Devotional Short-Note on Psalm 57 (Latin is 56/57 in Hebrew). Church Father Jerome was in Bethlehem when he translated the Psalms from Hebrew manuscript copies that he acquired somewhere. The manuscripts had slips on them and one can see it every now and then.

When he came to the same word that is the first word in the Hebrew Psalm line, but which is in Job 34:36, he translated it in Job with “to the end” = ad finem but here in Psalm 57:1 he translated it with “for victory” = pro victoria. Where Jerome got victory from is a good question. The word had a meaning in Aramaic, Phoenician and Syriac also as “victorious” like in conquering, so that is how Jerome chose that meaning.

His way of translation is literal so that the next phrase in Hebrew was translated by him “destroy not”. It is correct and as literal as possible to the Hebrew text. Other translations in modern times only read “Al-tashheth”.

Jerome’s copy had many slips and was written continuously without the help of word-divisions as we have it in modern times. So he had to divide it by himself. Jerome misread or his reader to him misread or actually the copy that was made to serve him was in letter not to clear so that he misread the original Hebrew instead of the proper miktam it was read by Jerome as makak = humiliated so he translated it as humilem whereas most modern translation read it as Michtam.

Those who visited his cave where he did the translations of the Scriptures in Latin during the 380’s, it is pretty dark in there and he was a geronti on top of it. With all due respect, much can fall through the cracks. Many people thought that Jerome just got to his translation based on semantics or understanding of meanings. Not so. A degenerative Hebrew text, or failing eyes, or illegible letters on a good text, or misdivision of letters could be the reason for differences in his translation. In this case, Jerome misdivided two letters tam, the last part of Michtam as “simple” and translated it as “simplicem” inserting a non-existent “and” in the original Hebrew, in his translation. His translation was: “For victory and not ruining humble and simple David, when he fled from Saul in the cave”. The original read “For that which pertain to the end, do not destroy to David Michtam in his fleeing from the face of Saul in a cave”.

In verse two where David starts to pray for God to be his refuge, Jerome is very literal even following the original Hebrew word-order exactly in the following example: “until calamities be overpassed” but Jerome had it more correct in order with “donec transeant insidiae” = “until pass by incidents”. We see the desire of Jerome to be faithful to the text he was to translate in 388 A.D. but he could not fully since the text was degenerative and word-divisions made it complicated for him. Sometimes the text was so bad that the letters kind of flow into each other so that Jerome read in Psalm 57:3 instead of the original Hebrew “to God Who accomplished over me” a rather fusion of two words in one: “to God Who revenge for me” in which he made the word gomer alay as one word gemulay meaning “recompense” or “reward of God” thus God’s vengeance on enemies as recompensation for the faithful. Jerome had it as Deum ultorem meum.

Jerome sometimes translated the tenses of the verbs correctly but in Psalm 57:4 we see him leaning on his own understanding of the text instead of letting the text dictates his translation: Instead of translating the future forms of the verbs in verse 4, Jerome translated it as past. Jerome had it: “He has sent from heaven and saved me” in Latin of the Vulgate as mittet de caelo et salvabit me. This is not correct according to the original Hebrew that reads: “He will send from heaven and He will save me.”

Jerome was eager not to paraphrase but to bring a literal translation, yet here we find him committing a very serious error. It will make what are promises in the Word of God already established events in the past. Imagine what will happen with the prophecies instead of future to use the past as if it already came to pass. The same error was done it he last part of the verse. David did not yet receive truth or mercy or a special team from heaven to come and save him. In this sense all of us are waiting for the team to come at the Second Coming but here Jerome wrote the verse off as locked in that past and of no value to us in the present.

David is fond of this phrase “like a lion” and in Psalm 7:3 one also finds him using a similar phrase that his soul is in the presence of a metaphorical lion. It is all about communication, language, words people use, the interplay between serious and satire, upfront or gossip, open or hidden in indirect references and metaphors. In an article that was reprinted in the late 1950’s in Signs of the Times from “United Evangelical Action” it said about Catholic Spain the following: “…Spain no longer kills Protestants - - it just makes it impossible for them to live. The idea is to exterminate the Protestants by simply making life ‘rough’ for them….” They cannot be in the government, cannot conduct weddings or funerals, cannot distribute Bibles of literature without permission, and the list goes on in the source.

This is also a case of finding oneself among the lions. “whose teeth are spears and arrows and their tongues a sharp sword” (57:5b-c). In this last part of the citation, Jerome kept precisely to the Hebrew word order in his Latin translation: et lingua eorum gladius acutus “and their tongues sharp swords” [and tongues their swords sharp = Hebrew and Jerome’s Latin Vulgate].

Since Jerome painstakingly translated hyper-literal, every deviation from the Hebrew original that we have today needs an answer in the form of the text and not necessarily just operations in his cognition.

In the translation of 57:6b Jerome was translating against painstakingly literal in word-order almost 100% in comparison to the original Hebrew. Unfortunately the preposition in Hebrew does not read “in all the earth” but “over all the earth”. Jerome translated exaltare super caelos Deus in omni terra gloria tua but should have translated it as exaltare super caelos Deus [super] omni terra gloria tua. David says that his enemies have gone to great length to work his fall or downfall in many constructive ways but just like Haman and Mordechai, the Haman syndrome led to their own downfall instead of that of David (57:7). There are many Hamans around all of us. There is a God in heaven that takes care of us as well. We also have nets and pits carved out for us but many times they fall in it instead of us.

David is stable and will sing praises to God (57:8). He will do it with musical instruments. Jerome used the word cithara for “harp” which is kenor in Hebrew. Our English word quitar is from these words. Let me cite from an article which I am working on now:

Quitar

Cithara in Latin is kenor in Hebrew; kenar in Syriac; kana’ara in Arabic. In Syriac there is a loanword from Greek as qitar. In Greek it is kithara.

Hebrew                           k                         n                         r

Greek                              k                         t                         r

Latin                               c                         th                       r

Syriac                              k                         n                         r

Arabic                             k                         n           ‘            r

English                            q                         t                         r

David wants to “awake early” or at dawn. Neon lights, solar lights and LED lights have made it possible for all of us to stay awake until past midnight so that we do not have energy to wake with the dawn like David. Some people force themselves to go to bed early so that they can wake at dawn. They say it is the best quality of worship that they get that time of the morning. David is not only going to sing to Hebrews or his own people. He is going to give thanks “among the peoples” (57:10a) and “among the nations” (57:10b). God had no special race in the Old Testament. He had a special faithful group of people from all nations. Ruth was a Moabite and, and, and. God’s truth and mercy is very big (57:11) and yet the Nano he created is very small. The Fingerprint of God is all over nature and the universe. God’s glory is above all the earth and God is exalted over all the earth, says David and we know what he is talking about.