The psalmist says he has calmed and quieted his nefesh, that is, himself, his inner being. Briggs comments: “the soul … was by deliberate action reduced to a calm, gentle, submissive, patient, and contented state.” Good News Translation “content and at peace” seems to represent the meaning. In some languages it is possible to use a direct address form and say, for example, “I said to my heart, ‘Sit down and be cool.’ ”

Child translates a Hebrew word that means “a weaned child” (so New Jerusalem Bible, New English Bible, New International Version, New American Bible, Jerusalem Bible; Dahood translates “infant”). The Hebrew says “like a weaned child with its mother.” But Revised Standard Version (like a child quieted at its mother’s breast) and Biblia Dios Habla Hoy take the meaning to be a younger child, before weaning, who has just finished nursing at its mother’s breast. This seems to make more sense and is supported by Briggs and Taylor; but others (Anderson, Weiser, Kirkpatrick, Cohen, Delitzsch) quite strongly reject this view and take the picture to be that of a child who has already been completely weaned and is content to be with its mother, without desiring any longer to be suckled. New International Version is “like a weaned child with its mother,” and Bible en français courant “like a child with its mother.” Translators in many languages will have to choose a form of child which indicates sex as well as age.

The next line in Hebrew is somewhat difficult to understand: “like a child upon me (is) my nefesh.” This is generally taken to mean, as Good News Translation has it, a comparison with the former line: his inner being, his spirit, is as content as a child with its mother is content. New Jerusalem Bible translates “like a weaned child am I in my mind.” New English Bible omits this line, which it translates in a footnote, “as a weaned child clinging to me.” New American Bible translates “so is my soul within me,” but places the line within brackets.

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 .