Psalms 22:16

22:16 Yes, ¹  wild dogs surround me –

a gang of evil men crowd around me;

like a lion they pin my hands and feet. ² 

Psalms 32:7

32:7 You are my hiding place;

you protect me from distress.

You surround me with shouts of joy from those celebrating deliverance. ³  (Selah)

Psalms 55:10

55:10 Day and night they walk around on its walls, ⁴ 

while wickedness and destruction ⁵  are within it.

Psalms 118:12

118:12 They surrounded me like bees.

But they disappeared as quickly ⁶  as a fire among thorns. ⁷ 

Indeed, in the name of the Lord I pushed them away.

[22:16]  ¹ tn Or “for.”

[22:16]  ² tn Heb “like a lion, my hands and my feet.” This reading is often emended because it is grammatically awkward, but perhaps its awkwardness is by rhetorical design. Its broken syntax may be intended to convey the panic and terror felt by the psalmist. The psalmist may envision a lion pinning the hands and feet of its victim to the ground with its paws (a scene depicted in ancient Near Eastern art), or a lion biting the hands and feet. The line has been traditionally translated, “they pierce my hands and feet,” and then taken as foreshadowing the crucifixion of Christ. Though Jesus does appropriate the language of this psalm while on the cross (compare v. 1 with Matt 27:46 and Mark 15:34), the NT does not cite this verse in describing the death of Jesus. (It does refer to vv. 7-8 and 18, however. See Matt 27:35, 39, 43; Mark 15:24, 29; Luke 23:34; John 19:23-24.) If one were to insist on an emendation of כָּאֲרִי (ka’ariy, “like a lion”) to a verb, the most likely verbal root would be כָּרָה (karah, “dig”; see the LXX). In this context this verb could refer to the gnawing and tearing of wild dogs (cf. NCV, TEV, CEV). The ancient Greek version produced by Symmachus reads “bind” here, perhaps understanding a verbal root כרך, which is attested in later Hebrew and Aramaic and means “to encircle, entwine, embrace” (see HALOT 497-98 s.v. כרך and Jastrow 668 s.v. כָּרַךְ). Neither one of these proposed verbs can yield a meaning “bore, pierce.”

[32:7]  ³ tn Heb “[with] shouts of joy of deliverance you surround me.”

[55:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “day and night they surround it, upon its walls.” Personified “violence and conflict” are the likely subjects. They are compared to watchmen on the city’s walls.

[55:10]  ⁶ sn Wickedness and destruction. These terms are also closely associated in Ps 7:14.

[118:12]  ⁷ tn Heb “were extinguished.”

[118:12]  ⁸ tn The point seems to be that the hostility of the nations (v. 10) is short-lived, like a fire that quickly devours thorns and then burns out. Some, attempting to create a better parallel with the preceding line, emend דֹּעֲכוּ (do’akhu, “they were extinguished”) to בָּעֲרוּ (ba’aru, “they burned”). In this case the statement emphasizes their hostility.