May their table before them become a trap, and their allies a snare. May their eyes grow too dark to see, make their loins perpetually shake. Pour out upon them Your wrath, and Your blazing fury overtake them. Psalm 69:23-25 [Hebrew Bible] Robert Alter Wrath – Here are your choices: wrath, fury, indignation, anger, judgment,…
Lord, do not rebuke me in Your wrath, and do not punish me in Your burning anger. Psalm 38:1 NASB Punish – Have you ever prayed a prayer like this? Have you reached the point, long after the Lord has redeemed you, long after you recognize your sinful condition and your desperate need for grace, where…
Your wrath has rested upon me, and You have afflicted me with all Your waves. Selah Psalm 88:7 NASB Wrath – God is good, right? Good all the time, right? Then why do we resonate with the thought in this verse? Why do we sometimes feel as if we’re under God’s thumb? “Your wrath” is from the Hebrew…
“His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” Matthew 3:12 NASB Burn up– Very few people in modern society have any sense of history. Yes, we know what happened yesterday, last week, last month. But…
“O LORD, rebuke me not in Your wrath, and chasten me not in Your burning anger.” Psalm 38:1 NASB Rebuke– “Rebuke me not.” The verb is yākaḥ. To convict. To judge. To reprove. Perhaps the translation does not give us the fullest appreciation of David’s plea. Literally, “YHVH, not to me in your wrath convict.” Don’t bring…
“O LORD, rebuke me not in Your wrath, and chasten me not in Your burning anger.” Psalm 38:1 NASB Wrath – “Rebuke me not in Your wrath” we read in English. But the Hebrew is more dramatic. The first word is the prefix “not.” David has fixed the emphasis on what is most desperately needed. “YHVH,…
But if our unrighteousness demonstrates the righteousness of God, what shall we say? The God who inflicts wrath is not unrighteous, is He? (I am speaking in human terms.) Romans 3:5 NASB Inflicts wrath – Is it right for God to inflict wrath (Greek – epipheron orgen)? That might sound like a rather silly question,…
Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand, to execute vengeance on the nations and punishment on the peoples, Psalm 149:6-7 NASB Execute Vengeance – David sounds like a contemporary imam. If they don’t follow YHVH, kill them all! What? Certainly David was a warrior king,…
Who understands the power of Your anger and Your fury, according to the fear that is due You? Psalm 90:11 NASB Power – Read the first verse of this psalm. No, not the first English verse. Read the first verse in the Hebrew text. Let me help you: tefillah le-Moshe ish ha-Elohim (A prayer of…
For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “But the righteous man shall live by faith.” Romans 1:17 NASB Revealed – The Greek verb translated “is revealed” is apokaluptetai. This is present tense – an on-going process. Notice that “is revealed” implies something new. This is…
