14. The metrical translation of the Psalms is not an accurate translation.
The 150 Psalms of Scripture are Hebrew poetry. There are written in prose and not in metre. For the Psalms to be sung in congregational worship today they have to be changed to metrical rhythm. In doing so there are many changes that take place.
Numerous additional words are added to suit the particular metre to which the Psalm is set. A very obvious example of this can easily be referenced. The longest of all the Psalms in the Bible is Psalm 119. If you paste the words of the English translation from the Authorised Version into a word processing document and do a simple word count, it will tell you that there are 2,621 words in the English translation of this particular Psalm. Do the same with the Scottish metrical version of Psalm 119 and the word count is 3,090. The Scottish metrical version of Psalm 119 has an additional 469 extra words! Amazingly, almost twenty percent of the metrical version is made up of additional words as compared with the Authorised Version!
