My wounds are loathsome and corrupt because of my foolishness.
Parallel Translations
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My wounds are loathsome and corrupt because of my foolishness.
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My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness.
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(38-6) My wounds are noisome, they fester, because of my foolishness.
Cross-references (5)
Passages linked to Psalms 38:5 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Isaiah 1:5-6 Why should you be beaten more, that you revolt more and more? The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even to the head there is no soundness in it: wounds, welts, and open sores. They haven’t been closed, bandaged, or soothed with oil.
- Psalms 69:5 God, you know my foolishness. My sins aren’t hidden from you.
- Jeremiah 8:22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then isn’t the health of the daughter of my people recovered?
- Psalms 32:3 When I kept silence, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.
- Psalms 38:7 For my waist is filled with burning. There is no soundness in my flesh.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (17 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 5 My wounds have become putrid In this verse,…
5 My wounds have become putrid In this verse, he pleads the long continuance of his disease as an argument for obtaining some alleviation. When the Lord declares, concerning his Church,
“that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned, for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins,” (Isaiah 40:2)
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his meaning is, that when he has sufficiently chastised his people, he is quickly pacified towards them; nay, more, that if he continue to manifest his displeasure for too long a time, he becomes through his mercy, as it were, weary of it, so that he hastens to give deliverance, as he says in another place,
“For my name’s sake will I defer mine anger, and for my praise will I refrain for thee, that I cut thee not off. Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction.”— (Isaiah 48:9, 10)
The object, therefore, which David has in view, in complaining of the long continuance of his misery is, that when he had endured the punishment which he had merited, he might at length obtain deliverance. It was certainly no slight trial to this servant of God to be thus kept in continual languishing, and, as it were, to putrify and be dissolved into corruption in his miseries. In this his constancy is the more to be admired, for it neither broke down from the long period of delay, nor failed under the immense load of suffering. By using the term foolishness instead of sin, he does not seek in this way to extenuate his faults, as hypocrites do when they are unable to escape the charge of guilt; for in order to excuse themselves in part, they allege the false pretense of ignorance, pleading, and wishing it to be believed, that they erred through imprudence and inadvertence. But, according to a common mode of expression in the Hebrew language, by the use of the term foolishness, he acknowledges that he had been out of his right mind, when he obeyed the lusts of the flesh in opposition to God. The Spirit, by employing this term in so many places to designate crimes the most atrocious, does not certainly mean to extenuate the criminality of men, as if they were guilty merely of some slight offenses, but rather charges them with maniacal fury, because, blinded by unhallowed desires, they wilfully fly in the face of their Maker. Accordingly, sin is always conjoined with folly or, madness. It is in this sense that David speaks of his own foolishness; as if he had said, that he was void of reason and transported with madness, like the infatuated rage of wild beasts, when he neglected God and followed his own lusts.
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 That rather gave place to mine own lusts, than…
That rather gave place to mine own lusts, than to the will of God.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Psa 38:5 My wounds stink [and] are corrupt because…
Psa 38:5 My wounds stink [and] are corrupt because of my foolishness.
Ver. 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt] What his grief or disease was we read not; some say the leprosy; some take all this allegorically. The word rendered wounds, signifieth stripes, scars, wales, Livores vibices tumices, mattery sores, running ulcers, the effects of the envenomed arrows of the Almighty. Could we but foresee what sin will cost us we durst not but be innocent. That we do not is extreme foolishness, as David here acknowledgeth.
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Because of my foolishness] In not considering beforehand the heinousness of my sin nor the heaviness of the divine displeasure. The word signifieth unadvised rashness, Pro 14:17, and it is probable he meaneth his great sin with Bathsheba, wherein he was miscarried by his lusts to his costs. See Psa 107:17-18. Because of my foolishness, i.e. Quia non praeveni Nathanem confessione, saith R. Obadiah, because I anticipated not Nathan’s coming, by a voluntary confession of my sin unto the Lord.
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 The bruises and sores caused by my disease are…
The bruises and sores caused by my disease are not only painful, but loathsome to myself and to others.
Foolishnss, i.e. sin, which really is, and is commonly called, folly, as Psa 69:5; Pro 13:16; 14:17; 15:2, &c.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain I am troubled,.... Discomposed and perplexed in mind; his…
I am troubled,.... Discomposed and perplexed in mind; his thoughts were disturbed and irregular, and in the utmost confusion and distress: this trouble was not only on account of the affliction that was upon him, but chiefly because of his sin; and which was increased by the view he had of the displeasure of God, concluding he was come forth against him in wrath and fury;
I am bowed down greatly; not in his body, at least not in that only, as if he was bowed together by his disorder, that he could not lift himself up; for he is said to walk in the next clause: or rather he bowed down his head as a bulrush voluntarily, and through sorrow and shame could not lift it up before the Lord; though it may chiefly design the pressure of his mind, that his soul was cast down within him, and with all his spiritual reasonings he could not erect himself; it is the Lord that raiseth up those that are bowed down in this sense; see Psa 42:5;
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I go mourning all the day long; or "I go black", or "in black" (i); meaning either that his skin was black, through the disease upon him, and the trouble that was in him, Job 30:30; or that he was clothed in black garments, as a token of mourning; as white garments were of joy and cheerfulness, Ecc 9:7; and he was blacker still in his own apprehension, by reason of inward corruptions and outward transgressions, which appeared in a very black hue, attended with aggravating circumstances; see Sol 1:5.
(i) "atratus", Montanus, Tigurine version, Vatablus, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius, Gejerus, Michaelis.
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 Foolishness - Sin.
Foolishness - Sin.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt] Taking…
Verse 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt] Taking this in connection with the rest of the Psalm, I do not see that we can understand the word in any figurative or metaphorical way. I believe they refer to some disease with which he was at this time afflicted; but whether the leprosy, the small pox, or some other disorder that had attacked the whole system, and showed its virulence on different parts of the outer surface, cannot be absolutely determined.
Because of my foolishness.] This may either signify sin as the cause of his present affliction, or it may import an affliction which was the consequence of that foolish levity which prefers the momentary gratification of an irregular passion to health of body and peace of mind.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain My wounds stink - The word rendered “wounds” here…
My wounds stink - The word rendered “wounds” here means properly the swelling or wales produced by stripes. See the notes at Isa 1:6; notes at Isa 53:5. The meaning here is, that he was under chastisement for his sin; that the stripes or blows on account of it had not only left a mark and produced a swelling, but that the skin itself had been broken, and that the flesh had become corrupt, and the sore offensive. Many expositors regard this as a mere figurative representation of the sorrow produced by the consciousness of sin; and of the loathsome nature of sin, but it seems to me that the whole connection rather requires us to understand it of bodily suffering, or of disease.
And are corrupt - The word used here - מקק mâqaq - means properly to melt; to pine away; and then, to flow, to run, as sores and ulcers do. The meaning here is, My sores run; to wit, with corrupt matter.
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Because of my foolishness - Because of my sin, regarded as folly. Compare the notes at Psa 14:1. The Scripture idea is that sin is the highest folly. Hence, the psalmist, at the same time that he confesses his sin, acknowledges also its foolishness. The idea of sin and that of folly become so blended together - or they are so entirely synonymous - that the one term may be used for the other.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain The loathsomeness, corruption, and wasting torture of severe physical…
The loathsomeness, corruption, and wasting torture of severe physical disease set forth his mental anguish [Psa 38:6]. It is possible some bodily disease was connected. The
loins are the seat of strength. His exhaustion left him only the power to groan [Psa 38:9].
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 5. Wounds—The description is that of a suppurated running…
5. Wounds—The description is that of a suppurated running sore, of offensive odour, and should here be understood literally.
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 5. My wounds] Or stripes (= bruises, Isa_1:6, A.V.):…
5. My wounds] Or stripes (= bruises, Isa_1:6, A.V.): for he has been as it were scourged by God.
my foolishness] Sin is essentially foolishness. Cp. Psa_107:17. The word occurs only once again in the Psalter (Psa_69:5), and elsewhere only in Proverbs, where it is common (e.g. Pro_5:23; Pro_19:3).
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 (5) Wounds.—Better, stripes, as in LXX.
(5) Wounds.—Better, stripes, as in LXX.
Stink and are corrupt.—Both words denote suppuration; the first in reference to the offensive smell, the second of the discharge of matter; the whole passage recalls Isa_1:6, seq.
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Foolishness.—Men are generally even more loth to confess their folly than their sins.
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 My wounds stink and are corrupt. The writer reverts…
My wounds stink and are corrupt. The writer reverts to his bodily pains. He has "wounds," which "stink" and "are corrupt;" or "fester and become noisome," which may be boils, or bed-sores, and which make him a loathsome object to others. (comp. Job_9:19 Job_30:18) Because of my foolishness. Because I was so foolish as to forsake the way of righteousness, and allow sin to get the dominion over me.
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 Ver. 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt because…
Ver. 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness. Apply this to the body, and it pictures a sad condition of disease; but read it of the soul, and it is to the life. Conscience lays on stripe after stripe till the swelling becomes a wound and suppurates, and the corruption within grows offensive. What a horrible creature man appears to be in his own consciousness when his depravity and vileness are fully opened up by the law of God, applied by the Holy Spirit! It is true there are diseases which are correctly described in this verse, when in the worst stage; but we prefer to receive the expressions as instructively figurative, since the words "because of my foolishness" point rather at a moral than a physical malady. Some of us know what it is to stink in our own nostrils, so as to loathe ourselves. Even the most filthy diseases cannot be so foul as sin. No ulcers, cancers, or putrifying sores, can match the unutterable vileness and pollution of iniquity. Our own perceptions have made us feel this. We write what we do know, and testify what we have seen; and even now we shudder to think that so much of evil should lie festering deep within our nature.
Ver. 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt, etc. These expressions seem to be in a great measure figurative, and significant rather of the diseased state of his mind than of his body. William Walford.
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Ver. 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt. I know, O Lord, I have done most foolishly, to let my sores run so long without seeking for help; for now, My wounds stink and are corrupt, in as ill a case as Lazarus' body was when it had been four days buried; enough to make any man despair that did not know thee as I do. For, do not I know, that nullum tempus occurrit tibi; do not I know thou hast as well wisdom to remedy my foolishness as power to cure my wounds? Could the grave hold Lazarus when thou didst but open thy mouth to call him forth? No more can the corruption of my sores be any hindrance to their healing when thy pleasure is to have them to be cured. Although, therefore, I have done my own discretion wrong to defer my care, yet I will not do thy power wrong to despair of thy cure; for, how should I despair, who know thee to be as powerful as thou art merciful; if I may not rather say, to be as merciful as thou art powerful! Sir Richard Baker.
Ver. 5. My wounds stink and are corrupt. Either they must be understood literally of the sores that were in his body (as the words in the following verse may also seem to import) which he calls wounds, to intimate that he looked upon them as the wheals or swelling tumours (for so the original word may signify) which the rod of God had made in his flesh, or the wounds of those arrows of which he had spoken Ps 38:2, "Thine arrows stick fast in me; "or else figuratively, of any other miseries that God had brought upon him, comparing them to stinking and festering sores; either to imply the long continuance of them, or the sharp pains and sorrows which he felt in himself by reason thereof. Yet some, I know, would have it meant of the shame which his sins had brought upon him. Arthur Jackson.
Ver. 5-6. The spiritual feeling of sin is indispensable to the feeling of salvation. A sense of the malady must ever precede, and prepare the soul for, a believing reception and due apprehension of the remedy. Wherever God intends to reveal his Son with power, wherever he intends to make the gospel to be "a joyful sound, "he makes the conscience feel and groan under the burden of sin. And sure am I that when a man is labouring under the burden of sin, he will be full of complaint. The Bible records hundreds of the complaints of God's people under the burden of sin. My wounds stink and are corrupt, cries one, because of my foolishness. I am troubled; I am bowed down greatly; I go mourning all the day long. "My soul, "cries another, "is full of troubles: and my life draweth nigh until the grave, "Ps 88:3. "He hath led me, "groans out a third, "and brought me into darkness, but not into light." La 3:2. A living man must needs cry under such circumstances. He cannot carry the burden without complaining of its weight. He cannot feel the arrow sticking in his conscience without groaning under the pain. He cannot have the worm gnawing his vitals, without complaining of its venomous tooth. He cannot feel that God is incensed against him without bitterly complaining that the Lord is his enemy. Spiritual complaint then is a mark of spiritual life, and is one which God recognises as such. "I have surely hear Ephraim bemoaning himself." Jer 31:18. It shows that he has something to mourn over; something to make him groan being burdened; that sin has been opened up to him in its hateful malignancy; that it is a trouble and distress to his soul; that he cannot roll it like a sweet morsel under his tongue; but that it is found out by the penetrating eye, and punished by the chastening hand of God. J. C. Philpot. 1842.
Ver. 5. Foolishness. The folly of sin. Everything that a man has to do with sin shows his folly.
1. Dallying with sin.
2. Committing it.
3. Continuing in it.
4. Hiding it.
5. Palliating it.
B. Davies.
Psalms 38:6*
Ver. 5-6. See Psalms on "Ps 38:6" for further information.
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 My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my…
Psa_38:5
My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness.
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Suffering for sin
I. Davids unhappy situation.
1. The pain and anguish he felt on account of sin (Job_20:12-14; Psa_88:15).
2. Shame and self-abhorrence (Pro_13:5; Job_42:6).
3. Danger. Though the principle of spiritual life be not totally extinguished in a true believer, yet by the prevalence of particular corruptions it may be brought into a very languishing state, and sometimes it seems as if it were giving up the ghost (Rev_3:2).
II. The cause to which his unhappy situation is attributed. My foolishness.
1. In sinning against God, he committed folly in Israel (1Sa_13:8; 2Sa_24:10). Sin must needs be folly, not only because it is contrary to the most sacred obligations, but because it is opposite to our best interests. Whatever injury we may thereby do to others, the greatest injury will be to ourselves. It is following after lying vanities, and forsaking our own mercies.
2. It was folly in David to persist in sin, after it was once committed.
3. His folly appeared in not confessing his sin, as the only means of obtaining effectual relief (Pro_28:13; 1Jn_1:9; Jer_3:18; Psa_32:5).
4. The principal part of Davids folly, and that for which he took blame to himself was, that he had so long neglected the remedy, after sin had been committed, and that he had not applied to that mercy which blots out all our transgressions. (B. Beddome, M. A.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 General Information:
General Information:
David continues describing what his guilt and shame does to his body. He uses hyperbole to emphasize the effects of this lesson.
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My wounds are infected and smell
Here "smell" refer to his sores having a bad smell that is associated with rotting flesh. AT: "My wounds are infected and stink as they rot" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
I am stooped over
The pain of the writer's wounds have caused him to be bent over as if he were an old, feeble man. AT: "I am bent over in pain" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
fool
mourn
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 38:5-8 The severity of God’s punishment brings anguish that…
38:5-8 The severity of God’s punishment brings anguish that affects every part of the psalmist’s being.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.