75:3 When the earth and all its inhabitants dissolve in fear, 1
I make its pillars secure.” 2 (Selah)
82:5 They 3 neither know nor understand.
They stumble 4 around in the dark,
while all the foundations of the earth crumble. 5
58:12 Your perpetual ruins will be rebuilt; 6
you will reestablish the ancient foundations.
You will be called, ‘The one who repairs broken walls,
the one who makes the streets inhabitable again.’ 7
58:2 They seek me day after day;
they want to know my requirements, 8
like a nation that does what is right
and does not reject the law of their God.
They ask me for just decrees;
they want to be near God.
2:19 They 9 will go into caves in the rocky cliffs
and into holes in the ground, 10
trying to escape the dreadful judgment of the Lord 11
and his royal splendor,
when he rises up to terrify the earth. 12
1 tn Heb “melt.”
2 tn The statement is understood in a generalizing sense; God typically prevents the world from being overrun by chaos. One could take this as referring to an anticipated event, “I will make its pillars secure.”
3 sn Having addressed the defendants, God now speaks to those who are observing the trial, referring to the gods in the third person.
4 tn Heb “walk.” The Hitpael stem indicates iterative action, picturing these ignorant “judges” as stumbling around in the darkness.
5 sn These gods, though responsible for justice, neglect their duty. Their self-imposed ignorance (which the psalmist compares to stumbling around in the dark) results in widespread injustice, which threatens the social order of the world (the meaning of the phrase all the foundations of the earth crumble).
6 tn Heb “and they will build from you ancient ruins.”
7 tc The Hebrew text has “the one who restores paths for dwelling.” The idea of “paths to dwell in” is not a common notion. Some have proposed emending נְתִיבוֹת (nÿtivot, “paths”) to נְתִיצוֹת (nÿtitsot, “ruins”), a passive participle from נָתַץ (natats, “tear down”; see HALOT 732 s.v. *נְתִיצָה), because tighter parallelism with the preceding line is achieved. However, none of the textual sources support this emendation. The line may mean that paths must be repaired in order to dwell in the land.
8 tn Heb “ways” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, TEV); NLT “my laws.”
9 tn The identity of the grammatical subject is unclear. The “idols” could be the subject; they will “go” into the caves and holes when the idolaters throw them there in their haste to escape God’s judgment (see vv. 20-21). The picture of the idols, which represent the foreign deities worshiped by the people, fleeing from the Lord would be highly polemical and fit the overall mood of the chapter. However it seems more likely that the idolaters themselves are the subject, for v. 10 uses similar language in sarcastically urging them to run from judgment.
10 tn Heb “dust”; ASV “into the holes of the earth.”
11 tn Heb “from the dread of the Lord,” that is, from the dread that he produces in the objects of his judgment.” The words “trying to escape” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.
12 tn Or “land.” It is not certain if these verses are describing the judgment of Judah (see vv. 6-9) or a more universal judgment on all proud men.