To the Chief Musician. - Intended therefore to be sung, and sung in the temple service! Yet is it by no means easy to imagine the whole nation singing such dreadful imprecations. We ourselves, at any rate, under the gospel dispensation, find it very difficult to infuse into the Psalm a gospel sense, or a sense at all compatible with the Christian spirit; and therefore one would think the Jews must have found it hard to chant such strong language without feeling the spirit of revenge excited; and the arousal of that spirit could never have been the object of divine worship in any period of time - under law or under gospel. At the very outset this title shows that the Psalm has a meaning with which it is fitting for men of God to have fellowship before the throne of the Most High: but what is that meaning? This is a question of no small difficulty, and only a very childlike spirit will ever be able to answer it.

A Psalm of David. Not therefore the ravings of a malicious misanthrope, or the execrations of a hot, revengeful spirit. David would not smite the man who sought his blood, he frequently forgave those who treated him shamefully; and therefore these words cannot be read in a bitter, revengeful sense, for that would be foreign to the character of the son of Jesse. The imprecatory sentences before us were penned by one who with all his courage in battle was a man of music and of tender heart, and they were meant be addressed to God in the form of a Psalm, and therefore they cannot possibly have en meant to be mere angry cursing.

Unless it can be proved that the religion of the old dispensation was altogether hard, morose, and Draconian, and that David was of a malicious, vindictive spirit, it cannot be conceived that this Psalm contains what one author has ventured to call "a pitiless hate, a refined and insatiable malignity." To such a suggestion we cannot give place, no, not for an hour. But what else can we make of such strong language? Truly this is one of the hard places of Scripture, a passage which the soul trembles to read; yet as it is a Psalm unto God, and given by inspiration, it is not ours to sit in judgment upon it, but to bow our ear to what God the Lord would speak to us therein.

This Psalm refers to Judas, for so Peter quoted it; but to ascribe its bitter denunciations to our Lord in the hour of his sufferings is more than we dare to do. These are not consistent with the silent Lamb of God, who opened not his mouth when led to the slaughter. It may seem very pious to put such words into his mouth; we hope it is our piety which prevents our doing so. See our first note from Perowne on page 445.

Division. - In the Psalm 109:1-5 David humbly pleads with God that he may be delivered from his remorseless and false-hearted enemies. From Psalm 109:6-20, filled with a prophetic furor, which carries him entirely beyond himself, he denounces judgment upon his foes, and then from Psalm 109:21-31 he returns to his communion with God in prayer and praise. The central portion of the Psalm in which the difficulty lies must be regarded not as the personal wish of the Psalmist in cool blood, but as his prophetic denunciation of such persons as he describes, and emphatically of one special "son of perdition" whom he sees with prescient eye. We would all pray for the conversion of our worst enemy, and David would have done the same; bat viewing the adversaries of the Lord, and doers of inquiry, as such, and as incorrigible, we cannot wish them well; on the contrary, we desire their overthrow and destruction. The gentlest hearts burn with indignation when they hear of barbarities to women and children, of crafty plots for ruining the innocent, of cruel oppression of helpless orphans, and gratuitous ingratitude to the good and gentle. A curse upon the perpetrators of the atrocities in Turkey may not be less virtuous than a blessing upon the righteous. We wish well to all mankind, and for that very reason we sometimes blaze with indignation against the Inhuman wretches by whom every law which protects our fellow creatures is trampled down, and every dictate of humanity is set at nought.

Hints to Preachers

Psalm 109:1. - The silence of God. What it may mean: what it involves: how we may endeavour to break it.

Psalm 109:1. - "God of my praise." A text which may be expounded in its double meaning.

Psalm 109:2. - Slander. Its cause - wickedness and malice. Its instruments - deceit and lies. Its frequency - Jesus and the saints slandered. Its punishment. Our resort when tried by it - prayer to God.

Psalm 109:1-3. -

I. God is for his people when the wicked are against them (Psalm 109:1);

1. for his people's sake;

2. for his own sake.

II. The wicked are against his people when he is for them (Psalm 109:2, Psalm 109:3);

1. from hatred to God;

2. from hatred to his people. - G. R.

Psalm 109:4. - On the excellency of prayer. See Expository Notes.

Psalm 109:4. - Our Lord's adversaries, and his resort.

Psalm 109:4, Psalm 109:5. -

I. David's spirit and conduct towards his enemies.

1. His spirit is love - love for hatred; hence his denunciations are against their sins, rather than against them.

2. His conduct. He returned good for evil; he interceded for them.

II. Their spirit and conduct towards him.

1. Hatred for love.

2. Evil for good. - G. R.

Psalm 109:5. - "Evil for good." This is devil-like. Have not men been guilty of this to parents, to those who have warned them, to saints and ministers, and especially to the Lord himself?

Psalm 109:5. - How has the Redeemer been recompensed? Show what he deserves and what he receives from various individuals. He feels the unkindness of those who are ungrateful.

Psalm 109:6. - It is the law of retribution to punish the wicked by means of the wicked. - Starke.

Psalm 109:7. - When may prayer become sin? From what is sought, how sought, by whom sought, and wherefore sought.

Psalm 109:8. - "Let his days be Jew." Sin the great shortener of human life. After the flood the whole race lived a shorter time; passion and avaricious care shorten life, and some sins have a peculiar power to do this, lust, drunkenness, &c.

Psalm 109:20, Psalm 109:21. -

I. David leaves his enemies in the hand of God (Psalm 109:20).

II. He puts himself into the same hands (Psalm 109:21). - G. R.

Psalm 109:21. - The plea of a believer must be drawn from his God, - his "name" and "mercy." The opposite habit of searching for arguments in self very common and very disappointing.

Psalm 109:21. - The peculiar goodness of divine mercy.

Psalm 109:22. - The inward sorrows of a saint. Their cause, effects, consolations, and cure.

Psalm 109:26, Psalm 109:27. -

I. The Prayer.

II. The Believing Title: "O Lord my God."

III. The attribute relied upon.

IV. The motive for the petition.

Psalm 109:28. - The divine cure for human ill-will; and the saint's temper when he trusts therein - "let thy servant rejoice."

Psalm 109:29. -

I. A prayer for the repentance of David's adversaries.

II. A prophecy for their confusion if they remain impenitent. - G. R.

Psalm 109:29. - The sinner's last mantle.

Psalm 109:30. - Vocal praise. Should be personal, resolute, intelligent, abundant, hearty. It should attract others, join with others, stimulate others, but never lose its personality.

Psalm 109:30, Psalm 109:31. -

I. David's will with respect to himself: "I will ... yea, I will," etc. (Psalm 109:30).

II. His shall with respect to God: "he shall," etc. (Psalm 109:31). -

Psalm 109:30, Psalm 109:31. - He promiseth God that he will praise him, Psalm 109:30. He promiseth himself that he shall have cause to praise God, Psalm 109:31. - Matthew Henry.

Psalm 109:31. -

I. The character to whom the promise is made - the poor.

II. The danger to which he is exposed - those that condemn his soul.

III. The deliverance which is promised to him - divine, opportune, efficient, complete, everlasting.

Explanatory Notes and Quaint Sayings

Whole Psalm

"Mysterious" was the one word written opposite this Psalm in the pocket Bible of a late devout and popular writer. It represents the utter perplexity with which it is very generally regarded. - Joseph Hammond.

Whole Psalm

In this Psalm David is supposed to refer to Doeg the Edomite, or to Ahithophel. It is the most imprecatory of the Psalms, and may well be termed the Iscariot Psalm. What David here refers to his mortal enemy, finds its accomplishment in the betrayer of the Son of David. It is from Psalm 109:8 that Peter infers the necessity of filling up the vacancy occasioned by the death of Judas: it was, says he, predicted that another should take his office. - Paton J. Gloag, in "A Commentary on the Acts," 1870.

Whole Psalm

We may consider Judas, at the same time, as the virtual head of the Jewish nation in their daring attempt to dethrone the Son of God. The doom pronounced, and the reasons for it, apply to the Jews as a nation, as well as to the leader of the band who took Jesus. - Andrew A. Bonar.

Whole Psalm

Is it possible that this perplexing and distressing Psalm presents us after all, not with David's maledictions upon his enemies, but with their maledictions upon him? Not only do I hold this interpretation to be quite legitimate, I hold it to be by far the more natural and reasonable interpretation. - Joseph Hammond.

[In Dr. Cox's Expositor, Vol. II. p. 225. this theory is well elaborated by Mr. Hammond, but we cannot for an instant accept it. - C. H. S.]

The Imprecations of the Psalm. - The language has been justified, not as the language of David, but as the language of Christ, exercising his office of Judge, or, in so far as he had laid aside that office during his earthly life, calling upon his Father to accomplish the curse. It has been alleged that this is the prophetic fore-shadowing of the solemn words, "Woe unto that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born" (Matthew 26:24). The curse in the words of Chrysostom is, "a prophecy in the form of a curse" (προφητεία ὲν εἴδει ἀρᾶς).

The strain which such a view compels us to put on much of the language ought to have led long since to its abandonment. Not even the words denounced by our Lord against the Pharisees can really be compared to the anathemas which are here strung together. Much less is there any pretence for saying that those words so full of deep and holy sorrow, addressed to the traitor in the gospels, are merely another expression of the appalling denunciations of the Psalm. But terrible as these undoubtedly are, to be accounted for by the spirit of the Old Dispensation, not to be defended by that of the New, still let us learn to estimate them aright. - J. J. Stewart Perowne.

The Imprecations. - These imprecations are not appropriate in the mouth of the suffering Saviour. It is not the spirit of Zion but of Sinai which here speaks out of the mouth of David; the spirit of Elias, which, according to Luke 9:58, is not the spirit of the New Testament. This wrathful spirit is overpowered by the spirit of love. But these anathemas are still not on this account so many beatings of the air. There is in them a divine energy, as in the blessing and cursing of every man who is united to God, and more especially of a man whose temper of mind is such as David's. They possess the same power as the prophetical threatenings, and in this sense they are regarded in the New Testament as fulfilled in the son of perdition (John 17:12). To the generation of the time of Jesus they were a deterrent warning not to offend against the Holy One of God, and this Psalmus Ischarioticus (Acts 1:20) will ever be such a mirror of warning to the enemies and persecutors of Christ and his church. - Franz Delitzsch.

The lmprecations. - Respecting the imprecations contained in this Psalm, it will be proper to keep in mind what I have said elsewhere, that when David forms such maledictions, or expresses his desire for them, he is not instigated by any immoderate carnal propensity, nor is he actuated by zeal without knowledge, nor is he influenced by any private personal considerations. These three matters must be carefully weighed, for in proportion to the amount of self-esteem which a man possesses, is he so enamoured with his own interests as to rush headlong upon revenge. Hence it comes to pass that the more a person is devoted to selfishness, he will be the more immoderately addicted to the advancement of his own individual interests. This desire for the promotion of personal interest gives birth to another species of vice: for no one wishes to be avenged upon his enemies because such a thing would be right and equitable, but because it is the means of gratifying his own spiteful propensity. Some, indeed, make a pretext of righteousness and equity in the matter; but the spirit of malignity, by which they are inflamed, effaces every trace of Justice, and blinds their minds.

When the two vices, selfishness and carnality, are corrected, there is still another thing demanding correction: we must repress the ardour of foolish zeal, in order that we may follow the Spirit of God as our guide. Should any one, under the influence of perverse zeal, produce David as an example of it, that would not be an example in point; for to such a person may be very aptly applied the answer which Christ returned to his disciples, "Ye know not what spirit ye are of," Luke 9:55. How detestable a piece of sacrilege is it on the part of the monks, and especially the Franciscan friars, to pervert this Psalm by employing it to countenance the most nefarious purposes! If a man harbour malice against a neighbour, it is quite a common thing for him to engage one of those wicked wretches to curse him, which he would do by daily repeating this Psalm. I know a lady in France who hired a parcel of these friars to curse her own and only son in these words. But I return to David, who, free from all inordinate passion, breathed forth his prayers under the influence of the Holy Spirit. - John Calvin.

The Imprecations. - It is possible, as Tholuck thinks, that in some of the utterances in what are called the vindictive Psalms, especially the imprecations in Psalm 109, unholy personal zeal may have been mingled with holy zeal, as was the case seemingly with the two disciples James and John, when the Lord chided their desire for vengeance (Luke 9:54-56). But, in reality, the feeling expressed in these Psalms may well be considered as virtuous anger, such as Bishop Butler explains and justifies in his sermons on "Resentment and the Forgiveness of Injuries," and such as Paul teaches in Ephesians 4:26, "Be ye angry, and sin not." Anger against sin and a desire that evildoers may be punished, are not opposed to the spirit of the gospel, or to that love of enemies which our Lord both enjoined and exemplified. If the emotion or its utterance were essentially sinful, how could Paul wish the enemy of Christ and the perverter of the gospel to be accursed (ἀνάθεμα, 1 Corinthians 16:22; Galatians 1:8); and especially, how could the spirit of the martyred saints in heaven call on God for vengeance (Revelation 6:10), and join to celebrate its final execution (Revelation 19:1-6); Yea, resentment against the wicked is so far from being necessarily sinful that we find it manifested by the Holy and Just One himself, when in the days of his flesh he looked around on his hearers "with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts" (Mark 3:5); and when in "the great day of his wrath" (Revelation 6:17), he shall say to "all workers of iniquity" (Luke 13:27), "Depart from me, ye cursed" (Matthew 25:41). - Benjamin Davies (1814-1875), in Kitto's Cyclopaedia.

Imprecations. - It is true that this vengeance is invoked on the head of the betrayer of Christ: and we may profit by reading even the severest of the passages when we regard them as dictated by a burning zeal for the honour of Jehovah, a righteous indignation and a jealousy of love, and generally, if not universally, as denunciations of just judgment against the obstinate enemies of Christ, and all who obey not the Gospel of God. At the same time, these passages cannot be fully accounted for without a frank recognition of the fact that the Psalter was conceived and written under the Old Covenant. That dispensation was more stern than ours. God's people had with all other peoples a conflict with sword and spear. They wanted to tread down their enemies, to crush the heathen; and thought it a grand religious triumph for a righteous man to wash his feet in the blood of the wicked, Psalm 58:10; Psalm 68:23. Now the struggle is without carnal weapons, and the tone of the dispensation is changed. - Donald Fraser, 1873.

Imprecations. - Imprecations of judgment on the wicked on the hypothesis of their continued impenitence are not inconsistent with simultaneous efforts to bring them to repentance; and Christian charity itself can do no more than labour for the sinners' conversion. The law of holiness requires us to pray for the fires of divine retribution: the law of love to seek meanwhile to rescue the brand from the burning. The last prayer of the martyr Stephen was answered not by any general averting of doom from a guilty nation, but by the conversion of an individual persecutor to the service of God. - Joseph Francis Thrupp.

Imprecations. - That explanation which regards the "enemies" as spiritual foes has a large measure of truth. It commended itself to a mind so far removed from mysticism as Arnold's. It is most valuable for devout private use of the Psalter. For, though we are come to Mount Sion, crested with the eternal calm, the opened ear can hear the thunder rolling along the peaks of Sinai. In the Gospel, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness. Sin is utterly hateful to God. The broad gates are flung wide open to the city that lies foursquare towards all the winds of heaven; for its ruler is divinely tolerant, But there shall in no wise enter it anything that defileth, neither whatever worketh abomination; for he is divinely intolerant too. And thus when, in public or private, we read these Psalms of imprecation, there is a lesson that comes home to us. We must read them, or dishonour God's word. Reading them, we must depart from sin, or pronounce judgment upon ourselves. Drunkenness, impurity, hatred, every known sin of flesh or spirit - these, and not mistaken men, are the worst enemies of God and of his Christ. Against these we pray in our Collects for Peace at Morning and Evening Prayer - "Defend us in all assaults of our enemies, that by thee we being defended from the fear of our enemies, may pass our time in rest and quietness." These were the dark hosts which swept through the Psalmist's vision when he cried, "Let all mine enemies be ashamed and sore vexed," Psalm 6:10. - William Alexander, in "The Witness of the Psalms to Christ and Christianity," 1877.

Imprecations. - I cannot forbear the following little incident that occurred the other morning at family worship. I happened to be reading one of the imprecatory Psalms, and as I paused to remark, my little boy, a lad of ten years, asked with some earnestness: "Father, do you think it right for a good man to pray for the destruction of his enemies like that?" and at the same time referred me to Christ as praying for his enemies. I paused a moment to know how to shape the reply so as to fully meet and satisfy his enquiry, and then said, "My son, if an assassin should enter the house by night, and murder your mother, and then escape, and the sheriff and citizens were all out in pursuit, trying to catch him, would you not pray to God that they might succeed and arrest him, and that he might be brought to justice?" "Oh, yes!" said he, "but I never saw it so before. I did not know that that was the meaning of these Psalms." "Yes," said I, "my son, the men against whom David prays were bloody men, men of falsehood and crime, enemies to the peace of society, seeking his own life, and unless they were arrested and their wicked devices defeated, many innocent persons must suffer." The explanation perfectly satisfied his mind. - F. G. Hibbard, in "The Psalms chronologically arranged," 1856.

Title

It is worth noting, that the superscription, "to the chief Musician," to the precentor (למנצת), proves it to have been designed, such as it is, for the Tabernacle or Temple service of song. - Joseph Hammond, in "The Expositor," 1875.

Title

Syriac inscription. - The verbs of the Hebrew text through nearly the whole of the imprecatory part of this Psalm are read in the singular number, as if some particular subject were signified by the divine prophet. But our translators always change the verbs into the plural number; which is not done by the Seventy and the other translators, who adhere more closely to the Hebrew text. But without doubt this has arisen, because the Syriac Christians explain this Psalm of the sufferings of Christ, which may be understood from the Syriac inscription of this Psalm, and which in Polyglottis Angl. reads thus: - "Of David: when they made Absolom king, he not knowing: and on account of this he was killed. But to us it sets forth the sufferings of Christ." For this reason all these imprecations are transferred to the enemies or murderers of Jesus Christ. - John Augustus Dathe, 1731-1791.

Psalm 109:1

"Hold not thy peace, O God of my praise." All commendation or manifestation of our innocence is to be sought from God when we are assailed with calumnies on all sides. When God is silent, we should cry all the more strongly; nor should we because of such delay despair of help, nor impatiently cease from praying. - Martin Geier.

Psalm 109:1

"Hold not thy peace." How appropriately this phrase is applied to God, with whom to speak is the same as to do; for by his word he made all things. Rightly, therefore, is he said to be silent when he seems not to notice the things which are done by the wicked and patiently bears with their malice. The Psalmist begs him to rise up and speak with the wicked in his wrath, and thus take deserved vengeance on them; which is as easy for him to do as for an angry man to break forth in words of rebuke and blame. This should be to us a great solace against the wickedness of this last age, which God, our praise, can restrain with one little word. - Wolfgang Musculus.

Psalm 109:1

"O God." As the most innocent and holy servants of God are subject to heavy slanders and false calumnies raised against them, so the best remedy and relief in this case is to go to God, as here the Psalmist doth. - David Dickson.

Psalm 109:1

"God of my praise." Thou, who art the constant object of my praise and thanksgiving, Jeremiah 17:14. - William Keatinge Clay.

Psalm 109:1

"O God of my praise." In denominating him the God of his praise, he intrusts to him the vindication of his innocence, in the face of the calumnies by which he was all but universally assailed. - John Calvin.

Psalm 109:1

"The God of MY praise." Give me leave, in order to expound it the better, to expostulate. What, David, were there no saints but thyself that gave praise to God? Why dost thou then seem to appropriate and engross God unto thyself, as the God of thy praise, as if none praised him else but thee? It is because his soul had devoted all the praise he was able to bestow on any, unto the Lord alone; as whom he had set himself to praise, and praise alone. As of a beloved son we use to say, "the son of my love." And further, it is as if he had said, If I had all the ability of all the spirits of men and angels wherewith to celebrate him, I would bestow them all on him, he is the God of my praise. And as he was David's, so he should be ours. - Thomas Goodwin.

Psalm 109:2

"For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful are opened against me." Speak, says Arnobius, to thine own conscience, O man of God, thou who art following Christ; and when the mouth of the wicked and deceitful man is opened concerning thee, rejoice and be secure; because while the mouth of the wicked is opened for thy slander in the earth, the mouth of God is opened for thy praise in heaven. - Lorinus.

Psalm 109:2, Psalm 109:3

Note, first, the detractor opens his mouth, that he may pour forth his poison, and that he may devour his victim. Hence, David says, "the mouth of the wicked is opened against me." Note, secondly, the detractor is talkative - "They have spoken," etc. The mouth of the detractor is a broken pitcher leaking all over. Note, thirdly, detraction springs from hatred, "they compassed me about also with words of hatred." In Greek, ἐκύκλωσάν με, i.e., as in a circle they have enclosed me. St. Climacus says, "Detraction is odii partus, a subtle disease, a fat but hidden leech which sucks the blood of charity and after destroys it." - Lorinus.

Psalm 109:2-5

"The mouth of the wicked," etc.

Vice - deformed

Itself, and ugly, and of flavour rank -

To rob fair Virtue of so sweet an incense,

And with it to anoint and salve its own

Rotten ulcers, and perfume the path that led

To death, strove daily by a thousand means:

And oft succeeded to make Virtue sour

In the world's nostrils, and its loathly self

Smell sweetly. Rumour was the messenger

1 Hold not thy peace, O God of my praise;

2 For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful are opened against me; they have spoken against me with a lying tongue.

3 They compassed me about also with words of hatred; and fought against me without a cause.

4 For my love they are my adversaries; but I give myself unto prayer.

5 And they have rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my love.

Psalm 109:1

"Hold not thy peace." Mine enemies speak, be thou pleased to speak too. Break thy solemn silence, and silence those who slander me. It is the cry of a man whose confidence in God is deep, and whose communion with him is very close and bold. Note, that he only asks the Lord to speak: a word from God is all a believer needs. "O God of my praise." Thou whom my whole soul praises, be pleased to protect my honour and guard my praise. "My heart is fixed," said he in the former Psalm, "I will sing and give praise," and now he appeals to the God whom he had praised. If we take care of God's honour he will take care of ours. We may look to him as the guardian of our character if we truly seek his glory. If we live to God's praise, he will in the long run give us praise among men.

Psalm 109:2

"For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful are opened against me." Wicked men must needs say wicked things, and these we have reason to dread; but in addition they utter false and deceitful things, and these are worst of all. There is no knowing what may come out of mouths which are at once lewd and lying. The misery caused to a good man by slanderous reports no heart can imagine but that which is wounded by them: in all Satan's armoury there are no worse weapons than deceitful tongues. To have a reputation, over which we have watched with daily care, suddenly bespattered with the foulest aspersions, is painful beyond description; but when wicked and deceitful men get their mouths fully opened we can hardly expect to escape any more than others. "They have spoken against me with a lying tongue." Lying tongues cannot lie still. Bad tongues are not content to vilify bad men, but choose the most gracious of saints to be the objects of their attacks. Here is reason enough for prayer. The heart sinks when assailed with slander, for we know not what may be said next, what friend may be alienated, what evil may be threatened, or what misery may be caused to us and others. The air is full of rumours, and shadows impalpable flit around; the mind is confused with dread of unseen foes and invisible arrows. What ill can be worse than to be assailed with slander,

"Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whoso tongue

Outvenoms all the worms of Nile"?

Psalm 109:3

"They compassed me about also with words of hatred." Turn which way he would they hedged him in with falsehood, misrepresentation, accusation, and scorn. Whispers, sneers, insinuations, satires, and open charges filled his ear with a perpetual buzz, and all for no reason, but sheer hate. Each word was as full of venom as an egg is full of meat; they could not speak without showing their teeth. "And fought against me without a cause." He had not provoked the quarrel or contributed to it, yet in a thousand ways they laboured to "corrode his comfort, and destroy his case." All this tended to make the suppliant feel the more acutely the wrongs which were done to him.

Psalm 109:4

continued...

6 Set thou a wicked man over him; and let Satan stand at his fight hand.

7 When he shall be judged, let him be condemned; and let his prayer become sin.

8 Let his days be few; and let another take his office.

9 Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.

10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg; let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.

11 Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labour.

12 Let there be none to extend mercy unto him; neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children.

13 Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.

14 Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord; and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.

15 Let them be before the Lord continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.

16 Because that he remembered not to shew mercy, but persecuted the poor and needy man, that he might even slay the broken in heart.

17 As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him: as he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him.

18 As he clothed himself with cursing like as with his garment, so let it come into his bowels like water, and like oil into his bones.

19 Let it be unto him as the garment which covereth him, and for a girdle wherewith he is girded continually.

continued...

21 But do thou for me, O God the Lord, for thy name's sake: because thy mercy is good, deliver thou me.

22 For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me.

23 I am gone like the shadow when it declineth: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

24 My knees are weak through fasting; and my flesh faileth of fatness.

25 I became also a reproach unto them: when they looked upon me they shaked their heads.

26 Help me, O Lord my God: O save me according to thy mercy:

27 That they may know that this is thy hand; that thou, Lord, hast done it.

28 Let them curse, but bless thou; when they arise, let them be ashamed; but let thy servant rejoice.

29 Let mine adversaries be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion, as with a mantle.

30 I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth; yea, I will praise him among the multitude.

31 For he shall stand at the right hand of the poor, to save him from those that condemn his soul.

Psalm 109:21

"But do thou for me, O God the Lord, for thy name's sake." How eagerly he turns from his enemies to his God! He sets the great Thou in opposition to all his adversaries, and you see at once that his heart is at rest. The words are very indistinct, and though our version may not precisely translate them, yet it in a remarkable manner hits upon the sense and upon the obscurity which hang over it. "Do thou for me" - what shall he do? Why, do whatever he thinks fit. He leaves himself in the Lord's hands, dictating nothing, but quite content so long as his God will but undertake for him. His plea is not his own merit, but the name. The saints have always felt this to be their most mighty plea. God himself has performed his grandest deeds of grace for the honour of his name, and his people know that this is the most potent argument with him. What the Lord himself has guarded with sacred jealousy we should reverence with our whole hearts and rely upon without distrust. "Because thy mercy is good, deliver thou me." Not because I am good, but because thy mercy is good: see how the saints fetch their pleadings in prayer from the Lord himself. God's mercy is the star to which the Lord's people turn their eye when they are tossed with tempest and not comforted, for the peculiar bounty and goodness of that mercy have a charm for weary hearts. When man has no mercy we shall still find it in God. When man would devour we may look to God to deliver. His name and his mercy are two firm grounds for hope, and happy are those who know how to rest upon them.

Psalm 109:22

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