I said to the LORD, “My Master You are, my good is only through You.” Psalm 16:2 Robert Alter (Hebrew numbering) Is only through You – “The textual difficulties of this whole segment of the poem being here, because the Hebrew bal-‘aleikha is unclear.”[1] Here are a few other attempts to translate this: I said…
You have said to YHWH, “You are my Lord, I have no good apart from You.” Psalm 16:2 No Goodness – It helps if we see the literal rendering of this verse. “My goodness is not apart from You.” Why is this important? Because the difference in the word order shows us what is emphasized…
You have said to YHWH, “You are my Lord, I have no goodness except in You.” Psalm 16:2 Said – The Hebrew verb amar is fairly common. It is used in all kinds of situations where the next phrase is a quotation. Since Hebrew has no punctuation, it’s a useful little verb, showing us…
I said to the LORD, “You are my Lord; I have no good besides You.” Psalm 16:2 Besides – The particle al (Ayin-Lamed) in Hebrew has a very wide range of meanings. It covers the ground from according to, on account of, on behalf of, concerning, beside, in addition to, together with, beyond, above, over,…
