Psalms 10:4

10:4 The wicked man is so arrogant he always thinks,

“God won’t hold me accountable; he doesn’t care.” ¹ 

Psalms 10:11

10:11 He says to himself, ² 

“God overlooks it;

he does not pay attention;

he never notices.” ³ 

Psalms 10:13

10:13 Why does the wicked man reject God? ⁴ 

He says to himself, ⁵  “You ⁶  will not hold me accountable.” ⁷ 

Psalms 14:4

14:4 All those who behave wickedly ⁸  do not understand – ⁹ 

those who devour my people as if they were eating bread,

and do not call out to the Lord.

Psalms 36:1

Psalm 36 ¹⁰ 

For the music director; written by the Lord’s servant, David; an oracle. ¹¹ 

36:1 An evil man is rebellious to the core. ¹² 

He does not fear God, ¹³ 

Ezekiel 8:12

8:12 He said to me, “Do you see, son of man, what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the dark, each in the chamber of his idolatrous images? ¹⁴  For they think, ‘The Lord does not see us! The Lord has abandoned the land!’”

Ezekiel 9:9

9:9 He said to me, “The sin of the house of Israel and Judah is extremely great; the land is full of murder, and the city is full of corruption, ¹⁵  for they say, ‘The Lord has abandoned the land, and the Lord does not see!’ ¹⁶ 

[10:4]  ¹ tn Heb “the wicked [one], according to the height of his nose, he does not seek, there is no God, all his thoughts.” The phrase “height of his nose” probably refers to an arrogant or snooty attitude; it likely pictures one with his nose turned upward toward the sky in pride. One could take the “wicked” as the subject of the negated verb “seek,” in which case the point is that the wicked do not “seek” God. The translation assumes that this statement, along with “there is no God,” is what the wicked man thinks to himself. In this case God is the subject of the verb “seek,” and the point is that God will not hold the wicked man accountable for his actions. Verse 13 strongly favors this interpretation. The statement “there is no God” is not a philosophical assertion that God does not exist, but rather a confident affirmation that he is unconcerned about how men live morally and ethically (see v. 11).

[10:11]  ² tn Heb “he says in his heart.” See v. 6.

[10:11]  ³ tn Heb “God forgets, he hides his face, he never sees.”

[10:13]  ⁴ tn The rhetorical question expresses the psalmist’s outrage that the wicked would have the audacity to disdain God.

[10:13]  ⁵ tn Heb “he says in his heart” (see vv. 6, 11). Another option is to understand an ellipsis of the interrogative particle here (cf. the preceding line), “Why does he say in his heart?”

[10:13]  ⁶ tn Here the wicked man addresses God directly.

[10:13]  ⁷ tn Heb “you will not seek.” The verb דָרַשׁ (darash, “seek”) is used here in the sense of “seek an accounting.” One could understand the imperfect as generalizing about what is typical and translate, “you do not hold [people] accountable.”

[14:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “all the workers of wickedness.” See Pss 5:5; 6:8.

[14:4]  ⁹ tn Heb “Do they not understand?” The rhetorical question (rendered in the translation as a positive affirmation) expresses the psalmist’s amazement at their apparent lack of understanding. This may refer to their lack of moral understanding, but it more likely refers to their failure to anticipate God’s defense of his people (see vv. 5-7).

[36:1]  ¹⁰ sn Psalm 36. Though evil men plan to harm others, the psalmist is confident that the Lord is the just ruler of the earth who gives and sustains all life. He prays for divine blessing and protection and anticipates God’s judgment of the wicked.

[36:1]  ¹¹ tn In the Hebrew text the word נאם (“oracle”) appears at the beginning of the next verse (v. 2 in the Hebrew text because the superscription is considered v. 1). The resulting reading, “an oracle of rebellion for the wicked [is] in the midst of my heart” (cf. NIV) apparently means that the psalm, which foresees the downfall of the wicked, is a prophetic oracle about the rebellion of the wicked which emerges from the soul of the psalmist. One could translate, “Here is a poem written as I reflected on the rebellious character of evil men.” Another option, followed in the translation above, is to attach נאם (nÿ’um, “oracle”) with the superscription. For another example of a Davidic poem being labeled an “oracle,” see 2 Sam 23:1.

[36:1]  ¹² tn Heb “[the] rebellion of an evil man [is] in the midst of my heart.” The translation assumes a reading “in the midst of his heart” (i.e., “to the core”) instead of “in the midst of my heart,” a change which finds support in a a few medieval Hebrew mss, the Hebrew text of Origen’s Hexapla, and the Syriac.

[36:1]  ¹³ tn Heb “there is no dread of God before his eyes.” The phrase “dread of God” refers here to a healthy respect for God which recognizes that he will punish evil behavior.

[8:12]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the room of his images.” The adjective “idolatrous” has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[9:9]  ¹⁵ tn Or “lawlessness” (NAB); “perversity” (NRSV). The Hebrew word occurs only here in the OT, and its meaning is uncertain. The similar phrase in 7:23 has a common word for “violence.”

[9:9]  ¹⁶ sn The saying is virtually identical to that of the elders in Ezek 8:12.