Verse 3 opens the second segment of the poem, which calls attention to mankind’s mortality, and this theme will be sustained to the end.

Verse 3 in Hebrew is “you turn man to dust, and you say, ‘Return, humankind.’ ” By most commentators and translators the two lines are taken as synonymous, indicating God’s activity in deciding a person’s time to die, by which that person returns to the dust from which God made the human race (Gen 3.19). The time of a person’s death is God’s decision. Some have understood the word translated dust to mean “destruction” (King James Version, Revised Version [ver RVver*]) or else “contrition” (see Jewish Publication Version, New Jerusalem Bible footnote); the majority, however, take it to mean the soil, the earth. Some take “return” in verse 3b to mean “repent”; this is possible but does not seem likely. Most understand the two lines to be parallel. Good News Translation reverses the two lines for greater ease of understanding.

Briggs and Dahood change the vowel mark for the last word of verse 2 in the Hebrew text from ʾel “God” to ʾal “not,” and connect it with what follows: “Do not turn man back to dust.” This is possible, but it is not widely accepted.

For comments on children of men in verse 3b, see 11.4.

The whole verse may be translated as follows:

• You order human beings to return to the soil,
you change them back to the soil they came from.

Verse 4 extends the meditation on mankind’s limited existence by looking at time as it were from God’s point of view. The poetic process is that of narrowing time from a thousand years to a day (yesterday) to a single watch in the night. The end point of this shortening of time is night, which prepares the reader for the next line, which is about sleep. In this way cohesion between the two verses is established.

Good News Translation has added, for clarity, “one day” in verse 4a, but this may not be necessary. The following may be said: “For a thousand years to you are as brief as yesterday, which is already gone….” A confusion which may arise in some languages in this verse is related to in thy sight or Good News Translation‘s “to you.” In some cases it will be clearer to say, for example, “A thousand years of ours is like one day of yours” or “The way people count time, a thousand years is the same as one day in the way you count time.” The Hebrew for “a short hour in the night” (Good News Translation) is “a night-watch,” which was a period of four hours (see also comments on 63.6); for a person asleep, this is a short time.

There may be an allusion to this verse in 2 Peter 3.8.

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Reyburn, William D. A Handbook on the Book of Psalms. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1991. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .