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Psalms

About this book
Psalm 14

1 For the music director, by David. Fools say to themselves, “There is no God.” They sin and commit evil deeds; none of them does what is right.⁠ 2 The Lord looks down from heaven at the human race,⁠ to see if there is anyone who is wise and seeks God. 3 Everyone rejects God; they are all morally corrupt. None of them does what is right, not even one.⁠ 4 All those who behave wickedly do not understand— those who devour my people as if they were eating bread and do not call out to the Lord. 5 They are absolutely terrified, for God defends the godly. 6 You want to humiliate the oppressed, even though the Lord is their shelter. 7 I wish the deliverance of Israel would come from Zion! When the Lord restores the well-being of his people, may Jacob rejoice, may Israel be happy!

Texts in conversation

Compare Psalm 14:3 and LXX Psalm 13:3 and Romans 3:12

Hebrew Bible · Septuagint · New Testament

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Summary

Psalm 14 compares fools who deny God with the people God defends. In Romans, Paul echoes the Greek Septuagint translation but leaves out the word "fool" so now the description applies to everyone without exception.

Passages

Psalm 14:3

Hebrew Bible
1 For the music director, by David. Fools say to themselves, “There is no God.” They sin and commit evil deeds; none of them does what is right. 2 The Lord looks down from heaven at the human race, to see if there is anyone who is wise and seeks God. 3 Everyone rejects God; they are all morally corrupt. None of them does what is right, not even one. 4 All those who behave wickedly do not understand— those who devour my people as if they were eating bread and do not call out to the Lord.
600–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Psalms

LXX Psalm 13:3

Septuagint
1 For the end, a Psalm of David. The fool has said in his heart, There is no God. They have corrupted themselves, and become abominable in their devices; there is none that does goodness, there is not even so much as one. 2 The Lord looked down from heaven upon the sons of men, to see if there were any that understood, or sought after God. 3 They have all gone out of the way, they have together become good for nothing, there is none that does good, no not one. Their throat is an open tomb; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood: destruction and misery are in their ways; and the way of peace they have not known: there is no fear of God before their eyes.
100–1 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX Psalms

Romans 3:12

New Testament
10 just as it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one; 11 there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. 12 All have turned away; together they have become worthless; there is no one who shows kindness, not even one.” 13 “Their throats are open graves; they deceive with their tongues; the poison of asps is under their lips.” 14 “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
55–58 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Romans

References

“... The opening line of the catena was rather forcibly derived from a combination of Ps 13:1 and Sir 7:20 [...] The Pauline redaction replaces the motif of “goodness” in Ps 13 with “righteous” from Ecclesiastes, a theme that resonates with his previous discussion and with the thesis of Romans. Paul also deletes the reference to the “fool” in Ps 13:1, thus eliminating the traditional distinction between the wise, righteous person and the foolish, wicked one. [...] Paul’s reformulation eliminates the existence of any righteous person. All of humanity is now captured in this denunciation. ...”
Robert Jewett, Romans: A Commentary (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 259.
“... The second line of the catena is cleverly adapted by Paul from LXX Ps 13:2, which depicts God’s looking “down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there were any that understood, or sought after God [...].” With the removal of the theme of the fool, this reference to God’s inquiring gaze in Ps 13:2a becomes irrelevant, and Paul can augment the anaphoric parallelism with two additional [...] references that serve to comprise a series of five, counting the two in the following verse. [...] This verse is drawn verbatim from LXX Ps 13:3 ...”
Robert Jewett, Romans: A Commentary (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 260.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Psalm 14:3 and LXX Psalm 13:3 and Romans 3:12

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