Mazmur 31:11

31:11 Because of all my enemies, people disdain me; ¹ 

my neighbors are appalled by my suffering ²  –

those who know me are horrified by my condition; ³ 

those who see me in the street run away from me.

Mazmur 68:1

Psalm 68 ⁴ 

For the music director; by David, a psalm, a song.

68:1 God springs into action! ⁵ 

His enemies scatter;

his adversaries ⁶  run from him. ⁷ 

[31:11]  ¹ tn Heb “because of all my enemies I am a reproach.”

[31:11]  ² tc Heb “and to my neighbors, exceedingly.” If the MT is retained, then these words probably go with what precedes. However the syntactical awkwardness of the text suggests it is textually corrupt. P. C. Craigie (Psalms 1-50 [WBC], 258) suggests that the initial mem (מ) on מְאֹד (me’od, “exceedingly”) be understood as an enclitic mem (ם) which was originally suffixed to the preceding form and then later misinterpreted. The resulting form אֵד (’ed) can then be taken as a defectively written form of אֵיד (’ed, “calamity”). If one follows this emendation, then the text reads literally, “and to my neighbors [I am one who experiences] calamity.” The noun פַחַד (fakhad, “[object of] horror”) occurs in the next line; אֵיד and פַחַד appear in parallelism elsewhere (see Prov 1:26-27).

[31:11]  ³ tn Heb “and [an object of ] horror to those known by me.”

[68:1]  ⁴ sn Psalm 68. The psalmist depicts God as a mighty warrior and celebrates the fact that God exerts his power on behalf of his people.

[68:1]  ⁵ tn Or “rises up.” The verb form is an imperfect, not a jussive. The psalmist is describing God’s appearance in battle in a dramatic fashion.

[68:1]  ⁶ tn Heb “those who hate him.”

[68:1]  ⁷ sn The wording of v. 1 echoes the prayer in Num 10:35: “Spring into action, Lord! Then your enemies will be scattered and your adversaries will run from you.”