Mazmur 139:1-6

Psalm 139 ¹ 

For the music director, a psalm of David.

139:1 O Lord, you examine me ²  and know.

139:2 You know when I sit down and when I get up;

even from far away you understand my motives.

139:3 You carefully observe me when I travel or when I lie down to rest; ³ 

you are aware of everything I do. ⁴ 

139:4 Certainly ⁵  my tongue does not frame a word

without you, O Lord, being thoroughly aware of it. ⁶ 

139:5 You squeeze me in from behind and in front;

you place your hand on me.

139:6 Your knowledge is beyond my comprehension;

it is so far beyond me, I am unable to fathom it. ⁷ 

Mazmur 139:16

139:16 Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. ⁸ 

All the days ordained for me

were recorded in your scroll

before one of them came into existence. ⁹ 

[139:1]  ¹ sn Psalm 139. The psalmist acknowledges that God, who created him, is aware of his every action and thought. He invites God to examine his motives, for he is confident they are pure.

[139:1]  ² tn The statement is understood as generalizing – the psalmist describes what God typically does.

[139:3]  ³ tn Heb “my traveling and my lying down you measure.” The verb זָרָה (zarah, “to measure”) is probably here a denominative from זָרָת (zarat, “a span; a measure”), though some derive it from זָרָה (zarat, “to winnow; to sift”; see BDB 279-80 s.v. זָרָה).

[139:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “all my ways.”

[139:4]  ⁵ tn Or “for.”

[139:4]  ⁶ tn Heb “look, O Lord, you know all of it.”

[139:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “too amazing [is this] knowledge for me, it is elevated, I cannot attain to it.”

[139:16]  ⁸ 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]  ⁹ 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).