Psalm 131

In June I started the second pass at translation and looking for macro structures (see this map). These past two months, I have redrafted 90 psalms. Still I cannot put them all in my head at once for processing their structure. I will continue kneading.

A song of the steps
Of David

יְהוָה my heart is not high
nor are my eyes exalted
nor do I walk in great things
or in wonders beyond me

If I had not stilled and quieted
my life
as one weaned
from its mother
as one weaned
my life

Wait Israel in יְהוָה now and forever

Note: The 'if not' construction seems awkward and incomplete. The Greek makes a different sense of it than traditional translations of the Hebrew. I have not followed the sense or the extra words of the Greek - but it depends on whether you think a weaned child is always well behaved towards its mother or not. The Hebrew is a fragment so I have left it as a half sentence with unstated conclusion. Sometimes I have rendered that verb as matured rather than weaned.

This being the last psalm in my second pass, it is appropriate that I leave it inconclusive, for there is at yet no conclusive summary from me that I can draw from these pages. You will find links to every psalm in the right hand panel.

This month I have also restarted some work on the New Testament and I am republishing a colorful study done 6 years ago on Romans.