Matthew 5:9(v7)Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.
Psalms 18:6(v1)In my distress I called on Yahweh, and cried to my God. He heard my voice out of his temple. My cry before him came into his ears.
Jonah 2:2(v1)He said, “I called because of my affliction to Yahweh. He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried. You heard my voice.
Psalms 118:5(v1)Out of my distress, I called on Yah. Yah answered me with freedom.
Hebrews 5:7(v1)He, in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and petitions with strong crying and tears to him who was able to save him from…
Show all 85 cross-references
Psalms 50:15(v1)Call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you will honor me.”
Psalms 130:1(v1)Out of the depths I have cried to you, Yahweh.
Psalms 107:13(v1)Then they cried to Yahweh in their trouble, and he saved them out of their distresses.
Psalms 125:1(v1)Those who trust in Yahweh are as Mount Zion, which can’t be moved, but remains forever.
Psalms 131:1(v1)Yahweh, my heart isn’t arrogant, nor my eyes lofty; nor do I concern myself with great matters, or things too wonderful for me.
Isaiah 37:3-4(v1)They said to him, “Hezekiah says, ‘Today is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the birth, and…
Luke 22:44(v1)Being in agony he prayed more earnestly. His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down on the ground.
Psalms 134:1(v1)Look! Praise Yahweh, all you servants of Yahweh, who stand by night in Yahweh’s house!
Isaiah 37:14-20(v1)Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it. Then Hezekiah went up to Yahweh’s house, and spread it before…
Psalms 30:7-8(v1)You, Yahweh, when you favored me, made my mountain stand strong; but when you hid your face, I was troubled. I cried to you, Yahweh. I made…
Psalms 102:2(v1)Don’t hide your face from me in the day of my distress. Turn your ear to me. Answer me quickly in the day when I call.
Psalms 109:4(v7)In return for my love, they are my adversaries; but I am in prayer.
Psalms 121:1(v1)I will lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from?
Psalms 122:1(v1)I was glad when they said to me, “Let’s go to Yahweh’s house!”
Psalms 124:1(v1)If it had not been Yahweh who was on our side, let Israel now say,
Psalms 127:1(v1)Unless Yahweh builds the house, they who build it labor in vain. Unless Yahweh watches over the city, the watchman guards it in vain.
Psalms 132:1(v1)Yahweh, remember David and all his affliction,
Psalms 133:1(v1)See how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to live together in unity!
Psalms 116:3-4(v1)The cords of death surrounded me, the pains of Sheol got a hold of me. I found trouble and sorrow. Then I called on Yahweh’s name: “Yahweh,…
Isaiah 38:2-5(v1)Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to Yahweh, and said, “Remember now, Yahweh, I beg you, how I have walked before you in…
Psalms 57:4(vv4, 6)My soul is among lions. I lie among those who are set on fire, even the sons of men, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a…
Genesis 10:2(v5)The sons of Japheth were: Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras.
Psalms 123:1(v1)I lift up my eyes to you, you who sit in the heavens.
Psalms 126:1(v1)When Yahweh brought back those who returned to Zion, we were like those who dream.
Psalms 128:1(v1)Blessed is everyone who fears Yahweh, who walks in his ways.
Psalms 129:1(v1)Many times they have afflicted me from my youth up. Let Israel now say,
Matthew 10:16(v6)“Behold, I send you out as sheep among wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.
James 3:5-8(v4)So the tongue is also a little member, and boasts great things. See how a small fire can spread to a large forest! And the tongue is a…
Psalms 34:14(v7)Depart from evil, and do good. Seek peace, and pursue it.
Psalms 140:1-3(v2)Deliver me, Yahweh, from the evil man. Preserve me from the violent man: those who devise mischief in their hearts. They continually gather…
Ezekiel 2:6(v6)You, son of man, don’t be afraid of them, neither be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns are with you, and you dwell among…
Hebrews 12:14(v7)Follow after peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no man will see the Lord,
Proverbs 12:22(vv2, 4)Lying lips are an abomination to Yahweh, but those who do the truth are his delight.
Genesis 25:13(v5)These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, by their names, according to the order of their birth: the firstborn of Ishmael, Nebaioth, then…
Proverbs 18:21(v4)Death and life are in the power of the tongue; those who love it will eat its fruit.
Proverbs 19:9(v4)A false witness shall not be unpunished. He who utters lies shall perish.
Ezekiel 27:13(v5)“ ‘ “Javan, Tubal, and Meshech were your traders. They traded the persons of men and vessels of bronze for your merchandise.
Matthew 10:36(v6)A man’s foes will be those of his own household.
Romans 12:18(v7)If it is possible, as much as it is up to you, be at peace with all men.
Psalms 35:20(v7)For they don’t speak peace, but they devise deceitful words against those who are quiet in the land.
Psalms 45:5(v4)Your arrows are sharp. The nations fall under you, with arrows in the heart of the king’s enemies.
Psalms 52:2-4(v2)Your tongue plots destruction, like a sharp razor, working deceitfully. You love evil more than good, lying rather than speaking the truth.…
Psalms 109:1-2(v2)God of my praise, don’t remain silent, for they have opened the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of deceit against me. They have spoken to…
Proverbs 16:27(v4)A worthless man devises mischief. His speech is like a scorching fire.
Proverbs 19:5(v4)A false witness shall not be unpunished. He who pours out lies shall not go free.
Song of Solomon 1:5(v5)I am dark, but lovely, you daughters of Jerusalem, like Kedar’s tents, like Solomon’s curtains.
Ephesians 2:14-17(v7)For he is our peace, who made both one, and broke down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in his flesh the hostility, the law…
Deuteronomy 32:23-24(v4)“I will heap evils on them. I will spend my arrows on them. They shall be wasted with hunger, and devoured with burning heat and bitter…
1 Samuel 20:30-33(v6)Then Saul’s anger burned against Jonathan, and he said to him, “You son of a perverse rebellious woman, don’t I know that you have chosen…
1 Samuel 24:9-11(v7)David said to Saul, “Why do you listen to men’s words, saying, ‘Behold, David seeks to harm you?’ Behold, today your eyes have seen how…
1 Samuel 26:2-4(v7)Then Saul arose, and went down to the wilderness of Ziph, having three thousand chosen men of Israel with him, to seek David in the…
2 Samuel 20:19(v7)I am among those who are peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why will you swallow up…
Job 27:8(v3)For what is the hope of the godless, when he is cut off, when God takes away his life?
Psalms 7:13(v4)He has also prepared for himself the instruments of death. He makes ready his flaming arrows.
Psalms 35:11(v2)Unrighteous witnesses rise up. They ask me about things that I don’t know about.
Psalms 52:5(v4)God will likewise destroy you forever. He will take you up, and pluck you out of your tent, and root you out of the land of the living.
Psalms 55:20(v7)He raises his hands against his friends. He has violated his covenant.
Psalms 59:7(v4)Behold, they spew with their mouth. Swords are in their lips, “For”, they say, “who hears us?”
Psalms 140:9-11(v4)As for the head of those who surround me, let the mischief of their own lips cover them. Let burning coals fall on them. Let them be thrown…
Proverbs 11:9(v4)With his mouth the godless man destroys his neighbor, but the righteous will be delivered through knowledge.
Proverbs 11:12(v4)One who despises his neighbor is void of wisdom, but a man of understanding holds his peace.
Proverbs 11:18(v4)Wicked people earn deceitful wages, but one who sows righteousness reaps a sure reward.
Isaiah 60:6-7(v5)A multitude of camels will cover you, the dromedaries of Midian and Ephah. All from Sheba will come. They will bring gold and frankincense,…
Jeremiah 9:2-3(v5)Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! For they are all…
Ezekiel 27:21(v5)“ ‘ “Arabia, and all the princes of Kedar were the merchants of your hand; in lambs, rams, and goats. In these, they were your merchants.
Ezekiel 38:2-3(v5)“Son of man, set your face toward Gog, of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal, and prophesy against him, and say,…
Ezekiel 39:1(v5)“You, son of man, prophesy against Gog, and say, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Behold, I am against you, Gog, prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal.
Micah 7:1-2(v5)Misery is mine! Indeed, I am like one who gathers the summer fruits, as gleanings of the vineyard: There is no cluster of grapes to eat. My…
Matthew 16:26(v3)For what will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and forfeits his life? Or what will a man give in exchange for his life?
Matthew 26:59-62(v2)Now the chief priests, the elders, and the whole council sought false testimony against Jesus, that they might put him to death; and they…
Romans 6:21(v3)What fruit then did you have at that time in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death.
2 Peter 2:7-8(v5)and delivered righteous Lot, who was very distressed by the lustful life of the wicked (for that righteous man dwelling among them was…
Revelation 2:13(v5)“I know your works and where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is. You hold firmly to my name, and didn’t deny my faith in the days of…
Revelation 21:8(v4)But for the cowardly, unbelieving, sinners, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their part is in…
1 Samuel 25:1(v5)Samuel died; and all Israel gathered themselves together, and mourned for him, and buried him at his house at Ramah. Then David arose, and…
Proverbs 18:8(v4)The words of a gossip are like dainty morsels: they go down into a person’s innermost parts.
Jeremiah 9:6(v5)Your habitation is in the middle of deceit. Through deceit, they refuse to know me,” says Yahweh.
Jeremiah 15:10(v5)Woe is me, my mother, that you have borne me, a man of strife, and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have not lent, neither have…
Jeremiah 49:28-29(v5)Of Kedar, and of the kingdoms of Hazor, which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon struck. Yahweh says: “Arise, go up to Kedar, and destroy the…
Titus 3:3(v6)For we were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating…
85 distinct cross-references across this passage (87 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (26 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
John Calvin1540 · Public DomainOn vv1–61. I cried to Jehovah in my distress. The…
1. I cried to Jehovah in my distress. The name of the author of the Psalm is not expressed, but the style of it throughout presents David to our view. Although, therefore, I cannot positively affirm, yet I am rather inclined to think that it was composed by him. Nor will it be improper, in my judgment, to explain it as if his name had been mentioned in the inscription. This, then, being granted, I would observe that although David, when in this verse he affirms that the Lord had heard him, gives thanks to him, yet his chief purpose was to set forth, in the form of complaint, how wickedly and cruelly Saul’s flatterers employed all their ingenuity and power to accomplish his destruction. He, however, sets out with an expression of his gratitude to God, telling us that he had not called upon Him in vain; and he does this, that by his own example he might encourage others, especially when oppressed with adversity, to confidence in prayer. Men, it is true, have need of God’s help every moment; but there is not a more suitable season for seeking him than when some great danger is immediately menacing us. It is therefore worthy of notice, that he was heard when, constrained and shut up by tribulation, he betook himself to the protection of God.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv1, 3, 4, 5, 7That is, of lifting up the tune and rising…
That is, of lifting up the tune and rising in singing.
Albeit the children of God ought to rejoice when they suffer for righteous sake, yet it is a great grief to the flesh to hear evil for well doing.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv1–7Psa 120:1 « A Song of degrees. » In…
Psa 120:1 « A Song of degrees. » In my distress I cried unto the LORD, and he heard me.
A Song of degrees] A most excellent song, Tremellius rendereth it; and so indeed this and the fourteen following are, both for the matter and for the form or manner of expression, which is wondrous short and sweet, as the very epigrams of the Holy Ghost himself, wherein each verse may well stand for an oracle. And in this sense Adam Hammahalah, or a man of degrees, is put for an eminent or excellent man, 1Ch 17:17. Others understand it otherwise; wherein they have good leave to abound in their own sense; since sine periculo hic erratur, an error here is not dangerous.
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Ver. 1. In my distress I cried unto the Lord] Oratio sine malis est, ut avis sine alis, Distress addeth wings to our devotions. Our Saviour, being in an agony, prayed more earnestly, Luk 22:44. So do all his members, and especially when they lie under the lash of a lying tongue, as here, Psa 120:2. "Being defamed, we pray," saith Paul, 1Co 4:13.
And he heard me] "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much," Jas 5:16 Zec 13:9. He that prayeth ardently speedeth assuredly, Psa 91:15, and the unmiscarrying return of prayer should be carefully observed and thankfully improved, Psa 66:20.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv2–5From lying lips; from the unjust censures and malicious…
From lying lips; from the unjust censures and malicious slanders of mine enemies, who traduce me as an egregious hypocrite, as a rebel and traitor.
From a deceitful tongue; which covereth mischievous designs with pretences of kindness.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry1710 · Public DomainOn vv1, 5Here is, I. Deliverance from a false tongue obtained…
Here is, I. Deliverance from a false tongue obtained by prayer. David records his own experience of this.
1. He was brought into distress, into great distress, by lying lips and a deceitful tongue. There were those that sought his ruin, and had almost effected it, by lying. (1.) By telling lies to him. They flattered him with professions and protestations of friendships, and promises of kindness and service to him, that they might the more securely and without suspicion carry on their designs against him, and might have an opportunity, by betraying his counsels, to do him a mischief. They smiled in his face and kissed him, even when they were aiming to smite him under the fifth rib. The most dangerous enemies, and those which it is most hard to guard against, are such as carry on their malicious designs under the colour of friendship. The Lord deliver every good man from such lying lips. (2.) By telling lies of him. They forged false accusations against him and laid to his charge things that he knew not. This has often been the lot not only of the innocent, but of the excellent ones, of the earth, who have been greatly distressed by lying lips, and have not only had their names blackened and made odious by calumnies in conversation, but their lives, and all that is dear to them in this world, endangered by false-witness-bearing in judgment. David was herein a type of Christ, who was distressed by lying lips and deceitful tongues.
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2. In this distress he had recourse to God by faithful and fervent prayer: I cried unto the Lord. Having no fence against false tongues, he appealed to him who has all men's hearts in his hand, who has power over the consciences of bad men, and can, when he pleases, bridle their tongues. His prayer was, "Deliver my soul, O Lord! from lying lips, that my enemies may not by these cursed methods work my ruin." He that had prayed so earnestly to be kept from lying (Psa 119:29) and hated it so heartily in himself (Psa 119:163) might with the more confidence pray to be kept from being belied by others, and from the ill consequences of it.
3. He obtained a gracious answer to this prayer. God heard him; so that his enemies, though they carried their designs very far, were baffled at last, and could not prevail to do him the mischief they intended. The God of truth is, and will be, the protector of his people from lying lips, Psa 37:6.
II. The doom of a false tongue foretold by faith, Psa 120:3, Psa 120:4. As God will preserve his people from this mischievous generation, so he will reckon with their enemies, Psa 12:3, Psa 12:7. The threatening is addressed to the sinner himself, for the awakening of his conscience, if he have any left: "Consider what shall be given unto thee, and what shall be done unto thee, by the righteous Judge of heaven and earth, thou false tongue." Surely sinners durst not do as they do if they knew, and would be persuaded to think, what will be in the end thereof. Let liars consider what shall be given to them: Sharp arrows of the Almighty, with coals of juniper, that is, they will fall and lie for ever under the wrath of God, and will be made miserable by the tokens of his displeasure, which will fly swiftly like arrows, and will strike the sinner ere he is aware and when he sees not who hurts him. This is threatened against liars, Psa 64:7. God shall shoot at them with an arrow; suddenly shall they be wounded. They set God at a distance from them, but from afar his arrows can reach them. They are sharp arrows, and arrows of the mighty, the Almighty; for they will pierce through the strongest armour and strike deep into the hardest heart. The terrors of the Lord are his arrows (Job 6:4), and his wrath is compared to burning coals of juniper, which do not flame or crackle, like thorns under a pot, but have a vehement heat, and keep fire very long (some say, a year round) even when they seem to be gone out. This is the portion of the false tongue; for all that love and make a lie shall have their portion in the lake that burns eternally, Rev 22:15.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv1–6In my distress I cried unto the Lord,.... Being…
In my distress I cried unto the Lord,.... Being at a distance from his own country, or, however, from the house of God; persecuted by men, under the lash of their tongues; reproached, abused, and belied by them: in this his case and circumstances, he betook himself by prayer to the Lord, and importuned help and deliverance of him, knowing that none could help him as he; see Psa 18:6;
and he heard me; answered him, and delivered him. The petition he put up follows, which shows his case, and his particular distress.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv1, 4, 5David prays against lying tongues, and denounces judgment against…
David prays against lying tongues, and denounces judgment against them, ver. 1-4. Complains of his wicked and unpeaceable neighbours, ver. 5-7. A song of degrees. Title of the psalm. Of degrees - Or, of accents, as the word properly signifies. This title is given to this and the fourteen following psalms, probably because they were sung upon the fifteen degrees, steps, or stairs of the temple, which the Jewish writers mention.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv1–7The psalmist, in great distress, calls on the Lord…
PSALM CXX
The psalmist, in great distress, calls on the Lord for
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deliverance from calumny and defamation, 1, 2;
shows the punishment that awaits his persecutor, 3, 4;
deplores the necessity of his residence with the ungodly, 5-7.
NOTES ON PSALM CXX
This Psalm, and all the rest that follow it, to the end of Psalm 134, fifteen in number, are called Psalms of Degrees; for thus the Hebrew title המעלות hammaaloth is generally translated, as coming from the root עלה alah, to ascend or mount upwards. Hence מעלות maaloth, steps or stairs for ascending, 1Kg 10:19-20; 2Kg 9:13. But as the word may be applied to elevation in general, hence some have thought that it may here signify the elevation of voice; "these Psalms being sung with the highest elevations of voice and music." Others have thought the word expresses rather the matter of these Psalms, as being of peculiar excellence: and hence Junius and Tremellius prefix to each Canticum excellentissimum, "A most excellent ode."
R. D. Kimchi says, "There were fifteen steps by which the priests ascended into the temple, on each of which they sang one of these fifteen Psalms." This opinion I find referred to in the Apocryphal Gospel of the birth of Mary: "Her parents brought her to the temple, and set her upon one of the steps. Now there are fifteen steps about the temple, by which they go up to it, according to the fifteen Psalms of Degrees." But the existence of such steps and practices cannot be proved.
Aben Ezra supposes that the word means some kind of tune sung to these Psalms. It is more likely, if the title be really ancient, that it was affixed to them on account of their being sung on the return from the Babylonish captivity, as the people were going up to Jerusalem; for though some of them are attributed to David, yet it is very probable that they were all made long after his time, and probably during the captivity, or about the end of it. The author of these fifteen Psalms is not known; and most probably they were not the work of one person. They have been attributed to David, to Solomon, to Ezra, to Haggai, to Zechariah, and to Malachi, without any positive evidence. They are, however, excellent in their kind, and written with much elegance; containing strong and nervous sentiments of the most exalted piety, expressed with great felicity of language in a few words.
Verse 1. In my distress] Through the causes afterwards mentioned.
I cried unto the Lord] Made strong supplication for help.
And he heard one.] Answered my prayer by comforting my soul.
It appears to be a prayer of the captives in Babylon for complete liberty; or perhaps he recites the prayer the Israelites had made previously to their restoration.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv2, 5Psa 120:2-4. Deliver my soul from lying lips —…
Psa 120:2-4. Deliver my soul from lying lips — From the unjust censures and malicious slanders of mine enemies; and from a deceitful tongue — Which covers mischievous designs under pretences of kindness. What shall be given unto thee — By the righteous Judge of heaven and earth; thou false tongue — O thou false accuser, or slanderer, or whosoever thou art, that art guilty of any such like practices? Sharp arrows of the mighty —
The wrath and vengeance of the almighty God, which in Scripture, and particularly in this book, is often compared to arrows, as Psa 7:13-14, &c., and here to arrows of the mighty, that is, arrows shot by the hands of a strong man; and to coals, Psa 140:10, and here to coals of juniper, which burn very fiercely, and retain their heat for a long time. And the psalmist may possibly express himself in these words, to show the suitableness of the punishment to the sin. As if he had said, As thy tongue shoots arrows, (as calumnies are often called,) and kindles coals, so thou shalt bring God’s arrows and coals, kindled by the fire of his wrath, upon thyself.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv1–7In my distress - In my suffering, as arising…
In my distress - In my suffering, as arising from slander, Psa 120:2-3. There are few forms of suffering more keen than those caused by slander:
“Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue
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Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose breath
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie
All corners of the world: kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave
This viperous slander enters.”
Cymbeline, iii. 4.
It is one of those things which a man cannot guard against; which he cannot repel by force; whose origin he cannot always trace; which will go where a vindication will not follow; whose effects will live long after the slander is refuted; which will adhere to a man, or leave a trait of suspicion, even after the most successful vindication, for the effect will be to make a second slander more easily credited than the first was.
I cried unto the Lord, and he heard me - I had no other resource. I could not meet the slander. I could not refute it. I could not prevent its effects on my reputation, and all that I could do was to commit the case to the Lord. See the notes at Psa 37:5-6.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures1864 · Public DomainOn v1Psalms 120
Psalms 120
A Song of Degrees
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In my distress I cried
Unto the Lord, and he heard me.
2 Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips,
And from a deceitful tongue.
3 What shall be given unto thee?
Or what shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue?
4 Sharp arrows of the mighty,
With coals of juniper.
5 Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech,
That I dwell in the tents of Kedar!
6 My soul hath long dwelt
With him that hateth peace.
7 I am for peace: but when I speak,
They are for war.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Composition.—On the superscription compare Introd. § 6, No. 5. We have but little to add here. Ewald now decides for the reference to the festival journeys to Jerusalem. So also Liebusch in the Ouedlinburg Osterprogramm. 1866, mentions “The pilgrim songs in the Fifth Book of the Psalms.” Delitzsch, on the contrary, now holds to the expression “songs of ascents,” but refers, it, with Gesenius and others, to the artificial climactic form of the rhythm, in which the poem, by the repetition of one of the significant words immediately preceding advances by a gradual ascent. Hitzig traces this obscure and doubtful term, for which none of the explanations proposed are sufficient, (Hupfeld), to a word-play, by the collector and redactor of the fifteen Psalms which are furnished with this title, referring to the steps of the Temple. For the ascent to the outer court was made through each of the three gates by seven steps, and that to the inner court by eight; and in this small collection of songs, which are closely connected by many similarities both of form and contents, the first contains seven, the second eight verses. It is further to be remarked that, in Psalms 121. is written exceptionally lammaálôth, which seems to favor the explanation: “for the upward journeys” (Aquila, Symmachus), but may just as well mean: after the manner of steps (Del.); for it is just in that Psalm that the climactic structure, which in others almost disappears, is displayed quite characteristically. This difference is entirely unnoticed by the Sept., Chald., and Jerome, and regarded by Hitzig as a mistake of the copyist.
[Hengstenberg, with whom Alexander and Perowne, as well as most commentators, agree, favors the view first mentioned above. Against the view given in the Syrian translation, and also by Chrysostom and Theodoret, and formerly held by Ewald, that the title refers to those songs which were sung by Israel on the way home from Babylon, he urges the consideration that David and Solomon are mentioned as the composers of some of the Psalms which bear that title. He accounts for the position assigned to those Psalms, and the dissimilarity of style and modes of thought between them and the others, on the hypothesis, that “these five ancient Psalms, sung by the people, as they went up to Jerusalem, before the captivity, were made the basis of a whole series or system, designed for the same use, by an inspired writer, after the restoration, who not only added new Psalms of his own, as appears from the resemblances of tone and diction, but joined them to the old ones in a studied or artificial manner, entirely inconsistent with the supposition of fortuitous or random combination.” On the characteristics of the Psalms bearing the general title, he remarks: “These Psalms have much in common. The tone never rises in any of them above a certain height, and descends very speedily from that height when gained. They all bear the character of simplicity. With the exception of Psalms 132. they are all of short compass. In all of them, with the same exception, the parallelism of the clauses is little attended to. No one of them bears an individual character; they all refer to the whole Church of God with the exception, in some measure, of Psalms 127., which, without being individual, places before us, in the first instance, the particular members of the Church, but which the collector has applied also to the circumstances of the whole community.”—J. F. M.]
In the Psalm before us is first presented an acknowledgment of prayer heard in former times (Psa_120:1). There is then offered a prayer for deliverance from the power of a false, warlike, and savage enemy (Psa_120:2-4). The suppliant longing for peace then complains (Psa_120:5-7) of that enemy’s implacable hatred, this complaint being the more sorrowful and urgent, as he had already bitterly experienced, dwelling as he did in the midst of such savage foes, the painful contrast, already too much aggravated, to his former condition. Nothing definitely can be said as to the historical situation, not even whether the author had in mind purely personal experiences, or sufferings of his nation shared by him. Nor can we say whether the name of the enemy is to be taken historically or symbolically.
Psa_120:2-4. The expressions here are so concise and obscure, and it is possible to connect them in so many different ways, that the sense is highly doubtful. It is first most readily suggested to consider Psa_120:3 as a continuation of the addressto Jehovah, and to take the deceitful tongue as the subject (Mendelssohn, Olshausen). But such a question would afford a sense but little suitable, and would be still less aptly connected with Psa_120:4. It has therefore been proposed to invert this order, and to regard Jehovah as the subject, and the deceitful tongue as addressed in the vocative (many since Isaaki, also Hengst. and Del.) An allusion is then supposed to exist to the formula usually employed in the announcement of the Divine punishments, (1Sa_3:17 and frequently), and Psa_120:4 is taken as a continuation of the question, and as a figurative description of the tongue (J. D. Mich., Ewald), which is a sharp sword (Psa_57:5), and a pointed arrow (Jer_9:7), and like the fire of hell (Jam_3:6); or it is regarded as the answer to the question, and as a sarcastic description of the punishments (comp. Psa_140:11) according to the law of retribution. But the supposition of a sudden change of subject is very harsh in this connection, nor do adequate reasons for it appear. If, then, we return to the construction, according to which the deceitful tongue is the subject, it would certainly be in the highest degree forced and strange to suppose the possessor of the tongue to be meant, as metonymically implied in Psa_120:2, and Psa_120:4 to mention the punishments to be inflicted upon him for his deceitful conduct (Chald., de Dieu) or to describe figuratively the injuries which he causes to others, while he himself gains nothing by them (Aben Ezra, Kimchi, Calvin, and many of the older expositors; also Rosenmüller and De Wette). But, instead of this, there would be an address to the Poet, whether in the form of a question put by himself, or by a third person, in poetical fashion, or whether it is, which however is least probable, referred to an indefinite person, as being a general expression. Psa_120:4 would then present the conditions which called forth the prayer in Psa_120:2, expressing figuratively the dangerous effects of the tongue, but in the form of an answer (Hitzig), and not as an explanatory description (Luther, Geier). [Dr. Moll thus translates Psa_120:3-4 : “What to thee gives, and what to thee brings the tongue of deceit?” (tongue being the subject). Arrows of a strong one, sharpened, along with coals of the broom-tree.” This ingenious mode of viewing the passage appears to present its most natural connection, and, at the same time, to bring out its poetic beauty. The following rendering of Psa_120:1-4 will exhibit this view, the arrangement of the clauses in the original being in some cases neglected for the sake of perspicuity.
1. (The Poet.) I called to Jehovah in my distress, and He answered me.
2. Jehovah, deliver me from lips of lying, from the tongue of deceit.
3. (A third person is represented as addressing the Poet). What does the tongue of deceit give thee and bring to thee?
4. (The Poet). Arrows of a mighty man, sharpened, with coals of the broom-tree.
The opinion mentioned above, as that of Hengstenberg and Delitzsch, is favored by Alexander and Perowne.—J. F. M.]
The roots of the rethem, that is, of the broom-tree (Gesen.), not of the juniper (Jerome, the Rabbins, and the older expositors), furnish the best wood-coals in the opinion of the Arabs (Burckhardt, Reisen in Syrien II., 791, 1073. Robinson, Palestine, I., 336). They retain the glow longest, and, therefore, along with sharp arrows, are a suitable figure in the present connection. It is not said that the arrows were sharpened with broom-tree coals, or hardened, pointed in them (older expositors cited in De Wette), or that they were burning (Knapp). The particular term is perhaps chosen in allusion to the mention made in the following verse of an abode in the tents of Kedar, a predatory Arab tribe (Gen_10:2; Isa_42:11; Isa_60:7; Sol. Son_1:5). But it does not follow from this, any more than it does from the cry of woe, (Calv., J. H. Mich.), that Psa_120:4 should be severed from the preceding verse.
Psa_120:5-6. Neither can Psa_120:4 be combined with the following verse, as though it represented the same historical situation. For we cannot justify the ingenious change of the reading גַחֲלֵי into אָהֳלֵי (Hupfeld), in order to gain the meaning: the arrows of a warrior are sharp in the tents of Rethamim, according to the analogy of Psa_120:5, and the similar proper name in Num_33:18. Moreover Mesech is named besides, along with Kedar, as a place of residence. This name points to a region between the Caspian and Black Seas in the far North near Magog (Eze_38:2). The attempts which have been made to bring it into connection with Damascus (Hitzig), or to refer it to another Ishmaelitish tribe elsewhere unmentioned (Olshausen), or to explain it appellatively of the long duration of the abode in a strange land (Sept. et al.) and thus to do away with the proper name, have arisen from the difficulty of assigning to the author a residence among two tribes so far apart, especially when such residence is also described as still continuing. Most expositors, therefore, since Saadias and Calvin, regard both names as figurative designations of rude and hostile companions. These are supposed by some to have been the nations among whom the Jews lived in the Exile; by others, the Samaritans, who retarded the re-building of the city; by others still, the tribes among whom the people of God dwelt during the dispersion.
[Psa_120:7. Delitzsch: “He, for his part is peace, (comp. Micah 9:4; Psa_109:4; Psa_110:3), inasmuch as love of peace, readiness for peace, and longing for peace fills his soul: yet, if he does but open his mouth, they are for war, their voice and conduct become hostile at once. . . . The Psalm ends with the shrill dissonance of שׁלום and מלחמה. The cry for help, with which it begins, lingers hovering over that discord, longing for its removal.”—J. F. M.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
To him who seeks peace, it is not always granted, in this world, to live in peace with those about him. He must often, and sometimes for a long period, have the bitterest experiences of their quarrelsome and hostile dispositions, and suffer much pain from their sore and malicious attacks by word and act. But the living God remains ever his Refuge, and the blessed experience of prayers, heard in times past, strengthens and encourages his faith in the coming of a like blessing in the troubled present, and his hopes of deliverance after renewed supplication.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The pious have no peace in the world, but they can rest in God.—Wounds, inflicted by a sharp and malicious tongue, burn more severely than fire does, but God has a balm for them.—Blessed is he, who, though experiencing suffering in this evil world, experiences deliverance too, from answers to prayer.
Starke: Liars and calumniators are the most injurious people in the world, and yet they injure none as much as they do themselves; for they are accursed, and an abomination unto God.—The kingdom of the devil is a kingdom of lies, and will in all likelihood, continue so, but Christ’s kingdom is one of eternal truth, whose fruit is peace and love.—The true Church has ever to dwell among the most cruel enemies, and under oppression. Frisch: It is much easier to heal a severe wound, than to repair the effects of a calumny circulated by lying tongues.—Guenther: The troubled, filthy spring of evil speaking is selfishness, envy, hatred of brethren, departure from God. If therefore, it is a sure mark of godlessness, and of a carnal disposition, to slander one’s brother, it is not to be wondered at, if the children of light have to suffer most from such poisonous arrows.—Taube: He who has entered into communion with the God of peace, through the blood of reconciliation, is a child of peace (Mat_5:9), while the wicked are like the troubled sea, which can never rest. (Isa_57:20 f.).
[Bp. Horne: Marvel not, O disciple of Jesus! if the world hate and oppose thee, but pray only that, when thou shalt be used as He was, thou mayest be enabled to bear that usage as He did.
Barnes: I cried unto the Lord, etc,. I had no other resource. I could not meet the slander, I could not refute it. I could not prevent its effects on my reputation, and all that I could do was to commit the case to the Lord.—There is a world of peace, and the peace of heaven will be all the more grateful and blessed, when we go up to it from such a scene of conflict and war.—J. F. M.].
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv1–71. Distress… cried… heard—This serial form—trouble, prayer, and answer—was…
1. Distress… cried… heard—This serial form—trouble, prayer, and answer—was common for David, and his faith in God touching the answer, gathered from past experience, was the ground of all his hope.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 71. In my distress I called unto Jehovah,
1. In my distress I called unto Jehovah,
And he answered me.
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The Psalmist calls to mind past answers to prayer as an encouragement to fresh prayer in his present distress. Cp. Psa_3:4. This is a simpler and more natural explanation of the verse than to take it as a confident anticipation of a favourable answer, I call … and he will surely answer me; or to suppose that the Psalmist is looking back upon trouble in the past, and that Psa_120:2-4 are the prayer to which he refers in Psa_120:1.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv2, 3, 4, 5, 7(2) Deliver . . .—This is the cry for…
(2) Deliver . . .—This is the cry for help of which mention has just been made. The thought is one we have met frequently. Of all the elements of bitterness which made up the lot of Israel under foreign dominion, taunts and calumnies seem to have made the deepest wound, and left the most lasting scar. This was “the torture prolonged from age to age,” under which we hear psalmist after psalmist raising his cry for deliverance.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv1–7THE next fifteen psalms have a common heading, which…
THE SONGS OF ASCENTS.
THE next fifteen psalms have a common heading, which is translated "Songs of Degrees," "Songs of Ascents," or "Songs of Steps." They constitute together "a Little Psalter," which contains indications of a formal arrangement. The central psalm the only one ascribed to Solomon has on either side of it a group of seven; each such group formed of two psalms ascribed to David, and five anonymous ones. The ascribed psalms are separated one from another by the anonymous ones, in such sort that no two of the former ever come together. This is evidently not the result of chance.
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Of the title itself different explanations are given. Some regard the degrees (ma"aloth) as "steps," and accept a rabbinical explanation, that the psalms were written for chanting upon fifteen steps, which led from the Court of the Women in the temple to the Court of the Men. But there is no sufficient evidence of the existence of these steps. Others, translating maaloth by "ascents," suggest that they are psalms composed for the Jews to chant on their ascent from Babylon to Jerusalem at the return from the Captivity. But the plural form is thus unaccounted for, while the ascription of five of the fifteen to David and Solomon is contradicted. Under these circumstances, recent critics mostly acquiesce in the view that the psalms were written for the pilgrims, who annually went up to Jerusalem at the three great feasts, to chant upon their journeys. (So Ewald, Thenius, Hengstenberg, Dean Johnson, and Professor Alexander.)
In my distress I cried unto the Lord, and he heard me. The particular "distress" intended can only be conjectured. Some suppose it to be the Captivity itself, others the opposition offered by the Samaritans, Ammonites, and others to the rebuilding of the temple (Ezr 4 Ezr 5) and restoration of the wails of Jerusalem. (Neh_2:19, 20 4:1-23 6:2-14) But these guesses are scarcely of much value.
Vers. 1-7. The perversion of power, etc.
This psalm, though "a difference of opinion exists respecting the interpretation of almost every verse and word of it," may suggest valuable thoughts upon
I THE PERVERSION OF POWER. It speaks of "lying lips," a "deceitful tongue," and of the "false tongue" (vers. 2, 3). We may say that sin is perversion; it is the misdirection and abuse of our various faculties and organs; turning to a bad account all our opportunities of good. The Apostle James gives at some length the perversion of the power of speech. (Jam_3:2-13) Our words may be reverent, true, kind, instructive, considerate, helpful, wise; or they may be profane, false, cruel, communicative of evil, injurious. There is hardly a limit to the possible service we may render our Lord and our kind if we avail ourselves of every opportunity of speaking the wise and gracious word; but it is impossible to estimate the evil which a man may do in a long life by a bitter, a false, an impure, a skeptical tongue. It becomes us to think that the power of speech is a great gift from the hand of God; that it is a talent entrusted tolls by our Divine Father for his glory and for the good of men. Whenever, therefore, we speak that which is hurtful to others or unworthy of ourselves we are guiltily abusing our power; we are turning that which was meant to be, and might constantly be made, a fountain of blessing into a stream of sorrow or even of sin. The same thought (respecting perversion) applies, in less degree, to the hands, the eyes, the feet; it is else, of course, very markedly true of the capacities of the mind.
II A CHARACTERISTIC OF DIVINE PUNISHMENT. "What shall be given unto thee... thou false tongue?" "Sharp arrows of the mighty, burning coals," is the reply. The punishment is suited to the offence. The tongue which itself is "a sharp sword" (Psa_57:4) is to be transfixed by the sharp arrows shot by a strong arm; the tongue which is itself "a fire" (Jam_3:6) is to be consumed with burning coals. As is the sin, so is the sorrow and the shame. The king that had done grievous domestic wrong was to suffer in his own family. (2Sa_12:11) The traitor who betrayed his Master was to be deserted and thrown over by his own companions. The pitiless man goes unpitied in the hour of his own desolation. The miser who keeps back the blessings he might confer on others withholds all comforts and delights from his own heart and his own home. He who does not regard the sacredness of his body will live to suffer in the body; he who neglects his mind will pay the penalty in intellectual poverty and feebleness. "Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap" loss, suffering, death, according to the nature of his sin.
III THE MISERY OF UNCONGENIAL SURROUNDINGS. (Vers. 5-7) The psalmist bewails his ill fortune in that he has to dwell in places remote from the civilization and the privileges of his home; he is surrounded by ungenial associates whose spirit is hostile, with whom he cannot live on terms of amity and good will. This "Mesech" of his is found in every latitude and longitude. It is the experience of a very large proportion of men and women, especially in the earlier period of life, to find themselves living or laboring with the unsympathetic, and even with the unfriendly; with those whose views on serious and even sacred subjects are dissimilar or opposite. We may have much to do with those whose spirit and whose attitude are positively provocative, who invite and almost compel us to dispute. It is trying in the last degree. But:
1. It is a recognized and accepted part of our earthly lot, and it will not last very long; it will give place, in time, to the holy friendships and blissful intercourse of the heavenly world.
2. It is a necessary part of the discipline through which we pass, at tempering and strengthening our character.
3. It provides daily opportunity for self-mastery, for submission to the will of God, for honoring the Name of Christ.
IV OUR REFUGE IN GOD. (Vers. 1, 2) Assailed by unjust or ungenerous attack, surrounded by uncongenial companions, we can always realize the near presence of one sympathizing Friend, of the all-powerful God, who can extricate us from the worst situation, or sustain us in it, so that our souls will be at rest.
HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-7. In Mesech and Kedar.
This psalm is a piteous declaration of the unhappy lot of him who is surrounded by the false, the treacherous, and the cruel. They of Mesech the Moschi of Herodotus (see Exposition) dwelt where now the horribly bloodthirsty Kurds have their habitation, who of late years have horrified all Christendom by their barbarous atrocities inflicted on the Christian Armenians. Amid men of such sort the psalmist is complaining that he has to dwell (ver. 5). It is a tale of treachery and cruelty that he portrays or rather suggests to us in this psalm. Concerning all such men of lying lips, we learn
I THEY ARE THE DISTRESS OF THE GODLY. How many a faithful missionary, amid similar hordes, has felt his heart die down in hopeless despair as he witnesses their horrid cruelty and deceit! We at home forget too much this special trial of the missionary. Nothing but the abundant supply of the Spirit of all grace can possibly sustain him amid such sad and revolting circumstances. If he gets used to them, and so indifferent to them, he can no longer be a true missionary; nor either if he fears them or yields to despair about them. And in less unusual form, God"s servants may yet have to say, "My soul is among lions". (Psa_57:4) Many a God-fearing working man amid a crowd of godless mates, many a Christian servant-girl amid companions who have no love for God, many a young disciple of Christ in school or office, these and others like them know by sad experience the treachery and cruelty of the ungodly.
II THE AWFUL AND OVERWHELMING WRATH OF GOD AWAITS THESE PERSECUTORS. (Vers. 3, 4; see Exposition for meaning) The false and lying tongue is often likened to fire, fire of hell, to sword and sharp arrow, and now here it is declared that what such tongue hath sown, that shall it also reap. (cf. Psa_57:4 Psa_64:3 Psa_55:21 Psa_59:7 Jam_3:6; and especially Psa_140:9, Psa_140:10) Sometimes even in this world we see the Divine vengeance poured out on those who have played the part of bloody and deceitful men towards the people of God. In the persecuting ages it was not unusual nor unnatural for the persecuted ones to point out, as proofs of the Divine wrath, the fearful deaths which overtook many of their persecutors. True it is today that he who blesses the servants of God is blessed, and he who curses them is cursed.
III IT MAY NEVERTHELESS BE APPOINTED FOR GOD"S PEOPLE TO DWELL AMID SUCH SURROUNDINGS. The great missionary command involved the possibility of such sojourn. If we are to go into all the world, we must expect to meet with what the world has to offer. And, in God"s providence, we often have to go and dwell amid, not the friends but the foes of God. The soldier in the field, the sailor, the boy at school. It may be God"s will for us. But
IV THEM ENMITY MAY OFTEN SEEM TO BE EXCITED BY THAT WHICH SHOULD MAKE IT ASHAMED. (Ver. 7) Not all at once will the Spirit of peace prevail.
V BUT NOTHING CAN ROB THE BELIEVING SOUL OF ITS BLESSED RELIEF AND REFUGE IN GOD. (Ver. 1) The first verse relates what really follows on the facts told of in the other verses. Call upon, cry unto the Lord, and he will ever help. S.C.
A dark fact explained and illuminated.
The dark fact is human distress; the explanation is the prayer it leads to; the illumination, the answer it brings. We have here
I A TOO RARE PERSONAGE. In my distress, I," etc. It is by no means every one who does this.
1. Some blaspheme curse God in their hearts.
2. Others east off all faith say, "There is no God." Many have done this.
3. Others harden their hearts, as Pharaoh did.
4. Others plunge deeper into sin. (Isa_1:5) In the distraction which for a while they gain, they drown the sense of their misery.
5. Others turn to human aid for deliverance and solace.
6. Yet others bestir themselves to get by their own effort what help they may. The psalmist"s resource does not condemn, but will often include, these two last methods, and will further their usefulness. But to turn to God in distress is as wise as it is too seldom adopted.
II A REAL REASON FOR DISTRESS. God sends it, or lets it come, that it may lead men to turn to him: that is ever his intent. But for such distress we should scarce turn to him at all.
III A RIGHT MANNER OF PRAYER. "I cried." It tells of earnestness, of humility, of believing trust, of self-distrust. It has all those elements which go to make up, acceptable and prevailing prayer. How little of our prayer is a crying unto God! It is decorous, reverent, formal, correct, and seeks true and worthy objects, but it lacks fervor, force, and the faith which will not let the Lord go unless he bless. No man ever yet cried unto the Lord" and failed to find response.
IV A READY AND REALIZED RESPONSE. "He heard me." How promptly this confession comes after the statement, "I cried"! (Cf. Caesar"s "Veni, vidi, vici.") It is like that. And the psalmist knew that he was heard. The outward circumstances may not have much changed, but in his heart the light had risen, the Lord had come.
CONCLUSION. Distress of one kind or another we all must know. Let us adopt this manner of prayer, and we shall surely find the ready response. S.C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Vers. 1, 2. The misery made by the untruthful.
This is the first of fifteen psalms that are called "Songs of Degrees;" Revised Version, Songs of Ascent;" literally, "Songs of Going up." The association of them with the journeying of country pilgrims to the feasts at Jerusalem is somewhat fanciful. These psalms are naturally explained as "Songs of Heart-uplifting." The key-note of them all is looking up out of some present distress, and seeking the help of God. "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills;" "Unto thee lift I up mine eyes;" "Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord." Two things are necessary to a "song of ascent:" some special form of present distress; a looking to God for help out of that distress. It is possible effectively to illustrate these psalms from the experiences of the returned exiles.
I THE PSALMIST"S DISTRESS. It may be regarded as personal, and then we notice that it is a mental anxiety rather than a set of difficult circumstances. And though mental anxieties may seem to be unreal, and often are, they are our most serious and overwhelming distresses; the ones we can least effectively deal with ourselves; the ones in which God"s help is most especially needed, and least frequently sought. Or the psalmist may be regarded as personifying the nation, and speaking in its name. The restored exiles were much distressed by the malicious slanders of the surrounding nationalities, whom the psalmist likens to the barbarous tribes of the Moschi, and the nomad hordes of Kedar. Here also the distress is mental; it was not outward injury, but worry caused by the slanders spread abroad concerning them. We love to be thought well of, and are distressed when reputation is damaged.
II THE CAUSE OF THE PSALMIST"S DISTRUST. Men did not speak the truth about him. Slander has a mysterious power of growth and enlargement; and no man"s reputation is safe when the gossip, the talebearer, and the slanderer attempt to deal with it. A man may never be afraid of the truth, nor need he fear the final triumph of his slanderers, but for a time the lying lips" may cause him infinite misery.
III THE RELIEF OF THE PSALMIST"S DISTRESS. He can turn to God, sure that he knows of his trouble knows the untruthfulness of the accusations made; is more jealous of his reputation than he can be of his own; could stop the lying lips at once, if he thought it best to do so; and permits them to keep on only because thus he can work out some higher good. R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Charles H. Spurgeon1885 · Public DomainOn vv1–7At the end of all these years the last…
At the end of all these years the last page of this Commentary is printed, and the seventh preface is requested. The demand sounds strangely in my ears. A preface when the work is done? It can be only nominally a preface, for it is really a farewell. I beg to introduce my closing volume, and then to retire with many apologies for having trespassed so much upon my reader's patience.
A tinge of sadness is on my spirit as I quit "The Treasury of David, "never to find on this earth a richer storehouse, though the whole palace of revelation is open to me. Blessed have been the days spent in meditating, mourning, hoping, believing, and exulting with David! Can I hope to spend hours more joyous on this side of the golden gate? Perhaps not; for the seasons have been very choice in which the harp of the great poet of the sanctuary has charmed my ears. Yet the training which has come of these heavenly contemplations may haply go far to create and sustain a peaceful spirit which will never be without its own happy psalmody, and never without aspirations after something higher than it yet has known. The Book of Psalms instructs us in the use of wings as well as words: it sets us both mounting and singing. Often have I ceased my commenting upon the text, that I might rise with the psalm, and gaze upon visions of God. If I may only hope that these volumes will be as useful to other hearts in the reading as to mine in the writing, I shall be well rewarded by the prospect.
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The former volumes have enjoyed a singular popularity. It may be questioned if in any age a commentary so large, upon a single book of the Bible, has enjoyed a circulation within measurable distance of that which has been obtained by this work. Among all orders of Christians "The Treasury" has found its way unrestrained by sectarian prejudiceanother proof of the unity of the spiritual life, and the oneness of the food upon which it delights to feed. The author may not dare to be proud of the generous acknowledgments which he has received from men of all sections of the church; but, on the other hand, he cannot pass over them in ungrateful silence. Conscious as he is of his many literary sins of omission and of commission in these seven volumes, he is yet glad to have been permitted to do his best, and to have received abundant encouragement in the doing of it. Of all its good the glory is the Lord's; of all its weakness the unworthy author must bear the blame.
This last portion of the Psalms has not been the easiest part of my gigantic task. On the contrary, with the exception of The Songs of Degrees, and one or two other Psalms, these later hymns and hallelujahs have not been largely expounded, nor frequently referred to, by our great divines. Failing the English, a larger use has been made of the Latin authors; and my esteemed friend, W. DURBAN, B.A., has rendered me great service in their translation. It would astonish our readers if they could see what tomes have been read, what folios have been covered with translations, and in the end what tiny morsels have been culled from the vast mass for incorporation with this Treasury. Heaps of earth have been sifted and washed, and have yielded only here and there a little "dust of gold." No labour has been spared; no difficulty has been shirked. May the good Lord accept my service, and enrich his church by it this day, and when I am gathered to my fathers!
My friend and amanuensis, Mr. J. L. KEYS, has continued to search the British Museum and public Libraries for me; and to him and many other kind friends I owe many a quotation which else might have been overlooked. Of the extracts I am editor in chief, and not much more; for brethren such as Mr. HENSON, of Kingsgate Street, have at sundry times, of their own accord, sent me material more or less useful. In the homiletical department my obligations are exceedingly great, and are duly acknowledged under initials. My venerable friend the Rev. GEORGE ROGERS leads the way; but several other brethren, hailing from the Pastors' College, follow with almost equal steps. Thanks are hereby tendered to them all, and to the multitude of authors from whom I have gathered flowers and fruits, fragrant and nourishing.
And now the colossal work is done! To God be all glory. More than twenty years have glided away while this pleasant labour has been in the doing; but the wealth of mercy which has been lavished upon me during that time my grateful heart is unable to measure. Surely goodness and mercy have followed me all those years, and made my heart to sing new psalms for new mercies. There is none like the God of Jeshurun. To him be all glory for ever and ever.
In these busy days, it would be greatly to the spiritual profit of Christian men if they were more familiar with the Book of Psalms, in which they would find a complete armoury for life's battles, and a perfect supply for life's needs. Here we have both delight and usefulness, consolation and instruction. For every condition there is a psalm, suitable and elevating. The Book supplies the babe in grace with penitent cries, and the perfected saint with triumphant songs. Its breadth of experience stretches from the jaws of hell to the gate of heaven. He who is acquainted with the marches of the Psalm country knows that the land floweth with milk and honey, and he delights to travel therein. To such I have aspired to be a helpful companion.
Reader, I beseech David's God to bless thee; and I pray thee, when it is well with thee, breathe a like prayer for
Thine heartily,
C.H. Spurgeon
WESTWOOD,
UPPER NORWOOD,
October, 1885.
This little psalter within the psalter consists of fifteen brief songs. Why they are grouped together and what is meant by their generic name it would be hard to tell. The conjectures are very mary, but they are mere suppositions. Out of them all the conjecture of Dr. Jebb best commends itself to my own mind, though it would be quite consistent with this suggestion to believe that the series of songs arranged by David became the Pilgrim Psalms of after ages, and were chanted by the Lord's people as they went up to the temple. They are "Songs of the Goings Up; "so some read the word. Those who delight to spiritualize everything find here Ascents of the Soul, or language fitted to describe the rising of the heal t from the deepest grief to the highest delight. I have thought it well to indicate the methods by which learned men have tried to explain the term "Songs of Degrees, " but the reader must select his own interpretation. C.H.S.
In the thirteenth chapter of the First Book of Chronicles, it is related, that David brought up the Ark from Kirjath-jearim to the house of Obed-edom. The word (hjlu) used in the seventh verse, for "bringing up" the Ark, is of the same etymology with, and cognate to that which is translated "degrees." And upon this occasion the great event was celebrated by the accompaniment of sacred music. "And David and all Israel played before God with all their might, and with singing, and with harps, and with psalteries, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and with trumpets." Again, in the fifteenth chapter of the same book, in the fourteenth verse, the same term is employed for bringing up the Ark to Jerusalem; and the choral services of the Levites are mentioned in immediate connection. And in the fifth chapter of the Second Book of Chronicles (fifth verse), we are told that Solomon assembled the people at the dedication of the Temple, to bring up the Ark from Sion to the Temple of the Lord. John Jebb.
I abide in the simple and plain sense as much as I may, and judge that these psalms are called The Psalms of Degrees because the Levites or priests were wont to sing them upon the stairs or some high place; even as with us he that begins the Psalms or preacheth, standeth in a place above the rest, that he may be the better seen and heard: For it seemeth not that these psalms were sung of the multitude which were in the Temple, or of the rest of the choir, but of certain which were appointed to sing them, or at least to begin them on the stairs to the rest, and so have their name; like as some other of the Psalms have their name and title from the singer. But how should a man know all their rites and ceremonies, especially after so long a time, whereby they are now clean worn out of the memory of all men? Seeing therefore among such a multitude of psalms, when the law was yet in his full force and power, some were wont to be sung with one manner of ceremony, and some with another, according to the time and place, as the use and custom then was, let this suffice us to think that this title pertaineth to no point of doctrine, but only to the ceremony of the singers, what manner of ceremony soever it was.
Martin Luther, in "A Commentarie upon the Psalmes of Degrees, "
1577.
There were fifteen steps by which the priests ascended into the Temple, on each of which they sang one of these fifteen psalms.
David Kimchi.
Whatever view of the Songs of Degrees you may take besides, you cannot leave out some association of them with the steps, without ignoring the unanimous belief about them handed down from time immemorial amongst the people who gave them to us; without, in fact, implying that at some epoch or other this strange association of the steps with the psalms was gratuitously invented, and, being invented, secured general acceptance in the sacred literature of the Hebrew nation. It is quite impossible to believe such a thing, when we are dealing with a people so jealous of precedent and authority in religion as the Hebrews have always been. I see, in fact, no sufficient; reason why we should not follow the leading of the Mischna and feel that Songs of Degrees, Songs of the Steps, is as much as to say Songs in the sacred Orchestra.
H.T. Armyqeld, in "The Gradual Psalms, "1874.
The great Carmelite expositor, Michael Ayguan, alleges that the fifteen psalms were divided by the Jews into three portions of five, with prayers intercalated, much as the Gregorian division of matins into three nocturns; and that each of the three grades of advance in the spiritual life is betokened by each quinary; the beginners, the progressors, and the perfect; or, in other terms, those who are severally in the purgative, the illuminative, and the unitive way. And thus it will be noticed that in Psalms 120-124, there is constant reference to trouble and danger; in 125-129 to confidence in God; in 130-134, to direct communion with him in his house. And Genebrardus, a later commentator, defines the fifteen degrees of going up out of the valley of weeping to the presence of God to be (1) affliction, (2) looking to God, (3) joy in communion, (4) invocation, (5) thanksgiving, (6) confidence, (7) patient waiting for deliverance, (8) God's grace and favour, (9) fear of the Lord, (10) martyrdom, (11) hatred of sins, (12) humility, (13) desire for the coming of Christ, (14) concord and charity, (15) constant blessing of God. Neale and Littledale.
No trace in history, or authentic tradition, can be found of these steps, which owe their construction solely to the accommodating fancy of the Rabbins, who, as usual, imagined facts, in order to support their preconceived theories.
John Jebb.
It is an additional objection to this Rabbinical conceit, that David, whose name several of these psalms bearand others of which have evident reference to his time and circumstanceslived in the time of the tabernacle which had no steps.
James Anderson's Note to Calvin in loc.
In the version of Theodotian, executed in the early part of the second century, with the express view of correcting the errors of the Septuagint, as well as in the translations by Aquila and by Symmachus, these psalms are rightly described as songs for the journeys up, and are thus at once referred to the stated pilgrimages to the Temple. The expressions, "Thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God thrice in the year" (Ex 39:24), "If this people go up to do sacrifice" (1Ki 3:27) a form of expression constantly employed as often as these sacred journeys are mentionedis precisely that which the psalms themselves exhibit: "I was glad when it was said unto me, Go up unto the house of the Lord"; and while we may well adopt this view, for the additional reason that it is in harmony with the whole spirit and sentiment which they breathe throughout, we shall find these psalms to form at the same time one of the most admirable and instructive manuals of devotion with which the love of our heavenly Father, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, has been pleased to bless us.
Robert Nisbet, in "The Songs of the Temple Pilgrims, "1863.
If the traditionary interpretation of the title, Song of Degrees, be accepted, that they were sung by devout pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem to keep the great feasts of the Lord, we may suppose that companies toiling up this long ascent would relieve the tedium of the way by chanting some of them.
From the customs of Orientals still prevalent, I think it highly probable that such an explanation of the title may be substantially correct. Nothing is more common than to hear individuals and parties of natives, travelling together through the open country and along mountain paths, especially during the night, break out into singing some of their favourite songs. Once, descending from the top of Sunnin, above Beirut, with a large company of natives, they spontaneously began to sing in concert. The moon was shining brightly in the clear sky, and they kept up their chanting for a long time. I shall not soon forget the impression made by that moonlight concert, as we wound our way down the eastern side of Lebanon to the Buka'a, on the way to Ba'albek. Through the still midnight air of that lofty region the rough edge of their stentorian voices, softened into melody, rang out full and strong, waking the sleeping echoes far and wide down the rocky defiles of the mountain. Something like this may have often rendered vocal this dreary ascent to Jerusalem. It is common in this country to travel in the night during the summer, and we know that the Hebrew pilgrims journeyed in large companies. On his ascent along this road from Jericho to the Holy City, Jesus was attended not only by the twelve apostles, but by others, both men and women; and it would be strange indeed if sometimes they did not seek relief from this oppressive solitude by singing the beautiful songs of Zion. William M. Thomson, in "The Land and the Book, "1881.
When we consider the place in the psalter which these "Songs of Degrees, or of the goings up" occupy, we see good reason to accept the statement (of the Syriac version, and of S. Chrysostom, Theodoret, Euthymius, and other Fathers, and also of Symmachus, Aquila, and of Hammond, Ewald, and many moderns), that these psalms describe the feelings of those Israelites who went up with Zerubbabel and Jeshua, and afterwards with Ezra, and still later with Nehemiah, from the land of their captivity and dispersion at Babylon, Susa, and other regions of the East, to the home of their fathers, Jerusalem. Hence, in some of the foregoing psalms, we have seen a reference to the dedication of the Second Temple, Psalm 118, and of the walls of Jerusalem Psalm 102, and to the building up of the nation itself on the old foundation of the law of God, given to their fathers at Sinai Psalm 119. Christopher Wordsworth.
Gesenius has the merit of having first discerned the true meaning of the questioned inscription, inasmuch as first in 1812, and frequently since that time, he has taught that the fifteen songs have their name from the step like progressive rhythm of their thoughts, and that consequently the name, like the triolet (roundelay) in Western poetry, does not refer to the liturgical usage, but to the technical structure. The correctness of this view has been duly appraised more particularly by De Wette, who adduces this rhythm of steps or degrees, too, among the more artificial rhythms. The songs are called Songs of Degrees or Gradual Psalms as being songs that move onward towards a climax, and that by, means of plokh (epiplokh), i.e., a taking up again of the immediately preceding word by way of giving intensity to the expression; and they are placed together on account of this common characteristic, just like the Miehtammim, which bear that name from a similar characteristic. Franz Delitzsch.
"Go up, go up, my soul!" must be the motto of one who would enter into the meaning of these psalms. They are a Jacob's ladder whose foot is fixed on the earth, but the top reaches up to the "heavenly Jerusalem."
The rhythmical structure of these psalms (in which one line is built up upon another stair wise) is a suitable outward accompaniment of the interior character of the psalms. Short, pointed lines fall in well with the flow of mystico allegorical thought: as in "Nearer, my God, to thee, "or, "Jerusalem; the golden." William Kay.
We may notice the following characteristics of nearly all these psalms: sweetness and tenderness; a sad pathetic tone; brevity; an absence generally of the ordinary parallelism; and something of a quick, trochaic rhythm. "The Speaker's Commentary."
Though it may be they are so called because of their excellency; a song of degrees being an excellent song, as an excellent man is called a man of high degree (1Ch 17:17); these being excellent ones for the matter of them, their manner of composure, and the brevity of them. John Gill.
This being a matter of small moment, I am not disposed to make it the subject of elaborate investigation; but the probable conjecture is, that this title was given to these psalms because they were sung on a higher key than others. The Hebrew word for degrees being derived from the word, hlu tsalah, to ascend, or go up, I agree with those who are of opinion that it denotes the different musical notes rising in succession. John Calvin.
Hezekiah liveth, these fifteen years, in safety and prosperity, having humbled himself before the Lord for his pride to the ambassadors of Babel. The degrees of the sun's reversing, and the fifteen years of Hezekiah's life prolonging, may call to our minds the fifteen Psalms of Degrees; viz. from Psalm 120 and forward. There were Hezekiah's songs that were sung to the stringed instruments in the house of the Lord (Isa 38:20): whether these were picked out by him for that purpose may be left to conjecture. John Lightfoot, 16021675.
WORKS UPON PSALMS 120-134, COMMONLY CALLED THE PSALMS OF DEGREES.
A Commentarie upon the Fifteene Psalmes, called "Psalmi traduum", that is, Psalmes of Degrees: Faithfully copied out of the Lectvres of D. Martin Luther, very fruitful and comfortable for all Christian afflicted consciences to reade. Translated out of Latine into English by HENRY BVI, L. London....1577. Quarto, Black Letter. Preface by John Fox, the Martyrologist. Another edition, 1615. Also 8vo., Lewes: 1823; and London: 1819.]
THE ASCENTS OF THE SOUL: OR, DAVID'S Mount Towards GOD'S House. Being Paraphrases on the Fifteen Psalms of Degrees. Written in Italian, By the Illustrious GEO. FRANCESCO LOREDANO, a Noble Venetian, 1656. Rendered in English, Anno Domi 1665. By Henry Hare, Lord Coleraine. London...1681. Small folio.
La Scala Santa: or, A Scale of Devotions, Musical and Gradual. Being Descants on the Fifteen Psalms of Degrees, in Metre; with Contemplations and Collects upon them, in Prose, 1670. By Henry Hare, Lord Coleraine. London...1681. Small folio.
The Pilgrim Psalms: an Exposition of the Songs of Degrees. Psalms
120-134. By the Rev. N. M'MICHAEL, D.D., Dunfermline... Edinburgh and London: 1860. Cr. 8vo.
The Songs of the Temple Pilgrims. An Exposition, Devotional and Practical, of the Psalms of Degrees. By ROBERT NISBET, D.D., Edinburgh. London: 1863. 12mo.]
The Gradual Psalms: a Treatise on the Fifteen Songs of Degrees, with Commentary, based on Ancient Hebrew, Chaldee, and Christian Authorities. By Rev. H. T. ARMFIELD, M.A., F.S.A. London; 1874. Cr. 8vo.]
The Pilgrim Psalms. An Exposition of the Songs of Degrees. By the Rev. SAMUEL COX. London: 1874. Cr. 8vo. In "The Golden Diary of Heart Converse with Jesus in the Book of Psalms"...By ALFRED EDERCHEIM, D.D., Ph.D., London, 1877, there are Expositions of Psalms 121, 124, 127, and 133.
The Caravan and the Temple, and Songs of the Pilgrims. Psalms
120-134. By EDWARD JEWITT ROBINSON. London... 1878.
Suddenly we have left the continent of the vast Hundred and Nineteenth Psalm for the islands and islets of the Songs of Degrees. It may be well to engage in protracted devotion upon a special occasion, but this must cast no slur upon the sacred brevities which sanctify the godly life day by day. He who inspired the longest psalm was equally the author of the short compositions which follow it.
A SONG OF DEGREES. We have already devoted a sufficient space to the consideration of this title in its application to this psalm and the fourteen compositions which succeed it. These appear to us to be Pilgrim Psalms, but we are not sure that they were always sung in company; for many of them are in the first person singular. No doubt there were solitary pilgrims as well as troops who went to the house of God in company, and for these lonely ones hymns were prepared.
A certain author supposes that this hymn was sung by an Israelite upon leaving his house to go up to Jerusalem. He thinks that the good man had suffered from the slander of his neighbours, and was glad to get away from their gossip, and spend his time in the happier engagements of the holy feasts. It may be so, but we hope that pious people were not so foolish as to sing about their bad neighbours when they were leaving them, for a few days. If they wished to leave their houses in safety, and to come home to kind surroundings, it would have been the height of folly to provoke those whom they were leaving behind by singing aloud a psalm of complaint against them. We do not know why this ode is placed first among the Psalms of Degrees, and we had rather hazard no conjecture of our own. We prefer the old summary of the translators"David prayeth against Doeg" to any far fetched supposition: and if this be the scope of the psalm, we see at once why it suggested itself to David at the station where the ark abode, and from which he had come to remove it. He came to fetch away the ark, and at the place where he found it he thought of Doeg, and poured out his complaint concerning him. The author had been grievously calumniated, and had been tortured into bitterness by the false charges of his persecutors, and here is his appeal to the great Arbiter of right and wrong before whose judgment seal no man shall suffer from slanderous tongues.
Ver. 1. In my distress. Slander occasions distress of the most grievous kind. Those who have felt the edge of a cruel tongue know assuredly that it is sharper than the sword. Calumny rouses our indignation by a sense of injustice, and yet we find ourselves helpless to fight with the evil, or to act in our own defence. We could ward off the strokes of a cutlass, but we have no shield against a liar's tongue. We do not know who was the father of the falsehood, nor where it was born, nor where it has gone, nor how to follow it, nor how to stay its withering influence. We are perplexed, and know not which way to turn. Like the plague of flies in Egypt, it baffles opposition, and few can stand before it. Detraction touches us in the most tender point, cuts to the quick, and leaves a venom behind which it is difficult to extract. In all ways it is a sore distress to come under the power of "slander, the foulest whelp of sin." Even in such distress we need not hesitate to cry unto the Lord. Silence to man and prayer to God are the best cures for the evil of slander.
I cried unto the LORD (or Jehovah). The wisest course that he could follow. It is of little use to appeal to our fellows on the matter of slander, for the more we stir in it the more it spreads; it is of no avail to appeal to the honour of the slanderers, for they have none, and the most piteous demands for justice will only increase their malignity and encourage them to fresh insult. As well plead with panthers and wolves as with black hearted traducers. However, when cries to man would be our weakness, cries to God will be our strength. To whom should children cry but to their father? Does not some good come even out of that vile thing, falsehood, when it drives us to our knees and to our God? "And he heard me". Yes, Jehovah hears. He is the living God, and hence prayer to him is reasonable and profitable. The Psalmist remembered and recorded this instance of prayer hearing, for it had evidently much affected him; and now he rehearses it for the glory of God and the good of his brethren. "The righteous cry and the Lord heareth them". The ear of our God is not deaf, nor even heavy. He listens attentively, he catches the first accent of supplication; he makes each of his children confess, "he heard me". When we are slandered it is a joy that the Lord knows us, and cannot be made to doubt our uprightness: he will not hear the lie against us, but he will hear our prayer against the lie.
If these psalms were sung at the ascent of the ark to Mount Zion, and then afterwards by the pilgrims to Jerusalem at the annual festivals and at the return from Babylon, we shall find in the life of David a reason for this being made the first of them. Did not this servant of God meet with Doeg the Edomite when he enquired of the oracle by Abiathar, and did not that wretched creature believe him and betray him to Saul? This made a very painful and permanent impression upon David's memory, and therefore in commencing the ark journey he poured out his lament before the Lord, concerning the great and monstrous wrong of "that dog of a Doeg", as Trapp wittily calls him. The poet, like the preacher, may find it to his advantage to "begin low, "for then he has the more room to rise: the next Psalm is a full octave above the present mournful hymn. Whenever we are abused it may console us to see that we are not alone in our misery we are traversing a road upon which David left his footprints.
Title. "A Song of Degrees". A most excellent song, Tremellius rendereth it; and so indeed this and the fourteen following are, both for the matter, and for the form or manner of expression, which is wondrous short and sweet, as the very epigrams of the Holy Ghost himself, wherein each verse may well stand for an oracle. And in this sense, "adam hammahalah", or, a man of degrees, is put for an eminent or excellent man: 1Ch 17:17. Others understand it otherwise; wherein they have good leave to abound in their own sense; an error here is not dangerous. John Trapp.
Whole Psalm. In the interpretation of these psalms, which sees in them the "degrees" of Christian virtues, this psalm aptly describes the first of such stepsthe renunciation of the evil and vanity of the world. It thus divides itself into two parts.
1. The Psalmist, in the person of one beginning the grades of virtue, finds many opponents in the shape of slanderers and ill advisers.
2. He laments the admixture of evil"Woe is me". H.T. Armfield.
Whole Psalm. It is a painful but useful lesson which is taught by this first of the Pilgrim Psalms, that all who manifest a resolution to obey the commands and seek the favour of God, may expect to encounter opposition and reproach in such a course... This these worshippers of old found when preparing to seek the Lord in his Temple. They were watched in their preparation by malignant eyes; they were followed to the house of prayer by the contempt and insinuations of bitter tongues. But their refuge is in him they worship; and, firmly convinced that he never can forsake his servants, they look up through the cloud of obloquy to his throne, and implore the succour which they know that his children shall ever find there. "O Lord, in this my trouble deliver my soul". Robert Nisbet.
Whole Psalm. The pilgrims were leaving home; and lying lips commonly attack the absent. They were about to join the pilgrim caravan; and in the excitements of social intercourse their own lips might easily deviate from truth. The psalm, moreover, breathes an intense longing for peace; and in this world of strife and confusion, when is that longing inappropriate? Is it any marvel that a Hebrew, with a deep spiritual longing for peace, should cry as he started for the Temple, "Let me get out of all that, at least for a time. Let me be quit of this fever and strain, free from the vain turbulence and conflicting noises of the world. Let me rest and recreate myself a while in the sacred asylum and sanctuary of the God of peace. God of peace, grant me thy peace as I worship in thy presence; and let me find a bettered world when I come back to it, or at least bring a bettered and more patient heart to its duties and strifes". Samuel Cox.
Ver. 1. In my distress I cried unto the Lord, etc. See the wondrous advantage of trouble, that it makes us call upon God; and again see the wondrous readiness of mercy, that when we call he heareth us! Very blessed are they that mourn while they are travelling the long upward journey from the Galilee of the Gentiles of this lower world to the heavenly Jerusalem, the high and holy city of the saints of God. J.W. Burgon, in "A Plain Commentary".
Ver. 1. In my distress. God's help is seasonable; it comes when we need it. Christ is a seasonable good... For the soul to be dark, and for Christ to enlighten it; for the soul to be dead, and Christ to enliven it; for the soul to be doubting, and for Christ to resolve it; and for the soul to be distressed, and for Christ to relieve it; is not this in season? For a soul to be hard, and for Christ to soften it; for a soul to be haughty, and for Christ to humble it; for a soul to be tempted, and for Christ to succour it; and for a soul to be wounded, and for Christ to heal it? Is not this in season? R. Mayhew, 1679.
Ver. 1. Cried. Heard. The verbs are in the past tense, but do not refer merely to a past occasion. Past experience and present are here combined. From the past he draws encouragement for the present. J.J. Stewart Perowne.
Ver. 1. And he heard me. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much: Jas 5:16; Zec 13:9. He that prayeth ardently, speeds assuredly (Ps 91:15); and the delayed return of prayer should be carefully observed and thankfully improved: Ps 66:20. John Trapp.
Ver. 1. A reminiscence.
1. It is threefold; distress, prayer, deliverance.
2. It has a threefold bearing: it excites my hope, stimulates my petitions, and arouses my gratitude.
Ver. 1.
1. Special trouble: "In my distress."
2. Special prayer: "I cried unto the Lord."
3. Special favour: "He heard me." G.R.
Psalms 120:2*
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Biblical Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6In my distress I cried unto the Lord, and…
Psa_120:1-7
In my distress I cried unto the Lord, and He heard me.
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The Songs of Degrees
How came this and fourteen following psalms to be put together, and to receive their distinctive title? It has been suggested that they were thus called from peculiarity in rhythm; but perhaps, in this respect, some of them might with as much correctness be described as songs of the goings-down. The opinion is equally doubtful that the heading was given them because, when they were chanted, the volume of voice and music gradually ascended. As much might be safely conjectured of many other psalms. It is not less a flight of fancy to explain the title as meaning Songs of the Steps, attaching the fifteen songs to the flight of fifteen steps in the Temple which led up from the common court to that of the priests; there being no evidence that the Levites were accustomed, in the great festivals, as they mounted from court to court, to halt on every step while singing, with the accompaniment of the flute, that song of the fifteen which corresponded with it in number; or no proof that the stair existed before the time of Herod. Nor can the allusion be to the carrying up of the ark to the tabernacle prepared for it by David; for the authors of half of the Songs of Degrees were not then born. Some conclude that these psalms were composed when the Jews went up from Babylon to their own country (Ezr_7:9). It is not a sufficient objection to this view that they are not called songs of the going-up, but of the goings-up, inasmuch as there were more ascents than one from Babylon to Jerusalem after the seventy years captivity; and there is no need to question that some of them were originated by circumstances of the return. But we take it that what the emancipation and its incidents suggested was, not more the composition of new songs than the adoption or adaptation of well-known hymns that had long been popular, and were suitable to the case of the returning Israelites. Fifteen were chosen; and, we may believe, scribes could not copy faster than the work was in demand. God directed the choice, and has preserved the Songs of Degrees for the use and edification of His Church to the end of time. It is not very difficult to see how appropriate were these select songs for the pilgrimages to Jerusalem. Patriotic, short and pithy, with key-words, and catch-words, they were easy to remember, and pleasant to repeat. Plaintive and low sometimes, blending with the thoughts of the aged and the sighs of the feeble and weary, they were as frequently lively and buoyant, tying the bounding youth to the slow pace of the caravan. Depicting demesne scenes, they brought to mind the dear ones left at home in the fatherly care of Jehovah. They contained sweet allusions to Davids piety, and the immortal harp he had tuned for the tribes on Mount Zion, and to Solomons magnificent and tranquil reign. They told of the beauty of the city, the splendour of the Temple, and the glad solemnities of the festival to which the pilgrims were going, or from which they were returning. Songs of defiance and triumph they were, of faith, hope and charity, of gratitude and joy, declaring the mighty deeds, watchful protection, bountiful providence and redeeming mercy of the Lord. Who, they demanded, could injure the servants of Him who had saved His people from their Egyptian, Arabian, Philistine, Babylonian and Samaritan foes? The songs of the pilgrims encouraged and strengthened them to persevere in the roughest places and against the greatest dangers. Songs of the Ascents these are, as aids in the goings-up of worship. A good hymn is wings to the soul; and the saint is a living psalm-book. The child of God often feels, when singing choice words, that his Fathers hand is helping him higher. Not only on the long journey to the feast and back were the Israelites singing pilgrims: they delighted in their sacred songs along the road and in Jerusalem, because they loved them at home. Hymns are for use in domestic and private devotion, as well as public services. The psalm-book is a looking-glass for you. In its writers, and the saints of whom they write, you may see yourself, and your experience and duty. Behold them at home, in the street, in the temple, in profound distress, in bitter conflict, looking to God, trusting in His mercy, waiting for His interposition, and triumphing in His salvation; and not merely resemble them in situation and want, but, so far as they set you a good example, in disposition, language, meaning and behaviour. Nothing can be fitter than this scroll of songs for the pilgrim to carry in his bosom, as he flies from Destruction, and aims at the Heavenly City. There is no stage in his progress in which it will not supply his heart and lips with appropriate -thought and expression. (E. J. Robinson.)
A good man with bad neighbours
Whoever is the author of the psalm he represents himself as a good man. He had prayed, and his prayer had been answered, and in the last verse he says that whilst his neighbours were for war he was for peace. But his neighbours were distinguished by two great evils--slandering tongues and querulous tempers.
I. Slandering tongues (verse 2). Slander is a common and a very pernicious evil. How frequently, says Sterne, is the honesty and integrity of a man disposed of by a smile or a shrug! How many good and generous actions have been sunk into oblivion by a distrustful look, or stamped with the imputations of proceeding from bad motives, by a mysterious and seasonable whisper.
I. The slanderous tongue was terribly painful to the psalmist. He speaks of it as--
(1) Sharp arrows of the mighty.
(2) Coals of juniper.
2. The slanderer deserves appropriate punishment.
II. Querulous tempers (verses 5, 6). There are in most neighbourhoods those of irascible, choleric, petulant tempers, always ready for angry wrangling and disputation. Like a tinder box they only require a spark to produce an explosion. Shenstone says, I consider you very testy and quarrelsome people in the same light as I do a loaded gun, which may, by accident, go off and kill one. What are you to do with people of this irascible make? Do not contend with them, do not return their spiteful and malignant utterances. As well endeavour to quench the lightning with a spoonful of water. As God made such tempers they have their use. Out of them come the severe critic, the inflexible censor, the savage warrior, the denunciatory preacher. On the contrary, show them kindness. Though much may depend upon their physical organization, the querulous spirit may be exorcized from them, may be utterly overcome. Such reformations have been effected, and Christs Gospel of kindness, mighty for that purpose, will one day turn all such natures into love. (Homilist.)
Uncongenial society
I. Its characteristics (verses 2, 6, 7). This is the very climax of bad society! There is nothing more damaging and dangerous than lying lips; nothing more viperous than a deceitful tongue; nothing more distracting and disagreeable than a spirit of strife and contention, etc.
II. Uncongenial society in its results.
1. Inflicting punishment on itself (verses 3, 4); piercing; scorching and consuming.
2. Inflicting distress on the Christian (verse 1). Causing--
(1) Misery (verse 5)
(2) Self-vindication (verse 7). (J. O. Keen, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible1887 · Public DomainOn v1Psalms 120
Psalms 120
THE collection of pilgrim songs is appropriately introduced by one expressive of the unrest arising from compulsory association with uncongenial and hostile neighbours. The psalmist laments that his sensitive "soul" has been so long obliged to be a "sojourner" where he has heard nothing but lying and strife. Weary of these, his soul stretches her wings towards a land of rest. His feeling ill at ease amidst present surroundings stings him to take the pilgrims staff. "In" this singers "heart are the ways."
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The simplicity of this little song scarcely admits of separation into parts; but one may note that an introductory verse is followed by two groups of three verses each, -the former of which is prayer for deliverance from the "deceitful tongue," and prediction that retribution will fall on it (Psa_120:2-4); while the latter bemoans the psalmists uncongenial abode among enemies (Psa_120:5-7).
The verbs in Psa_120:1 are most naturally referred to former experiences of the power of prayer, which encourage renewed petition. Devout hearts argue that what Jehovah has done once He will do again. Since His mercy endureth forever, He will not weary of bestowing, nor will former gifts exhaust His stores. Men say, "I have given so often that I can give no more"; God says, "I have given, therefore I will give." The psalmist was not in need of defence against armed foes, but against false tongues. But it is not plain whether these were slanderous, flattering, or untrustworthy in their promises of friendship. The allusions are too general to admit of certainty. At all events, he was surrounded by a choking atmosphere of falsehood, from which he longed to escape into purer air. Some commentators would refer the allusions to the circumstances of the exiles in Babylon; others to the slanders of the Samaritans and others who tried to hinder the rebuilding of the Temple; others think that his own hostile fellow countrymen are the psalmists foes. May we not rather hear in his plaint the voice of the devout heart, which ever painfully feels the dissonance between its deep yearnings and the Babel of vain words which fills every place with jangling and deceit? To one who holds converse with God, there is nothing more appalling or more abhorrent than the flood of empty talk which drowns the world. If there was any specific foe in the psalmists mind, he has not described him so as to enable us to identify him. Psa_120:3 may be taken in several ways, according as "deceitful tongue" is taken as a vocative or as the nominative of the verb "give," and as that verb is taken in a good or a bad sense, and as "thee" is taken to refer to the tongue or to some unnamed person. It is unnecessary to enter here on a discussion of the widely divergent explanations given. They fall principally into two classes. One takes the words "deceitful tongue" as vocative, and regards the question as meaning, "What retribution shall God give to thee, O deceitful tongue?" while the other takes it as asking what the tongue shall give unto an unnamed person designated by "thee." That person is by some considered to be the owner of the tongue, who is asked what profit his falsehood will be to him; while others suppose the "thee" to mean Jehovah, and the question to be like that of Job. {Job_10:3} Baethgen takes this view, and paraphrases, "What increase of Thy riches canst Thou expect therefrom, that Thou dost permit the godless to oppress the righteous?" Grammatically either class of explanation is warranted; and the readers feeling of which is most appropriate must decide. The present writer inclines to the common interpretation, which takes Psa_120:3 as addressed to the deceitful tongue, in the sense, "What punishment shall God inflict upon thee?" Psa_120:4 is the answer, describing the penal consequences of falsehood, as resembling the crimes which they avenge. Such a tongue is likened to sharp arrows and swords in Psa_57:4; Psa_64:3, etc. The punishment shall be like the crime. For the sentiment compare Psa_140:9-10. It is not necessary to suppose that the "Mighty" is God, though such a reference gives force to the words. "The tongue which shot piercing arrows is pierced by the sharpened arrows of an irresistibly strong One; it, which set its neighbour in a fever of anguish, must endure a lasting heat of broom coals, which consumes it surely" (Delitzsch).
In the group of Psa_120:5-7, the psalmist bemoans his compulsory association with hostile companions, and longs to "flee away and be at rest." Meshech was the name of barbarous tribes who, in the times of Sargon and Sennacherib inhabited the highlands to the east of Cilicia, and in later days retreated northwards to the neighbourhood of the Black Sea (Sayce, "Higher Criticism and Monuments," p. 130). Kedar was one of the Bedawin tribes of the Arabian desert. The long distance between the localities occupied by these two tribes requires an allegorical explanation of their names. They stand as types of barbarous and truculent foes-as we might say, Samoyeds and Patagonians. The psalmists plaint struck on Cromwells heart, and is echoed, with another explanation of its meaning which he had, no doubt, learned from some Puritan minister: "I live, you know where, in Meshech, which they say signifies prolonging; in Kedar, which signifies blackness; yet the Lord forsaketh me not" (Carlyle, "Letters and Speeches," 1:127: London, 1846). The peace-loving psalmist describes himself as stunned by the noise and quarrelsomeness of those around him. "I am peace". {compare Psa_109:4} But his gentlest word is like a spark on tinder. If he but speaks, they fly to their weapons, and are ready without provocation to answer with blows.
So the psalm ends as with a long-drawn sigh. It inverts the usual order of similar psalms, in which the description of need is wont to precede the prayer for deliverance. It thus sets forth most pathetically the sense of discordance between a man and his environment, which urges the soul that feels it to seek a better home. So this is a true pilgrim psalm.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn v1Psalms 120-134
THE SONGS OF DEGREES
Psalms 120-134
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GENERAL INTRODUCTION
The principal hypotheses on which to account for the “Songs of Degrees,” “Songs of Ascents,” “Pilgrim Psalms,” and to each of which great names are attached, and each of which has something to say for itself, are as follows:—
1. The songs of the pilgrims returning from exile (Syr. Chrysostom, Theodoret).
2. The songs chanted by the Temple worshippers on each of the fifteen steps of the Temple (The Rabbins, Gospel of Mary, Vulg.—Luther, Grotius).
3. Denoting some peculiar structure, a gradation of thought approaching a climax (Gesenius, Delitzsch).
4. A musical term denoting some peculiarity of rhythm or music (Michaelis, &c.).
5. And most supported songs for pilgrims making their periodical journeys to Jerusalem (Ewald, Perowne, Hengstenberg). The true interpretation probably is yet to be given, none of the above hypotheses completely answering the requirements of the case. Characteristics—“Sweetness and tenderness; a sad pathetic tone; an absence generally of the ordinary parallelism; and something of a quick trochaic rhythm.”—Speaker’s Com.
INTRODUCTION
This Psalm carries on its face the notion of individual and hardly bearable trial, more than that of national distress (opposition of foreigners to the rebuilding of the Temple, &c.). The trial is like that of David (1Sa_21:7; 1Sa_22:9, &c., mentioned in the contents of A. v.), and is inflicted by a slanderous tongue. It is soothed by the recollection that God hears the cry of the suppliant, and answers it always. A difference of opinion exists respecting almost every word and verse.—Speaker’s Com.
THE GODLY UNDER MISREPRESENTATION
(Psa_120:1-2)
I. That the godly are not exempt from misrepresentation. Rather are they most subject to it. They of all men have characters to lose, and from their guilelessness and sincerity are most open to attack. A greater than the Psalmist said, “In the world ye shall have tribulation,” and one of the keenest forms of tribulation comes from “lying lips and the deceitful tongue” (Mat_10:24-28). The motives of the godly are misrepresented, their words, their actions. Misrepresentation exists in many forms, direct lying, suppression, innuendo, &c. No man can expect to be entirely free from it. The thing itself might be endured but for the senseless minds who take it in, and the bad hearts who rejoice to believe it. Misrepresentation in its worst form is that which is covered by professions of friendship to the person misrepresented.
II. That the godly are distressed by misrepresentation, and, humanly speaking, they may well be. No circumspection can guard against it. No force can destroy it. Its origin cannot always be traced. Some will even believe it to be true. It reaches those who can never be reached by its refutation. Always leaves its object open to suspicion.
“Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue [breath
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie
All corners of the world: kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons; nay, the secrets of the grave,
This viperous slander enters.”—Shakespeare.
III. That the godly should cry to God in misrepresentation.
1. Because God knows all the facts of the case, and therefore judges righteously. Slander should not affect a man whose conscience is clear in the sight of God. He is the Master to whom man stands or falls. Let men, therefore, commit their case to Him (1Pe_2:24).
2. Because the slandered and suspected soul naturally yearns to unbosom itself. This it often dares not do to its dearest friend. Vehement vindication sometimes only gives rise to suspicions that there must have been something in it after all. The soul can tell its troubles to God without fear of this.
IV. That God clears the godly from misrepresentation.
1. God enables His people to live slander down. This is the only effectual refutation. Men who refuse to listen to the clearest vindication are compelled to recognise the manifestation of the truth, and the commendation of ourselves to every man’s conscience (2Co_4:2; 2Co_1:12).
2. God will vindicate them before the assembled universe, when all shall be made manifest; and throughout eternity.
THE SELF-RETRIBUTIVE CHARACTER OF SLANDER
(Psa_120:3-4)
“ ‘What punishment shall be assigned thee, or what shall be done or added to thee, in recompense for misery caused?’ or, ‘What shall (God) give unto thee, and what shall (He) add unto thee?’ Answer—‘Sharp arrows (Psa_45:5) wielded by a mighty one (Psa_127:4; Jer_50:9), and burning coals of juniper’ (Psa_140:10; Pro_25:22). Thus the punishment of the slanderous tongue is appropriate; for itself is a sharp sword (Psa_57:4), a pointed arrow (Jer_9:8), and it burns like hell fire (Jas_3:6). The root of the retem or broom is used for fire in the desert, and retains its heat for a year.”—Speaker’s Com.
I. The work of slander. Like that which shall destroy it.
1. To sting. It is always hurtful, harassing, and annoying. It will always more or less damage the reputation, and inflict a wound on the mind or temper which will take some time to heal. Its sting often remains.
2. To burn. It sometimes blasts and utterly destroys. It has frequently undermined a man’s character beyond recovery, and brought him down with grief, affliction, and poverty to an untimely grave.
II. The retribution of slander. The law of requital holds terribly good here.
1. It is stung in return. God’s arrows fly thick and sharp upon the slanderous soul. He is ever in fear lest the lie should be traced back to its source, lest it should be proved to be a lie, and lest his calumny should miss its mark. He bears about him, too, the sharpest javelin in God’s armoury—CONSCIENCE!
2. It is consumed. Society consumes the evil speaker and his speech. It sternly condemns him whether his mischievous tales are true or not, and avoids his company and leaves him in contempt to perish. His accumulated fears consume him; and he that maketh a lie inherits the hottest fire of God’s wrath.
THE TRIALS OF THE GODLY
(Psa_120:5-7)
I. Uncongenial neighbours. The Psalmist’s residence in Mesech and Kedar is probably not to be understood literally, as Mesech (Gen_10:1) inhabited the mountain ranges south of and adjoining Caucasus, and the south-coast borders of the Black Sea, and Kedar was probably an Arabian tribe. They evidently stand for Barbarians. A man can hardly be subjected to a greater trial than to be compelled to mix in society with which he has no sympathy and which has no sympathy with him,—e.g., a scholar with those who despise learning, an artist with those that have no taste, the pure with the impure, the sober with the profligate, and vice versa. So the Psalmist felt himself unhappy amongst men with whom he had no spiritual affinity. This is the case with the godly through all time. They dwell in a world that does not acknowledge their God, and with men who cannot appreciate their worth. Heaven is the place where all is harmony, and whose pursuits, &c., are congenial to all. Hell is the opposite.
II. Unrighteous contradictions. “They will listen to nothing. They are for discord, variance, strife. All my efforts to live in peace are vain. They are determined to quarrel, and I cannot prevent it. (a) A man should separate himself in such a case as the only way of peace. (b) If this cannot be done, then he should do nothing to irritate and keep up the strife. (c) If all his efforts for peace are vain, and he cannot separate, then he should bear it patiently as divine discipline. There are few situations where piety will shine more beautifully. (d) He should look with the more earnestness for the world of peace; and the peace of heaven will be all the more grateful after such a scene of conflict and war.”—Barnes.
THE NATURE AND DOOM OF CALUMNY
(Psa_120:1-4)
The Israelites had returned from Babylon, and were engaged in rebuilding the demolished Temple at Jerusalem. The Samaritans—heathens by extraction, and still continuing heathens at heart—wished to join in the work. The devout Jews, thinking it out of place for any who did not fully acknowledge Jehovah to take part in so sacred an enterprise, quietly but firmly declined their overtures. Exasperated with the repulse, the Samaritans employed every means to annoy the workers, and to hinder the work. They concocted the vilest slanders, and sought to prejudice the mind of the Persian king, by whose permission the liberated Jews were allowed to rebuild the Temple. The Church of God is still assailed by the malice of the wicked. What they cannot accomplish by open violence, they seek to effect by the subtlety of the tongue.
Observe:—
I. That calumny is a terrible instrument of mischief.
1. It is subtle in its insinuations. “A deceitful tongue.” It affects a reluctance to tell all it knows. It implies more than it openly states. It deals in half truths, or in a small modicum of truth, which it makes the pivot on which a whirlwind of the most pernicious slander revolves. It is eloquent in facial expression. A wink, a shrug of the shoulder, a little hieroglyphic finger-writing on the viewless air, a whispered innuendo, will insinuate more evil into the midst of a community than the most outspoken declamation. Calumny is cheating with the tongue.
2. It is false in its representations. “Lying lips.” A liar does his mischief openly for the most part. Stung by a well-deserved rebuff, or prompted by a feeling of spontaneous hatred, he circulates the most flagrant falsehoods. The more barefaced the falsehood the less harm it does among the thoughtful. The consummate liar rings his own alarm bell, and the unprejudiced are sufficiently warned. But there is always a large class of people who will believe the most abominable lies: the more confidently and unblushingly they are uttered, the more firmly are they credited. The splenetic detractor is never at a loss for defamatory material. A word is falsely reported, an act misconstrued, a motive misread, and the whole plan of life misconceived. When all else is exhausted, the vile calumniator falls back upon the endless fabrications of a corrupt imagination.
3. It is dangerous in its use. It pollutes and debases those who traffic in it.
“Let falsehood be a stranger to thy lips;
Shame on the policy that first began
To tamper with the heart to hide its thoughts!
And doubly shame on that unrighteous tongue
That sold its honesty and told a lie!”
—Havard.
It is pernicious in its effects on individuals, societies, and commonwealths. “A lie,” says Carlyle, “should be trampled on and extinguished wherever found. I am for fumigating the atmosphere when I suspect that falsehood, like pestilence, breathes around me.” The march of calumny is invisible as the wind, and often more terribly destructive.
II. That calumny is productive of acute suffering.
1. It fills the soul with anguish. “In my distress.” It wounds the soul as with the barb of an envenomed arrow, and inflicts incredible pain. The distress is aggravated when we discover that the javelin is thrown by the hand of a professed friend. The discovery of treachery in human nature is a painful shock to the confiding. Calumny is not easily traced to its source, and is often difficult to refute.
2. It mars the happiness of a life. “Deliver my soul”—my life. The Psalmist felt that his whole life was endangered. Calumny has ruined the fairest reputation, embittered many a life, blasted its prospects, diverted its influence, and injuriously affected its destiny.
III. That calumny drives the soul to seek redress in prayer.
1. The refuge of the calumniated is in God. “In my distress I cried unto the Lord. Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips.” No man is safe from the shafts of falsehood. He cannot always refute it. He cannot prevent its effects on his reputation. Slanders may penetrate into regions where its refutation never comes. The sufferer can do nothing but commit his case to God, and trust to his own conscious integrity, the lapse of time, and the operations of Divine providence to clear his character.
2. The cry of the calumniated is not in vain. “He heard me.” Prayer is the surest method of relief. The soul is comforted. Grace is given to act circumspectly, and to live down the false imputations. When Plato was told how his enemies slandered him, he quietly replied, “I fear them not. I will so live that no one shall believe them.” In His own way, and at His own time, Jehovah vindicates His suffering people.
IV. That calumny involves its perpetrators in severest vengeance.
“What shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue? Sharp arrows of the mighty, with coals of juniper.” The juniper sparkles, burns, and crackles more vehemently than any other wood, and is of such a nature that, if covered with ashes, it will continue alive the whole year. Fiery arrows, or arrows wrapped round with inflammable material, were formerly used in sieges to set the place on fire. The Chaldee has it:—“The strong sharp arrows are like lightning from above, with coals of juniper kindled in hell beneath.” The tongue of the calumniator was often like a sharp, fiery arrow shot by a strong hand, causing intense and prolonged pain; but now the fierce, burning arrow of vengeance, shot by the Mighty One, has pierced the soul, and will rankle there in ever-increasing torture. The future retributive sufferings of the wicked will infinitely exceed anything they ever inflicted on their most helpless victims. Beware of indulging revenge. We may safely leave our oppressors to their merited punishment. “Speak not of vengeance; ’tis the right of God.”
LESSONS:—
1. Calumny is the source of many evils.
2. The best of characters are liable to its most distressing assaults.
3. God will defend, sustain, and vindicate His people, and signally punish their calumniators.
THE FEROCITY OF THE WICKED A SOURCE OF DISTRESS TO THE GOOD
(Psa_120:5-7)
Mesech refers to a barbarous race inhabiting the Moschian regions between Iberia, Armenia, and Colchis. From this people the Muscovites descended. Kedar describes the wild, restless, nomadic offspring of Ishmael, who occupied the territory of Arabia Petræa. The Psalmist did not personally reside in either Mesech or Kedar. The sixth verse gives the key to the sense in which the words are to be understood. He dwelt in the midst of a people as rudely barbarous, and as fiercely contentious, as those in Mesech and Kedar. The Church of God is now situated in the midst of a mass of gross wickedness that surrounds and assails it like an angry sea.
I. That the Good are brought into Unavoidable Contact with the Wicked.
There is no spot under heaven into which evil cannot penetrate. Go where we will it presses in upon us from every quarter. The exigencies of life will sometimes lead the godly into the company of the wicked. But for this, not only would commercial extension be impossible, but the humanising influence of social intercourse be lost to the world. The Providence of God may conduct His people into the midst of the wicked—to testify against their pernicious practices, to moderate their violence, to present a holy and beneficent example, to attract to a better life. The residence of the good among the habitations of the wicked is sometimes compulsory. Without any fault of their own they are banished from home and temple, and compelled to mingle with people whose principles they disapprove, and whose practices they detest. It is possible to be encompassed with evil, and yet not participate in it. As the fire-fly will pass through the flame without being singed, as fresh water currents circulate in the sea without partaking of its saline property, as the pearl is unimpaired by the unsightly shell in which it is clasped, so the good may move about in the midst of abounding wickedness without contamination.
II. That the attitude of the wicked is one of fierce antagonism to the good.
They hate peace—they are for war. The presence of the good is a perpetual rebuke to the wicked. Their simple transparency of character makes them conscious of the duplicity and blackness of their own; their pacific temper, instead of soothing, is made an occasion of ungovernable irritability.
1. The antagonism of the wicked is prompted by a spirit of intense hatred. “My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace.” Hatred is the great mischief-maker. It sets man against himself; against society; against God; against the universe. “A man,” says Plato, “should not allow himself to hate even his enemies; because if you indulge this passion, on some occasion it will rise of itself on others; if you hate your enemies, you will contract such a vicious habit of mind, as by degrees will break out upon those who are your friends, or those who are indifferent to you.” Hatred in the heart of the wicked is a fiend let loose.
2. The antagonism of the wicked is unreasonable. “I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war.” There are some restless, quarrelsome spirits, whom nothing will propitiate or pacify. If no provocation is given, they will invent one. Whatever efforts are made to promote peace, they construe into causes for new hostilities. They are like the Macedonians, of whom it was said, in the time of Philip, “To them peace was war, and war was peace.” Such conduct is senseless and unreasonable.
III. That the ferocity of the wicked is a source of distress to the good. “Woe is me.”
There is no greater pain to a tender, sensitive spirit, than to be brought in contact with prevalent wickedness. The most pathetic lamentations of Jeremiah were uttered when he beheld the moral degeneracy and violent discord of his countrymen. Evil is abhorrent in any aspect; but when it assumes the fierceness of a reckless, impetuous, and fiendish aggression, it is intolerable. To be compelled to dwell in the midst of the quarrelsome is a miniature pandemonium. Such an experience is often the means of discipline to the good. It teaches forbearance, patience, and self-control. It calls for the exercise of a spirit of god-like forgiveness and charity. It reveals the diabolic character of sin, and its inevitable tendency to transform men into demons.
Learn—
1. The universality of sin.
2. The greatest troubles of life are the result of sin.
3. A time is coming when the good will be for ever delivered from the assaults of sin.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant1903 · Public DomainOn v1A song of the ascents.
Solitary!
A song of the ascents.
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{Verse 3: Or, "will he give," "will he add . . . O deceitful tongue?"}
No mere historical view of the origin of these psalms can unite them together in an intelligible manner. Nothing will do it except the realization that they give us various lines of connection between the history of Israel in their distress as nationally away from God, and that prophetic future which we find so clearly announced for them in the pages of the Old Testament. The partial return from Babylon cannot fill out the picture here, -can give nothing but a faint and transient anticipation of it. Here is where commentators go astray so largely as to the Psalms; trying to satisfy themselves with theories of their origin in the past, with which Scripture itself, it is plain; so little concerns itself, and which are mere, if not wild, conjectures; while, as given by men led of the Holy Ghost, their meaning is to be sought in connection with those counsels of God as to Israel and the world, with regard to which all their voices come into harmony, and adjust and explain each other. In these "songs of the ascents" especially, the history is so generalized that it would be difficult, indeed, to fix its connections. Who can tell us about the "sojourning in Meshech," or the "dwelling in the tents of Kedar"? Accordingly Delitzsch, with many others, decides that "both these names of peoples are to be understood emblematically." And elsewhere we have really nothing to furnish a clue at all. Yet, read in connection; there is no real difficulty as to the purport of these psalms. Had not the often unanswerable "how?" come so largely to displace the all-important "why?" in the minds of the professed interpreters of Scripture, they would not have been in the confusion that they are today. The "how" may be largely human: the "why" is divine. And where God is, we shall find Him more accessible than man is, as He is how much more worthy of being sought to, and the knowledge thus obtained infinitely more gainful.
The 120th psalm is almost all distress. The main point of cheer in it is what comes first of all, that "in my strait to Jehovah I call, and He answereth me." This the psalmist realizes, although the great deliverance that he seeks for has not come. God does not always cash His notes at sight; but if not, He pays large interest on them. "The lying lip" and the "deceitful tongue" are the subject of his first complaint, whether this be some special deceiver, or more general. The third verse may be understood in two very different ways; and most would read it with the common version; as an address to the "tongue," -the deceiver. In this case the question will be as to the judgment of God, and the fourth verse will announce the judgment. The numerical structure seems to decide for another interpretation; in which the question "what does this deceitful tongue give to thee?" is answered by experience. In this case, the transition is better seen also, to the war spirit of the close of the psalm: "Sharp arrows of the mighty" remind us of the similar "sharp razor" of the "mighty one" in the fifty-second psalm, who is addressed also as a "deceitful tongue." And "coals of broom" do not seem so suitable an image for divine judgment as for human fury breaking out. This naturally leads on to the psalmist’s lament over his sojourn in Meshech and in the tents of Kedar, nomads, very likely to suggest the "sharp arrows" he has spoken of; and whose trade as Ishmaelites was depredation and war.
The names are, as already said, "emblematic": "My soul has long dwelt with him that hateth peace"; that is the moral of it. "I am peace," -a man characterized by that; but to speak it only rouses the opposition: "when I speak, they are for war." This is what the world is: and this is what it showed itself to be when the Prince of peace came into it. Thus it was that He, over whom; as born into it, the angels proclaimed peace, in His own clear knowledge of the immediate result, proclaimed "not peace, but a sword." He could indeed say "I am peace," -the very incarnation of it. What did His humanity mean but "peace: good pleasure in man"? Yet His rejection was written upon the cross in every typical human language.
Israel were not then, and have not since been; the "sons of peace," such as the Lord sent His disciples out to seek. And we must look on to the latter days to find them as depicted here. The remnant,then,will indeed be "like sheep in the midst of wolves"; the essential opposition between Christ’s people and the world will have sharpened into its acutest form; and it is simple enough that this first psalm here should give it expression.
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow1909 · Public DomainOn v1These Pss. are similar in thought, style, and language.…
These Pss. are similar in thought, style, and language. Each bears the heading A Song of degrees, RV 'A Song of Ascents.' Scholars now agree for the most part in interpreting this title 'A Song of Pilgrimages' (lit. 'goings up'), as indicating the use of these Pss. for pilgrims on their annual journeys to keep the various feasts at Jerusalem. Others explain the 'Ascent' as referring to the return of the exiles from Babylon. This section had doubtless been a separate Psalter with this title, 'Songs of Pilgrimages,' affixed. When these Pss. became a part of the greater collection 90-150, the title was affixed to each Ps. separately. There is also an indication in these titles that the Pss. are specially intended for vocal music. Exquisitely beautiful they are, well fitted for pilgrim songs, either for the Jew to Jerusalem, or for the Christian to that heavenly Zion whose builder and maker is God: see Intro.
A cry for help to Jehovah in the midst of sore distress, evidently by an exile under foreign oppression.
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4. 'Sharp arrows of a mighty man, with glowing coals of broom,' i.e. burning charcoal made of broom. Both expressions are figures for divine judgments: cp. Psa_140:10.
5. Mesech] i.e. the Moschi, a tribe dwelling near the Euxine Sea: cp. Gen_10:2, also Herodotus 3.94. Kedar] tribes of N. Arabia famous for their black tents: cp. Son_1:5. Here the two names are probably taken as typical examples of the wild and inhospitable peoples among whom many of the Jews were exiled.
6. Long] the emphatic word 'all too long.' Turbulent tribes fond of war surround the writer.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield1917 · Public DomainOn v1A Song of degrees
A Song of degrees
Literally, "of ascents." Perhaps chanted by the people as they went up to Jerusalem to the feasts. See, e.g. Psa 112:1; Psa 112:2.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein1922 · Public DomainOn v1Psalm 120-134
Psalm 120-134
The Psalms of Degrees
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Fifteen brief Psalms follow, called songs of degrees, or, ascents. They were in all probability used by Israel going up to Jerusalem three times a year to celebrate the feasts of the Lord--”Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD, a testimony for Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the LORD.” They are indeed Psalms of “the goings-up” for we rise higher and higher as we read through them. Prophetically they give us again the steps from trial and suffering to the glorious consummation.
As they are so simple in language and construction no lengthy annotations are needed. Psa 120:1-7 begins with distress, picturing again the suffering of the righteous godly remnant. In Psa 121:1-8 the Keeper of Israel, the Covenant Keeping God, is revealed, who has made heaven and earth and neither sleeps nor slumbers. He has kept Israel in all their troubles and saved them. Psa 122:1-9 brings us to Jerusalem and the house of the Lord. The redeemed ones go up to worship there. Thrones are there also for judgment, the thrones of which our Lord speaks in Mat 19:28. Peace and prosperity have come.
In Psa 123:1-4 there is another cry to Jehovah to be gracious and the next one, Psa 124:1-8 celebrates the deliverance of Israel. “Blessed be the LORD.” Men arose against them, but the Lord delivered His people. Mount Zion comes in view in Psa 125:1-5. It cannot be moved, it abideth forever. Then when the word and the law go forth from Zion and Jerusalem there will be peace upon Israel. Psa 126:1-6 celebrates the returning of the captives and this is the song they sing: “The LORD has done great things for us, whereof we are glad.” Psa 127:1-5 acknowledges the Lord as the One from whom all blessing and help must come. Psa 128:1-6, which follows, shows the blessing which will be enjoyed when the Lord reigneth and blesseth His people out of Zion. Then we have a description of Israel’s affliction in the past and how the hand of the Lord delivered them out of all their afflictions--Psa 129:1-8. And in Psa 130:1-8 we have a Psalm calling for forgiveness and waiting for the plenteous mercy and redemption which is promised to His people. Psa 131:1-3 shows Israel prostrate, hoping in the Lord. Then follows the beautiful One hundred thirty-second Psalm in which Zion and its King is prophetically unfolded. It begins with the promise made by David to build a house, but the Lord made a covenant instead with him. “The LORD hath sworn in truth unto David; He will not turn from it; of the fruit of thy body will I set upon Thy throne” (Act 2:30). And that is Christ, as the Son of David. He will choose Zion; it is His resting-place. He is enthroned in Zion and what is connected with it is found in verses 13-18.
The One hundred thirty-third Psalm gives a blessed picture, not of the church, as it is so often taught, but of the great brotherhood of Israel, when once more they are a nation before the Lord. Then the Spirit will flow upon them and through them. In the last songs of the ascents, Psa 134:1-3, we behold them in the house of the Lord, in the temple, lifting up their hands in worship in the sanctuary, praising the Lord and calling for blessing out of Zion.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann1924 · Public DomainOn v1Prayer for Deliverance from Slander and Deceit.
Prayer for Deliverance from Slander and Deceit.
A song of degrees, literally, "of ascents," the first of fifteen psalms designated by that name, the reference being either to the fact that these hymns were used by the pilgrims on their three annual journeys to Jerusalem, or to the peculiar structure of these psalms, since every new verse or strophe builds up on the preceding in form and thought. The writer here, while acknowledging the mercy of God, prays for relief from a slanderous foe.
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v. 1. In my distress, when he was in tribulation at some former time, I cried unto the Lord, turning to Him alone for deliverance, and He heard me, graciously affording help, for it pleases Him to have His children cry to Him.
v. 2. Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips and from a deceitful tongue, literally, "from a lip of lying, from a tongue of malice," the contention of the psalmist being implied that he is innocent of the charges falsely brought against him. He now turns directly to the base slanderer.
v. 3. What shall be given unto thee, by way of righteous punishment, or what shall be done unto thee, being added to the measure of the first punishment, thou false tongue? He himself gives the answer,
v. 4. Sharp arrows of the mighty, inflictions of a most destructive kind, with coals of juniper, the charcoal made of the wood of the broom-tree retaining its heat longest; a picture, therefore, of long-continued heat of affliction.
v. 5. Woe is me that I sojourn in Mesech, a region between the Black and the Caspian Sea, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar, of barbarous Arabia! The point of comparison in both cases is the wild and rude character of the people of these regions; such was also the nature of the slanderers of the psalmist, which made it appear to him that he had been inadvertently set down in the midst of barbarians.
v. 6. My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace, people who were maliciously hostile and took every occasion to do him harm.
v. 7. I am for peace, his entire attitude showed his love of peace, his willingness to maintain peace, his desire for peace; but when I speak, protesting this readiness to live at peace with all men, if possible, they are for war, they deliberately choose to regard his attitude as hostile and act accordingly. Thus the unbelievers everywhere pounce upon the slightest excuse for acts of hostility against the faithful, often even inventing an excuse for the occasion.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv1, 3, 5General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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A song of ascents
Possible meanings are 1) "A song people sang while going up to Jerusalem for a celebration" or 2) "A song people sang while going up the steps into the temple" or 3) "A song whose words are like steps."
In my distress
"In my trouble" or "When I was in trouble"
Rescue my life
Here the word "life" represents the person. AT: "Rescue me" (See: Metonymy)
those who lie with their lips and deceive with their tongues
Here the phrases "their lips" and "their tongues" represent the people who speak lies and deceit. AT: "those who lie to me and try to deceive me" (See: Synecdoche)
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv1, 3, 5, 6Pss 120–134 These short, appealing songs were sung during…
Pss 120–134 These short, appealing songs were sung during pilgrims’ journeys to Jerusalem for the national festivals three times per year (Deut 16:16). The title of these psalms includes the Hebrew word for stairs, which some take to mean “ascending to Jerusalem.” These psalms (sometimes called the Songs of Ascents) take the reader on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to praise God for his goodness to Israel throughout history.
Ps 120 This short, individual lament expresses the psalmist’s trust that the Lord will deal with deceptive evildoers. It also laments living as a stranger among hateful liars. The psalmist’s picture of his life in a foreign land might have been a reality as he set out for Jerusalem, or it might depict his feelings and concerns as he begins his pilgrimage. Overwhelmed with injustice, he trusts God and looks forward to arriving in the Lord’s presence.
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120:1-2 The psalmist is surrounded by liars, so he makes his lament to the Lord, the only one who can help him.
GEBible — Godless Engineer's Bible App
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1–6 1. I cried to Jehovah in my distress. The…
1. I cried to Jehovah in my distress. The name of the author of the Psalm is not expressed, but the style of it throughout presents David to our view. Although, therefore, I cannot positively affirm, yet I am rather inclined to think that it was composed by him. Nor will it be improper, in my judgment, to explain it as if his name had been mentioned in the inscription. This, then, being granted, I would observe that although David, when in this verse he affirms that the Lord had heard him, gives thanks to him, yet his chief purpose was to set forth, in the form of complaint, how wickedly and cruelly Saul’s flatterers employed all their ingenuity and power to accomplish his destruction. He, however, sets out with an expression of his gratitude to God, telling us that he had not called upon Him in vain; and he does this, that by his own example he might encourage others, especially when oppressed with adversity, to confidence in prayer. Men, it is true, have need of God’s help every moment; but there is not a more suitable season for seeking him than when some great danger is immediately menacing us. It is therefore worthy of notice, that he was heard when, constrained and shut up by tribulation, he betook himself to the protection of God.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 5, 7 That is, of lifting up the tune and rising…
That is, of lifting up the tune and rising in singing.
Albeit the children of God ought to rejoice when they suffer for righteous sake, yet it is a great grief to the flesh to hear evil for well doing.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–7 Psa 120:1 « A Song of degrees. » In…
Psa 120:1 « A Song of degrees. » In my distress I cried unto the LORD, and he heard me.
A Song of degrees] A most excellent song, Tremellius rendereth it; and so indeed this and the fourteen following are, both for the matter and for the form or manner of expression, which is wondrous short and sweet, as the very epigrams of the Holy Ghost himself, wherein each verse may well stand for an oracle. And in this sense Adam Hammahalah, or a man of degrees, is put for an eminent or excellent man, 1Ch 17:17. Others understand it otherwise; wherein they have good leave to abound in their own sense; since sine periculo hic erratur, an error here is not dangerous.
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Ver. 1. In my distress I cried unto the Lord] Oratio sine malis est, ut avis sine alis, Distress addeth wings to our devotions. Our Saviour, being in an agony, prayed more earnestly, Luk 22:44. So do all his members, and especially when they lie under the lash of a lying tongue, as here, Psa 120:2. "Being defamed, we pray," saith Paul, 1Co 4:13.
And he heard me] "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much," Jas 5:16 Zec 13:9. He that prayeth ardently speedeth assuredly, Psa 91:15, and the unmiscarrying return of prayer should be carefully observed and thankfully improved, Psa 66:20.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv2–5 From lying lips; from the unjust censures and malicious…
From lying lips; from the unjust censures and malicious slanders of mine enemies, who traduce me as an egregious hypocrite, as a rebel and traitor.
From a deceitful tongue; which covereth mischievous designs with pretences of kindness.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 5 Here is, I. Deliverance from a false tongue obtained…
Here is, I. Deliverance from a false tongue obtained by prayer. David records his own experience of this.
1. He was brought into distress, into great distress, by lying lips and a deceitful tongue. There were those that sought his ruin, and had almost effected it, by lying. (1.) By telling lies to him. They flattered him with professions and protestations of friendships, and promises of kindness and service to him, that they might the more securely and without suspicion carry on their designs against him, and might have an opportunity, by betraying his counsels, to do him a mischief. They smiled in his face and kissed him, even when they were aiming to smite him under the fifth rib. The most dangerous enemies, and those which it is most hard to guard against, are such as carry on their malicious designs under the colour of friendship. The Lord deliver every good man from such lying lips. (2.) By telling lies of him. They forged false accusations against him and laid to his charge things that he knew not. This has often been the lot not only of the innocent, but of the excellent ones, of the earth, who have been greatly distressed by lying lips, and have not only had their names blackened and made odious by calumnies in conversation, but their lives, and all that is dear to them in this world, endangered by false-witness-bearing in judgment. David was herein a type of Christ, who was distressed by lying lips and deceitful tongues.
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2. In this distress he had recourse to God by faithful and fervent prayer: I cried unto the Lord. Having no fence against false tongues, he appealed to him who has all men's hearts in his hand, who has power over the consciences of bad men, and can, when he pleases, bridle their tongues. His prayer was, "Deliver my soul, O Lord! from lying lips, that my enemies may not by these cursed methods work my ruin." He that had prayed so earnestly to be kept from lying (Psa 119:29) and hated it so heartily in himself (Psa 119:163) might with the more confidence pray to be kept from being belied by others, and from the ill consequences of it.
3. He obtained a gracious answer to this prayer. God heard him; so that his enemies, though they carried their designs very far, were baffled at last, and could not prevail to do him the mischief they intended. The God of truth is, and will be, the protector of his people from lying lips, Psa 37:6.
II. The doom of a false tongue foretold by faith, Psa 120:3, Psa 120:4. As God will preserve his people from this mischievous generation, so he will reckon with their enemies, Psa 12:3, Psa 12:7. The threatening is addressed to the sinner himself, for the awakening of his conscience, if he have any left: "Consider what shall be given unto thee, and what shall be done unto thee, by the righteous Judge of heaven and earth, thou false tongue." Surely sinners durst not do as they do if they knew, and would be persuaded to think, what will be in the end thereof. Let liars consider what shall be given to them: Sharp arrows of the Almighty, with coals of juniper, that is, they will fall and lie for ever under the wrath of God, and will be made miserable by the tokens of his displeasure, which will fly swiftly like arrows, and will strike the sinner ere he is aware and when he sees not who hurts him. This is threatened against liars, Psa 64:7. God shall shoot at them with an arrow; suddenly shall they be wounded. They set God at a distance from them, but from afar his arrows can reach them. They are sharp arrows, and arrows of the mighty, the Almighty; for they will pierce through the strongest armour and strike deep into the hardest heart. The terrors of the Lord are his arrows (Job 6:4), and his wrath is compared to burning coals of juniper, which do not flame or crackle, like thorns under a pot, but have a vehement heat, and keep fire very long (some say, a year round) even when they seem to be gone out. This is the portion of the false tongue; for all that love and make a lie shall have their portion in the lake that burns eternally, Rev 22:15.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–6 In my distress I cried unto the Lord,.... Being…
In my distress I cried unto the Lord,.... Being at a distance from his own country, or, however, from the house of God; persecuted by men, under the lash of their tongues; reproached, abused, and belied by them: in this his case and circumstances, he betook himself by prayer to the Lord, and importuned help and deliverance of him, knowing that none could help him as he; see Psa 18:6;
and he heard me; answered him, and delivered him. The petition he put up follows, which shows his case, and his particular distress.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 5 David prays against lying tongues, and denounces judgment against…
David prays against lying tongues, and denounces judgment against them, ver. 1-4. Complains of his wicked and unpeaceable neighbours, ver. 5-7. A song of degrees. Title of the psalm. Of degrees - Or, of accents, as the word properly signifies. This title is given to this and the fourteen following psalms, probably because they were sung upon the fifteen degrees, steps, or stairs of the temple, which the Jewish writers mention.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1–7 The psalmist, in great distress, calls on the Lord…
PSALM CXX
The psalmist, in great distress, calls on the Lord for
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deliverance from calumny and defamation, 1, 2;
shows the punishment that awaits his persecutor, 3, 4;
deplores the necessity of his residence with the ungodly, 5-7.
NOTES ON PSALM CXX
This Psalm, and all the rest that follow it, to the end of Psalm 134, fifteen in number, are called Psalms of Degrees; for thus the Hebrew title המעלות hammaaloth is generally translated, as coming from the root עלה alah, to ascend or mount upwards. Hence מעלות maaloth, steps or stairs for ascending, 1Kg 10:19-20; 2Kg 9:13. But as the word may be applied to elevation in general, hence some have thought that it may here signify the elevation of voice; "these Psalms being sung with the highest elevations of voice and music." Others have thought the word expresses rather the matter of these Psalms, as being of peculiar excellence: and hence Junius and Tremellius prefix to each Canticum excellentissimum, "A most excellent ode."
R. D. Kimchi says, "There were fifteen steps by which the priests ascended into the temple, on each of which they sang one of these fifteen Psalms." This opinion I find referred to in the Apocryphal Gospel of the birth of Mary: "Her parents brought her to the temple, and set her upon one of the steps. Now there are fifteen steps about the temple, by which they go up to it, according to the fifteen Psalms of Degrees." But the existence of such steps and practices cannot be proved.
Aben Ezra supposes that the word means some kind of tune sung to these Psalms. It is more likely, if the title be really ancient, that it was affixed to them on account of their being sung on the return from the Babylonish captivity, as the people were going up to Jerusalem; for though some of them are attributed to David, yet it is very probable that they were all made long after his time, and probably during the captivity, or about the end of it. The author of these fifteen Psalms is not known; and most probably they were not the work of one person. They have been attributed to David, to Solomon, to Ezra, to Haggai, to Zechariah, and to Malachi, without any positive evidence. They are, however, excellent in their kind, and written with much elegance; containing strong and nervous sentiments of the most exalted piety, expressed with great felicity of language in a few words.
Verse 1. In my distress] Through the causes afterwards mentioned.
I cried unto the Lord] Made strong supplication for help.
And he heard one.] Answered my prayer by comforting my soul.
It appears to be a prayer of the captives in Babylon for complete liberty; or perhaps he recites the prayer the Israelites had made previously to their restoration.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv2, 5 Psa 120:2-4. Deliver my soul from lying lips —…
Psa 120:2-4. Deliver my soul from lying lips — From the unjust censures and malicious slanders of mine enemies; and from a deceitful tongue — Which covers mischievous designs under pretences of kindness. What shall be given unto thee — By the righteous Judge of heaven and earth; thou false tongue — O thou false accuser, or slanderer, or whosoever thou art, that art guilty of any such like practices? Sharp arrows of the mighty —
The wrath and vengeance of the almighty God, which in Scripture, and particularly in this book, is often compared to arrows, as Psa 7:13-14, &c., and here to arrows of the mighty, that is, arrows shot by the hands of a strong man; and to coals, Psa 140:10, and here to coals of juniper, which burn very fiercely, and retain their heat for a long time. And the psalmist may possibly express himself in these words, to show the suitableness of the punishment to the sin. As if he had said, As thy tongue shoots arrows, (as calumnies are often called,) and kindles coals, so thou shalt bring God’s arrows and coals, kindled by the fire of his wrath, upon thyself.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1–7 In my distress - In my suffering, as arising…
In my distress - In my suffering, as arising from slander, Psa 120:2-3. There are few forms of suffering more keen than those caused by slander:
“Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue
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Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose breath
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie
All corners of the world: kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave
This viperous slander enters.”
Cymbeline, iii. 4.
It is one of those things which a man cannot guard against; which he cannot repel by force; whose origin he cannot always trace; which will go where a vindication will not follow; whose effects will live long after the slander is refuted; which will adhere to a man, or leave a trait of suspicion, even after the most successful vindication, for the effect will be to make a second slander more easily credited than the first was.
I cried unto the Lord, and he heard me - I had no other resource. I could not meet the slander. I could not refute it. I could not prevent its effects on my reputation, and all that I could do was to commit the case to the Lord. See the notes at Psa 37:5-6.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 Psalms 120
Psalms 120
A Song of Degrees
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In my distress I cried
Unto the Lord, and he heard me.
2 Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips,
And from a deceitful tongue.
3 What shall be given unto thee?
Or what shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue?
4 Sharp arrows of the mighty,
With coals of juniper.
5 Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech,
That I dwell in the tents of Kedar!
6 My soul hath long dwelt
With him that hateth peace.
7 I am for peace: but when I speak,
They are for war.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Composition.—On the superscription compare Introd. § 6, No. 5. We have but little to add here. Ewald now decides for the reference to the festival journeys to Jerusalem. So also Liebusch in the Ouedlinburg Osterprogramm. 1866, mentions “The pilgrim songs in the Fifth Book of the Psalms.” Delitzsch, on the contrary, now holds to the expression “songs of ascents,” but refers, it, with Gesenius and others, to the artificial climactic form of the rhythm, in which the poem, by the repetition of one of the significant words immediately preceding advances by a gradual ascent. Hitzig traces this obscure and doubtful term, for which none of the explanations proposed are sufficient, (Hupfeld), to a word-play, by the collector and redactor of the fifteen Psalms which are furnished with this title, referring to the steps of the Temple. For the ascent to the outer court was made through each of the three gates by seven steps, and that to the inner court by eight; and in this small collection of songs, which are closely connected by many similarities both of form and contents, the first contains seven, the second eight verses. It is further to be remarked that, in Psalms 121. is written exceptionally lammaálôth, which seems to favor the explanation: “for the upward journeys” (Aquila, Symmachus), but may just as well mean: after the manner of steps (Del.); for it is just in that Psalm that the climactic structure, which in others almost disappears, is displayed quite characteristically. This difference is entirely unnoticed by the Sept., Chald., and Jerome, and regarded by Hitzig as a mistake of the copyist.
[Hengstenberg, with whom Alexander and Perowne, as well as most commentators, agree, favors the view first mentioned above. Against the view given in the Syrian translation, and also by Chrysostom and Theodoret, and formerly held by Ewald, that the title refers to those songs which were sung by Israel on the way home from Babylon, he urges the consideration that David and Solomon are mentioned as the composers of some of the Psalms which bear that title. He accounts for the position assigned to those Psalms, and the dissimilarity of style and modes of thought between them and the others, on the hypothesis, that “these five ancient Psalms, sung by the people, as they went up to Jerusalem, before the captivity, were made the basis of a whole series or system, designed for the same use, by an inspired writer, after the restoration, who not only added new Psalms of his own, as appears from the resemblances of tone and diction, but joined them to the old ones in a studied or artificial manner, entirely inconsistent with the supposition of fortuitous or random combination.” On the characteristics of the Psalms bearing the general title, he remarks: “These Psalms have much in common. The tone never rises in any of them above a certain height, and descends very speedily from that height when gained. They all bear the character of simplicity. With the exception of Psalms 132. they are all of short compass. In all of them, with the same exception, the parallelism of the clauses is little attended to. No one of them bears an individual character; they all refer to the whole Church of God with the exception, in some measure, of Psalms 127., which, without being individual, places before us, in the first instance, the particular members of the Church, but which the collector has applied also to the circumstances of the whole community.”—J. F. M.]
In the Psalm before us is first presented an acknowledgment of prayer heard in former times (Psa_120:1). There is then offered a prayer for deliverance from the power of a false, warlike, and savage enemy (Psa_120:2-4). The suppliant longing for peace then complains (Psa_120:5-7) of that enemy’s implacable hatred, this complaint being the more sorrowful and urgent, as he had already bitterly experienced, dwelling as he did in the midst of such savage foes, the painful contrast, already too much aggravated, to his former condition. Nothing definitely can be said as to the historical situation, not even whether the author had in mind purely personal experiences, or sufferings of his nation shared by him. Nor can we say whether the name of the enemy is to be taken historically or symbolically.
Psa_120:2-4. The expressions here are so concise and obscure, and it is possible to connect them in so many different ways, that the sense is highly doubtful. It is first most readily suggested to consider Psa_120:3 as a continuation of the addressto Jehovah, and to take the deceitful tongue as the subject (Mendelssohn, Olshausen). But such a question would afford a sense but little suitable, and would be still less aptly connected with Psa_120:4. It has therefore been proposed to invert this order, and to regard Jehovah as the subject, and the deceitful tongue as addressed in the vocative (many since Isaaki, also Hengst. and Del.) An allusion is then supposed to exist to the formula usually employed in the announcement of the Divine punishments, (1Sa_3:17 and frequently), and Psa_120:4 is taken as a continuation of the question, and as a figurative description of the tongue (J. D. Mich., Ewald), which is a sharp sword (Psa_57:5), and a pointed arrow (Jer_9:7), and like the fire of hell (Jam_3:6); or it is regarded as the answer to the question, and as a sarcastic description of the punishments (comp. Psa_140:11) according to the law of retribution. But the supposition of a sudden change of subject is very harsh in this connection, nor do adequate reasons for it appear. If, then, we return to the construction, according to which the deceitful tongue is the subject, it would certainly be in the highest degree forced and strange to suppose the possessor of the tongue to be meant, as metonymically implied in Psa_120:2, and Psa_120:4 to mention the punishments to be inflicted upon him for his deceitful conduct (Chald., de Dieu) or to describe figuratively the injuries which he causes to others, while he himself gains nothing by them (Aben Ezra, Kimchi, Calvin, and many of the older expositors; also Rosenmüller and De Wette). But, instead of this, there would be an address to the Poet, whether in the form of a question put by himself, or by a third person, in poetical fashion, or whether it is, which however is least probable, referred to an indefinite person, as being a general expression. Psa_120:4 would then present the conditions which called forth the prayer in Psa_120:2, expressing figuratively the dangerous effects of the tongue, but in the form of an answer (Hitzig), and not as an explanatory description (Luther, Geier). [Dr. Moll thus translates Psa_120:3-4 : “What to thee gives, and what to thee brings the tongue of deceit?” (tongue being the subject). Arrows of a strong one, sharpened, along with coals of the broom-tree.” This ingenious mode of viewing the passage appears to present its most natural connection, and, at the same time, to bring out its poetic beauty. The following rendering of Psa_120:1-4 will exhibit this view, the arrangement of the clauses in the original being in some cases neglected for the sake of perspicuity.
1. (The Poet.) I called to Jehovah in my distress, and He answered me.
2. Jehovah, deliver me from lips of lying, from the tongue of deceit.
3. (A third person is represented as addressing the Poet). What does the tongue of deceit give thee and bring to thee?
4. (The Poet). Arrows of a mighty man, sharpened, with coals of the broom-tree.
The opinion mentioned above, as that of Hengstenberg and Delitzsch, is favored by Alexander and Perowne.—J. F. M.]
The roots of the rethem, that is, of the broom-tree (Gesen.), not of the juniper (Jerome, the Rabbins, and the older expositors), furnish the best wood-coals in the opinion of the Arabs (Burckhardt, Reisen in Syrien II., 791, 1073. Robinson, Palestine, I., 336). They retain the glow longest, and, therefore, along with sharp arrows, are a suitable figure in the present connection. It is not said that the arrows were sharpened with broom-tree coals, or hardened, pointed in them (older expositors cited in De Wette), or that they were burning (Knapp). The particular term is perhaps chosen in allusion to the mention made in the following verse of an abode in the tents of Kedar, a predatory Arab tribe (Gen_10:2; Isa_42:11; Isa_60:7; Sol. Son_1:5). But it does not follow from this, any more than it does from the cry of woe, (Calv., J. H. Mich.), that Psa_120:4 should be severed from the preceding verse.
Psa_120:5-6. Neither can Psa_120:4 be combined with the following verse, as though it represented the same historical situation. For we cannot justify the ingenious change of the reading גַחֲלֵי into אָהֳלֵי (Hupfeld), in order to gain the meaning: the arrows of a warrior are sharp in the tents of Rethamim, according to the analogy of Psa_120:5, and the similar proper name in Num_33:18. Moreover Mesech is named besides, along with Kedar, as a place of residence. This name points to a region between the Caspian and Black Seas in the far North near Magog (Eze_38:2). The attempts which have been made to bring it into connection with Damascus (Hitzig), or to refer it to another Ishmaelitish tribe elsewhere unmentioned (Olshausen), or to explain it appellatively of the long duration of the abode in a strange land (Sept. et al.) and thus to do away with the proper name, have arisen from the difficulty of assigning to the author a residence among two tribes so far apart, especially when such residence is also described as still continuing. Most expositors, therefore, since Saadias and Calvin, regard both names as figurative designations of rude and hostile companions. These are supposed by some to have been the nations among whom the Jews lived in the Exile; by others, the Samaritans, who retarded the re-building of the city; by others still, the tribes among whom the people of God dwelt during the dispersion.
[Psa_120:7. Delitzsch: “He, for his part is peace, (comp. Micah 9:4; Psa_109:4; Psa_110:3), inasmuch as love of peace, readiness for peace, and longing for peace fills his soul: yet, if he does but open his mouth, they are for war, their voice and conduct become hostile at once. . . . The Psalm ends with the shrill dissonance of שׁלום and מלחמה. The cry for help, with which it begins, lingers hovering over that discord, longing for its removal.”—J. F. M.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
To him who seeks peace, it is not always granted, in this world, to live in peace with those about him. He must often, and sometimes for a long period, have the bitterest experiences of their quarrelsome and hostile dispositions, and suffer much pain from their sore and malicious attacks by word and act. But the living God remains ever his Refuge, and the blessed experience of prayers, heard in times past, strengthens and encourages his faith in the coming of a like blessing in the troubled present, and his hopes of deliverance after renewed supplication.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The pious have no peace in the world, but they can rest in God.—Wounds, inflicted by a sharp and malicious tongue, burn more severely than fire does, but God has a balm for them.—Blessed is he, who, though experiencing suffering in this evil world, experiences deliverance too, from answers to prayer.
Starke: Liars and calumniators are the most injurious people in the world, and yet they injure none as much as they do themselves; for they are accursed, and an abomination unto God.—The kingdom of the devil is a kingdom of lies, and will in all likelihood, continue so, but Christ’s kingdom is one of eternal truth, whose fruit is peace and love.—The true Church has ever to dwell among the most cruel enemies, and under oppression. Frisch: It is much easier to heal a severe wound, than to repair the effects of a calumny circulated by lying tongues.—Guenther: The troubled, filthy spring of evil speaking is selfishness, envy, hatred of brethren, departure from God. If therefore, it is a sure mark of godlessness, and of a carnal disposition, to slander one’s brother, it is not to be wondered at, if the children of light have to suffer most from such poisonous arrows.—Taube: He who has entered into communion with the God of peace, through the blood of reconciliation, is a child of peace (Mat_5:9), while the wicked are like the troubled sea, which can never rest. (Isa_57:20 f.).
[Bp. Horne: Marvel not, O disciple of Jesus! if the world hate and oppose thee, but pray only that, when thou shalt be used as He was, thou mayest be enabled to bear that usage as He did.
Barnes: I cried unto the Lord, etc,. I had no other resource. I could not meet the slander, I could not refute it. I could not prevent its effects on my reputation, and all that I could do was to commit the case to the Lord.—There is a world of peace, and the peace of heaven will be all the more grateful and blessed, when we go up to it from such a scene of conflict and war.—J. F. M.].
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1–7 1. Distress… cried… heard—This serial form—trouble, prayer, and answer—was…
1. Distress… cried… heard—This serial form—trouble, prayer, and answer—was common for David, and his faith in God touching the answer, gathered from past experience, was the ground of all his hope.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7 1. In my distress I called unto Jehovah,
1. In my distress I called unto Jehovah,
And he answered me.
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The Psalmist calls to mind past answers to prayer as an encouragement to fresh prayer in his present distress. Cp. Psa_3:4. This is a simpler and more natural explanation of the verse than to take it as a confident anticipation of a favourable answer, I call … and he will surely answer me; or to suppose that the Psalmist is looking back upon trouble in the past, and that Psa_120:2-4 are the prayer to which he refers in Psa_120:1.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 7 (2) Deliver . . .—This is the cry for…
(2) Deliver . . .—This is the cry for help of which mention has just been made. The thought is one we have met frequently. Of all the elements of bitterness which made up the lot of Israel under foreign dominion, taunts and calumnies seem to have made the deepest wound, and left the most lasting scar. This was “the torture prolonged from age to age,” under which we hear psalmist after psalmist raising his cry for deliverance.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1–7 THE next fifteen psalms have a common heading, which…
THE SONGS OF ASCENTS.
THE next fifteen psalms have a common heading, which is translated "Songs of Degrees," "Songs of Ascents," or "Songs of Steps." They constitute together "a Little Psalter," which contains indications of a formal arrangement. The central psalm the only one ascribed to Solomon has on either side of it a group of seven; each such group formed of two psalms ascribed to David, and five anonymous ones. The ascribed psalms are separated one from another by the anonymous ones, in such sort that no two of the former ever come together. This is evidently not the result of chance.
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Of the title itself different explanations are given. Some regard the degrees (ma"aloth) as "steps," and accept a rabbinical explanation, that the psalms were written for chanting upon fifteen steps, which led from the Court of the Women in the temple to the Court of the Men. But there is no sufficient evidence of the existence of these steps. Others, translating maaloth by "ascents," suggest that they are psalms composed for the Jews to chant on their ascent from Babylon to Jerusalem at the return from the Captivity. But the plural form is thus unaccounted for, while the ascription of five of the fifteen to David and Solomon is contradicted. Under these circumstances, recent critics mostly acquiesce in the view that the psalms were written for the pilgrims, who annually went up to Jerusalem at the three great feasts, to chant upon their journeys. (So Ewald, Thenius, Hengstenberg, Dean Johnson, and Professor Alexander.)
In my distress I cried unto the Lord, and he heard me. The particular "distress" intended can only be conjectured. Some suppose it to be the Captivity itself, others the opposition offered by the Samaritans, Ammonites, and others to the rebuilding of the temple (Ezr 4 Ezr 5) and restoration of the wails of Jerusalem. (Neh_2:19, 20 4:1-23 6:2-14) But these guesses are scarcely of much value.
Vers. 1-7. The perversion of power, etc.
This psalm, though "a difference of opinion exists respecting the interpretation of almost every verse and word of it," may suggest valuable thoughts upon
I THE PERVERSION OF POWER. It speaks of "lying lips," a "deceitful tongue," and of the "false tongue" (vers. 2, 3). We may say that sin is perversion; it is the misdirection and abuse of our various faculties and organs; turning to a bad account all our opportunities of good. The Apostle James gives at some length the perversion of the power of speech. (Jam_3:2-13) Our words may be reverent, true, kind, instructive, considerate, helpful, wise; or they may be profane, false, cruel, communicative of evil, injurious. There is hardly a limit to the possible service we may render our Lord and our kind if we avail ourselves of every opportunity of speaking the wise and gracious word; but it is impossible to estimate the evil which a man may do in a long life by a bitter, a false, an impure, a skeptical tongue. It becomes us to think that the power of speech is a great gift from the hand of God; that it is a talent entrusted tolls by our Divine Father for his glory and for the good of men. Whenever, therefore, we speak that which is hurtful to others or unworthy of ourselves we are guiltily abusing our power; we are turning that which was meant to be, and might constantly be made, a fountain of blessing into a stream of sorrow or even of sin. The same thought (respecting perversion) applies, in less degree, to the hands, the eyes, the feet; it is else, of course, very markedly true of the capacities of the mind.
II A CHARACTERISTIC OF DIVINE PUNISHMENT. "What shall be given unto thee... thou false tongue?" "Sharp arrows of the mighty, burning coals," is the reply. The punishment is suited to the offence. The tongue which itself is "a sharp sword" (Psa_57:4) is to be transfixed by the sharp arrows shot by a strong arm; the tongue which is itself "a fire" (Jam_3:6) is to be consumed with burning coals. As is the sin, so is the sorrow and the shame. The king that had done grievous domestic wrong was to suffer in his own family. (2Sa_12:11) The traitor who betrayed his Master was to be deserted and thrown over by his own companions. The pitiless man goes unpitied in the hour of his own desolation. The miser who keeps back the blessings he might confer on others withholds all comforts and delights from his own heart and his own home. He who does not regard the sacredness of his body will live to suffer in the body; he who neglects his mind will pay the penalty in intellectual poverty and feebleness. "Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap" loss, suffering, death, according to the nature of his sin.
III THE MISERY OF UNCONGENIAL SURROUNDINGS. (Vers. 5-7) The psalmist bewails his ill fortune in that he has to dwell in places remote from the civilization and the privileges of his home; he is surrounded by ungenial associates whose spirit is hostile, with whom he cannot live on terms of amity and good will. This "Mesech" of his is found in every latitude and longitude. It is the experience of a very large proportion of men and women, especially in the earlier period of life, to find themselves living or laboring with the unsympathetic, and even with the unfriendly; with those whose views on serious and even sacred subjects are dissimilar or opposite. We may have much to do with those whose spirit and whose attitude are positively provocative, who invite and almost compel us to dispute. It is trying in the last degree. But:
1. It is a recognized and accepted part of our earthly lot, and it will not last very long; it will give place, in time, to the holy friendships and blissful intercourse of the heavenly world.
2. It is a necessary part of the discipline through which we pass, at tempering and strengthening our character.
3. It provides daily opportunity for self-mastery, for submission to the will of God, for honoring the Name of Christ.
IV OUR REFUGE IN GOD. (Vers. 1, 2) Assailed by unjust or ungenerous attack, surrounded by uncongenial companions, we can always realize the near presence of one sympathizing Friend, of the all-powerful God, who can extricate us from the worst situation, or sustain us in it, so that our souls will be at rest.
HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-7. In Mesech and Kedar.
This psalm is a piteous declaration of the unhappy lot of him who is surrounded by the false, the treacherous, and the cruel. They of Mesech the Moschi of Herodotus (see Exposition) dwelt where now the horribly bloodthirsty Kurds have their habitation, who of late years have horrified all Christendom by their barbarous atrocities inflicted on the Christian Armenians. Amid men of such sort the psalmist is complaining that he has to dwell (ver. 5). It is a tale of treachery and cruelty that he portrays or rather suggests to us in this psalm. Concerning all such men of lying lips, we learn
I THEY ARE THE DISTRESS OF THE GODLY. How many a faithful missionary, amid similar hordes, has felt his heart die down in hopeless despair as he witnesses their horrid cruelty and deceit! We at home forget too much this special trial of the missionary. Nothing but the abundant supply of the Spirit of all grace can possibly sustain him amid such sad and revolting circumstances. If he gets used to them, and so indifferent to them, he can no longer be a true missionary; nor either if he fears them or yields to despair about them. And in less unusual form, God"s servants may yet have to say, "My soul is among lions". (Psa_57:4) Many a God-fearing working man amid a crowd of godless mates, many a Christian servant-girl amid companions who have no love for God, many a young disciple of Christ in school or office, these and others like them know by sad experience the treachery and cruelty of the ungodly.
II THE AWFUL AND OVERWHELMING WRATH OF GOD AWAITS THESE PERSECUTORS. (Vers. 3, 4; see Exposition for meaning) The false and lying tongue is often likened to fire, fire of hell, to sword and sharp arrow, and now here it is declared that what such tongue hath sown, that shall it also reap. (cf. Psa_57:4 Psa_64:3 Psa_55:21 Psa_59:7 Jam_3:6; and especially Psa_140:9, Psa_140:10) Sometimes even in this world we see the Divine vengeance poured out on those who have played the part of bloody and deceitful men towards the people of God. In the persecuting ages it was not unusual nor unnatural for the persecuted ones to point out, as proofs of the Divine wrath, the fearful deaths which overtook many of their persecutors. True it is today that he who blesses the servants of God is blessed, and he who curses them is cursed.
III IT MAY NEVERTHELESS BE APPOINTED FOR GOD"S PEOPLE TO DWELL AMID SUCH SURROUNDINGS. The great missionary command involved the possibility of such sojourn. If we are to go into all the world, we must expect to meet with what the world has to offer. And, in God"s providence, we often have to go and dwell amid, not the friends but the foes of God. The soldier in the field, the sailor, the boy at school. It may be God"s will for us. But
IV THEM ENMITY MAY OFTEN SEEM TO BE EXCITED BY THAT WHICH SHOULD MAKE IT ASHAMED. (Ver. 7) Not all at once will the Spirit of peace prevail.
V BUT NOTHING CAN ROB THE BELIEVING SOUL OF ITS BLESSED RELIEF AND REFUGE IN GOD. (Ver. 1) The first verse relates what really follows on the facts told of in the other verses. Call upon, cry unto the Lord, and he will ever help. S.C.
A dark fact explained and illuminated.
The dark fact is human distress; the explanation is the prayer it leads to; the illumination, the answer it brings. We have here
I A TOO RARE PERSONAGE. In my distress, I," etc. It is by no means every one who does this.
1. Some blaspheme curse God in their hearts.
2. Others east off all faith say, "There is no God." Many have done this.
3. Others harden their hearts, as Pharaoh did.
4. Others plunge deeper into sin. (Isa_1:5) In the distraction which for a while they gain, they drown the sense of their misery.
5. Others turn to human aid for deliverance and solace.
6. Yet others bestir themselves to get by their own effort what help they may. The psalmist"s resource does not condemn, but will often include, these two last methods, and will further their usefulness. But to turn to God in distress is as wise as it is too seldom adopted.
II A REAL REASON FOR DISTRESS. God sends it, or lets it come, that it may lead men to turn to him: that is ever his intent. But for such distress we should scarce turn to him at all.
III A RIGHT MANNER OF PRAYER. "I cried." It tells of earnestness, of humility, of believing trust, of self-distrust. It has all those elements which go to make up, acceptable and prevailing prayer. How little of our prayer is a crying unto God! It is decorous, reverent, formal, correct, and seeks true and worthy objects, but it lacks fervor, force, and the faith which will not let the Lord go unless he bless. No man ever yet cried unto the Lord" and failed to find response.
IV A READY AND REALIZED RESPONSE. "He heard me." How promptly this confession comes after the statement, "I cried"! (Cf. Caesar"s "Veni, vidi, vici.") It is like that. And the psalmist knew that he was heard. The outward circumstances may not have much changed, but in his heart the light had risen, the Lord had come.
CONCLUSION. Distress of one kind or another we all must know. Let us adopt this manner of prayer, and we shall surely find the ready response. S.C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Vers. 1, 2. The misery made by the untruthful.
This is the first of fifteen psalms that are called "Songs of Degrees;" Revised Version, Songs of Ascent;" literally, "Songs of Going up." The association of them with the journeying of country pilgrims to the feasts at Jerusalem is somewhat fanciful. These psalms are naturally explained as "Songs of Heart-uplifting." The key-note of them all is looking up out of some present distress, and seeking the help of God. "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills;" "Unto thee lift I up mine eyes;" "Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord." Two things are necessary to a "song of ascent:" some special form of present distress; a looking to God for help out of that distress. It is possible effectively to illustrate these psalms from the experiences of the returned exiles.
I THE PSALMIST"S DISTRESS. It may be regarded as personal, and then we notice that it is a mental anxiety rather than a set of difficult circumstances. And though mental anxieties may seem to be unreal, and often are, they are our most serious and overwhelming distresses; the ones we can least effectively deal with ourselves; the ones in which God"s help is most especially needed, and least frequently sought. Or the psalmist may be regarded as personifying the nation, and speaking in its name. The restored exiles were much distressed by the malicious slanders of the surrounding nationalities, whom the psalmist likens to the barbarous tribes of the Moschi, and the nomad hordes of Kedar. Here also the distress is mental; it was not outward injury, but worry caused by the slanders spread abroad concerning them. We love to be thought well of, and are distressed when reputation is damaged.
II THE CAUSE OF THE PSALMIST"S DISTRUST. Men did not speak the truth about him. Slander has a mysterious power of growth and enlargement; and no man"s reputation is safe when the gossip, the talebearer, and the slanderer attempt to deal with it. A man may never be afraid of the truth, nor need he fear the final triumph of his slanderers, but for a time the lying lips" may cause him infinite misery.
III THE RELIEF OF THE PSALMIST"S DISTRESS. He can turn to God, sure that he knows of his trouble knows the untruthfulness of the accusations made; is more jealous of his reputation than he can be of his own; could stop the lying lips at once, if he thought it best to do so; and permits them to keep on only because thus he can work out some higher good. R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Charles H. Spurgeon 1885 · Public Domain On vv1–7 At the end of all these years the last…
At the end of all these years the last page of this Commentary is printed, and the seventh preface is requested. The demand sounds strangely in my ears. A preface when the work is done? It can be only nominally a preface, for it is really a farewell. I beg to introduce my closing volume, and then to retire with many apologies for having trespassed so much upon my reader's patience.
A tinge of sadness is on my spirit as I quit "The Treasury of David, "never to find on this earth a richer storehouse, though the whole palace of revelation is open to me. Blessed have been the days spent in meditating, mourning, hoping, believing, and exulting with David! Can I hope to spend hours more joyous on this side of the golden gate? Perhaps not; for the seasons have been very choice in which the harp of the great poet of the sanctuary has charmed my ears. Yet the training which has come of these heavenly contemplations may haply go far to create and sustain a peaceful spirit which will never be without its own happy psalmody, and never without aspirations after something higher than it yet has known. The Book of Psalms instructs us in the use of wings as well as words: it sets us both mounting and singing. Often have I ceased my commenting upon the text, that I might rise with the psalm, and gaze upon visions of God. If I may only hope that these volumes will be as useful to other hearts in the reading as to mine in the writing, I shall be well rewarded by the prospect.
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The former volumes have enjoyed a singular popularity. It may be questioned if in any age a commentary so large, upon a single book of the Bible, has enjoyed a circulation within measurable distance of that which has been obtained by this work. Among all orders of Christians "The Treasury" has found its way unrestrained by sectarian prejudiceanother proof of the unity of the spiritual life, and the oneness of the food upon which it delights to feed. The author may not dare to be proud of the generous acknowledgments which he has received from men of all sections of the church; but, on the other hand, he cannot pass over them in ungrateful silence. Conscious as he is of his many literary sins of omission and of commission in these seven volumes, he is yet glad to have been permitted to do his best, and to have received abundant encouragement in the doing of it. Of all its good the glory is the Lord's; of all its weakness the unworthy author must bear the blame.
This last portion of the Psalms has not been the easiest part of my gigantic task. On the contrary, with the exception of The Songs of Degrees, and one or two other Psalms, these later hymns and hallelujahs have not been largely expounded, nor frequently referred to, by our great divines. Failing the English, a larger use has been made of the Latin authors; and my esteemed friend, W. DURBAN, B.A., has rendered me great service in their translation. It would astonish our readers if they could see what tomes have been read, what folios have been covered with translations, and in the end what tiny morsels have been culled from the vast mass for incorporation with this Treasury. Heaps of earth have been sifted and washed, and have yielded only here and there a little "dust of gold." No labour has been spared; no difficulty has been shirked. May the good Lord accept my service, and enrich his church by it this day, and when I am gathered to my fathers!
My friend and amanuensis, Mr. J. L. KEYS, has continued to search the British Museum and public Libraries for me; and to him and many other kind friends I owe many a quotation which else might have been overlooked. Of the extracts I am editor in chief, and not much more; for brethren such as Mr. HENSON, of Kingsgate Street, have at sundry times, of their own accord, sent me material more or less useful. In the homiletical department my obligations are exceedingly great, and are duly acknowledged under initials. My venerable friend the Rev. GEORGE ROGERS leads the way; but several other brethren, hailing from the Pastors' College, follow with almost equal steps. Thanks are hereby tendered to them all, and to the multitude of authors from whom I have gathered flowers and fruits, fragrant and nourishing.
And now the colossal work is done! To God be all glory. More than twenty years have glided away while this pleasant labour has been in the doing; but the wealth of mercy which has been lavished upon me during that time my grateful heart is unable to measure. Surely goodness and mercy have followed me all those years, and made my heart to sing new psalms for new mercies. There is none like the God of Jeshurun. To him be all glory for ever and ever.
In these busy days, it would be greatly to the spiritual profit of Christian men if they were more familiar with the Book of Psalms, in which they would find a complete armoury for life's battles, and a perfect supply for life's needs. Here we have both delight and usefulness, consolation and instruction. For every condition there is a psalm, suitable and elevating. The Book supplies the babe in grace with penitent cries, and the perfected saint with triumphant songs. Its breadth of experience stretches from the jaws of hell to the gate of heaven. He who is acquainted with the marches of the Psalm country knows that the land floweth with milk and honey, and he delights to travel therein. To such I have aspired to be a helpful companion.
Reader, I beseech David's God to bless thee; and I pray thee, when it is well with thee, breathe a like prayer for
Thine heartily,
C.H. Spurgeon
WESTWOOD,
UPPER NORWOOD,
October, 1885.
This little psalter within the psalter consists of fifteen brief songs. Why they are grouped together and what is meant by their generic name it would be hard to tell. The conjectures are very mary, but they are mere suppositions. Out of them all the conjecture of Dr. Jebb best commends itself to my own mind, though it would be quite consistent with this suggestion to believe that the series of songs arranged by David became the Pilgrim Psalms of after ages, and were chanted by the Lord's people as they went up to the temple. They are "Songs of the Goings Up; "so some read the word. Those who delight to spiritualize everything find here Ascents of the Soul, or language fitted to describe the rising of the heal t from the deepest grief to the highest delight. I have thought it well to indicate the methods by which learned men have tried to explain the term "Songs of Degrees, " but the reader must select his own interpretation. C.H.S.
In the thirteenth chapter of the First Book of Chronicles, it is related, that David brought up the Ark from Kirjath-jearim to the house of Obed-edom. The word (hjlu) used in the seventh verse, for "bringing up" the Ark, is of the same etymology with, and cognate to that which is translated "degrees." And upon this occasion the great event was celebrated by the accompaniment of sacred music. "And David and all Israel played before God with all their might, and with singing, and with harps, and with psalteries, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and with trumpets." Again, in the fifteenth chapter of the same book, in the fourteenth verse, the same term is employed for bringing up the Ark to Jerusalem; and the choral services of the Levites are mentioned in immediate connection. And in the fifth chapter of the Second Book of Chronicles (fifth verse), we are told that Solomon assembled the people at the dedication of the Temple, to bring up the Ark from Sion to the Temple of the Lord. John Jebb.
I abide in the simple and plain sense as much as I may, and judge that these psalms are called The Psalms of Degrees because the Levites or priests were wont to sing them upon the stairs or some high place; even as with us he that begins the Psalms or preacheth, standeth in a place above the rest, that he may be the better seen and heard: For it seemeth not that these psalms were sung of the multitude which were in the Temple, or of the rest of the choir, but of certain which were appointed to sing them, or at least to begin them on the stairs to the rest, and so have their name; like as some other of the Psalms have their name and title from the singer. But how should a man know all their rites and ceremonies, especially after so long a time, whereby they are now clean worn out of the memory of all men? Seeing therefore among such a multitude of psalms, when the law was yet in his full force and power, some were wont to be sung with one manner of ceremony, and some with another, according to the time and place, as the use and custom then was, let this suffice us to think that this title pertaineth to no point of doctrine, but only to the ceremony of the singers, what manner of ceremony soever it was.
Martin Luther, in "A Commentarie upon the Psalmes of Degrees, "
1577.
There were fifteen steps by which the priests ascended into the Temple, on each of which they sang one of these fifteen psalms.
David Kimchi.
Whatever view of the Songs of Degrees you may take besides, you cannot leave out some association of them with the steps, without ignoring the unanimous belief about them handed down from time immemorial amongst the people who gave them to us; without, in fact, implying that at some epoch or other this strange association of the steps with the psalms was gratuitously invented, and, being invented, secured general acceptance in the sacred literature of the Hebrew nation. It is quite impossible to believe such a thing, when we are dealing with a people so jealous of precedent and authority in religion as the Hebrews have always been. I see, in fact, no sufficient; reason why we should not follow the leading of the Mischna and feel that Songs of Degrees, Songs of the Steps, is as much as to say Songs in the sacred Orchestra.
H.T. Armyqeld, in "The Gradual Psalms, "1874.
The great Carmelite expositor, Michael Ayguan, alleges that the fifteen psalms were divided by the Jews into three portions of five, with prayers intercalated, much as the Gregorian division of matins into three nocturns; and that each of the three grades of advance in the spiritual life is betokened by each quinary; the beginners, the progressors, and the perfect; or, in other terms, those who are severally in the purgative, the illuminative, and the unitive way. And thus it will be noticed that in Psalms 120-124, there is constant reference to trouble and danger; in 125-129 to confidence in God; in 130-134, to direct communion with him in his house. And Genebrardus, a later commentator, defines the fifteen degrees of going up out of the valley of weeping to the presence of God to be (1) affliction, (2) looking to God, (3) joy in communion, (4) invocation, (5) thanksgiving, (6) confidence, (7) patient waiting for deliverance, (8) God's grace and favour, (9) fear of the Lord, (10) martyrdom, (11) hatred of sins, (12) humility, (13) desire for the coming of Christ, (14) concord and charity, (15) constant blessing of God. Neale and Littledale.
No trace in history, or authentic tradition, can be found of these steps, which owe their construction solely to the accommodating fancy of the Rabbins, who, as usual, imagined facts, in order to support their preconceived theories.
John Jebb.
It is an additional objection to this Rabbinical conceit, that David, whose name several of these psalms bearand others of which have evident reference to his time and circumstanceslived in the time of the tabernacle which had no steps.
James Anderson's Note to Calvin in loc.
In the version of Theodotian, executed in the early part of the second century, with the express view of correcting the errors of the Septuagint, as well as in the translations by Aquila and by Symmachus, these psalms are rightly described as songs for the journeys up, and are thus at once referred to the stated pilgrimages to the Temple. The expressions, "Thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God thrice in the year" (Ex 39:24), "If this people go up to do sacrifice" (1Ki 3:27) a form of expression constantly employed as often as these sacred journeys are mentionedis precisely that which the psalms themselves exhibit: "I was glad when it was said unto me, Go up unto the house of the Lord"; and while we may well adopt this view, for the additional reason that it is in harmony with the whole spirit and sentiment which they breathe throughout, we shall find these psalms to form at the same time one of the most admirable and instructive manuals of devotion with which the love of our heavenly Father, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, has been pleased to bless us.
Robert Nisbet, in "The Songs of the Temple Pilgrims, "1863.
If the traditionary interpretation of the title, Song of Degrees, be accepted, that they were sung by devout pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem to keep the great feasts of the Lord, we may suppose that companies toiling up this long ascent would relieve the tedium of the way by chanting some of them.
From the customs of Orientals still prevalent, I think it highly probable that such an explanation of the title may be substantially correct. Nothing is more common than to hear individuals and parties of natives, travelling together through the open country and along mountain paths, especially during the night, break out into singing some of their favourite songs. Once, descending from the top of Sunnin, above Beirut, with a large company of natives, they spontaneously began to sing in concert. The moon was shining brightly in the clear sky, and they kept up their chanting for a long time. I shall not soon forget the impression made by that moonlight concert, as we wound our way down the eastern side of Lebanon to the Buka'a, on the way to Ba'albek. Through the still midnight air of that lofty region the rough edge of their stentorian voices, softened into melody, rang out full and strong, waking the sleeping echoes far and wide down the rocky defiles of the mountain. Something like this may have often rendered vocal this dreary ascent to Jerusalem. It is common in this country to travel in the night during the summer, and we know that the Hebrew pilgrims journeyed in large companies. On his ascent along this road from Jericho to the Holy City, Jesus was attended not only by the twelve apostles, but by others, both men and women; and it would be strange indeed if sometimes they did not seek relief from this oppressive solitude by singing the beautiful songs of Zion. William M. Thomson, in "The Land and the Book, "1881.
When we consider the place in the psalter which these "Songs of Degrees, or of the goings up" occupy, we see good reason to accept the statement (of the Syriac version, and of S. Chrysostom, Theodoret, Euthymius, and other Fathers, and also of Symmachus, Aquila, and of Hammond, Ewald, and many moderns), that these psalms describe the feelings of those Israelites who went up with Zerubbabel and Jeshua, and afterwards with Ezra, and still later with Nehemiah, from the land of their captivity and dispersion at Babylon, Susa, and other regions of the East, to the home of their fathers, Jerusalem. Hence, in some of the foregoing psalms, we have seen a reference to the dedication of the Second Temple, Psalm 118, and of the walls of Jerusalem Psalm 102, and to the building up of the nation itself on the old foundation of the law of God, given to their fathers at Sinai Psalm 119. Christopher Wordsworth.
Gesenius has the merit of having first discerned the true meaning of the questioned inscription, inasmuch as first in 1812, and frequently since that time, he has taught that the fifteen songs have their name from the step like progressive rhythm of their thoughts, and that consequently the name, like the triolet (roundelay) in Western poetry, does not refer to the liturgical usage, but to the technical structure. The correctness of this view has been duly appraised more particularly by De Wette, who adduces this rhythm of steps or degrees, too, among the more artificial rhythms. The songs are called Songs of Degrees or Gradual Psalms as being songs that move onward towards a climax, and that by, means of plokh (epiplokh), i.e., a taking up again of the immediately preceding word by way of giving intensity to the expression; and they are placed together on account of this common characteristic, just like the Miehtammim, which bear that name from a similar characteristic. Franz Delitzsch.
"Go up, go up, my soul!" must be the motto of one who would enter into the meaning of these psalms. They are a Jacob's ladder whose foot is fixed on the earth, but the top reaches up to the "heavenly Jerusalem."
The rhythmical structure of these psalms (in which one line is built up upon another stair wise) is a suitable outward accompaniment of the interior character of the psalms. Short, pointed lines fall in well with the flow of mystico allegorical thought: as in "Nearer, my God, to thee, "or, "Jerusalem; the golden." William Kay.
We may notice the following characteristics of nearly all these psalms: sweetness and tenderness; a sad pathetic tone; brevity; an absence generally of the ordinary parallelism; and something of a quick, trochaic rhythm. "The Speaker's Commentary."
Though it may be they are so called because of their excellency; a song of degrees being an excellent song, as an excellent man is called a man of high degree (1Ch 17:17); these being excellent ones for the matter of them, their manner of composure, and the brevity of them. John Gill.
This being a matter of small moment, I am not disposed to make it the subject of elaborate investigation; but the probable conjecture is, that this title was given to these psalms because they were sung on a higher key than others. The Hebrew word for degrees being derived from the word, hlu tsalah, to ascend, or go up, I agree with those who are of opinion that it denotes the different musical notes rising in succession. John Calvin.
Hezekiah liveth, these fifteen years, in safety and prosperity, having humbled himself before the Lord for his pride to the ambassadors of Babel. The degrees of the sun's reversing, and the fifteen years of Hezekiah's life prolonging, may call to our minds the fifteen Psalms of Degrees; viz. from Psalm 120 and forward. There were Hezekiah's songs that were sung to the stringed instruments in the house of the Lord (Isa 38:20): whether these were picked out by him for that purpose may be left to conjecture. John Lightfoot, 16021675.
WORKS UPON PSALMS 120-134, COMMONLY CALLED THE PSALMS OF DEGREES.
A Commentarie upon the Fifteene Psalmes, called "Psalmi traduum", that is, Psalmes of Degrees: Faithfully copied out of the Lectvres of D. Martin Luther, very fruitful and comfortable for all Christian afflicted consciences to reade. Translated out of Latine into English by HENRY BVI, L. London....1577. Quarto, Black Letter. Preface by John Fox, the Martyrologist. Another edition, 1615. Also 8vo., Lewes: 1823; and London: 1819.]
THE ASCENTS OF THE SOUL: OR, DAVID'S Mount Towards GOD'S House. Being Paraphrases on the Fifteen Psalms of Degrees. Written in Italian, By the Illustrious GEO. FRANCESCO LOREDANO, a Noble Venetian, 1656. Rendered in English, Anno Domi 1665. By Henry Hare, Lord Coleraine. London...1681. Small folio.
La Scala Santa: or, A Scale of Devotions, Musical and Gradual. Being Descants on the Fifteen Psalms of Degrees, in Metre; with Contemplations and Collects upon them, in Prose, 1670. By Henry Hare, Lord Coleraine. London...1681. Small folio.
The Pilgrim Psalms: an Exposition of the Songs of Degrees. Psalms
120-134. By the Rev. N. M'MICHAEL, D.D., Dunfermline... Edinburgh and London: 1860. Cr. 8vo.
The Songs of the Temple Pilgrims. An Exposition, Devotional and Practical, of the Psalms of Degrees. By ROBERT NISBET, D.D., Edinburgh. London: 1863. 12mo.]
The Gradual Psalms: a Treatise on the Fifteen Songs of Degrees, with Commentary, based on Ancient Hebrew, Chaldee, and Christian Authorities. By Rev. H. T. ARMFIELD, M.A., F.S.A. London; 1874. Cr. 8vo.]
The Pilgrim Psalms. An Exposition of the Songs of Degrees. By the Rev. SAMUEL COX. London: 1874. Cr. 8vo. In "The Golden Diary of Heart Converse with Jesus in the Book of Psalms"...By ALFRED EDERCHEIM, D.D., Ph.D., London, 1877, there are Expositions of Psalms 121, 124, 127, and 133.
The Caravan and the Temple, and Songs of the Pilgrims. Psalms
120-134. By EDWARD JEWITT ROBINSON. London... 1878.
Suddenly we have left the continent of the vast Hundred and Nineteenth Psalm for the islands and islets of the Songs of Degrees. It may be well to engage in protracted devotion upon a special occasion, but this must cast no slur upon the sacred brevities which sanctify the godly life day by day. He who inspired the longest psalm was equally the author of the short compositions which follow it.
A SONG OF DEGREES. We have already devoted a sufficient space to the consideration of this title in its application to this psalm and the fourteen compositions which succeed it. These appear to us to be Pilgrim Psalms, but we are not sure that they were always sung in company; for many of them are in the first person singular. No doubt there were solitary pilgrims as well as troops who went to the house of God in company, and for these lonely ones hymns were prepared.
A certain author supposes that this hymn was sung by an Israelite upon leaving his house to go up to Jerusalem. He thinks that the good man had suffered from the slander of his neighbours, and was glad to get away from their gossip, and spend his time in the happier engagements of the holy feasts. It may be so, but we hope that pious people were not so foolish as to sing about their bad neighbours when they were leaving them, for a few days. If they wished to leave their houses in safety, and to come home to kind surroundings, it would have been the height of folly to provoke those whom they were leaving behind by singing aloud a psalm of complaint against them. We do not know why this ode is placed first among the Psalms of Degrees, and we had rather hazard no conjecture of our own. We prefer the old summary of the translators"David prayeth against Doeg" to any far fetched supposition: and if this be the scope of the psalm, we see at once why it suggested itself to David at the station where the ark abode, and from which he had come to remove it. He came to fetch away the ark, and at the place where he found it he thought of Doeg, and poured out his complaint concerning him. The author had been grievously calumniated, and had been tortured into bitterness by the false charges of his persecutors, and here is his appeal to the great Arbiter of right and wrong before whose judgment seal no man shall suffer from slanderous tongues.
Ver. 1. In my distress. Slander occasions distress of the most grievous kind. Those who have felt the edge of a cruel tongue know assuredly that it is sharper than the sword. Calumny rouses our indignation by a sense of injustice, and yet we find ourselves helpless to fight with the evil, or to act in our own defence. We could ward off the strokes of a cutlass, but we have no shield against a liar's tongue. We do not know who was the father of the falsehood, nor where it was born, nor where it has gone, nor how to follow it, nor how to stay its withering influence. We are perplexed, and know not which way to turn. Like the plague of flies in Egypt, it baffles opposition, and few can stand before it. Detraction touches us in the most tender point, cuts to the quick, and leaves a venom behind which it is difficult to extract. In all ways it is a sore distress to come under the power of "slander, the foulest whelp of sin." Even in such distress we need not hesitate to cry unto the Lord. Silence to man and prayer to God are the best cures for the evil of slander.
I cried unto the LORD (or Jehovah). The wisest course that he could follow. It is of little use to appeal to our fellows on the matter of slander, for the more we stir in it the more it spreads; it is of no avail to appeal to the honour of the slanderers, for they have none, and the most piteous demands for justice will only increase their malignity and encourage them to fresh insult. As well plead with panthers and wolves as with black hearted traducers. However, when cries to man would be our weakness, cries to God will be our strength. To whom should children cry but to their father? Does not some good come even out of that vile thing, falsehood, when it drives us to our knees and to our God? "And he heard me". Yes, Jehovah hears. He is the living God, and hence prayer to him is reasonable and profitable. The Psalmist remembered and recorded this instance of prayer hearing, for it had evidently much affected him; and now he rehearses it for the glory of God and the good of his brethren. "The righteous cry and the Lord heareth them". The ear of our God is not deaf, nor even heavy. He listens attentively, he catches the first accent of supplication; he makes each of his children confess, "he heard me". When we are slandered it is a joy that the Lord knows us, and cannot be made to doubt our uprightness: he will not hear the lie against us, but he will hear our prayer against the lie.
If these psalms were sung at the ascent of the ark to Mount Zion, and then afterwards by the pilgrims to Jerusalem at the annual festivals and at the return from Babylon, we shall find in the life of David a reason for this being made the first of them. Did not this servant of God meet with Doeg the Edomite when he enquired of the oracle by Abiathar, and did not that wretched creature believe him and betray him to Saul? This made a very painful and permanent impression upon David's memory, and therefore in commencing the ark journey he poured out his lament before the Lord, concerning the great and monstrous wrong of "that dog of a Doeg", as Trapp wittily calls him. The poet, like the preacher, may find it to his advantage to "begin low, "for then he has the more room to rise: the next Psalm is a full octave above the present mournful hymn. Whenever we are abused it may console us to see that we are not alone in our misery we are traversing a road upon which David left his footprints.
Title. "A Song of Degrees". A most excellent song, Tremellius rendereth it; and so indeed this and the fourteen following are, both for the matter, and for the form or manner of expression, which is wondrous short and sweet, as the very epigrams of the Holy Ghost himself, wherein each verse may well stand for an oracle. And in this sense, "adam hammahalah", or, a man of degrees, is put for an eminent or excellent man: 1Ch 17:17. Others understand it otherwise; wherein they have good leave to abound in their own sense; an error here is not dangerous. John Trapp.
Whole Psalm. In the interpretation of these psalms, which sees in them the "degrees" of Christian virtues, this psalm aptly describes the first of such stepsthe renunciation of the evil and vanity of the world. It thus divides itself into two parts.
1. The Psalmist, in the person of one beginning the grades of virtue, finds many opponents in the shape of slanderers and ill advisers.
2. He laments the admixture of evil"Woe is me". H.T. Armfield.
Whole Psalm. It is a painful but useful lesson which is taught by this first of the Pilgrim Psalms, that all who manifest a resolution to obey the commands and seek the favour of God, may expect to encounter opposition and reproach in such a course... This these worshippers of old found when preparing to seek the Lord in his Temple. They were watched in their preparation by malignant eyes; they were followed to the house of prayer by the contempt and insinuations of bitter tongues. But their refuge is in him they worship; and, firmly convinced that he never can forsake his servants, they look up through the cloud of obloquy to his throne, and implore the succour which they know that his children shall ever find there. "O Lord, in this my trouble deliver my soul". Robert Nisbet.
Whole Psalm. The pilgrims were leaving home; and lying lips commonly attack the absent. They were about to join the pilgrim caravan; and in the excitements of social intercourse their own lips might easily deviate from truth. The psalm, moreover, breathes an intense longing for peace; and in this world of strife and confusion, when is that longing inappropriate? Is it any marvel that a Hebrew, with a deep spiritual longing for peace, should cry as he started for the Temple, "Let me get out of all that, at least for a time. Let me be quit of this fever and strain, free from the vain turbulence and conflicting noises of the world. Let me rest and recreate myself a while in the sacred asylum and sanctuary of the God of peace. God of peace, grant me thy peace as I worship in thy presence; and let me find a bettered world when I come back to it, or at least bring a bettered and more patient heart to its duties and strifes". Samuel Cox.
Ver. 1. In my distress I cried unto the Lord, etc. See the wondrous advantage of trouble, that it makes us call upon God; and again see the wondrous readiness of mercy, that when we call he heareth us! Very blessed are they that mourn while they are travelling the long upward journey from the Galilee of the Gentiles of this lower world to the heavenly Jerusalem, the high and holy city of the saints of God. J.W. Burgon, in "A Plain Commentary".
Ver. 1. In my distress. God's help is seasonable; it comes when we need it. Christ is a seasonable good... For the soul to be dark, and for Christ to enlighten it; for the soul to be dead, and Christ to enliven it; for the soul to be doubting, and for Christ to resolve it; and for the soul to be distressed, and for Christ to relieve it; is not this in season? For a soul to be hard, and for Christ to soften it; for a soul to be haughty, and for Christ to humble it; for a soul to be tempted, and for Christ to succour it; and for a soul to be wounded, and for Christ to heal it? Is not this in season? R. Mayhew, 1679.
Ver. 1. Cried. Heard. The verbs are in the past tense, but do not refer merely to a past occasion. Past experience and present are here combined. From the past he draws encouragement for the present. J.J. Stewart Perowne.
Ver. 1. And he heard me. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much: Jas 5:16; Zec 13:9. He that prayeth ardently, speeds assuredly (Ps 91:15); and the delayed return of prayer should be carefully observed and thankfully improved: Ps 66:20. John Trapp.
Ver. 1. A reminiscence.
1. It is threefold; distress, prayer, deliverance.
2. It has a threefold bearing: it excites my hope, stimulates my petitions, and arouses my gratitude.
Ver. 1.
1. Special trouble: "In my distress."
2. Special prayer: "I cried unto the Lord."
3. Special favour: "He heard me." G.R.
Psalms 120:2*
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6 In my distress I cried unto the Lord, and…
Psa_120:1-7
In my distress I cried unto the Lord, and He heard me.
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The Songs of Degrees
How came this and fourteen following psalms to be put together, and to receive their distinctive title? It has been suggested that they were thus called from peculiarity in rhythm; but perhaps, in this respect, some of them might with as much correctness be described as songs of the goings-down. The opinion is equally doubtful that the heading was given them because, when they were chanted, the volume of voice and music gradually ascended. As much might be safely conjectured of many other psalms. It is not less a flight of fancy to explain the title as meaning Songs of the Steps, attaching the fifteen songs to the flight of fifteen steps in the Temple which led up from the common court to that of the priests; there being no evidence that the Levites were accustomed, in the great festivals, as they mounted from court to court, to halt on every step while singing, with the accompaniment of the flute, that song of the fifteen which corresponded with it in number; or no proof that the stair existed before the time of Herod. Nor can the allusion be to the carrying up of the ark to the tabernacle prepared for it by David; for the authors of half of the Songs of Degrees were not then born. Some conclude that these psalms were composed when the Jews went up from Babylon to their own country (Ezr_7:9). It is not a sufficient objection to this view that they are not called songs of the going-up, but of the goings-up, inasmuch as there were more ascents than one from Babylon to Jerusalem after the seventy years captivity; and there is no need to question that some of them were originated by circumstances of the return. But we take it that what the emancipation and its incidents suggested was, not more the composition of new songs than the adoption or adaptation of well-known hymns that had long been popular, and were suitable to the case of the returning Israelites. Fifteen were chosen; and, we may believe, scribes could not copy faster than the work was in demand. God directed the choice, and has preserved the Songs of Degrees for the use and edification of His Church to the end of time. It is not very difficult to see how appropriate were these select songs for the pilgrimages to Jerusalem. Patriotic, short and pithy, with key-words, and catch-words, they were easy to remember, and pleasant to repeat. Plaintive and low sometimes, blending with the thoughts of the aged and the sighs of the feeble and weary, they were as frequently lively and buoyant, tying the bounding youth to the slow pace of the caravan. Depicting demesne scenes, they brought to mind the dear ones left at home in the fatherly care of Jehovah. They contained sweet allusions to Davids piety, and the immortal harp he had tuned for the tribes on Mount Zion, and to Solomons magnificent and tranquil reign. They told of the beauty of the city, the splendour of the Temple, and the glad solemnities of the festival to which the pilgrims were going, or from which they were returning. Songs of defiance and triumph they were, of faith, hope and charity, of gratitude and joy, declaring the mighty deeds, watchful protection, bountiful providence and redeeming mercy of the Lord. Who, they demanded, could injure the servants of Him who had saved His people from their Egyptian, Arabian, Philistine, Babylonian and Samaritan foes? The songs of the pilgrims encouraged and strengthened them to persevere in the roughest places and against the greatest dangers. Songs of the Ascents these are, as aids in the goings-up of worship. A good hymn is wings to the soul; and the saint is a living psalm-book. The child of God often feels, when singing choice words, that his Fathers hand is helping him higher. Not only on the long journey to the feast and back were the Israelites singing pilgrims: they delighted in their sacred songs along the road and in Jerusalem, because they loved them at home. Hymns are for use in domestic and private devotion, as well as public services. The psalm-book is a looking-glass for you. In its writers, and the saints of whom they write, you may see yourself, and your experience and duty. Behold them at home, in the street, in the temple, in profound distress, in bitter conflict, looking to God, trusting in His mercy, waiting for His interposition, and triumphing in His salvation; and not merely resemble them in situation and want, but, so far as they set you a good example, in disposition, language, meaning and behaviour. Nothing can be fitter than this scroll of songs for the pilgrim to carry in his bosom, as he flies from Destruction, and aims at the Heavenly City. There is no stage in his progress in which it will not supply his heart and lips with appropriate -thought and expression. (E. J. Robinson.)
A good man with bad neighbours
Whoever is the author of the psalm he represents himself as a good man. He had prayed, and his prayer had been answered, and in the last verse he says that whilst his neighbours were for war he was for peace. But his neighbours were distinguished by two great evils--slandering tongues and querulous tempers.
I. Slandering tongues (verse 2). Slander is a common and a very pernicious evil. How frequently, says Sterne, is the honesty and integrity of a man disposed of by a smile or a shrug! How many good and generous actions have been sunk into oblivion by a distrustful look, or stamped with the imputations of proceeding from bad motives, by a mysterious and seasonable whisper.
I. The slanderous tongue was terribly painful to the psalmist. He speaks of it as--
(1) Sharp arrows of the mighty.
(2) Coals of juniper.
2. The slanderer deserves appropriate punishment.
II. Querulous tempers (verses 5, 6). There are in most neighbourhoods those of irascible, choleric, petulant tempers, always ready for angry wrangling and disputation. Like a tinder box they only require a spark to produce an explosion. Shenstone says, I consider you very testy and quarrelsome people in the same light as I do a loaded gun, which may, by accident, go off and kill one. What are you to do with people of this irascible make? Do not contend with them, do not return their spiteful and malignant utterances. As well endeavour to quench the lightning with a spoonful of water. As God made such tempers they have their use. Out of them come the severe critic, the inflexible censor, the savage warrior, the denunciatory preacher. On the contrary, show them kindness. Though much may depend upon their physical organization, the querulous spirit may be exorcized from them, may be utterly overcome. Such reformations have been effected, and Christs Gospel of kindness, mighty for that purpose, will one day turn all such natures into love. (Homilist.)
Uncongenial society
I. Its characteristics (verses 2, 6, 7). This is the very climax of bad society! There is nothing more damaging and dangerous than lying lips; nothing more viperous than a deceitful tongue; nothing more distracting and disagreeable than a spirit of strife and contention, etc.
II. Uncongenial society in its results.
1. Inflicting punishment on itself (verses 3, 4); piercing; scorching and consuming.
2. Inflicting distress on the Christian (verse 1). Causing--
(1) Misery (verse 5)
(2) Self-vindication (verse 7). (J. O. Keen, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v1 Psalms 120
Psalms 120
THE collection of pilgrim songs is appropriately introduced by one expressive of the unrest arising from compulsory association with uncongenial and hostile neighbours. The psalmist laments that his sensitive "soul" has been so long obliged to be a "sojourner" where he has heard nothing but lying and strife. Weary of these, his soul stretches her wings towards a land of rest. His feeling ill at ease amidst present surroundings stings him to take the pilgrims staff. "In" this singers "heart are the ways."
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The simplicity of this little song scarcely admits of separation into parts; but one may note that an introductory verse is followed by two groups of three verses each, -the former of which is prayer for deliverance from the "deceitful tongue," and prediction that retribution will fall on it (Psa_120:2-4); while the latter bemoans the psalmists uncongenial abode among enemies (Psa_120:5-7).
The verbs in Psa_120:1 are most naturally referred to former experiences of the power of prayer, which encourage renewed petition. Devout hearts argue that what Jehovah has done once He will do again. Since His mercy endureth forever, He will not weary of bestowing, nor will former gifts exhaust His stores. Men say, "I have given so often that I can give no more"; God says, "I have given, therefore I will give." The psalmist was not in need of defence against armed foes, but against false tongues. But it is not plain whether these were slanderous, flattering, or untrustworthy in their promises of friendship. The allusions are too general to admit of certainty. At all events, he was surrounded by a choking atmosphere of falsehood, from which he longed to escape into purer air. Some commentators would refer the allusions to the circumstances of the exiles in Babylon; others to the slanders of the Samaritans and others who tried to hinder the rebuilding of the Temple; others think that his own hostile fellow countrymen are the psalmists foes. May we not rather hear in his plaint the voice of the devout heart, which ever painfully feels the dissonance between its deep yearnings and the Babel of vain words which fills every place with jangling and deceit? To one who holds converse with God, there is nothing more appalling or more abhorrent than the flood of empty talk which drowns the world. If there was any specific foe in the psalmists mind, he has not described him so as to enable us to identify him. Psa_120:3 may be taken in several ways, according as "deceitful tongue" is taken as a vocative or as the nominative of the verb "give," and as that verb is taken in a good or a bad sense, and as "thee" is taken to refer to the tongue or to some unnamed person. It is unnecessary to enter here on a discussion of the widely divergent explanations given. They fall principally into two classes. One takes the words "deceitful tongue" as vocative, and regards the question as meaning, "What retribution shall God give to thee, O deceitful tongue?" while the other takes it as asking what the tongue shall give unto an unnamed person designated by "thee." That person is by some considered to be the owner of the tongue, who is asked what profit his falsehood will be to him; while others suppose the "thee" to mean Jehovah, and the question to be like that of Job. {Job_10:3} Baethgen takes this view, and paraphrases, "What increase of Thy riches canst Thou expect therefrom, that Thou dost permit the godless to oppress the righteous?" Grammatically either class of explanation is warranted; and the readers feeling of which is most appropriate must decide. The present writer inclines to the common interpretation, which takes Psa_120:3 as addressed to the deceitful tongue, in the sense, "What punishment shall God inflict upon thee?" Psa_120:4 is the answer, describing the penal consequences of falsehood, as resembling the crimes which they avenge. Such a tongue is likened to sharp arrows and swords in Psa_57:4; Psa_64:3, etc. The punishment shall be like the crime. For the sentiment compare Psa_140:9-10. It is not necessary to suppose that the "Mighty" is God, though such a reference gives force to the words. "The tongue which shot piercing arrows is pierced by the sharpened arrows of an irresistibly strong One; it, which set its neighbour in a fever of anguish, must endure a lasting heat of broom coals, which consumes it surely" (Delitzsch).
In the group of Psa_120:5-7, the psalmist bemoans his compulsory association with hostile companions, and longs to "flee away and be at rest." Meshech was the name of barbarous tribes who, in the times of Sargon and Sennacherib inhabited the highlands to the east of Cilicia, and in later days retreated northwards to the neighbourhood of the Black Sea (Sayce, "Higher Criticism and Monuments," p. 130). Kedar was one of the Bedawin tribes of the Arabian desert. The long distance between the localities occupied by these two tribes requires an allegorical explanation of their names. They stand as types of barbarous and truculent foes-as we might say, Samoyeds and Patagonians. The psalmists plaint struck on Cromwells heart, and is echoed, with another explanation of its meaning which he had, no doubt, learned from some Puritan minister: "I live, you know where, in Meshech, which they say signifies prolonging; in Kedar, which signifies blackness; yet the Lord forsaketh me not" (Carlyle, "Letters and Speeches," 1:127: London, 1846). The peace-loving psalmist describes himself as stunned by the noise and quarrelsomeness of those around him. "I am peace". {compare Psa_109:4} But his gentlest word is like a spark on tinder. If he but speaks, they fly to their weapons, and are ready without provocation to answer with blows.
So the psalm ends as with a long-drawn sigh. It inverts the usual order of similar psalms, in which the description of need is wont to precede the prayer for deliverance. It thus sets forth most pathetically the sense of discordance between a man and his environment, which urges the soul that feels it to seek a better home. So this is a true pilgrim psalm.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 Psalms 120-134
THE SONGS OF DEGREES
Psalms 120-134
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GENERAL INTRODUCTION
The principal hypotheses on which to account for the “Songs of Degrees,” “Songs of Ascents,” “Pilgrim Psalms,” and to each of which great names are attached, and each of which has something to say for itself, are as follows:—
1. The songs of the pilgrims returning from exile (Syr. Chrysostom, Theodoret).
2. The songs chanted by the Temple worshippers on each of the fifteen steps of the Temple (The Rabbins, Gospel of Mary, Vulg.—Luther, Grotius).
3. Denoting some peculiar structure, a gradation of thought approaching a climax (Gesenius, Delitzsch).
4. A musical term denoting some peculiarity of rhythm or music (Michaelis, &c.).
5. And most supported songs for pilgrims making their periodical journeys to Jerusalem (Ewald, Perowne, Hengstenberg). The true interpretation probably is yet to be given, none of the above hypotheses completely answering the requirements of the case. Characteristics—“Sweetness and tenderness; a sad pathetic tone; an absence generally of the ordinary parallelism; and something of a quick trochaic rhythm.”—Speaker’s Com.
INTRODUCTION
This Psalm carries on its face the notion of individual and hardly bearable trial, more than that of national distress (opposition of foreigners to the rebuilding of the Temple, &c.). The trial is like that of David (1Sa_21:7; 1Sa_22:9, &c., mentioned in the contents of A. v.), and is inflicted by a slanderous tongue. It is soothed by the recollection that God hears the cry of the suppliant, and answers it always. A difference of opinion exists respecting almost every word and verse.—Speaker’s Com.
THE GODLY UNDER MISREPRESENTATION
(Psa_120:1-2)
I. That the godly are not exempt from misrepresentation. Rather are they most subject to it. They of all men have characters to lose, and from their guilelessness and sincerity are most open to attack. A greater than the Psalmist said, “In the world ye shall have tribulation,” and one of the keenest forms of tribulation comes from “lying lips and the deceitful tongue” (Mat_10:24-28). The motives of the godly are misrepresented, their words, their actions. Misrepresentation exists in many forms, direct lying, suppression, innuendo, &c. No man can expect to be entirely free from it. The thing itself might be endured but for the senseless minds who take it in, and the bad hearts who rejoice to believe it. Misrepresentation in its worst form is that which is covered by professions of friendship to the person misrepresented.
II. That the godly are distressed by misrepresentation, and, humanly speaking, they may well be. No circumspection can guard against it. No force can destroy it. Its origin cannot always be traced. Some will even believe it to be true. It reaches those who can never be reached by its refutation. Always leaves its object open to suspicion.
“Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue [breath
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie
All corners of the world: kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons; nay, the secrets of the grave,
This viperous slander enters.”—Shakespeare.
III. That the godly should cry to God in misrepresentation.
1. Because God knows all the facts of the case, and therefore judges righteously. Slander should not affect a man whose conscience is clear in the sight of God. He is the Master to whom man stands or falls. Let men, therefore, commit their case to Him (1Pe_2:24).
2. Because the slandered and suspected soul naturally yearns to unbosom itself. This it often dares not do to its dearest friend. Vehement vindication sometimes only gives rise to suspicions that there must have been something in it after all. The soul can tell its troubles to God without fear of this.
IV. That God clears the godly from misrepresentation.
1. God enables His people to live slander down. This is the only effectual refutation. Men who refuse to listen to the clearest vindication are compelled to recognise the manifestation of the truth, and the commendation of ourselves to every man’s conscience (2Co_4:2; 2Co_1:12).
2. God will vindicate them before the assembled universe, when all shall be made manifest; and throughout eternity.
THE SELF-RETRIBUTIVE CHARACTER OF SLANDER
(Psa_120:3-4)
“ ‘What punishment shall be assigned thee, or what shall be done or added to thee, in recompense for misery caused?’ or, ‘What shall (God) give unto thee, and what shall (He) add unto thee?’ Answer—‘Sharp arrows (Psa_45:5) wielded by a mighty one (Psa_127:4; Jer_50:9), and burning coals of juniper’ (Psa_140:10; Pro_25:22). Thus the punishment of the slanderous tongue is appropriate; for itself is a sharp sword (Psa_57:4), a pointed arrow (Jer_9:8), and it burns like hell fire (Jas_3:6). The root of the retem or broom is used for fire in the desert, and retains its heat for a year.”—Speaker’s Com.
I. The work of slander. Like that which shall destroy it.
1. To sting. It is always hurtful, harassing, and annoying. It will always more or less damage the reputation, and inflict a wound on the mind or temper which will take some time to heal. Its sting often remains.
2. To burn. It sometimes blasts and utterly destroys. It has frequently undermined a man’s character beyond recovery, and brought him down with grief, affliction, and poverty to an untimely grave.
II. The retribution of slander. The law of requital holds terribly good here.
1. It is stung in return. God’s arrows fly thick and sharp upon the slanderous soul. He is ever in fear lest the lie should be traced back to its source, lest it should be proved to be a lie, and lest his calumny should miss its mark. He bears about him, too, the sharpest javelin in God’s armoury—CONSCIENCE!
2. It is consumed. Society consumes the evil speaker and his speech. It sternly condemns him whether his mischievous tales are true or not, and avoids his company and leaves him in contempt to perish. His accumulated fears consume him; and he that maketh a lie inherits the hottest fire of God’s wrath.
THE TRIALS OF THE GODLY
(Psa_120:5-7)
I. Uncongenial neighbours. The Psalmist’s residence in Mesech and Kedar is probably not to be understood literally, as Mesech (Gen_10:1) inhabited the mountain ranges south of and adjoining Caucasus, and the south-coast borders of the Black Sea, and Kedar was probably an Arabian tribe. They evidently stand for Barbarians. A man can hardly be subjected to a greater trial than to be compelled to mix in society with which he has no sympathy and which has no sympathy with him,—e.g., a scholar with those who despise learning, an artist with those that have no taste, the pure with the impure, the sober with the profligate, and vice versa. So the Psalmist felt himself unhappy amongst men with whom he had no spiritual affinity. This is the case with the godly through all time. They dwell in a world that does not acknowledge their God, and with men who cannot appreciate their worth. Heaven is the place where all is harmony, and whose pursuits, &c., are congenial to all. Hell is the opposite.
II. Unrighteous contradictions. “They will listen to nothing. They are for discord, variance, strife. All my efforts to live in peace are vain. They are determined to quarrel, and I cannot prevent it. (a) A man should separate himself in such a case as the only way of peace. (b) If this cannot be done, then he should do nothing to irritate and keep up the strife. (c) If all his efforts for peace are vain, and he cannot separate, then he should bear it patiently as divine discipline. There are few situations where piety will shine more beautifully. (d) He should look with the more earnestness for the world of peace; and the peace of heaven will be all the more grateful after such a scene of conflict and war.”—Barnes.
THE NATURE AND DOOM OF CALUMNY
(Psa_120:1-4)
The Israelites had returned from Babylon, and were engaged in rebuilding the demolished Temple at Jerusalem. The Samaritans—heathens by extraction, and still continuing heathens at heart—wished to join in the work. The devout Jews, thinking it out of place for any who did not fully acknowledge Jehovah to take part in so sacred an enterprise, quietly but firmly declined their overtures. Exasperated with the repulse, the Samaritans employed every means to annoy the workers, and to hinder the work. They concocted the vilest slanders, and sought to prejudice the mind of the Persian king, by whose permission the liberated Jews were allowed to rebuild the Temple. The Church of God is still assailed by the malice of the wicked. What they cannot accomplish by open violence, they seek to effect by the subtlety of the tongue.
Observe:—
I. That calumny is a terrible instrument of mischief.
1. It is subtle in its insinuations. “A deceitful tongue.” It affects a reluctance to tell all it knows. It implies more than it openly states. It deals in half truths, or in a small modicum of truth, which it makes the pivot on which a whirlwind of the most pernicious slander revolves. It is eloquent in facial expression. A wink, a shrug of the shoulder, a little hieroglyphic finger-writing on the viewless air, a whispered innuendo, will insinuate more evil into the midst of a community than the most outspoken declamation. Calumny is cheating with the tongue.
2. It is false in its representations. “Lying lips.” A liar does his mischief openly for the most part. Stung by a well-deserved rebuff, or prompted by a feeling of spontaneous hatred, he circulates the most flagrant falsehoods. The more barefaced the falsehood the less harm it does among the thoughtful. The consummate liar rings his own alarm bell, and the unprejudiced are sufficiently warned. But there is always a large class of people who will believe the most abominable lies: the more confidently and unblushingly they are uttered, the more firmly are they credited. The splenetic detractor is never at a loss for defamatory material. A word is falsely reported, an act misconstrued, a motive misread, and the whole plan of life misconceived. When all else is exhausted, the vile calumniator falls back upon the endless fabrications of a corrupt imagination.
3. It is dangerous in its use. It pollutes and debases those who traffic in it.
“Let falsehood be a stranger to thy lips;
Shame on the policy that first began
To tamper with the heart to hide its thoughts!
And doubly shame on that unrighteous tongue
That sold its honesty and told a lie!”
—Havard.
It is pernicious in its effects on individuals, societies, and commonwealths. “A lie,” says Carlyle, “should be trampled on and extinguished wherever found. I am for fumigating the atmosphere when I suspect that falsehood, like pestilence, breathes around me.” The march of calumny is invisible as the wind, and often more terribly destructive.
II. That calumny is productive of acute suffering.
1. It fills the soul with anguish. “In my distress.” It wounds the soul as with the barb of an envenomed arrow, and inflicts incredible pain. The distress is aggravated when we discover that the javelin is thrown by the hand of a professed friend. The discovery of treachery in human nature is a painful shock to the confiding. Calumny is not easily traced to its source, and is often difficult to refute.
2. It mars the happiness of a life. “Deliver my soul”—my life. The Psalmist felt that his whole life was endangered. Calumny has ruined the fairest reputation, embittered many a life, blasted its prospects, diverted its influence, and injuriously affected its destiny.
III. That calumny drives the soul to seek redress in prayer.
1. The refuge of the calumniated is in God. “In my distress I cried unto the Lord. Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips.” No man is safe from the shafts of falsehood. He cannot always refute it. He cannot prevent its effects on his reputation. Slanders may penetrate into regions where its refutation never comes. The sufferer can do nothing but commit his case to God, and trust to his own conscious integrity, the lapse of time, and the operations of Divine providence to clear his character.
2. The cry of the calumniated is not in vain. “He heard me.” Prayer is the surest method of relief. The soul is comforted. Grace is given to act circumspectly, and to live down the false imputations. When Plato was told how his enemies slandered him, he quietly replied, “I fear them not. I will so live that no one shall believe them.” In His own way, and at His own time, Jehovah vindicates His suffering people.
IV. That calumny involves its perpetrators in severest vengeance.
“What shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue? Sharp arrows of the mighty, with coals of juniper.” The juniper sparkles, burns, and crackles more vehemently than any other wood, and is of such a nature that, if covered with ashes, it will continue alive the whole year. Fiery arrows, or arrows wrapped round with inflammable material, were formerly used in sieges to set the place on fire. The Chaldee has it:—“The strong sharp arrows are like lightning from above, with coals of juniper kindled in hell beneath.” The tongue of the calumniator was often like a sharp, fiery arrow shot by a strong hand, causing intense and prolonged pain; but now the fierce, burning arrow of vengeance, shot by the Mighty One, has pierced the soul, and will rankle there in ever-increasing torture. The future retributive sufferings of the wicked will infinitely exceed anything they ever inflicted on their most helpless victims. Beware of indulging revenge. We may safely leave our oppressors to their merited punishment. “Speak not of vengeance; ’tis the right of God.”
LESSONS:—
1. Calumny is the source of many evils.
2. The best of characters are liable to its most distressing assaults.
3. God will defend, sustain, and vindicate His people, and signally punish their calumniators.
THE FEROCITY OF THE WICKED A SOURCE OF DISTRESS TO THE GOOD
(Psa_120:5-7)
Mesech refers to a barbarous race inhabiting the Moschian regions between Iberia, Armenia, and Colchis. From this people the Muscovites descended. Kedar describes the wild, restless, nomadic offspring of Ishmael, who occupied the territory of Arabia Petræa. The Psalmist did not personally reside in either Mesech or Kedar. The sixth verse gives the key to the sense in which the words are to be understood. He dwelt in the midst of a people as rudely barbarous, and as fiercely contentious, as those in Mesech and Kedar. The Church of God is now situated in the midst of a mass of gross wickedness that surrounds and assails it like an angry sea.
I. That the Good are brought into Unavoidable Contact with the Wicked.
There is no spot under heaven into which evil cannot penetrate. Go where we will it presses in upon us from every quarter. The exigencies of life will sometimes lead the godly into the company of the wicked. But for this, not only would commercial extension be impossible, but the humanising influence of social intercourse be lost to the world. The Providence of God may conduct His people into the midst of the wicked—to testify against their pernicious practices, to moderate their violence, to present a holy and beneficent example, to attract to a better life. The residence of the good among the habitations of the wicked is sometimes compulsory. Without any fault of their own they are banished from home and temple, and compelled to mingle with people whose principles they disapprove, and whose practices they detest. It is possible to be encompassed with evil, and yet not participate in it. As the fire-fly will pass through the flame without being singed, as fresh water currents circulate in the sea without partaking of its saline property, as the pearl is unimpaired by the unsightly shell in which it is clasped, so the good may move about in the midst of abounding wickedness without contamination.
II. That the attitude of the wicked is one of fierce antagonism to the good.
They hate peace—they are for war. The presence of the good is a perpetual rebuke to the wicked. Their simple transparency of character makes them conscious of the duplicity and blackness of their own; their pacific temper, instead of soothing, is made an occasion of ungovernable irritability.
1. The antagonism of the wicked is prompted by a spirit of intense hatred. “My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace.” Hatred is the great mischief-maker. It sets man against himself; against society; against God; against the universe. “A man,” says Plato, “should not allow himself to hate even his enemies; because if you indulge this passion, on some occasion it will rise of itself on others; if you hate your enemies, you will contract such a vicious habit of mind, as by degrees will break out upon those who are your friends, or those who are indifferent to you.” Hatred in the heart of the wicked is a fiend let loose.
2. The antagonism of the wicked is unreasonable. “I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war.” There are some restless, quarrelsome spirits, whom nothing will propitiate or pacify. If no provocation is given, they will invent one. Whatever efforts are made to promote peace, they construe into causes for new hostilities. They are like the Macedonians, of whom it was said, in the time of Philip, “To them peace was war, and war was peace.” Such conduct is senseless and unreasonable.
III. That the ferocity of the wicked is a source of distress to the good. “Woe is me.”
There is no greater pain to a tender, sensitive spirit, than to be brought in contact with prevalent wickedness. The most pathetic lamentations of Jeremiah were uttered when he beheld the moral degeneracy and violent discord of his countrymen. Evil is abhorrent in any aspect; but when it assumes the fierceness of a reckless, impetuous, and fiendish aggression, it is intolerable. To be compelled to dwell in the midst of the quarrelsome is a miniature pandemonium. Such an experience is often the means of discipline to the good. It teaches forbearance, patience, and self-control. It calls for the exercise of a spirit of god-like forgiveness and charity. It reveals the diabolic character of sin, and its inevitable tendency to transform men into demons.
Learn—
1. The universality of sin.
2. The greatest troubles of life are the result of sin.
3. A time is coming when the good will be for ever delivered from the assaults of sin.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain On v1 A song of the ascents.
Solitary!
A song of the ascents.
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{Verse 3: Or, "will he give," "will he add . . . O deceitful tongue?"}
No mere historical view of the origin of these psalms can unite them together in an intelligible manner. Nothing will do it except the realization that they give us various lines of connection between the history of Israel in their distress as nationally away from God, and that prophetic future which we find so clearly announced for them in the pages of the Old Testament. The partial return from Babylon cannot fill out the picture here, -can give nothing but a faint and transient anticipation of it. Here is where commentators go astray so largely as to the Psalms; trying to satisfy themselves with theories of their origin in the past, with which Scripture itself, it is plain; so little concerns itself, and which are mere, if not wild, conjectures; while, as given by men led of the Holy Ghost, their meaning is to be sought in connection with those counsels of God as to Israel and the world, with regard to which all their voices come into harmony, and adjust and explain each other. In these "songs of the ascents" especially, the history is so generalized that it would be difficult, indeed, to fix its connections. Who can tell us about the "sojourning in Meshech," or the "dwelling in the tents of Kedar"? Accordingly Delitzsch, with many others, decides that "both these names of peoples are to be understood emblematically." And elsewhere we have really nothing to furnish a clue at all. Yet, read in connection; there is no real difficulty as to the purport of these psalms. Had not the often unanswerable "how?" come so largely to displace the all-important "why?" in the minds of the professed interpreters of Scripture, they would not have been in the confusion that they are today. The "how" may be largely human: the "why" is divine. And where God is, we shall find Him more accessible than man is, as He is how much more worthy of being sought to, and the knowledge thus obtained infinitely more gainful.
The 120th psalm is almost all distress. The main point of cheer in it is what comes first of all, that "in my strait to Jehovah I call, and He answereth me." This the psalmist realizes, although the great deliverance that he seeks for has not come. God does not always cash His notes at sight; but if not, He pays large interest on them. "The lying lip" and the "deceitful tongue" are the subject of his first complaint, whether this be some special deceiver, or more general. The third verse may be understood in two very different ways; and most would read it with the common version; as an address to the "tongue," -the deceiver. In this case the question will be as to the judgment of God, and the fourth verse will announce the judgment. The numerical structure seems to decide for another interpretation; in which the question "what does this deceitful tongue give to thee?" is answered by experience. In this case, the transition is better seen also, to the war spirit of the close of the psalm: "Sharp arrows of the mighty" remind us of the similar "sharp razor" of the "mighty one" in the fifty-second psalm, who is addressed also as a "deceitful tongue." And "coals of broom" do not seem so suitable an image for divine judgment as for human fury breaking out. This naturally leads on to the psalmist’s lament over his sojourn in Meshech and in the tents of Kedar, nomads, very likely to suggest the "sharp arrows" he has spoken of; and whose trade as Ishmaelites was depredation and war.
The names are, as already said, "emblematic": "My soul has long dwelt with him that hateth peace"; that is the moral of it. "I am peace," -a man characterized by that; but to speak it only rouses the opposition: "when I speak, they are for war." This is what the world is: and this is what it showed itself to be when the Prince of peace came into it. Thus it was that He, over whom; as born into it, the angels proclaimed peace, in His own clear knowledge of the immediate result, proclaimed "not peace, but a sword." He could indeed say "I am peace," -the very incarnation of it. What did His humanity mean but "peace: good pleasure in man"? Yet His rejection was written upon the cross in every typical human language.
Israel were not then, and have not since been; the "sons of peace," such as the Lord sent His disciples out to seek. And we must look on to the latter days to find them as depicted here. The remnant,then,will indeed be "like sheep in the midst of wolves"; the essential opposition between Christ’s people and the world will have sharpened into its acutest form; and it is simple enough that this first psalm here should give it expression.
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 These Pss. are similar in thought, style, and language.…
These Pss. are similar in thought, style, and language. Each bears the heading A Song of degrees, RV 'A Song of Ascents.' Scholars now agree for the most part in interpreting this title 'A Song of Pilgrimages' (lit. 'goings up'), as indicating the use of these Pss. for pilgrims on their annual journeys to keep the various feasts at Jerusalem. Others explain the 'Ascent' as referring to the return of the exiles from Babylon. This section had doubtless been a separate Psalter with this title, 'Songs of Pilgrimages,' affixed. When these Pss. became a part of the greater collection 90-150, the title was affixed to each Ps. separately. There is also an indication in these titles that the Pss. are specially intended for vocal music. Exquisitely beautiful they are, well fitted for pilgrim songs, either for the Jew to Jerusalem, or for the Christian to that heavenly Zion whose builder and maker is God: see Intro.
A cry for help to Jehovah in the midst of sore distress, evidently by an exile under foreign oppression.
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4. 'Sharp arrows of a mighty man, with glowing coals of broom,' i.e. burning charcoal made of broom. Both expressions are figures for divine judgments: cp. Psa_140:10.
5. Mesech] i.e. the Moschi, a tribe dwelling near the Euxine Sea: cp. Gen_10:2, also Herodotus 3.94. Kedar] tribes of N. Arabia famous for their black tents: cp. Son_1:5. Here the two names are probably taken as typical examples of the wild and inhospitable peoples among whom many of the Jews were exiled.
6. Long] the emphatic word 'all too long.' Turbulent tribes fond of war surround the writer.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v1 A Song of degrees
A Song of degrees
Literally, "of ascents." Perhaps chanted by the people as they went up to Jerusalem to the feasts. See, e.g. Psa 112:1; Psa 112:2.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 Psalm 120-134
Psalm 120-134
The Psalms of Degrees
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Fifteen brief Psalms follow, called songs of degrees, or, ascents. They were in all probability used by Israel going up to Jerusalem three times a year to celebrate the feasts of the Lord--”Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD, a testimony for Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the LORD.” They are indeed Psalms of “the goings-up” for we rise higher and higher as we read through them. Prophetically they give us again the steps from trial and suffering to the glorious consummation.
As they are so simple in language and construction no lengthy annotations are needed. Psa 120:1-7 begins with distress, picturing again the suffering of the righteous godly remnant. In Psa 121:1-8 the Keeper of Israel, the Covenant Keeping God, is revealed, who has made heaven and earth and neither sleeps nor slumbers. He has kept Israel in all their troubles and saved them. Psa 122:1-9 brings us to Jerusalem and the house of the Lord. The redeemed ones go up to worship there. Thrones are there also for judgment, the thrones of which our Lord speaks in Mat 19:28. Peace and prosperity have come.
In Psa 123:1-4 there is another cry to Jehovah to be gracious and the next one, Psa 124:1-8 celebrates the deliverance of Israel. “Blessed be the LORD.” Men arose against them, but the Lord delivered His people. Mount Zion comes in view in Psa 125:1-5. It cannot be moved, it abideth forever. Then when the word and the law go forth from Zion and Jerusalem there will be peace upon Israel. Psa 126:1-6 celebrates the returning of the captives and this is the song they sing: “The LORD has done great things for us, whereof we are glad.” Psa 127:1-5 acknowledges the Lord as the One from whom all blessing and help must come. Psa 128:1-6, which follows, shows the blessing which will be enjoyed when the Lord reigneth and blesseth His people out of Zion. Then we have a description of Israel’s affliction in the past and how the hand of the Lord delivered them out of all their afflictions--Psa 129:1-8. And in Psa 130:1-8 we have a Psalm calling for forgiveness and waiting for the plenteous mercy and redemption which is promised to His people. Psa 131:1-3 shows Israel prostrate, hoping in the Lord. Then follows the beautiful One hundred thirty-second Psalm in which Zion and its King is prophetically unfolded. It begins with the promise made by David to build a house, but the Lord made a covenant instead with him. “The LORD hath sworn in truth unto David; He will not turn from it; of the fruit of thy body will I set upon Thy throne” (Act 2:30). And that is Christ, as the Son of David. He will choose Zion; it is His resting-place. He is enthroned in Zion and what is connected with it is found in verses 13-18.
The One hundred thirty-third Psalm gives a blessed picture, not of the church, as it is so often taught, but of the great brotherhood of Israel, when once more they are a nation before the Lord. Then the Spirit will flow upon them and through them. In the last songs of the ascents, Psa 134:1-3, we behold them in the house of the Lord, in the temple, lifting up their hands in worship in the sanctuary, praising the Lord and calling for blessing out of Zion.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 Prayer for Deliverance from Slander and Deceit.
Prayer for Deliverance from Slander and Deceit.
A song of degrees, literally, "of ascents," the first of fifteen psalms designated by that name, the reference being either to the fact that these hymns were used by the pilgrims on their three annual journeys to Jerusalem, or to the peculiar structure of these psalms, since every new verse or strophe builds up on the preceding in form and thought. The writer here, while acknowledging the mercy of God, prays for relief from a slanderous foe.
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v. 1. In my distress, when he was in tribulation at some former time, I cried unto the Lord, turning to Him alone for deliverance, and He heard me, graciously affording help, for it pleases Him to have His children cry to Him.
v. 2. Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips and from a deceitful tongue, literally, "from a lip of lying, from a tongue of malice," the contention of the psalmist being implied that he is innocent of the charges falsely brought against him. He now turns directly to the base slanderer.
v. 3. What shall be given unto thee, by way of righteous punishment, or what shall be done unto thee, being added to the measure of the first punishment, thou false tongue? He himself gives the answer,
v. 4. Sharp arrows of the mighty, inflictions of a most destructive kind, with coals of juniper, the charcoal made of the wood of the broom-tree retaining its heat longest; a picture, therefore, of long-continued heat of affliction.
v. 5. Woe is me that I sojourn in Mesech, a region between the Black and the Caspian Sea, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar, of barbarous Arabia! The point of comparison in both cases is the wild and rude character of the people of these regions; such was also the nature of the slanderers of the psalmist, which made it appear to him that he had been inadvertently set down in the midst of barbarians.
v. 6. My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace, people who were maliciously hostile and took every occasion to do him harm.
v. 7. I am for peace, his entire attitude showed his love of peace, his willingness to maintain peace, his desire for peace; but when I speak, protesting this readiness to live at peace with all men, if possible, they are for war, they deliberately choose to regard his attitude as hostile and act accordingly. Thus the unbelievers everywhere pounce upon the slightest excuse for acts of hostility against the faithful, often even inventing an excuse for the occasion.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 5 General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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A song of ascents
Possible meanings are 1) "A song people sang while going up to Jerusalem for a celebration" or 2) "A song people sang while going up the steps into the temple" or 3) "A song whose words are like steps."
In my distress
"In my trouble" or "When I was in trouble"
Rescue my life
Here the word "life" represents the person. AT: "Rescue me" (See: Metonymy)
those who lie with their lips and deceive with their tongues
Here the phrases "their lips" and "their tongues" represent the people who speak lies and deceit. AT: "those who lie to me and try to deceive me" (See: Synecdoche)
translationWords
call
Yahweh
deceive
tongue
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 5, 6 Pss 120–134 These short, appealing songs were sung during…
Pss 120–134 These short, appealing songs were sung during pilgrims’ journeys to Jerusalem for the national festivals three times per year (Deut 16:16). The title of these psalms includes the Hebrew word for stairs, which some take to mean “ascending to Jerusalem.” These psalms (sometimes called the Songs of Ascents) take the reader on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to praise God for his goodness to Israel throughout history.
Ps 120 This short, individual lament expresses the psalmist’s trust that the Lord will deal with deceptive evildoers. It also laments living as a stranger among hateful liars. The psalmist’s picture of his life in a foreign land might have been a reality as he set out for Jerusalem, or it might depict his feelings and concerns as he begins his pilgrimage. Overwhelmed with injustice, he trusts God and looks forward to arriving in the Lord’s presence.
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120:1-2 The psalmist is surrounded by liars, so he makes his lament to the Lord, the only one who can help him.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.