Psalms:
Bk 1: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41
Bk 2: 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72
Bk 3: 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89
Bk 4: 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106
Bk 5: 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119a 119b 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132
133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
Additional Psalms: 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 Samuel Chronicles
Essays: Intro - Music - Form & Language
Psalm 53
Marked "for the leader of the choir and orchestra", this is probably just an office note, the way we might make multiple photocopies and mark each one for those intended to have access: file copy, for the Board, for the press office, for the finance department, and in this case, "for the leader of the choir and orchestra". My sense is that this is the intent behind each of the Psalms dedicated in similar manner.
As usual, KJ has merged verse 1 into the title, adjusting its verse-numbering accordingly.
53:1 LA MENATSE'ACH AL MACHALAT MASKIL LE DAVID
לַמְנַצֵּחַ עַל מָחֲלַת מַשְׂכִּיל לְדָוִד
KJ: (To the chief Musician upon Mahalath, Maschil, A Psalm of David.) The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. Corrupt are they, and have done abominable iniquity: there is none that doeth good.
BN (option a): Copy to the Artistic Director, during his sick leave. A Teaching-Psalm. For David.
BN (option b): To the Artistic Director. To the tune of Machalat. A Teaching-Psalm. For David.
BN (option c): To the Artistic Director. On the sickness of David. A Teaching-Psalm.
BN (option d): To the Artistic Director. To be accompanied by dancing. A Teaching-Psalm. For David.
BN (option d): To the Artistic Director. To be accompanied by dancing. A Teaching-Psalm. For David.
MACHALAT: Why is Machalat left untranslated by so many of the translators, Jewish, Christian and secular? Do they not have access to a dictionary? Most end up deciding that it must have been a well-known song, and this one simply used it as a "ready-made", borrowed and given a new lyric. Which is entirely possible, but that original would also have been called MACHALAT for a reason, and so we still need to undertake the source-hunting.
To start, go to the link under her name, above; and yes, "her name" - you will see why when you get there. Much of what follows here is also explained there.
There is also an option e), but I have not included it, because I think it unlikely: that MACHALAT is like AYELET HA SHACHAR in Psalm 22, a calendric moment being celebrated/acknowledged. It is possible, because the year too - the day, the hour, the month as well - likewise "turn round and round". But if there were such an occasion, we would surely have encountered it elsewhere, and still today.
A MACHALAH is a sickness, and we have witnessed Psalms a-plenty that deal with spiritual as well as physical and psychological maladies, so it could very well be that; the order of the verse, however, makes it unclear whether it is the Artistic Director who is sick, or the subject-matter is sickness itself, parabled through the myths of David.
But, and we have also witnessed this in several previous Psalms, the root CHUL gives "sickness", because it means "to twist" or "to turn around", which could be a person's gut, either literally or metaphorically, or just as feasibly the choreography of the Chubby Checker of the day: cf Judges 21:21, which we need to do, because that is the reason for option d), and given further weight by Psalm 88:1,
MASKIL: this has been explained many times previously, but see verse 3.
53:2 AMAR NAVAL BE LIBO EYN ELOHIM HISHCHIYTU VE HIT'IYVU AVEL EYN OSEH TOV
KJ: as above.
BN (option a): The fool has said in his heart: "There are no gods; {N} they have lied to us, and done us terrible damage; not one of them is any good."
NAVAL: The word does indeed mean "fool", but Naval is also a significant figure in David's story (1 Samuel 25); the first husband of Avi-Gayil. Once again, history or mythology? (We seem to be working our way through all of David's biography, key episode by key episode - is there an argument for re-organising the Psalms chronologically, based on this? Would it even be possible to do so, given the number of Psalms that are not obviously biographical? Or is there already a calendric chronology, which requires us to take the stories as they come in the diary, and not as they happened in the mythological history? It might be interesting to draw up the list anyway, just to see.)
The lack of punctuation makes this verse ambiguous. The opening of the quotation marks is easy; but where do they close? The answer seems to me to lie between NAVAL, which is singular, and HISHCHIYTU VE HIT'IYVU, which are both plural. But who then is speaking the next verse, which is also singular? The content there has to be the Psalmist, rather than the NAVAL.
53:2 AMAR NAVAL BE LIBO EYN ELOHIM HISHCHIYTU VE HIT'IYVU AVEL EYN OSEH TOV
אָמַר נָבָל בְּלִבּוֹ אֵין אֱלֹהִים הִשְׁחִיתוּ וְהִתְעִיבוּ עָוֶל אֵין עֹשֵׂה טוֹב
KJ: as above.
BN (option a): The fool has said in his heart: "There are no gods; {N} they have lied to us, and done us terrible damage; not one of them is any good."
NAVAL: The word does indeed mean "fool", but Naval is also a significant figure in David's story (1 Samuel 25); the first husband of Avi-Gayil. Once again, history or mythology? (We seem to be working our way through all of David's biography, key episode by key episode - is there an argument for re-organising the Psalms chronologically, based on this? Would it even be possible to do so, given the number of Psalms that are not obviously biographical? Or is there already a calendric chronology, which requires us to take the stories as they come in the diary, and not as they happened in the mythological history? It might be interesting to draw up the list anyway, just to see.)
The lack of punctuation makes this verse ambiguous. The opening of the quotation marks is easy; but where do they close? The answer seems to me to lie between NAVAL, which is singular, and HISHCHIYTU VE HIT'IYVU, which are both plural. But who then is speaking the next verse, which is also singular? The content there has to be the Psalmist, rather than the NAVAL.
Is this saying: atheists are stupid? Or is this saying: the stupiduousness and corruptitude and abominable iniquitosity of human kind appears to suggest, even to a simple fool, that "eyn din ve eyn dayan" - "there is no judge and there is no justice", the sad conclusion of my chief mentor and porobable ancestor Rebbe Menachem-Mendl of Kocke.
Or is it, as I have translated it, fleshing out the case of the atheist, making the managers of the Ponzi scheme called religion the ones who are wicked?
HISHCHIYTU: and is this a suggestion that "God is dead, we have killed him" (the line is Nietzsche's), regarding HISHCHIYTU as a form of SHECHITAH = "ritual slaughter", rather than "corruption"? After all, and why not, à la Nietzsche: the ritual sacrifice of God, and of belief in God, in the holy name of the progress of Humanity? It will have to be done eventually.
53:3 ELOHIM MI SHAMAYIM HISHKIYPH AL BENEY ADAM LIR'OT HA YESH MASKIL DORESH ET ELOHIM
אֱלֹהִים מִשָּׁמַיִם הִשְׁקִיף עַל בְּנֵי אָדָם לִרְאוֹת הֲיֵשׁ מַשְׂכִּיל דֹּרֵשׁ אֶת אֱלֹהִים
BN: Elohim looked down from the heavens on the human race, {N} to see if there were any enlightened souls seeking the gods.
ELOHIM: Yet again the deity of this section of the Psalms is Elohim, not YHVH; 3rd in a row without so much as a mention.
What do we understand by this? Seeking God today generally means seeking a spiritual answer to the world, an explanation about a Creator-divinity with a plan for humanity and a competent architect to design it for our benefit. In the Biblical world, where the Elohim were the dynamic and kinetic forces of the physical and material world, understanding Elohim meant understanding Physics, Chemistry and Biology, as well as all the other sciences, albeit by other names, albeit with rather less "understanding" than we claim to have today. But in the sense of this Psalm, to spend time in the science yeshiva studying the 2nd law of thermo-dynamics is just as much (well, "relatively" just as much) a "seeking after God" as is time spent in the Talmudic yeshiva studying the 2nd law of Mosheh.
53:4 KULO SAG YACHDAV NE'ELACHU EYN OSEH TOV EYN GAM ECHAD
כֻּלּוֹ סָג יַחְדָּו נֶאֱלָחוּ אֵין עֹשֵׂה טוֹב אֵין גַּם אֶחָד
KJ (53:3): Every one of them is gone back: they are altogether become filthy; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.
BN: Every one of them has turned away; together they have become corrupt; there isn't one among them, not one, who does good.
SAG: The root is SUG, not SIG. SIG is what is left when metal starts to rust, and bits of it flake off; as in Proverbs 25:4. But see also Ezekiel 22:18, which helps us understand how SIG came to be one of the words for "dross", and also explains why I needed to include an explanation of SIG - it is clearly a word-play in this verse. SUG, the verb actually used, means "to turn away", and is used for retreating armies as much as for back-sliding in general (cf Psalm 35:4).
GAM used to mean "even" rather than "also": "not even one". Note the repetition of EYN in the original, which I have retained in my rendition.
Why are so many of these Psalms so dismally misanthropic? (Usually for the same reason that Dickens wrote "A Christmas Carol" the way he did. "Bah, humbug!" in the first half; then introduce the angels and saints, and by the end Archbishop Ebenezer is ready to go on pilgrimage. I tried the same methodology in my novel "A Singular Shade of Grey". It produced, shall we say, interesting results.)
And from this verse too, the same question as verse 2: which side of the argument is this making? (It is a Maskil, so reasonable to assume that the answer is: both).
53:5 HA LO YAD'U PO'ALEY AVEN OCHLEY AMI ACHLU LECHEM ELOHIM LO KARA'U
KJ (53:4): Have the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who eat up my people as they eat bread: they have not called upon God.
BN: Are these workers of iniquity really that ignorant? They devour my people like bread, and never call upon the gods?
53:6 SHAM PACHADU PHACHAD LO HAYAH PHACHAD KI ELOHIM PIZAR ATSMOT CHONACH HEVISHOTAH KI ELOHIM ME'ASAM
KJ (53:5): There were they in great fear, where no fear was: for God hath scattered the bones of him that encampeth againstthee: thou hast put them to shame, because God hath despised them.
53:7 MI YITEN MI TSI'ON YESHU'OT YISRA-EL BE SHUV ELOHIM SHEVUT AMO YAGEL YA'AKOV YISMACH YISRA-EL
KJ (53:6): Oh that the salvation of Israel were come out of Zion! When God bringeth back the captivity of his people, Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad.
Why are so many of these Psalms so dismally misanthropic? (Usually for the same reason that Dickens wrote "A Christmas Carol" the way he did. "Bah, humbug!" in the first half; then introduce the angels and saints, and by the end Archbishop Ebenezer is ready to go on pilgrimage. I tried the same methodology in my novel "A Singular Shade of Grey". It produced, shall we say, interesting results.)
And from this verse too, the same question as verse 2: which side of the argument is this making? (It is a Maskil, so reasonable to assume that the answer is: both).
53:5 HA LO YAD'U PO'ALEY AVEN OCHLEY AMI ACHLU LECHEM ELOHIM LO KARA'U
הֲלֹא יָדְעוּ פֹּעֲלֵי אָוֶן אֹכְלֵי עַמִּי אָכְלוּ לֶחֶם אֱלֹהִים לֹא קָרָאוּ
KJ (53:4): Have the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who eat up my people as they eat bread: they have not called upon God.
BN: Are these workers of iniquity really that ignorant? They devour my people like bread, and never call upon the gods?
53:6 SHAM PACHADU PHACHAD LO HAYAH PHACHAD KI ELOHIM PIZAR ATSMOT CHONACH HEVISHOTAH KI ELOHIM ME'ASAM
שָׁם פָּחֲדוּ פַחַד לֹא הָיָה פָחַד כִּי אֱלֹהִים פִּזַּר עַצְמוֹת חֹנָךְ הֱבִשֹׁתָה כִּי אֱלֹהִים מְאָסָם
KJ (53:5): There were they in great fear, where no fear was: for God hath scattered the bones of him that encampeth againstthee: thou hast put them to shame, because God hath despised them.
BN (provisional translation): There are those who now live in great fear, where there was no fear previously. {N} For the gods have scattered the bones of he who is encamped against you. You have put them to shame, because the gods have rejected them.
PIZAR: "Scattered", or "dispersed", as in Jeremiah 50:17? Or "gives generously" and "acts liberally", as in Proverbs 11:24? Again I think it is both, and the word-play that we have witnessed previously with ATSMOT endorses this: ATSMOT are bones, but they also mean "strength", because it is the bones that hold up the body by providing it with a framework, just as the faith in the deity strengthens human life and provides it with a moral framework.
PIZAR: "Scattered", or "dispersed", as in Jeremiah 50:17? Or "gives generously" and "acts liberally", as in Proverbs 11:24? Again I think it is both, and the word-play that we have witnessed previously with ATSMOT endorses this: ATSMOT are bones, but they also mean "strength", because it is the bones that hold up the body by providing it with a framework, just as the faith in the deity strengthens human life and provides it with a moral framework.
Whereas, if we take it as "the scattering of bones", we are left wondering whose, and where, and why - because no tale of war or siege has even been hinted at in this Psalm until now.
And then. PIZAR. The root is never used on its own. A root has to have shoots, and those shoots are either verbs, nouns, gerunds, adverbs, adjectives...The nearest we can get to any of these comes from treating PIZAR as a supplementary adjective to ELOHIM:
For the gods are themselves the giving of strength to...
But then we have CHONCHA (masculine), or CHONACH (feminine) in the Masoretic version - either way it means the same thing, though what exactly it does mean is less easy to determine. A MACHANEH is indeed "a camp", or simply one single "tent" within that camp; but CHEN is "grace" and "mercy", while the root of MACHANEH is CHANAH with a final Hey, which this does not have.
BN (revised translation): There are those who now live in great fear, where there was no fear previously. {N} For the gods are themselves the giving of strength to your own goodness. You have put them to shame, by causing the gods to reject them.
53:7 MI YITEN MI TSI'ON YESHU'OT YISRA-EL BE SHUV ELOHIM SHEVUT AMO YAGEL YA'AKOV YISMACH YISRA-EL
מִי יִתֵּן מִצִּיּוֹן יְשֻׁעוֹת יִשְׂרָאֵל בְּשׁוּב אֱלֹהִים שְׁבוּת עַמּוֹ יָגֵל יַעֲקֹב יִשְׂמַח יִשְׂרָאֵל
KJ (53:6): Oh that the salvation of Israel were come out of Zion! When God bringeth back the captivity of his people, Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad.
BN: Oh that the salvation of Yisra-El were come out of Tsi'on! {N} When Elohim turns the captivity of his people, let Ya'akov rejoice, let Yisra-El be glad. {P}
Which statement can surely only have been made between 586 and 536 BCE, in Bavel (Babylon). And entitles us to ask: did most of the captives lose their faith because of the captivity, and was this then written to try to evangelise them back to faith? If so, it makes for an interesting contrast with Psalm 137.
Which statement can surely only have been made between 586 and 536 BCE, in Bavel (Babylon). And entitles us to ask: did most of the captives lose their faith because of the captivity, and was this then written to try to evangelise them back to faith? If so, it makes for an interesting contrast with Psalm 137.
MACHALAT: So let me return to that key word from the opening of this Psalm. Can we now conclude, from the text, that the sickness is neither the Artistic Director's, nor the King's, nor the Earth-god's, and nobody in their right minds (pardon the pun) wants to dance, not even to pogo, to a lyric like this, on any date in the calendar. The sickness is in the human world. The sickness is atheism.
(DISCLAIMER: The editor of this site is not responsible for the content of the original material, and cannot be assumed either to agree, or indeed to disagree, with any of it.)
As noted at psalm 14, Choral Ode theory reckons that Psalm 53 is a repetition of Psalm 14. I would suggest that they are wrong, but only in one degree (I think I can say degree, as these are the Psalms, the Shirey Ma'alot, the "Songs of Degrees" in many-a-translation). I would rather make the case that the editor of the anthology did not do his proof-checking with sufficient fastidiousness, and put Psalm 14 in twice, the first time as Psalm 14, the second as Psalm 53.
As noted at psalm 14, Choral Ode theory reckons that Psalm 53 is a repetition of Psalm 14. I would suggest that they are wrong, but only in one degree (I think I can say degree, as these are the Psalms, the Shirey Ma'alot, the "Songs of Degrees" in many-a-translation). I would rather make the case that the editor of the anthology did not do his proof-checking with sufficient fastidiousness, and put Psalm 14 in twice, the first time as Psalm 14, the second as Psalm 53.
Psalms:
Bk 1: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41
Bk 2: 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72
Bk 3: 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89
Bk 4: 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106
Bk 5: 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119a 119b 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132
133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
Additional Psalms: 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 Samuel Chronicles
Essays: Intro - Music - Form & Language
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