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Psalm 95[a]

95 Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord.
Let us shout out praises to our Protector who delivers us.[b]
Let us enter his presence[c] with thanksgiving.
Let us shout out to him in celebration.[d]
For the Lord is a great God,
a great king who is superior to[e] all gods.
The depths of the earth are in his hand,[f]
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
The sea is his, for he made it.
His hands formed the dry land.
Come, let us bow down and worship.[g]
Let us kneel before the Lord, our Creator.
For he is our God;
we are the people of his pasture,
the sheep he owns.[h]
Today, if only you would obey him.[i]
He says,[j] “Do not be stubborn like they were at Meribah,[k]
like they were that day at Massah[l] in the wilderness,[m]
where your ancestors challenged my authority,[n]
and tried my patience, even though they had seen my work.
10 For forty years I was continually disgusted[o] with that generation,
and I said, ‘These people desire to go astray;[p]
they do not obey my commands.’[q]
11 So I made a vow in my anger,
‘They will never enter into the resting place I had set aside for them.’”[r]

Footnotes

  1. Psalm 95:1 sn Psalm 95. The psalmist summons Israel to praise God as the creator of the world and the nation’s protector, but he also reminds the people not to rebel against God.
  2. Psalm 95:1 tn Heb “to the rocky summit of our deliverance.”
  3. Psalm 95:2 tn Heb “meet his face.”
  4. Psalm 95:2 tn Heb “with songs of joy.”
  5. Psalm 95:3 tn Heb “above.”
  6. Psalm 95:4 tn The phrase “in his hand” means within the sphere of his authority.
  7. Psalm 95:6 tn Heb “kneel down.”
  8. Psalm 95:7 tn Heb “of his hand.”
  9. Psalm 95:7 tn Heb “if only you would listen to his voice.” The Hebrew particle אִם (ʾim, “if”) and following prefixed verbal form here express a wish (cf. Ps 81:8). Note that the apodosis (the “then” clause of the conditional sentence) is suppressed.
  10. Psalm 95:8 tn The words “he says” are supplied in the translation to clarify that the following words are spoken by the Lord (see vv. 9-11).
  11. Psalm 95:8 sn The name Meribah means “strife.” Two separate but similar incidents at Meribah are recorded in the Pentateuch (Exod 17:1-7; Num 20:1-13, see also Pss 81:7; 106:32). In both cases the Israelites complained about lack of water and the Lord miraculously provided for them.
  12. Psalm 95:8 sn The name Massah means “testing.” This was another name (along with Meribah) given to the place where Israel complained following the Red Sea Crossing (see Exod 17:1-7, as well as Deut 6:16; 9:22; 33:8).
  13. Psalm 95:8 tn Heb “do not harden your heart[s] as [at] Meribah, as [in] the day of Massah in the wilderness.”
  14. Psalm 95:9 tn Heb “where your fathers tested me.”
  15. Psalm 95:10 tn The prefixed verbal form is either a preterite or an imperfect. If the latter, it emphasizes the ongoing nature of the condition in the past. The translation reflects this interpretation of the verbal form.
  16. Psalm 95:10 tn Heb “a people, wanderers of heart [are] they.”
  17. Psalm 95:10 tn Heb “and they do not know my ways.” In this context the Lord’s “ways” are his commands, viewed as a pathway from which his people, likened to wayward sheep (see v. 7), wander.
  18. Psalm 95:11 tn Heb “my resting place.” The promised land of Canaan is here viewed metaphorically as a place of rest for God’s people, who are compared to sheep (see v. 7).