Psalms 73:5-9

73:5 They are immune to the trouble common to men;

they do not suffer as other men do. ¹ 

73:6 Arrogance is their necklace, ² 

and violence their clothing. ³ 

73:7 Their prosperity causes them to do wrong; ⁴ 

their thoughts are sinful. ⁵ 

73:8 They mock ⁶  and say evil things; ⁷ 

they proudly threaten violence. ⁸ 

73:9 They speak as if they rule in heaven,

and lay claim to the earth. ⁹ 

Psalms 73:17-20

73:17 Then I entered the precincts of God’s temple, ¹⁰ 

and understood the destiny of the wicked. ¹¹ 

73:18 Surely ¹²  you put them in slippery places;

you bring them down ¹³  to ruin.

73:19 How desolate they become in a mere moment!

Terrifying judgments make their demise complete! ¹⁴ 

73:20 They are like a dream after one wakes up. ¹⁵ 

O Lord, when you awake ¹⁶  you will despise them. ¹⁷ 

[73:5]  ¹ tn Heb “in the trouble of man they are not, and with mankind they are not afflicted.”

[73:6]  ² sn Arrogance is their necklace. The metaphor suggests that their arrogance is something the wicked “wear” proudly. It draws attention to them, just as a beautiful necklace does to its owner.

[73:6]  ³ tn Heb “a garment of violence covers them.” The metaphor suggests that violence is habitual for the wicked. They “wear” it like clothing; when one looks at them, violence is what one sees.

[73:7]  ⁴ tc The MT reads “it goes out from fatness their eye,” which might be paraphrased, “their eye protrudes [or “bulges”] because of fatness.” This in turn might refer to their greed; their eyes “bug out” when they see rich food or produce (the noun חֵלֶב [khelev, “fatness”] sometimes refers to such food or produce). However, when used with the verb יָצָא (yatsa’, “go out”) the preposition מִן (“from”) more naturally indicates source. For this reason it is preferable to emend עֵינֵמוֹ (’enemo, “their eye”) to עֲוֹנָמוֹ, (’avonamo, “their sin”) and read, “and their sin proceeds forth from fatness,” that is, their prosperity gives rise to their sinful attitudes. If one follows this textual reading, another interpretive option is to take חֵלֶב (“fatness”) in the sense of “unreceptive, insensitive” (see its use in Ps 17:10). In this case, the sin of the wicked proceeds forth from their spiritual insensitivity.

[73:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “the thoughts of [their] heart [i.e., mind] cross over” (i.e., violate God’s moral boundary, see Ps 17:3).

[73:8]  ⁶ tn The verb מוּק (muq, “mock”) occurs only here in the OT.

[73:8]  ⁷ tn Heb “and speak with evil.”

[73:8]  ⁸ tn Heb “oppression from an elevated place they speak.” The traditional accentuation of the MT places “oppression” with the preceding line. In this case, one might translate, “they mock and speak with evil [of] oppression, from an elevated place [i.e., “proudly”] they speak.” By placing “oppression” with what follows, one achieves better poetic balance in the parallelism.

[73:9]  ⁹ tn Heb “they set in heaven their mouth, and their tongue walks through the earth.” The meaning of the text is uncertain. Perhaps the idea is that they lay claim to heaven (i.e., speak as if they were ruling in heaven) and move through the earth declaring their superiority and exerting their influence. Some take the preposition -בְּ (bet) the first line as adversative and translate, “they set their mouth against heaven,” that is, they defy God.

[73:17]  ¹⁰ tn The plural of the term מִקְדָּשׁ (miqdash) probably refers to the temple precincts (see Ps 68:35; Jer 51:51).

[73:17]  ¹¹ tn Heb “I discerned their end.” At the temple the psalmist perhaps received an oracle of deliverance announcing his vindication and the demise of the wicked (see Ps 12) or heard songs of confidence (for example, Ps 11), wisdom psalms (for example, Pss 1, 37), and hymns (for example, Ps 112) that describe the eventual downfall of the proud and wealthy.

[73:18]  ¹² tn The use of the Hebrew term אַךְ (’akh, “surely”) here literarily counteracts its use in v. 13. The repetition draws attention to the contrast between the two statements, the first of which expresses the psalmist’s earlier despair and the second his newly discovered confidence.

[73:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “cause them to fall.”

[73:19]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “they come to an end, they are finished, from terrors.”

[73:20]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “like a dream from awakening.” They lack any real substance; their prosperity will last for only a brief time.

[73:20]  ¹⁶ sn When you awake. The psalmist compares God’s inactivity to sleep and the time of God’s judgment to his awakening from sleep.

[73:20]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “you will despise their form.” The Hebrew term צֶלֶם (tselem, “form; image”) also suggests their short-lived nature. Rather than having real substance, they are like the mere images that populate one’s dreams. Note the similar use of the term in Ps 39:6.