| 2. Linguistic Exegesis The verse opens with the idiom ad-anah {עַד־אָ֭נָה | ʿaḏ-ʾānāh} ‘how long,’ which frames the line as a lamented duration rather than a request for information. Two parallel Piel imperfect verbs—togyun {תּוֹגְי֣וּן | tôgyûn} ‘you will torment’ and u-tedakkeunani {וּֽתְדַכּאוּנַ֥נִי | ûṯəḏakkəʾûnannî} ‘and you will crush me’—portray repeated, intensified mistreatment by a plural “you,” likely the speaker’s accusers. The direct object nafshi {נַפְשִׁ֑י | nap̄šî} ‘my soul’ foregrounds the inner self as the primary locus of suffering, while the second verb’s object is encoded in the suffix “me,” tightening the personal impact. The prepositional phrase be-milim {בְמִלִּֽים | bə-millîm} ‘with words’ functions instrumentally, identifying speech as the means of violence; the line’s poetic parallelism thus moves from internal anguish to crushing pressure, with “words” as the weapon. |