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119. Psalm 1191 Blessed are those whose ways are blameless,who walk according to the law of the LORD. 2 Blessed are those who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart— 3 they do no wrong but follow his ways. 4 You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed. 5 Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying your decrees! 6 Then I would not be put to shame when I consider all your commands. 7 I will praise you with an upright heart as I learn your righteous laws. 8 I will obey your decrees; do not utterly forsake me. ב Beth
9 How can a young person stay on the path of purity?
ג Gimel
17 Be good to your servant while I live,
ד Daleth
25 I am laid low in the dust;
ה He
33 Teach me, LORD, the way of your decrees,
ו Waw
41 May your unfailing love come to me, LORD,
ז Zayin
49 Remember your word to your servant,
ח Heth
57 You are my portion, LORD;
ט Teth
65 Do good to your servant
י Yodh
73 Your hands made me and formed me;
כ Kaph
81 My soul faints with longing for your salvation,
ל Lamedh
89 Your word, LORD, is eternal;
מ Mem
97 Oh, how I love your law!
נ Nun
105 Your word is a lamp for my feet,
ס Samekh
113 I hate double-minded people,
ע Ayin
121 I have done what is righteous and just;
פ Pe
129 Your statutes are wonderful;
צ Tsadhe
137 You are righteous, LORD,
ק Qoph
145 I call with all my heart; answer me, LORD,
ר Resh
153 Look on my suffering and deliver me,
ש Sin and Shin
161 Rulers persecute me without cause,
ת Taw
169 May my cry come before you, LORD;
THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
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82 My eyes have waxed dim in looking for thy word This verse is very similar to the preceding, — transforming to the eyes what had been said before concerning the soul. The only difference is, that, instead of longing after salvation or help, the expression, longing after God’s word compromise, is here used; for salvation is an act, as it is termed; that is to say, it consists in effect, whereas a promise keeps us suspended in expectation. God may not, all at once, openly perform what he has promised; and, in this case, it being only in his word that he promises us help, there is no other way by which we can hope for help, than by our reposing on his word. As, then, the word precedes, in order, the help which God affords, or, rather, as it is the manner in which it is represented to our view, the prophet, when sighing after salvation, very properly declares that he kept his eyes fixed on the Divine word, until his sight failed him. Here we have presented to us the wonderful and incredible power of patience, under the infirmity of the flesh, when, being faint and deprived of all rigor, we have recourse to God for help, even while it is hidden from us. In short, the prophet, to prevent it from being supposed that he was too effeminate and faint-hearted, intimates that his fainting was not without cause. In asking God, When wilt thou comfort me? he shows, with sufficient plainness, that he was for a long time, as it were, cast off and forsaken. 83. For I have been as a bottle in the smoke. 426426 Bottles, among the Jews and other nations of the East, were made of goats’ or kids’ skins, as is the custom among the Eastern nations at this day. When the animal was killed, they cut off its feet and head, and drew it, in that manner, out of the skin without opening the belly. They afterwards sewed up the places where the legs were cut off, and the tail, and when it was filled, they tied it about the neck. In these bottles, not only water, milk, and other liquids were put, but every thing intended to be carried to a distance, whether dry or liquid. To these goat-skin vessels a reference is here undoubtedly made. The peasantry of Asia are in the habit of suspending them from the roof, or hanging them against the walls of their tents or humble dwellings: here they soon become quite black with smoke; for, as in their dwellings there are seldom any chimneys, and the smoke can only escape through an aperture in the roof, or by the door, whenever a fire is lighted the apartment is instantly filled with dense smoke. Accordingly, some suppose that the allusion here chiefly is to the blackness which a bottle contracts by hanging in the smoke; and the translators of our English Bible, by referring in the margin to Job 30:30, as parallel to this, seem to have supposed that the Psalmist refers to the blackness his face contracted by sorrow. “But,” says Harmer, “this can hardly be supposed to be the whole of his thought. In such a case, would he not rather have spoken of the blackness of a pot, as it is supposed the prophet Joel does, (Joel 2:6,) rather than to that of a leather bottle?” — Harmer’s Observations, volume 1, page 218. When such bottles are suspended in the smoky tent of an Arab, if they do not contain liquids, or are not quite filled by the solids which they hold, they become dry, shrunk, and shriveled; and to this, as well as to their blackness, the Psalmist may allude. Long-continued bodily affliction and mental trouble produce a similar change on the human frame, destroying its beauty and strength by drying up the natural moisture. It has also been thought that there is a contrast between such mean bottles and the rich vessels of gold and silver which were used in the palaces of kings. “My appearance in the state of my exile is as different from what it was when I dwelt at court, as are the gold and silver vessels of a palace from the smoky skin bottles of a poor Arab’s tent, where I am now compelled to reside.” — Ibid. and Paxton’s Illustrations, volume 2, pages 409, 410. The particle כי, ki, translated for, might also, not improperly, be resolved into the adverb of time, when; so that we might read the verse in one connected sentence, thus’ When I was like a dried bottle, I, nevertheless, did not forget thy law. The obvious design of the Psalmist is to teach us, that, although he had been proved by severe trials, and wounded to the quick, he yet had not been withdrawn from the fear of God. In comparing himself to a bottle or bladder, he intimates that he was, as it were, parched by the continual heat of adversities. Whence we learn, that that sorrow must have been intense which reduced him to such a state of wretchedness and emaciation, that like a shriveled bottle he was almost dried up. It, however, appears that he intends to point cut, not only the severity of his affliction, but also its lingering nature that he was tormented, as it were, at a slow fire; 427427 “Comme a petit feu.” — Fr. even as the smoke which proceeds from heat dries bladders by slow degrees. The prophet experienced a long series of grief’s, which might have consumed him a hundred times, and that, by their protracted and lingering nature, had he not been sustained by the word of God. In short, it is a genuine evidence of true godliness, when, although plunged into the deepest afflictions, we yet cease not to submit ourselves to God. 84. How many are the days of thy servant? etc. Some read these two clauses apart, as if the first were a general complaint of the brevity of human life, such as is to be met with in other psalms, and more frequently in the book of Job; and next, in their opinion, there follows a special prayer of the Psalmist, that God would take vengeance upon his enemies. But I rather prefer joining the two clauses together, and limit both to David’s afflictions; as if it had been said, Lord, how long hast thou determined to abandon thy servant to the will of the ungodly? when wilt thou set thyself in opposition to their cruelty and outrage, in order to take vengeance upon them? The Scriptures often use the word days in this sense; as, for example, “the days of Egypt,” Ezekiel 30:9; “the days of Babylon,” and “the days of Jerusalem,” Psalm 137:7; a word which, in other places, is called “the day of visitation,” Isaiah 10:3. By the use of the plural number, is denoted a certain determinate portion of time, which, in other places, is compared to the “days of an hireling,” Job 14:6; Isaiah 16:14. The Psalmist does not, then, bewail in general the transitory life of man, but he complains that the time of his state of warfare in this world had been too long protracted; and, therefore, he naturally desires that it might be brought to a termination. In expostulating with God about his trouble, he does not do so obstinately, or with a murmuring spirit; but still, in asking how long it will be necessary for him to suffer, he humbly prays that God would not delay to succor him. As to the point of his stirring him up by prayer to execute vengeance, we have elsewhere seen in what sense it was lawful for him to make such a request; namely, because the vengeance which he desired to see was such as is properly suitable to God. It is certain that he had divested himself of all the corrupt affections of the flesh, that he might, with a pure and undisturbed zeal, desire God’s judgment. He, however, in this passage, only wishes in general to be delivered by the hand of God from the wrongs which were inflicted upon him, without adjudging to perdition his adversaries; for he was quite contented, provided God appeared to defend him. |
