The two similes in verse 8 are also reasonably clear, but it should be noted: (1) Snail translates a word found only here in the Old Testament; some take it to mean “beeswax,” and others “worm.” G. R. Driver takes the word to be synonymous with “abortion” in line b (see New English Bible “like an abortive birth which melts away”); most translate as do Good News Translation and Revised Standard Version. It seems that it was thought, from the trail of slime left by a snail, that the snail gradually dissolves, and finally there is nothing left but the empty snail shell. (2) The verb translated dissolves also occurs only here in the Old Testament, but its meaning is reasonably certain.

The simile in verse 8b is clear enough; see Job 3.16; Ecclesiastes 6.3 for the same figure. The untimely birth: a more normal way in English to say this would be either “a stillborn child” or “an aborted fetus.”

The difficulty, not to say the impossibility, of translating verse 9 can be demonstrated by the fact that Dahood does not provide a translation of it and confesses: “The Hebrew of this verse is unintelligible to me.” He rightly scores Revised Standard Version for not giving any indication of the impossibility of making sense of the Masoretic text. It would be of little practical use to list the many ways in which the text has been handled. No two translations agree completely, and all (including even New International Version) have textual footnotes. Whatever course a translator takes, a note should indicate that the Hebrew makes little sense. Notice how two translations in English have rendered the same Hebrew text: New Jerusalem Bible “Before the thorns grow into a bramble, may He whirl them away alive in fury”; New English Bible “All unawares, may they be rooted up like a thorn-bush, like weeds which a man angrily clears away!”; and one other suggested version, “Before their pots feel the heat of the thorns, whether green or dry, may God sweep them away.”8-9 Hebrew Old Testament Text Project (“A” decision) says the Masoretic text is difficult and can be interpreted in two ways: (1) “before your kettles were aware of the thorn, the stormwind wipes away, be it green or dry!”; (2) “before your thorns rise to a bush: while it is (still) green, the stormwind wipes it away (as if it were) dried!”

Good News Translation translates an emended text which mostly follows G. R. Driver’s reconstruction in “Studies in the Vocabulary of the O.T. V,” Journal of Theological Studies 34 (1933), page 44; see also Anderson.

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 .