Psalms 107:42

107:42 When the godly see this, they rejoice,

and every sinner ¹  shuts his mouth.

Psalms 112:2

112:2 His descendants ²  will be powerful on the earth;

the godly ³  will be blessed.

Psalms 19:8

19:8 The Lord’s precepts are fair ⁴ 

and make one joyful. ⁵ 

The Lord’s commands ⁶  are pure ⁷ 

and give insight for life. ⁸ 

Psalms 111:1

Psalm 111 ⁹ 

111:1 Praise the Lord!

I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart,

in the assembly of the godly and the congregation.

Psalms 140:13

140:13 Certainly the godly will give thanks to your name;

the morally upright will live in your presence.

Psalms 49:14

49:14 They will travel to Sheol like sheep, ¹⁰ 

with death as their shepherd. ¹¹ 

The godly will rule ¹²  over them when the day of vindication dawns; ¹³ 

Sheol will consume their bodies and they will no longer live in impressive houses. ¹⁴ 

[107:42]  ¹ tn Heb “all evil,” which stands metonymically for those who do evil.

[112:2]  ² tn Or “offspring”; Heb “seed.”

[112:2]  ³ tn Heb “His seed will be mighty on the earth, the generation of the godly.” The Hebrew term דוֹר (dor, “generation”) could be taken as parallel to “offspring” and translated “posterity,” but the singular more likely refers to the godly as a class. See BDB 189-90 s.v. for other examples where “generation” refers to a class of people.

[19:8]  ³ tn Or “just.” Perhaps the idea is that they impart a knowledge of what is just and right.

[19:8]  ⁴ tn Heb “[they] make happy [the] heart.” Perhaps the point is that they bring a sense of joyful satisfaction to the one who knows and keeps them, for those who obey God’s law are richly rewarded. See v. 11b.

[19:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “command.” The singular here refers to the law as a whole.

[19:8]  ⁶ tn Because they reflect God’s character, his commands provide a code of moral and ethical purity.

[19:8]  ⁷ tn Heb [they] enlighten [the] eyes.

[111:1]  ⁴ sn Psalm 111. The psalmist praises God for his marvelous deeds, especially the way in which he provides for and delivers his people. The psalm is an acrostic. After the introductory call to praise, every poetic line (twenty-two in all) begins with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

[49:14]  ⁵ tn Heb “like sheep to Sheol they are appointed.” The verb form שַׁתּוּ (shatu) is apparently derived from שָׁתַת (shatat), which appears to be a variant of the more common שִׁית (shiyt, “to place; to set”; BDB 1060 s.v. שָׁתַת and GKC 183 §67.ee). Some scholars emend the text to שָׁחוּ (shakhu; from the verbal root שׁוּח [shukh, “sink down”]) and read “they descend.” The present translation assumes an emendation to שָׁטוּ (shatu; from the verbal root שׁוּט [shut, “go; wander”]), “they travel, wander.” (The letter tet [ט] and tav [ת] sound similar; a scribe transcribing from dictation could easily confuse them.) The perfect verbal form is used in a rhetorical manner to speak of their destiny as if it were already realized (the so-called perfect of certitude or prophetic perfect).

[49:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “death will shepherd them,” that is, death itself (personified here as a shepherd) will lead them like a flock of helpless, unsuspecting sheep to Sheol, the underworld, the land of the dead.

[49:14]  ⁷ tn The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) consecutive carries the same force as the perfect verbal form in v. 14a. The psalmist speaks of this coming event as if it were already accomplished.

[49:14]  ⁸ tn Heb “will rule over them in the morning.” “Morning” here is a metaphor for a time of deliverance and vindication after the dark “night” of trouble (see Pss 30:5; 46:5; 59:16; 90:14; 143:8; Isa 17:14). In this context the psalmist confidently anticipates a day of vindication when the Lord will deliver the oppressed from the rich (see v. 15) and send the oppressors to Sheol.

[49:14]  ⁹ tn Heb “their form [will become an object] for the consuming of Sheol, from a lofty residence, to him.” The meaning of this syntactically difficult text is uncertain. The translation assumes that צוּר (tsur, “form”; this is the Qere [marginal] reading; the Kethib has צִירָם [tsiram, “their image”]) refers to their physical form or bodies. “Sheol” is taken as the subject of “consume” (on the implied “become” before the infinitive “to consume” see GKC 349 §114.k). The preposition מִן (min) prefixed to “lofty residence” is understood as privative, “away from; so as not.” The preposition -ל (lamed) is possessive, while the third person pronominal suffix is understood as a representative singular.