You have renounced the covenant of your servant. You have defiled his crown in the dust.
You have broken down all his hedges. You have brought his strongholds to ruin.
All who pass by the way rob him. He has become a reproach to his neighbors.
You have exalted the right hand of his adversaries. You have made all of his enemies rejoice.
Yes, you turn back the edge of his sword, and haven’t supported him in battle.
You have ended his splendor, and thrown his throne down to the ground.
You have shortened the days of his youth. You have covered him with shame.
How long, Yahweh? Will you hide yourself forever? Will your wrath burn like fire?
Remember how short my time is, for what vanity you have created all the children of men!
What man is he who shall live and not see death, who shall deliver his soul from the power of Sheol?
Lord, where are your former loving kindnesses, which you swore to David in your faithfulness?
Remember, Lord, the reproach of your servants, how I bear in my heart the taunts of all the mighty peoples,
With which your enemies have mocked, Yahweh, with which they have mocked the footsteps of your anointed one.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv40, 42, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51 40. Thou hast broken down all his walls. The…
40. Thou hast broken down all his walls. The prophet, although he might easily have found another cause to which to impute the breaking down and razing of the fortifications, yet under the influence of devout and sanctified feeling acknowledges God to be the author of this calamity; being fully convinced that men could not at their pleasure have destroyed the kingdom which God had set up had not the Divine anger been kindled. Afterwards speaking metaphorically, he complains that the kingdom was exposed as a prey to all passers-by, resembling a field or garden, of which the walls were broken down, and the ground laid open to depredation. As an aggravation of a calamity which in itself was sufficiently grievous, the additional indignity is brought forward, that the king was a reproach to his neighbors. The worldly and the profane, there can be no doubt, finding an opportunity so much according to their wishes, derided him, saying, Is this that king of God’s choice, a king more excellent than the angels, and whose throne was to continue as long as the sun and the moon should endure? As these railings recoiled upon God himself, the prophet justly complains of the reproachful derision with which God’s Anointed was treated, whose dignity and royal estate were ratified and confirmed by heavenly anointing.
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 vv39, 45, 46, 47, 50, 51 Because of the horrible confusion of things, the Prophet…
Because of the horrible confusion of things, the Prophet complaineth to God, as though he saw not the performance of his promise. And thus discharging his cares on God, he resisteth doubt and impatience.
By this he meaneth the horrible dissipation and renting of the kingdom, which was under Jeroboam: or else by the Spirit of prophecy Ethan speaketh of those great miseries, which came soon afterward to pass at the captivity of Babylon.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv39–51 Psa 89:39 Thou hast made void the covenant of…
Psa 89:39 Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant: thou hast profaned his crown [by casting it] to the ground.
Ver. 39. Thou hast made void the covenant] This passage a certain Spanish Rabbi stumbled at (as hath been noted on the title of this psalm), but without cause; for all these things are spoken κατα δοξαν, and not κατ αληθειαν, according to opinion, and not according to the truth of things. And, therefore, Kimchi saith well here, Many wonder at this psalmist, and I do as much wonder at their wondering, &c.
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Thou hast profaned his crown] By rendering his regal dignity contemptible. The Greek rendereth it, his sanctuary, αγιασμα αυτου..
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 vv39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 45, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51 Made void the covenant; which seems contrary to thy…
Made void the covenant; which seems contrary to thy word given Psa 89:34.
Of thy servant, i.e. made with him.
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Profained his crown, by exposing that sacred person, and family, and kingdom to contempt, and giving his sceptre and power into the hands of the uncircumcised.
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 On vv39–51 Thou hast broken down all his hedges,.... Round about…
Thou hast broken down all his hedges,.... Round about his vine, the church; see Psa 80:12. A famous church was raised at Jerusalem, quickly after the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ, which seemed to be well filled, fenced, and protected; but on a sudden a violent persecution arose, and the members of it were made havoc of, and the ministers of the word were scattered abroad, and which was the breaking down of the hedges; and what was done to the church was taken by Christ as done to himself, as it is here spoken of him; see Act 8:1, and this might seem contrary to the word and oath of God, that his seed should endure for ever, and his throne as the days of heaven, Psa 89:29, when the first Christian church was used in this manner; but that providence was overruled, for the spread of the Gospel, and the interest of Christ, in other parts; see Act 8:4, and so no objection to what is before said:
thou hast brought his strong holds to ruin; the same as before, the church of Christ, which seemed to be so well built and fortified; see Isa 26:1.
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 vv45, 47, 48, 50, 51 Youth - The youthful and flourishing estate of David's…
Youth - The youthful and flourishing estate of David's kingdom was very short, and reached not beyond his next successor.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv40–51 Verse 40. Thou hast broken down all his hedges]…
Verse 40. Thou hast broken down all his hedges] Thou hart permitted the land to be stripped of all defence; there is not even one strong place in the hands of thy people.
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 vv47, 48, 51 Psa 89:47. Remember how short my time is —…
Psa 89:47. Remember how short my time is — That is, our time, the time of our king and kingdom, in whose name the psalmist put up this petition, and about whom he was much more solicitous than about himself, as is evident, both from the following verses and from the whole body of the Psalm. The sense seems to be this: Our king and all his people, and I among the rest, are short-lived and perishing creatures, who of ourselves, and according to the course of nature, must shortly die, and therefore there is no need that thou shouldest add further afflictions to sweep us away before the time. Wherefore hast thou made all men in vain? — Wherefore hast thou made us and our king, and consequently all other men, (whose condition is in nothing better than ours,) in vain, or to so little purpose? Didst thou raise up us and him, establish us for thy people, settle the crown upon David and his seed by a solemn covenant, erect a magnificent and glorious temple, and vouchsafe so many and great promises and privileges, and all this but for a few years; that our crown and glory should be taken from us within a little time after it was put upon our heads? It is not strange that such considerations as these should fill the psalmist’s mind with amazement and sad perplexing thoughts. Nor doth he accuse or upbraid God here with, but only useth it as an argument to move him to repair and restore their decayed state, that they might live to praise, serve, and glorify him.
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 vv39–51 Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant…
Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant - Thou hast dealt with him as if there were no such covenant; as if no such promise had been made to him. The word rendered “made void,” means to abhor, or reject.
Thou hast profaned his crown, by casting it to the ground - literally, “Thou hast profaned to the earth his crown;” that is, Thou hast treated it as a polluted thing; a thing to be rejected and abhorred; a thing which one casts indignantly upon the ground.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 50, 51 39. Made void the covenant—Wholly rejected the covenant; treated…
39. Made void the covenant—Wholly rejected the covenant; treated it as worthless. Contrast Psa_89:34-35.
Profaned his crown—By allowing it to be “cast to the ground”—despoiled. See Psa_89:19-20
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 vv39–51 39. Thou hast abhorred the covenant of thy servant:
39. Thou hast abhorred the covenant of thy servant:
Thou hast cast his desecrated crown to the ground.
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Thine anointed, thy servant (cp. Psa_89:20) include both David and the successor who represents him. The titles plead the claim which the king had on God’s protection.
The word nçzer means (1) consecration, and (2) the crown or diadem of the high priest (Exo_29:6) or the king (2Sa_1:10), as the mark of consecration to their office. For the phrase profaned to the ground cp. Psa_74:7.
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 vv39, 43, 44, 46, 47, 48, 50, 51 (39) Made void.—Better, cast off, as the word is…
(39) Made void.—Better, cast off, as the word is rendered in Lam_2:7, the only other place where it occurs. There the LXX. have “shook off;” here, “turned upside down.”
Thou hast profaned.—Comp. Psa_74:7.
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 vv39–51 Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant;…
Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant; or, "abhorred" (Cheyne, Revised Version). The verb is a very unusual one, occurring only here and in Lam_2:7. Thou hast profaned his crown by casting it to the ground. (comp. Psa_74:7) The theocratic crown was so holy a thing, that any degradation of it might be regarded as a "profanation."
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 vv39–51 Ver. 39. Thou hast made void the covenant of…
Ver. 39. Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant. The dispensations of providence looked as if there had been a disannulling of the sacred compact, though indeed it was not so.
Thou hast profaned his crown by casting it to the ground. The king had been subject to such sorrow and shame that his diadem had been as it were taken from his head, dashed on the earth, and rolled in the mire. He was a theocratic monarch, and the Lord, who gave him his crown, took it from him and treated it with contempt, at least so it seemed. In these sad days also we may utter the same complaint, for Jesus is not acknowledged in many of the churches, and usurpers have profaned his crown. When we hear of kings and queens set up as "heads of the church", and a priest styled "The Vicar of Christ", while parliaments and courts take upon themselves to legislate for the church of God, we may bitterly lament that things should come to so wretched a pass. Few are there who will acknowledge the crown rights of King Jesus, the very subject is considered to be out of date. O Lord how long!
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Ver. 39. Thou hast profaned his crown, etc. The crown of a king, (like that of the high priest, on which was inscribed "holiness to the Lord") (Ex 28:36) was a sacred thing, and therefore to cast it in the dust was to profane it. A.R. Fausset.
Ver. 39.
1. Providence may often seem to be at variance with promises.
2. Promises are never at variance with providence. It is the covenant of thy servant and his crown still.
Ver. 39. How the throne of King Jesus may be profaned.
Psalms 89:40*
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 vv47–49 Remember how short my time is: wherefore hast Thou…
Psa_89:47-48
Remember how short my time is: wherefore hast Thou made all men in vain?
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The sense of lifes brevity
I. That it is a right feeling, because it accords with fact. Human life is short, if you consider--
1. That an end must come to it here.
2. Its re-beginning after its earthly close. It is short in view of the new life. What is it to eternity? Nothing.
II. That it argues the underlying sentiment of immortality. A man could have no feeling of the length or brevity of time, with all its changes, unless he had within him a settled sentiment of permanence.
III. That it implies a deep interest in some purpose in life. He is anxious to see the work done; and he is so impressed with the brevity of life, that he works and labours with all diligence.
IV. That it involves an underlying belief that life on the whole is a blessing. Of all the million sufferers in the world, there are but few of the number who would have their life shortened even by one day.
V. That it serves to stimulate us to make the best use of it. One who feels that he is in the world only for a little time, will strike out for the best things. (Homilist.)
A homily for the closing year
God makes no man in vain, but he may choose to live in vain. He may turn his existence in this world to utter vanity and waste.
1. The true value of our life lies in its spiritual significance; and we save it from being vain and worthless only as we connect it with the spiritual and the eternal. We are accustomed to say that life is long or short, according as it is crowded with incidents and experiences, or is deficient in them. An eventful life is a long life. Some men live more in one year than others do in many. But then, what is the quality of the experience? Your life outwardly may be eventful enough, but inwardly it may be strangely destitute of all that is fitted to give it a distinctive and a noble character.
2. The value of our life lies in the nature of the work that has been given us to do in it; and we save it from being vain only by earnest and diligent attention to that work. It demands the cultivation in ourselves of the affections and energies of the life of God, and the diffusion of such an influence and the doing of such deeds as shall be for the enduring benefit and blessing of the world in which He has placed us. (Joseph Waite, M.A.)
Unfulfilled lives
That mens lives are vain is the universal complaint. Men are perplexed and overwhelmed by the mystery of life and the worlds misery. The Bible is full of it. Isaiah tells how we all do fade as a leaf, and that plaintive thought was the same felt so keenly by Homer, too--like leaves on trees the race of man is found. It is the solemn teaching and experience of the human heart, and of the sages and poets of all ages. Sadness, said Savonarola, besieges me day and night. Whatever I see, or hear, bears the standard of sadness. The memory of my friends saddens me, the meditation of my studies afflicts me, the thought of my sins sinks me down, and, as in a fever, the sweetest things taste as sadness in my mouth. It has been ever so; and apostles and prophets, however inspired, weep out the same sad notes. Christ alone, though he was the man of sorrows, indulges no morbid note on man, for he saw too clearly the destiny of man to utter any words that could sound like a dirge over his being.
I. Yet, I think, I may first attempt to collect and press upon you the evidence upon this common thought--the temptation to believe that man is made in vain. Everything rebukes vanity in man, since he himself, as well as the world, is vain. The idea often thrills through us that man is made in vain. Experiences are different, but the feeling is universal. All men feel it of all men. Job speaks of his being like a hidden, untimely birth. Yes, and what a mockery there is, apparently, in the birth and death of little children. But I do not think that these are the most startling views of the vanity of life. I would rather fix the argument upon the utter disproportion between the powers and the position of man. It is then, I say and see, that man is made in vain. Nothing has more perplexed me than the sight in life of angels--I must call them so--who have lost their way; their lives seem to have been altogether in vain; a gifted sensibility, perhaps, in a hard, coarse family; a soul sensitive to every impression of gentleness and beauty, with a body unable to second the designs and desires of the soul--the soul soaring, the body limping. Our thoughts crush us--man was made to mourn, and man was made in vain. Unsatisfactory and miserable world, may we well exclaim, where nothing is real, and nothing is realized; when I consider how our lives are passed in the struggle for existence; when I consider the worry of life; when I consider how the millions pass their time in a mere toil for sensual objects; when I consider the millions of distorted existences; and the many millions!--the greater number of the world by far--who wander Christless, loveless, hopeless, over the broad highway of it; when I consider life in many of the awakened as a restless dream; when I consider this, and much else, I can almost exclaim with our unhappy poet--
Count all the joys thine hours have seen,
Count all thy days from anguish free,
And know, whatever thou hast been,
Twere something better not to be.
I can conceive many a soul, and not an irreverent one, saying, O God! what is my life? What am I? What have I done? I am a failure. Why have I had given me unoccupied affections; they have never met their response, their realization, their fulfilment. How I could have loved, how I could have wrought; I feel these things in me. Now, it is the fashion of infidelity to believe that God has no details, no specialities, and this thought sometimes drives in with a panic on the spirit; for we are caught up by the huge engine of the machine-god, and torn amidst the wheels of what does not care more for hearts than it does for oaks. Our lives seem spent in vain. I know the reply to all this with many is a cold and icy sneer of contempt at the egotism and conceit of it all. The universe has done very well for you hitherto; trust the universe, let these inquisitive questions alone. To which I reply, Alas! they will not let me alone; moreover, if my fault is egotism and individuality, what is yours? Indifference, inhumanity, coldness, in a word--brutality. I do not desire to sink to the unconsciousness of beasts that perish.
II. Notice the structure of the question, Is it possible to reconcile the vanity of man with the greatness of God? This vanity of man, is it consistent with thee, and with what thou art?
1. I believe that thou hast not a chief regard to thine own power. God is not a mere power. What should we think of him who, able to stamp upon the canvas the forms of Murillo, the colours of Tintoretto, able to hew his marbles to the shape of Flaxman, or to mould his pottery to Etruscan loveliness, yet treated all as a freak, and destroyed remorselessly as readily as he created? But what is the artist of the canvas to the artist of flowers, to the artist of the human eye, the artist of the birds wing? The artist says, I made them, but I cannot preserve them; but the author of eternal beauty Thou art, and why hast Thou made not only things, but man himself in vain? The mother, indeed, goes to her little cot where the lamb of her bosom lies stretched out in its little shroud. She says, Yes, my darling, I bare thee, and nursed thee; but I could not keep thee; but God, Why hast Thou made men in vain?
2. God is not mere law. I believe Thou art not heedless of Thy creatures desire, though they seem to be mocked. We are not like children at play, blowing bubbles which break in non-existence even while they soar. This cannot be enjoyment to Thee.
3. Thou art pure being, Thou canst not, therefore, be pleased only to contemplate evanescence and decay. It is not consistent with Thy glory that the whole creation should groan and travail in pain together. Dost Thou not rejoice in Thy works? and canst Thou rejoice in these? Is not Thy world one huge stone coffin, where every piece of limestone is but the record of death, and the fairest things float loathsomely out of existence into corruption and decay. And now these are, as you well know, the soliloquies and cries of our nature; and the appropriate answer to all is, Man is not made in vain. Unless I have mistaken myself, I believe that some of the topics I have suggested will convey a reply to this question, and show that the absolute vanity of man is incompatible with the glory and with the promise of God. There is something in him which God does not regard as vanity. The sure mercies of David are not vanity; the covenant ordered in all things and sure is not vanity; the exceeding great and precious promises, by which we become partakers of the Divine nature, are not vanity. Mutation and change, indeed, surround us everywhere. But there are two immutable, unchangeable things--the will of God, and the Word of God, as the expression of His will. There is an image, over which change never passes. It can suffer no defacement; nothing can mar it. And as we are conformed to this, a growing joy steals over us, and steeps us in its blessedness as we become new creatures in Christ, Jesus; as the old things pass away, as the Word which gives light enters and sows itself in the heart, we gradually learn what it is for man not to be made in vain.
III. Hence I have conjoined with this poor human word; this elegy over unfulfilled lives; this other word; this word of repose on Divine intention and completed being--My times are in Thy hand. Nothing is more certain, nothing are men more indisposed to perceive than this--we have to
Wait for some transcendent life,
Reserved by God to follow this.
To this end Gods real way is made up of all the ways of our life. His hand holds all our times. My times are in Thy hand--the hand of my Saviour. He regulates our life clock. Christ for and Christ in us. My times are in His hand. My life can be no more in vain, than was my Saviours life in vain.
IV. And this truth rightly grasped and held, we shall never think it possible that any life can be unfulfilled which does not, by its own voluntary perversity, fling itself away. No doubt, men may be suicides to their own souls. Did not our Lord say, Better were it for that man that he had never been born? and there are beings for whom that would be the only appropriate epitaph. All in vain! O my soul, anything to escape that. Let life here seem increasingly vain; only save me from the vanity of eternity, and the horrors of that fearful looking for where nothing is realized but woe. Oh to reach the fulness of joy, so that I and mine may say as we gaze upon our Redeemer in light, No, through Thee and Thy merits, we have not been made in vain. But you solitary, suffering, disappointed hearts, take some comfort. The best is yet to be. (E. Paxton Hood.)
Suggestions of lifes vanity
There are many circumstances in life that tend to impress us with the vanity of our mortal existence on the assumption that there is no future.
I. The disproportion between the length of our existence and our longings.
II. The disproportion between our faculties and our achievements. All feel they can do vastly more than they can accomplish here.
III. The disproportion between our aspirations and our attainment. How much knowledge, power, influence we aspire to, but how little do we gain!(Homilist.)
Vanity of man, if not immortal
I. Some direct proofs of the vanity of human life.
1. The brevity of our mortal existence.
2. The positive evils that are in the world.
(1) Sickness and pain.
(2) Wars and fightings.
(3) Famine.
(4) Earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, etc.
II. The real value of those things which seem to render our existence of most worth.
1. After all the failure, and fiction, and insincerity, and envy, that attend worldly possessions, we cannot surely suppose them of much real value. If we had only what they afford, we should be compelled to confess we were made in vain.
2. Knowledge is not necessarily happiness. We are not going to say, that increase of knowledge is always increase of sorrow (Ecc_1:18); but we believe most of the happiness that we find in knowledge, in exercising intellect, in discovering truth, springs from the hope we entertain of making our knowledge subserve our happiness in other respects. If our only felicity consisted in knowing, we believe it would be extremely small. And how little even men called learned succeed in making their acquisitions advance human felicity, the whole history of cultured intellect too sadly tells.
3. Some one might say to us, the joys of friendly attachment are neither few nor small; they are pure; they are peaceful; they are noble. But let us remember there are regions where the husband and the father is the tyrant; where the mother murders her offspring; where the wife is the slave; and where the widow burns on the funeral pile of her husband! Let us remember, too, how often friendships give place to enmity. When half the world is dressed in mourning, its friendships can scarcely convince us that, apart from another world, all men have not been made in vain.
4. Religion is vain, if the world is all. Its votaries are miserably deluded. They have renounced the world, but gained nothing.
III. Conclusions.
1. The amazing difficulties of that species of infidelity which denies a future state.
2. That the doctrine of immortality, and the truths of religion, are very needful to us, in order to make us happy even here. Remove immortality--and what is man? a distressful dream! a throb--a wish--a sigh--then, nothing! But, blessed be God, life and immortality are brought to light. Yes--
3. That the true Christian is the happiest man. He is not perplexed with a thousand doubts and difficulties that trouble the unbeliever. (I. S. Spencer, D.D.)
The vanity and value of human life
I. If we consider life as it is is itself, and form our estimate of its value only by the degree of temporal enjoyment it is capable of affording, it will appear to be very vain indeed; and man will almost seem to be made for nothing.
1. Consider how short life is!
2. Consider its uncertainty. Who can say of any project that he has formed, that he shall accomplish it?
3. Survey also the sufferings to which life is exposed in this short existence.
Take notice of the natural calamities which belong to man. Look at the history of man, and see what he suffers from his own species.
4. Look also at the business of life, the very end for which most men live, and the same reflection will forcibly recur. What is the end for which so much toil is endured, so many cares and anxieties suffered? Simply this; to go on suffering the same anxieties and cares, and enduring the same toil.
II. Let us look at life in another point of view, and we shall see that God has not made man in vain.
1. We live not to eat, and drink, and labour; but we eat, drink, and labour, in order to live; that is, to fulfil the will of our great Creator and to glorify His name. Now, this is done when His will is made the chief rule of our lives, and His glory the end of our actions; when we exercise dispositions proper to our stations in life and agreeable to the duties we owe to Him. In this light the events of life are comparatively of little consequence, the duties they call forth are what are of importance. In this view, life is not to be regarded as given in vain.
2. When we carry our view forward to that eternal state of which this life is but the beginning, and in comparison of which it is but a moment; when we consider that this eternal life will be either miserable or happy according to the manner in which we spend our short existence here; surely this life is not in vain: it becomes of infinite importance--an importance proportioned to that infinite happiness or woe with which it is necessarily connected.
3. What a value is stamped upon life; what dignity upon the world, when we behold the only Son of God taking upon Him that life, and coming into that world! Are men made in vain, when the only begotten of the Father gave His life as a ransom for theirs?
4. Is life of such unspeakable moment, and yet is it so short in its duration? What an additional value does it derive even from this circumstance, which may seem, at first sight, to detract from its worth! If life be so uncertain; if almost the only thing certain in life is that we shall die, what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness! (John Penn, M.A)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v48 Heb. "Sheol," (See Scofield "Hab 2:5").
grave
Heb. "Sheol," (See Scofield "Hab 2:5").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv41, 44, 46, 49 to his neighbors
to his neighbors
Here "neighbors" means people of nearby nations.
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raised the right hand of his enemies
Here "right hand" represents power. To "raise the right hand" means that Yahweh has made his enemies strong enough to defeat God's chosen king. (See: Metonymy and Symbolic Action)
turn back the edge of his sword
Here "sword" represents the king's power in battle. To turn the sword back represents making the king unable to win in battle. (See: Metonymy and Idiom)
the edge of his sword
Here "edge" represents the whole sword. AT: "his sword" (See: Synecdoche)
have not made him stand when in battle
Here "stand" represents being victorious in battle. AT: "You have not helped him to be victorious in battle" (See: Metonymy)
translationWords
neighbor
raise
right hand
joy
sword
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 vv40, 42, 46, 50 89:40 broken down the walls: The Lord’s people are…
89:40 broken down the walls: The Lord’s people are completely vulnerable.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.