Psalms 104:2

104:2 He covers himself with light as if it were a garment.

He stretches out the skies like a tent curtain,

Psalms 109:29

109:29 My accusers will be covered ¹  with shame,

and draped in humiliation as if it were a robe.

Psalms 89:45

89:45 You have cut short his youth, ² 

and have covered him with shame. (Selah)

Psalms 109:19

109:19 May a curse attach itself to him, like a garment one puts on, ³ 

or a belt ⁴  one wears continually!

Psalms 71:13

71:13 May my accusers be humiliated and defeated!

May those who want to harm me ⁵  be covered with scorn and disgrace!

Psalms 84:6

84:6 As they pass through the Baca Valley, ⁶ 

he provides a spring for them. ⁷ 

The rain ⁸  even covers it with pools of water. ⁹ 

[109:29]  ¹ tn Heb “clothed.” Another option is to translate the prefixed verbal forms in this line and the next as jussives (“may my accusers be covered with shame”).

[89:45]  ¹ tn Heb “the days of his youth” (see as well Job 33:25).

[109:19]  ¹ tn Heb “may it be for him like a garment one puts on.”

[109:19]  ² tn The Hebrew noun מֵזַח (mezakh, “belt; waistband”) occurs only here in the OT. The form apparently occurs in Isa 23:10 as well, but an emendation is necessary there.

[71:13]  ¹ tn Heb “those who seek my harm.”

[84:6]  ¹ tn The translation assumes that the Hebrew phrase עֵמֶק הַבָּכָא (’emeq habbakha’) is the name of an otherwise unknown arid valley through which pilgrims to Jerusalem passed. The term בָּכָא (bakha’) may be the name of a particular type of plant or shrub that grew in this valley. O. Borowski (Agriculture in Iron Age Israel, 130) suggests it is the black mulberry. Some take the phrase as purely metaphorical and relate בָּכָא to the root בָּכָה (bakhah, “to weep”). In this case one might translate, “the valley of weeping” or “the valley of affliction.”

[84:6]  ² tc The MT reads “a spring they make it,” but this makes little sense. Many medieval Hebrew mss, as well as the LXX, understand God to be the subject and the valley to be the object, “he [God] makes it [the valley] [into] a spring.”

[84:6]  ³ tn This rare word may refer to the early (or autumn) rains (see Joel 2:23).

[84:6]  ⁴ tc The MT reads בְּרָכוֹת (bÿrakhot, “blessings”) but the preceding reference to a “spring” favors an emendation to בְּרֵכוֹת (bÿrekhot, “pools”).