Psalms 88:4-5

88:4 They treat me like ¹  those who descend into the grave. ² 

I am like a helpless man, ³ 

88:5 adrift ⁴  among the dead,

like corpses lying in the grave,

whom you remember no more,

and who are cut off from your power. ⁵ 

Isaiah 38:11-12

38:11 “I thought,

‘I will no longer see the Lord ⁶  in the land of the living,

I will no longer look on humankind with the inhabitants of the world. ⁷ 

38:12 My dwelling place ⁸  is removed and taken away ⁹  from me

like a shepherd’s tent.

I rolled up my life like a weaver rolls cloth; ¹⁰ 

from the loom he cuts me off. ¹¹ 

You turn day into night and end my life. ¹² 

[88:4]  ¹ tn Heb “I am considered with.”

[88:4]  ² tn Heb “the pit.” The noun בּוֹר (bor, “pit,” “cistern”) is sometimes used of the grave and/or the realm of the dead.

[88:4]  ³ tn Heb “I am like a man [for whom] there is no help.”

[88:5]  ⁴ tn Heb “set free.”

[88:5]  ⁵ tn Heb “from your hand.”

[38:11]  ⁶ tn The Hebrew text has יָהּ יָהּ (yah yah, the abbreviated form of יְהוָה [yÿhvah] repeated), but this is probably a corruption of יְהוָה.

[38:11]  ⁷ tc The Hebrew text has חָדֶל (khadel), which appears to be derived from a verbal root meaning “to cease, refrain.” But the form has probably suffered an error of transmission; the original form (attested in a few medieval Hebrew mss) was likely חֶלֶד (kheled, “world”).

[38:12]  ⁸ tn According to HALOT 217 s.v. דּוֹר this noun is a hapax legomenon meaning “dwelling place,” derived from a verbal root meaning “live” (see Ps 84:10). For an interpretation that understands the form as the well-attested noun meaning “generation,” see J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:679, n. 4.

[38:12]  ⁹ tn The verb form appears to be a Niphal from גָּלָה (galah), which normally means “uncovered, revealed” in the Niphal. Because of the following reference to a shepherd’s tent, some prefer to emend the form to וְנָגַל, a Niphal from גָלָל (galal, “roll”) and translate “is rolled [or “folded”] up.”

[38:12]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “I rolled up, like a weaver, my life” (so ASV).

[38:12]  ¹¹ sn For a discussion of the imagery employed here, see J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah (NICOT), 1:684.

[38:12]  ¹² tn Heb “from day to night you bring me to an end.”