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O Lord God of Heaven’s Armies,[a]
how long will you remain angry at your people while they pray to you?[b]

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Footnotes

  1. Psalm 80:4 tn HebLord, God, hosts.” One expects the construct form אֱלֹהֵי (ʾelohe) before צְבָאוֹת (tsevaʾot; “hosts”; see Ps 89:9), but יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים (yehvah ʾelohim) precedes צְבָאוֹת (tsevaʾot) in Pss 59:5 and 84:8 as well. In this context the term “hosts” has been rendered “Heaven’s Armies.”
  2. Psalm 80:4 tn Heb “How long will you remain angry during the prayer of your people.” Some take the preposition ב (bet) in an adversative sense here (“at/against the prayer of your people”), but the temporal sense is preferable. The psalmist expects persistent prayer to pacify God.

Also, when I cry out desperately[a] for help,[b]
he has shut out my prayer.[c]

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Footnotes

  1. Lamentations 3:8 tn Heb “I call and I cry out.” The verbs אֶזְעַק וַאֲשַׁוֵּעַ (ʾezʿaq vaʾashavveaʿ, “I call and I cry out”) form a verbal hendiadys where the second retains its full verbal sense while the first functions adverbially: “I cry out desperately.”
  2. Lamentations 3:8 tn The verb שׁוע (“to cry out”) usually denotes calling out to God for help or deliverance from a lamentable plight (e.g., Job 30:20; 36:13; 38:41; Pss 5:3; 18:7, 42; 22:25; 28:2; 30:3; 31:23; 88:14; 119:147; Isa 58:9; Lam 3:8; Jon 2:3; Hab 1:2).
  3. Lamentations 3:8 tn The verb שָׂתַם (satam) is a hapax legomenon (term that appears in the Hebrew scriptures only once) meaning “stop up” or “shut out.” It functions as an idiom here, meaning “he has shut his ears to my prayer” (BDB 979 s.v.).

44 You shrouded yourself with a cloud
so that no prayer could get through.

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