1A song of ascents.
Much they beset me from my youth
2much they beset me from my youth,
yet they did not prevail over me.
3My back the harrowers harrowed,
they drew a long furrow.
4The LORD is just.
He has slashed the bonds of the wicked.
5May they be shamed and fall back,
all the haters of Zion.
6May they be like the grass on rooftops
that the east wind withers,
7with which no reaper fills his hand,
no binder of sheaves his bosom,
8and no passersby say, “The LORD’s blessing upon you!
We bless you in the name of the LORD.”
PSALM 129 NOTES
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1. Much they beset me from my youth. The first-person language makes this initially sound like an individual complaint, but as the reference to “the haters of Zion” in verse 5 indicates, the first person is speaking on behalf of the nation, and the enemies referred to are probably the foreign oppressors who have conquered Judah.
let Israel now say. As in Psalm 124:1, this interjection would be words of direction called out by the choral leader.
3. harrowers . . . / furrow. This agricultural image for laceration and torment, vivid enough in itself, leads (moving chronologically from plowing to reaping) to the agricultural simile of the curse in verses 6–8.
6. like the grass on rooftops. Grass uprooted to serve as thatch of course quickly withers.
that the east wind withers. The Masoretic Text, sheqadmat shalaf yavesh, is opaque. One might translate it as “before it is pulled up it dries out,” but the (Aramaic?) form of the first word is peculiar, and the grammar of the second word (it shows the form of an active transitive verb) is wrong. This translation follows an emendation first proposed by Hermann Gunkel, sheqadim tishdof.
7. no reaper fills his hand, / no binder of sheaves his bosom. The withered, wind-blasted grass on the rooftops produces an anti-harvest—nothing to grasp, nothing to bind and gather in. This image for the fate of the wicked is related to the one used in Psalm 1:4, “like chaff that the wind drives away.”
8. The LORD’s blessing upon you. These words are fairly close to the exchange of greetings between Boaz and the harvesters in Ruth 2:4, so one may assume that such formulas of mutual blessing were customarily exchanged between reapers and passersby during the harvest, itself a season of blessing through the produce of the fields. For this reason, it makes better sense to construe “We bless you in the name of the LORD” as part of this harvest dialogue and not as a liturgical benediction at the end of the psalm. In Ruth, it should be observed, both Boaz and the harvesters pronounce blessings.