Psalm 23 Telephone

Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death...

Though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death...

Think about it—why would there be a valley attributed to some "shadow of death"? It may sound cool but it is not necessarily meaningful.

Yet it makes sense there might be a "valley of death" such as the biblical Gehenna, a valley known for child sacrifices to a false god. The psalmist imagines having to walk though the shadow cast by such a valley. This way the metaphor is preserved—maybe having been lost in the days it was sung long before it was ever scribed.