Psalms 56:8

56:8 You keep track of my misery. ¹ 

Put my tears in your leather container! ² 

Are they not recorded in your scroll? ³ 

Psalms 39:12

39:12 Hear my prayer, O Lord!

Listen to my cry for help!

Do not ignore my sobbing! ⁴ 

For I am dependent on you, like one residing outside his native land;

I am at your mercy, just as all my ancestors were. ⁵ 

Psalms 42:3

42:3 I cannot eat, I weep day and night; ⁶ 

all day long they say to me, ⁷  “Where is your God?”

[56:8]  ¹ tn Heb “my wandering you count, you.” The Hebrew term נֹד (nod, “wandering,” derived from the verbal root נוֹד, nod, “to wander”; cf. NASB) here refers to the psalmist’s “changeable circumstances of life” and may be translated “misery.” The verb סָפַר (safar, “count”) probably carries the nuance “assess” here. Cf. NIV “my lament”; NRSV “my tossings.”

[56:8]  ² tn Traditionally “your bottle.” Elsewhere the Hebrew word נֹאד (no’d, “leather container”) refers to a container made from animal skin which is used to hold wine or milk (see Josh 9:4, 13; Judg 4:19; 1 Sam 16:20). If such a container is metaphorically in view here, then the psalmist seems to be asking God to store up his tears as a reminder of his suffering.

[56:8]  ³ tn The word “recorded” is supplied in the translation for clarification. The rhetorical question assumes a positive response (see the first line of the verse).

[39:12]  ⁴ tn Heb “do not be deaf to my tears.”

[39:12]  ⁵ tn Heb “For a resident alien [am] I with you, a sojourner like all my fathers.”

[42:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “My tears have become my food day and night.”

[42:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “when [they] say to me all the day.” The suffixed third masculine plural pronoun may have been accidentally omitted from the infinitive בֶּאֱמֹר (be’ÿmor, “when [they] say”). Note the term בְּאָמְרָם (bÿ’omram, “when they say”) in v. 10.