Psalm 48:2–5

Footnotes

1. 2 Heb “beautiful of height.” The Hebrew term נוֹף (nof, “height”) is a genitive of specification after the qualitative noun “beautiful.” The idea seems to be that Mount Zion, because of its lofty appearance, is pleasing to the sight.
2. 3 A source of joy to the whole earth. The language is hyperbolic. Zion, as the dwelling place of the universal king, is pictured as the world’s capital. The prophets anticipated this idealized picture becoming a reality in the eschaton (see Isa 2:1–4).
3. 4 Heb “Mount Zion, the peaks of Zaphon.” Like all the preceding phrases in v. 2, both phrases are appositional to “city of our God, his holy hill” in v. 1, suggesting an identification in the poet’s mind between Mount Zion and Zaphon. “Zaphon” usually refers to the “north” in a general sense (see Pss 89:12; 107:3), but here, where it is collocated with “peaks,” it refers specifically to Mount Zaphon, located in the vicinity of ancient Ugarit and viewed as the mountain where the gods assembled (see Isa 14:13). By alluding to West Semitic mythology in this way, the psalm affirms that Mount Zion is the real divine mountain, for it is here that the Lord God of Israel lives and rules over the nations. See P. Craigie, Psalms 1–50 (), , and T. N. D. Mettinger, In Search of God, 103.
4. 5 Heb “he is known for an elevated place.”
5. 6 The logical connection between vv. 3–4 seems to be this: God is the protector of Zion and reveals himself as the city’s defender—this is necessary because hostile armies threaten the city.
6. 7 The perfect verbal forms in vv. 4–6 are understood as descriptive. In dramatic style (note הִנֵּה, hinneh, “look”) the psalm describes an enemy attack against the city as if it were occurring at this very moment. Another option is to take the perfects as narrational (“the kings assembled, they advanced”), referring to a particular historical event, such as Sennacherib’s siege of the city in 701 b.c. (cf. , ). Even if one translates the verses in a dramatic-descriptive manner (as the present translation does), the Lord’s victory over the Assyrians was probably what served as the inspiration of the description (see v. 8).
7. 8 The object of “see” is omitted, but v. 3b suggests that the Lord’s self-revelation as the city’s defender is what they see.
8. 9 Heb “they look, so they are shocked.” Here כֵּן (ken, “so”) has the force of “in the same measure.”
9. 10 The translation attempts to reflect the staccato style of the Hebrew text, where the main clauses of vv. 4–6 are simply juxtaposed without connectives.