Discovery BoxPsalms 82:7
Context82:7 Yet you will die like mortals; 1
you will fall like all the other rulers.” 2
Psalms 34:20
Context34:20 He protects 3 all his bones; 4
not one of them is broken. 5
Psalms 89:35
Context89:35 Once and for all I have vowed by my own holiness,
I will never deceive 6 David.
Psalms 106:11
Context106:11 The water covered their enemies;
not even one of them survived. 7
Psalms 14:3
Contextthey are all morally corrupt. 9
None of them does what is right, 10
not even one!
Psalms 53:3
Contextthey are all morally corrupt. 12
None of them does what is right, 13
not even one!
Psalms 62:11
Context62:11 God has declared one principle;
two principles I have heard: 14
God is strong, 15
Psalms 139:16
Context139:16 Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. 16
All the days ordained for me
were recorded in your scroll
before one of them came into existence. 17
Psalms 27:4
Context27:4 I have asked the Lord for one thing –
this is what I desire!
I want to live 18 in the Lord’s house 19 all the days of my life,
so I can gaze at the splendor 20 of the Lord
and contemplate in his temple.
[82:7] 1 tn Heb “men.” The point in the context is mortality, however, not maleness.
[82:7] 2 tn Heb “like one of the rulers.” The comparison does not necessarily imply that they are not rulers. The expression “like one of” can sometimes mean “as one of” (Gen 49:16; Obad 11) or “as any other of” (Judg 16:7, 11).
[34:20] 3 tn The Hebrew participial form suggests such protection is characteristic.
[34:20] 4 tn That is, he protects the godly from physical harm.
[34:20] 5 sn Not one of them is broken. The author of the Gospel of John saw a fulfillment of these words in Jesus’ experience on the cross (see John 19:31-37), for the Roman soldiers, when they saw that Jesus was already dead, did not break his legs as was customarily done to speed the death of crucified individuals. John’s use of the psalm seems strange, for the statement in its original context suggests that the Lord protects the godly from physical harm. Jesus’ legs may have remained unbroken, but he was brutally and unjustly executed by his enemies. John seems to give the statement a literal sense that is foreign to its original literary context by applying a promise of divine protection to a man who was seemingly not saved by God. However, John saw in this incident a foreshadowing of Jesus’ ultimate deliverance and vindication. His unbroken bones were a reminder of God’s commitment to the godly and a sign of things to come. Jesus’ death on the cross was not the end of the story; God vindicated him, as John goes on to explain in the following context (John 19:38-20:18).
[14:3] 9 tn Heb “everyone turns aside.”
[14:3] 10 tn Heb “together they are corrupt.”
[14:3] 11 tn Heb “there is none that does good.”
[53:3] 11 tn Heb “all of it turns away.” Ps 14:1 has הָכֹּל (hakkol) instead of כֻּלּוֹ, and סָר (sar, “turn aside”) instead of סָג (sag, “turn away”).
[53:3] 12 tn Heb “together they are corrupt.”
[53:3] 13 tn Heb “there is none that does good.”
[62:11] 13 tn Heb “one God spoke, two which I heard.” This is a numerical saying utilizing the “x” followed by “x + 1” pattern to facilitate poetic parallelism. (See W. M. W. Roth, Numerical Sayings in the Old Testament [VTSup], 55-56.) As is typical in such sayings, a list corresponding to the second number (in this case “two”) follows. Another option is to translate, “God has spoken once, twice [he has spoken] that which I have heard.” The terms אַחַת (’akhat, “one; once”) and שְׁתַּיִם (shÿtayim, “two; twice”) are also juxtaposed in 2 Kgs 6:10 (where they refer to an action that was done more than “once or twice”) and in Job 33:14 (where they refer to God speaking “one way” and then in “another manner”).
[62:11] 14 tn Heb “that strength [belongs] to God.”
[139:16] 15 tn Heb “Your eyes saw my shapeless form.” The Hebrew noun גֹּלֶם (golem) occurs only here in the OT. In later Hebrew the word refers to “a lump, a shapeless or lifeless substance,” and to “unfinished matter, a vessel wanting finishing” (Jastrow 222 s.v. גּוֹלֶם). The translation employs the dynamic rendering “when I was inside the womb” to clarify that the speaker was still in his mother’s womb at the time he was “seen” by God.
[139:16] 16 tn Heb “and on your scroll all of them were written, [the] days [which] were formed, and [there was] not one among them.” This “scroll” may be the “scroll of life” mentioned in Ps 69:28 (see the note on the word “living” there).
[27:4] 18 sn The
