Psalms 37:16

THE RIGHTEOUS AND THE WICKED CONTRASTED

"Better is a little that the righteous hath

Than the abundance of many wicked.

For the arms of the wicked shall be broken;

But Jehovah upholdeth the righteous.

Jehovah knoweth the days of the perfect;

And the days of their inheritance shall be forever.

They shall not be put to shame in the time of evil;

And in the days of famine they shall be satisfied.

But the wicked shall perish,

And the enemies of Jehovah shall be as the fat of lambs.

They shall consume; in smoke shall they consume away.

The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again;

But the righteous dealeth graciously, and giveth.

For such as are blessed of him shall inherit the land;

And they that are cursed of him shall be cut off."

As Ash noted, "Throughout the remainder of this psalm, either the righteous or the wicked are mentioned in practically every verse."[9]

"Better than the abundance of the wicked" (Psalms 37:16). As Spurgeon noted, "For a wicked heart, the whole world is not enough."[10] The greed, envy, and covetousness that eat like a cancer in the heart of the wicked are insatiable, while the child of God learns with the apostles that "godliness with contentment" is great gain.

"The enemies of Jehovah shall be as the fat of lambs" (Psalms 37:20). We are certain that the RSV rendition of this place is erroneous. It reads, "The enemies of the Lord are like the glory of the pastures." (1) "The Hebrew word here commonly and properly means `lamb'; but it also may mean the meadow or pasture where lambs feed."[11] This is another instance in which translators deliberately choose the least appropriate meaning in a situation of multiple choices. The fact that the common and ordinary meaning of the word here is `lamb' strongly favors the American Standard Version rendition.

(2) But that is not all. The genius of Hebrew poetry has the advantage of repeating the meaning in the next line; and here that settles the matter. The reason why God's enemies are like the fat of lambs is that they shall eventually be burned up, just like the fat of the sacrifices was always burned (See Exodus 29:13-25). Notice how that thought is echoed in the next clause: "They shall consume; in smoke shall they consume away"!

What are the grounds, then, upon which the RSV rejected the ancient versions and came up with their recent change? It is here stated by Rawlinson:

"Both translations are tenable; but the RSV is preferable, since the consumption of the fat of lambs upon the altar is connected with the idea, not of rejection, but of acceptance."[12]

To us this excuse is absolutely untenable as any adequate explanation of the RSV error. Some of the scholars try to make the new translation fit, by pointing out that sometimes pastures had to be burned off; and that, of course, would harmonize with the `smoke' in the second clause; but lambs do not feed in a pasture that is being `burned off.' Furthermore, the new rendition speaks of "the glory of the pastures"; and where do they get that?