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Psalm 12 · a question people ask

"You will keep them, LORD" (12:7). Who are "them"?

In the text

The verse doesn't name them: "You will keep them, LORD. You will preserve them from this generation forever" (12:7). The nearest before it are the LORD's words: "The LORD’s words are flawless words" (12:6). Before that come the people the LORD speaks for, "the weak" and "the needy", and "I will set him in safety from those who malign him" (12:5). The Hebrew doesn't settle it plainly either. In the Westminster Leningrad Codex as the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible tags it, the first verb, keep, ends in a plural them, and the second, preserve, in a singular ending, where the WEB has them for both. The verse can be read with the words in mind, or the weak and needy. It doesn't say which, and these notes don't choose.

The verses

““Because of the oppression of the weak and because of the groaning of the needy, I will now arise,” says the LORD; “I will set him in safety from those who malign him.” The LORD’s words are flawless words, as silver refined in a clay furnace, purified seven times. You will keep them, LORD. You will preserve them from this generation forever.”
Psalm 12:5-7 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Psalm 12

Psalm 12: Flawless words

Psalm 12 is words against words: empty speech, smooth lips and a double heart (in Hebrew, heart said twice), and the boast "Who is lord over us?" (12:4). Then the LORD speaks for himself, "I will now arise" (12:5), the verb the psalms cry to him with, and the psalm calls his words silver refined, "purified seven times" (12:6).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions