Psalm 3/Notes/Grammar.v. 3.628435

• The noun victory (יְשׁוּעָה) is highlighted, not only by its repetition throughout the psalm (vv. 3b, 9a; verbal form in 8b) but by its morphology. The first occurrence of the word here in v. 3b has a unique ending (תָה- cf. Ps 80:3; Jon 2:10). This ending appears to be the remains of an earlier case ending which is now, according to GKC, "used merely for the sake of poetical emphasis [= poetic foregrounding]." The word is also prosodically foregrounded by the Masoretic accentuation (יְֽשׁוּעָ֓תָה); it has the rare accent shalshelet qetana (only 8 times in the Hebrew Bible). The foregrounding of the word is appropriate because "victory" is "the key motif in the psalm." The same word (יְשׁוּעָה) occurs again in the last verse of the psalm as the only word in the psalm to have the definite article (ה).