Prosody of Ps. 22:1
As follow up to John's posts about the ISV, I would like to ask him, or anyone else, to comment on the first verse of Psalm 22.
אֵלִי אֵלִי, לָמָה עֲזַבְתָּנִי
רָחוֹק מִישׁוּעָתִי, דִּבְרֵי שַׁאֲגָתִי
- Deus, Deus meus, respice in me : quare me dereliquisti ?
longe a salute mea verba delictorum meorum.
Vulgate
Deus Deus meus quare dereliquisti me
longe a salute mea verba rugitus mei
Jerome's Hebraica
Deus mi deus mi utquid dereliquisti me,
elongates es a salute me,
et a verbis rugitus mei
Pagnini
- O God my God, look upon me: why hast thou forsaken me?
Far from my salvation are the words of my sins.
- My God, my God: why hast thou forsaken me?
the words of my complaint are far from my health.
- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
why art thou so far from helping me,
and from the words of my roaring?
- My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me,
and art far from my help at the words of my cry.
posted by Suzanne McCarthy at 3:49 PM
5 Comments:
Hi Suzanne,
you sure picked an interesting verse. From the prosodic point of view, Psalm 22:2 (using the numbering system I'm used to) consists of two lines, each of which is made up of two versets. The structure is:
2:2
2:2
The verse is bisected by the appropriate cantillation mark after עֲזַבְתָּנִי.
The commas that you have in the Hebrew are rightly placed.
Scanned according to my text model, Ps 22 is a 40 line (22 + 18), 90 verset (50 + 40) poem. I should post the whole thing, shouldn't I?
The semantics of the line beginning with רָחוֹק far from clear. But that is another topic.
Sorry about the numbering system. I reviewed a dozen translations of this verse today and lost track of the details.
Would it look better to format this verse this way,
My God, My God,
Why have you forsaken me?
Why art thou so far from helping me,
So far from the words of my roaring?
The extra "and" was put into the Pagnini version in italics and I didn't represent that. It was an italic ampersand. It took me a minute to realize that it was italics on purpose.
Also, the other translations have "God, my God" but Pagnini's is closer to the Hebrew, "My God, my God" - more poetic and accurate.
Luther's translation is also good. I enjoy his Psalms a lot. They have very simple language but they are very poetic just the same.
PS I would love to see the whole psalm in Jerome's Hebraica also.
Hi Suzanne - I put my $.02 on my blog at http://drmacdonald.blogspot.com/2007/08/practising-new-not-quite-skill.html
Thanks for all the stimulating posts.
Suzanne,
I like your formatting and your translation. The prosodic hierarchy might be put in greater evidence by formatting as follows:
My God, my God,
why have you forsaken me?
Why are thou so far from helping me,
so far from the words of my roaring?
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