Psalms 22:23

22:23 You loyal followers of the Lord, ¹  praise him!

All you descendants of Jacob, honor him!

All you descendants of Israel, stand in awe of him! ² 

Psalms 22:25

22:25 You are the reason I offer praise ³  in the great assembly;

I will fulfill my promises before the Lord’s loyal followers. ⁴ 

Psalms 34:9

34:9 Remain loyal to ⁵  the Lord, you chosen people of his, ⁶ 

for his loyal followers ⁷  lack nothing!

Psalms 45:11

45:11 Then ⁸  the king will be attracted by ⁹  your beauty.

After all, he is your master! Submit ¹⁰  to him! ¹¹ 

Psalms 74:8

74:8 They say to themselves, ¹² 

“We will oppress all of them.” ¹³ 

They burn down all the places where people worship God in the land. ¹⁴ 

Psalms 89:15

89:15 How blessed are the people who worship you! ¹⁵ 

O Lord, they experience your favor. ¹⁶ 

[22:23]  ¹ tn Heb “[you] fearers of the Lord.” See Ps 15:4.

[22:23]  ² tn Heb “fear him.”

[22:25]  ³ tn Heb “from with you [is] my praise.”

[22:25]  ⁴ tn Heb “my vows I will fulfill before those who fear him.” When asking the Lord for help, the psalmists would typically promise to praise the Lord publicly if he intervened and delivered them.

[34:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “fear.”

[34:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “O holy ones of his.”

[34:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “those who fear him.”

[45:11]  ⁷ tn After the preceding imperatives, the jussive verbal form with vav (ו) conjunctive is best understood as introducing a purpose (“so that the king might desire your beauty”) or result clause (see the present translation and cf. also NASB). The point seems to be this: The bride might tend to be homesick, which in turn might cause her to mourn and diminish her attractiveness. She needs to overcome this temptation to unhappiness and enter into the marriage with joy. Then the king will be drawn to her natural beauty.

[45:11]  ⁸ tn Or “desire.”

[45:11]  ⁹ tn Or “bow down.”

[45:11]  ¹⁰ sn Submit to him. The poet here makes the point that the young bride is obligated to bring pleasure to her new husband. Though a foreign concept to modern western culture, this was accepted as the cultural norm in the psalmist’s day.

[74:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “in their heart.”

[74:8]  ¹⁰ tc Heb “[?] altogether.” The Hebrew form נִינָם (ninam) is problematic. It could be understood as the noun נִין (nin, “offspring”) but the statement “their offspring altogether” would make no sense here. C. A. Briggs and E. G. Briggs (Psalms [ICC], 2:159) emends יָחַד (yakhad, “altogether”) to יָחִיד (yakhid, “alone”) and translate “let their offspring be solitary” (i.e., exiled). Another option is to understand the form as a Qal imperfect first common plural from יָנָה (yanah, “to oppress”) with a third masculine plural pronominal suffix, “we will oppress them.” However, this verb, when used in the finite form, always appears in the Hiphil. Therefore, it is preferable to emend the form to the Hiphil נוֹנֵם (nonem, “we will oppress them”).

[74:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “they burn down all the meeting places of God in the land.”

[89:15]  ¹¹ tn Heb “who know the shout.” “Shout” here refers to the shouts of the Lord’s worshipers (see Pss 27:6; 33:3; 47:5).

[89:15]  ¹² tn Heb “in the light of your face they walk.” The idiom “light of your face” probably refers to a smile (see Eccl 8:1), which in turn suggests favor and blessing (see Num 6:25; Pss 4:6; 31:16; 44:3; 67:1; 80:3, 7, 19; Dan 9:17).