Psalm 11 Exegetical Issues
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Psalm 11/Exegetical Issues
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Psalm 11
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Exegetical Issues Video
Introduction to Exegetical Issues
Presented here are the top three Exegetical Issues that any interpreter of the psalm—whether they’re reading the text in Hebrew or looking at a number of translations—are likely to encounter. These issues usually involve textual criticism, grammar, lexical semantics, verbal semantics, and/or phrase-level semantics, though they sometimes involve higher-level layers as well.
Exegetical Issues for Psalm 11
- Psalm 11:1d presents several textual, grammatical, and semantic issues that affect its interpretation and translation. The textual issues concern the variation between the MT ketiv (נודו) and qere (נוּדִי), as well as whether כמ should be understood as a second-person masculine plural suffix (הַרְכֶם צִפּׂור) or as a preposition (הֵר כְּמׂו צִפּוׁר). If the MT is retained, grammatical questions arise concerning whether צִפּוֹר ("bird") functions as a vocative or as an adverbial noun phrase ("like a bird"), and whether the sentence consists of one clause or two. The semantic issues concern whether צִפּוֹר ("bird") and הַרְכֶם/הַר ("mountain") should be understood as singular or collective, and whether the mountain represents the destination of the flight ("to the/your mountain[s]") or its point of departure ("from the/your mountain[s]"). These questions lead to significantly different interpretations and translations of the verse.
- Psalm 11:3 presents several semantic issues that affect its interpretation and translation, despite the general agreement among modern translations. The first concerns the meaning of הַשָּׁתוֹת ("foundations"), which may refer to literal foundations or be understood figuratively. The second involves the function of כִּי, which may introduce either a conditional clause ("if") or a causal clause ("for"). A third issue concerns the verbal semantics of the verse, particularly whether the verbs should be understood as irrealis ("If/when the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?") or as future and past, respectively ("For the foundations will be destroyed. What has the righteous one done?"). Finally, the identity of צַדִּיק ("righteous") is debated: it may refer to YHWH as the Righteous One or to a righteous person more generally. These questions have significant implications for understanding the meaning of the verse.
- The meaning of Psalm 11:5 depends on how the lines are divided. Some translations divide the first lines as follows: "The LORD examines the righteous, // but the wicked, those who love violence, he hates with a passion."[1] Other translations divide the lines differently: "The LORD examines both the righteous and the wicked. // He hates those who love violence."[2]