Psalm 104
The full text of Psalm 104 in the Trinity Bible Version — clear modern English, translated from the original Hebrew. Free to read.
1 Bless the LORD, O my soul!
O LORD my God, you are very great!
You are clothed with splendor and majesty,
2 covering yourself with light as with a garment,
stretching out the heavens like a tent.
3 He lays the beams of his chambers on the waters;
he makes the clouds his chariot;
he rides on the wings of the wind;
4 he makes his messengers winds,
his ministers a flaming fire.
5 He set the earth on its foundations,
so that it should never be moved.
6 You covered it with the deep as with a garment;
the waters stood above the mountains.
7 At your rebuke they fled;
at the sound of your thunder they took to flight.
8 The mountains rose, the valleys sank down
to the place that you appointed for them.
9 You set a boundary that they may not pass,
so that they might not again cover the earth.
10 You make springs gush forth in the valleys;
they flow between the hills;
11 they give drink to every beast of the field;
the wild donkeys quench their thirst.
12 Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell;
they sing among the branches.
13 From your lofty abode you water the mountains;
the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work.
14 You cause the grass to grow for the livestock
and plants for man to cultivate,
that he may bring forth food from the earth
15 and wine to gladden the heart of man,
oil to make his face shine
and bread to strengthen man's heart.
16 The trees of the LORD are watered abundantly,
the cedars of Lebanon that he planted.
17 In them the birds build their nests;
the stork has her home in the fir trees.
18 The high mountains are for the wild goats;
the rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers.
19 He made the moon to mark the seasons;
the sun knows its time for setting.
20 You make darkness, and it is night,
when all the beasts of the forest creep about.
21 The young lions roar for their prey,
seeking their food from God.
22 When the sun rises, they steal away
and lie down in their dens.
23 Man goes out to his work
and to his labor until the evening.
24 O LORD, how manifold are your works!
In wisdom you have made them all;
the earth is full of your creatures.
25 Here is the sea, great and wide,
which teems with creatures innumerable,
living things both small and great.
26 There go the ships,
and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it.
27 These all look to you,
to give them their food in due season.
28 When you give it to them, they gather it up;
when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
29 When you hide your face, they are dismayed;
when you take away their breath, they die
and return to their dust.
30 When you send forth your Spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the ground.
31 May the glory of the LORD endure forever;
may the LORD rejoice in his works,
32 who looks on the earth and it trembles,
who touches the mountains and they smoke!
33 I will sing to the LORD as long as I live;
I will sing praise to my God while I have being.
34 May my meditation be pleasing to him,
for I rejoice in the LORD.
35 Let sinners be consumed from the earth,
and let the wicked be no more!
Bless the LORD, O my soul!
Praise the LORD!
Translation notes (7)
- Psalm 104:2a The word rendered here as 'tent' is yeriah (יְרִיעָה), 'tent curtain', the fabric stretched over a tent frame; Isaiah 40:22 uses the same image of the heavens spread like a curtain to dwell in. Depicting the sky as a stretched canopy over the earth was common in ancient Near Eastern descriptions of the cosmos.
- Psalm 104:3a The 'waters' are those above the firmament (Genesis 1:7), upon which God frames his aliyyot, 'upper chambers'. The picture of a deity riding the clouds has a long ancient Near Eastern history; in Ugaritic texts the storm god Baal bears the epithet 'rider of the clouds', an image the psalmist claims for the God of Israel alone.
- Psalm 104:4a The Hebrew syntax permits either 'he makes his messengers winds' or 'he makes the winds his messengers', since mal'akhav (מַלְאָכָיו) can mean 'messengers' or 'angels' and ruchot (רוּחוֹת) can mean 'winds' or 'spirits'. The Septuagint takes the first sense, applying it to angels, and Hebrews 1:7 quotes the verse in that form.
- Psalm 104:6a The word tehom (תְּהוֹם), 'the deep', is the same term used in Genesis 1:2 for the primeval waters that covered the earth before creation was ordered. The psalm portrays these waters not as a rival power but as a garment God himself laid over the earth and, in the following verse, commands away.
- Psalm 104:9a The Hebrew gevul (גְּבוּל), 'boundary', recalls the divine restraint of the sea in Job 38:8–11, where the waters are told they may come thus far and no farther. The promise that the waters will not again cover the earth alludes to God's pledge after the flood in Genesis 9:11, casting creation's stability as an act of ongoing covenant faithfulness.
- Psalm 104:26a Livyatan (לִוְיָתָן) elsewhere names the many-headed chaos monster of ancient Near Eastern myth, cognate with Litan of the Ugaritic Baal texts (compare Psalm 74:14; Isaiah 27:1). Here the dreaded serpent is a creature made to frolic; the Hebrew lesachek-bo can also be read 'to play with him', picturing God sporting with Leviathan, as in Job 41:5.
- Psalm 104:30a Hebrew ruachakha (רוּחֲךָ), 'your Spirit', uses the same word rendered 'breath' in the previous verse; ruach denotes both the breath of living creatures and the life-giving Spirit of God. The psalmist thus presents creation as a continuing divine act, with each generation of creatures called into being by the same ruach that animated the first.
About this translation
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