Mazmur 37:34

37:34 Rely ¹  on the Lord! Obey his commands! ² 

Then he will permit you ³  to possess the land;

you will see the demise of evil men. ⁴ 

Mazmur 39:11

39:11 You severely discipline people for their sins; ⁵ 

like a moth you slowly devour their strength. ⁶ 

Surely all people are a mere vapor. (Selah)

Mazmur 52:5

52:5 Yet ⁷  God will make you a permanent heap of ruins. ⁸ 

He will scoop you up ⁹  and remove you from your home; ¹⁰ 

he will uproot you from the land of the living. (Selah)

Mazmur 58:9

58:9 Before the kindling is even placed under your pots, ¹¹ 

he ¹²  will sweep it away along with both the raw and cooked meat. ¹³ 

[37:34]  ¹ tn Or “wait.”

[37:34]  ² tn Heb “keep his way.” The Lord’s “way” refers here to the “conduct required” by the Lord. In Ps 25 the Lord’s “ways” are associated with his covenantal demands (see vv. 4, 9-10). See also Ps 119:3 (cf. vv. 1, 4), as well as Deut 8:6; 10:12; 11:22; 19:9; 26:17; 28:9; 30:16.

[37:34]  ³ tn Heb “and he will lift you up.” The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) is best taken here as a result clause following the imperatives in the preceding lines.

[37:34]  ⁴ tn Heb “when evil men are cut off you will see.”

[39:11]  ⁵ tn “with punishments on account of sin you discipline a man.”

[39:11]  ⁶ tc Heb “you cause to dissolve, like a moth, his desired [thing].” The translation assumes an emendation of חֲמוּדוֹ (khamudo, “his desirable [thing]”) to חֶמְדוֹ (khemdo, “his loveliness” [or “beauty”]), a reading that is supported by a few medieval Hebrew mss.

[52:5]  ⁷ tn The adverb גַּם (gam, “also; even”) is translated here in an adversative sense (“yet”). It highlights the contrastive correspondence between the evildoer’s behavior and God’s response.

[52:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “will tear you down forever.”

[52:5]  ⁹ tn This rare verb (חָתָה, khatah) occurs only here and in Prov 6:27; 25:22; Isa 30:14.

[52:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “from [your] tent.”

[58:9]  ¹¹ tn Heb “before your pots perceive thorns.”

[58:9]  ¹² tn Apparently God (v. 6) is the subject of the verb here.

[58:9]  ¹³ tn Heb “like living, like burning anger he will sweep it away.” The meaning of the text is unclear. The translation assumes that within the cooking metaphor (see the previous line) חַי (khay, “living”) refers here to raw meat (as in 1 Sam 2:15, where it modifies בָּשָׂר, basar, “flesh”) and that חָרוּן (kharun; which always refers to God’s “burning anger” elsewhere) here refers to food that is cooked. The pronominal suffix on the verb “sweep away” apparently refers back to the “thorns” of the preceding line. The image depicts swift and sudden judgment. Before the fire has been adequately kindled and all the meat cooked, the winds of judgment will sweep away everything in their path.