22:29 All of the thriving people 1 of the earth will join the celebration and worship; 2
all those who are descending into the grave 3 will bow before him,
including those who cannot preserve their lives. 4
30:9 “What 5 profit is there in taking my life, 6
in my descending into the Pit? 7
Can the dust of the grave 8 praise you?
Can it declare your loyalty? 9
122:4 The tribes go up 10 there, 11
the tribes of the Lord,
where it is required that Israel
give thanks to the name of the Lord. 12
143:7 Answer me quickly, Lord!
My strength is fading. 13
Do not reject me, 14
or I will join 15 those descending into the grave. 16
1 tn Heb “fat [ones].” This apparently refers to those who are healthy and robust, i.e., thriving. In light of the parallelism, some prefer to emend the form to יְשֵׁנֵי (yÿsheney, “those who sleep [in the earth]”; cf. NAB, NRSV), but דִּשְׁנֵי (dishney, “fat [ones]”) seems to form a merism with “all who descend into the grave” in the following line. The psalmist envisions all people, whether healthy or dying, joining in worship of the
2 tn Heb “eat and worship.” The verb forms (a perfect followed by a prefixed form with vav [ו] consecutive) are normally used in narrative to relate completed actions. Here the psalmist uses the forms rhetorically as he envisions a time when the
3 tn Heb “all of the ones going down [into] the dust.” This group stands in contrast to those mentioned in the previous line. Together the two form a merism encompassing all human beings – the healthy, the dying, and everyone in between.
4 tn Heb “and his life he does not revive.”
5 sn The following two verses (vv. 9-10) contain the prayer (or an excerpt of the prayer) that the psalmist offered to the Lord during his crisis.
6 tn Heb “What profit [is there] in my blood?” “Blood” here represents his life.
7 tn The Hebrew term שָׁחַת (shakhat, “pit”) is often used as a title for Sheol (see Pss 16:10; 49:9; 55:24; 103:4).
8 tn Heb “dust.” The words “of the grave” are supplied in the translation for clarification.
9 tn The rhetorical questions anticipate the answer, “Of course not!”
9 tn Or “went up.”
10 tn Heb “which is where the tribes go up.”
11 tn Heb “[it is] a statute for Israel to give thanks to the name of the
13 tn Heb “my spirit is failing.”
14 tn Heb “do not hide your face from me.” The idiom “hide the face” (1) can mean “ignore” (see Pss 10:11; 13:1; 51:9) or (2) can carry the stronger idea of “reject” (see Pss 30:7; 88:14).
15 tn Heb “I will be equal with.”
16 tn Heb “the pit.” The Hebrew noun בּוֹר (bor, “pit; cistern”) is sometimes used of the grave and/or the realm of the dead. See Ps 28:1.