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October 6, 2020

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with thematically matched Old and New Testament readings.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 144

Psalm 144^[a]

By David.

144 The Lord, my Protector,^[b] deserves praise^[c]—
the one who trains my hands for battle,^[d]
and my fingers for war,
²who loves me^[e] and is my stronghold,
my refuge^[f] and my deliverer,
my shield and the one in whom I take shelter,
who makes nations submit to me.^[g]
³O Lord, of what importance is the human race,^[h] that you should notice them?
Of what importance is mankind,^[i] that you should be concerned about them?^[j]
⁴People^[k] are like a vapor,
their days like a shadow that disappears.^[l]
⁵O Lord, make the sky sink^[m] and come down.^[n]
Touch the mountains and make them smolder.^[o]
⁶Hurl lightning bolts and scatter the enemy.
Shoot your arrows and rout them.^[p]
⁷Reach down^[q] from above.
Grab me and rescue me from the surging water,^[r]
from the power of foreigners,^[s]
⁸who speak lies,
and make false promises.^[t]
⁹O God, I will sing a new song to you.
Accompanied by a ten-stringed instrument, I will sing praises to you,
¹⁰the one who delivers^[u] kings,
and rescued David his servant from a deadly^[v] sword.
¹¹Grab me and rescue me from the power of foreigners,^[w]
who speak lies,
and make false promises.^[x]
¹²Then^[y] our sons will be like plants,
that quickly grow to full size.^[z]
Our daughters will be like corner pillars,^[aa]
carved like those in a palace.^[ab]
¹³Our storehouses^[ac] will be full,
providing all kinds of food.^[ad]
Our sheep will multiply by the thousands
and fill^[ae] our pastures.^[af]
¹⁴Our cattle will be weighted down with produce.^[ag]
No one will break through our walls,
no one will be taken captive,
and there will be no terrified cries in our city squares.^[ah]
¹⁵How blessed are the people who experience these things.^[ai]
How blessed are the people whose God is the Lord.

Footnotes

Psalm 144:1 sn Psalm 144. The psalmist expresses his confidence in God, asks for a mighty display of divine intervention in an upcoming battle, and anticipates God’s rich blessings on the nation in the aftermath of military victory.
Psalm 144:1 tn Heb “my rocky summit.” The Lord is compared to a rocky summit where one can find protection from enemies. See Ps 18:2.
Psalm 144:1 tn Heb “blessed [be] the Lord, my rocky summit.”
Psalm 144:1 sn The one who trains my hands for battle. The psalmist attributes his skill with weapons to divine enablement (see Ps 18:34). Egyptian reliefs picture gods teaching the king how to shoot a bow. See O. Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World, 265.
Psalm 144:2 tn Heb “my loyal love,” which is probably an abbreviated form of “the God of my loyal love” (see Ps 59:10, 17).
Psalm 144:2 tn Or “my elevated place.”
Psalm 144:2 tn Heb “the one who subdues nations beneath me.”
Psalm 144:3 tn Heb “What is mankind?” The singular noun אֱנוֹשׁ (ʾenosh) is used here in a collective sense and refers to the human race. See Ps 8:5.
Psalm 144:3 tn Heb “and the son of man.” The phrase “son of man” is used here in a collective sense and refers to human beings. For other uses of the phrase in a collective or representative manner, see Num 23:19; Ps 146:3; Isa 51:12.
Psalm 144:3 tn Heb “take account of him.” The two imperfect verbal forms in v. 4 describe God’s characteristic activity.
Psalm 144:4 tn Heb “man,” or “mankind.”
Psalm 144:4 tn Heb “his days [are] like a shadow that passes away,” that is, like a late afternoon shadow made by the descending sun that will soon be swallowed up by complete darkness. See Ps 102:11.
Psalm 144:5 tn The Hebrew verb נָטָה (natah) can carry the sense “to [cause to] bend; to [cause to] bow down.” For example, Gen 49:15 pictures Issachar as a donkey that “bends” its shoulder or back under a burden. Here the Lord causes the sky, pictured as a dome or vault, to sink down as he descends in the storm. See Ps 18:9.
Psalm 144:5 tn Heb “so you might come down.” The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) conjunctive indicates purpose after the preceding imperative. The same type of construction is utilized in v. 6.
Psalm 144:5 tn Heb “so they might smolder.” The prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) conjunctive indicates purpose after the preceding imperative.
Psalm 144:6 sn Arrows and lightning bolts are associated in other texts (see Pss 18:14; 77:17-18; Zech 9:14), as well as in ancient Near Eastern art (see R. B. Chisholm, “An Exegetical and Theological study of Psalm 18/2 Samuel 22” [Th.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary, 1983], 187).
Psalm 144:7 tn Heb “stretch out your hands.”
Psalm 144:7 tn Heb “mighty waters.” The waters of the sea symbolize the psalmist’s powerful foreign enemies, as well as the realm of death they represent (see the next line and Ps 18:16-17).
Psalm 144:7 tn Heb “from the hand of the sons of foreignness.”
Psalm 144:8 tn Heb “who [with] their mouth speak falsehood, and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood.” The reference to the “right hand” is probably a metonymy for an oath. When making an oath, one would raise the hand as a solemn gesture. See Exod 6:8; Num 14:30; Deut 32:40. The figure thus represents the making of false oaths (false promises).
Psalm 144:10 tn Heb “grants deliverance to.”
Psalm 144:10 tn Heb “harmful.”
Psalm 144:11 tn Heb “from the hand of the sons of foreignness.”
Psalm 144:11 tn Heb “who [with] their mouth speak falsehood, and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood.” See v. 8 where the same expression occurs.
Psalm 144:12 tn Some consider אֲשֶׁר (ʾasher) problematic, but here it probably indicates the anticipated consequence of the preceding request. (For other examples of אֲשֶׁר indicating purpose/result, see BDB 83 s.v. and HALOT 99 s.v.) If the psalmist—who appears to be a Davidic king preparing to fight a battle (see vv. 10-11)—is victorious, the whole nation will be spared invasion and defeat (see v. 14) and can flourish. Some prefer to emend the form to אַשְׁרֵי (“how blessed [are our sons]”). A suffixed noun sometimes follows אַשְׁרֵי (ʾashre; see 1 Kgs 10:8; Prov 20:7), but the presence of a comparative element (see “like plants”) after the suffixed noun makes the proposed reading too awkward syntactically.
Psalm 144:12 tn Heb “grown up in their youth.” The translation assumes that “grown up” modifies “plants” (just as “carved” modifies “corner pillars” in the second half of the verse). Another option is to take “grown up” as a predicate in relation to “our sons,” in which case one might translate, “they will be strapping youths.”
Psalm 144:12 tn The Hebrew noun occurs only here and in Zech 9:15, where it refers to the corners of an altar.
Psalm 144:12 tn Heb “carved [in] the pattern of a palace.”
Psalm 144:13 tn The Hebrew noun occurs only here.
Psalm 144:13 tn Heb “from kind to kind.” Some prefer to emend the text to מָזוֹן עַל מָזוֹן (mazon ʿal mazon, “food upon food”).
Psalm 144:13 tn Heb “they are innumerable.”
Psalm 144:13 tn Heb “in outside places.” Here the term refers to pastures and fields (see Job 5:10; Prov 8:26).
Psalm 144:14 tn Heb “weighted down.” This probably refers (1) to the cattle having the produce from the harvest placed on their backs to be transported to the storehouses (see BDB 687 s.v. סָבַל). Other options are (2) to take this as reference to the cattle being pregnant (see HALOT 741 s.v. סבל pu) or (3) to their being well-fed or fattened (see L. C. Allen, Psalms 101-150 [WBC], 288).
Psalm 144:14 tn Heb “there [will be] no breach, and there [will be] no going out, and there [will be] no crying out in our broad places.”
Psalm 144:15 tn Heb “[O] the happiness of the people who [it is] such to them.”

Isaiah 27:1-6

27 At that time^[a] the Lord will punish
with his destructive,^[b] great, and powerful sword
Leviathan the fast-moving^[c] serpent,
Leviathan the squirming serpent;
he will kill the sea monster.^[d]
²When that time comes,^[e]
sing about a delightful vineyard!^[f]
³“I, the Lord, protect it;^[g]
I water it regularly.^[h]
I guard it night and day,
so no one can harm it.^[i]
⁴I am not angry.
I wish I could confront some thorns and briers!
Then I would march against them^[j] for battle;
I would set them^[k] all on fire,
⁵unless they became my subjects^[l]
and made peace with me;
let them make peace with me.”^[m]
⁶The time is coming when Jacob will take root;^[n]

Israel will blossom and grow branches.
The produce^[o] will fill the surface of the world.^[p]

Footnotes

Isaiah 27:1 tn Heb “in that day” (so KJV).
Isaiah 27:1 tn Heb “hard, severe”; cf. NAB, NRSV “cruel”; KJV “sore”; NLT “terrible.”
Isaiah 27:1 tn Heb “fleeing” (so NAB, NASB, NRSV). Some translate “slippery” or “slithering.” See the same Hebrew phrase in Job 26:13.
Isaiah 27:1 tn The description of Leviathan should be compared with the following excerpts from Ugaritic mythological texts: (1) “Was not the dragon (Ugaritic tnn, cognate with Hebrew תַנִּין [tannin, translated “sea monster” here]) vanquished and captured? I did destroy the wriggling (Ugaritic ʿqltn, cognate to Hebrew עֲקַלָּתוֹן [ʿaqallaton, translated “squirming” here]) serpent, the tyrant with seven heads (cf. Ps 74:14).” (See CTA 3 iii 38-39.) (2) “for all that you smote Leviathan the slippery (Ugaritic brh, cognate to Hebrew בָּרִחַ [bariakh, translated “fast-moving” here]) serpent, [and] made an end of the wriggling serpent, the tyrant with seven heads” (See CTA 5 i 1-3.) sn In the Ugaritic mythological texts Leviathan is a sea creature that symbolizes the destructive water of the sea and in turn the forces of chaos that threaten the established order. Isaiah here applies imagery from Canaanite mythology to Yahweh’s eschatological victory over his enemies. Elsewhere in the OT, the battle with the sea motif is applied to Yahweh’s victories over the forces of chaos at creation and in history (cf. Pss 74:13-14; 77:16-20; 89:9-10; Isa 51:9-10). Yahweh’s subjugation of the chaos waters is related to His kingship (cf. Pss 29:3, 10; 93:3-4). Apocalyptic literature employs the imagery as well. The beasts of Dan 7 emerge from the sea, while Rev 13 speaks of a seven-headed beast coming from the sea.
Isaiah 27:2 tn Heb “in that day” (so KJV).
Isaiah 27:2 tn Heb “vineyard of delight,” or “vineyard of beauty.” Many medieval mss read כֶּרֶם חֶמֶר (kerem khemer, “vineyard of wine”), i.e., “a productive vineyard.”
Isaiah 27:3 tn Heb “her.” Apparently “vineyard” is the antecedent, though normally this noun is understood as masculine (see Lev 25:3, however).
Isaiah 27:3 tn Or perhaps, “constantly.” Heb “by moments.”
Isaiah 27:3 tn Heb “lest [someone] visit [harm] upon it, night and day I guard it.”
Isaiah 27:4 tn Heb “it.” The feminine singular suffix apparently refers back to the expression “thorns and briers,” understood in a collective sense. For other examples of a cohortative expressing resolve after a hypothetical statement introduced by מִי with נָתָן (mi with natan), see Judg 9:29; Jer 9:1-2; Ps 55:6.
Isaiah 27:4 tn Heb “it.” The feminine singular suffix apparently refers back to the expression “thorns and briers,” understood in a collective sense.
Isaiah 27:5 tn Heb “or let him take hold of my refuge.” The subject of the third masculine singular verb form is uncertain. Apparently the symbolic “thorns and briers” are in view, though in v. 4b a feminine singular pronoun was used to refer to them.
Isaiah 27:5 tc The Hebrew text has, “he makes peace with me; peace he makes with me.” Some contend that two alternative readings are preserved here and one should be deleted. The first has the object שָׁלוֹם (shalom, “peace”) preceding the verb עָשָׂה (ʿasah, “make”); the second reverses the order. Another option is to retain both statements, although repetitive, to emphasize the need to make peace with Yahweh.
Isaiah 27:6 tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “the coming ones, let Jacob take root.” הַבָּאִים (habbaʾim, “the coming ones”) should probably be emended to יָמִים בָּאִים (yamim baʾim, “days [are] coming”) or בְּיָמִים הַבָּאִים (biyamim habbaʾim, “in the coming days”).
Isaiah 27:6 tn Heb “fruit” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).
Isaiah 27:6 sn This apparently refers to a future population explosion. See 26:18.

2 Corinthians 5:17-21

¹⁷So then, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; what is old has passed away^[a]—look, what is new^[b] has come!^[c] ¹⁸And all these things are from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and who has given us the ministry of reconciliation. ¹⁹In other words, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting people’s trespasses against them, and he has given us^[d] the message of reconciliation. ²⁰Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making his plea^[e] through us. We plead with you^[f] on Christ’s behalf, “Be reconciled to God!” ²¹God^[g] made the one who did not know sin^[h] to be sin for us, so that in him^[i] we would become the righteousness of God.

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 144[a]

By David.

Footnotes

Footnotes

Footnotes

Psalm 144^[a]