Psalms 89:37

89:37 it will remain stable, like the moon, ¹ 

his throne will endure like the skies.” ²  (Selah)

Psalms 93:1

Psalm 93 ³ 

93:1 The Lord reigns!

He is robed in majesty,

the Lord is robed,

he wears strength around his waist. ⁴ 

Indeed, the world is established, it cannot be moved.

Psalms 119:90-91

119:90 You demonstrate your faithfulness to all generations. ⁵ 

You established the earth and it stood firm.

119:91 Today they stand firm by your decrees,

for all things are your servants.

Job 38:10-11

38:10 when I prescribed ⁶  its limits,

and set ⁷  in place its bolts and doors,

38:11 when I said, ‘To here you may come ⁸ 

and no farther, ⁹ 

here your proud waves will be confined’? ¹⁰ 

Job 38:33

38:33 Do you know the laws of the heavens,

or can you set up their rule over the earth?

Proverbs 8:27-29

8:27 When he established the heavens, I was there;

when he marked out the horizon ¹¹  over the face of the deep,

8:28 when he established the clouds above,

when the fountains of the deep grew strong, ¹² 

8:29 when he gave the sea his decree

that the waters should not pass over his command, ¹³ 

when he marked out the foundations of the earth,

Isaiah 54:9

54:9 “As far as I am concerned, this is like in Noah’s time, ¹⁴ 

when I vowed that the waters of Noah’s flood ¹⁵  would never again cover the earth.

In the same way I have vowed that I will not be angry at you or shout at you.

Jeremiah 31:35-36

The Lord Guarantees Israel’s Continuance

31:35 The Lord has made a promise to Israel.

He promises it as the one who fixed the sun to give light by day

and the moon and stars to give light by night.

He promises it as the one who stirs up the sea so that its waves roll.

He promises it as the one who is known as the Lord who rules over all. ¹⁶ 

31:36 The Lord affirms, ¹⁷  “The descendants of Israel will not

cease forever to be a nation in my sight.

That could only happen if the fixed ordering of the heavenly lights

were to cease to operate before me.” ¹⁸ 

Jeremiah 33:25

33:25 But I, the Lord, make the following promise: ¹⁹  I have made a covenant governing the coming of day and night. I have established the fixed laws governing heaven and earth.

[89:37]  ¹ tn Heb “like the moon it will be established forever.”

[89:37]  ² tn Heb “and a witness in the sky, secure.” Scholars have offered a variety of opinions as to the identity of the “witness” referred to here, none of which is very convincing. It is preferable to join וְעֵד (vÿ’ed) to עוֹלָם (’olam) in the preceding line and translate the commonly attested phrase עוֹלָם וְעֵד (“forever”). In this case one may translate the second line, “[it] will be secure like the skies.” Another option (the one reflected in the present translation) is to take עד as a rare noun meaning “throne” or “dais.” This noun is attested in Ugaritic; see, for example, CTA 16 vi 22-23, where ksi (= כִּסֵּא, kisse’, “throne”) and ’d (= עד, “dais”) appear as synonyms in the poetic parallelism (see G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 91). Emending בַּשַּׁחַק (bashakhaq, “in the heavens”) to כַּשַׁחַק (kashakhaq, “like the heavens”) – bet/kaf (כ/ב) confusion is widely attested – one can then read “[his] throne like the heavens [is] firm/stable.” Verse 29 refers to the enduring nature of the heavens, while Job 37:18 speaks of God spreading out the heavens (שְׁחָקִים, shÿkhaqim) and compares their strength to a bronze mirror. Ps 89:29 uses the term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim, “skies”) which frequently appears in parallelism to שְׁחָקִים.

[93:1]  ³ sn Psalm 93. The psalmist affirms that the Lord is the king of the universe who preserves order and suppresses the destructive forces in the world.

[93:1]  ⁴ sn Strength is compared here to a belt that one wears for support. The Lord’s power undergirds his rule.

[119:90]  ⁵ tn Heb “to a generation and a generation [is] your faithfulness.”

[38:10]  ⁶ tc The MT has “and I broke,” which cannot mean “set, prescribed” or the like. The LXX and the Vulgate have such a meaning, suggesting a verb עֲשִׁית (’ashiyt, “plan, prescribe”). A. Guillaume finds an Arabic word with a meaning “measured it by span by my decree.” Would God give himself a decree? R. Gordis simply argues that the basic meaning “break” develops the connotation of “decide, determine” (2 Sam 5:24; Job 14:3; Dan 11:36).

[38:10]  ⁷ tn Dhorme suggested reversing the two verbs, making this the first, and then “shatter” for the second colon.

[38:11]  ⁸ tn The imperfect verb receives the permission nuance here.

[38:11]  ⁹ tn The text has תֹסִיף (tosif, “and you may not add”), which is often used idiomatically (as in verbal hendiadys constructions).

[38:11]  ¹⁰ tn The MT literally says, “here he will put on the pride of your waves.” The verb has no expressed subject and so is made a passive voice. But there has to be some object for the verb “put,” such as “limit” or “boundary”; the translations “confined; halted; stopped” all serve to paraphrase such an idea. The LXX has “broken” at this point, suggesting the verse might have been confused – but “breaking the pride” of the waves would mean controlling them. Some commentators have followed this, exchanging the verb in v. 11 with this one.

[8:27]  ¹¹ sn The infinitive construct בְּחוּקוֹ (bÿkhuqo, “to cut; to engrave; to mark”) and the noun חוּג (khug, “horizon; circle”) form a paronomasia in the line.

[8:28]  ¹² tn To form a better parallel some commentators read this infinitive בַּעֲזוֹז (ba’azoz), “when [they] grew strong,” as a Piel causative, “when he made firm, fixed fast” (cf. NIV “fixed securely”; NLT “established”). But the following verse (“should not pass over”) implies the meaning “grew strong” here.

[8:29]  ¹³ tn Heb “his mouth.”

[54:9]  ¹⁴ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “For [or “indeed”] the waters of Noah [is] this to me.” כִּי־מֵי (ki-me, “for the waters of”) should be emended to כְּמֵי (kÿmey, “like the days of”), which is supported by the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a and all the ancient versions except LXX.

[54:9]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “the waters of Noah” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).

[31:35]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.” See the study note on 2:19 for this title. In the Hebrew text the verse reads: “Thus says the Lord who provides the sun for light by day, the fixed ordering of the moon and stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea and its waves roar, whose name is Yahweh of armies, ‘…’” The hymnic introduction to the quote which does not begin until v. 36 has been broken down to avoid a long awkward sentence in English. The word “said” has been translated “made a promise” to reflect the nature of the content in vv. 36-37. The first two lines of the Hebrew poetry are a case of complex or supplementary ellipsis where the complete idea of “providing/establishing the fixed laws” is divided between the two lines (cf. E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 110-13). The necessity for recombining the ellipsis is obvious from reference to the fixed ordering in the next verse. (Some commentators prefer to delete the word as an erroneous glossing of the word in the following line (see, e.g., J. Bright, Jeremiah [AB], 277, n. y).

[31:36]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[31:36]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “‘If these fixed orderings were to fail to be present before me,’ oracle of the Lord, ‘then the seed of Israel could cease from being a nation before me forever (or more literally, “all the days”).’” The sentence has been broken up to conform more to modern style. The connection has been maintained by reversing the order of condition and consequence and still retaining the condition in the second clause. For the meaning of “cease to operate” for the verb מוּשׁ (mush) compare the usage in Isa 54:10; Ps 55:11 (55:12 HT); Prov 17:13 where what is usually applied to persons or things is applied to abstract things like this (see HALOT 506 s.v. II מוּשׁ Qal for general usage).

[33:25]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Thus says the Lord.” See the translator’s note at the beginning of v. 20 for the style adopted here. Here the promise is in v. 26 following the contrary to fact condition in v. 25. The Hebrew text of vv. 25-26 reads: “Thus says the Lord, “If I have not established my covenant with day and night [and] the laws/statutes of heaven and earth, also I could reject the seed of Jacob and David my servant from taking from his seed as rulers over the seed of Abraham…” The syntax of the original is a little awkward because it involves the verbs “establish” and “reject” governing two objects, the first governing two similar objects “my covenant” and “the regulations” and the second governing two dissimilar objects “the seed of Jacob” and “my servant David from taking [so as not to take].” The translation has sought to remove these awkward syntactical constructions and also break down the long complex original sentence in such a way as to retain its original intent, i.e., the guarantee of the continuance of the seed of Jacob and of the rule of a line of David’s descendants over them based on the fixed order of God’s creation decrees.