Psalms 9:6

9:6 The enemy’s cities have been reduced to permanent ruins; ¹ 

you destroyed their cities; ² 

all memory of the enemies has perished. ³ 

Psalms 9:20

9:20 Terrify them, Lord! ⁴ 

Let the nations know they are mere mortals! ⁵  (Selah)

Psalms 27:2

27:2 When evil men attack me ⁶ 

to devour my flesh, ⁷ 

when my adversaries and enemies attack me, ⁸ 

they stumble and fall. ⁹ 

Psalms 43:3

43:3 Reveal ¹⁰  your light ¹¹  and your faithfulness!

They will lead me, ¹² 

they will escort ¹³  me back to your holy hill, ¹⁴ 

and to the place where you live. ¹⁵ 

Psalms 56:6

56:6 They stalk ¹⁶  and lurk; ¹⁷ 

they watch my every step, ¹⁸ 

as ¹⁹  they prepare to take my life. ²⁰ 

Psalms 59:15

59:15 They wander around looking for something to eat;

they refuse to sleep until they are full. ²¹ 

Psalms 102:26

102:26 They will perish,

but you will endure. ²² 

They will wear out like a garment;

like clothes you will remove them and they will disappear. ²³ 

[9:6]  ¹ tn Heb “the enemy – they have come to an end [in] ruins permanently.” The singular form אוֹיֵב (’oyev, “enemy”) is collective. It is placed at the beginning of the verse to heighten the contrast with יְהוָה (yÿhvah, “the Lord”) in v. 7.

[9:6]  ² tn Heb “you uprooted cities.”

[9:6]  ³ tn Heb “it has perished, their remembrance, they.” The independent pronoun at the end of the line is in apposition to the preceding pronominal suffix and lends emphasis (see IBHS 299 §16.3.4). The referent of the masculine pronoun is the nations/enemies (cf. v. 5), not the cities (the Hebrew noun עָרִים [’arim, “cities”] is grammatically feminine). This has been specified in the present translation for clarity; many modern translations retain the pronoun “them,” resulting in ambiguity (cf. NRSV “their cities you have rooted out; the very memory of them has perished”).

[9:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “place, Lord, terror with regard to them.” The Hebrew term מוֹרָה (morah, “terror”) is an alternative form of מוֹרָא (mora’; a reading that appears in some mss and finds support in several ancient textual witnesses).

[9:20]  ⁵ tn Heb “let the nations know they [are] man[kind]”; i.e., mere human beings (as opposed to God).

[27:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “draw near to me.”

[27:2]  ⁸ sn To devour my flesh. The psalmist compares his enemies to dangerous, hungry predators (see 2 Kgs 9:36; Ezek 39:17).

[27:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “my adversaries and my enemies against me.” The verb “draw near” (that is, “attack”) is understood by ellipsis; see the previous line.

[27:2]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew verbal forms are perfects. The translation assumes the psalmist is generalizing here, but another option is to take this as a report of past experience, “when evil men attacked me…they stumbled and fell.”

[43:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “send.”

[43:3]  ¹¹ sn God’s deliverance is compared here to a light which will lead the psalmist back home to the Lord’s temple. Divine deliverance will in turn demonstrate the Lord’s faithfulness to his people.

[43:3]  ¹² tn Or “may they lead me.” The prefixed verbal forms here and in the next line may be taken as jussives.

[43:3]  ¹³ tn Heb “bring.”

[43:3]  ¹⁴ sn In this context the Lord’s holy hill is Zion/Jerusalem. See Isa 66:20; Joel 2:1; 3:17; Zech 8:3; Pss 2:6; 15:1; 48:1; 87:1; Dan 9:16.

[43:3]  ¹⁵ tn Or “to your dwelling place[s].” The plural form of the noun may indicate degree or quality; this is the Lord’s special dwelling place (see Pss 46:4; 84:1; 132:5, 7).

[56:6]  ¹³ tn The verb is from the root גּוּר (gur), which means “to challenge, attack” in Isa 54:15 and “to stalk” (with hostile intent) in Ps 59:3.

[56:6]  ¹⁴ tn Or “hide.”

[56:6]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “my heels.”

[56:6]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “according to,” in the sense of “inasmuch as; since,” or “when; while.”

[56:6]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “they wait [for] my life.”

[59:15]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “if they are not full, they stay through the night.”

[102:26]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “stand.”

[102:26]  ²⁰ tn The Hebrew verb חָלַף (khalaf) occurs twice in this line, once in the Hiphil (“you will remove them”) and once in the Qal (“they will disappear”). The repetition draws attention to the statement.