Psalm 112-113
New English Translation
Psalm 112[a]
112 Praise the Lord!
How blessed is the one[b] who obeys[c] the Lord,
who takes great delight in keeping his commands.[d]
2 His descendants[e] will be powerful on the earth;
the godly[f] will be blessed.
3 His house contains wealth and riches;
his integrity endures.[g]
4 In the darkness a light[h] shines for the godly,
for each one who is merciful, compassionate, and just.[i]
5 It goes well for the one[j] who generously lends money,
and conducts his business honestly.[k]
6 For he will never be shaken;
others will always remember one who is just.[l]
7 He does not fear bad news.
He[m] is confident; he trusts in the Lord.
8 His resolve[n] is firm; he will not succumb to fear
before he looks in triumph on his enemies.
9 He generously gives[o] to the needy;
his integrity endures.[p]
He will be vindicated and honored.[q]
10 When the wicked[r] see this, they will worry;
they will grind their teeth in frustration[s] and melt away.
The desire of the wicked will perish.[t]
Psalm 113[u]
113 Praise the Lord.
Praise, you servants of the Lord,
praise the name of the Lord.
2 May the Lord’s name be praised
now and forevermore.
3 From east to west[v]
the Lord’s name is deserving of praise.
4 The Lord is exalted over all the nations;
his splendor reaches beyond the sky.[w]
5 Who can compare to the Lord our God,
who sits on a high throne?[x]
6 He bends down to look[y]
at the sky and the earth.
7 He raises the poor from the dirt,
and lifts up the needy from the garbage pile,[z]
8 that he might seat him with princes,
with the princes of his people.
9 He makes the barren woman of the family[aa]
a happy mother of children.[ab]
Praise the Lord.
Footnotes
- Psalm 112:1 sn Psalm 112. This wisdom psalm lists some of the benefits of living a godly life. The psalm is an acrostic. After the introductory call to praise, every poetic line (twenty-two in all) begins with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
- Psalm 112:1 tn Heb “[Oh] the happiness [of] the man.” Hebrew wisdom literature often assumes and reflects the male-oriented perspective of ancient Israelite society. The individual is representative of a larger group, called the “godly” in vv. 3-4. The principle of the psalm is certainly applicable to all people, regardless of their gender. To facilitate modern application, we translate the gender specific “man” with the more neutral “one.” The generic masculine pronoun is used in the following verses.
- Psalm 112:1 tn Heb “fears.”
- Psalm 112:1 tn Heb “in his commands he delights very much.” The words “in keeping” are supplied in the translation for clarification. Taking delight in the law is metonymic here for obeying God’s moral will. See Ps 1:2.
- Psalm 112:2 tn Or “offspring”; Heb “seed.”
- Psalm 112:2 tn Heb “His seed will be mighty on the earth, the generation of the godly.” The Hebrew term דוֹר (dor, “generation”) could be taken as parallel to “offspring” and translated “posterity,” but the singular more likely refers to the godly as a class. See BDB 189-90 s.v. for other examples where “generation” refers to a class of people.
- Psalm 112:3 tn Heb “stands forever.”
- Psalm 112:4 tn In this context “light” symbolizes divine blessing in its various forms (see v. 2), including material prosperity and stability.
- Psalm 112:4 tn Heb “merciful and compassionate and just.” The Hebrew text has three singular adjectives, which are probably substantival and in apposition to the “godly” (which is plural, however). By switching to the singular, the psalmist focuses on each individual member of the group known as the “godly.” Note how vv. 5-9, like vv. 1-2a, use the singular to describe the representative godly individual who typifies the whole group.
- Psalm 112:5 tn Heb “man.”
- Psalm 112:5 tn Heb “he sustains his matters with justice.”
- Psalm 112:6 tn Heb “for an eternal memorial a just [one] will be.”
- Psalm 112:7 tn Heb “his heart,” viewed here as the seat of the volition and emotions (see Ps 108:1).
- Psalm 112:8 tn Heb “his heart,” viewed here as the seat of the volition.
- Psalm 112:9 tn Heb “he scatters, he gives.”
- Psalm 112:9 tn Heb “stands forever.”
- Psalm 112:9 tn Heb “his horn will be lifted up in honor.” The horn of an ox underlies the metaphor (see Deut 33:17; 1 Kgs 22:11; Ps 92:10). The horn of the wild ox is frequently a metaphor for military strength; the idiom “exalt/lift up the horn” signifies military victory (see 1 Sam 2:10; Pss 89:17, 24; 92:10; Lam 2:17).
- Psalm 112:10 tn The Hebrew text uses the singular; the representative wicked individual is in view as typifying the group (note the use of the plural form in v. 10).
- Psalm 112:10 tn Heb “his teeth he will gnash.” In Pss 35:16 and 37:12 this action is associated with a vicious attack.
- Psalm 112:10 tn This could mean that the desires of the wicked will go unfulfilled. Another possibility is that “desire” refers by metonymy to the object desired and acquired. In this case the point is that the wicked will lose what they desired so badly and acquired by evil means (see Ps 10:3).
- Psalm 113:1 sn Psalm 113. The psalmist praises God as the sovereign king of the world who reaches down to help the needy.
- Psalm 113:3 tn Heb “from the rising of the sun to its setting.” The extent is not temporal (“from sunrise to sunset”) but spatial (“from the place where the sun rises [the east] to the place where it sets [the west].” In the phenomenological language of OT cosmology, the sun was described as rising in the east and setting in the west.
- Psalm 113:4 tn Heb “above the sky [is] his splendor.”
- Psalm 113:5 tn Heb “the one who makes high to sit.”
- Psalm 113:6 tn Heb “the one who makes low to see.”
- Psalm 113:7 sn The language of v. 7 is almost identical to that of 1 Sam 2:8.
- Psalm 113:9 tn Heb “of the house.”
- Psalm 113:9 tn Heb “sons.”
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