en_tn_condensed/psa/054/001.md

# General Information:

This psalm is a prayer for help. Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: [[rc://en/ta/man/jit/writing-poetry]] and [[rc://en/ta/man/jit/figs-parallelism]])

# For the chief musician; on stringed instruments. A maschil of David; when the Ziphites came and said to Saul, "Does David not hide himself with us?"

This is a superscription that tells about the psalm. Some scholars say that this is part of the scripture and some say that it is not. (See "What are Superscriptions in Psalms" in [Introduction to Psalms](../front/intro.md).)

# For the chief musician

"This is for the director of music to use in worship"

# on stringed instruments

"people should play stringed instruments with this song"

# A maschil

This may refer to a style of music. See how you translated this in [Psalms 32:1](../032/001.md)

# Ziphites

people from the city of Ziph in the Judean mountains, southeast of Hebron. (See: [[rc://en/ta/man/jit/translate-names]])

# Save me, God, by your name

Here God's name represents his character. It may represent specifically his power or his justice. Alternate translation: "Save me, God, by your power" (See: [[rc://en/ta/man/jit/figs-metonymy]])

# judge me in your might

Judging David here represents showing people that David is not guilty. When God uses his might to save David, people will know that God has judged him as not guilty. Alternate translation: "In your might, show people that I am not guilty" or "Show people that I am not guilty by using your power to rescue me" (See: [[rc://en/ta/man/jit/figs-metonymy]])