Psalm 46/Notes/Grammar.v. 9.463485

In the preferred option, the participle משבית is understood as a substantive, i.e., “[the] one who terminates wars to the end of the earth". Taken this way, it serves as the subject of the two yiqtols in v. 10bc---“The one terminating wars (or who terminates wars) breaks the bow and snaps the spear.” Separating v. 10 from v. 9 makes v. 10 emphatic: v. 9 mentions “works of the Lord” and "great devastation" which are general (military) deeds undertaken by God. In v. 10, however, the focus shifts to more specific acts (terminating wars and destroying weaponry; on such shift from general to specific, see also Ps 66:5ff, which quotes Ps 46:9a). Furthermore, in vv. 8-12, van der Lugt has identified a series of concentric features in vv. 9-11, which frame v. 10, making it "pivotal". "The double imperatives (lkw h.zw and hrpw wd‘w respectively), exactly at the beginning of the outer verselines (vv. 9 and 11), and b’rs (‘on earth’) exactly at the end of these lines deserve special mentioning". Again, within these frames, v. 10 (with its specific acts of destruction of weapons) could be emphatic. V. 10 also stands out in the strophe and in the psalms as a whole because it is a tricolon. Therefore, some suggest deleting v. 10c altogether. Thus, "An additional line has been added by a later editor to emphasise this destruction, but at the expense of the measure and symmetry of Str., Wagons He burneth in the fire." "This l.[ine] is trimeter and excessive to the Str. and is doubtless a gloss of intensification."