Some translations (Revised Standard Version, New American Bible) take the first three clauses in a conditional sense (“If you try…” or “Should you try…”); others, like Good News Translation, Bible en français courant, Biblia Dios Habla Hoy, New Jerusalem Bible, take them as statements of fact. Either is possible, but it seems better to follow Good News Translation and others and translate as a statement. In some languages it is not natural to express a series of conditional clauses followed by a single consequence, as in Revised Standard Version. In such cases it will be best to follow Good News Translation. In some cases line a will appear misplaced, because it will seem more natural to occur after line c, as a consequence of lines b and c. This is not necessarily the case where these lines are rendered as conditional clauses.

The psalmist protests that he is completely innocent. (1) If thou triest (or, If you examine) my heart (“triest” is the same verb used in 7.9). (2) If thou visitest me by night (the verb is translated “care for” in 8.4). This visitation by night may imply a night spent in the Temple, where the psalmist would, perhaps by means of dreams or visions, be aware of the presence of Yahweh. (3) If thou testest me is literally “refine” (see use of “refined” and comments in 12.6). This is a picture of one undergoing “fiery” tests in order to have all impurities removed. In some languages it is possible to maintain the imagery of refining; for example, “You have tried me by putting me in fire.” Or it is sometimes possible to restructure this line as a simile; for example, “You have tried me as gold is refined in fire.”

As a result of all this examining and testing, thou wilt find no wickedness in me. This rendering (same meaning as in Good News Translation, New English Bible, New American Bible) involves a slight change in the Hebrew text, which says “you will find nothing, I have purposed”; with a change of vowels the word for “I have purposed” becomes “my evil conduct” (see 26.10a; 119.150a). Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, however, prefers to keep the Hebrew text form, for which there are two possible interpretations in the context of the line that follows: (1) “my plans (thoughts) do not go beyond my mouth,” which means, my thoughts and my words agree; (2) “if I devise something wicked, this should not cross my mouth,” that is, I must not reveal any wicked thoughts I have had.

The next statement, my mouth does not transgress (Good News Translation “I speak no evil”), may be taken as an independent statement (Revised Standard Version and others), or else it may be connected to the following two Hebrew words, which are the beginning of verse 4, “according to the deeds of man.” Good News Translation has followed the latter alternative, translating “as others do”; see New Jerusalem Bible “I have not sinned with my mouth as most people do” (also New American Bible, Biblia Dios Habla Hoy). It is also possible to have “I utter no evil plan. * However other men act….” New English Bible and New Jerusalem Bible represent other ways of handling the text. My mouth does not transgress is sometimes rendered idiomatically; for example, “I speak with one mouth” or “The words I speak are straight.”

Revised Standard Version takes the first two words of the Hebrew text of verse 4 as a clause that is connected to what follows: With regard to the works of men …. This makes for a complex structure, not easy to understand.

“I have obeyed your command” (Good News Translation) translates what appears in Revised Standard Version as by the word of thy lips. Revised Standard Version connects this phrase with what follows: by the word of thy lips I have avoided the ways of the violent (also Biblia Dios Habla Hoy). But there is difficulty with the Hebrew passage which Revised Standard Version translates I have avoided the ways of the violent. The Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation renderings seem to involve taking the verb meaning “keep, obey, observe” (see New American Bible “I have kept the ways of the law”) in the sense “I have kept from,” thus rendering I have avoided. But this normally requires the Hebrew preposition “from” (as in 121.7), which is not here, or else it requires the passive form of the verb, “I have been kept from.” The Syriac (according to Briggs) supplies the preposition “from”: “I have kept from.” Delitzsch and others say that here the statement “I have kept the paths of the violent” has the implication “I have kept from going along them,” and point to the use of the same verb in 1 Samuel 25.21; but in this passage the verb may mean “to guard, protect.” K-B classifies the verb here in the same category in which it is used in 1 Samuel 1.12, “Eli observed her mouth” (see also Zech 11.11 “watching me”). So here the Hebrew text may mean “I have observed the paths of violent people.” So New Jerusalem Bible “I have kept in view of the fate of the lawless.” Revised Standard Version have avoided and Good News Translation “have not followed” have the same meaning.

Ways translates the same word used in 16.11, “path.” New Jerusalem Bible translates “fate,” and in the margin it refers to this meaning for “paths” in Proverbs 1.19; Traduction œcuménique de la Bible has “I have followed the prescribed paths.” The word translated the violent is literally a burglar, a robber (the word appears only here in Psalms); see Jeremiah 7.11 “a den of robbers.” The ways of the violent must often be restructured in translation, because the reference is to people who behave in a violent manner; for example, “I have not acted with anger” or “I have not followed the path of men who use strong force against others.”

One possible way to translate the three lines is:

• I speak no evil,
4 nor have I followed men’s evil deeds and violent ways,
for I have obeyed your command.

Bible en français courant translates as follows:

I have made no comments
4 on the actions of others,
but I have applied myself
to do what you have commanded.
On the difficult path
5 I firmly keep my feet.

There are almost as many different renditions of these lines as there are commentaries and translations. The Septuagint translates the second part of verse 4 “because of the words of your lips I have kept to difficult paths.”

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Reyburn, William D. A Handbook on the Book of Psalms. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1991. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .