Psalms 74:16-17

74:16 You established the cycle of day and night; ¹ 

you put the moon ²  and sun in place. ³ 

74:17 You set up all the boundaries ⁴  of the earth;

you created the cycle of summer and winter. ⁵ 

Isaiah 24:14-16

24:14 They ⁶  lift their voices and shout joyfully;

they praise ⁷  the majesty of the Lord in the west.

24:15 So in the east ⁸  extol the Lord,

along the seacoasts extol ⁹  the fame ¹⁰  of the Lord God of Israel.

24:16 From the ends of the earth we ¹¹  hear songs –

the Just One is majestic. ¹² 

But I ¹³  say, “I’m wasting away! I’m wasting away! I’m doomed!

Deceivers deceive, deceivers thoroughly deceive!” ¹⁴ 

[74:16]  ¹ tn Heb “To you [is] day, also to you [is] night.”

[74:16]  ² tn Heb “[the] light.” Following the reference to “day and night” and in combination with “sun,” it is likely that the Hebrew term מָאוֹר (ma’or, “light”) refers here to the moon.

[74:16]  ³ tn Heb “you established [the] light and [the] sun.”

[74:17]  ⁴ tn This would appear to refer to geographical boundaries, such as mountains, rivers, and seacoasts. However, since the day-night cycle has just been mentioned (v. 16) and the next line speaks of the seasons, it is possible that “boundaries” here refers to the divisions of the seasons. See C. A. Briggs and E. G. Briggs, Psalms (ICC), 2:156.

[74:17]  ⁵ tn Heb “summer and winter, you, you formed them.”

[24:14]  ⁶ sn The remnant of the nations (see v. 13) may be the unspecified subject. If so, then those who have survived the judgment begin to praise God.

[24:14]  ⁷ tn Heb “they yell out concerning.”

[24:15]  ⁸ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “in the lights,” interpreted by some to mean “in the region of light,” referring to the east. Some scholars have suggested the emendation of בָּאֻרִים (ba’urim) to בְּאִיֵּי הַיָּם (bÿ’iyyey hayyam, “along the seacoasts”), a phrase that is repeated in the next line. In this case, the two lines form synonymous parallelism. If one retains the MT reading (as above), “in the east” and “along the seacoasts” depict the two ends of the earth to refer to all the earth (as a merism).

[24:15]  ⁹ tn The word “extol” is supplied in the translation; the verb in the first line does double duty in the parallelism.

[24:15]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “name,” which here stands for God’s reputation achieved by his mighty deeds.

[24:16]  ¹¹ sn The identity of the subject is unclear. Apparently in vv. 15-16a an unidentified group responds to the praise they hear in the west by exhorting others to participate.

[24:16]  ¹² tn Heb “Beauty belongs to the just one.” These words may summarize the main theme of the songs mentioned in the preceding line.

[24:16]  ¹³ sn The prophet seems to contradict what he hears the group saying. Their words are premature because more destruction is coming.

[24:16]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “and [with] deception deceivers deceive.”