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Psalm 30 · a question people ask

"Shall the dust praise you?" (30:9). Is the psalmist bargaining with God?

In the text

The psalm gives these words as his cry: "I cried to you, LORD. I made supplication to the Lord" (30:8). They are questions: "What profit is there in my destruction, if I go down to the pit? Shall the dust praise you? Shall it declare your truth?" (30:9). Then a plea: "Hear, LORD, and have mercy on me. LORD, be my helper" (30:10). The psalm doesn't call his questions a bargain or a complaint; it quotes them. Psalm 6 asks the same kind of question, "In Sheol, who shall give you thanks?" (Psalm 6:5), and Psalm 6's honest question sets it beside Psalm 88 and Hezekiah's writing; these notes don't repeat it. What Psalm 30 adds is its ending. Praise in "Shall the dust praise you?" is yadah, the verb of 30:4's "Give thanks" (tap thanks), and the psalm's last words are that verb again: "LORD my God, I will give thanks to you forever!" (30:12).

The verses

“I cried to you, LORD. I made supplication to the Lord: “What profit is there in my destruction, if I go down to the pit? Shall the dust praise you? Shall it declare your truth? Hear, LORD, and have mercy on me. LORD, be my helper.””
Psalm 30:8-10 · World English Bible
“Sing praise to the LORD, you saints of his. Give thanks to his holy name.”
Psalm 30:4 · World English Bible
“to the end that my heart may sing praise to you, and not be silent. LORD my God, I will give thanks to you forever!”
Psalm 30:12 · World English Bible
“For in death there is no memory of you. In Sheol, who shall give you thanks?”
Psalm 6:5 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Psalm 30

Psalm 30: Mourning into dancing

In Psalm 30, "you have raised me up" (30:1) is dalah, a verb for drawing water. "I shall never be moved" (30:6), said in prosperity, opens with two Hebrew words that Psalm 10's wicked man and Psalm 16 also say. And the verb of the cry "Shall the dust praise you?" (30:9) comes back in the psalm's last line: "I will give thanks to you forever!" (30:12).

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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