TheBibleNet: Psalm 94

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

Another untitled and undedicated piece, though the Septuagint assigns it, with Psalms 91, 93, 95-97, 101 and 104, to David; the remainder in Book Four are anonymous. Like the previous, this is addressed primarily to YHVH, who is moving cautiously towards his Night of the Long Knives.

The Septuagint states that this, with the first three verses of Psalm 95 was the Psalm for "the fourth day towards the Shabat". Click here for a detailed explanation of how the Psalms of the Day were [probably or at least possibly] selected; or go to page 293 of "A Myrtle Among Reeds" for a rather less orthodox-academic explanation. The full list is

Day One (Sunday)   Psalm 24

Day Two (Monday)   Psalm 14 (or 48 - see my notes at Psalm 82)

Day Three (Tuesday)     Psalm 82

Day Four (Wednesday) Psalm 94:1-95:3

Day Five (Thursday) Psalm 81

Day Seven (Friday) Psalm 93

Day Six (Saturday)   Psalm 92

The variations for New Moon and other festivals are also listed in "Myrtle", and there is a short commentary on each Psalm there as well.

94:1 EL NEKAMOT YHVH EL NEKAMOT HOPHIYA

אֵל נְקָמוֹת יְהוָה אֵל נְקָמוֹת הוֹפִיַע

KJ (King James translation): O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.

BN (BibleNet translation): YHVH is the god of vengeance. YHVH, god of vengeance, reveal yourself.

The wording of this verse, using repetition the way it does, is far more complex than either of these translations convey. The first EL is joined by hyphenation to the first NEKAMOT in standard Masoretic texts (see below), with YHVH standing alone; but the second EL is separated, or at least not "joined by hyphenation", which may not be the same as "separated", and the pointing below the Aleph is also varied. How far is this ambivalence simply a consequence of poetic form, an effect of echo-lines rather than an intellectual conceit per se, or a factor of musical rather than phonetic notation?

אֵל־נְקָמ֥וֹת יְהֹוָ֑ה אֵ֖ל נְקָמ֣וֹת הוֹפִֽיעַ

HOPHIYA: The root means "to make an appearance", but this is the sun-god, and when the sun-god makes an appearance "he shines". That is definitely case in the YEVARECHECHA. Might that word-play be in place here too? See my notes at Joshua 19:12.

94:2 HINAS'E SHOPHET HA ARETS HASHEV GEMUL AL GE'IM

הִנָּשֵׂא שֹׁפֵט הָאָרֶץ הָשֵׁב גְּמוּל עַל גֵּאִים

KJ: Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud.

BN: Rise up, Judge of the Earth; give their reward to the proud.

Definitely the sun!

94:3 AD MATAI RESHA'IM YHVH AD MATAI RESHA'IM YA'ALOZU

עַד מָתַי רְשָׁעִים יְהוָה עַד מָתַי רְשָׁעִים יַעֲלֹזוּ

KJ: LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?

BN: How long shall the wicked, YHVH, how long shall the wicked go on exulting?

Parallelisms and echo lines. But other sorts of echoes too - at least the fourth time that we have heard this famous phrase of Yesha-Yah (Isaiah 6:11): or maybe he was quoting Psalms and the scholars down the ages have it the wrong way around?

94:4 YABIY'U YEDABRU ATAK YIT'AMRU KOL PO'ALEY AVEN

יַבִּיעוּ יְדַבְּרוּ עָתָק יִתְאַמְּרוּ כָּל פֹּעֲלֵי אָוֶן

KJ: How long shall they utter and speak hard things? and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves?

BN: They spew out their arrogant pronouncements; they are so self-important, all these do-badders.

KJ adds even more echoes and parallels, which is fine from the poetic point of view, but I'm not sure that it hasn't also changed the meaning, which makes it erroneous.

YIT'AMRU: AMAR in the Hitpa'el? It is indeed: people who speak about themselves loftily.

PO'ALEY AVEN: And if you can have do-gooders, why can you not have do-badders as well?

94:5 AMCHA YHVH YEDAK'U VE NACHALAT'CHA YE'ANU

עַמְּךָ יְהוָה יְדַכְּאוּ וְנַחֲלָתְךָ יְעַנּוּ

KJ: They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage.

BN: They crush your people, YHVH, and afflict your heritage.

NACHALAT'CHA: YHVH's "heritage" being the Beney Yisra-El. See the Book of Joshua especially, where this comes up again and again. Or Deuteronomy 19:10 and 14... many others.

94:6 ALMANAH VE GER YAHAROGU VIYTOMIM YERATSECHU

אַלְמָנָה וְגֵר יַהֲרֹגוּ וִיתוֹמִים יְרַצֵּחוּ

KJ: They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.

BN: They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.

Some Psalms, specifically the early ones (early in history, not necessarily early in this anthology), are focused on the works of the deity: what happens in Nature and around the cosmos: droughts and storms, good harvests and infertile wives, prayers for rain in the dry season, thanks for rain when it waters the crop: always the Yevarechecha, the need for sunlight. Then there are the later Psalms, probably not earlier than the 6th century BCE, in which human behaviour is the central theme: wars, sins of various kinds, general hostility between individuals, families, tribes, nations. The former focus on the impact of the deity on Humankind, the latter on the impact of Humankind on the deity. This Psalm falls into the second category.

VIYTOMIM: An interesting point of sociology this. We would prefer to translate this as "orphans", and the word certainly has that meaning, but in that world the having or not having of a father was far more significant than the having or not having of a mother, and effectively you were an orphan when you lost your father, even if your mother was still alive.

94:7 VA YOMRU LO YIR'EH YAH VE LO YAVIYN ELOHEY YA'AKOV

וַיֹּאמְרוּ לֹא יִרְאֶה יָּהּ וְלֹא יָבִין אֱלֹהֵי יַעֲקֹב

KJ: Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.

BN: And they say: Yah will not see it; nor will the god of Ya'akov pay it any attention.

YAH: My notes to the previous verse are confident that this is a Psalm from the later centuries, and by that time the moon-goddess of the polytheon was in process of absorption into the masculine, patriarchal monotheism of Second Temple proto-Judaism, with only her resplendent shadow still lingering on, now renamed the Shechinah. The question then is not: how late was this Psalm? Rather it is: how far had the process of masculinisation gone by the time of the Ezraic Redaction - which was the middle of the 5th century BCE? Or phrase it differently: is Yah here a continuing acceptance that the processes of physics, chemistry and biology, mythologised in the form of deities, require a female (Yah) and a male (YHVH, here rendered as ELOHEY YA'AKOV), or have we already reached that stage towards the Omnideity, in which the now One God has a thousand names because he has absorbed a thousand deities, and any one is just as good to use as any other? My translation provides my answer to that question.

94:8 BIYNO BO'ARIM BA AM U CHESIYLIM MATAI TASKIYLU

בִּינוּ בֹּעֲרִים בָּעָם וּכְסִילִים מָתַי תַּשְׂכִּילוּ

KJ: Understand, ye brutish among the people: and ye fools, when will ye be wise?

BN: Understand, you half-educated among the people; and you fools, when will you understand?

BO'ARIM: I have an explanation of this term in Psalm 92. I wonder if it is the source of the word "boor" in English (and yes, I know that comes from the German Bür, or the Dutch Boer; but where did they get it from?)

TASKIYLU: The word whose root yields MASKIL, which is one of the forms we have encountered in several of the Psalms.

94:9 HA NOTA OZEN HA LO YISHMA IM YOTSER AYIN HA LO YABIYT

הֲנֹטַע אֹזֶן הֲלֹא יִשְׁמָע אִם יֹצֵר עַיִן הֲלֹא יַבִּיט

KJ: He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see?

BN: He who fashioned the ear, will he not hear? He who formed the eye, will he not see?

HA: Very sophisticated grammar-play, and thereby another indication of the lateness of the Psalm. The first HA is "the one who", the second HA is the equivalent of "est-ce que" in French. My only question is: why does it say IM at the start of the second half of the alexandrine, and not HA there as well: HA YOTSER AYIN HA LO YABIYT would parallel to perfection, even down to the echo of the Yud : YISHMA...YABIYT

NOT'A: "Planted" is correct, and rather nice, but not terribly precise, alas!

There is much in the language of this Psalm that appears to echo the previous Psalms in this section of the anthology: eyes and ears here, brutishness above.

94:10 HA YOSER GOYIM HA LO YOCHIYACH HA MELAMED ADAM DA'AT

הֲיֹסֵר גּוֹיִם הֲלֹא יוֹכִיחַ הַמְלַמֵּד אָדָם דָּעַת

KJ: He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? he that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?

BN: He who disciplines the nations, shall he not correct them, he who teaches Humankind knowledge?

YOSER: Which is not the same as the MASKIL that we had in verse 8. This is more about the behaviour in the classroom than what is on the curriculum.

GOYIM: Another very bad case of theological imperialism by KJ, imposing a negative concept where none is intended, inferiorising in the process: a classic Christian activity, I am sorry to have to say, which some modern Jews have also adopted. GOYIM simply means "nations", without any attached adjective, positive or negative.

94:11 YHVH YODE'A MACHSHEVOT ADAM KI HEMAH HAVEL

יְהוָה יֹדֵעַ מַחְשְׁבוֹת אָדָם כִּי הֵמָּה הָבֶל

KJ: The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.

BN: YHVH knows the thoughts of Humankind, that they are vanity.

HAVEL: This is far more complex than meets either the eye or the ear of verse 9; suffice it to say that it is better that the thoughts of Man are HAVEL than that they should be his brother KAYIN (Cain). - rather than writing another essay here, go to my notes on HAVEL (Abel) at the link. But better still that they should be connected with that master of creativity TUVAL, whose name has cropped up in word-play several times recently, and will again in several more of the Psalms in Book Four, as an alternate word for the Cosmos itself. The root of HAVEL means "breath", which is why it is used to mean "vanity" - a mere breath. But that breath is also life itself.

And yes, HAVEL is also the word used in that famous opening phrase of the Book of Ecclesiastes, for which click here.

94:12 ASHREI HA GEVER ASHER TEYASRENU YAH U MI TORAT'CHA TELAMDENU

אַשְׁרֵי הַגֶּבֶר אֲשֶׁר תְּיַסְּרֶנּוּ יָּהּ וּמִתּוֹרָתְךָ תְלַמְּדֶנּוּ

KJ: Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O LORD, and teachest him out of thy law;

BN: Happy is the man whom you instruct, Yah, and whom you teach from your Torah...

The homophonic play between ASHREI and ASHER is so obvious that I am surprised it has taken until Psalm 94 for it to be used; the mythological connection between ASHREI and ASHERAH is not in play here, but the second reference to Yah, who was the Phoenician equivalent of Asherah, unquestionably is - and with it an implicit acknowledgement that the earlier Ashrei Psalms were indeed addressed to the goddess, before she was absorbed into the male cult.

TEYASRENU: Is that in the feminine?! Or am I misreading the root? Either way it is yet another word-play, ASHREI and ASHER and now ASER.

TORATEYCHA: I have left this as "Torah" because it allows me to explain the ambiguity here. TORAH means "teaching", from the root OR meaning "light", and as such it is synonymous with HASKALAH, usually rendered as "Enlightenment", and the same root that gives MASKIL, the form of many of these Psalms. So is Yah teaching through general enlightenment, or through the specifics of the text of Torah? Probably the former, in the First Temple period; probably both, in the second half of the Second Temple period.

GEVER: I have explained the difference between GEVER, ISH, ADAM and BEN ADAM previously. The significance here lies in the very choice of this word rather than any of the others. Any of the others could be male or female, and are generally both. GEVER can only be male. The concept of "teach your children" in the Shema, at this epoch and for many centuries yet to follow, means boys, excludes girls.

94:13 LEHASHKIT LO MIYMEY RA AD YIKAREH LA RASHA SHACHAT

לְהַשְׁקִיט לוֹ מִימֵי רָע עַד יִכָּרֶה לָרָשָׁע שָׁחַת

KJ: That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked.

BN: That you may give him rest from the days of evil, until the pit be dug for the wicked.

LEHASHKIT: Silence, peace, rest.

SHACHAT: need to look again at the difference between She'ol, Bor and Shachat. Also DUMAH in verse 17. All of them variations on what happens when life ends, though none of them include what we would call "the afterlife".

And note the sound-play between LEHASHKIT at the start of the verse, and SHACHAT at its end. Idea-play too: the silence of tranquility in life is very different from the Hamletian silence in the world of the dead. See verse 17.

94:14 KI LO YITOSH YHVH AMO VE NACHALATO LO YA'AZOV

כִּי לֹא יִטֹּשׁ יְהוָה עַמּוֹ וְנַחֲלָתוֹ לֹא יַעֲזֹב

KJ: For the LORD will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.

BN: For YHVH will not cast off his people, nor will he forsake his inheritance.

94:15 KI AD TSEDEK YASHUV MISHPAT VE ACHARAV KOL YISHREY LEV

כִּי עַד צֶדֶק יָשׁוּב מִשְׁפָּט וְאַחֲרָיו כָּל יִשְׁרֵי לֵב

KJ: But judgment shall return unto righteousness: and all the upright in heart shall follow it.

BN: For justice shall return to righteousness, and all the upright in heart shall follow it.

94:16 MI YAKUM LI IM MERE'IM MI YITYATSEV LI IM PO'ALEY AVEN

מִי יָקוּם לִי עִם מְרֵעִים מִי יִתְיַצֵּב לִי עִם פֹּעֲלֵי אָוֶן

KJ: Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?

BN: Who will rise up for me against the evil-doers? Who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?

Once again an alexandrine.

94:17 LULEY YHVH EZRATAH LI KIM'AT SHACHNAH DUMAH NAPHSHI

לוּלֵי יְהוָה עֶזְרָתָה לִּי כִּמְעַט שָׁכְנָה דוּמָה נַפְשִׁי

KJ: Unless the LORD had been my help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence.

BN: If YHVH had not been my helper, my soul might have desended to the realm of silence.

KI'MAT or KIME'AT? The word is an artificial contraction of two words, KI meaning "as" and ME'AT meaning "small", so it is open to question whether the sheva is under the second consonant, and therefore silent, or under the first consonant following a prefix, and therefore pronounced. Modern Israelis have clearly not resolved this, as both pronunciations are commonplace for a much-used word.

DUMAH: See the link.

94:18 IM AMARTI MATAH RAGLI CHASDECHA YHVH YIS'ADENI

אִם אָמַרְתִּי מָטָה רַגְלִי חַסְדְּךָ יְהוָה יִסְעָדֵנִי

KJ: When I said, My foot slippeth; thy mercy, O LORD, held me up.

BN: If I say: "My foot slips", your loving-kindness, YHVH, holds me up.

RAGLI: An opportunity to retell the tale of Rabbi Hillel standing on one leg! Click here for one incorrect version of it. All versions of it are incorrect, so it doesn't matter which link I chose. The point is BE REGEL ECHAD, which could indeed mean "standing on one foot", but it also means "in one rule", and the one rule that Hillel gives the man is "love your neighbour as yourself", which is a quote from Leviticus 19:18. And ditto here, it isn't really his foot that slips, but a metaphor for sinning.

94:19 BE ROV SAR'APAI BE KIRBI TANCHUMEYCHA YESHA'ASH'U NAPHSHI

בְּרֹב שַׂרְעַפַּי בְּקִרְבִּי תַּנְחוּמֶיךָ יְשַׁעַשְׁעוּ נַפְשִׁי

KJ: In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul.

BN: When my cares are many within me, your comforts bring quietness to my soul.

YESHA'ASH'U: The apotheosis of onomatopoeia! Though I also can't avoid hearing the name of a Prophet or two in there as well: Yesha-Yah, which is probably the origin of Jesus.

94:20 HA YECHAVRECHA KIS'E HAVOT YOTSER AMAL ALEY CHOK

הַיְחָבְרְךָ כִּסֵּא הַוּוֹת יֹצֵר עָמָל עֲלֵי חֹק

KJ: Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frameth mischief by a law?

BN: Shall the throne of wickedness have fellowship with you, which frames mischief by statute?

YECHAVRECHA: Is that a word-play on YEVARECHECHA?

YOTSER AMAL ALEY CHOK: Very late theology this, brought back from Persia after 536BCE; the source is Zoroastrian, the division of the world between the two sons of AHURA MAZDA, one (SPENTA MAINYU) who is pure light and goodness, and an adversary (the literal meaning of HA SATAN) named (ANGRA MAINYU) who plays Opposition to the former's Government. The source of Christian dualism as well.

94:21 YAGODU AL NEPHESH TSADIK VE DAM NAKI YARSHIY'U

יָגוֹדּוּ עַל נֶפֶשׁ צַדִּיק וְדָם נָקִי יַרְשִׁיעוּ

KJ: They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.

BN: They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn innocent blood.

94:22 VA YEHI YHVH LI LE MISGAV V'ELOHEY LE TSUR MACHSI

וַיְהִי יְהוָה לִי לְמִשְׂגָּב וֵאלֹהַי לְצוּר מַחְסִי

KJ: But the LORD is my defence; and my God is the rock of my refuge.

BN: But YHVH has been my high tower, and my gods have been the rock of my refuge.

And though verse 20 showed us that this was a late text, it is still not yet a Monotheistic text.

94:23 VA YASHEV ALEYHEM ET ONAM U VERA'ATAM YATSMIYTEM YATSMIYTEM YHVH ELOHEYNU

וַיָּשֶׁב עֲלֵיהֶם אֶת אוֹנָם וּבְרָעָתָם יַצְמִיתֵם יַצְמִיתֵם יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ

KJ: And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off in their own wickedness; yea, the LORD our God shall cut them off.

BN: And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and will cut them off in their own evil; {N} YHVH our god will cut them off. {P}

Notice how this final verse mirrors to perfection the form of the opening verse, extending it to complete the argument/conceit (as in a mediaeval sonnet) but employing the same methodology of repetitions and echoes.

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Psalms:

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