless or lifeless substance,” and to “unfinished matter, a vessel wanting finishing” (Jastrow 222 s.v. גּוֹלֶם). The translation employs the dynamic rendering “when I was inside the womb” to clarify that the speaker was still in his mother’s womb at the time he was “seen” by God.
8 tn Heb “and on your scroll all of them were written, [the] days [which] were formed, and [there was] not one among them.” This “scroll” may be the “scroll of life” mentioned in Ps 69:28 (see the note on the word “living” there).
9 tn Or “for.”
10 tn Heb “better is a day in your courts than a thousand [spent elsewhere].”
11 tn Heb “I choose being at the entrance of the house of my God over living in the tents of the wicked.” The verb סָפַף (safaf) appears only here in the OT; it is derived from the noun סַף (saf, “threshold”). Traditionally some have interpreted this as a reference to being a doorkeeper at the temple, though some understand it to mean “lie as a beggar at the entrance to the temple” (see HALOT 765 s.v. ספף).
12 tn The verb דּוּר (dur, “to live”) occurs only here in the OT.