Psalms 129 WEB
Summary: A Song of Ascents reflecting on Israel's long history of suffering, opening with a repeated refrain: "Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say" (v. 1-2), yet affirming that oppressors "have not prevailed against me." It uses the image of plowmen cutting furrows on the psalmist's back — "the plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows" (v. 3) — before God is credited with cutting the wicked free of their bonds. It closes wishing haters of Zion to be "as the grass upon the housetops, which withereth afore it groweth up" (v. 6), unable to yield any harvest.
1Many times they have afflicted me from my youth up. Let Israel now say,
2many times they have afflicted me from my youth up, yet they have not prevailed against me.
3The plowers plowed on my back. They made their furrows long.
4Yahweh is righteous. He has cut apart the cords of the wicked.
5Let them be disappointed and turned backward, all those who hate Zion.
6Let them be as the grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows up,
7with which the reaper doesn’t fill his hand, nor he who binds sheaves, his bosom.
8Neither do those who go by say, “The blessing of Yahweh be on you. We bless you in Yahweh’s name.”
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