page_title: Psalm 39
section_title: Structure
hierarchical_section_title: Psalm 39 / Structure
caption_attribution_description: English: Scroll of the Psalms
context_page_description: Psalm 39 is the 39th psalm of the Book of Psalms, generally known in English by its first verse, in the King James Version, "I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue". The Book of Psalms is the third section of the Hebrew Bible, and a book of the Christian Old Testament. In the Greek Septuagint version of the bible, and in its Latin translation in the Vulgate, this psalm is Psalm 38 in a slightly different numbering system. In Latin, it is known as "Dixi custodiam vias meas". It is a meditation on the fragility of man before God, ending in a prayer for a peaceful life.
  The psalm is a regular part of Jewish, Catholic, Anglican and Protestant liturgies and is appointed in the Anglican Common Prayer to be read at funerals. It has inspired hymns based on it, and has been set to music often. It was set by Baroque composers such as Heinrich Schütz, and single verses were used prominently in major works, by Johannes Brahms in Ein deutsches Requiem and by Igor Stravinsky in Symphony of Psalms.
context_section_description: The numbering of the verses differs between the Hebrew and Latin versions.
  Clarke holds that the psalm: 
  relates the care and watchfulness over one's thoughts, tongue, and actions, v1-3;
  considers the brevity and uncertainty of human life, v4-7;
  prays for deliverance from sin, v8-11; and
  asks that the author be protected and spared until he is fitted for another world, v12, 13.
  Spurgeon broke the psalm down as follows:
  Burdened with many sorrows v1-2;
  Prayer in his torment v 3–6;
  Submission to God v7-13;
  Relief and trust.
  The Old Testament scholar Hermann Gunkel in his standard work The Psalms believes the structuring of the verses was originally:
  Vers 2–4: Introduction to and emergence of the poem
  Vers 5ff: The actual poem
  Vers 5–7 and 12: General considerations
  Vers 8 and 13c.d: Return to yourself
  Vers 13a.b, 9-11 and Vers 14:  The actual dirge
caption: Psalms scroll.
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