Psalms 124:3

124:3 they would have swallowed us alive,

when their anger raged against us.

Psalms 27:13

27:13 Where would I be if I did not believe I would experience

the Lord’s favor in the land of the living? ¹ 

Psalms 36:9

36:9 For you are the one who gives

and sustains life. ² 

Psalms 38:19

38:19 But those who are my enemies for no reason are numerous; ³ 

those who hate me without cause outnumber me. ⁴ 

Psalms 69:28

69:28 May their names be deleted from the scroll of the living! ⁵ 

Do not let their names be listed with the godly! ⁶ 

Psalms 16:11

16:11 You lead me in ⁷  the path of life; ⁸ 

I experience absolute joy in your presence; ⁹ 

you always give me sheer delight. ¹⁰ 

Psalms 21:4

21:4 He asked you to sustain his life, ¹¹ 

and you have granted him long life and an enduring dynasty. ¹² 

Psalms 30:5

30:5 For his anger lasts only a brief moment,

and his good favor restores one’s life. ¹³ 

One may experience sorrow during the night,

but joy arrives in the morning. ¹⁴ 

Psalms 34:12

34:12 Do you want to really live? ¹⁵ 

Would you love to live a long, happy life? ¹⁶ 

Psalms 52:5

52:5 Yet ¹⁷  God will make you a permanent heap of ruins. ¹⁸ 

He will scoop you up ¹⁹  and remove you from your home; ²⁰ 

he will uproot you from the land of the living. (Selah)

Psalms 55:15

55:15 May death destroy them! ²¹ 

May they go down alive into Sheol! ²² 

For evil is in their dwelling place and in their midst.

Psalms 133:3

133:3 It is like the dew of Hermon, ²³ 

which flows down upon the hills of Zion. ²⁴ 

Indeed ²⁵  that is where the Lord has decreed

a blessing will be available – eternal life. ²⁶ 

[27:13]  ¹ tn In the Hebrew text the sentence is incomplete: “If I had not believed [I would] see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.” The words “Where would I be” are supplied in the translation to clarify the intent of the statement.

[36:9]  ¹ tn Heb “for with you is the fountain of life, in your light we see light.” Water (note “fountain”) and light are here metaphors for life.

[38:19]  ¹ tn Heb “and my enemies, life, are many.” The noun חַיִּים (khayyim, “life”) fits very awkwardly here. The translation assumes an emendation to חִנָּם (khinam, “without reason”; note the parallelism with שֶׁקֶר [sheqer, “falsely”] and see Pss 35:19; 69:4; Lam 3:52). The verb עָצַם (’atsam) can sometimes mean “are strong,” but here it probably focuses on numerical superiority (note the parallel verb רָבַב, ravav, “be many”).

[38:19]  ² tn Heb “are many.”

[69:28]  ¹ tn Heb “let them be wiped out of the scroll of the living.”

[69:28]  ² tn Heb “and with the godly let them not be written.”

[16:11]  ¹ tn Heb “cause me to know”; or “cause me to experience.”

[16:11]  ² tn This is a metaphorical way of saying, “you preserve my life.” The phrase “path of life” stands in contrast to death/Sheol in Prov 2:18-19; 5:5-6; 15:24.

[16:11]  ³ tn Heb “abundance of joy [is] with your face.” The plural form of the noun שִׂמְחָה (simkhah, “joy”) occurs only here and in Ps 45:15. It may emphasize the degree of joy experienced.

[16:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “delight [is] in your right hand forever.” The plural form of the adjective נָעִים (na’im, “pleasant, delightful”) may here emphasize the degree of delight experienced (see Job 36:11).

[21:4]  ¹ tn Heb “life he asked from you.” Another option is to translate the perfect verbal forms in v. 4 with the present tense, “he asks…you grant.”

[21:4]  ² tn Heb “you have granted him length of days forever and ever.” The phrase “length of days,” when used of human beings, usually refers to a lengthy period of time (such as one’s lifetime). See, for example, Deut 30:20; Job 12:12; Ps 91:16; Prov 3:2, 16; Lam 5:20. The additional phrase “forever and ever” is hyperbolic. While it seems to attribute eternal life to the king (see Pss 61:6-7; 72:5 as well), the underlying reality is the king’s enduring dynasty. He will live on, as it were, through his descendants, who will continue to rule over his kingdom long after he has passed off the scene.

[30:5]  ¹ tn Heb “for [there is] a moment in his anger, [but] life in his favor.” Because of the parallelism with “moment,” some understand חַיִּים (khayyim) in a quantitative sense: “lifetime” (cf. NIV, NRSV). However, the immediate context, which emphasizes deliverance from death (see v. 3), suggests that חַיִּים has a qualitative sense: “physical life” or even “prosperous life” (cf. NEB “in his favour there is life”).

[30:5]  ² tn Heb “in the evening weeping comes to lodge, but at morning a shout of joy.” “Weeping” is personified here as a traveler who lodges with one temporarily.

[34:12]  ¹ tn Heb “Who is the man who desires life?” The rhetorical question is used to grab the audience’s attention. “Life” probably refers here to quality of life, not just physical existence or even duration of life. See the following line.

[34:12]  ² tn Heb “[Who] loves days to see good?”

[52:5]  ¹ tn The adverb גַּם (gam, “also; even”) is translated here in an adversative sense (“yet”). It highlights the contrastive correspondence between the evildoer’s behavior and God’s response.

[52:5]  ² tn Heb “will tear you down forever.”

[52:5]  ³ tn This rare verb (חָתָה, khatah) occurs only here and in Prov 6:27; 25:22; Isa 30:14.

[52:5]  ⁴ tn Heb “from [your] tent.”

[55:15]  ¹ tc The meaning of the MT is unclear. The Kethib (consonantal text) reads יַשִּׁימָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ (yashimavet ’alemo, “May devastation [be] upon them!”). The proposed noun יַשִּׁימָוֶת occurs only here and perhaps in the place name Beth-Jeshimoth in Num 33:49. The Qere (marginal text) has יַשִּׁי מָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ (yashi mavet ’alemo). The verbal form יַשִּׁי is apparently an alternate form of יַשִּׁיא (yashi’), a Hiphil imperfect from נָשַׁא (nasha’, “deceive”). In this case one might read “death will come deceptively upon them.” This reading has the advantage of reading מָוֶת (mavet, “death”) which forms a natural parallel with “Sheol” in the next line. The present translation is based on the following reconstruction of the text: יְשִׁמֵּם מָוֶת (yeshimmem mavet). The verb assumed in the reconstruction is a Hiphil jussive third masculine singular from שָׁמַם (shamam, “be desolate”) with a third masculine plural pronominal suffix attached. This reconstruction assumes that (1) haplography has occurred in the traditional text (the original sequence of three mems [מ] was lost with only one mem remaining), resulting in the fusion of originally distinct forms in the Kethib, and (2) that עָלֵימוֹ (’alemo, “upon them”) is a later scribal addition attempting to make sense of a garbled and corrupt text. The preposition עַל (’al) does occur with the verb שָׁמַם (shamam), but in such cases the expression means “be appalled at/because of” (see Jer 49:20; 50:45). If one were to retain the prepositional phrase here, one would have to read the text as follows: יַשִּׁים מָוֶת עָלֵימוֹ (yashim mavet ’alemo, “Death will be appalled at them”). The idea seems odd, to say the least. Death is not collocated with this verb elsewhere.

[55:15]  ² sn Go down alive. This curse imagines a swift and sudden death for the psalmist’s enemies.

[133:3]  ¹ sn Hermon refers to Mount Hermon, located north of Israel.

[133:3]  ² sn The hills of Zion are those surrounding Zion (see Pss 87:1; 125:2). The psalmist does not intend to suggest that the dew from Mt. Hermon in the distant north actually flows down upon Zion. His point is that the same kind of heavy dew that replenishes Hermon may also be seen on Zion’s hills. See A. Cohen, Psalms (SoBB), 439. “Dew” here symbolizes divine blessing, as the next line suggests.

[133:3]  ³ tn Or “for.”

[133:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forever.”