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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with sequential stories told across multiple weeks.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 6

Psalm 6^[a]

For the music director, to be accompanied by stringed instruments, according to the sheminith style;^[b] a psalm of David.

6 Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger.
Do not discipline me in your raging fury.^[c]
²Have mercy on me,^[d] Lord, for I am frail.
Heal me, Lord, for my bones are shaking.^[e]
³I am absolutely terrified,^[f]
and you, Lord—how long will this continue?^[g]
⁴Relent, Lord, rescue me!^[h]
Deliver me because of your faithfulness.^[i]
⁵For no one remembers you in the realm of death.^[j]
In Sheol who gives you thanks?^[k]
⁶I am exhausted as I groan.
All night long I drench my bed in tears;^[l]
my tears saturate the cushion beneath me.^[m]
⁷My eyes^[n] grow dim^[o] from suffering;
they grow weak^[p] because of all my enemies.^[q]
⁸Turn back from me, all you who behave wickedly,^[r]
for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.^[s]
⁹The Lord has heard my appeal for mercy;
the Lord has accepted^[t] my prayer.
¹⁰They will be humiliated^[u] and absolutely terrified.^[v]
All my enemies will turn back and be suddenly humiliated.

Footnotes

Psalm 6:1 sn Psalm 6. The psalmist begs the Lord to withdraw his anger and spare his life. Having received a positive response to his prayer, the psalmist then confronts his enemies and describes how they retreat.
Psalm 6:1 tn The meaning of the Hebrew term שְׁמִינִית (sh^eminit, “sheminith”) is uncertain; perhaps it refers to a particular style of music. See 1 Chr 15:21.
Psalm 6:1 sn The implication is that the psalmist has sinned, causing God to discipline him by bringing a life-threatening illness upon him (see vv. 2-7).
Psalm 6:2 tn Or “show me favor.”
Psalm 6:2 tn Normally the verb בָּהַל (bahal) refers to an emotional response and means “tremble with fear, be terrified” (see vv. 3, 10). Perhaps here the “bones” are viewed as the seat of the psalmist’s emotions. However, the verb may describe one of the effects of his physical ailment, perhaps a fever. In Ezek 7:27 the verb describes how the hands of the people will shake with fear when they experience the horrors of divine judgment.
Psalm 6:3 tn Heb “my being is very terrified.” The suffixed form of נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, “being”) is often equivalent to a pronoun in poetic texts.
Psalm 6:3 tn Heb “and you, Lord, how long?” The suffering psalmist speaks in broken syntax. He addresses God, but then simply cries out with a brief, but poignant, question: How long will this (= his suffering) continue?
Psalm 6:4 tn Heb “my being,” or “my life.” The suffixed form of נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, “being”) is often equivalent to a pronoun in poetic texts.
Psalm 6:4 sn Deliver me because of your faithfulness. Though the psalmist is experiencing divine discipline, he realizes that God has made a commitment to him in the past, so he appeals to God’s faithfulness in his request for help.
Psalm 6:5 tn Heb “for there is not in death your remembrance.” The Hebrew noun זֵכֶר (zekher, “remembrance”) here refers to the name of the Lord as invoked in liturgy and praise. Cf. Pss 30:4; 97:12. “Death” here refers to the realm of death where the dead reside. See the reference to Sheol in the next line.
Psalm 6:5 tn The rhetorical question anticipates the answer, “no one.”sn In Sheol who gives you thanks? According to the OT, those who descend into the realm of death/Sheol are cut off from God’s mighty deeds and from the worshiping covenant community that experiences divine intervention (Pss 30:9; 88:10-12; Isa 38:18). In his effort to elicit a positive divine response, the psalmist reminds God that he will receive no praise or glory if he allows the psalmist to die. Dead men do not praise God!
Psalm 6:6 tn Heb “I cause to swim through all the night my bed.”
Psalm 6:6 tn Heb “with my tears my bed I flood/melt.”
Psalm 6:7 tn The Hebrew text has the singular “eye” here.
Psalm 6:7 tn Or perhaps, “are swollen.”
Psalm 6:7 tn Or perhaps, “grow old.”
Psalm 6:7 sn In his weakened condition the psalmist is vulnerable to the taunts and threats of his enemies.
Psalm 6:8 tn Heb “all [you] workers of wickedness.” See Ps 5:5.
Psalm 6:8 sn The Lord has heard. The psalmist’s mood abruptly changes because the Lord responded positively to the lament and petition of vv. 1-7 and promised him deliverance.
Psalm 6:9 tn The prefixed verbal form is probably a preterite here; it is parallel to a perfect and refers to the fact that the Lord has responded favorably to the psalmist’s request.
Psalm 6:10 tn In the structure of the Psalm, this verse is either another petition or a statement of confidence. If a petition, the four prefixed verbal forms in this verse should be understood as jussives. By form, many prefixed verbs can be either imperfect or jussive. But the third verb in the series, יָשֻׁבוּ (yashuvu), can be distinguished as an imperfect by its qibbuts theme vowel, and is not a jussive (which would have had a qamets hatuph or holem). Expecting all four verbs to be the same due to parallelism leads to the conclusion that this section is a statement of confidence, in which the imperfect verbs should be treated as future.
Psalm 6:10 sn The psalmist uses the same expression in v. 3 to describe the terror he was experiencing. He is confident that the tables will be turned and his enemies will know what absolute terror feels like.

2 Kings 6:1-7

Elisha Makes an Ax Head Float

6 Some of the prophets^[a] said to Elisha, “Look, the place where we meet with you^[b] is too cramped^[c] for us. ²Let’s go to the Jordan. Each of us will get a log from there, and we will build a meeting place for ourselves there.” He said, “Go.” ³One of them said, “Please come along with your servants.” He replied, “All right, I’ll come.” ⁴So he went with them. When they arrived at the Jordan, they started cutting down trees. ⁵As one of them was felling a tree, the ax head^[d] dropped into the water. He shouted, “Oh no,^[e] my master! It was borrowed!” ⁶The prophet^[f] asked, “Where did it drop in?” When he showed him the spot, Elisha^[g] cut off a branch, threw it in at that spot, and made the ax head float. ⁷He said, “Lift it out.” So he reached out his hand and grabbed it.

Luke 10:13-16

¹³“Woe to you, Chorazin!^[a] Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if^[b] the miracles^[c] done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon,^[d] they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes.^[e] ¹⁴But it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon^[f] in the judgment than for you! ¹⁵And you, Capernaum,^[g] will you be exalted to heaven?^[h] No, you will be thrown down to Hades!^[i]

¹⁶“The one who listens^[j] to you listens to me,^[k] and the one who rejects you rejects me, and the one who rejects me rejects^[l] the one who sent me.”^[m]

Footnotes

Luke 10:13 sn Chorazin was a town of Galilee that was probably fairly small in contrast to Bethsaida and is otherwise unattested. Bethsaida was more significant; it was declared a polis (“city”) by the tetrarch Herod Philip, sometime after a.d. 30.
Luke 10:13 tn This introduces a second class (contrary to fact) condition in the Greek text.
Luke 10:13 tn Or “powerful deeds.”
Luke 10:13 sn Tyre and Sidon are two other notorious OT cities (Isa 23; Jer 25:22; 47:4). The remark is a severe rebuke, in effect: “Even the hardened sinners of the old era would have responded to the proclamation of the kingdom and repented, unlike you!”
Luke 10:13 sn To clothe oneself in sackcloth and ashes was a public sign of mourning or lament, in this case for past behavior and associated with repentance.
Luke 10:14 sn Jesus’ general point is that in the day of judgment the Gentile cities will come off better than the cities of Galilee. This is not to indicate toleration for the sins of the Gentile cities, but to show how badly the judgment will go for the Galilean ones. In the OT prophetic oracles were pronounced repeatedly against Tyre and Sidon: Isa 23:1-18; Ezek 26:1-28:26; Joel 4:4; Zech 9:2-4.
Luke 10:15 sn Capernaum was a town located on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, 680 ft (204 m) below sea level. It existed since Hasmonean times and was a major trade and economic center in the North Galilean region. The population in the first century is estimated to be around 1,500. Capernaum became the hub of operations for Jesus’ Galilean ministry (Matt 4:13; Mark 2:1). In modern times the site was discovered in 1838 by the American explorer E. Robinson, and major excavations began in 1905 by German archaeologists H. Kohl and C. Watzinger. Not until 1968, however, were remains from the time of Jesus visible; in that year V. Corbo and S. Loffreda began a series of annual archaeological campaigns that lasted until 1985. This work uncovered what is thought to be the house of Simon Peter as well as ruins of the first century synagogue beneath the later synagogue from the fourth or fifth century A.D. Today gently rolling hills and date palms frame the first century site, a favorite tourist destination of visitors to the Galilee.
Luke 10:15 tn The interrogative particle introducing this question expects a negative reply.
Luke 10:15 sn In the OT, Hades was known as Sheol. It is the place where the unrighteous will reside (Matt 11:23; Luke 16:23; Rev 20:13-14).
Luke 10:16 tn Grk “hears you,” but as the context of vv. 8-9 makes clear, it is response that is the point. In contemporary English, “listen to” is one way to express this function (L&N 31.56).
Luke 10:16 sn Jesus linked himself to the disciples’ message: Responding to the disciples (listens to you) counts as responding to him.
Luke 10:16 tn The double mention of rejection in this clause—ἀθετῶν ἀθετεῖ (athetōn athetei) in the Greek text—keeps up the emphasis of the section.
Luke 10:16 sn The one who sent me refers to God.

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Psalm 6[a]

For the music director, to be accompanied by stringed instruments, according to the sheminith style;[b] a psalm of David.

Footnotes

Elisha Makes an Ax Head Float

Footnotes

Footnotes

Psalm 6^[a]

For the music director, to be accompanied by stringed instruments, according to the sheminith style;^[b] a psalm of David.