Sunday, July 26, 2020

Psalm 91:5-6

I've written about Psalm 91 twice before, but when it was one of the readings on Worship Anew last month, I noticed something else about verses 5-6.  I was following along in my French hymnal, where these verses are:
5 Tu ne craindras ni les terreurs de la nuit,
ni la flèche qui vole au grand jour,
6 ni la peste qui rôde dans le noir,
ni le fléau qui frappe à midi.
The formatting (which I followed) makes it clear that there's anaphora here:  the repeated "ni."  There are four "ni"s, but the corresponding English has a "not" and three "nor"s:
5 You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day, 6 nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness, nor the destruction that wastes at noonday.
It may just be because of the formatting, but I think the French does a better job of evoking a list of things that we need not fear because we have God's protection.  It's as if each "ni" is a separate bullet point.

Additionally, both grammatical genders (masculine "le" and feminine "la") and singular and plural are represented, which gives a sense of entirety.