Psalms 94:11-23

94:11 The Lord knows that

peoples’ thoughts are morally bankrupt.¹

94:12 How blessed is the one² whom you instruct, O Lord,

the one whom you teach from your law,

94:13 in order to protect him from times of trouble,³

until the wicked are destroyed.⁴

94:14 Certainly⁵ the Lord does not forsake his people;

he does not abandon the nation that belongs to him.⁶

94:15 For justice will prevail,⁷

and all the morally upright⁸ will be vindicated.⁹

94:16 Who will rise up to defend me¹⁰ against the wicked?

Who will stand up for me against the evildoers?¹¹

94:17 If the Lord had not helped me,

I would have laid down in the silence of death.¹²

94:18 If I say, “My foot is slipping,”

your loyal love, O Lord, supports me.

94:19 When worries threaten to overwhelm me,¹³

your soothing touch makes me happy.¹⁴

94:20 Cruel rulers¹⁵ are not your allies,

those who make oppressive laws.¹⁶

94:21 They conspire against¹⁷ the blameless,¹⁸

and condemn to death the innocent.¹⁹

94:22 But the Lord will protect me,²⁰

and my God will shelter me.²¹

94:23 He will pay them back for their sin.²²

He will destroy them because of²³ their evil;

the Lord our God will destroy them.

¹tn Heb “the Lord knows the thoughts of man, that they are emptiness.” The psalmist thinks specifically of the “thoughts” expressed in v. 7.

²tn Heb “[Oh] the happiness [of] the man.” Hebrew wisdom literature often assumes and reflects the male-oriented perspective of ancient Israelite society. The principle of the psalm is certainly applicable to all people, regardless of their gender or age. To facilitate modern application, we translate the gender and age specific “man” with the more neutral “one.” The generic masculine pronoun is used in v. 2.

³tn Heb “to give him rest from the days of trouble.”

⁴tn Heb “until a pit is dug for the wicked.”

⁵tn Or “for.”

⁶tn Or “his inheritance.”

⁷tn Heb “for judgment will return to justice.”

⁸tn Heb “all the pure of heart.” The “heart” is here viewed as the seat of one’s moral character and motives. The “pure of heart” are God’s faithful followers who trust in and love the Lord and, as a result, experience his deliverance (see Pss 7:10; 11:2; 32:11; 36:10; 64:10; 97:11).

⁹tn Heb “and after it [are] the pure of heart.”

¹⁰tn Heb “for me.”

¹¹sn Who will stand up for me…? The questions anticipate the answer, “No one except God” (see v. 17).

¹²tn Heb “If the Lord [were] not my help, quickly my life would have lain down in silence.” The psalmist, perhaps speaking as the nation’s representative, recalls God’s past intervention. For other examples of conditional sentences with the term לוּלֵי (luley, “if not”) in the protasis and a perfect verbal form in the apodosis, see Pss 119:92 and 124:2-5.

¹³tn Heb “when my worries are many within me.”

¹⁴tn Heb “your comforts cause my soul to delight.”

¹⁵tn Heb “a throne of destruction.” “Throne” stands here by metonymy for rulers who occupy thrones.

¹⁶tn Heb “Is a throne of destruction united to you, one that forms trouble upon a statute?” The rhetorical question anticipates the answer, “Of course not!” The translation, while not preserving the interrogative form of the statement, reflects its rhetorical force.

¹⁷tn Or “attack.”

¹⁸tn Heb “the life of the blameless.”

¹⁹tn Heb “and the blood of the innocent they declare guilty.”

²⁰tn Heb “and the Lord has become my elevated place.” The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) consecutive is used in a rhetorical sense, describing an anticipated development as if it were already reality.

²¹tn Heb “and my God [has become] a rocky summit of my safety.”

²²tn The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) consecutive is used in a rhetorical sense, describing an anticipated development as if it were already reality.

²³tn Or “in.”