The Rough Road

You have taken account of my miseries; put my tears in Your bottle.  Are they not in Your book?  Psalm 56:8  NASB

Miseries – There’s been a change.  Between the 1995 version of the NASB and the contemporary one, the word nôdi was changed from “wanderings” to “miseries.”  Here’s the 1995 translation:

You have taken account of my wanderings; put my tears in Your bottle.  Are they not in Your book?  NASB 1995

And here’s the translation from Chabad:

You counted my wanderings; place my tears in Your flask. Is it not in Your accounting?  Chabad

נֹדִי֘ סָפַ֪רְתָּה֫ אָ֥תָּה שִׂ֣ימָה דִמְעָתִ֣י בְנֹאדֶ֑ךָ הֲ֜לֹ֗א בְּסִפְרָתֶֽךָ

So, why the change?  Well, let’s look at the umbrella of meaning for the Hebrew nûd.

נוּד (nûd) wander; have compassion on.

Derivatives

1319a  נוֹד (nôd), נֹד (nōd) wandering of aimless fugitive (Ps 59:9).

1319b  נִיד (nîd) quivering motion of lips (Job 16:5).

1319c  מָנוֹד (mānôd) a shaking, wagging (Ps 44:15, only).^[1]

 nûd basically denotes a going back and forth. It is applied to a physical movement or an attitude. Cf. Arabaic nāda“move to and fro” (as the head of one falling asleep). The two connotations of our word are evidenced by its parallels and synonyms. First, our word is parallel to nḥm (Isa 51:19) “to comfort,” “be sorry for someone or one’s self,” and ḥml (Jer 15:5) “to spare,” “have compassion on.” Secondly, cf. nûaʿ “wander unstably,” “move unsteadily,” “wag one’s head mockingly” (Gen 4:12). It is important to note that the root sometimes equals or is similar to nādad “to flee in disorderly retreat”; hence, it is paralleled to nûs “flee” (Jer 4:30) and contrasted to ḥāsâ “take refuge” (Ps 11:1), and cf. Prov 27:8. Our verb occurs twenty-seven times.

The basic meaning, to wander aimlessly and/or homelessly, is seen in the curse God placed upon Cain (Gen 4:12, 14). . . This to and fro movement is also typical of the nodding of one’s head “as a sign of pity that sympathizes with one and recognizes the magnitude of the evil” (KD; Ps 69:20 [H 21]).^[2]

The contemporary version of the NASB has replaced the usual meaning with a metaphorical one, derived from the expression of sympathy in nodding the head.  But doesn’t this extrapolation alter the basic meaning?  Isn’t there a significant difference between “miseries” and “wanderings”?  The current version of the NASB makes it seem as if God takes into account my afflictions (which, of course, He does) but it eliminates the sense of confusion and mistaken direction that comes with wandering, an action that does not necessarily imply suffering.  What is the difference in the feeling if I say, “God knows about all my back and forth decisions” versus “God knows about my miseries”?

I prefer the original.  Why?  Because I’d like to think that God pays attention to all my misdirection, not just my suffering.  I’d like to realize that He is concerned with all the times I went one way and then another, even if it wasn’t miserable.  I’d like to know that He feels the pain in my tears when I tried to turn around again.  “Miseries” isn’t quite big enough to capture all the frustration, confusion, the aimlessness, and hopelessness that came with the sense that I just keep going over the same ground without getting anywhere.

Topical Index: nûd, wandering, misery, Psalm 56:8

^[1] Coppes, L. J. (1999). 1319 נוּד. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 560). Moody Press.

KD K. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament

^[2] Ibid.