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the vine) (cf. Arabic zbr, to write, from the buzzing noise of the style or reed on the writing material). The signification of singing and playing proper to the Piel are not connected with the signification “to nip.” For neither the rhythmical division (Schultens) nor the articulated speaking (Hitz.) furnish a probable explanation, since the caesura and syllable are not natural but artificial notions, nor also the nipping of the strings (Böttch., Ges.), for which the language has coined the word נגּן (of like root with נגע). Moreover, the earliest passages in which זמרה and זמּר occur (Gen 43:11; Exo 15:2; Jdg 5:3), speak rather of song than music and both words frequently denote song in distinction from music, e.g., Psa 98:5; Psa 81:3, cf. Sol 2:12. Also, if זמּר originally means, like ψάλλειν, carpere (pulsare) fides, such names of instruments as Arab. zemr the hautboy and zummâra the pipe would not be formed. But זמּר means, as Hupfeld has shown, as indirect an onomatope as canere, “to make music” in the widest sense; the more accurate usage of the language, however, distinguishes זמּר and שׁיר as to play and to sing. With בּ of the instrument זמּר denotes song with musical accompaniment (like the Aethiopic זמר instrumento canere) and זמרה (Aram. זמר) is sometimes, as in Amo 5:23, absolutely: music. Accordingly מזמור signifies technically the music and שׁיר the words. And therefore we translate the former by “Psalm,” for ὁ ψαλμός ἐστιν - says Gregory of Nyssa - ἡ διὰ τοῦ ὀργάνου τοῦ μουσικοῦ μελωδία ᾠδὴ δὲ ἡ διὰ στόματος γενομένου τοῦ μέλους μετὰ ῥημάτων ἐκφώνησις.
That Psa 3:1-8 is a hymn arranged for music is also manifest from the סלה which occurs here 3 times. It is found in the Psalter, as Bruno has correctly calculated, 71 times (17 times in the 1st book, 30 in the 2nd, 20 in the 3rd, 4 in the 4th) and, with the exception of the anonymous Ps 66, Psa 67:1-7, always in those that are inscribed by the name of David and of the psalmists famed from the time of David. That it is a marginal note referring to the Davidic Temple-music is clearly seen from the fact, that all the Psalms with סלה have the למנצּח which relates to the musical execution, with the exception of eight (Psa 32:1-11, Psa 48:1-14, 50, Psa 82:1-8, 83, Psa 87:1-7, 89, Psa 143:1-12) which, however, from the designation מזמור