TheBibleNet: Psalm 85

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

KJ has merged verse 1 into the title, and shifted its numbering down to meet this.

85:1 LA MENATSE'ACH LIVNEY KORACH MIZMOR

לַמְנַצֵּחַ לִבְנֵי קֹרַח מִזְמוֹר

KJ (King James translation): (To the chief Musician, A Psalm for the sons of Korah.) LORD, thou hast been favourable unto thy land: thou hast brought back the captivity of Jacob.

BN: Copy for the Artistic Director. Sheet music for the Beney Korach.

LA MENATSE'ACH: see my note at Psalm 51:1.

BENEY KORACH: See the link. Psalms 84, 85, 87 and 88 are all for the Beney Korach.

85:2 RATSIYTA YHVH ARTSECHA SHAVTA SHEVUT YA'AKOV

רָצִיתָ יְהוָה אַרְצֶךָ שַׁבְתָּ שְׁבוּת יַעֲקֹב

KJ (85:1): as above

BN: YHVH, you have shown favour to your land, you have brought Ya'akov back from captivity.

RATSIYTA...ARTSECHA...SHAVTA SHEVUT: playing with words and their sounds. But is this the Joshuaic conquest, and the "captivity" was Mitsrayim, or the return under Zeru-Bavel from "captivity" in Babylon, circa 536 BCE? Eight hundred years of history separate those two events, so we need textual evidence to make that determination. The naming of the deity as YHVH in verse 1 is insufficient; it is the later name, but the Redactor frequently amends ancient texts to update the theology.

85:3 NASA'TA AVON AMECHA KISIYTA CHOL CHAT'ATAM (SELAH)

נָשָׂאתָ עֲוֹן עַמֶּךָ כִּסִּיתָ כָל חַטָּאתָם סֶלָה

KJ (85:2): Thou hast forgiven the iniquity of thy people, thou hast covered all their sin. Selah.

BN: You have forgiven the iniquity of your people; you have pardoned all their sins. (Selah)

Note again the assonaces and alliterations: NASA'TA paired with KISIYTA, AVON with AMECHA, but AMECHA also with CHOL and CHAT'ATAM, which latter also echoes back to NASA'TA.The same continues throughout this Psalm, but I shall not point out every one.

The selah here can only be a musical break, because the intellectual content continues in the next verse. Logical, as this is a Mizmor.

85:4 ASAPHTA CHOL EVRATECHA HESHIYVOTA ME CHARON APECHA

אָסַפְתָּ כָל עֶבְרָתֶךָ הֱשִׁיבוֹתָ מֵחֲרוֹן אַפֶּךָ

KJ (85:3): Thou hast taken away all thy wrath: thou hast turned thyself from the fierceness of thine anger.

BN: You have withdrawn all your wrath; you have turned from the fierceness of your anger.

ASAPHTA: Most of the hymns in this second Book of the Psalms were dedicated "LE ASAPH", and the historical assumption has been (probably incorrectly on both counts) that a) they were written by him, and b) that the him in question was the leader of the orchestra in King David's time. Is whoever the writer might be on this occasion playing with that [his own] name? We have to assume yes, because this is not a verb that we would usually associate with the subject of anger.

Having said which, see my notes on the same theme at several recent Psalms.

85:5 SHUVENU ELOHEY YISH'ENU VE HAPHER KA'ASCHA IMANU

שׁוּבֵנוּ אֱלֹהֵי יִשְׁעֵנוּ וְהָפֵר כַּעַסְךָ עִמָּנוּ

KJ (85:4): Turn us, O God of our salvation, and cause thine anger toward us to cease.

BN: Restore us, O gods of our salvation, and cause your indignation toward us to cease.

SHUVENU: This links back to SHAVTA SHEVUT in verse 2. There it was a geographical restoration: return to the land. But this is about expiation of sin, and it links to the later concept of BA'AL TESHUVAH: return to faith and practice.

KA'ASCHA: What is the difference between this and EVRATECHA in the previous verse? And I don't mean lexically, but in their intent: one is "anger", the other "indignation"; one has been withdrawn, the other is still in force. Is it simply that EVRATECHA was the volcano physically exploding, but it has now ceased; while the assumed anger behind that eruption continues to require propitiation? Very primitive theology if it is that.

85:6 HA LE OLAM TE'ENAPH BANU TIMSHOCH APCHA LE DOR VA DOR

הַלְעוֹלָם תֶּאֱנַף בָּנוּ תִּמְשֹׁךְ אַפְּךָ לְדֹר וָדֹר

KJ (85:5): Wilt thou be angry with us for ever? wilt thou draw out thine anger to all generations?

BN: Will you be angry with us for ever? Will you draw out your anger from generation to generation?

But this verse does appear to confirm my reading of the previous verse: for all our promises, the human race never does actually do better. And so, yes, Nature will remain angry, and the ozone layer will collapse, and the icebergs will melt - Nature responding to human stupidity in the only way its elements (Elohim) and essences (YHVH) allow.

85:7 HA LO ATAH TASHUV TECHAYENU VE AMCHA YISMECHU VACH

הֲלֹא אַתָּה תָּשׁוּב תְּחַיֵּנוּ וְעַמְּךָ יִשְׂמְחוּ בָךְ

KJ (85:6): Wilt thou not revive us again: that thy people may rejoice in thee?

BN: Will you not restore us fully reprieved, that your people may rejoice in you?

TASHUV TECHAYENU: Which is the verb here? Actually, both - which is gramatically interesting and unusual, to say the least. The second comes from the word CHAI, meaning "life", but this is obviously not restoration from the dead in a physical sense: morally, spiritually, as a nation: the full recovery from the impact of conquest, exile, captivity.

85:8 HAR'ENU YHVH CHASDECHA VE YESH'ACHA TITEN LANU

הַרְאֵנוּ יְהוָה חַסְדֶּךָ וְיֶשְׁעֲךָ תִּתֶּן לָנוּ

KJ (85:7): Shew us thy mercy, O LORD, and grant us thy salvation.

BN: Show us your mercy, YHVH, and grant us your salvation.

YESH'ACHA: Despite the CHA ending, this is MOSHI'A, not MASHIYACH, the spiritual redeemer not the earthly king. The CHA ending is simply the 2nd person pronoun suffixed.

85:9 ESHME'AH MAH YEDABER HA EL YHVH KI YEDABER SHALOM EL AMO VE EL CHASIYDAV VE AL YASHUVU LE CHISLAH

אֶשְׁמְעָה מַה יְדַבֵּר הָאֵל יְהוָה כִּי יְדַבֵּר שָׁלוֹם אֶל עַמּוֹ וְאֶל חֲסִידָיו וְאַל יָשׁוּבוּ לְכִסְלָה

KJ (85:8): I will hear what God the LORD will speak: for he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints: but let them not turn again to folly.

BN: I will hear what the god YHVH will speak; {N} for he will speak peace to his people, and to his pious followers; but let them not turn back to folly.

AL YASHUVU: Again that word; again playing with its multiple meanings.

85:10 ACH KAROV LIYRE'AV YISH'O LISHKON KAVOD BE ARTSENU

אַךְ קָרוֹב לִירֵאָיו יִשְׁעוֹ לִשְׁכֹּן כָּבוֹד בְּאַרְצֵנוּ

KJ (85:9): Surely his salvation is nigh them that fear him; that glory may dwell in our land.

BN: Surely his salvation is near for those who fear him, so that respect may inhabit our land.

85:11 CHESED VE EMET NIPHGASHU TSEDEK VE SHALOM NASHAKU

חֶסֶד וֶאֱמֶת נִפְגָּשׁוּ צֶדֶק וְשָׁלוֹם נָשָׁקוּ

KJ (85:10): Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.

BN: Mercy and truth have met together; righteousness has embraced peace.

CHESED VE EMET: Lots of synagogues have taken this phrase for their name. The inference of the change of tense is that a positive response to the prayer was received in the space between the last verse and this one, and the positive implications of that will incipit in the next.

85:12 EMET ME ERETS TITSMACH VE TSEDEK MI SHAMAYIM NISHKAPH

אֱמֶת מֵאֶרֶץ תִּצְמָח וְצֶדֶק מִשָּׁמַיִם נִשְׁקָף

KJ (85:11): Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven.

BN: Truth will be born from the earth, and righteousness will rain down from the heavens.

I am fascinated to witness, not just the development of thought from the material to the abstract in these Psalms, but the visible process of transition. Once the gods were purely the rains, the grass, the fruit and flowers, the animals and insects, the sun and moon and stars, the volcanoes and hurricanes... now we begin to see the emergence of abstraction, with concepts of Mercy, Truth, Justice, and their negatives - Wickedness, Evil, Sin - all of which existed before in the human realm, but were never Divine Attributes, as they are now. But in this verse the abstract literally emerges from the material, Truth "springing from the Earth", Righteousness "looking down from the skies". The evidence that we have suggests that this evolutionary leap took place at the very earliest, and at the most basic level if it did, in the 12th century BCE (Zoroaster), but much more probably in the 6th century BCE, the century of Buddha, Pythagoras, Yesha-Yah (Isaiah), Confucius and others.

85:13 GAM YHVH YITEN HA TOV VE ARTSENU TITEN YEVULAH

גַּם יְהוָה יִתֵּן הַטּוֹב וְאַרְצֵנוּ תִּתֵּן יְבוּלָהּ

KJ (85:12): Yea, the LORD shall give that which is good; and our land shall yield her increase.

BN: Yea, YHVH will give what is good; and our land will produce her Jubilee.

But the transition is still in process, not yet complete, which is why this verse yields both interpretations: worship the deity and he will reward you with a bumper crop: worship the deity and you will find peace as well as corn, justice as well as fruit.

YEVULAH: Are the translators simply amateurs, or incompetents, or do they sit around in committees and agree these things as a compromise over individual, personal opinions? How can you read the word YEVULAH and not see in it the word YOVEL, not know that the Jubilee laws have been fundamental to agricultural and religious practice in this land for centuries - and find some way to show that by your choice of vocabulary in translation? It isn't very difficult to do (though it might be amusing to Maoise it, to Marxise it, and translate this as "and our land shall fulfil our Seven Year Plan"!). See Leviticus 23 and 25. (And Genesis 41 for Yoseph and the original "7 year plan"!).

85:14 TSEDEK LEPHANAV YEHALECH VE YASEM LE DERECH PE'AMAV

צֶדֶק לְפָנָיו יְהַלֵּךְ וְיָשֵׂם לְדֶרֶךְ פְּעָמָיו

KJ (85:13): Righteousness shall go before him; and shall set us in the way of his steps.

BN: Righteousness shall go before him, and make a path for his footsteps. {P}

LE DERECH PE'AMAV: The syntax of this allows it to be read both ways, that righteousness will make a path for his footsteps, and/or that his footsteps will make a path for righteousness. And really it should be read both ways, mutually supportive.

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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