What Does Psalm 94:1 Mean?
O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongs; O God, to whom vengeance belongs, shine forth.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.THE KEY
The doubled claim that vengeance belongs to God turns the cry for justice into a plea for God’s visible presence.
THE MEANING
Your cry for vengeance is held before God: vengeance belongs to the LORD, and the repetition gives the plea its force. “Shew thyself” asks for the one who owns vengeance to become visible where justice is sought.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that justice rests on your own power to avenge gives way: this verse names vengeance as God’s and asks God to appear.
THE ROOT
הופיעה
hophiah
GROWS FROM
יפע
yafaʿ
shine forth, appear with radiance
The verb translated “shew thyself” comes from יפע (yafaʿ, to shine forth), so the plea is for God to become visibly present. Paired with the repeated claim that vengeance belongs to God, the verse asks for justice to emerge into view under its rightful owner.
ALSO GROWS
hophiah: shine forth; appear
הוֹפִיעָה
This is the verse’s own verb, making the plea a call for God’s presence to become visible.
hophia: he shone forth; appeared
הוֹפִיעַ
The same root elsewhere describes God shining forth, revealing the radiance carried inside “shew thyself.”
נקמות
neqamot
GROWS FROM
נקם
naqam
avenge; enact vengeance
The noun “vengeance” and the verb “to avenge” share one root: what can sound like an abstract possession is also an action. Repeated twice, the word anchors the cry in the claim that God owns the act itself.
ALSO GROWS
naqam: to avenge
נָקַם
The verb makes the action inside “vengeance” explicit: the verse calls on God as the one who can enact it.
neqamah: vengeance
נְקָמָה
This related noun carries the same root into the repeated claim that vengeance belongs to God.
THE PATTERN
The claim that vengeance belongs to God becomes a plea for God to appear.
To me belongs vengeance, and repayment. At its appointed time their foot slips, for the day of their falling is near, and what is readied comes hurrying upon them.Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but give room to wrath. For it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will give back, says the LORD.THE THREAD
To me belongs vengeance, and repayment. At its appointed time their foot slips, for the day of their falling is near, and what is readied comes hurrying upon them.Both passages use נקם (naqam, to avenge), and Deuteronomy names vengeance as belonging to God. Psalm 94 turns that same claim into a request for God to appear, joining ownership of justice with its visibility.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us