Psalms 108:12

108:12 Give us help against the enemy,

for any help men might offer is futile. ¹ 

Psalms 124:1-3

Psalm 124 ² 

A song of ascents, ³  by David.

124:1 “If the Lord had not been on our side” –

let Israel say this! –

124:2 if the Lord had not been on our side,

when men attacked us, ⁴ 

124:3 they would have swallowed us alive,

when their anger raged against us.

Psalms 146:3

146:3 Do not trust in princes,

or in human beings, who cannot deliver! ⁵ 

Isaiah 30:7

30:7 Egypt is totally incapable of helping. ⁶ 

For this reason I call her

‘Proud one ⁷  who is silenced.’” ⁸ 

Isaiah 31:3

31:3 The Egyptians are mere humans, not God;

their horses are made of flesh, not spirit.

The Lord will strike with ⁹  his hand;

the one who helps will stumble

and the one being helped will fall.

Together they will perish. ¹⁰ 

[108:12]  ¹ tn Heb “and futile [is] the deliverance of man.”

[124:1]  ² sn Psalm 124. Israel acknowledges that the Lord delivered them from certain disaster.

[124:1]  ³ sn The precise significance of this title, which appears in Pss 120-134, is unclear. Perhaps worshipers recited these psalms when they ascended the road to Jerusalem to celebrate annual religious festivals. For a discussion of their background see L. C. Allen, Psalms 101-150 (WBC), 219-21.

[124:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “rose up against us.”

[146:3]  ⁵ tn Heb “in a son of man, to whom there is no deliverance.”

[30:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “As for Egypt, with vanity and emptiness they help.”

[30:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “Rahab” (רַהַב, rahav), which also appears as a name for Egypt in Ps 87:4. The epithet is also used in the OT for a mythical sea monster symbolic of chaos. See the note at 51:9. A number of English versions use the name “Rahab” (e.g., ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV) while others attempt some sort of translation (cf. CEV “a helpless monster”; TEV, NLT “the Harmless Dragon”).

[30:7]  ⁸ tn The MT reads “Rahab, they, sitting.” The translation above assumes an emendation of הֵם שָׁבֶת (hem shavet) to הַמָּשְׁבָּת (hammashbat), a Hophal participle with prefixed definite article, meaning “the one who is made to cease,” i.e., “destroyed,” or “silenced.” See HALOT 444-45 s.v. ישׁב.

[31:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “will extend”; KJV, ASV, NASB, NCV “stretch out.”

[31:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “together all of them will come to an end.”