Many times they have afflicted me from my youth up. Let Israel now say,
many times they have afflicted me from my youth up, yet they have not prevailed against me.
The plowers plowed on my back. They made their furrows long.
Parallel Translations
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Many times they have afflicted me from my youth up. Let Israel now say,
many times they have afflicted me from my youth up, yet they have not prevailed against me.
The plowers plowed on my back. They made their furrows long.
-
Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say:
Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth: yet they have not prevailed against me.
The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows.
Show all 3 translations
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A Song of Ascents. 'Much have they afflicted me from my youth up', let Israel now say;
'Much have they afflicted me from my youth up; but they have not prevailed against me.
The plowers plowed upon my back; they made long their furrows.
Cross-references (37)
- Psalms 124:1 (v1) If it had not been Yahweh who was on our side, let Israel now say,
- Psalms 34:19 (v2) Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but Yahweh delivers him out of them all.
- Isaiah 51:23 (v3) I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you, who have said to your soul, ‘Bow down, that we may walk over you;’ and you have laid…
- Matthew 16:18 (v2) I also tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my assembly, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.
- 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 (v2) We are pressed on every side, yet not crushed; perplexed, yet not to despair; pursued, yet not forsaken; struck down, yet not destroyed;
Show all 36 cross-references
- Revelation 12:8-9 (v2) They didn’t prevail. No place was found for them any more in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down, the old serpent, he who is called…
- Psalms 125:1 (vv1–2) Those who trust in Yahweh are as Mount Zion, which can’t be moved, but remains forever.
- Psalms 42:1 (v2) As the deer pants for the water brooks, so my soul pants after you, God.
- Psalms 118:13 (v2) You pushed me back hard, to make me fall, but Yahweh helped me.
- Jeremiah 2:2 (v1) “Go and proclaim in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Yahweh says, “I remember for you the kindness of your youth, the love of your weddings;…
- Hosea 11:1 (v1) “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.
- John 16:33 (v2) I have told you these things, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have trouble; but cheer up! I have overcome the world.”
- Exodus 1:12-14 (v1) But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and the more they spread out. They started to dread the children of Israel. The…
- Job 5:19 (v2) He will deliver you in six troubles; yes, in seven no evil will touch you.
- Psalms 120:1 (v1) In my distress, I cried to Yahweh. He answered me.
- Psalms 122:1 (v1) I was glad when they said to me, “Let’s go to Yahweh’s house!”
- Psalms 126:1 (v1) When Yahweh brought back those who returned to Zion, we were like those who dream.
- 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.
- Romans 8:35-39 (v2) Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Could oppression, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?…
- Judges 10:8-12 (v1) They troubled and oppressed the children of Israel that year. For eighteen years they oppressed all the children of Israel that were beyond…
- Isaiah 47:12 (v1) “Stand now with your enchantments and with the multitude of your sorceries, in which you have labored from your youth, as if you might…
- Exodus 1:22 (v1) Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying, “You shall cast every son who is born into the river, and every daughter you shall save alive.”
- Exodus 5:7-19 (v1) “You shall no longer give the people straw to make brick, as before. Let them go and gather straw for themselves. You shall require from…
- Judges 2:15 (v1) Wherever they went out, Yahweh’s hand was against them for evil, as Yahweh had spoken, and as Yahweh had sworn to them; and they were very…
- Psalms 141:7 (v3) “As when one plows and breaks up the earth, our bones are scattered at the mouth of Sheol.”
- Judges 3:8 (v1) Therefore Yahweh’s anger burned against Israel, and he sold them into the hand of Cushan Rishathaim king of Mesopotamia; and the children…
- Psalms 88:15 (v1) I am afflicted and ready to die from my youth up. While I suffer your terrors, I am distracted.
- Psalms 121:1 (v1) I will lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from?
- Psalms 123:1 (v1) I lift up my eyes to you, you who sit in the heavens.
- Jeremiah 22:21 (v1) I spoke to you in your prosperity; but you said, ‘I will not listen.’ This has been your way from your youth, that you didn’t obey my voice.
- Lamentations 1:3 (v1) Judah has gone into captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude. She dwells among the nations. She finds no rest. All…
- Ezekiel 23:3 (v1) They played the prostitute in Egypt. They played the prostitute in their youth. Their breasts were fondled there, and their youthful…
- 1 Samuel 13:19 (v1) Now there was no blacksmith found throughout all the land of Israel; for the Philistines said, “Lest the Hebrews make themselves swords or…
- Hosea 2:15 (v1) I will give her vineyards from there, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she will respond there, as in the days of her youth,…
- Ezra 4:1-23 (v1) Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity were building a temple to Yahweh, the God of…
- Psalms 128:1 (v1) Blessed is everyone who fears Yahweh, who walks in his ways.
36 distinct cross-references across this passage (37 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (25 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1, 3 1. They have often afflicted me from my youth.…
1. They have often afflicted me from my youth. This Psalm was probably composed at a time when the Church of God, reduced to a state of extreme distress, or dismayed by some great danger, or oppressed with tyranny, was on the verge of total destruction. This conjecture, I conceive, is supported by the adverb of time, now, which appears to me to be emphatic. It is as if the Prophet; had said, When God’s faithful ones are with difficulty drawing their breath under the burden of temptations, it is a seasonable time for them to reflect on the manner in which he has exercised his people from the beginning, and from age to age. As soon as God has given loose reins to our enemies to do as they please we are distressed with sorrow, and our thoughts are wholly engrossed with the evils which presently harass us. Hence proceeds despair; for we do not remember that the patience of the fathers was subjected to the like trial, and that nothing happens to us which they did not experience. It is then an exercise eminently fitted to comfort true believers to look back to the conflicts of the Church in the days of old, in order thereby to know that she has always labored under the cross, and has been severely afflicted by the unrighteous violence of her enemies. The most probable conjecture which occurs to me at present is, that this Psalm was written after the Jews had returned from the Babylonish captivity, and when, having suffered many grievous and cruel injuries at the hands of their neighbors, they hadn’t length almost fainted under the tyranny of Antiochus Epiphanes. In this dark and troublous state of matters, the Prophet encourages the faithful to fortitude, nor does he address himself to a few of them only, but to the whole body without exception; and in order to their sustaining such fierce assaults, he would have them to oppose to them a hope inspired by the encouraging consideration, that the Church, by patient endurance, has uniformly proved victorious. Almost every word is emphatic. Let Israel now say, that is, let him consider the trials of the Church in ancient times, from which it may be gathered, that the people of God have never been exempted from bearing the cross, and yet that the various afflictions by which they have been tried have always had a happy issue. In speaking of the enemies of Israel simply by the pronoun they, without being more specific, the Psalmist aggravates the greatness of the evil more than if he had expressly named the Assyrians or the Egyptians. By not specifying any particular class of foes, he tacitly intimates that the world is fraught with innumerable bands of enemies, whom Satan easily arms for the destruction of good men, his object being that new wars may arise continually on every side. History certainly bears ample testimony that the people of God had not to deal with a few enemies, but that they were assaulted by almost the whole world; and farther, that they were molested not only by external foes, but also by those of an internal kind, by such as professed to belong to the Church.
The term youth here denotes their first beginnings, Hence it is said in Hosea 11:1 —
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“When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.”
Youth is in like manner ascribed to a people, in Isaiah 47:12, 15; Jeremiah 48:11; and Ezekiel 16:43.
When the Prophet says twice, they have afflicted me, they have afflicted me, the repetition is not superfluous, it being intended to teach us that the people of God had not merely once or twice to enter the conflict, but that their patience had been tried by continual exercises. He had said that they had commenced this conflict from their youth, intimating that they had been inured to it from their first origin, in order to their being accustomed to bear the cross. He now adds, that their being subjected to this rigorous training was not without good reason, inasmuch as God had not ceased, by a continued course, to make use of these calamities for subduing them to himself. If the exercises of the Church, during her state of childhood, were so severe, our effeminacy will be very shameful indeed, if in the present day, when the Church, by the coming of Christ, has reached the age of manhood, we are found wanting in firmness for enduring trials. Matter of consolation is laid down in the last clause, which informs us that the enemies of Israel, after having tried all methods, never succeeded in realizing their wishes, God having always disappointed their hopes, and baffled their attempts.
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 v1 The Church now afflicted ought to remember how her…
The Church now afflicted ought to remember how her condition hath ever been such from the beginning to be molested most grievously by the wicked: yet in time it hath ever been delivered.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Psa 129:1 « A Song of degrees. » Many…
Psa 129:1 « A Song of degrees. » Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say:
Ver. 1. Many a time] Or, much, and long.
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Have they] i.e. The persecutors that deserve not a name. The rich man is not named (as Lazarus is), because not worthy, Luk 16:19. They shall be written in the earth, Jer 17:13.
Afflictcted me] i.e. The whole community of saints; spoken of here in the singular, for their, 1. unity; 2. paucity.
From my youth] The first that ever died, died for religion; so early came martyrdom into the world.
May Israel now say] Who yet are promised peace, Psa 128:6; but so was Josiah, and yet he died in battle, 2Ch 34:28. But the very God of peace had sanctifed him throughout, and so altered the property of his affliction, that it was subservient to his salvation.
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 vv1, 3 They; mine enemies or oppressors; which is easily understood,…
They; mine enemies or oppressors; which is easily understood, both from the nature of the thing, and from Psa 129:3, where they are expressed under the name of ploughers.
From my youth; from the time that I was a people, when I was in Egypt and came out of it, which is called the time of Israel’s youth, Jer 2:2; Eze 23:3.
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 v1 The church of God, in its several ages, is…
The church of God, in its several ages, is here spoken of, or, rather, here speaks, as one single person, now old and gray-headed, but calling to remembrance the former days, and reflecting upon the times of old. And, upon the review, it is found, 1. That the church has been often greatly distressed by its enemies on earth: Israel may now say, "I am the people that has been oppressed more than any people, that has been as a speckled bird, pecked at by all the birds round about," Jer 12:9. It is true, they brought their troubles upon themselves by their sins; it was for them that God punished them; but it was for the peculiarity of their covenant, and the singularities of their religion, that their neighbours hated and persecuted them. "For these many a time have they afflicted me from my youth." Note, God's people have always had many enemies, and the state of the church, from its infancy, has frequently been an afflicted state. Israel's youth was in Egypt, or in the times of the Judges; then they were afflicted, and thenceforward more or less. The gospel-church, ever since it had a being, has been at times afflicted; and it bore this yoke most of all in its youth, witness the ten persecutions which the primitive church groaned under. The ploughers ploughed upon my back, Psa 129:3. We read (Psa 125:3) of the rod of the wicked upon the lot of the righteous, where we rather expected the plough, to mark it out for themselves; here we read of the plough of the wicked upon the back of the righteous, where we rather expected to find the rod. But the metaphors in these places may be said to be crossed; the sense however of both is the same, and is too plain, that the enemies of God's people have all along used them very barbarously. They tore them, as the husbandman tears the ground with his plough-share, to pull them to pieces and get all they could out of them, and so to wear out the saints of the Most High, as the ground is worn out that has been long tilled, tilled (as we say) quite out of heart. When God permitted them to plough thus he intended it for his people's good, that, their fallow ground being thus broken up, he might sow the seeds of his grace upon them, and reap a harvest of good fruit from them: howbeit, the enemies meant not so, neither did their hearts think so (Isa 10:7); they made long their furrows, never knew when to have done, aiming at nothing less than the destruction of the church. Many by the furrows they made on the backs of God's people understand the stripes they gave them. The cutters cut upon my back, so they read it. The saints have often had trials of cruel scourgings (probably the captives had) and cruel mockings (for we read of the scourge or lash of the tongue, Heb 11:36), and so it was fulfilled in Christ, who gave his back to the smiters, Isa 50:6. Or it may refer to the desolations they made of the cities of Israel. Zion shall, for your sake, be ploughed as a field, Mic 3:12. 2. That the church has been always graciously delivered by her friend in heaven. (1.) The enemies' projects have been defeated. They have afflicted the church, in hopes to ruin it, but they have not gained their point. Many a storm it has weathered; many a shock, and many a brunt, it has borne; and yet it is in being: They have not prevailed against me. One would wonder how this ship has lived at sea, when it has been tossed with tempests, and all the waves and billows have gone over it. Christ has built his church upon a rock, and the gates of hell have not prevailed against it, nor ever shall. (2.) The enemies' power has been broken: God has cut asunder the cords of the wicked, has cut their gears, their traces, and so spoiled their ploughing, has cut their scourges, and so spoiled their lashing, has cut the bands of union by which they were combined together, has cut the bands of captivity in which they held God's people. God has many ways of disabling wicked men to do the mischief they design against his church and shaming their counsels. These words, The Lord is righteous, may refer either to the distresses or to the deliverances of the church. [1.] The Lord is righteous in suffering Israel to be afflicted. This the people of God were always ready to own, that, how unjust soever their enemies were, God was just in all that was brought upon them, Neh 9:33. [2.] The Lord is righteous in not suffering Israel to be ruined; for he has promised to preserve it a people to himself, and he will be as good as his word. He is righteous in reckoning with their persecutors, and rendering to them a recompence, Th2 1:6.
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 vv1–3 Many a time have they afflicted me from my…
Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth,.... That is, the enemies of Israel, afterwards called "ploughers". This may be understood of literal Israel, the posterity of Jacob; whose youth was the beginning of their constitution as a nation and church, or the first times of it; when they were greatly distressed by their enemies, and from thenceforward; as in Egypt, where, and in places near it, they were afflicted four hundred years, according to a prophecy given to Abraham their ancestor, and where their lives were made bitter with hard bondage; and in the times of the Judges, by several neighbouring nations, which was the time of their youth, or their settlement in Canaan; and afterwards in the times of their kings, particularly in the times of Ahaz king of Judah, by the Edomites and Philistines, and by Tiglathpileser, king of Assyria; and in the times of Hoshea, king of Israel, by Salmaneser, who carried away captive, ten tribes; and in the times of Jeconiah and Zedekiah, kings of Judah, by Nebuchadnezzar, who carried captive to Babylon the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. And the psalmist, by a spirit of prophecy, might have a further respect to the distresses of Israel in the times of Antiochus and the Maccabees, when the temple was profaned, the altar demolished, and the daily sacrifice made to cease, and many good men lost their lives; to which times the apostle may be thought to have regard, Heb 11:35; and also to their last affliction by the Romans, the greatest of all; and their present captivity, and deliverance from it;
may Israel now say; this now refers to the time of redemption, as Arama observes, whether at their return from Babylon, or at their future conversion; then reviewing their former troubles ever since they were a people, may say as before. This may be applied to mystical Israel, or to the church of God in Gospel times, which, in its infancy, and from its youth upwards, has been afflicted, many a time, and by many enemies; first, by the unbelieving Jews, who killed the Lord Jesus, and persecuted his apostles and members; then by Rome Pagan, under the ten persecutions of so many emperors; and afterwards by Rome Papal, the whore of Babylon, who many a time been drunk with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus. Yea, this may be applied to the Messiah, one of whose names is Israel, Isa 49:3; who was a man of sorrows, and acquainted with griefs all his days, even from his youth, Isa 53:3; he was the "Aijeleth Shahar", the hind of the morning, Psa 22:1, title; hunted by Herod in his infancy, Mat 2:13; and obliged to be carried into Egypt for safety when a child, from whence he was called, Hos 11:1; and ever after was more or less afflicted by his enemies, men or devils, in mind or body; and at last endured great sufferings, and death itself. It may moreover be applied to every Israelite indeed, to every true believer and member of Christ; conversion is their time of youth; they are first newborn babes, and then young men; as soon as regenerated, they are afflicted with the temptations of Satan, the reproaches and persecutions of men; which are many, though no more than necessary, and it is the will of God should be, and all for their good.
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 v1 The people of God commemorate their deliverance out of…
The people of God commemorate their deliverance out of sore afflictions, ver. 1-4. The destruction of their enemies, ver. 5- 8. A song of degrees.
From my youth - From the time that I was a people.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1–3 The Jews give an account of the afflictions which…
PSALM CXXIX
The Jews give an account of the afflictions which they have
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passed through, 1-3.
And thank God for their deliverance, 4.
The judgments that shall fall on the workers of iniquity, 5-8.
NOTES ON PSALM CXXIX
This Psalm was written after the captivity; and contains a reference to the many tribulations which the Jews passed through from their youth, i.e., the earliest part of their history, their bondage in Egypt. It has no title in any of the Versions, nor in the Hebrew text, except the general one of A Psalm of Degrees. The author is uncertain.
Verse 1. Many a time have they afflicted me] The Israelites had been generally in affliction or captivity from the earliest part of their history, here called their youth. So Ho 2:15: "She shall sing as in the days of her youth, when she came up out of the land of Egypt." See Jer 2:2, and Eze 16:4, &c.
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 vv1, 3 Psa 129:1. Many a time have they — Namely,…
Psa 129:1. Many a time have they — Namely, my enemies or oppressors; afflicted me from my youth — From the time that I was a people; when I was in Egypt, and after I came out of it, which is called the time of Israel’s youth, Jer 2:2; Eze 23:3. I am the people that has been oppressed more than any people, that has been as a speckled bird, pecked at by all the birds round about; attacked by all the beasts of the field assembled to devour, Jer 12:9. It is true they brought their troubles upon themselves by their sins, for which it was that God punished them; but it was for the peculiarity of their covenant, and the singularities of their religion, that their neighbours hated and persecuted them. God’s real people have always had many enemies, and the state of the church, from its infancy, has frequently been an afflicted state.
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 vv1–3 Many a time - Margin, as in Hebrew, “much.”…
Many a time - Margin, as in Hebrew, “much.” Probably, however, the idea is, as expressed in our translation, “many a time;” “often.” So it is in the Latin Vulgate and the Septuagint; and this accords better with the connection.
Have they afflicted me from my youth - Have I been afflicted; have others dealt unjustly by me. The youth here is the beginning. of the history of that people: since we began to be a people; since the nation was founded.
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May Israel now say - May the nation now say. It is clear from this that the psalm was not written at an early period of their history.
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 129
Psalms 129
A Song of degrees
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Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth,
May Israel now say:
2 Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth;
Yet they have not prevailed against me.
3 The ploughers ploughed upon my back:
They made long their furrows.
4 The Lord is righteous:
He hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked.
5 Let them all be confounded and turned back
That hate Zion.
6 Let them be as the grass upon the house-tops,
Which withereth afore it groweth up:
7 Wherewith the mower filleth not his hand:
Nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom.
8 Neither do they which go by say,
The blessing of the Lord be upon you:
We bless you in the name of the Lord.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Composition.—The Psalmist recalls (Psa_129:1-4) the severe oppression which Israel, the servant of the Lord, had repeatedly suffered from his youth, and which is described by the image of physical ill-treatment, as in Isa_49:1 f.; Psa_50:4 f., from which, however, the righteous God granted deliverance. From this he educes a wish (Psa_129:5-8) that all the enemies of Zion may be consigned to utter ruin.
There is a very close resemblance to Psalms 124—Israel’s youth is the sojourn in Egypt (Hos_2:17; Hos_11:1; Jer_2:2; Eze_23:3). Since that time a long period had passed, full of national troubles and divine deliverances. Just at this time Israel begins to breathe freely after such a visitation, but knows that Zion’s enemies have not disappeared wholly and forever. Hence arises the expression used towards them at the close, with reference to the greeting which in former times used to be given by passers by even to heathen mowers (comp. Rth_2:4). The period shortly after the return from exile may be regarded as a suitable occasion for the composition.
[Psa_129:1. The Hebrew word rendered: many a time in E. V., means literally: greatly. It sometimes refers to time, but has no special reference to it. The opinion that most interpreters render it in that sense (Alexander) is incorrect. Gesenius, Ewald, Hupfeld, Delitzsch, Moll, Perowne and many others, give it the more general reference.—J. F. M.]
Psa_129:2. Yet.גַם is employed here, as in Exo_16:28; Ecc_6:7, in the sense of; although or nevertheless (Ewald, § 484 a.). [Hupfeld denies that this sense ever exists, and asserts that it has here as always the sense of: also. He compares Gen_30:8. He also discusses the question in his Quæstiones in Jobeidos locos vexatos on Gen_2:19. The meaning of the verse is unaffected by either view.—J. F. M.].
Psa_129:3. As in Isa_51:23; Isa_66:12, Israel is compared to a street, and men are represented as walking and riding over his back, so here they are compared to a strip of land, which the ploughman goes over in such a way, that every time he reaches either end he turns his team for the purpose of making a new furrow (Wetzstein in his excursus in Delitzsch, p. 795). Relentless and regardless treatment is better exhibited by this than by the usual explanation by which long furrows are understood to be meant.
Psa_129:6 ff. The grass upon the roofs which are flat and covered with loose stones or earth (Jahn Bibl. Arch I. 1. 200 f.), Isa_37:27 grows up rapidly but soon withers. It is doubtful whether שׁלף means: to draw out, pluck up (most). [Here impersonally: one plucks it up, instead of the passive—J. F. M.], or: to sprout forth in blossom (Aquila, Chald., Calvin, Ewald, Delitzsch.) [In connection with the passage cited in the introduction with regard to the greeting, Psa_129:8. Delitzsch remarks: “It is the passers-by here who salute the harvesters thus: the blessing of Jehovah be upon you, and (since the following in the mouths of the same persons would be a purposeless excess of courtesy) receive the greeting in return: we bless you, etc. The contrast to this is, that the righteous, joyfully exchanging greetings, will be able to bring in all the harvest they have sown.”—J. F. M.].
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
As compared with the world the pious are righteous, and may expect, from the righteous Rewarder, deliverance from the power of the enemy.—The ungodly have only the appearance of power and prosperity: after their brief season of bloom comes swift, certain, and awful destruction by God’s judgments.—The Church of God has upon earth to suffer much and severely. But God is and remains her Deliverer from each and every distress.
Starke: As the Church has never been without tribulation, so she has never failed of strength and victory.—The names of the persecutors of God’s people are not written in heaven, but their wickedness and enmity are remembered to their shame.—The Church is and remains a rose among thorns, until the thorny ground of this world is destroyed by fire, and its thistles are cast into hell.—The longer the furrows are drawn, and the deeper the plowshares of suffering sink, the more abundant and precious fruits grow therefrom.—It is the part of faith to praise God’s righteousness in affliction, and so to overcome the offence of the cross.—What is begun without God, or rather against God, ends in wailing.—The sighs and tears of afflicted Zion have already become to many an enemy of truth and godliness, a flood of waters which sweeps away them and their followers.
Frisch: If Zion is God’s inheritance, whoever harms Zion touches God Himself.—Richter: Let it not be an offence unto thee, that the world is hostile to the Israel of God; but ponder in faith the examples in Hebrews 11 and especially the example of Christ, of whom suffering Israel was a type.—Guenther: The sword with which God shall cut asunder the bands which persecutors have thrown around His people, has been sharpened from eternity.—Diedrich: The despisers of the Word and the true Church have no sure ground of continued existence. They are like the wild grass upon the roof. For all their achievements are nothing in the light of truth; they are found too light in God’s balances.—Taube: For the lovers of Zion the crown is gleaming beyond the cross, and the harvest of joy is waving beyond the tearful sowing.
[Matt. Henry: The enemies of God’s Church wither of themselves, and stay not till they are rooted out by the judgments of God.—Woe to those who have the prayers of the saints against them!—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 vv1–3 1. From my youth—From the days of Israel’s abode…
1. From my youth—From the days of Israel’s abode in Egypt. So Hos_2:15; Hos_11:1; Jer_2:2
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 vv1–3 1. Much have they vexed me from my youth…
1. Much have they vexed me from my youth up, let Israel now say.
The history of Israel is often compared to the life of an individual. Israel’s life began in Egypt Cp. Hos_2:3; Hos_2:15; Hos_11:1; Jer_2:2; &c. From the Egyptian bondage onward it has repeatedly been oppressed by enemies. For let Israel say, i.e. let Israel thankfully recall the lessons of its history, cp. Psa_118:2; Psa_124:1.
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1–4. Throughout its history Israel has been harassed by enemies, but in His faithfulness Jehovah has preserved His people from destruction.
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 vv1, 3 (1) Many a time.—Or more literally, much. (See margin.)
(1) Many a time.—Or more literally, much. (See margin.)
From my youth.—Here, of course, not the youth of a person, but of the nation. The poet glances back even to the Egyptian bondage. (See Hos_2:15, “as in the days of her youth, and as in the days when she came up out of the land of Egypt;” comp. Eze_23:3; Jer_2:2; Jer_22:21, recalling all the long series of oppressions suffered by the race.)
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May Israel now say.—There is in the original no adverb of time: “let Israel say.”
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 vv1–3 THIS psalm consists of a retrospect (vers. 1-4) and…
THIS psalm consists of a retrospect (vers. 1-4) and an anticipation (vers. 5-8). The retrospect shows Israel oppressed by enemies for a long term of years, but finally vindicated and delivered (ver. 4). The anticipation shows her enemies afflicted in their turn, and suffering the just reward for their misdeeds.
Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth. Israel"s recollection is one of frequent, almost constant, "affliction." She has been downtrodden beneath the feet of Egyptians, Moabites, Mesopotamians, Canaanites, Ammonites, Philistines, Syrians. Assyrians, Babylonians. Her sufferings began in her extreme youth, as soon as she was a nation. (Exo_1:11-22) May Israel now say; rather, let Israel now say. The psalmist directs his countrymen to look back upon their past history.
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Vers. 1-8. Sin a failure.
Neither the violence of sin against others nor its effort on its own behalf is successful.
I THE FAILURE OF ITS VIOLENCE. The enemies of Israel are regarded as the enemies of the Lord; their attempts to despoil and destroy Israel were sins against God. They consequently proved to be utter failures. They were mercilessly cruel; they "ploughed upon the back, and made long their furrows;" they strove to enslave with their strong cords (ver. 4), but "they did not prevail" (ver. 2); their cords were cut asunder (ver. 4). Israel survived the hardships of Egypt and the captivity of Babylon. Many nations and communities have passed through similar afflictions and oppressions, but they have borne them bravely; they may even have been the purer, the stronger, the more united, for all they have suffered. Many a man can speak in the same strain; his history has been one of struggle and hardship in youth, of toil in mid-life, of deliverance and gratitude in later years. He has lived to see his oppressors humbled, to find that they who offend God by ill treating his servants come to shame and sorrow. The most striking lesson of the psalm is
II THE DEGENERACY OF SIN. The psalmist prays (or states) that those who "hate Zion" may be like the grass which has no depth of earth, which withers before it attains maturity, which falls short of the blessing which the well-planted corn enjoys (vers. 6-8). Here are two evils which the unholy have to face.
1. Early withering.
(1) Sin often leads down to some form of vice, some evil habit which is at variance with the laws of our nature and the will of God, We know what that means. It means the drying up of the distinctively human resources; it means loss of physical vitality; it means the fading" of mental power, it means the degeneracy of the soul. The end is not far off; before it has fully grown up, before the zenith of life is reached, the constitution is wrecked, the darkness of death has fallen.
(2) Sin is selfishness, very often worldliness and vanity. And either of these ends in a sad spiritual withering. The heart closes up; there is no expansion, no ripening, no fruit-bearing under the gracious influences of Divine love and human pity and holy fellowship. Long before bodily death arrives, spiritual destruction has come.
2. The loss of the higher good. The man who is living under the dominion of sin and selfishness misses all that is worthiest and best. In his life is no such scenery as that so beautifully sketched in the psalm. He has to go without the blessing of God and the benediction of his kind.
HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-8. The Divine life.
This psalm is capable of a threefold application. It tells of the Divine life
I IN ISRAEL.
1. The existence of the chosen people was a lifelong struggle. The sounds of battle and war are never, save but for short intervals, absent from their history. From the oppression they had to endure in Egypt right down to the time when this psalm was composed, they never lacked enemies who "fought against" them, and did them all the harm they could.
2. But their enemies never altogether prevailed. (Ver. 2) Sooner or later deliverance came. Such a deliverance had just now come, and hence this psalm. And the complete deliverance which is still needed for Israel we may well believe, from the records of the past, will, in God"s good time, be forthcoming.
3. The sufferings which they caused them were very great. (Ver. 3) As the ploughshare tears up the soil, so the lacerating scourge tore their flesh. In these psalms we yet hear the wail of their lamentations and their exceeding bitter cry. (see Ps 124 Ps 137, and many more; comp. Isa_1:6 Isa_51:23)
4. The Lord, true to his covenant, put an end to their sufferings. As when the cords, the traces that fasten the oxen to the plough, are cut, the plough comes to a standstill, so the dread plough of suffering, which ploughed such agonizing furrows in their souls, was brought to a standstill; for the Lord cut asunder the cords.
5. But the bitter memory begot bitter prayers. (Vers. 6-8) That those who so dealt with them may be ashamed, defeated, despised as worthless, like the grass that springs up and at once withers, because on the house-top there can be no depth of earth, and hence such grass is of no value at all, (cf. Isa_37:27) and that they may be such as no blessing of the Lord can rest upon (ver. 8). Before we condemn such prayers, we should put ourselves in the place of those who offered them. They may not be Christian any more than war is always Christian, but they are very natural. They are not the utterances of personal revenge, but prayers for the overthrow of those who hated Zion, and who were the enemies of God as well as of Zion. Nevertheless, in spite of all, Israel was preserved of God.
II IN THE CHURCH. Verse by verse the words of the psalm tell of her experience. Cradled in conflict, oppressed with suffering, "fought against" by enemies one after another, varied in kind, but all terrible, yet never really defeated have not prevailed against me;" so may the Church say. And long ago the Lord has cut asunder, for the most part, the cords whereby the cruel ploughshare of persecution was dragged over the bleeding flesh of the people of God. Our freedom should kindle and keep glowing our sympathy with those Christians who, in the dominions of the "unspeakable Turk," are yet subjected to horrible atrocities. Oh that the Lord may soon cut asunder those cords, and set his people free! Nor are the prayers against the perpetrators of such atrocities with which this psalm closes improper for us, and still less for those who endure such wrongs. But God"s Church ever lives.
III IN THE INDIVIDUAL SOUL. Again is this psalm the transcript of the history of the life of God, but now as existing in the soul of the individual Christian. The enemies now are not of flesh and blood, but spiritual, and, therefore, yet more terrible. For they who hurt the body soon have no more that they can do; but these can eternally torment us they can destroy both soul and body in hell. Therefore we may well, as Christ bids us, fear them. Nor are the most terrible of the prayers in these imprecatory psalms out of place when we think of these foes. We are bound to hate them and pray against them, and by God"s help we will. S.C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. Our seven sorrows.
"Many a time have they afflicted me;" so many times that it seemed useless to try and count them up. It is enough to represent them by one number, and that the representative of completeness, seven times. Israel may be said, as a nation, to have had an all-round experience of affliction and discipline. Eliphaz the Temanite speaks rightly to Job for God when he says, "He shall deliver thee in six troubles; yea, in seven there shall be no evil touch thee". (Job_5:19)
I A FACT OF THE NATIONAL HISTORY. So far as the record reveals that history, it appears to be a series of calamities and distresses; some brought about by characteristic national frailties, some by individuals forcing their willfulnesses, some by untoward circumstances, and some by the active schemes of enemies. It would even seem that national sorrows are so well represented in this history that we may speak of its "seven sorrows;" and we may find the mission of all forms of human trial illustrated in the moral influence of these calamities and woes of Israel. But we need not assume that its experiences were unique. Every nation is born of, and molded by, similar troubles. The peculiarity of Israel does not lie in its experiences, but in the reading of its experiences. The Bible reads them in the light of Jehovahs relation to them. This is the only true reading of human history, and all history needs to be read in this light. God is in the sorrows of a nation.
II A FACT OF THE INDIVIDUAL HISTORY. It does not matter where, or under what circumstances, or in what relations, a man"s life is lived. A man is "born to trouble as the sparks fly upward." No man can escape it. It would be his curse if he could. A man can, as a moral being, become righteous; but there is no school in which he can be trained for righteousness save the school of affliction. It is no ground of boasting to any man that his life has been free from trials. If a man may boast at all, he should boast over his "seven sorrows," because he may indulge the hope that God"s grace has been mighty in him, and he has come into much sanctifying discipline. R.T.
HOMILIES BY C. SHORT Vers. 1-8. Suffering and victory.
"Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth," etc. The connection is shown thus
I THE PSALMIST SAW THE REDEMPTIVE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD AS SUPREME. (Ver. 4) God"s strength and justice surely prevail against all the devices of evil men.
II GOOD MEN PREVAIL WHEN THEY USE THEIR SUFFERING AS CORRECTIVE DISCIPLINE. Some of the greatest lessons of life are learned from our severest sufferings. "For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy," etc.; "Our light affliction worketh out... while we look not at the things which are seen," etc.
III THE OPPOSITION OF ENEMIES CALLS FORTH THEIR GREATEST ENERGIES. This a law that operates in the physical, the intellectual, and the moral life. Stem a torrent, and you increase its force. An intellectual difficulty rouses us to the greatest endeavor, and moral obstacles call forth our most triumphant strength.
IV THE UNRIGHTEOUS ARE ULTIMATELY DEFEATED IN THEIR OPPOSITION TO THE GOOD CAUSE. (Vers. 5, 6) They are driven back, and made ashamed of their efforts and designs upon the righteous cause. The psalmist is not doubtful of the final issue of the conflict between good and evil. The evil will wither like grass on the house-tops.
V THE RIGHTEOUS WILL GATHER THE HARVEST OF THEIR LABORS AMID THE BENEDICTIONS OF GOD AND MAN. (Ver. 8) No good seed that has been sown will fail of a harvest more or less abundant. God and man rejoice in all good work done, whatever the extent of its consequences. "Well done, good and faithful servant;" "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the way of the wicked," whose "delight is in the Law of the Lord. S.
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 vv1–3 Title. A Song of Degrees. I fail to see…
Title. A Song of Degrees. I fail to see how this is a step beyond the previous Psalm; and yet it is clearly the song of an older and more tried individual, who looks back upon a life of affliction in which he suffered all along, even from his youth. Inasmuch as patience is a higher, or at least more difficult, grace than domestic love, the ascent or progress may perhaps be seen in that direction. Probably if we knew more of the stations on the road to the Temple we should see a reason for the order of these Psalms; but as that information cannot be obtained, we must take the songs as we find them, and remember that, as we do not now go on pilgrimages to Zion, it is our curiosity and not oar necessity which is a loser by our not knowing the cause of the arrangement of the songs in this Pilgrim Psalter.
AUTHOR, ETC. It does not seem to us at all needful to ascribe this Psalm to a period subsequent to the captivity...indeed, it is more suitable to a time when as yet the enemy bad not so far prevailed as to have carried the people indo a distant land. It is a mingled hymn of sorrow and of strong resolve. Though sorely smitten, the afflicted one is heart whole, and scorns to yield in the least degree to the enemy. The poet sings the trials of Israel, Ps 129:1-3; the interposition of the Lord, Ps 129:4; and the unblessed condition of Israel's foes, Ps 129:5-8. It is a rustic song, full of allusions to husbandry. It reminds us of the books of Ruth and Amos.
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Ver. 1. Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say. In her present hour of trial she may remember her former afflictions and speak of them for her comfort, drawing from them the assurance that he who has been with her for so long will not desert her in the end. The song begins abruptly. The poet has been musing, and the fire burns, therefore speaks he with his tongue; he cannot help it, he feels that he must speak, and therefore "may now say" what he has to say. The trials of the church have been repeated again and again, times beyond all count: the same afflictions are fulfilled in us as in our fathers. Jacob of old found his days full of trouble; each Israelite is often harassed; and Israel as a whole has proceeded from tribulation to tribulation. "Many a time", Israel says, because she could not say how many times. She speaks of her assailants as "they", because it would be impossible to write or even to know all their names. They had straitened, harassed, and fought against her from the earliest days of her history from her youth; and they had continued their assaults right on without ceasing. Persecution is the heirloom of the church, and the ensign of the elect. Israel among the nations was peculiar, and this peculiarity brought against her many restless foes, who could never be easy unless they were warring against the people of God. When in Canaan, at the first, the chosen household was often severely tried; in Egypt it was heavily oppressed; in the wilderness it was fiercely assailed; and in the promised land it was often surrounded by deadly enemies. It was something for the afflicted nation that it survived to say, "Many a time have they afflicted me." The affliction began early"from my youth"; and it continued late. The earliest years of Israel and of the Church of God are spent in trial. Babes in grace are cradled in opposition. No sooner is the man child born than the dragon is after it. "It is", however, "good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth", and he shall see it to be so when in after days he tells the tale.
Whole Psalm. In the "degrees" of Christian virtue the Psalm corresponds to the tenth step, which is patience in adversity. H. T. Armfield.
Whole Psalm. The following incident in connection with the glorious return of the Vaudois under Henri Arnaud is related in Muston's "Israel of the Alps": "After these successes the gallant patriots took an oath of fidelity to each other, and celebrated divine service in one of their own churches, for the first time since their banishment. The enthusiasm of the moment was irrepressible; they chanted the seventy-fourth Psalm to the clash of arms; and Henri Arnaud, mounting the pulpit with a sword in one hand and a Bible in the other, preached from the Hundred and twenty-ninth Psalm, and once more declared, in the face of heaven, that he would never resume his pastoral office in patience and peace, until he should witness the restoration of his brethren to their ancient and rightful settlements."
Ver. 1. Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth. 1. How old these afflictions are: "From my youth." Aye, from my infancy, birth and conception. 2. There is the frequency and iteration of these afflictions. They were oft and many: "many a time." 3. There is the grievousness of these afflictions, expressed by a comparison. "The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows." So these were old afflictionsfrom her youth. They were many a time: more times than can be numbered. And then they were grievous, even like iron ploughs, drawing deep and long furrows on their back. Alexander Henderson.
Ver. 1. Many a time have they afflicted me, etc. God had one Son, and but one Son, without sin; but never any without sorrow. We may be God's children, and yet still under persecution; his Israel, and afflicted from our youth up. We may feel God's hand as a Father upon us when he strikes us as well as when he strokes us. When he strokes us, it is lest we faint under his hand; and when he strikes us, it is that we should know his hand. Abraham Wright (1611-1690), in "A Practical Commentary upon the Psalms."
Ver. 1. They. The persecutors deserve not a name. The rich man is not named (as Lazarus is) because not worthy: Lu 16:1-31 "They shall be written in the earth": Jer 17:13. John Trapp.
Ver. 1. They. In speaking of the enemies of Israel simply by the pronoun "they", without being more specific, the Psalmist aggravates the greatness of the evil more than if he had expressly named the Assyrians or the Egyptians. By not specifying any particular class of foes, he tacitly intimates that the world is filled with innumerable bands of enemies, whom Satan easily arms for the destruction of good men, his object being that new wars may arise continually on every side. History certainly bears ample testimony that the people of God had not to deal with a few enemies, but that they were assaulted by almost the whole world; and further, that they were molested not only by external foes, but also by those of an internal kind, by such as professed to belong to the Church. John Calvin.
Ver. 1. They afflicted me. Why are these afflictions of the righteous? Whence is it that he who has given up his Son to death for them, should deny them earthly blessings? Why is faith a mourner so frequently here below, and with all that heroic firmness in her aspect, and hope of glory in her eye, why needs she to be painted with so deep a sorrow on her countenance, and the trace of continual tears on her check? First, we reply, for her own safety. Place religion out of the reach of sorrow, and soon she would pine and perish. God is said to choose his people in the furnace, because they most often choose him there.
It is ever from the cross that the most earnest "My God" proceeds, and never is the cry heard but he speeds forth at its utterance, who once hung there, to support, to comfort, and to save.
As it is only in affliction God is sought, so by many it is only in affliction God is known. This, one of the kings of these worshippers of the Temple found. "When Manasseh was brought to affliction, then he knew that the Lord he was God": 2Ch 33:12-13.
But, further, it is only by affliction we ourselves are known. What is the source of that profound and obstinate indifference to divine truth which prevails among men of the world, except the proud conviction that they may dispense with it? It is only when they are crushed as the worm they are made to feel that the dust is their source; only when earthly props are withdrawn will they take hold of that arm of omnipotence which Jesus offers, and which he has offered so long in vain.
While men know themselves, they know their sin also in affliction. What is the natural course and experience of the unbelieving of mankind? Transgression, remorse, and then forgetfulness; new transgression, new sorrow, and again forgetfulness. How shall this carelessness be broken? How convince them that they stand in need of a Saviour as the first and deepest want of their being, and that they can only secure deliverance from wrath eternal by a prompt and urgent application to him? By nothing so effectually as by affliction. God's children, who had forgotten him, arise and go to their Father when thus smitten by the scourge of sorrow; and no sooner is the penitent "Father, I have sinned" spoken, than they are clasped in his arms, and safe and happy in his love.
It is, further, by affliction that the world is known to God's children. God's great rival is the world. The lust of the flesh, pleasure; the lust of the eye, desire; the pride of life, the longing to be deemed superior to those about us, comprise everything man naturally covets. Give us ease, honour, distinction, and all life's good will seem obtained. But what wilt thou do, when he shall judge thee? This is a question fitted to alarm the happiest of the children of prosperity.
What so frequently and effectually shows the necessity of piety as the sharp teachings of affliction? They show what moralists and preachers never could, that riches profit not in the day of death, that pleasures most fully enjoyed bring no soothing to the terrors which nearness to eternity presents, and that friends, however affectionate, cannot plead for and save us at the bar of God. "Miserable comforters are they all", and it is for the very purpose of inspiring this conviction, along with a belief that it is Jesus alone who can comfort in the hour of need, that affliction is sent to God's children. Robert Nisbet.
Ver. 1. From my youth. The first that ever died, died for religion; so early came martyrdom into the world. John Trapp.
Ver. 1-2. 1. The visible Church from the beginning of the world is one body, and, as it were, one man, growing up from infancy to riper age; for so speaketh the church here: Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth. 2. The wicked enemies of the church, they also are one body, one adverse army, from the beginning of the world continuing war against the church: "Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth." 3. As the former injuries done to the church are owned by the church, in after ages, as done against the same body, so also the persecution of former enemies is imputed and put upon the score of present persecutors: "Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say." 4. New experience of persecution, when they call to mind the exercise of the church in former ages, serves much for encouragement and consolation in troubles: "Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel mow say." 5. Albeit this hath been the endeavour of the wicked in all ages to destroy the church, yet God hath still preserved her iron age to age: Yet they have not prevailed. David Dickson.
Ver. 1-2. When the prophet says twice, "They have afflicted me", "they have afflicted me", the repetition is not superfluous, it being intended to teach us that the people of God had not merely once or twice to enter the conflict, but that their patience had been tried by continual exercises. John Calvin.
Ver. 1. Affliction as it comes to saints from men of the world.
1. Reason for itenmity of the serpent's seed.
2. Modes of its displaypersecution, ridicule, slander, disdain, etc.
3. Comfort under it. So persecuted they the prophets: so the Master. It is their nature. They cannot kill the soul. It is but for a time, etc.
Ver. 1-2.
1. How far persecution for righteousness' sake may go.
a) It may be great: "afflicted", "afflicted."
b) It may be frequent: "Many a time."
c) It may be early: "From my youth."
2. How far it cannot go.
a) It may seem to prevail.
b) It may prevail in some degree.
c) It cannot ultimately prevail.
d) It shall cause that to which it is opposed increasingly to prevail. G. R.
Ver. 1-4. Israel persecuted but not forsaken. Persecution.
1. Whence it came: "they."
2. How it came: "Many a time", "from my youth", severely: "afflicted", "ploughed."
3. Why it came. Human and Satanic hatred, and Divine permission.
4. What came of it: "not prevailed" to destroy, to drive to despair, to lead to sin. God's righteousness manifested in upholding his people, baffling their foes, etc.
Ver. 1-4. The enemies of God's church.
1. Their violence: "The plowers plowed", etc.
2. Their persistency: "Many a time...from my youth."
3. Their failure: "Yet they have not prevailed."
4. Their great opponent: "The Lord...hath cut asunder."
J. F.
Psalms 129:2*
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 v1 Many a time have they afflicted me from my…
Psa_129:1-8
Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth.
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The persecuted condition of godly men on this earth
I. As suffering under the hand of wicked persecution. The persecution here referred to was--
1. Of early commencement (verse 1). It is ever so; the persecutions of godly men begin in this life in the very youthhood of their religion.
2. Frequent in its occurrence.
3. Violent in its character (verse 3). (Isa_51:23; Mic_3:12.) This language finds its application in--
(1) Christ.
(2) His Church.
II. As engaging the merciful interposition of heaven (verse 4).
1. He is engaged in sustaining them. The bush burned on, but was not consumed. The branches were torn up, but the roots struck deeper. Not all the enemies of Christ prevailed against Him. Heaven always sustains the good.
2. He is engaged in delivering them. The plough is fastened by cords to the yoke of the oxen, and they draw its tearing iron through the ground. If you would stop the plough you must cut the cords. This is the figure, God in righteousness will one day stop the plough of persecution, He will deliver His people out of all their troubles.
III. As rising triumphantly over all their enemies (Psa_129:5-8). Persecutors will be utterly routed, driven back with burning shame, with panic dread. This was the case with Pharaoh, Sennacherib, with Haman, Herod; aye, with persecutors in every age. I will break your church in pieces with a hammer, if you do not obey me, said a French monarch to a Protestant pastor. Calm and dignified was the reply: This anvil has broken many a hammer. (Homilist.)
Persecuted, but not forsaken
The life of the Lord Jesus Christ is the picture of the life of His people. As He was, says Paul, so are we also in this world. This is so remarkably true that, in the Psalms, we sometimes can hardly tell whether the writer is describing himself or the Lord Jesus. Shall the disciple be above his Master,? Shall the servant be above his Lord? If they have persecuted Him, they will also persecute us.
I. First notice, concerning Israels affliction, whence it came: Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth. Who was it that afflicted Israel? The text says, they. And why is the word they used? Because to enter into particulars would rather obscure the sense than impress anything upon the memory. They. I hardly like to think of who they are who, in many cases, have afflicted Gods true servants; but it is still true that a mans foes shall be they of his own household. A woman is just brought to Christ, and her greatest trouble comes from him whom she loves best of all living mortals; her husband becomes her terror. Outside, in the world, the Christian man frequently meets with those who would rejoice to see him halt, who try to make faults where there are none, and exaggerate little mistakes into great crimes. He is a pilgrim through the midst of Vanity Fair whom the traders there cannot understand. In his case, that ancient word is again fulfilled (Jer_12:9).
II. How does this persecution come? The psalm says, Many a time; that means very often. So, then, you who are faithful to God must expect that you will frequently be assailed.
III. What is the reason for all this persecution? There are two reasons; and the first is the hatred of the serpent and his seed. There are two things that are inconceivable in length and breadth. The first is the love of God to His people, which is altogether without limit; and the next is, the hatred of the devil, which is and must be finite, for he is only a creature; but, still, it is as great as it possibly can be. Still, there is a higher reason for the persecution of the saints. The second reason is because God permits it. Why does He permit it? Well, very often for your safety. The Church of God has often been preserved by persecution; she was never purer, she was never truer, and she never lived nearer to God and more like her Saviour, than when she was persecuted. Next, it is for our trial and testing, to separate the precious from the vile. Satan, in persecuting the saints, is simply a scullion in Christs kitchen, cleansing His pots and pans; they never are so bright as when he scours them, and it is a scouring with a vengeance. Yet, in that way, ha separates, or God through him separates, between the precious and the vile.
IV. The blessings which come to the tried children of God through their troubles. I do so enjoy the reading of that part of the psalm where it says, But they have not prevailed against me. You see a troop of horsemen riding into the very midst of the battle, and you lose sight of them for a moment amidst the dust and smoke; but out of the middle of that cloud you hear the brave captains cry, They have not prevailed against me. You see that little band advancing into a yet more crowded host, all glaring upon them like wolves. Surely they will be cut to pieces now; but in the very centre of the struggling mass you see the banner still waving, and again comes the cry, They have not prevailed against me. That is, in brief, the story of the Church of Christ, and that shall be the story of every man who puts his trust in God; he shall have to say, at the close of every trouble,--aye, and even in the midst of it,--They have not prevailed against me. What is the reason why the enemy cannot prevail against the saints? The Lord is righteous. He may delay the overthrow of His peoples foes; but He will in the end take their part, and display His almighty power. For the present, He is patient; He bears long with the ungodly; but He will not always do so. The fact that the Lord is righteous is the pledge that the wicked shall not prevail over His saints. Then notice the next sentence: He hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked. Literally, He hath cut the traces of the wicked. They are ploughing, you see; and, in the East, the oxen are fastened to the plough by a long cord. What does God do in the middle of their ploughing? There are the bullocks, and there is the plough; but God has cut the harness; and how wonderfully He has sometimes cut the harness of the persecutors of His people! Look at the way He did this for our poor hunted brethren in Piedmont. They were likely every one of them to be crushed; and, apparently, there was nobody to protect them. The Duke of Savoy, whose subjects they were, had given them up to be destroyed. The next country was France, and the King of France was a Roman Catholic, and as eager for their destruction as was the Duke. But, one day, Oliver Cromwell sent for the French ambassador, and said to him, Tell your master to order the Duke of Savoy to leave off persecuting my brethren in Piedmont, or he shall hear from me about the matter. Sire, said the ambassador, they are not the subjects of the King of France; he has nothing to do with them. The Duke of Savoy is an independent prince; we cannot interfere with him. I do not care for that, replied Cromwell; I will hold your king answerable if he does not stop the Duke of Savoy from persecuting the Piedmontese. And they knew that Old Nell meant what he said; so, somehow, the King of France managed to interfere with that precious independent prince, and told him that he had better cease his persecutions, for, if he did not, Oliver Cromwell would take up the quarrel. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The afflictions and triumphs of the Church of Christ
I. The afflictions and triumphs of the Church of Christ. Scarcely was the Church organized, after our Divine Redeemers ascension into heaven, when she was assailed by three descriptions of enemies, either all at once, or consecutively, viz. the prejudices of authority and human wisdom,--the violence of persecution,--and the errors and heresies of false teachers. In all these respects the Church has been afflicted from her youth, yet her enemies have not prevailed against her.
II. The impressions which the contemplation of the afflictions and triumphs of the Church of God ought to produce upon our minds.
1. In the Church, always afflicted and persecuted, yet still subsisting,--like the bush, burning but unconsumed,--behold a confirmation of our faith, and an evident demonstration that the religion of Jesus Christ is from God.
2. Further, the conformity of our own reformed Church, as well as of all the other orthodox Protestant Churches, with the primitive Christian Church, in her afflictions and triumphs, furnishes us with an irrefragable proof of the truth of the holy religion which they and we profess.
III. What, now, are the practical instructions which we may derive from the important topics which we have been considering?
1. Since God has, in His mercy, called us out of papal darkness into the marvellous light of the Gospel, let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; seeing that it is based, not upon unauthorized human traditions, but upon the foundation of the prophets and apostles, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner-stone;--the great and fundamental object of all the predictions of the prophets, and of the preaching and writings of the holy apostles.
2. Let us devoutly bless the Father of Mercies, who remembered the Church of Christ in her low estate, for His mercy endureth for ever; and through whose propitious aid, and providential interpositions, the Reformation was accomplished, and our civil and religious liberties have been secured and transmitted to us.
3. Let us pity and pray for those nations of the earth who are yet under the yoke of papal dominion and superstition,--would that I could say, are groaning under it.
4. Above all, since the Almighty, when lie bestows extraordinary favours upon man, expects from him a proportionate return of gratitude, let us remember the solemn obligations under which we are individually laid, as Protestant Christians, to exhibit a corresponding excellence of Christian character, as the necessary result of a true and lively faith; since we enjoy advantages and privileges which involve the possessors of them in no ordinary degree of moral responsibility. (T. H. Horne, B. D.)
Affliction may strengthen
Care must be taken not to make too much account of the effect exercised by the great convulsions of nature on the moral condition of a people. The need of this precaution is well shown by the social history of Iceland. This country has for the thousand years of its history been subjected to imminent peril from the instability of the earth as well as from the inhospitable nature of its climate. In almost every century of the worlds history famine caused by the accidents of the earth and air has menaced the life of the population. Many successive volcanic outbreaks, attended by serious earthquakes, have convulsed this island, and yet amid these mishaps the people have maintained the highest measure of social order in any state of which we have a history. The Icelanders have had the moral strength to rise superior to such afflictions. In this state, as in certain individuals, chastise-merit which would have destroyed weaker natures served to affirm the vigour of the strong people. (Shaler: Aspects of the Earth.)
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 129
Psalms 129
THE point of view here is the same as in Psalms 124, with which the present psalm has much similarity both in subject and in expression. It is a retrospect of Israels past, in which the poet sees a uniform exemplification of two standing facts-sore affliction and wonderful deliverance. The bush burned, nec tamen consumebatur. "Cast down but not destroyed," is the summary of the Churchs history. No doubt the recent deliverance from captivity underlies this, as most of the pilgrim psalms. The second part (Psa_129:5-8) blends confidence and wish, founded on the experience recorded in the first part, and prophesies and desires the overthrow of Israels foes. The right use of retrospect is to make it the ground of hope. They who have passed unscathed through such afflictions may well be sure that any tomorrow shall be as the yesterdays were, and that all future assaults will fail as all past ones have failed.
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The words which Israel is called upon to say twice with triumphant remembrance are the motto of the Ecclesia pressa in all ages. Ever there is antagonism; never is there overthrow. Israels "youth" was far back in the days of Egyptian bondage; and many an affliction has he since met, but he lives still, and his existence proves that "they have not prevailed against" him. Therefore the backward look is gladsome, though it sees so many trials. Survived sorrows yield joy and hope, as gashes in trees exude precious gums.
Psa_129:3 expresses Israels oppressions by a strong metaphor, in which two figures are blended-a slave under the lash, and a field furrowed by ploughing. Cruel lords had laid on the whip, till the victims back was scored with long wounds, straight and parallel, like the work of a ploughman. The Divine deliverance follows in Psa_129:4. The first words of the verse do not stand in the usual order, if rendered "Jehovah is righteous," and are probably to be taken as above; "righteous" standing in apposition to "Jehovah," and expressing the Divine characterisitc which guaranteed and in due time accomplished Israels deliverance. God could not but be true to His covenant obligations. Therefore He cut the "cord of the wicked." The figure is here changed to one occasioned by the former. Israel is now the draught ox harnessed to the plough; and thus both sides of his bondage are expressed-cruel treatment by the former, and hard toil by the latter, figure. The same act which, in the parallel 124th Psalm, is described as breaking the fowlers snare, is in view here; and the restoration from Babylon suits the circumstances completely.
The story of past futile attempts against Israel animates the confidence and vindicates the wish breathed in the latter half of the psalm. To hate Zion, which Jehovah so manifestly loves and guards, must be suicidal. It is something far nobler than selfish vengeance which desires and foresees the certain failure of attempts against it. The psalmist is still under the influence of his earlier metaphor of the ploughed field, but now has come to think of the harvest. The graphic image of the grass on flat housetops of clay, which springs quickly because it has no depth of earth, and withers as it springs, vividly describes the short-lived success and rapid extinction of plots against Zion and of the plotters. The word rendered above "shoots forth" is by some translated "is plucked up," and that meaning is defensible, but grass on the housetops would scarcely be worth plucking, and the word is used elsewhere for unsheathing a sword. It may, therefore, be taken here to refer to the shooting out of the spikelets from their covering. The psalmist dilates upon his metaphor in Psa_129:7 which expresses the fruitlessness of assaults on Gods chosen. No harvest is to be reaped from such sowing. The enemies may plot and toil, and before their plans have had time to bud they are smitten into brown dust; and when the contrivers come expecting success, there is nothing to mow or gather. "They look for much, and behold little." So it has been; so it shall be; so it should be; so may it be, wishes the psalmist; and true hearts will say amen to his aspiration.
Such reapers have no joy in harvest, and no man can invoke Jehovahs blessing on their bad work. Psa_129:8 brings up a lovely little picture of a harvest field, where passers-by shout their good wishes to the glad toilers, and are answered by these with like salutations. It is doubtful whether Psa_129:8 c is spoken by the passers-by or is the reapers responsive greeting. The latter explanation gives animation to the scene. But in any case the verse suggests by contrast the gloomy silence of Israels would be destroyers, who find, as all who set themselves against Jehovahs purposes do find, that He blasts their plans with His breath, and makes their "harvest a heap in the day of grief and desperate sorrow."
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 This Psalm was written after the Captivity, and contains…
INTRODUCTION
This Psalm was written after the Captivity, and contains a reference to the many tribulations which the Jews passed through from their youth—i.e., the earliest part of their history,—their bondage in Egypt. The intent of the Psalmist is to comfort the Church in affliction, and to stir her up to glorify God for His providence over her, always for her good, and bringing her enemies to confusion and sudden ruin.—A. Clarke.
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THE AFFLICTIONS OF THE GOOD
(Psa_129:1-4)
I. That the good in all ages have been greatly afflicted.
1. The afflictions of the good are manifold. “Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth” (Psa_129:1). The Jews had been oppressed by Pharaoh in Egypt, by the tribes north of the wilderness, by the Canaanites, Philistines, and Ammonites, by the Assyrians and Babylonians; and now they were harassed by the time-serving Samaritans. So has it been in all ages. The Church has suffered from a variety of enemies—from the reigning powers for the time being, from the envy and hatred of unbelievers, from the falseness and apathy of professed friends.
2. The afflictions of the good are marked by unusual severity. “The plowers plowed upon my back; they made long their furrows” (Psa_129:3). The sufferings of God’s people have been unparalleled. They have been torn as the husbandman tears the ground with his ploughshare. Many martyrs for the truth have been “first lashed with the terrible scorpion and loaded whips; and then, as they hung on the little horse, torn with the hooked rake, which literally dug deep, long furrows in their bleeding and quivering flesh.” But there is One in whom we see all Israel, and in whose sufferings the words of the text received a remarkable fulfilment. The incarnate Son of God gave His back to the smiters (Isa_50:6).
II. That the good have always survived the cruelty of their tormentors. “Yet they have not prevailed against me” (Psa_129:2). The combined powers of evil have not been able to destroy the Church. A Swedish captain has recently invented a fire-proof dress, the wearer of which is enabled to walk up and down in the fiercest furnace without being injured. So the people of God have outlived the fiery assaults of the wicked, because clothed in the unconsumable panoply of the Divine protection. The afflictions of the Church have tended to its purity and strength. When Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch (A.D. 107), was taken to Rome and cast to the lions, he exclaimed, “I am God’s wheat, and must be ground by the teeth of the wild beasts that I may be found His pure bread.” The Church of God is unconquerable. “It is,” says Trapp, “as the palm tree, which spreadeth and springeth up the more it is oppressed: as the bottle or bladder that may be dipped but not drowned: as the oak that sprouts out the thicker from the maims and wounds it receiveth.”
III. That the afflictions of the good are Divinely limited.
1. The character of God is a pledge of timely deliverance. “The Lord is righteous” (Psa_129:4). As His people become worldly and unfaithful, He permits them to be afflicted; but when they cry to Him in penitence and faith, he delivers them out of their distresses. They suffer not a moment longer than may be necessary for their more complete consecration to God and holiness.
2. The power of the wicked to harm is limited. “He hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked” (Psa_129:4). Evil is not omnipotent, and it is restrained and defeated by the strong hand of God. The very instrumentalities by which the wicked sought to destroy the rising Church have been used to frustrate their cruel designs, and to effect their own ruin.
LESSONS:—
1. The holiest are not exempt from suffering.
2. Affliction may prove a blessed moral discipline.
3. The good are Divinely rescued from trial.
THE LAMENTABLE FATE OF THE CHURCH’S ENEMIES
(Psa_129:5-8)
I. They are signally defeated.—“Let them all be;” or, “They shall all be confounded, and turned back that hate Zion” (Psa_129:5). Though advancing in formidable and threatening array, they shall be thrown into confusion and driven into ignominious retreat. They are engaged in an unequal conflict. They are allowed to gain some unimportant conquests, and while full of boastful daring, and reckoning upon certain and final victory, they are “melted like snow in the glance of the Lord” (Job_34:20-21; Psa_70:2).
II. Their wicked life-purpose is abortive. “Let them be as the grass upon the house tops, which withereth,” &c. (Psa_129:6-7). On the flat roofs of Eastern houses it is not uncommon to see grass growing, but for want of proper nourishment and soil, it cannot grow to maturity, and speedily withers away. It is sad to see one’s life-purpose suddenly collapse and hopelessly perish. But so must it be with the designs of the wicked, after a lifetime of plotting and toiling; so must it be with the wicked themselves (Isa_37:27).
III. They remain unblessed. “Neither do they which go by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you: we bless you in the name of the Lord” (Psa_129:8). An emblem of Israel blessed by the Lord is a wide field of thickly growing corn stirred by gentle breezes under a ripening sun. As the labourers, humming or shouting snatches of cheery song, bind the sheaves and carry load after load away, they receive friendly salutations from people passing by (Rth_2:4). The thought is ridiculous of house-top harvesting occasioning such benedictions. Equally out of question is it for the Church’s adversaries to be blessed by God or man. (The Caravan and Temple.) It is impossible for nature to furnish an emblem that can sufficiently express the utter confusion, disaster, and misery that will certainly overtake the enemies of God. It is the highest aggravation of their sufferings that they remain for ever unblest.
LESSONS:—
1. A life of sin is a series of disappointments and defeats.
2. The enemies of God cannot escape His righteous vengeance.
3. The haters of Zion ignore the hope of salvation, which it alone offers.
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 An over-ruling Hand.
An over-ruling Hand.
A song of the ascents.
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The first psalm here carries us behind the outward disorder of things, to show us God accomplishing His will through all. He may be acting with the enemies of His people, but He is not Himself an enemy. Israel may look back through the time of her long afflictions, and see how men have inflicted these on her; yet they have never really prevailed. They have not done what they intended; and they have done what they never intended. They have been as plowers plowing on the back, -painful and humiliating work enough; but it means none the less sowing and harvest; and the plow is set aside even before this. He who uses it for good, sets it aside too, to have the good.
So the psalmist prophesies and prays for the destruction of the wicked at the hands of the righteous God. He sees their cords cut asunder, and prays that they may be turned back in shame who hate Zion; and hate thus the purposes of grace with which it is identified. As grass upon the house-tops, withering be fore men think enough of it to pluck it up; which never has a handful for the mower, nor a bosomful for the binder, -so let them be under the ban of God apart from Jehovah’s blessing. So indeed must the evil, as evil, find its doom from God.
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 A song of deliverance in trouble and the overthrow…
A song of deliverance in trouble and the overthrow of the wicked.
3. Made long their furrows] Descriptive of the persecutions Israel had endured.
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6. Afore it groweth up] better, 'before it is plucked,' or, 'before it is unsheathed,' i.e. before it shoots into blossom.
8. Cp. Rth_2:4.
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
See title note; (See Scofield "Psa 120:1").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 The Victory of the Church over Her Enemies.
The Victory of the Church over Her Enemies.
A song of degrees, describing the deliverances of the people of God in the past and therefore confidently asserting the overthrow of the enemies in the future as well.
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v. 1. Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, with severe oppressions, may Israel now say, the reference being especially to the bondage of Egypt;
v. 2. many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, the thought being repeated for the sake of emphasis, with not only Egypt in mind, but also the Philistines, the Midianites, the Moabites, the Syrians, and the Babylonians; yet they have not prevailed against me, it had not been possible for the enemies to carry out their purpose of subduing Israel and exterminating it as a nation.
v. 3. The plowers plowed upon my back, a figure of scourging expressing the most severe physical punishment; they made long their furrows, with relentless cruelty, for the picture is that of a strip of land which the farmer works with great thoroughness. Such had been the condition of Israel in the past.
v. 4. The Lord is righteous, also in His judgment upon the wicked; He hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked, with which they tried to hold Israel in captivity. From the deliverance thus experienced the psalmist draws a conclusion regarding the future, expressed in the form of a prayer to Jehovah.
v. 5. Let them all be confounded, covered with shame and disgrace, and turned back, hindered from accomplishing their wicked designs, that hate Zion (the members of the spiritual Israel), who attempt to hinder the work of the Church of all times.
v. 6. Let them be as the grass upon the housetops, the grass that sprouts in the thin soil blown or carried on the flat roofs of Oriental houses, which withereth afore it groweth up, since it lacks sufficient nourishment and moisture and therefore cannot endure the heat of the sun for any length of time,
v. 7. wherewith the mower filleth not his hand, since it is not worthwhile to pluck the few stalks, nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom, the amount being too small to carry home and the quality poor.
v. 8. Neither do they which go by say, with the ancient greeting used especially by workers in the harvest, The blessing of the Lord be upon you, whereupon the workers answered, We bless you in the name of the Lord, Rth 2:4. For the wicked, the enemies of the Church, of the believers, there will be no joyful harvest, but they will wither and die. The righteous, however, joyfully exchanging greetings, will be able to bring in all the harvest which they have sown, to be stored in the eternal granaries of heaven.
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 v1 General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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song of ascents
Possible meanings are 1) "song people sang while going up to Jerusalem for a celebration" or 2) "song people sang while going up the steps into the temple" or 3) "song whose words are like steps." See how you translated this in Psalms 120:1
The plowers plowed on my back
The cuts from a whipping are spoken of as the plow of a plowman. A farmer plowed deep lines into a field. AT: "My enemies have cut me deeply on my back" (See: Metaphor)
they made their furrows long
This is a continuation of the plowing metaphor. The "furrow" is the line the farmer plowed. AT: "they made their cuts long" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
Israel
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 Ps 129 The psalmist briefly reviews Israel’s history of…
Ps 129 The psalmist briefly reviews Israel’s history of trouble (129:1-2) and redemption (129:3-4). He concludes with curses against the enemies and blessings on the godly (129:5-6).
129:1-2 Israel’s earliest youth as a nation was during its sojourn in Egypt.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.