Psalms 9:8

9:8 He judges the world fairly;

he makes just legal decisions for the nations. ¹ 

Psalms 135:14

135:14 For the Lord vindicates ²  his people,

and has compassion on his servants. ³ 

Psalms 7:8

7:8 The Lord judges the nations. ⁴ 

Vindicate me, Lord, because I am innocent, ⁵ 

because I am blameless, ⁶  O Exalted One! ⁷ 

Psalms 96:10

96:10 Say among the nations, “The Lord reigns!

The world is established, it cannot be moved.

He judges the nations fairly.”

Psalms 110:6

110:6 He executes judgment ⁸  against ⁹  the nations;

he fills the valleys with corpses; ¹⁰ 

he shatters their heads over the vast battlefield. ¹¹ 

¹ tn Heb “the peoples.” The imperfect verbal forms in v. 8 either describe God’s typical, characteristic behavior, or anticipate a future judgment of worldwide proportions (“will judge…”).

² tn Heb “judges,” but here the idea is that the Lord “judges on behalf of” his people. The imperfect verbal forms here and in the next line draw attention to the Lord’s characteristic actions.

³ sn Verse 14 echoes Deut 32:36, where Moses affirms that God mercifully relents from fully judging his wayward people.

³ sn The Lord judges the nations. In hyperbolic fashion the psalmist pictures the nations assembled around the divine throne (v. 7a). He urges God to take his rightful place on the throne (v. 7b) and then pictures him making judicial decisions that vindicate the innocent (see vv. 8-16).

⁴ tn Heb “judge me, O Lord, according to my innocence.”

⁵ tn Heb “according to my blamelessness.” The imperative verb translated “vindicate” governs the second line as well.

⁶ tn The Hebrew form עָלָי (’alay) has been traditionally understood as the preposition עַל (’al, “over”) with a first person suffix. But this is syntactically awkward and meaningless. The form is probably a divine title derived from the verbal root עָלָה (’alah, “ascend”). This relatively rare title appears elsewhere in the OT (see HALOT 824-25 s.v. I עַל, though this text is not listed) and in Ugaritic as an epithet for Baal (see G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 98). See M. Dahood, Psalms (AB), 1:44-45, and P. C. Craigie, Psalms 1-50 (WBC), 98.

⁴ tn The imperfect verbal forms in vv. 6-7 are understood here as descriptive-dramatic or as generalizing, though they could be taken as future.

⁵ tn Or “among.”

⁶ tn Heb “he fills [with] corpses,” but one expects a double accusative here. The translation assumes an emendation to גְוִיּוֹת גֵאָיוֹת(בִּ) מִלֵּא or מִלֵּא גֵאָיוֹת גְּוִיוֹת (for a similar construction see Ezek 32:5). In the former case גֵאָיוֹת(ge’ayot) has accidentally dropped from the text due to homoioteleuton; in the latter case it has dropped out due to homoioarcton.

⁷ tn Heb “he strikes [the verb is מָחַץ (makhats), translated “strikes down” in v. 5] head[s] over a great land.” The Hebrew term רַבָּה (rabbah, “great”) is here used of distance or spatial measurement (see 1 Sam 26:13).