Psalms 65:9-13

65:9 You visit the earth and give it rain; ¹ 

you make it rich and fertile ² 

with overflowing streams full of water. ³ 

You provide grain for them, ⁴ 

for you prepare the earth to yield its crops. ⁵ 

65:10 You saturate ⁶  its furrows,

and soak ⁷  its plowed ground. ⁸ 

With rain showers you soften its soil, ⁹ 

and make its crops grow. ¹⁰ 

65:11 You crown the year with your good blessings, ¹¹ 

and you leave abundance in your wake. ¹² 

65:12 The pastures in the wilderness glisten with moisture, ¹³ 

and the hills are clothed with joy. ¹⁴ 

65:13 The meadows are clothed with sheep,

and the valleys are covered with grain.

They shout joyfully, yes, they sing.

Psalms 77:16-17

77:16 The waters ¹⁵  saw you, O God,

the waters saw you and trembled. ¹⁶ 

Yes, the depths of the sea ¹⁷  shook with fear. ¹⁸ 

77:17 The clouds poured down rain; ¹⁹ 

the skies thundered. ²⁰ 

Yes, your arrows ²¹  flashed about.

Psalms 78:24-27

78:24 He rained down manna for them to eat;

he gave them the grain of heaven. ²² 

78:25 Man ate the food of the mighty ones. ²³ 

He sent them more than enough to eat. ²⁴ 

78:26 He brought the east wind through the sky,

and by his strength led forth the south wind.

78:27 He rained down meat on them like dust,

birds as numerous as the sand on the seashores. ²⁵ 

Deuteronomy 11:10-12

11:10 For the land where you are headed ²⁶  is not like the land of Egypt from which you came, a land where you planted seed and which you irrigated by hand ²⁷  like a vegetable garden. 11:11 Instead, the land you are crossing the Jordan to occupy ²⁸  is one of hills and valleys, a land that drinks in water from the rains, ²⁹  11:12 a land the Lord your God looks after. ³⁰  He is constantly attentive to it ³¹  from the beginning to the end of the year. ³² 

Deuteronomy 11:14

11:14 then he promises, ³³  “I will send rain for your land ³⁴  in its season, the autumn and the spring rains, ³⁵  so that you may gather in your grain, new wine, and olive oil.

Ezekiel 34:26

34:26 I will turn them and the regions around my hill into a blessing. I will make showers come down in their season; they will be showers that bring blessing. ³⁶ 

[65:9]  ¹ tn The verb form is a Polel from שׁוּק (shuq, “be abundant”), a verb which appears only here and in Joel 2:24 and 3:13, where it is used in the Hiphil stem and means “overflow.”

[65:9]  ² tn Heb “you greatly enrich it.”

[65:9]  ³ tn Heb “[with] a channel of God full of water.” The divine name is probably used here in a superlative sense to depict a very deep stream (“a stream fit for God,” as it were).

[65:9]  ⁴ tn The pronoun apparently refers to the people of the earth, mentioned in v. 8.

[65:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “for thus [referring to the provision of rain described in the first half of the verse] you prepare it.” The third feminine singular pronominal suffix attached to the verb “prepare” refers back to the “earth,” which is a feminine noun with regard to grammatical form.

[65:10]  ⁶ tn Heb “saturating” [the form is an infinitive absolute].

[65:10]  ⁷ tn Heb “flatten, cause to sink.”

[65:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “trenches,” or “furrows.”

[65:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “soften it,” that is, the earth.

[65:10]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “its vegetation you bless.” Divine “blessing” often involves endowing an object with special power or capacity.

[65:11]  ¹¹ tn Heb “your good,” which refers here to agricultural blessings.

[65:11]  ¹² tn Heb “and your paths drip with abundance.”

[65:12]  ¹³ tn Heb “drip.”

[65:12]  ¹⁴ tn That is, with rich vegetation that brings joy to those who see it.

[77:16]  ¹⁵ tn The waters of the Red Sea are here personified; they are portrayed as seeing God and fearing him.

[77:16]  ¹⁶ tn The prefixed verbal form may be taken as a preterite or as an imperfect with past progressive force.

[77:16]  ¹⁷ tn The words “of the sea” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[77:16]  ¹⁸ tn The prefixed verbal form may be taken as a preterite or as an imperfect with past progressive force.

[77:17]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “water.”

[77:17]  ²⁰ tn Heb “a sound the clouds gave.”

[77:17]  ²¹ tn The lightning accompanying the storm is portrayed as the Lord’s “arrows” (see v. 18).

[78:24]  ²² sn Manna was apparently shaped like a seed (Exod 16:31), perhaps explaining why it is here compared to grain.

[78:25]  ²³ sn Because of the reference to “heaven” in the preceding verse, it is likely that mighty ones refers here to the angels of heaven. The LXX translates “angels” here, as do a number of modern translations (NEB, NIV, NRSV).

[78:25]  ²⁴ tn Heb “provision he sent to them to satisfaction.”

[78:27]  ²⁵ tn Heb “and like the sand of the seas winged birds.”

[11:10]  ²⁶ tn Heb “you are going there to possess it”; NASB “into which you are about to cross to possess it”; NRSV “that you are crossing over to occupy.”

[11:10]  ²⁷ tn Heb “with your foot” (so NASB, NLT). There is a two-fold significance to this phrase. First, Egypt had no rain so water supply depended on human efforts at irrigation. Second, the Nile was the source of irrigation waters but those waters sometimes had to be pumped into fields and gardens by foot-power, perhaps the kind of machinery (Arabic shaduf) still used by Egyptian farmers (see C. Aldred, The Egyptians, 181). Nevertheless, the translation uses “by hand,” since that expression is the more common English idiom for an activity performed by manual labor.

[11:11]  ²⁸ tn Heb “which you are crossing over there to possess it.”

[11:11]  ²⁹ tn Heb “rain of heaven.”

[11:12]  ³⁰ tn Heb “seeks.” The statement reflects the ancient belief that God (Baal in Canaanite thinking) directly controlled storms and rainfall.

[11:12]  ³¹ tn Heb “the eyes of the Lord your God are continually on it” (so NIV); NASB, NRSV “always on it.”

[11:12]  ³² sn From the beginning to the end of the year. This refers to the agricultural year that was marked by the onset of the heavy rains, thus the autumn. See note on the phrase “the former and the latter rains” in v. 14.

[11:14]  ³³ tn The words “he promises” do not appear in the Hebrew text but are needed in the translation to facilitate the transition from the condition (v. 13) to the promise and make it clear that the Lord is speaking the words of vv. 14-15.

[11:14]  ³⁴ tn Heb “the rain of your land.” In this case the genitive (modifying term) indicates the recipient of the rain.

[11:14]  ³⁵ sn The autumn and the spring rains. The “former” (יוֹרֶה, yoreh) and “latter” (מַלְקוֹשׁ, malqosh) rains come in abundance respectively in September/October and March/April. Planting of most crops takes place before the former rains fall and the harvests follow the latter rains.

[34:26]  ³⁶ tn Heb “showers of blessing.” Abundant rain, which in turn produces fruit and crops (v. 27), is a covenantal blessing for obedience (Lev 26:4).