Mazmur 34:21-22

34:21 Evil people self-destruct; ¹ 

those who hate the godly are punished. ² 

34:22 The Lord rescues his servants; ³ 

all who take shelter in him escape punishment. ⁴ 

Mazmur 38:3

38:3 My whole body is sick because of your judgment; ⁵ 

I am deprived of health because of my sin. ⁶ 

Mazmur 39:9

39:9 I am silent and cannot open my mouth

because of what you have done. ⁷ 

Mazmur 55:3

55:3 because of what the enemy says, ⁸ 

and because of how the wicked ⁹  pressure me, ¹⁰ 

for they hurl trouble ¹¹  down upon me ¹² 

and angrily attack me.

Mazmur 90:15

90:15 Make us happy in proportion to the days you have afflicted us,

in proportion to the years we have experienced ¹³  trouble!

[34:21]  ¹ tn Heb “evil kills the wicked [one].” The singular form is representative; the typical evil person is envisioned. The Hebrew imperfect verbal form draws attention to the typical nature of the action.

[34:21]  ² tn Heb “are guilty,” but the verb is sometimes used metonymically with the meaning “to suffer the consequences of guilt,” the effect being substituted for the cause.

[34:22]  ³ tn Heb “redeems the life of his servants.” The Hebrew participial form suggests such deliverance is characteristic.

[34:22]  ⁴ tn “Taking shelter” in the Lord is an idiom for seeking his protection. Seeking his protection presupposes and even demonstrates the subject’s loyalty to the Lord. In the psalms those who “take shelter” in the Lord are contrasted with the wicked and equated with those who love, fear, and serve the Lord (Pss 2:12; 5:11-12; 31:19).

[38:3]  ⁵ tn Heb “there is no soundness in my flesh from before your anger.” “Anger” here refers metonymically to divine judgment, which is the practical effect of God’s anger at the psalmist’s sin.

[38:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “there is no health in my bones from before my sin.”

[39:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “because you acted.” The psalmist has in mind God’s disciplinary measures (see vv. 10-13).

[55:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “because of [the] voice of [the] enemy.”

[55:3]  ⁹ tn The singular forms “enemy” and “wicked” are collective or representative, as the plural verb forms in the second half of the verse indicate.

[55:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “from before the pressure of the wicked.” Some suggest the meaning “screech” (note the parallel “voice”; cf. NEB “shrill clamour”; NRSV “clamor”) for the rare noun עָקָה (’aqah, “pressure”).

[55:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “wickedness,” but here the term refers to the destructive effects of their wicked acts.

[55:3]  ¹² tc The verb form in the MT appears to be a Hiphil imperfect from the root מוֹט (mot, “to sway”), but the Hiphil occurs only here and in the Kethib (consonantal text) of Ps 140:10, where the form יַמְטֵר (yamter, “let him rain down”) should probably be read. Here in Ps 55:3 it is preferable to read יַמְטִירוּ (yamtiru, “they rain down”). It is odd for “rain down” to be used with an abstract object like “wickedness,” but in Job 20:23 God “rains down” anger (unless one emends the text there; see BHS).

[90:15]  ¹³ tn Heb “have seen.”