Psalm 89
The full text of Psalm 89 in the Trinity Bible Version — clear modern English, translated from the original Hebrew. Free to read.
A maskil of Ethan the Ezrahite.
1 I will sing of the LORD's faithful love forever;
with my mouth I will make known your faithfulness
to all generations.
2 For I said, "Faithful love is built up forever;
in the heavens you establish your faithfulness."
3 "I have made a covenant with my chosen one;
I have sworn to David my servant:
4 'I will establish your offspring forever
and build up your throne to all generations.'" Selah
5 The heavens praise your wonders, O LORD,
your faithfulness in the assembly of the holy ones.
6 For who in the skies can be compared to the LORD?
Who among the sons of gods is like the LORD?
7 A God greatly feared in the council of the holy ones,
and awesome above all who surround him.
8 O LORD God of hosts, who is mighty like you, O LORD?
Your faithfulness surrounds you.
9 You rule the raging of the sea;
when its waves rise, you still them.
10 You crushed Rahab like a carcass;
with your mighty arm you scattered your enemies.
11 The heavens are yours; the earth also is yours;
the world and all that fills it—you founded them.
12 The north and the south—you created them;
Tabor and Hermon shout for joy at your name.
13 You have a mighty arm;
strong is your hand, exalted your right hand.
14 Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne;
faithful love and truth go before your face.
15 Blessed are the people who know the festal shout,
who walk, O LORD, in the light of your face.
16 In your name they rejoice all the day,
and in your righteousness they are exalted.
17 For you are the glory of their strength;
by your favor our horn is exalted.
18 For our shield belongs to the LORD,
our king to the Holy One of Israel.
19 Then you spoke in a vision to your faithful one and said:
"I have set a crown on a warrior;
I have exalted one chosen from the people.
20 I have found David my servant;
with my holy oil I have anointed him,
21 with whom my hand shall be established;
my arm also shall strengthen him.
22 The enemy shall not outwit him;
the son of wickedness shall not afflict him.
23 I will crush his foes before him
and strike those who hate him.
24 My faithfulness and my faithful love shall be with him,
and in my name his horn shall be exalted.
25 I will set his hand on the sea
and his right hand on the rivers.
26 He shall cry to me, 'You are my Father,
my God, and the rock of my salvation.'
27 And I will make him the firstborn,
the highest of the kings of the earth.
28 My faithful love I will keep for him forever,
and my covenant shall stand firm for him.
29 I will establish his offspring forever
and his throne as the days of heaven.
30 If his children forsake my law
and do not walk in my judgments,
31 if they violate my statutes
and do not keep my commands,
32 then I will punish their transgression with the rod
and their guilt with blows.
33 But my faithful love I will not take from him,
nor will I be false to my faithfulness.
34 I will not violate my covenant
or alter what has gone out from my lips.
35 Once for all I have sworn by my holiness;
I will not lie to David:
36 his offspring shall endure forever,
his throne as long as the sun before me.
37 Like the moon it shall be established forever,
a faithful witness in the sky." Selah
38 But you have rejected and spurned;
you have been full of wrath against your anointed.
39 You have renounced the covenant with your servant;
you have defiled his crown in the dust.
40 You have broken through all his walls;
you have laid his strongholds in ruins.
41 All who pass by plunder him;
he has become a reproach to his neighbors.
42 You have exalted the right hand of his foes;
you have made all his enemies rejoice.
43 You have also turned back the edge of his sword
and have not upheld him in battle.
44 You have put an end to his splendor
and cast his throne to the ground.
45 You have cut short the days of his youth;
you have covered him with shame. Selah
46 How long, O LORD? Will you hide yourself forever?
How long will your wrath burn like fire?
47 Remember how short my time is!
For what futility you have created all the children of mortals!
48 What man can live and not see death?
Who can deliver his soul from the power of Sheol? Selah
49 Where are your former acts of faithful love, O Lord,
which you swore to David in your faithfulness?
50 Remember, O Lord, the reproach of your servants—
how I bear in my heart the insults of all the many peoples,
51 with which your enemies reproach, O LORD,
with which they reproach the footsteps of your anointed.
52 Blessed be the LORD forever.
Amen and amen.
Translation notes (10)
- Psalm 89:6a The Hebrew bene elim, 'sons of gods', is divine council language, depicting the LORD as incomparable among heavenly beings; the same phrase opens Psalm 29. The next verse continues the image with the 'council of the holy ones', a scene comparable to Job 1:6. The psalm affirms that no member of this assembly rivals the covenant God.
- Psalm 89:7a Hebrew sod qedoshim, 'council of the holy ones', pictures the LORD presiding over an assembly of heavenly beings, an image common in ancient Near Eastern literature and echoed in Psalm 82 and Job 1. The psalmist deploys the motif polemically: whereas other gods sat as peers in such councils, here every member of the assembly trembles before the incomparable God of Israel.
- Psalm 89:10a Rahav (רַהַב) names a mythic sea monster of primeval chaos, not the woman of Jericho, whose name is spelled differently in Hebrew. The same figure appears in Job 26:12 and Isaiah 51:9, and elsewhere serves as a poetic name for Egypt (Isaiah 30:7), so the crushing of Rahab may also evoke the exodus.
- Psalm 89:12a Hebrew tsafon veyamin, literally 'north and the right hand', names the compass points as one faces east, the right hand marking the south. Tabor, a solitary hill in Lower Galilee, and Hermon, the snow-capped peak on Israel's far northern horizon, pair a modest western landmark with a towering northern one, so the whole land joins the compass points in praising the Creator.
- Psalm 89:19a The Masoretic Text reads ezer (עֵזֶר), 'help'—literally 'I have placed help upon a warrior'; 'crown' follows the widely proposed emendation nezer (נֵזֶר), which suits the parallel with the defiled crown of verse 39. Hebrew gibbor, 'mighty man' or 'warrior', anticipates David, named in the verse that follows.
- Psalm 89:20a The phrase echoes 1 Samuel 13:14, where the Lord seeks out a man after his own heart, and the anointing recalls Samuel's act with the horn of oil in 1 Samuel 16:13. In Hebrew the verb matsati, 'I have found', presents David's election as the Lord's own discovery, grounding the covenant promises that the psalm's later lament will press upon God.
- Psalm 89:26a The address avi attah ('you are my Father') takes up the Davidic covenant of 2 Samuel 7:14, where God promises David's heir, 'I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me.' Psalm 89 recites that promise at length before lamenting its apparent failure, making this verse the covenantal center of the psalm's argument.
- Psalm 89:27a The Hebrew bekhor, 'firstborn' (בְּכוֹר), is here a covenantal title of rank rather than a statement of birth order; David was in fact the youngest of Jesse's sons. The title confers the firstborn's legal preeminence, defined by the parallel line as supremacy over the kings of the earth.
- Psalm 89:37a Hebrew ed bashachaq ne'eman (עֵד בַּשַּׁחַק נֶאֱמָן), 'a faithful witness in the sky', is most naturally read of the moon, whose fixed course attests the permanence of the Davidic covenant, much as the bow serves in Genesis 9. Some interpreters instead take God himself as the witness; the Hebrew syntax permits either reading.
- Psalm 89:52a This doxology is not part of Psalm 89 proper but marks the close of Book III of the Psalter (Psalms 73–89); similar formulas conclude Books I, II, and IV. The double amen (Hebrew amen ve'amen) follows the abrupt lament of the preceding verses, so the blessing functions as an editorial seal on the collection rather than a resolution of the psalm's complaint.
About this translation
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