In this verse the speaker confesses the sins of the people and sees the punishment now taking place to be a result of these sins. But he also expresses hope that the Lord will eventually restore his people. In the opening sentence Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation again convey essentially the same relationship of cause and effect between the sin and the punishment, but again they do so by different constructions. Revised Standard Version puts the result (“I will bear the indignation of the LORD”) before the reason (“because I have sinned against him”). Good News Translation puts the reason (We have sinned against the LORD) before the result (so now we must endure his anger for a while). Some languages prefer one order and some the other. Translators should of course follow the order that most naturally conveys the correct relationship in their own language.
The Lord’s anger here refers to the results of his anger, namely, the way that he is punishing the people of Israel. It may be necessary to make this clear in some languages and say something like “We have sinned against the Lord, so now he is angry with us, and we must accept our punishment.” At the end of this line Good News Translation has added for a while. This phrase brings out part of the meaning of the word “until” in the third line of Revised Standard Version, showing that the experience of punishment will not last forever.
The middle part of verse 9 again uses the language of the law court and asserts that in the end the Lord will defend us. In the end means “after a while” or “eventually.” It is not a reference to the last judgment. Defend (“pleads my cause” in Revised Standard Version) means to speak in court to convince the judge that someone is right. As in 6.1 (see the discussion there), this is figurative language, and we should not be troubled about who the judge is that the Lord is speaking to. The plain meaning is that the Lord is going to help them and see that justice is done. “Execute judgment” of Revised Standard Version is explained in more detail in Good News Translation as right the wrongs that have been done to us. In languages that require the actor to be stated, this can be restructured as “put right the wrongs our enemies have done to us.”
In the last part of the verse, some translators may need to expand Good News Translation a little and say He will bring us out of the darkness into the light. As in verse 8, the images of darkness and light refer to the time of trouble and the time of peace.
The final clause of Revised Standard Version, “I shall behold his deliverance,” is expanded to we will live to see him save us in Good News Translation. This makes the participants explicit, and many translators will wish to do the same. Good News Translation has translated live to see, where Revised Standard Version follows the Hebrew more literally with one word, “behold.” These words are apparently spoken in a time of great trouble, when it would be easy to think that there is no hope and that all the people will be killed. These words not only express hope that the Lord will save them, but that the speakers themselves will actually see this happen. This idea is expressed well in English by the expression “live to see,” but in other languages it may be enough simply to say “we will see,” as the Hebrew does.
Quoted with permission from Clark, David J. et al. A Handbook on Micah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1978, 1982, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .