A prayer 2 of David.
16:1 Protect me, O God, for I have taken shelter in you. 3
16:2 I say to the Lord, “You are the Lord,
my only source of well-being.” 4
18:2 The Lord is my high ridge, 5 my stronghold, 6 my deliverer.
My God is my rocky summit where 7 I take shelter, 8
my shield, the horn that saves me, 9 and my refuge. 10
For the music director; according to the tune “Morning Doe;” 12 a psalm of David.
22:1 My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? 13
I groan in prayer, but help seems far away. 14
22:2 My God, I cry out during the day,
but you do not answer,
and during the night my prayers do not let up. 15
43:5 Why are you depressed, 16 O my soul? 17
Why are you upset? 18
Wait for God!
For I will again give thanks
to my God for his saving intervention. 19
56:3 When 20 I am afraid,
I trust in you.
56:4 In God – I boast in his promise 21 –
in God I trust, I am not afraid.
What can mere men 22 do to me? 23
A psalm of David, written when he was in the Judean wilderness. 25
63:1 O God, you are my God! I long for you! 26
My soul thirsts 27 for you,
my flesh yearns for you,
in a dry and parched 28 land where there is no water.
71:12 O God, do not remain far away from me!
My God, hurry and help me! 29
71:22 I will express my thanks to you with a stringed instrument,
praising 30 your faithfulness, O my God!
I will sing praises to you accompanied by a harp,
O Holy One of Israel! 31
1 sn Psalm 16. The psalmist seeks divine protection because he has remained loyal to God. He praises God for his rich blessings, and is confident God will vindicate him and deliver him from death.
2 tn The precise meaning of the Hebrew term מִכְתָּם (mikhtam) is uncertain. HALOT 582-83 s.v. defines it as “inscription.”
3 tn The Hebrew perfect verbal form probably refers here to a completed action with continuing results (see 7:1; 11:1).
4 tn Heb “my good [is] not beyond you.” For the use of the preposition עַל (’al) in the sense of “beyond,” see BDB 755 s.v. 2.
5 sn My high ridge. This metaphor pictures God as a rocky, relatively inaccessible summit, where one would be able to find protection from enemies. See 1 Sam 23:25, 28.
6 sn My stronghold. David often found safety in such strongholds. See 1 Sam 22:4-5; 24:22; 2 Sam 5:9, 17; 23:14.
7 tn Or “in whom.”
8 sn Take shelter. “Taking shelter” in the Lord is an idiom for seeking his protection. Seeking his protection presupposes and even demonstrates the subject’s loyalty to the Lord. In the psalms those who “take shelter” in the Lord are contrasted with the wicked and equated with those who love, fear and serve the Lord (Pss 5:11-12; 31:17-20; 34:21-22).
9 tn Heb “the horn of my salvation”; or “my saving horn.”
10 tn Or “my elevated place.” The parallel version of this psalm in 2 Sam 22:3 adds at this point, “my refuge, my savior, [you who] save me from violence.”
11 sn Psalm 22. The psalmist cries out to the Lord for deliverance from his dangerous enemies, who have surrounded him and threaten his life. Confident that the Lord will intervene, he then vows to thank the Lord publicly for his help and anticipates a time when all people will recognize the Lord’s greatness and worship him.
12 tn Heb “according to the doe of the dawn.” Apparently this refers to a particular musical tune or style.
13 sn From the psalmist’s perspective it seems that God has abandoned him, for he fails to answer his cry for help (vv. 1b-2).
14 tn Heb “far from my deliverance [are] the words of my groaning.” The Hebrew noun שְׁאָגָה (shÿ’agah) and its related verb שָׁאַג (sha’ag) are sometimes used of a lion’s roar, but they can also describe human groaning (see Job 3:24 and Pss 32:3 and 38:8.
15 tn Heb “there is no silence to me.”
16 tn Heb “Why do you bow down?”
17 sn For poetic effect the psalmist addresses his soul, or inner self.
18 tn Heb “and why are you in turmoil upon me?”
19 tc Heb “for again I will give him thanks, the saving acts of my face and my God.” The last line should be emended to read יְשׁוּעֹת פְנֵי אֱלֹהָי (yÿshu’ot fÿney ’elohay, “[for] the saving acts of the face of my God,” that is, the saving acts associated with God’s presence/intervention. This refrain is identical to the one in Ps 42:11. See also 42:5, which differs only slightly.
20 tn Heb “[in] a day.”
21 tn Heb “in God I boast, his word.” The syntax in the Hebrew text is difficult. (1) The line could be translated, “in God I boast, [in] his word.” Such a translation assumes that the prepositional phrase “in God” goes with the following verb “I boast” (see Ps 44:8) and that “his word” is appositional to “in God” and more specifically identifies the basis for the psalmist’s confidence. God’s “word” is here understood as an assuring promise of protection. Another option (2) is to translate, “in God I will boast [with] a word.” In this case, the “word” is a song of praise. (In this view the pronominal suffix “his” must be omitted as in v. 10.) The present translation reflects yet another option (3): In this case “I praise his word” is a parenthetical statement, with “his word” being the object of the verb. The sentence begun with the prepositional phrase “in God” is then completed in the next line, with the prepositional phrase being repeated after the parenthesis.
22 tn Heb “flesh,” which refers by metonymy to human beings (see v. 11, where “man” is used in this same question), envisioned here as mortal and powerless before God.
23 tn The rhetorical question assumes the answer, “Nothing!” The imperfect is used in a modal sense here, indicating capability or potential.
24 sn Psalm 63. The psalmist expresses his intense desire to be in God’s presence and confidently affirms that God will judge his enemies.
25 sn According to the psalm superscription David wrote the psalm while in the “wilderness of Judah.” Perhaps this refers to the period described in 1 Sam 23-24 or to the incident mentioned in 2 Sam 15:23.
26 tn Or “I will seek you.”
27 tn Or “I thirst.”
28 tn Heb “faint” or “weary.” This may picture the land as “faint” or “weary,” or it may allude to the effect this dry desert has on those who are forced to live in it.
29 tn Heb “hurry to my help.”
30 tn The word “praising” is supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.
31 sn The basic sense of the word “holy” is “set apart from that which is commonplace, special, unique.” The
32 tn Grk “ground, praying and saying.” Here the participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.
33 tn Grk “if it is possible.”
34 sn This cup alludes to the wrath of God that Jesus would experience (in the form of suffering and death) for us. See Ps 11:6; 75:8-9; Isa 51:17, 19, 22 for this figure.
35 tn Grk “saying.” The participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant here in contemporary English and has not been translated.
36 tn Grk “this”; the referent (the cup) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
37 tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.
38 tn Grk “with a loud voice, saying.” The participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant here in contemporary English and has not been translated.
39 sn A quotation from Ps 22:1.
40 tn Grk “Jesus said to her.”