Psalms 74:3-10

74:3 Hurry and look ¹  at the permanent ruins,

and all the damage the enemy has done to the temple! ² 

74:4 Your enemies roar ³  in the middle of your sanctuary; ⁴ 

they set up their battle flags. ⁵ 

74:5 They invade like lumberjacks

swinging their axes in a thick forest. ⁶ 

74:6 And now ⁷  they are tearing down ⁸  all its engravings ⁹ 

with axes ¹⁰  and crowbars. ¹¹ 

74:7 They set your sanctuary on fire;

they desecrate your dwelling place by knocking it to the ground. ¹² 

74:8 They say to themselves, ¹³ 

“We will oppress all of them.” ¹⁴ 

They burn down all the places where people worship God in the land. ¹⁵ 

74:9 We do not see any signs of God’s presence; ¹⁶ 

there are no longer any prophets ¹⁷ 

and we have no one to tell us how long this will last. ¹⁸ 

74:10 How long, O God, will the adversary hurl insults?

Will the enemy blaspheme your name forever?

[74:3]  ¹ tn Heb “lift up your steps to,” which may mean “run, hurry.”

[74:3]  ² tn Heb “everything [the] enemy has damaged in the holy place.”

[74:4]  ³ tn This verb is often used of a lion’s roar, so the psalmist may be comparing the enemy to a raging, devouring lion.

[74:4]  ⁴ tn Heb “your meeting place.”

[74:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “they set up their banners [as] banners.” The Hebrew noun אוֹת (’ot, “sign”) here refers to the enemy army’s battle flags and banners (see Num 2:12).

[74:5]  ⁶ tn Heb “it is known like one bringing upwards, in a thicket of wood, axes.” The Babylonian invaders destroyed the woodwork in the temple.

[74:6]  ⁷ tn This is the reading of the Qere (marginal reading). The Kethib (consonantal text) has “and a time.”

[74:6]  ⁸ tn The imperfect verbal form vividly describes the act as underway.

[74:6]  ⁹ tn Heb “its engravings together.”

[74:6]  ¹⁰ tn This Hebrew noun occurs only here in the OT (see H. R. Cohen, Biblical Hapax Legomena [SBLDS], 49-50).

[74:6]  ¹¹ tn This Hebrew noun occurs only here in the OT. An Akkadian cognate refers to a “pickaxe” (cf. NEB “hatchet and pick”; NIV “axes and hatchets”; NRSV “hatchets and hammers”).

[74:7]  ¹² tn Heb “to the ground they desecrate the dwelling place of your name.”

[74:8]  ¹³ tn Heb “in their heart.”

[74:8]  ¹⁴ 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]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “they burn down all the meeting places of God in the land.”

[74:9]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “our signs we do not see.” Because of the reference to a prophet in the next line, it is likely that the “signs” in view here include the evidence of God’s presence as typically revealed through the prophets. These could include miraculous acts performed by the prophets (see, for example, Isa 38:7-8) or object lessons which they acted out (see, for example, Isa 20:3).

[74:9]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “there is not still a prophet.”

[74:9]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and [there is] not with us one who knows how long.”