For the music director; a song, a psalm.
66:1 Shout out praise to God, all the earth!
66:2 Sing praises about the majesty of his reputation! 2
Give him the honor he deserves! 3
66:3 Say to God:
“How awesome are your deeds!
Because of your great power your enemies cower in fear 4 before you.
66:4 All the earth worships 5 you
and sings praises to you!
They sing praises to your name!” (Selah)
66:5 Come and witness 6 God’s exploits! 7
His acts on behalf of people are awesome! 8
1 sn Psalm 66. The psalmist praises God because he has delivered his people from a crisis.
2 tn Heb “his name,” which here stands metonymically for God’s reputation.
3 tn Heb “make honorable his praise.”
4 tn See Deut 33:29; Ps 81:15 for other uses of the verb כָּחַשׁ (kakhash) in the sense “cower in fear.” In Ps 18:44 the verb seems to carry the nuance “be weak, powerless” (see also Ps 109:24).
5 tn Or “bows down to.” The prefixed verbal forms in v. 4 are taken (1) as imperfects expressing what is typical. Another option (2) is to interpret them as anticipatory (“all the earth will worship you”) or (3) take them as jussives, expressing a prayer or wish (“may all the earth worship you”).
6 tn Or “see.”
7 tn Or “acts” (see Ps 46:8).
8 tn Heb “awesome [is] an act toward the sons of man.” It is unclear how the prepositional phrase relates to what precedes. If collocated with “act,” it may mean “on behalf of” or “toward.” If taken with “awesome” (see 1 Chr 16:25; Pss 89:7; 96:4; Zeph 2:11), one might translate “his awesome acts are beyond human comprehension” or “his awesome acts are superior to anything men can do.”