I will give thanks to Yahweh with my whole heart. I will tell of all your marvelous works.
Parallel Translations
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I will give thanks to Yahweh with my whole heart. I will tell of all your marvelous works.
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I will praise thee, O LORD, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy marvellous works.
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(9-1) For the Leader; upon Muthlabben. A Psalm of David. (9-2) I will give thanks unto the LORD with my whole heart; I will tell of all Thy marvellous works.
Cross-references (22)
Passages linked to Psalms 9:1 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Psalms 86:12 I will praise you, Lord my God, with my whole heart. I will glorify your name forever more.
- 1 Chronicles 16:24 Declare his glory among the nations, and his marvelous works among all the peoples.
- Psalms 145:1-3 I will exalt you, my God, the King. I will praise your name forever and ever. Every day I will praise you. I will extol your name forever and ever. Great is Yahweh, and greatly to be praised! His greatness is unsearchable.
- Psalms 103:1-2 Praise Yahweh, my soul! All that is within me, praise his holy name! Praise Yahweh, my soul, and don’t forget all his benefits,
- Psalms 111:1 Praise Yah! I will give thanks to Yahweh with my whole heart, in the council of the upright, and in the congregation.
- Psalms 26:7 that I may make the voice of thanksgiving to be heard and tell of all your wondrous deeds.
- Psalms 146:1-2 Praise Yah! Praise Yahweh, my soul. While I live, I will praise Yahweh. I will sing praises to my God as long as I exist.
- Hebrews 13:15 Through him, then, let’s offer up a sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of lips which proclaim allegiance to his name.
- Psalms 138:1 I will give you thanks with my whole heart. Before the gods, I will sing praises to you.
- 1 Chronicles 16:12 Remember his marvelous works that he has done, his wonders, and the judgments of his mouth,
- Psalms 7:17 I will give thanks to Yahweh according to his righteousness, and will sing praise to the name of Yahweh Most High.
- Psalms 51:15 Lord, open my lips. My mouth will declare your praise.
- Isaiah 43:21 the people which I formed for myself, that they might declare my praise.
- Isaiah 12:1 In that day you will say, “I will give thanks to you, Yahweh; for though you were angry with me, your anger has turned away and you comfort me.
- Luke 10:27 He answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”
- Revelation 15:3 They sang the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, “Great and marvelous are your works, Lord God, the Almighty! Righteous and true are your ways, you King of the nations.
- 1 Chronicles 29:10-13 Therefore David blessed Yahweh before all the assembly; and David said, “You are blessed, Yahweh, the God of Israel our father, forever and ever. Yours, Yahweh, is the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty! For all that is in the heavens and in the earth is yours. Yours is the kingdom, Yahweh, and you are exalted as head above all. Both riches and honor come from you, and you rule over all! In your hand is power and might! It is in your hand to make great, and to give strength to all! Now therefore, our God, we thank you, and praise your glorious name.
- Revelation 5:9-14 They sang a new song, saying, “You are worthy to take the book and to open its seals: for you were killed, and bought us for God with your blood out of every tribe, language, people, and nation, and made us kings and priests to our God, and we will reign on the earth.” I saw, and I heard something like a voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders. The number of them was ten thousands of ten thousands, and thousands of thousands; saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who has been killed to receive the power, wealth, wisdom, strength, honor, glory, and blessing!” I heard every created thing which is in heaven, on the earth, under the earth, on the sea, and everything in them, saying, “To him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb be the blessing, the honor, the glory, and the dominion, forever and ever! Amen!” The four living creatures said, “Amen!” Then the elders fell down and worshiped.
- Psalms 34:1-4 I will bless Yahweh at all times. His praise will always be in my mouth. My soul shall boast in Yahweh. The humble shall hear of it and be glad. Oh magnify Yahweh with me. Let’s exalt his name together. I sought Yahweh, and he answered me, and delivered me from all my fears.
- Psalms 106:2 Who can utter the mighty acts of Yahweh, or fully declare all his praise?
- Isaiah 60:6 A multitude of camels will cover you, the dromedaries of Midian and Ephah. All from Sheba will come. They will bring gold and frankincense, and will proclaim the praises of Yahweh.
- Psalms 9:14 that I may show all of your praise. I will rejoice in your salvation in the gates of the daughter of Zion.
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 1. I will praise the Lord. David begins the…
1. I will praise the Lord. David begins the psalm in this way, to induce God to succor him in the calamities with which he was now afflicted. As God continues his favor towards his own people without intermission, all the good he has hitherto done to us should serve to inspire us with confidence and hope, that he will be gracious and merciful to us in the time to come. “Doit servir pour nous asseurer et faire esperer qu’il nous sera propice et debonnaire, l’advenir.” — Fr.
“De la faveur qu’il a receu, de Dieu.” — Fr.
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“Processions.” — Fr.
“Afin que leurs belles prouesses veissent en cognaissance.” — Fr.
“Qu’ils sont entre Dieu et eux.” — Fr.
I will tell of all thy marvellous works. Here David confirms what I have already said, that he does not treat in this psalm of one victory or one deliverance only; for he proposes to himself in general all the miracles which God had wrought in his behalf, as subjects of meditation. He applies the term marvellous not to all the benefits which he had received from God, but to those more signal and memorable deliverances in which was exhibited a bright and striking manifestation of the divine power. God would have us to acknowledge him as the author of all our blessings; but on some of his gifts he has engraven more evident marks in order the more effectually to awaken our senses, which are otherwise as if asleep or dead. David’s language, therefore, is an acknowledgement that he was preserved of God, not by ordinary means, but by the special power of God, which was conspicuously displayed in this matter; inasmuch as he had stretched forth his hand in a miraculous manner, and above the common and usual way.
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 Or, kind of instrument, or tune, or for the…
Or, kind of instrument, or tune, or for the death of Labben or Goliath.
God is not praised, except the whole glory be given to him alone.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Psa 9:1 « To the chief Musician upon Muthlabben,…
Psa 9:1 « To the chief Musician upon Muthlabben, A Psalm of David. » I will praise [thee], O LORD, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy marvellous works.
Upon Muth-labben] This was the name of a certain instrument, say some; the beginning of a song, say others, to the tune whereof this psalm was to be sung. Montanus and many more hold it to be an anagrammatism, and render it, For the death of Nabal, viz. by a covert intimation, and inversion of the letters. So in the title of Psa 7:1, Cush Beniemini for Kish the Benjamite. That is,
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Parcere nominibus, dicere de vitiis.
Ver. 1. I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart This is a gratulatory psalm, wherein David shows his thankfulness, which a very heathen calleth Maximam imo matrem omnium virtutmn reliquarum, the mother of all the rest of the virtues (Cicero). True thankfulness, as one well observeth, is here and in the next verse described, 1. By the matter of it. 2. By the manner. First, for matter, the psalmist delivereth it in four parts. 1. The acknowledging of God in all. 2. A ciphering and summing up of special mercies (of ספר seems to come Cipher). 3. An expression of spiritual joy in God, as well as in his gifts. 4. A dedication of our songs and selves to his name.
Secondly, for the manner, he presseth, 1. Integrity for the subject and object, Psa 9:12. Sincerity for affection and end, Psa 9:2.
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 With my whole heart, i.e. with a sincere, and…
With my whole heart, i.e. with a sincere, and affectionate, and united heart. I will discourse in the general of thy manifold wonders wrought for me, and for thy church and people formerly. The particle
all is here, as it is oft elsewhere, taken in a restrained sense.
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 The title of this psalm gives a very uncertain…
The title of this psalm gives a very uncertain sound concerning the occasion of penning it. It is upon Muth-labben, which some make to refer to the death of Goliath, others of Nabal, others of Absalom; but I incline to think it signifies only some tone, or some musical instrument, to which this psalm was intended to be sung; and that the enemies David is here triumphing in the defeat of are the Philistines, and the other neighbouring nations that opposed his settlement in the throne, whom he contested with and subdued in the beginning of his reign, Sa2 5:8. In these verses,
I. David excites and engages himself to praise God for his mercies and the great things he had of late done for him and his government, Psa 9:1, Psa 9:2. Note, 1. God expects suitable returns of praise from those for whom he has done marvellous works. 2. If we would praise God acceptably, we must praise him in sincerity, with our hearts, and not only with our lips, and be lively and fervent in the duty, with our whole heart. 3. When we give thanks for some one particular mercy we should take occasion thence to remember former mercies and so to show forth all his marvellous works. 4. Holy joy is the life of thankful praise, as thankful praise is the language of holy joy: I will be glad and rejoice in thee. 5. Whatever occurs to make us glad, our joy must pass through it, and terminate in God only: I will be glad and rejoice in thee, not in the gift so much as in the giver. 6. Joy and praise are properly expressed by singing psalms. 7. When God has shown himself to be above the proud enemies of the church we must take occasion thence to give glory to him as the Most High. 8. The triumphs of the Redeemer ought to be the triumphs of the redeemed; see Rev 12:10; Rev 19:5; Rev 15:3, Rev 15:4.
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II. He acknowledges the almighty power of God as that which the strongest and stoutest of his enemies were no way able to contest with or stand before, Psa 9:3. But, 1. They are forced to turn back. Their policy and their courage fail them, so that they cannot, they dare not, push forward in their enterprises, but retire with precipitation. 2. When once they turn back, they fall and perish; even their retreat will be their ruin, and they will save themselves no more by flying than by fighting. If Haman begin to fall before Mordecai, he is a lost man, and shall prevail no more; see Est 6:13. 3. The presence of the Lord, and the glory of his power, are sufficient for the destruction of his and his people's enemies. That is easily done which a man does with his very presence; with that God confounds his enemies, such a presence has he. This was fulfilled when our Lord Jesus, with one word, I am he, made his enemies to fall back at his presence (Joh 18:6) and he could, at the same time, have made them perish. 4. When the enemies of God's church are put to confusion we must ascribe their discomfiture to the power, not of instruments, but of his presence, and give him all the glory.
III. He gives to God the glory of his righteousness, in his appearing on his behalf (Psa 9:4): "Thou hast maintained my right and my cause, that is, my righteous cause; when that came on, thou satest in the throne, judging right." Observe, 1. God sits in the throne of judgment. To him it belongs to decide controversies, to determine appeals, to avenge the injured, and to punish the injurious; for he has said, Vengeance is mine. 2. We are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth and that with him there is no unrighteousness. Far be it from God that he should pervert justice. If there seem to us to be some irregularity in the present decisions of Providence, yet these, instead of shaking our belief of God's justice, may serve to strengthen our belief of the judgment to come, which will set all to-rights. 3. Whoever disown and desert a just and injured cause, we may be sure that the righteous God will maintain it and plead it with jealousy, and will never suffer it to be run down.
IV. He records, with joy, the triumphs of the God of heaven over all the powers of hell and attends those triumphs with his praises, Psa 9:5. By three steps the power and justice of God had proceeded against the heathen, and wicked people, who were enemies to the king God had lately set up upon his holy hill of Zion. 1. He had checked them: "Thou hast rebuked the heathen, hast given them real proofs of thy displeasure against them." This he did before he destroyed them, that they might take warning by the rebukes of Providence and so prevent their own destruction. 2. He had cut them off: Thou hast destroyed the wicked. The wicked are marked for destruction, and some are made monuments of God's vindictive justice and destructive power in this world. 3. He had buried them in oblivion and perpetual infamy, had put out their name for ever, that they should never be remembered with any respect.
V. He exults over the enemy whom God thus appears against (Psa 9:6): Thou hast destroyed cities. Either, "Thou, O enemy! hast destroyed our cities, at least in intention and imagination," or "Thou, O God! hast destroyed their cities by the desolation brought upon their country." It may be taken either way; for the psalmist will have the enemy to know, 1. That their destruction is just and that God was but reckoning with them for all the mischief which they had done and designed against his people. The malicious and vexatious neighbours of Israel, as the Philistines, Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, and Syrians, had made incursions upon them (when there was no king in Israel to fight their battles), had destroyed their cities and done what they could to make their memorial perish with them. But now the wheel was turned upon them; their destructions of Israel had come to a perpetual end; they shall now cease to spoil and must themselves be spoiled, Isa 33:1. 2. That it is total and final, such a destruction as should make a perpetual end of them, so that the very memorial of their cities should perish with them, So devouring a thing is time, and much more such desolations do the righteous judgments of God make upon sinners, that great and populous cities have been reduced to such ruins that their very memorial has perished, and those who have sought them could not find where they stood; but we look for a city that has stronger foundations.
VI. He comforts himself and others in God, and pleases himself with the thoughts of him. 1. With the thoughts of his eternity. On this earth we see nothing durable, even strong cities are buried in rubbish and forgotten; but the Lord shall endure for ever, Psa 9:7. There is no change of his being; his felicity, power, and perfection, are out of the reach of all the combined forces of hell and earth; they may put an end to our liberties, our privileges, our lives, but our God is still the same, and sits even upon the floods, unshaken, undisturbed, Psa 29:10; Psa 93:2. 2. With the thoughts of his sovereignty both in government and judgment: He has prepared his throne, has fixed it by his infinite wisdom, has fixed it by his immutable counsel. It is the great support and comfort of good people, when the power of the church's enemies is threatening and the posture of its affairs melancholy and perplexed, that God now rules the world and will shortly judge the world. 3. With the thoughts of his justice and righteousness in all the administrations of his government. He does all every day, he will do all at the last day, according to the eternal unalterable rules of equity (Psa 9:8): He shall judge the world, all persons and all controversies, shall minister judgment to the people (shall determine their lot both in this and in the future state) in righteousness and in uprightness, so that there shall not be the least colour of exception against it. 4. With the thoughts of that peculiar favour which God bears to his own people and the special protection which he takes them under. The Lord, who endures for ever, is their everlasting strength and protection; he that judges the world will be sure to judge for them, when at any time they are injured or distressed (Psa 9:9): He will be a refuge for the oppressed, a high place, a strong place, for the oppressed, in times of trouble. It is the lot of God's people to be oppressed in this world and to have troublous times appointed to them. Perhaps God may not immediately appear for them as their deliverer and avenger; but, in the midst of their distresses, they may by faith flee to him as their refuge and may depend upon his power and promise for their safety, so that no real hurt shall be done them. 5. With the thoughts of that sweet satisfaction and repose of mind which those have that make God their refuge (Psa 9:10): "Those that know thy name will put their trust in thee, as I have done" (for the grace of God is the same in all the saints), "and then they will find, as I have found, that thou dost not forsake those that seek thee;" for the favour of God is the same towards all the saints. Note, (1.) The better God is known the more he is trusted. Those who know him to be a God of infinite wisdom will trust him further than they can see him (Job 35:14); those who know him to be a God of almighty power will trust him when creature-confidences fail and they have nothing else to trust to (Ch2 20:12); and those who know him to be a God of infinite grace and goodness will trust him though he slay them, Job 13:15. Those who know him to be a God of inviolable truth and faithfulness will rejoice in his word of promise, and rest upon that, though the performance be deferred and intermediate providences seem to contradict it. Those who know him to be the Father of spirits, and an everlasting Father, will trust him with their souls as their main care and trust in him at all times, even to the end. (2.) The more God is trusted the more he is sought unto. If we trust God we shall seek him by faithful and fervent prayer, and by a constant care to approve ourselves to him in the whole course of our conversations. (3.) God never did, nor ever will, disown or desert any that duly seek to him and trust in him. Though he afflict them, he will not leave them comfortless; though he seem to forsake them for a while, yet he will gather them with everlasting mercies.
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 I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole,…
I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole, heart,.... This is what is called in the New Testament making melody in the heart, or singing with grace in the heart, Eph 5:19; and yet does not signify mere mental singing, but vocal singing, the heart joining therein; for the word here used for praise signifies to confess, to speak out, to declare openly the praises of God in the public congregation, as David elsewhere determines to do, Psa 111:1; the heart ought to, be engaged in every, part of divine service and worship, whether in preaching or in hearing, or in prayer, or in singing of praise; and the whole heart also: sometimes God has nothing of the heart in worship, it is removed far from, him, and gone after other objects; and sometimes it is divided between God and the creature; hence the psalmist prays that God would unite his heart to fear him, and then he should praise him with all his heart, with all that was within him, with all the powers and faculties of his soul; see Psa 86:11. This phrase is not expressive of the perfection of this duty, or of performing it in such manner as that there would be no imperfection in it, or sin attending it; for good men fail in all their performances, and do nothing good without sin; hence provision is made for the iniquities of holy things; but of the heartiness and sincerity of it; and in such a sincere and upright manner the psalmist determines, in the strength of divine grace, to praise the Lord;
I will show forth all thy marvellous works; such as the creation of all things out of nothing, and the bringing them into the form and order in which they are by the word of God; and in which there is such a display of the power and wisdom of God; and particularly the formation of man out of the dust of the earth, in the image, and after the likeness of God; the sustentation of the whole world of creatures in their being, the providential care of them all, the preservation of man and beast; and especially the work of redemption: it is marvellous that God should think of redeeming sinful men; that he should fix the scheme of it in the way he has; that he should pick upon his own Son to be the Redeemer; that ungodly men, sinners, the chief of sinners, and enemies, should be the persons redeemed; and that not all the individuals of human nature, but some out of every kindred, tongue, people, and nation: as also the work of grace, which is a new creation, and more marvellous than the old; a regeneration, or a being born again, which is astonishing to a natural man, who cannot conceive how this can be; a resurrection from the dead, or a causing dry bones to live; a call of men out of darkness into marvellous light; and it is as wondrous how this work is preserved amidst so many corruptions of the heart, temptations of Satan, and snares of the world, as that it is; to which may be added the wonderful works yet to be done, as the setting up of the kingdom of Christ, the destruction of antichrist, the resurrection of the dead, the last judgment, and the eternal glory and happiness of the saints; and doubtless the psalmist may have respect to the many victories which he, through the divine power, obtained over his enemies; and particularly the marvellous one which was given him over Goliath with a stone and sling: these the psalmist determined to make the subject of his song, to dwell and enlarge upon, to show forth unto others, and to point out the glories, beauties, and excellency of them: and when he says "all" of them, it must be understood of as many of them as were within the compass of his knowledge, and of as much of them as he was acquainted with; for otherwise the marvellous works of God are infinite and without number, Job 5:9.
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 David praises God for giving him victory over his…
David praises God for giving him victory over his enemies, ver. 1-6. Triumphs in confidence that God would judge the world and protect his people, ver. 7-10. Calls others to praise him, ver. 11, 12. Prays for help, and praises God, ver. 13-20. To the chief musician upon Muth-labben, A psalm of David Title of the psalm. Muth-labben - This also seems to be a title of some tune, or instrument: of which we may be content to be ignorant, as the Jewish doctors are.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain David praises God for the benefits which he has…
PSALM IX
David praises God for the benefits which he has granted to
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Israel in general, and to himself in particular, 1-4.
He encourages himself in the Lord, knowing that he will ever
judge righteously, and be a refuge for the distressed, 7-10.
He exhorts the people to praise God for his judgments, 11, 12;
prays for mercy and support; and thanks God for his judgments
executed upon the heathen, 13-16.
He foretells the destruction of the ungodly, 17;
prays for the poor and needy, and against their oppressors,
18-20.
NOTES ON PSALM IX
The inscription to this Psalm in the HEBREW text is, To the chief Musician upon Muth-lab-ben, A Psalm of David. The CHALDEE has, "A Song of David, to be sung concerning the Death of the Strong Man, (or champion, דגברא degabra,) who went out between the Camps;" that is, Goliath, on account of whose defeat this Psalm has been supposed by many to have been composed. The date in the margin is several years posterior to the death of Goliath. See the introduction.
The VULGATE: A Psalm of David, for the end; concerning the secrets of the Son."
The SEPTUAGINT and AETHIOPIC are the same with the Vulgate.
The SYRIAC: "A Psalm of David concerning Christ's receiving the throne and the kingdom, and defeating his enemies.
The ARABIC: "Concerning the mysteries of the Son, as to the glory of Christ, his resurrection, and kingdom, and the destruction of all the disobedient."
Houbigant causes the Hebrew title to agree with the Vulgate, Septuagint, and AEthiopic, by uniting על מות al muth, "concerning the death," into the word עלמות alamoth, which signifies secrets or hidden things. "To the chief musician, or conqueror; secrets concerning the Son: A Psalm of David.
About a hundred MSS. and printed editions unite the words as above. Some translate עלמות alamoth, "concerning the youth or infancy; the infancy of the Son." Several of the fathers have on this ground interpreted it, "concerning the incarnation of our Lord." Indeed the title and the Psalm have been so variously understood, that it would be as painful as it would be useless to follow the different commentators, both ancient and modern, through all their conjectures.
Verse 1. I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart] And it is only when the whole heart is employed in the work that God can look upon it with acceptance.
I will show forth] אספרה asapperah, "I will number out, or reckon up;" a very difficult task, נפלאותיך niphleotheycha, "thy miracles;" supernatural interventions of thy power and goodness. He whose eye is attentive to the operation of God's hand will find many of these. In the Vulgate this Psalm begins with Confitebor tibi, Domine, "I will confess unto thee, O Lord," which my old MS. above quoted translates thus: I sal schrife Lard, til the, in al my hert, I sal tel al twi wonders. On which we find the following curious paraphrase: "Here the prophete spekes agaynes that grucches with ese of il men: and the travel and anguis of gude men. I sal schrife til the Lard; that is, I sal lufe the in al my hert, hally gederant it til thi luf: and gyfand na party tharof tyl errour, na to covatyse: ne til fleschly luf. A vile errour it is that some men says, that God dose unrightwisly in mani thinges in erthe: for tham thynk that tay sold noght be done. Als I hard say noght lang sythem, of a man of religyon, and of grete fame, that qwen he was in the see, in poynte to peryshe, he said tyl Gode: Lard thu dos unryghtwysly if thou sofyr us to perysch here. God myght haf answered and said, My rightwysnes reches to sofer a beter man than thou ert to perisse here: for I hope, had he ben a ryghtwyse man, he had noght sayd swa: for al ar unryghtwyse, that hopes that any unrightwysnes may be in Godes wylle. Bot I sal luf the in al thi workes; and tel al thy wonders; that is, bathe that er sene, and that ar noght sene; visibels and invisibels."
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Psa 9:1-2. I will praise thee with my whole…
Psa 9:1-2. I will praise thee with my whole heart — With a sincere, affectionate, and devout heart. I will show forth all thy marvellous works — I will discourse, in the general, of thy manifold wonders wrought for me, and for thy church and people formerly. The particle all is here, as it is often elsewhere, taken in a restrained sense. I will rejoice in thee — In thy favour and help vouchsafed to me.
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 I will praise thee, O Lord - That is,…
I will praise thee, O Lord - That is, in view of the merciful interpositions referred to in the psalm Psa 9:3-5, and in view of the attributes of God’s character which had been displayed on that occasion Psa 9:7-12.
With my whole heart - Not with divided affection, or with partial gratitude. He meant that all his powers should be employed in this service; that he would give utterance to his feelings of gratitude and adoration in the loftiest and purest manner possible.
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I will show forth - I will recount or narrate - to wit, in this song of praise.
All thy marvelous works - All his works or doings fitted to excite admiration or wonder. The reference here is particularly to what God had done which had given occasion to this psalm, but still the psalmist designs undoubtedly to connect with this the purpose to give a general expression of praise in view of all that God had done that was fitted to excite such feelings.
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 Psalms 9
Psalms 9
To the chief Musician upon Muth-labben, A Psalm of David.
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1 I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart;
I will shew forth all thy marvellous works.
2 I will be glad and rejoice in thee:
I will sing praise to thy name, O thou Most High.
3 When mine enemies are turned back,
They shall fall and perish at thy presence.
4 For thou hast maintained my right and my cause;
Thou satest in the throne judging right.
5 Thou hast rebuked the heathen, thou hast destroyed the wicked,
Thou hast put out their name forever and ever.
6 O thou enemy, destructions are come to a perpetual end:
And thou hast destroyed cities; their memorial is perished with them.
7 But the Lord shall endure forever:
He hath prepared his throne for judgment.
8 And he shall judge the world in righteousness,
He shall minister judgment to the people in uprightness.
9 The Lord also will be a refuge for the oppressed,
A refuge in times of trouble.
10 And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee:
For thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.
11 Sing praises to the Lord, which dwelleth in Zion:
Declare among the people his doings.
12 When he maketh inquisition for blood, he
He forgetteth not the cry of the humble.
13 Have mercy upon me, O Lord; consider my trouble which I suffer of them that hate me,
Thou that liftest me up from the gates of death:
14 That I may shew forth all thy praise
In the gates of the daughter of Zion: I will rejoice in thy salvation.
15 The heathen are sunk down in the pit
In the net which they hid is their own foot taken.
16 The Lord is known by the judgment which he executeth:
The wicked is snared in the work of his own hands. Higgaion. Selah.
17 The wicked shall be turned into hell,
And all the nations that forget God.
18 For the needy shall not always be forgotten:
The expectation of the poor shall not perish forever.
19 Arise, O Lord; let not man prevail:
Let the heathen be judged in thy sight.
20 Put them in fear, O Lord:
That the nations may know themselves to be but men. Selah.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Its contents and character. A Psalm of thanksgiving (Psa_9:1-2) after a victory (Psa_9:3) over the heathen wrought by Divine judgment (Psa_9:4-6), expressing confidence in His constant protection of the oppressed (Psa_9:7-10); therefore the pious have to thank God (Psa_9:11-12), and pray to Him in every time of need (Psa_9:13-14). The judicial government of God causes the enemies finally to perish and saves the sufferers (Psa_9:15-18); therefore the prayer (Psa_9:19-20) which shows the dangerous position of the Psalmist and his people. The people of Israel were indeed very generally in such circumstances as this (Hupf.), but this does not imply that it is here merely a supposed case (Hengst.). If the thankful remembrance (Psa_9:1) embraces the entire series of former benefits, yet Psa_9:6 refers to what has just happened, and indeed to great overthrows of a foreign enemy after severe distress in Israel, which has not even yet entirely ceased. There is no sufficient reason to descend into the times after the exile (Ewald), still less for the Maccabean times with reference to the death of Judas Maccabeus (Venema). This Psalm cannot have originated in the exile itself (Ferrand) on account of the “gates of the daughter of Zion” (Psa_9:14), and we may not place it too early, because Psa_9:11 already mentions Zion as the royal seat of Jehovah. In agreement with this is the reference which some overlook to the death of Goliath (Chald. et al.) or to Absalom (Ruding,). or Nabal (Grot.) Maurer thinks that the king Hezekiah was the author of this Psalm after his deliverance from the siege of Sennacherib. De Wette refers to the Assyrian times with reference to Isaiah 33 Most interpreters abide by David, and indeed either without attempting to mark the time more closely (Dathe, Knapp, Rosenm.), or refer it to the Ammonite and Syrian war (Mich., Muntinghe, et al.), or what is best, to the wars with the Philistines after the event, 2Sa_5:7, (Hitzig, Delitzsch). Hitzig adduces as marks of its composition in the earliest times of psalmody: the rough and broken language, the terseness of expression, peculiarities in the use of words and forms. He gives prominence to the many resemblances with those Psalms, which are decidedly Davidic, by the apt remark that we must not draw the lines too closely in distinguishing the ideas and language of David (comp. 2Sa_1:19-27; 2Sa_7:18-29; 2Sa_23:1-7); and he remarks that we meet the alphabetical arrangement of verses, nowhere indeed before the time of Jeremiah, but that the arrangement in the order of the consonants is here very freely used, and is not carried out; a later author would not have ventured to proceed so loosely.8
The Psalm is so complete in itself, and has with many strong resemblances to the following Psalm, such a different tone that the fact that Psalms 10, which is without a title, partially carries out the alphabetical arrangement used in this Psalm only to ק, does not justify us in regarding both Psalms as originally one connected alphabetical Psalm, which afterwards was broken up and revised in two parts (although important reasons may be adduced for this. They are best presented by Hupf. and G. Baur in De Wette’s Comm.). Nor does it justify us in accordance with the Sept. and Vulgate to unite them again into one Psalm (Ewald, Krahm, Sachs). [Hitzig regards them as two co-ordinate halves of a whole of higher unity. To this Delitzsch assents, and this seems to be the best statement of the case, for the agreement is close and remarkable as well in the Psalms themselves, as in their giving parts of the same alphabetical order. Hupfeld shows that the difference in tone is not unusual in the Psalms. Such changes of feeling are frequent (vid.Psalms 27; Psalms 40; and in Psalms 9 itself, in Psa_9:13-14).—C. A. B.]
An attempt has been made by Delitzsch to express the alphabetical arrangement of the Hebrew in German. It would, however, injure our efforts for perspicuity if we should adopt it. It only remains to remark that the introductory strophe, which states the contents, has the same initial letter א in all four lines; that a strophe with ד is entirely lacking; also one with ה, unless this is contained in the holy name of God (Psa_9:7, Hupf); and that the closing strophe has ק instead of כ.
[Str. I. Psa_9:1. With my whole heart.—Hupfeld: “Partly with the heart, not merely with the mouth, (Isa_29:13), sincerely, hence 119:7,‘ with honest heart;’ partly, zealously, with all the powers of the soul, as love and trust in God should be, Deu_4:29; Deu_6:5; Deu_10:12, etc. In this is contained the idea that all the honor is given to God, all is ascribed to His grace, and it is not divided between himself and God (Calv.)”—C. A. B.]
Str. II. Psa_9:3. In the turning of mine enemies back.—All the ancient versions regard בְ as temporal, and indeed the equivalent of when in the antecedent, to which the second member of the verse then forms the consequent in the future [So A. V.] Most interpreters, however, find here stated the subject and reason of the joy=on account of that, but they translate the infinitive, in whose stead imperfects directly come, in the rule by the perfect, and thus loosen somewhat the connection between the fact of the victory and its celebration, which are so closely connected in the Psalm. [Delitzsch regards the preposition בְ as indicating time and reason at the same time, like Latin recedentibus hostibus meis retro=in the turning of my enemies back. So Ewald, Alexander. Perowne renders it as reason, “because mine enemies are turned backward (because) they stumble and perish at thy presence.” Hupfeld regards it as dependent upon the previous joy and praise as the ground or reason of it, and translates, “that mine enemies retreat back, stumble and fall before Thy countenance.” This is the best rendering.—C. A. B.]
The perfects in Psa_9:4-6, however, are in contrast with the imperfects in Psa_9:7 sq., and show that the Divine judgment is not expected first on account of His righteousness (De Wette and the ancients who also interpreted this Psalm as Messianic), but has already taken place (Hupf. et al.) The reference here, moreover, is not to God’s sitting on His eternal, heavenly, royal throne, as Psa_9:7 a [A. V.], but to a historical, and indeed judicial act of this eternal, all-embracing Sovereignty of God, for the accomplishment of which He has taken His seat upon His throne of judgment (Psa_9:4 b), which He has set up (Psa_9:7 b), and from which also He will in the future (Psa_9:8) hold judgment, and render decisions respecting the nations.
Str. III. Psa_9:6. The enemy—destroyed to ruins forever; and cities hast Thou rooted out; their memory is lost, even theirs.—[A. V. is entirely astray here. “O thou enemy, destructions are come to a perpetual end; and thou hast destroyed cities; their memorial is perished with them.”—C. A. B.] Enemy is a collective noun, and is to be connected with the plural of the following verb. With this construction the following words are to be regarded as in apposition (De Wette), or as accusative of effect (Hupf.). The most ancient translations have followed another pointing which is found still in same Codd.; swords instead of ruins. According to some Codd., we must also translate: cities hast thou forsaken. The translation enemies instead of cities is unjustifiable. At the close of the clause the pronoun is placed, notwithstanding the suffix has already preceded. The emphasis which is thereby laid upon cities means that their vanishment from history is sure, in consequence of the Divine judgment. For the various untenable attempts to explain this entire passage, which is burdened with many difficulties, vid. Rosenm. Hitzig explains very differently; O thou enemy! the abuse has an end forever; and the cities which thou forsakest, their remembrance is blotted out forever. [This is an exceedingly difficult passage. The author has the true idea in which he follows Hupfeld. I may mention, however, that the “Thou” refers back to the “Thou” of the preceding verses, and is Jehovah Himself, and not the enemy.—C. A. B.]
Str. V. Psa_9:9. Stronghold [A. V.: “Refuge”], literally height, as a place of refuge to which one has been snatched away from enemies.—Oppressed, literally down-trodden, pounded, but constantly only in a figurative sense.—Trouble, literally to be cut off, partly as excluding, a bar, partly as confining, distress (Hupf.).
Str. VI. Psa_9:12. For the avenger of blood has remembered them [A. V.: “When he maketh inquisition for blood.” The כִּי is not “when,” as in the English version, but “for,” “because,” assigning the reason of the praise, as Ewald and the author, or the subject of the declaration “that,” as Hupf.: and Delitzsch.—Hupf.: “דֹרֵשׁ דָמִים properly means the goel, the nearest relative of the murdered man, who must avenge him according to the Oriental custom; here a title of God as one who punishes, recompenses, and judges; primarily of bloodshed—but it is not confined to this, but extends to the punishment of misdeeds in general.” “Blood is used typically or synedochically, not only for death, destruction in general, but also for injury, harm, hurt of any kind. So ‘blood-guilt’ is also used generally for wickedness, violence, and the guilt or liability for it,” vid. Hupf. in loco. “Thus God is said to be the avenger of blood, as the avenger of evil in general, derived from the most conspicuous kind of wickedness and its punishment.”—C. A. B.]
The reading (Psa_9:12) is doubtful, mostly between עֲניִּיִם and עֲנָוִים. Hupf. seeks to prove against Hengst. that there is no difference in the meaning, but Delitzsch maintains that the former word means: those who are in a condition of depression owing to afflictions which have befallen them; the latter: those who are in a condition of internal commotion, that is, of humility and meekness.
Str. VII. Psa_9:13. Be gracious unto me [A. V.: “Have mercy upon me”].—In the Hebrew figuratively, in an uncontracted form of a word which is usually contracted. Many interpreters, even Delitzsch and Hitzig, find in Psa_9:13-14 the prayer of the sufferer mentioned in Psa_9:12; others, with Calv., regard the second part of the Psalm as beginning here, the prayer for help, for which the former part lays the foundation; others still, with Ruding., regard the prayer as breaking forth in sudden change of tone from a feeling of need that was still present.
[Gates of death.—Sheol is here poetically regarded as a prison with strong gates and bars, from which there is no escape, vid.Psa_107:18; Isa_38:10. Hupfeld refers to the Ἀϊδαω πύλαι of Homer.—C. A. B.]
In the gates of the daughter of Zion.—These are in contrast with the gates of death (Calv.); but the daughter of Zion is not the heavenly Jerusalem with the praises of the blessed, but the earthly Jerusalem, or, more properly, its inhabitants. Cities and people were, in ancient times, readily personified as females, now as virgins, now as mothers, whose daughters then were the inhabitants as a class. It may, however, refer to the filial relation of the people to God, parallel with the expression “son,” in which case it must be translated Daughter Zion, as Isaiah 37. “In the gates” does not mean: within the city, in the temple (Hengst.), but in public, before a great assemblage, amidst a number of people. Hupf. has excellently shown that the gates, as a place of public gathering and of all kinds of public affairs, are to be regarded not only as a noisy market-place, but also as set apart for still higher purposes.
Str. VIII. Psa_9:15. Sunk down—literally, were plunged. If the perfect is regarded as prophetic (Calv., De Wette, Hengst.), as if it were here said with confidence that the preceding prayers would be heard, the contrast with the imperfects of the following strophe is lost. If this is regarded as important, it may be taken as expressing either merely a clause of experience, as a basis for confidence in the future (Hupfeld), or as referring to the recent historical past (Delitzsch).
Str. IX. Psa_9:17. Return [A. V.: be turned].—This idea, according to Hupf., Delitzsch, Hitzig, is not to be taken away from שוּב. But when Hupf. finally concludes that it here most naturally refers to the idea of “again,” with J. H. Michaelis, and not to the place whither they go, but to the state which they left, namely, the life, which they lose again; then not only a part of the polemic against Hengst. falls to the ground, but the fundamental idea of the remarks of Hitzig upon the language of the passage, so sharply emphasized by him, that the heathen must return thither whence they came, is lost; since now Sheol is named as this place, the expression cannot be entirely the equivalent of “becoming dust again, sinking down to nothingness.” A glance is given into a dreadful condition after death, which is in close connection with the condemned. It is not their physical descent or their historical origin which is here stated, but their home, or the place to which they have shown in their earthly life that they belong.
Str. X. Psa_9:19. Let not man grow strong [Let not man prevail—A. V.—Hupf. and Perowne, et al., agree with the author. The idea is that God will not allow him to grow strong, so that he may carry out his designs. “Prevail” is too strong a word. Hupf.: “As God rises up, man is to cease from being strong, and appears in his weakness and nothingness.” Delitzsch and Ewald translate “defy,” but without sufficient grounds.—C. A. B.]
Psa_9:20. Terror [A. V.: “fear”].—Most interpreters regard מוֹרָה as an orthographical variation from מוֹרָא, so that the reference is to terrors of God (Gen_35:5). So already Chald. and Aquil. On the other hand, Sept., Syr., Vulg. translate according to the pointing מוֹרֶא=lawgiver, teacher. With Rabbi Isaki, however, A. Schultens, J. H. Michaelis, et al., regard the word of the text as Jdg_13:5, and frequently, as razor, and think of the cutting off of the beard as the greatest shame. Hitzig finally believes that the original reading was שְמוּרָה=set a guard for them, as an arrangement which hinders them from striking=hindrances. (In the first edit. of his Comm. he regards the word in question as a secondary form of תוֹרָה and as=חֹק, comp. Job_14:13; Jer_5:22, in order to get the same idea of hindrances. Symm. also has νόμον, but in the sense, give them instruction.) The singular אנוֹש is here not a collective, but emphasizes frailty as the characteristic of man when compared with God.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. He who has lived to see and experience the wonders of the Lord, feels compelled to narrate them. It is well if he can do this with thankfulness and joy. For it is the will of God that the honor due Him should be given publicly and that His name should be declared among all nations, in order that even the heathen may become acquainted with Him. For God Judges the world and all who dwell therein; but He saves also all who turn to Him. Therefore the world is afraid, but the Church rejoices; their hope will not be ashamed if only their faith falters not. For God’s temporal acts of judgment and salvation are only preludes to that which will take place at the end of days.
2. God does not postpone judgment and salvation till the end of the world, although times of trouble come for the pious and days of apparent victory for their enemies. He already judges in history individuals and nations, so that all traces of them are blotted out from the earth, and their name is forgotten. He likewise saves, blesses and raises up others who take refuge with Him and put their trust in Him. In order that they may find Him and learn to know Him, He has arranged and offered places where He reveals Himself, and services which bestow blessings, and means of grace and of salvation, as He has also established His judgment-seat in the midst of the world, and made the people to know that though He is enthroned in the heavens, He has not departed from man. However, it is made known what man has to expect at the last judgment, in that the names of those upon whom the Divine punishment falls will be forever blotted out, and that they will not only die, but they are to be sent back into the lower world as to their home; whilst the pious are raised up from the gates of death, and present their life in the Church as saved by grace, and thereby they strengthen and deepen their communion with the living and eternal God of salvation.
3. There is no direct declaration here of the resurrection of eternal life; the foundations and prerequisites of such a faith, merely, are laid and it is hinted at negatively in that the frailty of man is emphasized as a characteristic peculiar to him from birth and nature, and it is brought out prominently that his rebellion against God is vain and destructive, and the entire description of the Divine treatment of the wicked in His judicial dealings with them, leads to a separation made by God, which has begun in spiritual death, and has been continued in temporal death, as brought on by Divine punishment, and whose end is not yet announced, is also not yet to be seen, upon which, however, a dreadful perspective is opened. Hæc est continua fidei in hac vita exercitatio, gratias agere de victoria, et misericordiam implorare, ut vincas (Bugenhagen).
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The judgments of God are as unerring as they are unavoidable; as terrible as they are just; as salutary as they are necessary.—The arm of the Lord in just judgment casts down to hell those who forget Him, and raises up by grace from the gates of death to life in the Church those who take refuge with Him in the fulness of faith.—The rebellion of man against God and His holy ordinances is no less foolish than wicked, yet it is as guilty as it is weak and audacious.—God is essentially the helper of the needy; on this base your trust in every time of need.—God does not forget even those who forget Him; how should He not be mindful of those who daily call upon Him? It is likewise good for the pious to be reminded of death, judgment and hell.—The temporal consequences of sin are often now more severe than man can bear; but when they are regarded and received as the well-deserved punishments of the righteous God, the terrors which have fallen upon him on account of the Divine judgment may be wholesome for him; where they are not, death will bring him no deliverance.—The good that the Lord has done thee in silence, thou mayest confess publicly and thank Him for it in the Church.—Thankfulness of heart and the song of praise agree well together; the one unites man closer to God; the other edifies the Church and draws the attention of those who are without to the wonders of the Lord.—He whose life is saved by God from perils, will be used by God for the benefit of His kingdom and His Church.
Starke: All the benefits received from God are real wonders to the humble soul; for it is an inconceivable grace, that God the Lord should show so much mercy bodily and spiritual with wonderful wisdom and faithfulness to those who are in the highest degree unworthy.—The characteristic of a holy joy well pleasing to God, is that the heart and mouth are full of thankfulness and the praise of God.—God fights for His children, and he who fights against them fights against God Himself.—The enemies of the Church cannot be defeated at all by man or human power; but only by the omnipotence of God; for they are confederates of the mighty prince of darkness; therefore all the honor of the victory belongs to the Lord alone.—Where the fear of God retires there desolation follows; the curse presses upon that land and consumes it as with fire.—Because God abides forever, therefore those who trust in God and put their hope in God abide forever.—He who honors the name of the Lord truly and actively can never lack hope and faith.—Great is the kindness of God that He should dwell with believers! Great is His faithfulness that He should inquire for the blood of those who are oppressed and should not forget their cries.—The spiritual Zion is not confined to any place, in the world, but the Lord dwells everywhere where there are believers, and may be prayed to and praised in all respects.—If a man should merely tell the grace which has been bestowed upon himself he would have material enough to praise God daily without intermission.—It is a great blindness in the heart of the wicked that they should suppose God does not inquire after what is done in earth.—A man’s own words spoken in unbelief and his actions are snares and judgment enough for him. Forgetfulness of God is the source of all ungodliness and consequently of everlasting ruin.
Luther: That is truly a new kind of men, that live among the dead and are glad among the suffering.—Selnekker: He who has not taken refuge in time of need, easily supposes that faith is a mere delusion on the tongue; but he who enters the school where David has been, has a very different opinion.—Bake: Prayer must not originate with the tongue, but in the heart.—Arndt: We should pray and fight with the strength of the Spirit and of faith against great deeds of violence, if we would have the victory.—Herberger: Thanksgiving is the best sound at the table, in the house, in the Church and in the city; it will also be the everlasting sound of heaven.—God’s gracious gifts are simply undeserved wonders.—Unrighteousness destroys the land and the people.—Wicked advice does more harm to those who contrive it than to any one else.—Œtinger: Zion is indeed little and poor, but yet God dwells there.—Tholuck: The true kind of triumph in all our actions is to rejoice in God and praise the name of the Most High.—Taube: Thankfulness and prayer are the two parts between which, as between two levers going up and down, moves the entire militant Church of God, and every Christian heart which fights the good fight.—To true thanksgiving belong: 1) the entire heart, not half of it; 2) humility, to which all the benefits of God appear as inconceivable grace and pure wonders, as indeed they are; 3) modest faithfulness, which does not stop with the gift, but goes straight to the Giver and rests in Him alone; 4) the enlightened eye, which knows the true name of the Giver and declares it in accordance with the nature of the gift.
[Matth. Henry: The better God is known, the more He is trusted. Those who know Him to be a God of infinite wisdom will trust Him farther than they can see Him, Job_35:14; to be a God of almighty power, will trust Him when creature confidences fail, and they have nothing else to trust to, 2Ch_20:12; and to be a God of infinite grace and goodness, will trust Him though He slay them, Job_13:15. Those that know Him to be a God of inviolable truth and faithfulness will rejoice in His word of promise and rest upon that, though the performance be deferred and intermediate providences seem to contradict it. Those that know Him to be the Father of spirits, and an everlasting Father, will trust Him with their souls as their main care; and trust Him at all times even to the end.—Spurgeon: Gladness and joy are the appropriate spirit in which to praise the goodness of the Lord. Birds extol the Creator in notes of overflowing joy, the cattle low forth His praise with tumult of happiness, and the fish leap up in His worship with excess of delight. Moloch may be worshipped with shrieks of pain, and Juggernaut may be honored by dying groans and inhuman yells, but He whose name is Love is best pleased with holy mirth, and sanctified gladness of His people. Daily rejoicing is an ornament to the Christian character, and a suitable robe for God’s choristers to wear.—Thousands may come at once to the throne of the Judge of all the earth, but neither plaintiff nor defendant shall have to complain that He is not prepared to give their cause a fair hearing.—How the prospect of appearing before the impartial tribunal of the Great King should act as a check to us when tempted to sin, and as a comfort when we are slandered or oppressed.—Saints are not so selfish as to look only to self; they desire mercy’s diamond, that they may let others see it flash and sparkle, and may admire Him who gives such priceless gems to His beloved.—Prayers are the believer’s weapons of war. When the battle is too hard for us we call in our great ally, who, as it were, lies in ambush until faith gives the signal by crying out, “Arise, O Lord.”—One would think that men would not grow so vain as to deny themselves to be but men, but it appears to be a lesson which only a Divine school-master can teach to some proud spirits. Crowns leave their wearers but men, degrees of eminent learning make their owners not more than men, valor and conquest cannot elevate beyond the dead level of “but men,” and all the wealth of Crœsus, the wisdom of Solon, the power of Alexander, the eloquence of Demosthenes, if added together, would leave the possessor but a man.—Plumer: An occasional “God, I thank Thee,” is no fit return for a perpetual stream of rich benefits.—C. A. B.]
Footnotes:
[8][Delitzsch: “These two Psalms [9 and 10] show that David composed acrostics. And why not? Among the Romans also Ennius already composed acrostics (Cicero de divin. II., 54, § 111) who did not belong to the leaden, but to the iron age, from which the golden subsequently arose; and our most ancient German heroics are in the form of alliteration. Moreover, the alphabetic form is popular, as we see from Augustine, Retract, I. 20. It is not merely a weak substitute for the departed spirit of poetry, it is not merely an external ornament for the eye, it has itself a meaning. The didactic poet regards the row of letters as stairs up which he leads his pupil to the sanctuary of wisdom, or as the casket of many parts in which he places the pearl of his wisdom. And the lyric poet regards them as the harp upon all the strings of which he plays in order to express his feelings. Even the prophet does not scorn to allow the order of letters to exert an influence upon the order of his thought, as is clear from Nah_1:3-7. When now among the nine alphabetical Psalms (9, 10, 25, 34, 37, 111, 112, 119, 145.), four bear the name of David (9, 25, 34, 145) we will not regard them as not by David because the alphabetical arrangement is more or less thoroughly carried out.”—C. A. B.]
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 1, 2. I will praise—Each of the four lines…
1, 2. I will praise—Each of the four lines in these two verses begins with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, but beyond this the alphabetical arrangement is imperfect. The verses are replete with various expressions and modes of praise, as if the heart overflowed with joy.
Most High—An attributive name of God, who had shown himself to be the absolutely Supreme.
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 1. I will praise thee, O Lord] R.V., I…
1. I will praise thee, O Lord] R.V., I will give thanks unto the Lord, as in Psa_7:17.
with my whole heart] With the heart, not with the lips only (Isa_29:13): with the whole heart, acknowledging that all the honour is due to Jehovah. Cp. Deu_6:5. These conditions of true worship correspond to the divine attributes of omniscience (Psa_7:9), and ‘jealousy’ (Exo_34:14).
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thy marvellous works] A special term for the singular and conspicuous works of God, both in nature (Job_5:9), and in His dealings with His people (Exo_3:20), particularly in the great crises of their history (Psa_78:4; Psa_78:11; Psa_78:32), which declare His power and love, and arouse the admiration of all who behold them. The word includes ‘miracles’ commonly so called, as one limited class of ‘the wonderful works of God,’ but is of much wider application. To recount and celebrate His marvellous works is the duty and delight of God’s saints.
1–4. The Psalmist’s purpose to praise Jehovah for the recent manifestation of His righteous judgement in the defeat of His enemies. Each of the four lines in Psa_9:1-2 begins with Aleph, the first letter of the alphabet.
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 (1) The alphabetic arrangement is begun in its completest…
(1) The alphabetic arrangement is begun in its completest form. Every clause of the first stanza begins with Aleph.
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 This psalm, which, like the six preceding it, is…
This psalm, which, like the six preceding it, is declared by the title to be "a Psalm of David," is a song of thanksgiving for the defeat of some foreign enemy. It is the first of what are called "the alphabetic psalms;" but the law of alphabetic order is applied in it somewhat loosely and irregularly. All the four lines of the first stanza commence with aleph; but after this it is only the first line of each stanza that observes the law. And even this amount of observance is neglected in the last stanza. The poem is one of the most regular in its structure of all the psalms, consisting as it does of ten equal strophes of four lines each. The words in the title, "upon Muth-labben," have been variously explained; but no explanation hitherto given is satisfactory.
I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart; rather, I will give thanks (Kay, Cheyne, Revised Version). The thanks are special for a great deliverance a deliverance from some heathen enemy (vers. 5, 15), who has been signally defeated and almost exterminated (vers. 5, 6). It has been conjectured that the subjugation of Ammon (2Sa_12:26-31) is the occasion referred to ("Speaker"s Commentary"); but the expectation of further attack (vers. 17-20) scarcely suits this period, when David"s wars were well-nigh over. Perhaps the earlier victory over Ammon and Syria, (2Sa_10:6-14) which was followed by the renewed invasion of the same nations in conjunction with "the Syrians beyond the river", (2Sa_10:16) is more likely to have drawn forth the composition. I will show forth all thy marvellous works; rather, I will tell forth, or I will recount all thy wondrous deeds. Not necessarily miracles, but any strange and unexpected deliverances, such as the recent one. (comp. Psa_40:5 Psa_78:4)
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HOMILIES BY C. CLEMANCE Vers. 1-20. Praise for the destroyer"s destruction.
The title of this psalm is obscure. Its archaisms cannot now be satisfactorily explained. And even a reference to the most learned expositors may possibly only increase the confusion. The title, indeed, is very suggestive. It reads, "Upon the death of Labben." Walford regards "Muth-labben" as the name of a musical instrument. For this we can find no warrant. The word muth, which is equivalent to "death," seems to put us on a line of thought which is, at any rate, in harmony with the entire psalm. If we grant (as appears from the whole tenor of the verses) that the reference is to the death of some enemy, by whose plots and snares the people of God were imperilled, the whole song reads naturally enough. Whether we read "Labben" as a proper name, or read it "of the Son," or regard the psalm as referring to the death of Goliath of Gath, is of no consequence as regards its general meaning or spiritual significance. Delitzsch, indeed, says, "This psalm is a thoroughly national song of thanksgiving for victory by David, belonging to the time when Jahve was already enthroned on Zion (ver. 14), and therefore to the time after the ark was brought home." He asks," Was it composed after the triumphant extermination of the Syro-Ammonitish War?" Hengstenberg remarks, "The relation which David had in view when he composed this psalm for public use was that of the Church of God to its external enemies." Note: It is a fitting occasion for sanctuary-song when God"s people are delivered from threatening perils. Many English hearts would send up such a shout of praise as we find here, over England"s deliverance from the Spanish Armada. The joy, however, was not in its destruction, but in Britain"s safety. For a pulpit exposition of the psalm, we have five lines of thought presented to us.
I WE HAVE HERE SHOWN US IN WHAT PERIL GOD"S PEOPLE HAD BEEN PLACED. Although we cannot be sure to what specific events this psalm refers, yet several phrases therein show us the kind of peril to which the writer alludes, and thus put both expositor and preacher on the line for usefully and helpfully dealing therewith on any special occasion when unusual perils beset the Church of God. E.g.:
1. Enemies (ver. 3).
2. Oppression (ver. 12).
3. Murder (ver. 12).
4. Deceit (ver. 15).
Four formidable terms, surely sufficiently typical of perils which have had to be confronted again and again in the history of God"s Church, whether from paganism, or from the papacy, or from mere worldly hostility to goodness and truth.
II GOD HAD WROUGHT A GREAT DELIVERANCE FOR HIS PEOPLE. The psalm is, owing to this deliverance, one of triumph and joy.
1. It was so illustrious as to be altogether marvellous, yea, miraculous (ver. 1).
2. God had manifested his judgments (ver. 7).
3. He had rebuked the nations (ver. 5).
4. Had brought guilty cities low, and even blotted them out (ver.6).
5. Had shown himself as the Goel, the Avenger of innocent blood (ver. 12).
6. Had manifested his remembrance of the poor and of the oppressed (ver. 12).
7. Had made the devices of the wicked to recoil upon themselves.
These are but so many illustrative forms of the way in which God"s providence is ever working in the world, even now, under the administration of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is Head over all things to his Church.
III SUCH DELIVERANCES HAD THROWN GREAT LIGHT ON GOD"S CHARACTER, WORKS, AND WAYS. They had shown:
1. How truly there is a throne high above all the scheming and plotting of men (ver. 7)!
2. That under the sway of that throne judgment is administered for all who are oppressed.
3. That this judgment is manifested in vindicating right and putting wrong to shame (vers. 7, 8).
4. That such glorious and gracious government reveals the lustre of God"s everlasting Name. All providential dealings are disclosers of God. "Whoso is wise, and will observe these things, even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord.
IV A SONG OF GRATITUDE, TRIUMPH, AND TRUST IS HEREBY AWAKENED. The very beginning of the psalm is an outburst of thankfulness (ver. 1). The psalmist gathers from deliverances already effected, a ground of trust in God for future days (vers. 9, 10). Judgments already brought to pass prove that God will not let evil deeds slumber in everlasting forgetfulness, and that he will not let the cry of the humble and downtrodden remain for ever unheard (ver. 12). Yea, more. They prove the glorious truth which is triumphantly proclaimed in ver. 17, "The wicked shall return to Sheol, and all the nations that forget God." Few verses, indeed, have been more violently twisted than this to make it suit the exigencies of mediaeval theology. It has been repeatedly dealt with as if it were a sentence on the wicked of everlasting woe. The question of future punishment is dealt with clearly enough in other parts of the Word of God. But it is not that which is intended here. The verse means God will not suffer wicked people or nations perpetually to oppress the Church. In a little, in his own good time, they shall return to the dust whence they came, and enter the invisible realm of the dead. That this is the meaning intended is shown by the verse which follows. (ver. 18; cf. also Psa_37:10) Cheer up, ye poor, despised, and oppressed people of God! Your Vindicator liveth. He will bring you forth to the light when your foes shall have vanished from the scene.
V THE GRATEFUL SONG OVER MERCIES PAST IS FOLLOWED BY A PRAYER THAT MERCIES YET NEEDED MAY BE VOUCHSAFED.
1. Although there had been a marked deliverance, yet the affliction from which the psalmist had suffered still left its scars upon him. Hence the prayer in vers. 13, 14. The oppression and the oppressor may be speedily removed, but the depression thereby caused lasts long after. And only the. prolonged bestowal of grace to help in time of need will ever be sufficient to meet the case.
2. The future security of the world depends on the manifestation of the Divine presence and power; in counteracting the base designs of men, in asserting the right, and avenging the wrong (ver. 19).
3. This can only be done, perhaps, by such judgments as will make the nations tremble, and so will cause them to feel their utter impotence in the grasp of the mighty God (ver. 20).
Note: The remarks, applicable to so many psalms, should not be overlooked here.
1. That we have here, not words of God to man, but words of man to God. Hence they may or may not be models for our imitation. Anyway, no inspiration in prayer can rise above the level of the revelation which had been granted where and when such prayer was offered.
2. Although, in every country and age, prayer from the heart must be limited by the measure of light in the conscience, yet a gracious God will answer it, not according to its limitation or imperfection, but according to his infinite wisdom, his boundless love, and his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
3. The Divine answers to such prayers as we find in the psalm, although they bring deliverance to the righteous, will bring terror and confusion to the wicked. The destruction of Pharaoh"s host is the salvation of the hosts of the Lord. C.
HOMILIES BY C. SHORT Vers. 1-6. Thanksgiving.
This and the following psalm have been considered one poem, written by the same author. This one is in a continued strain of triumph throughout, and was composed, perhaps, by David at the conclusion of the Syro-Ammonite War, or after one of his victories over the Philistines.
I NATURE OF THE PSALMIST"S THANKSGIVING.
1. All his powers of mind and soul took part in it. "With my whole heart." He ascribed his deliverances to God, and not to himself; therefore he was not half-hearted in his praise.
2. He gathered up in his mental vision the mercies of a lifetime. "All thy marvellous works." He was filled with a sense of wonder when he thought of the long succession of God"s marvel-lolls ways towards him. The last deliverance did not blot out the memory of those that had gone before.
3. God"s condescension filled him with rejoicing gratitude. He felt that God was "most High," and that he had wonderfully stooped to regard him and his affairs the same thought as in the previous psalm.
II THE GROUNDS OF THE PSALMIST"S THANKSGIVING. Speaking generally, it was for deliverance from his enemies. The language here suggests:
1. That the sense of God"s presence with us nerves us against our greatest dangers. (Ver. 3) Perils and temptations lose their power over us when we know God to be with us.
2. God"s deliverances from evil spring out of his regard for what is right. (Ver. 4) God"s righteousness is as much concerned for our salvation as his love and mercy. The rescue of a soul from sin satisfies the sense of infinite right, and is part of the eternal administration of God.
3. The psalmist saw in prospect the certain destruction of all wickedness, both individual and social. (Vers. 5, 6) The prospect of the prevalence and reign of righteousness filled him with holy gladness and thanksgiving. Not only himself, but all righteous persons, would then enjoy peace and safety. One evil man can do much mischief, and work wide ruin; but when cities and governments become corrupt, their power for evil sweeps all virtue out of its path. Therefore David rejoiced in their extirpation. Let us cultivate a thankful spirit for all the wonderful deliverances which God has made possible and actual to us. S.
Vers. 1-6. The cause of gratitude.
To derive benefit from the study of any ancient writings, we must translate them into our present forms of thought and ways of thinking. David as king sang these hymns to God for the nation and to the nation, and for himself; for he and the people were one. It is difficult for us to realize this, being, as we are, in lower stations and with an intenser feeling of our individuality.
I THE PRELUDE TO THIS SONG. He praises God for his marvellous works and for his supremacy.
1. They captivated and subdued his whole nature: "With my whole heart.
2. They filled him with joy.
3. He published them to others.
II THE SPECIAL CAUSES OF HIS GRATITUDE. God had judged his cause and maintained the right by subduing his enemies.
1. We too have enemies to be subdued difficulties and temptations and hindrances which threaten our safety and destroy our peace.
2. David overlooks his own instrumentality in his victories by thinking only of the great First Cause of them. He saw God in everything. We lose sight of the cause in the instrument, and are not so devout as he. We see law where he saw a person. The highest men see both the law which prescribes the way of conquest, and him who imparts the needed strength to obey.
III DAVID REJOICED OVER THE COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF HIS ENEMIES.
1. He thought it right to rejoice over the destruction of human life; for he thought God sanctioned and did it.
2. Our outward difficulties may vanish, while the inward may remain.
3. We shall fully rejoice only when all our enemies, inward and outward, are vanquished. 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 To the Chief Musician upon Muth-labben, a Psalm of…
To the Chief Musician upon Muth-labben, a Psalm of David. The meaning of this title is very doubtful. It may refer to the tune to which the Psalm was to be sung, so Wilcocks and others think; or it may refer to a musical instrument now unknown, but common in those days; or it may have a reference to Ben, who is mentioned in 1Ch 15:18, as one of the Levitical singers. If either of these conjectures should be correct, the title of Muth-Labben has no teaching for us, except it is meant to show us how careful David was that in the worship of God, all things should be done according to due order. From a considerable company of learned witnesses we gather that the title will bear a meaning far more instructive, without being fancifully forced: it signifies a Psalm concerning the death of the Son. The Chaldee has, "concerning the death of the Champion who went out between the camps, "referring to Goliath of Gath, or some other Philistine, on account of whose death many suppose this Psalm to have been written in after years by David. Believing that out of a thousand guesses this is at least as consistent with the sense of the Psalm as any other, we prefer it; and the more especially so because it enables us to refer it mystically to the victory of the Son of God over the champion of evil, even to enemy of souls (Ps 9:6). We have here before us most evidently a triumphal hymn; may it strengthen the faith of the militant believer and stimulate the courage of the timid saint, as he sees here THE CONQUEROR, on whose vesture and thigh is the name written, King of kings and Lord of lords.
ORDER. Bonar remarks, "The position of the Psalms in their relation to each other is often remarkable." It is questioned whether the present arrangement of them was the order to which they were given forth to Israel, or whether some later compiler, perhaps Ezra, was inspired to attend to this matter, as well as to other points connected with the canon. Without attempting to decide this point, it is enough to remark that we have proof that the order of the Psalms is as ancient as the completing of the canon, and if so, it seems obvious that the Holy Spirit wished this book to come down to us in its present order. We make these remarks, in order to invite attention to the fact, that as the eighth caught up the last line of the seventh, this ninth Psalm opens with an apparent reference to the eighth:
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"I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy marvellous works.
I will be glad and rejoice in thee.
(Compare So 1:4 Re 19:7) I will sing to THY NAME, O thou Most High." Psalms 1-2.
As if "The Name, "so highly praised in the former Psalm, were still ringing in the ear of the sweet singer of Israel. And in Ps 9:10, he returns to it, celebrating their confidence who "know" that "name" as if its fragrance still breathed in the atmosphere around.
The strain so continually changes, that it is difficult to give an outline of it methodically arranged: we give the best we can make. From Ps 9:1-6 is a song of jubilant thanksgiving; from
Ps 9:7-12, there is a continued declaration of faith as to the future. Prayer closes the first great division of the Psalm in Ps 9:13-14. The second portion of this triumphal ode, although much shorter, is parallel in all its parts to the first portion, and is a sort of rehearsal of it. Observe the song for past judgments, Ps 9:15-16; the declaration of trust in future justice, Ps 9:17-18; and the closing prayer, Ps 9:19-20. Let us celebrate the conquests of the Redeemer as we read this Psalm, and it cannot but be a delightful task if the Holy Ghost be with us.
Ver. 1. With a holy resolution the songster begins his hymn;
I will praise thee, O Lord. It sometimes needs all our determination to face the foe, and bless the Lord in the teeth of his enemies; vowing that whoever else may be silent we will bless his name; here, however, the overthrow of the foe is viewed as complete, and the song flows with sacred fulness of delight. It is our duty to praise the Lord; let us perform it as a privilege. Observe that David's praise is all given to the Lord. Praise is to be offered to God alone; we may be grateful to the intermediate agent, but our thanks must have long wings and mount aloft to heaven.
With my whole heart. Half heart is no heart.
I will show forth. There is true praise to the thankful telling forth to others of our heavenly Father's dealings with us; this is one of the themes upon which the godly should speak often to one another, and it will not be casting pearls before swine if we make even the ungodly hear of the lovingkindness of the Lord to us.
All thy marvellous works. Gratitude for one mercy refreshes the memory as to thousands of others. One silver link in the chain draws up a long series of tender remembrances. Here is eternal work for us, for there can be no end to the showing forth of all his deeds of love. If we consider our own sinfulness and nothingness, we must feel that every work of preservation, forgiveness, conversion, deliverance, sanctification, etc., which the Lord has wrought for us, or in us is a marvellous work. Even in heaven, divine lovingkindness will doubtless be as much a theme of surprise as of rapture.
Whole Psalm. We are to consider this song of praise, as I conceive, to be the language of our great Advocate and Mediator, "in the midst of the church giving thanks unto God, "and teaching us to anticipate by faith his great and final victory over all the adversaries of our peace temporal and spiritual, with especial reference to his assertion of his royal dignity on Zion, his holy mountain. The victory over the enemy, we find by the fourth verse, is again ascribed to the decision of divine justice, and the award of a righteous judge, who has at length resumed his tribunal. This renders it certain, that the claim preferred to the throne of the Almighty, could proceed from the lips of none but our MELCHISEDEC. John Fry, B.A., 1842.
Ver. 1. I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart. As a vessel by the scent thereof tells what liquor is in it, so should our mouths smell continually of that mercy wherewith our hearts have been refreshed: for we are called vessels of mercy. William Cowper, 1612.
Ver. 1. I will praise the Lord with my whole heart, I will shew forth all thy marvellous works. The words With my whole heart, serve at once to show the greatness of the deliverance wrought for the psalmist, and to distinguish him from the hypocrites the coarser, who praise the Lord for his goodness merely with the lips; and the more refined, who praise him with just half their heart, while they secretly ascribe the deliverance more to themselves than to him. All thy wonders, the marvellous tokens of thy grace. The psalmist shows by this term, he recognized them in all their greatness. Where this is done, there the Lord is also praised with the whole heart. Half heartedness, and the depreciation of divine grace, go hand in hand. The b is the b instrum. The heart is the instrument of praise, the mouth only its organ. E.W. Hengstenberg.
Ver. 1. (second clause). When we have received any special good thing from the Lord, it is well, according as we have opportunities, to tell others of it. When the woman who had lost one of her ten pieces of silver, found the missing portion of her money, she gathered her neighbours and her friends together, saying, "Rejoice with me, for I have found the piece which I had lost." We may do the same; we may tell friends and relations that we have received such and such a blessing, and that we trace it directly to the hand of God. Why have we not already done this? Is there a lurking unbelief as to whether it really came from God; or are we ashamed to own it before those who are perhaps accustomed to laugh at such things? Who knows so much of the marvellous works of God as his own people; if they be silent, how can we expect the world to see what he has done? Let us not be ashamed to glorify God, by telling what we know and feel he has done; let us watch our opportunity to bring out distinctly the fact of his acting; let us feel delighted at having an opportunity, from our own experience, of telling what must turn to his praise; and them that honour God, God will honour in turn; if we be willing to talk of his deeds, he will give us enough to talk about. P. B. Power, in "I Wills" of the Psalms.
Ver. 1-2. I will confess unto thee, O Lord, with my whole heart, etc. Behold with what a flood of the most sweet affections he says that he will confess, show forth, rejoice, be glad, and sing, being filled with ecstasy! He does not simply say, "I will confess, but, with my heart, and with my whole heart." Nor does he propose to speak simply of "works, "but of the marvellous works of God, and of all those "works." Thus his spirit (like John in the womb) exults and rejoices in God his Saviour, who has done great things for him, and those marvellous things which follow. In which words are opened the subject of this Psalm: that is, that he therein sings the marvellous works of God. And these works are wonderful, because he converts, by those who are nothing, those who have all things, and, by the ALMUTH who live in hidden faith, and are dead to the world, he humbles those who flourish in glory, and are looked upon in the world. Thus accomplishing such mighty things without force, without arms, without labour, by the cross only and blood. But how will his saying, that he will show forth "all" his marvellous works, agree with that of Job 9:10, "which doeth great things past finding out; yea, and wonders without number"? For, who can show forth all the marvellous works of God? We may say, therefore, that these things are spoken in that excess of feeling in which he said, (Ps 6:6), "I will water my couch with my tears." That is, he hath such an ardent desire to speak of the wonderful works of God, that, as far as his wishes are concerned, he would set the "all" forth, though he could not do it, for love has neither bounds nor end: and, as Paul saith (1Co 13:7), "Love beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things; "hence it can do all things, and does do all things, for God looketh at the heart and spirit. Martin Luther.
Ver. 1.
1. The only object of our praise thee, O Lord.
2. The abundant themes of praise all thy marvellous works.
3. The proper nature of praise with my whole heart. B. Davies.
Ver. 1. I will show forth. Endless employment and enjoyment.
Ver. 1. Thy marvellous works. Creation, Providence, Redemption, are all marvellous, as exhibiting the attributes of God in such a degree as to excite the wonder of all God's universe. A very suggestive topic.
Ver. 1-2. I will confess unto thee, O Lord, with my whole heart, See Psalms on "Ps 9:1" 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 I will praise Thee, O Lord.
Psa_9:1-20
I will praise Thee, O Lord.
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Praise, trust, and prayer
In the Septuagint, this Psalm refers to the death of the Divine Son, and recites His victory over death, the grave, and all our foes.
I. There is a predominant note of praise. (Verses 1-5, 11, 12, 14.) Let us not praise with a divided, but a whole heart. It is incited by recounting all Gods works. Let memory heap fuel on the altar of praise.
II. There is an assertion of trust. (Verses 7-12, 18.) The oppressed, the humble, the needy, and the poor have strong encouragement. Calamity drives them to God, and so they come to know Him, and then the more they trust Him. Doubt is born of ignorance. Leave God to vindicate you; He will not forget.
III. There is a petition for further help. (Verses 13, 19, 20.) What a contrast between the gates of death (Psa_9:13), and the gates of the Holy City (Psa_9:14)! See Haman as illustrating Psa_9:15. He who lifts the righteous, hurls down the wicked. It is a sin to forget God (Psa_9:17). (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
The ministry of praise
I will praise Thee. That is the note that is too commonly silent in our religious life. We rarely gather together for the supremely exhilarating business of praise. In the Psalm is a man who sets himself to the business of praise, as though he were about to engage in a great matter. He sets about it with undivided attention--with my whole heart. The word heart is a spacious word. It includes all the interior things, all the central things; when a man comes to praise, will, intellect, and imagination must all be active. He must bring to the ministry of praise the worship of his feelings. Come will, and make my praise forceful. Come intellect, and make it enlightened. Come feeling, and make it affectionate. In the words, I will sow forth, is suggested that he will score it as with a mark, he will not allow it to slip by unrecorded. He will keep a journal of mercies. He will not only register the marvellous works, he will publish them. The word is suggestive not only of a notebook, but of a proclamation. I will rejoice, the word is suggestive of the exulting bubbling of the spring. The two words, glad, rejoice, together give us the image of the leaping waters with the sunshine on them. And such is always the joy of the Lord. It is fresh as the spring, and warm and cheering as the sunlight. (J. H. Jowett, M. A.)
A praiseful heart
We should praise God more, and thank Him more often for His ceaseless goodness. How can we forget His countless benefits? Dean Alford said, It seems to me that five minutes of real thanksgiving for the love of our dear Saviour is worth a year of hard reasoning on the hidden parts of our redemption. Of the last days of the Venerable Bede, his disciple Cuthbert wrote, He was much troubled with shortness of breath, yet without pain, before the day of our Lords resurrection, that is, for about a fortnight, and thus he afterwards passed his life cheerful and rejoicing, giving thanks to Almighty God every day and night, nay, every hour, till the day of our Lords ascension. He also passed all the night awake in joy and thanksgiving, unless a short sleep prevented it, in which case he no sooner awoke than he presently repeated his wonted exercises, and ceased not to give thanks to God with uplifted hands. I declare with truth that I have never seen with my eyes, or heard with my ears, any man so earnest in giving thanks to the living God.
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 Psalms 9
Psalms 9
Psalms 7 and 9 are connected by the recurrence of the two thoughts of God as the Judge of nations and the wicked falling into the pit which he digged. Probably the original arrangement of the Psalter put these two next each other, and Psalms 8 was inserted later.
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Psalms 9 is imperfectly acrostic. It falls into strains of two verses each, which are marked by sequence of thought as well as by the acrostic arrangement. The first begins with Aleph, the second with Beth, and so on, the second verse of each pair not being counted in the scheme. The fourth letter is missing, and Psa_9:7, which should begin with it, begins with the sixth. But a textual correction, which is desirable on other grounds, makes the fifth letter (He) the initial of Psa_9:7, and then the regular sequence is kept up till Psa_9:19, which should begin with the soft K, but takes instead the guttural Q. What has become of the rest of the alphabet? Part of it is found in Psalms 10, where the first verse begins with the L, which should follow the regular K for Psa_9:19. But there is no more trace of acrostic structure in 10 till Psa_10:12, which resumes it with the Q which has already appeared out of place in Psa_9:19; and it goes on to the end of the alphabet, with only the irregularity that the R strain {Psa_10:14} has but one verse. Verses with the missing letters would just about occupy the space of the non-acrostic verses in Psalms 10, and the suggestion is obvious that the latter are part of some other psalm which has been substituted for the original; but there are links of connection between the non-acrostic and acrostic portions of Psalms 10, which make that hypothesis difficult. The resemblances between the two psalms as they stand are close, and the dissimilarities not less obvious. The psalmists enemies are different. In the former they are foreign, in the latter domestic. Psalms 8 rings with triumph; Psalms 10 is in a minor key. The former celebrates a judgment as accomplished which the latter almost despairingly longs to see begun. On the whole, the two were most probably never formally one, but are a closely connected pair. There is nothing to discredit the Davidic authorship. The singers enemies are "nations" and the destruction of these foreign foes is equivalent to "maintaining his cause." That would be language natural in the mouth of a king, and there were foreign wars enough in Davids reign to supply appropriate occasions for such a song. The psalm falls into two parts, Psa_9:1-12 and Psa_9:13-20, of which the second substantially repeats the main thoughts of the first, but with a significant difference. In the first part the sequence is praise and its occasion (Aleph and Beth verses, Psa_9:1-4), triumphant recounting of accomplished judgment (Gimel Psa_9:5-6), confident expectation of future wider judgment (amended He and Vav pairs, Psa_9:7-10), and a final call to praise. {Psa_7:12} Thus set, as it were, in a circlet of praise, are experience of past and consequent confidence of future deliverance. The second part gives the same order, only, instead of praise, it has prayer for its beginning and end, the two central portions remaining the same as in part 1. The Cheth pair (Psa_9:13-14) is prayer, the deliverance not being perfected, though some foes have fallen; the past act of accomplished judgment is again celebrated in the Teth pair (Psa_9:15-16), followed, as before, by the triumphant confidence of future complete crushing of enemies (Yod strain, Psa_9:17-18); and all closes with prayer (Qoph pair, Psa_9:19-20). Thus the same thoughts are twice dwelt on; and the different use made of them is the explanation of the repetition, which strikes a cursory reader as needless. The diamond is turned a little in the hand, and a differently tinted beam flashes from its facet.
In the first pair of verses, the song rushes out like some river breaking through a dam and flashing as it hurries on its course. Each short clause begins with Aleph; each makes the same fervid resolve. Wholehearted praise is sincere, and all the singers being is fused into it. "All Thy marvellous works" include the great deliverances of the past, with which a living sense of Gods working associates those of the present, as one in character and source. Today is as full of God to this man as the sacred yesterdays of national history, and his deliverances as wonderful as those of old. But high above the joy in Gods work is the joy in Himself to which it leads, and "Thy name, O thou Most High," is the ground of all pure delight and the theme of all worthy praise.
The second stanza (Beth, Psa_9:3-4) is best taken as giving the ground of praise. Render in close connection with preceding "because mine enemies turn back; they stumble and perish at [or from] Thy presence." Gods face blazes out on the foe, and they turn and flee from the field, but in their flight they stumble, and, like fugitives, once fallen can rise no more. The underlying picture is of a battlefield and a disastrous rout. it is Gods coming into action that scatters the enemy, as Psa_9:4 tells by its "for." When he took His seat on the throne (of judgment rather than of royalty), they fled; and that act of assuming judicial activity was the maintaining of the psalmists cause.
The third pair of verses (Gimel, Psa_9:5-6) dwells on the grand picture of judgment, and specifies for the first time the enemies as "the nations" or "heathen," thus showing that the psalmist is not a private individual, and probably implying that the whole psalm is a hymn of victory, in which the heat of battle still glows, but which writes no name on the trophy but that of God. The metaphor of a judgment seat is exchanged for a triumphant description of the destructions fallen on the land of the enemy, in all which God alone is recognised as the actor. "Thou hast rebuked"; and just as His creative word was all powerful, so His destructive word sweeps its objects into nothingness. There is a grand and solemn sequence in that "Thou hast rebuked; Thou hast destroyed." His breath has made; His breath can unmake. In Psa_9:6 the rendering to be preferred is substantially that of the R.V: "The enemy are ended, [they are] ruins forever, and cities hast Thou rooted out; perished is their memory." To take "enemy" as a vocative breaks the continuity of the address to God, and brings in an irrelevant reference to the former conquests of the foe ("Thou hast destroyed cities") which is much more forcible if regarded as descriptive of Gods destruction of his cities. "Their memory" refers to the enemy, not to the cities. Utter, perpetual ruin, so complete that the very name is forgotten, has fallen on the foe.
In the fourth pair of verses a slight emendation of the text is approved of by most critics. The last word of Psa_9:6 is the pronoun "they," which. though possible in such a position, is awkward. If it is transferred to the beginning of Psa_9:7, and it is further supposed that "are perished" has dropped out, as might easily be the case, from the verb having just occurred in the singular, a striking antithesis is gained: "They perish, but Jehovah shall sit," etc. Further, the pair of verses then begins with the fifth letter; and the only irregularity in the acrostic arrangement till Psa_9:19 is the omission of the fourth letter: Daleth. A very significant change in tenses takes place at this point. Hitherto the verbs have been perfects, implying a finished act; that is to say, hitherto the psalm has been dealing with facts of recent but completed experience. Now the verbs change to imperfects or futures, and continue so till Psa_9:12; that is to say, "experience doth attain to something of prophetic strain," and passes into confidence for the future. That confidence is cast in the mould supplied by the deliverance on which it is founded. The smaller act of judgment, which maintained the psalmists cause, expands into a world wide judgment in righteousness, for which the preparations are already made. "He hath prepared His throne for judgment" is the only perfect in the series. This is the true point of view from which to regard the less comprehensive acts of judgment thinly sown through history, when God has arisen to smite some hoary iniquity or some godless conqueror. Such acts are premonitions of the future. and every "day of the Lord" is a miniature of that final dies irae. The psalmist probably was rather thinking of other acts of judgment which would free him and his people from hostile nations, but his hope was built on the great truth that all such acts are prophecies of others like them, and it is a legitimate extension of the same principle to view them all in relation to the last and greatest of the series.
The fifth pair (Vav stanza, Psa_9:9-10) turns to the glad contemplation of the purpose of all the pomp and terror of the judgment thus hoped for. The Judge is seated on high, and His elevation makes a "lofty stronghold" for the crushed or downtrodden.
The rare word rendered "extremity" in Psa_9:9 occurs only here and in Psa_10:1. It means a cutting off, i.e., of hope of deliverance. The notion of distress intensified to despair is conveyed. Gods judgments show that even in such extremity He is an inexpugnable defence, like some hill fortress, inaccessible to any foe. A further result of judgment is the (growing) trust of devout souls (Psa_9:10). To "know Thy name" is here equivalent to learning Gods character as made known by His acts, especially by the judgments anticipated. For such knowledge some measure of devout trust is required, but further knowledge deepens trust. The best teacher of faith is experience; and, on the other hand, the condition of such experience is faith. The action of knowledge and of trust is reciprocal. That trust is reinforced by the renewed evidence, afforded by the judgments, that Jehovah does not desert them that seek Him. To "seek Him" is to long for Him, to look for His help in trouble, to turn with desire and obedience to Him in daily life; and anything is possible rather than that He should not disclose and give Himself to such search. Trust and seeking, fruition and desire, the repose of the soul on God and its longing after God, are inseparable. They are but varying aspects of the one thing. When a finite spirit cleaves to the infinite God, there must be longing as an element in all possession and possession as an element in all longing; and both will be fed by contemplation of the self-revealing acts which are the syllables of His name.
Section 6, the last of the first part (Zayin, Psa_9:11-12), circles round to section 1, and calls on all trusters and seekers to be a chorus to the solo of praise therein. The ground of the praise is the same past act which has been already set forth as that of the psalmists thanksgiving, as is shown by the recurrence here of perfect tenses (hath remembered; hath not forgotten). The designation of God as "dwelling" in Zion is perhaps better rendered, with allusion to the same word in Psa_9:7, "sitteth." His seat had been there from the time that the Ark was brought thither. That earthly throne was the type of his heavenly seat, and from Zion He is conceived as executing judgment. The world wide destination of Israels knowledge of God inspires the call to "show forth His doings" to "the peoples." The "nations" are not merely the objects of destructive wrath, but are to be summoned to share in the blessing of knowing His mighty acts. The psalmist may not have been able to harmonise these two points of view as to Israels relation to the Gentile world, but both thoughts vibrate in his song. The designation of God as "making inquisition for blood" thinks of him as the Goel, or Avenger. To seek means, here to demand back as one who had entrusted property to another who had destroyed it would do, thence to demand compensation or satisfaction, and thus finally comes to mean to avenge or punish (so Hupfeld, Delitzsch, etc.). "The poor" or "meek" (R.V and margin) whose cry is heard are the devout portion of the Jewish people, who are often spoken of in the Psalms and elsewhere as a class.
The second part of the psalm begins with Psa_9:13. The prayer in that verse is the only trace of trouble in the psalm. The rest is triumph and exultation. This, at first sight discordant, note has sorely exercised commentators; and the violent solution that the whole Cheth stanza (Psa_9:13-14) should be regarded as "the cry of the meek," quoted by the psalmist, and therefore be put in inverted commas (though adopted by Delitzsch and Cheyne), is artificial and cold. If the view of the structure of the psalm given above is adopted, there is little difficulty in the connection. The victory has been completed over certain enemies, but there remain others; and the time for praise unmingled with petition has not yet come for the psalmist, as it never comes for any of us in this life. Quatre Bras is won, but Waterloo has to be fought tomorrow. The prayer takes account of the dangers still threatening, but it only glances at these, and then once more turns to look with hope on the accomplished deliverance. The thought of how God had lifted the suppliant up from the very gates of death heartens him to pray for all further mercy needed. Death is the lord of a gloomy prison house, the gates of which open inwards only and permit no egress. On its very threshold the psalmist had stood. But God had lifted him thence, and the remembrance wings his prayer. "The gates of the daughter of Zion" are in sharp, happy contrast with the frowning portals of death. A citys gates are the place of cheery life, stir, gossip, business. Anything proclaimed there flies far. There the psalmist resolves that he will tell his story of rescue, which he believes was granted that it might be told. Gods purpose in blessing men is that they may open their lips to proclaim the blessings and so bring others to share in them. Gods end is the spread of his name, not for any good to Him, but because to know it is life to us.
The Teth pair (Psa_9:15-16) repeats the thoughts of the Gimel Stanza (Psa_9:5-6), recurring to the same significant perfects and dwelling on the new thought that the destruction of the enemy was self-caused. As in Psalms 7, the familiar figure of the pitfall catching the hunter expresses the truth that all evil, and especially malice, recoils on its contriver. A companion illustration is added of the fowlers (or hunters) foot being caught in his own snare. Psa_9:16 presents the other view of retribution, which was the only one in Psa_9:5-6, namely that it is a Divine act. It is God who executes judgment, and who "snareth the wicked," though it be "the work of his own hands" which weaves the snare. Both views are needed for the complete truth. This close of the retrospect of deliverance which is the main motive of the psalm is appropriately marked by the musical direction "Higgaion. Selah," which calls for a strain of instrumental music to fill the pause of the song and to mark the rapture of triumph in accomplished deliverance.
The Yod stanza (Psa_9:17-18), like the He and Vav stanzas (Psa_9:7-10), passes to confidence for the future. The correspondence is very close, but the two verses of this stanza represent the four of the earlier ones; thus Psa_9:17 answers to Psa_9:7-8, while Psa_9:18 is the representative of Psa_9:9-10. In Psa_9:17 the "return to Sheol" is equivalent to destruction. In one view, men who cease to be may be regarded as going back to original nothingness, as in Psa_90:3. Sheol is not here a place of punishment, but is the dreary dwelling of the dead, from the gates of which the psalmist had been brought up. Reduction to nothingness and yet a shadowy, dim life or death-in-life will certainly be the end of the wicked. The psalmists experience in his past deliverance entitles him to generalise thus. To forget God is the sure way to be forgotten. The reason for the certain destruction of the nations who forget God and for the psalmists assurance of it is (Psa_9:18) the confidence he has that "the needy shall not always be forgotten." That confidence corresponds precisely to Psa_9:9-10, and also looks back to the "hath remembered" and "not forgotten" of Psa_9:12. They who remember God are remembered by Him; and their being remembered- i.e. by deliverance-necessitates the wickeds being forgotten, and those who are forgotten by God perish. The second clause of Psa_9:18 echoes the other solemn word of doom from Psa_9:3-6. There the fate of the evil-doers was set forth as "perishing"; their very memory was to "perish." But the "expectation of the poor shall not perish." Apparently fragile and to the eve of sense unsubstantial as a soap bubble, the devout mans hope is more solid than the most solid-seeming realities, and will outlast them all.
The final stanza (Psa_9:19-20) does not take Kaph as it should do, but Qoph. Hence some critics suspect that this pair of verses has been added by another hand, but the continuity of sense is plain, and is against this supposition. The psalmist was not so bound to his form but that he could vary it, as here. The prayer of this concluding stanza circles round to the prayer in Psa_9:13, as has been noticed, and so completes the whole psalm symmetrically. The personal element in Psa_9:13 has passed away; and the prayer is general, just as the solo of praise in Psa_9:1 broadened into the call for a chorus of voices in Psa_9:12. The scope of the prayer is the very judgment which the previous stanza has contemplated as certain. The devout mans desires are moulded on Gods promises, and his prayers echo these. "Let not mortal man grow strong," or rather "vaunt his strength." The word for man here connotes weakness. How ridiculous for him, being such as he is, to swell and swagger as if strong, and how certain his boasted strength is to shrivel like a leaf in the fire, if God should come forth, roused to action by his boasting! Psa_9:20 closes the prayer with the cry that some awe-inspiring act of Divine justice may be flashed before the "nations," in order to force the conviction of their own weakness home to them. "Set terror for them," the word terror meaning not the emotion, but the object which produces it, namely an act of judgment such as the whole psalm has had in view. Its purpose is not destruction, but conviction, the wholesome consciousness of weakness, out of which may spring the recognition of their own folly and of Gods strength to bless. So the two parts of the psalm end with the thought that the "nations" may yet come to know the name of God, the one calling upon those who have experienced his deliverance to "declare among the peoples His doings," the other praying God to teach by chastisement what nations who forget Him have failed to learn from mercies.
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 “A psalm of thanksgiving (Psa_9:1-2) after a victory (Psa_9:3)…
INTRODUCTION
“A psalm of thanksgiving (Psa_9:1-2) after a victory (Psa_9:3) over the heathen wrought by Divine judgment (Psa_9:4-6), expressing confidence in His constant protection of the oppressed (Psa_9:7-10); therefore the pious have to thank God (Psa_9:11-12), and pray to Him in every time of need (Psa_9:13-14). The judicial government of God causes the enemies finally to perish, and saves the sufferers (Psa_9:15-18); therefore the prayer (Psa_9:19-20), which shows the dangerous position of the Psalmist and his people.”—Moll.
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PRAISE
(Psa_9:1-3.)
In the foregoing psalms we have had much prayer, but here we have a sublime burst of praise. The Psalmist’s soul is filled with admiration and joy in view of the Divine character and government, and in glorious language he gives utterance to the ecstasy of his soul. There is something exceedingly sublime in praise; when we bless God, with the angels we take our part. One of our old poets has some quaint, but fine lines, “On Praise.”
“Praise is devotion fit for mightie minds!
The diff’ring world’s agreeing sacrifice,
Where heav’n divided faiths united finds,
But pray’r in various discord upward flies.
“For pray’r the ocean is, where diversly
Men steer their course, each to a sev’ral coast;
Where all our int’rests so discordant be,
That half beg winds by which the rest are lost.
“By Penitence, when we ourselves forsake,
’Tis but in wise design on piteous heav’n;
In praise we nobly give, what God may take,
And are, without a beggar’s blush, forgiv’n.
“Its utmost force, like powder’s, is unknown!
And though weak kings excess of praise may fear,
Yet when ’tis here, like powder, dang’rous grown,
Heav’n’s vault receives, what would the palace tear.”
—SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT.
Let us notice, then, the thanksgiving of the text:
I. The minstrel.
“I will praise Thee” (Psa_9:1). “I will show forth Thy works.” All God’s works praise Him, but man is to be the leading singer in the great choir. The Esthonians have a beautiful legend to explain the origin of Song. The god of song descended on the Domberg, on which stands a sacred wood, and there played and sang. All creatures were invited to listen, and they each learnt some fragment of the celestial sound; the listening wood learnt its rustling, the stream its roar; the wind caught and learnt to re-echo the shrillest tones, and the birds the prelude of the song. Man only grasped it all, and therefore his song pierces into the depths of the heart, and upwards to the dwellings of the gods. As this legend pictures, man’s song is the fullest and the deepest; and whilst creation with her thousand voices praises God, from man comes the music which is sweetest to the throne of God. And each of us ought to find a tongue to bless God. “I will praise Thee.” “I will be glad.” “I will sing praise.” We must not leave the organist and chorister to praise God for us, and ourselves stand dumb images in the pews. No proxy here. He has blessed me, and I will glorify Him. Gratitude ought to make musicians of us all.
Notice:
II. The harp.
“With my whole heart.” The heart is the lyre wherewith to worship God. No instrument of music is so wonderful as this one—full of cunning pipes and exquisite strings; and this is the true harp to take into the closet, into the sanctuary. Not lips merely. “The heart is the instrument of praise, the mouth only its organ.”—Hengstenberg. True praise is an overflow of feeling; we thank God for His goodness, and, as the French say, “There is a tear in our voice.” “Making melody in our heart unto the Lord.” “With my whole heart.” The harp has many strings—some longer, others shorter, some of one tone and colour, whilst the other chords are differently tuned and coloured; and so there are many strings in that living harp with which we should praise God, and every chord should be smitten in His honour. Some of the cathedrals on the Continent contain several organs; and so in our breast are reason, will, imagination, sensibility, and we should summon every faculty to glorify God. Let us call upon all that is within us to bless the holy name.
Notice:
III. The song.
1. The theme of it; or rather, perhaps, we should say themes. “I will show forth all Thy marvellous works.” I will praise Him for all His grace, gifts, deliverances, consolations, promises. “If we be willing to talk of His deeds, He will give us enough to talk about.”—Power. They are “marvellous works.” “All the benefits received from God are real wonders to the humble soul, for it is an inconceivable grace that God the Lord should show so much mercy, bodily and spiritual, with wonderful wisdom and faithfulness to those who are in the highest degree unworthy.”—Starke.
“We take the blessing from above,
And wonder at the boundless love.”
And it is our duty to show these forth. Tell what God has done for you. “Songs without words,” the unspoken and unspeakable joy and worship of the heart, are acceptable before God; but we must utter the memory of His great goodness that the world may know and believe. As one has said, “Christian experience will save the world.”
2. The joyfulness of it. “I will be glad.” The knowledge of God’s love thrills the soul. When the devil played on our heart he brought out the dismal wailing of a perpetual “Dead March;” but if we yield our heart to God, it shall utter forth an endless “Hallelujah Chorus” of gladsomeness and triumph.
3. The object of it. “I will praise Thee.” “I will rejoice in Thee” “I will joy and triumph in Thee, not merely in Thy presence, or because of Thee, i.e., because of what Thou hast done, but in communion with Thee, and because of my personal interest in Thee.”—Alexander. In prayer there is a remembrance of ourselves, but in praise God fills our eye and our heart. As the harp-string passes out of sight trembling with music, so self is forgotten when we joy in God.
4. The occasion of it (Psa_9:3). “Because my enemies are turned back, because they stumble and perish before Thy countenance.”—Speaker’s Com. “The Romans in their triumphs presented a palm to Jupiter.”—Trapp. So in each blessing, victory, joy, let us afresh tune our harps, and glorify the great source of all blessings. More than this, in the dark days let us take our harp from the willow and glorify God. The legend says that Orpheus was drowned, and it is because his lyre is in the flood that the waters make such sweet music. Certainly the harp of David is never sweeter than when it sounds from a flood of tears. “We glory in tribulation also. That is truly a new kind of men, that live among the dead, and are glad among the suffering.”—Luther.
THE DIVINE GOVERNMENT IN ITS RELATION TO THE NATIONS
(Psa_9:4-9.)
I. The Divine government is characterised by equity.
Psa_9:4. “Thou satest in the throne judging right.” “He shall judge the world in righteousness” (Psa_9:8). It sometimes seems as if God acted towards nations and men with a strange partiality, but it is really not so; deep down is the law of truth and righteousness, and all God’s ways are equal. In the 4th verse the Psalmist says, “Thou hast passed sentence for me and done me right.”—Horsley. And thus it shall be with each nation, each individual. The Scriptures assure us of this. Conscience testifies to this. Although we see the saint wronged, and the sinner triumphant a thousand times, yet conscience persistently testifies that justice will be done.
II. The Divine government is vindicated with severity.
Psa_9:5-6. “And cities, Thou, O God, hast rooted out; their memorial, even theirs is perished. What God destroys cannot be restored, and their cities are desolate for ever.”—Wordsworth. “They are perpetual ruins.”—Perowne. “The Psalmist appears to be speaking of the entire destruction of the cities of the enemy, and he seems to state in this clause that they should be completely desolated, so as to prevent any re-establishment of them at a future time; or so as to make it impossible for the work of desolation to be carried any further. The memory of them has perished.”—Phillips.
1. Observe, God’s government will vindicate itself. Some one has said, “That the Spanish laws are the best in the world, but they are never acted upon.” God’s laws are the best laws, and, be sure, He will insist upon every one of them.
2. God’s government vindicates itself now. “God does not postpone judgment and salvation till the end of the world, although times of trouble come for the pious, and days of apparent victory for their enemies. He already judges in history individuals and nations, so that all traces of them are blotted out from the earth, and their name is forgotten.”—Moll. Thrones founded in unrighteousness fall, fortunes are shipwrecked, cities perish, empires and armies melt. Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Grecian, Roman, Jewish—all are illustrations.
3. God’s government vindicates itself with awful severity. God blots out the impenitent nation or person. The nations before Him are as the drop of a bucket, and, as such, are dried up in the hot light of His wrath, when once He is angry.
III. The Divine government survives all opposition.
Psa_9:7. “The enemy has been utterly annihilated, whilst Jehovah remains King for ever.”—Perowne. “The serene majesty of the eternal Judge is contrasted with the struggles and overthrow of evil men.”—Speaker’s Com. We are reminded (Isa_6:1.), “In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple.” Kings die, and their kingdoms perish, but God sitteth a King for ever, and of His government there shall be no end. The kingdom of Christ will survive all hostilities—political, ecclesiastical, philosophical, personal.
IV. The Divine government comprehends all nations, and shall bring them all into judgment.
Psa_9:8. “And He shall judge the world in righteousness, He shall minister judgment to the peoples in uprightness.” He will apply to us in modern times the same severe tests which He applied to the peoples of the past; and if, when weighed in the balances, we are found wanting, He shall blot out our name from under the heavens. Let us honour God in our age and nation, for if we rule, and legislate, and serve in His fear, our throne shall be established; and the way for God to dwell in a nation is for every one to see that God dwells in his heart.
GOD THE PROTECTOR AND AVENGER OF THE OPPRESSED
(Psa_9:9-13.)
God has His eye on the strong and unjust, and He will not fail to punish them; He has His eye on the weak and faithful, and will vindicate their cause. What a record of injustice is history! How the true, good, noble, in every age, have been wronged! Thousands are still being similarly wronged. What is the relation of God to these?
I. He is their Protector.
Mark:
1. The strength of this protection (Psa_9:9). “The Lord will be a refuge.” “Properly, as in the margin, a high place, a fort on the summit of an inaccessible rock, such as often afforded a refuge to David in early days of exile.”—Speaker’s Com. What a power there is in the grace of God to lift a man above his trouble! The blessing of God comes down on His tried and persecuted people, and they feel at once they are sweetly lodged in an inaccessible Rock. Violence cannot overturn it; Sorrow cannot get a foothold in it; Fear cannot scale it; the devil can find no secret winding in it by which he may reach the saints. It is a rock of strength and safety, and blessed are all those who claim, its shelter.
“How happy are the little flock,
Who, safe beneath their guardian-rock,
In all commotions rest!
‘When war’s and tumult’s waves run high,
Unmoved above the storm they lie;
They lodge in Jesus’ breast.”
2. The seasonableness of it (Psa_9:9). “A refuge in times of trouble, i.e., steeped in trouble.”—Kay. If it were a physical presence, we might sometimes justly say, “Lord, if thou hadst been here,” this and that disaster would not have occurred; but the spiritual presence is ever with us. He is a help in the time of trouble; a present help, a very present help. In South-Eastern India there is a wild race which believes that all the evil in the world is done whilst God is sleeping; if He were not obliged to sleep there would be no sickness, no sorrow, no death. What a comfort to feel that God’s eyes neither slumber nor sleep, and that He is never far from any one of us. God is the nearest to us when we want Him the most.
3. The immutability of it. “Thou hast not forsaken them that seek Thee” (Psa_9:10). “Hast never failed them that seek Thee.”—P. B. Version. And He never will.
II. He is their Avenger.
Psa_9:12. “Like the Goël, the next of kin, who was bound to avenge the murder of his kinsman, so God calls the murderer to account, requires satisfaction at his hand.”—Perowne.
Let us learn:
1. Not to oppress. It is a fearful thing in anywise to wrong our brother. The cry of the oppressed reaches God, and God cannot rest on His throne until that cry is avenged. Let us not do anything against our brother’s rights, freedom, property, conscience, happiness, life, character. He “has no friend, kick him.” But the weak man at your feet has a Friend; don’t kick him, help him on his feet, and God shall bless you.
2. In oppression trust in God. “They that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee” (Psa_9:10). “Those knowing Thy name, i.e., those who are acquainted with Thy power.”—Phillips. Such will trust God. “They can do no otherwise that savingly know God’s sweet attributes and noble acts for His people.”—Trapp.
THE PERSONAL REALISATION OF GENERAL TRUTHS
(Psa_9:13-14.)
The Psalmist has been dealing with great principles, and regarding these in their application to great nations and long periods of time, when he interrupts the general reflection by this personal cry. These two verses are considered to break the unity of the psalm. “They disturb the unity of the psalm, and interfere awkwardly with its general strain of triumph.”—Delitzsch. But we must remember that the Psalmist writes as a man, not as an artist, and we have here the instinctive, irrepressible cry of his heart.
He recognises:
I. His personal fault.
“Have mercy upon me, O Lord” (Psa_9:13). Is there not here a recognition of his own unworthiness, as well as his own suffering? He asks for help, but it is on the ground of mercy. So should we ever in acknowledging the corruption of human nature remember the corruption of our own; and in deploring the sin of the world take care to deplore our own sin. How often we forget this! The woman of Samaria was versed in theological lore, and acknowledged with freedom various great religious principles, but how strangely she forgot her own personal situation! In the presence of Sinai, of Calvary, of an imperfect and guilty race, let us cry before Heaven, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.”
II. His personal need.
“Consider my trouble” (Psa_9:13). Whilst the Psalmist thought of the general sorrow, he recalled before God his own. Every heart knows its own bitterness, and it is our privilege to make our case known to God. Every one of us may go to God and cry, “Consider my trouble” We cannot go with every little ailment to the doctor, nor with every little perplexity to the lawyer, nor with every little trouble to a friend; but we may go to God with all our distresses, and He will give us audience and relief. He appeals to God as.
III. His personal Helper.
“Thou that liftest me up” (Psa_9:13). He has seen in God the world’s Judge and Redeemer, and he now recognises God as his God. Let us not stay short of this personal relationship and plea. Let us not lose ourselves in a crowd. Let us be able to say, “O Lord, Thou art my Lord, and my God, and my Helper.” Finally, the Psalmist vows:
IV. His personal consecration.
Psa_9:14. “That I may show forth,” &c. In “the gates,” as the most public place of concourse. It ought not only to be, “All the earth praises Thee,” but also, “Bless the Lord, O my soul.” Our voice, profession, gifts, service are needed. I must praise God, acknowledge Him, love Him, and seek to build up His kingdom.
THE EXTREMITIES OF THE SAINTS
(Psa_9:13-14.)
Observe:
I. The depth of their distress.
“Thou that liftest me up from the gates of death” (Psa_9:13). “From desperate and deadly dangers, such as threaten present destruction, and show a man the grave even gaping for him. David was oft at this pass; and God delivered Paul from so great a death (2Co_1:10). He commonly reserveth His hand for a dead-lift, and rescueth those who were even talking of their graves.”—Trapp. Believers are often brought “very low.” Constitutional infirmity; bodily sickness; worldly trouble; spiritual conflicts; persecution; these often depress and bewilder the saints, and they are at their “wits’ end.”
II. The fulness of their deliverance.
“In the gates of Jerusalem” (Psa_9:14). He brings His people from the gates of hell to the gates of glory. “There is a beautiful contrast between ‘the gates of death,’ in the preceding verse, and ‘the gates of the daughter of Sion,’ or the heavenly Jerusalem, in this—the one leads down to the pit, the other up to the Mount of God; the one opens into perpetual darkness, the other into light eternal; from the one proceeds nothing but what is evil, from the other nothing but what is good; infernal spirits watch at the one, the other are unbarred by the hands of angels. What a blessing, then, is it to be snatched from the former, and transported to the latter.”—Horne.
1. God has thus lifted up His people in their conversion. They were “snatched as brands from the burning,” and placed in safety in the Church, which is the “gate of heaven.”
2. God does thus lift up His people in their experience. When our sins, our sorrows, our sufferings, our persecutors have brought us very low, how God interferes on our behalf, and turns the shadow of death into the morning!
3. God will thus lift up His people from death and the grave. He will transfigure their crown of thorns into amaranth; change their corruptible into incorruption; raise them from the dust and worms to stars and angels!
“Millions of transgressors poor
Thou hast for Jesus’ sake forgiven;
Made them of Thy favour sure,
And snatched from hell to heaven.”
III. The expression of their gratitude.
“That I may show forth all Thy praise,” &c. (Psa_9:14). “That I may recount all Thy praise.” “This is one important end for which he asks to be delivered, namely, that God may have the praise of his deliverance.”—Alexander. We will praise Him on earth, and surely no song in heaven shall be louder and sweeter than ours.
“My soul, through my Redeemer’s care,
Saved from the second death I feel,
My eyes from tears of dark despair,
My feet from falling into hell.
“Wherefore to Him my feet shall run,
My eyes on His perfections gaze;
My soul shall live for God alone;
And all within me shout His praise.”
Lessons:
1. In the darkest hours do not despair. In the darkest hours of life, of death, do not despair. At the gates of death, believe, hope! “There is nothing desperate in the state of good men where there is a right principle within them, and God’s superintendency over them.”—Whichcote. “When the axe already touches thy neck, still hope in God’s saving grace.”—Talmud. From the deepest pit we see the stars.
2. In the darkest hours remember that the depth of the shade prophesies the fulness of the glory which is to be revealed. As much as you are brought low, so much shall you be lifted up. From gates of death you spring to beautiful gates of lofty Christian life and worship; to pearly gates, golden gates of heavenly rest and victory. Men measure mountains by their shadows; and so from the sorrows of to-day we may argue somewhat to the grandeurs which await us. But even then we must remember that “the sufferings of the present time are not worthy to be compared to the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
RETRIBUTION
(Psa_9:15-20.)
We are taught here:
I. That the pit of human misery and ruin is digged by man, not by God.
“The pit that they made” (Psa_9:15). Yes; all the pits into which man falls are self-digged. That is true of all the pits on earth. God’s laws were all made for man’s good and joy, but we create misery for ourselves. What scenes of misery there are on the earth—jails, madhouses, penitentiaries, &c., &c.; but God did not design these places. In the original arrangement of things our perfection and pleasure alone were designed; but pride, appetite, folly, covetousness, have dug the horrible pits from whence come up evermore sighs of misery and despair. This is true of the pit of hell. God made Eden for us, the beautiful earth, heaven beyond; but we make hell for ourselves. We build its prisons, kindle its fires, forge its fetters, originate its woe. As Dr. Griffin says, “God is right, and man is wrong.”
II. That sin may be cleverly devised and executed, but its frustration is certain.
“The pit that they made, the net which they hid.” How subtlely the thing has been conceived and wrought! Sin is often an attempt to overmatch man; to take advantage of his ignorance, or weakness, or unwariness. It is always an attempt to overmatch God. It is dexterously done, so to break the laws of God as to escape the threatened penalty. But it does not succeed. The sinner falls into the pit, is taken in the snare. We think of cheating man, devil, God; but we shall only cheat ourselves.
III. That sin may long remain unpunished, but its punishment is certain.
“The Lord is known by the judgment which He executeth” (Psa_9:16). “Known is Jehovah, or has made Himself known. Justice has He done, or judgment has He executed. God has revealed Himself as present and attentive, notwithstanding His apparent oblivion and inaction, by doing justice on His enemies, or rather by making them do justice on themselves.”—Alexander. God will arise to punish sinners; and the punishment shall be all the more terrible for the delay. V. Hugo says concerning the sea: “Beware of the gale that has been long delayed. It was Angot who said that ‘the sea pays well old debts.’ ” Sinner, beware of the wrath long delayed; justice pays well old debts.
IV. That the final punishment of sin is overwhelming.
Psa_9:17. “Not the heathen, as such, but all (of whatever race) who wilfully forget and put away from them that knowledge of Himself which God has inscribed on men’s consciences.”—Kay. “God’s righteousness shall be seen in cutting off the wicked by a sudden and premature end.”—Perowne.
Lessons:
1. The saints must trust in God (Psa_9:18). “The patient abiding of the meek” shall not be in vain.—P. B. Version.
2. The ungodly must tremble at the judgments of God (Psa_9:20). They are “but men,” however proud and defiant they may be. “Crowns leave their wearers, but men, degrees of eminent learning, make their owners not more than men; valour and conquest cannot elevate beyond the dead level of ‘but men;’ and all the wealth of Crœsus, the wisdom of Solon, the power of Alexander, the eloquence of Demosthenes, if added together, would leave the possessor but a man.”—Spurgeon. And what can man do when God awakes to judgment?
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 The throne of righteousness.
The throne of righteousness.
To the chief musician. Upon Muth-labben. A psalm of David.
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We come now then to the consideration of these psalms in detail. The ninth has for its subject the contemplation of that throne of righteousness which the earth has so long desired to see and found not. Christ as the King of righteousness has been refused, and the world has sought all kinds of substitutes for Him in vain. It must be but in vain! Yet the "desire of all nations" shall come, and shall be found in Him. He shall be "King of kings and Lord of lords."
The inscription is considered a difficult one, and has had, as usual in such cases, many interpretations. Muth-labben means most naturally, however, and is most commonly taken to be, "Death for the son." Remembering the Egyptian oppression out of which Moses and the people of Israel as a whole were saved, and which God remembered against Egypt on the passover night of their deliverance, -and remembering, too, that here we have the final and worst tribulation of the same people Israel, when out of the bitterest persecution they shall be delivered, -there is no great difficulty in the application of the inscription in this way. So taken it confirms from another side the meaning of the psalm.
1. The psalm begins with an outburst of praise to the Most High -that millennial name of God with which the seventh psalm ended. Israel’s tongue is loosed, the whole heart united in this praise. It is Jehovah, the covenant God, the Living and Unchangeable, who is now manifested as this, whose wondrous, works have made Him known, and these as being the means of their own deliverance, and with their new-opened mouth, Israel will declare. David the Israelite has long since led, and still leads, in such strains as these; and Christ, the anti-type of David, will lead "in the midst of the assembly," in the days to come.
The speaker repeats, confirms, and amplifies the song of praise. It is God Himself in whom he rejoices, and whom His works make known; it is His name which he celebrates in psalms. This is indeed the joy of joys, that, as is not the case with changeful man, what He has done is the real manifestation of Himself, His nature, -and that is what His "Name" implies. Thus we can know Him better than we can know ourselves: for the heart of man, "who can know it?"
What a joy indeed, to have Him manifestly reigning -Christ the perfect expression of what He is, and Christ upon the throne!
2. Deliverance from the enemy is what now their hearts are full of: righteous deliverance for the righteous, as the seventh psalm has declared it as far as the oppressor is concerned:
he has no claim that the divine government can recognize. There is efficient power, and when the work of deliverance begins, it is fully accomplished: when the enemies turn back, they stumble and perish, for God is there. Israel can now say, "Thou hast maintained my right and my cause;" and it is One who plainly sits upon the throne who does so.
Nor is this deliverance local merely. It connects itself with the judgment of the earth, and the destruction of the wicked out of it: even their name is blotted out and disappears; and this involves a moral change of the face of the world, which makes haste in this way to forget them. More than this, the desolations wrought by the reign of evil are over: the "times of restitution" are come, -summer and fruitage for all the earth, with quiet rest under the care of the good Shepherd. For He it is who reigns, and the iron rod has destroyed those only who destroy the earth.
3. Jehovah dwells in Zion, and His rule has all the character of divine beneficence. Man is no longer a stranger and an exile from God. The earth returned to her orbit circles round her central sun.
(a) It is the rule of the Eternal: while other kingdoms arise and fall, this endures: "Jehovah abideth forever." No danger of a failure in the succession; no uncertainty from transmission through many hands: the glorious Priest-King never resigns or forfeits His throne to others; He is Himself the dynasty, and its character will never change: He "establisheth His throne for judgment; and He shall judge the world in righteousness, He shall give judgment in uprightness to the races of men." Thus there is no fear either of the clashing of party interests or of national prejudices, or of aught else. One King is King to all, ministering incorruptible justice to all alike. Rule is now true service, and the oppressed is secure of a ready hearing in the one ever-accessible court of appeal. He is their refuge, their sanctuary, -"a stronghold in seasons of strait." This is no theory merely: there is no contradiction between the ideal and the real. It is known by experience, affirmed by the consciousness of all His people: for "they that know Thy Name will trust in Thee: for Thou, Jehovah, haft not forsaken them that seek Thee."
(b) Israel is naturally the witness of all this in her own experience, and by her deliverance will "tell out His deeds among the peoples" -the nations brought at last to be His own. The persecution even to death of the chosen nation He has now remembered: their cry has come up into His ears. Now He dwells in Zion, and forever; the wings that long since would have sheltered them, are now stretched over them, -at rest in the love that has drawn them nigh.
4. After all this -strangely as it seems, no doubt, -we have the actual cry of distress; and to the end of the psalm, though there are outbursts of triumphant anticipation, the deliverance contemplated is seen not to be really come as yet. And this character of the psalm we shall find repeated in many future ones. The realization of faith comes first, and then the actual circumstances are seen, out of which faith looks to the fulfillment of precious promises, which are indeed as sure as if fulfilled. The stand-point of the psalm is thus that of those for whom it has been specially prepared, and their faith is strengthened by such Spirit-inspired glimpses as we have had into the then so near future, the bright fulfillment of the longings and prayers of successive generations of saints, who died with its light-glow in their faces. And this hope too is ours, with its brightness only intensified by the fact that ours too are heavenly promises, and that as "heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ" we are to see and rejoice in the earth’s bridal-glory, when the Bridegroom-King shall be "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews." Our interest in these things is not likely to be spoiled by the fact of fuller entrance than Israel herself into this ineffable joy.
Here then we have the experience of Jacob’s hour of trial once again, the cry -though with the confidence begotten of previous anticipations -from the very "gates of death." Yet they expect to change this yawning shadow for the "gates of the daughter of Zion," and to praise Jehovah there, exulting in His salvation -not surely a mere temporal deliverance. We have seen already (Psa 6:1-10) what death is linked with in their minds; and corresponding with this is the meaning of deliverance from it for the hearts of these worshipers -a praise that shall be led of Messiah Himself.
5. Thus again faith descries the future from its firm ground in the prophetic word, and rehearses the righteous ways of divine government in quite a similar manner to the seventh psalm. These things need the emphasis of repetition for men’s careless ears. The nations sink into a pit their own hands have prepared, and are taken in the net they have hid for their own entanglement. And this is Jehovah’s judgment, the unswerving ways by which Jehovah is made known. Higgaion: here is "meditation" for those who do not refuse it: let them "ponder it in their own hearts upon their beds, and be still."
And "the wicked are turned into Sheol, -all the nations that forget God." This is still, of course, the judgment of the world that is in question: final it is, as far as the world goes, but yet not the full eternal judgment which the New Testament reveals. For this, Sheol or hades must deliver up its dead, (held by it only as prisoners for the assize,) and the "resurrection of judgment" introduce them to "the great white throne" for discriminating sentence. (Rev 20:1-15.) This we have not here, nor generally in the Old Testament. Death -what we ordinarily call that -is, as we see it everywhere, the legal penalty, though still with the shadow of divine wrath therefore in it. It is here the doom of "outer darkness," outside the day of earth’s festival and joy; the doom of those who "forget God;" and thus we understand the cry of the sixth psalm, though there in the lips of those to whom forgetfulness of God is the misery they dread: "for in death there is no remembrance of Thee; in Sheol who shall give Thee thanks?" It is the doom of those who have chosen to forget God, but as contemplated by those with whom, according to the well-understood parallelism here, to "remember" is to "give Him thanks." Alas, it is the portion they have chosen they will have -aye, and must have, because they have chosen it, not because He has chosen it for them. From so awful a thought as this He has interposed his oath to save us: "As I live, saith the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth: therefore turn yourselves and live ye."
6. The psalm concludes with prayer, mingled with the assurance which he who prays whispers to his heart. Frail man, thrusting himself across the path of the almighty purpose! what must be the end? God’s people may be indeed the "needy," and with no spirit of self-assertion, scarcely turning as the worm upon the foot of him that treads on it -the "meek." Aye, but it is because, not their despair, but their "expectation" quiets them. "My soul, wait thou upon God," is the reminder with which they control themselves. Shall they be forgotten perpetually, though for a time it seem so? shall such expectation come to naught? shall they who have no hope but in God be disappointed by Him? No: it is impossible to entertain the thought. And so out of that conviction comes the cry —
"Arise, Jehovah! let not frail man be (thus) strong!" has not his success reached already the ordained bound? "let the nations be judged before Thy face!" They have forgotten Thee, and so can boast themselves: let Thy presence convict them of their folly, and rebuke the vain pretension; "put them in fear, Jehovah! that the nations may know themselves to be frail men!"
Thus the psalm ends. Though irregular in its construction, the alphabetic arrangement only lacks one letter, so far as it goes, which is just half-way through the alphabet. Thus, instead of eleven letters, there are ten -the psalm clinging, indeed, to what this number indicates -human responsibility and recompense; while the omitted letter, daleth, standing for the number 4, which speaks of creature weakness and failure, may find in this the reason of its omission from a psalm which throughout so strongly emphasizes the indefectible righteousness of the divine government. Reason will certainly be found everywhere for every "jot and tittle" of the inspired word which we are considering. Believing research will find that every claim that has been made for it on that score fails only in feebleness of statement, not in excess.
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain Psalms 9, 10 are combined in LXX, and there…
Psalms 9, 10 are combined in LXX, and there is certainly a real, though obscure, relationship between them. The two together form one 'acrostic,' the vv. beginning with the successive letters of the Hebrew alphabet, though in both Pss. there is a gap in the arrangement. The subject matter of the two Pss., however, does not suggest that we have in tbem the two halves of what was originally a single Ps. Psalms 9 is distinctly national and Psalms 10 as distinctly personal, and though both may be by the same author, the problem of their connexion must be left unsolved.
Psalms 9 is the song of a king who has gained a victory over a foreign enemy, and finds in this a proof of God's righteous rule over the whole earth—a rule which he prays may be yet more fully displayed. Only in Psa_9:13-14 is the note of personal affliction and need to be heard.
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Title.—Upon Muth-labben] 'Muth-labben' means 'Death to the son,' and probably indicates some well-known song, to the tune of which the Ps. was directed to be sung.
3. They shall fall] RV 'they stumble.'
4. Judging right] RV 'judging righteously.'
5. Heathen] RV 'nations.' So in Psa_9:15, Psa_9:19.
6. RV 'The enemy are come to an end, they are desolate for ever: and the cities which thou hast overthrown, their very memorial is perished.' The words are still part of the prayer to Jehovah. Faith in God demands complete deliverance.
7. Shall endure] RV 'sitteth as king.' The eternal rule of God contrasted with the passing powers of earth.
8. People] RV 'peoples.'
10. Thy name] see on Psa_5:11.
11. Which dwelleth in Zion] Jerusalem, and especially the hill of Zion, was regarded as the earthly throne of God, after David had placed the ark there: see Psa_76:2; Psa_132:13.
12. RV 'For he that maketh inquisition for blood remembereth them.' God is represented as the avenger of blood (Gen_9:5). Humble] RV 'poor' or meek. One of a group of words which in OT. have at first an outward and then a more spiritual sense, the chief sufferers from want and oppression being often God's true people.
13, 14. This personal cry of distress seems to break the connexion rather abruptly. Possibly we should read, 'The Lord has had mercy.. he has considered my trouble.' The gates of death] the extremity of affliction.
The gates of the daughter of Zion] 'The daughter of Zion' is a figure for Jerusalem: see Isa_1:8; Lam_2:2-5; Psa_45:12; Psa_137:8. The gates of an Eastern city were its most public and busy spots. The throng of life is thus contrasted with the solitude and dreariness of 'the gates of death' in Psa_9:13.
16. RV 'The Lord hath made himself known, he hath executed judgment.' Higgaion] a musical term applied only here. It occurs in the text of Psa_92:3, and probably means something like our forte. Selah] see on Psa_3:4. 'Higgaion. Selah' together may mean fortissimo.
17. Be turned into hell] RV 'return to Sheol,' the place of the dead, not regarded specially as a place of torment. 'Return' seems strictly to apply to the body, which goes back to the dust whence it was taken: cp. Gen_3:19; Psa_90:3; Psa_104:29.
18. Needy] Another of the group of words referred to in the note on Psa_9:12. Poor] The same word as in Psa_9:12.
19. Man] The word means 'frail man,' as in Psa_8:4.
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 "death of the son," is not a musical instrument…
Muth-labben
"death of the son," is not a musical instrument but the title of the Psalm. Possibly connected with 2Sa 12:20.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain Psalm 9
Psalm 9
The Godly Remnant. The Wicked One and His Followers (9-15)
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1. The praise of the Most High (Psa 9:1-2)
2. Millennial deliverances and glories (Psa 9:3-12)
3. Prayer for divine intervention: Faith’s Vision (Psa 9:12-18)
Psa 9:1-2. Psalm 9-15 continue the great prophetic story. Once more the godly remnant is before us and in this section the wicked one, the man of sin, is also revealed. The first part of this Psalm is a prophetic vision of what will be on earth, when the Son of Man has come and when all things are put under Him. His triumph is celebrated. We doubt not what is written here will be the comfort of that company of believing Jews at the end of the age as they anticipate in faith what will be when the King comes. But how much more we His heavenly people should praise Him, and declare His wondrous works in grace.
Psa 9:3-12. What it will mean when the Lord reigns is told out in these verses. His enemies will be defeated; He rebukes the nations and destroys the wicked; He judgeth the world in righteousness, and He is a refuge for His people. The Lord will dwell in Zion, Israel will sing praises and become the witness amongst the nations.
Psa 9:13-20. Up to the previous verse we saw the glorious results for Israel when the Son of Man comes. But that has not yet come. Faith realizeth it. In verse 13 we hear the voice of supplication of those who in faith look forward to the promises, but who suffer in the midst of the trials of the ending days of the age. They are hated and suffer and long to shew forth praises in Zion. Then once more the vision of faith what must happen ere long to the nations and to the wicked (15-18). The plea “Arise, O LORD,” is the prayer for His glorious manifestation.
This Psalm and the next are linked together by the letters of the Alphabet (in Hebrew). Ten letters are used in this Psalm and five in the next. Six letters are dropped out in this alphabetical composition. The irregularity may be explained as in harmony with the time of tribulation when everything on earth is broken and out of joint.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain A Song of Praise for Victory over the Enemies.
A Song of Praise for Victory over the Enemies.
Thanksgiving for the Victory Gained.
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To the chief musician, for use in liturgical services, upon Muth-labben, that is, to be sung after the melody known as "Death to the Son," probably that of a folk-song, a psalm of David.
v. 1. I will praise Thee, O Lord, in a song of thanksgiving, with my whole heart, with all the powers of the soul; I will show forth all Thy marvelous works, declaring their greatness before all men.
v. 2. I will be glad and rejoice in Thee, exulting in the favor shown him by Jehovah; I will sing praise to Thy name, O Thou Most High, giving Him the credit for the victories gained by singing psalms extolling His honor, the greatness of His attributes.
v. 3. When mine enemies are turned back, overthrown in battle, they shall fall and perish at Thy presence, when God sets His face against them.
v. 4. For Thou hast maintained my right and my cause, upholding him and vindicating him by granting him the victory; Thou satest in the throne judging right, dispensing justice.
v. 5. Thou hast rebuked the heathen, in granting the victory to the arms of David; Thou hast destroyed the wicked, Thou hast put out their name forever and ever, blotting it out of history, destroying its remembrance.
v. 6. O thou enemy, destructions are come to a perpetual end, desolation and ruin is found where the enemy formerly flourished; and Thou, Jehovah as the Leader of Israel’s armies, hast destroyed cities, plucking them up, rooting them out; their memorial is perished with them, God had caused their complete annihilation. Note: The way of unbelief is to praise human power and valor, but believers give thanks to God alone for His almighty assistance in all troubles.
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 General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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For the chief musician
"This is for the director of music to use in worship"
set to Muth Labben
This may refer to a style of music.
A psalm of David
Possible meanings are 1) David wrote the psalm or 2) the psalm is about David or 3) the psalm is in the style of David's psalms.
I will give thanks to Yahweh with my whole heart
Since this song is addressed to Yahweh, Yahweh can be referred to as "you." AT: "Yahweh, I will give thanks to you with all my heart" (See: First, Second, or Third Person)
all your marvelous deeds
The noun "deeds" can be expressed with the verb "do." AT: "all the marvelous things you do" or "all the marvelous things you have done" (See: Abstract Nouns)
I will sing praise to your name
Here God's name represents God. AT: "I will sing praise to you" (See: Metonymy)
translationWords
chief
psalm
David
Yahweh
heart
amazed
works
joy
praise
name
Most High
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 Pss 9–10 This hymn celebrates the Lord’s kingship and…
Pss 9–10 This hymn celebrates the Lord’s kingship and victory over evil. It might also serve as a response to the laments of Pss 3–7. Some believe that Pss 9 and 10 should be read together as one psalm in two parts because Ps 9 includes a title and Ps 10 does not, and although several letters are missing or inverted, the two psalms connect as an acrostic of the Hebrew alphabet (other such alphabetic acrostics are Pss 25, 34, 37, 111–112, 119, 145). The ancient Greek and Latin translations treat 9 and 10 as one.
9:title This psalm was originally sung to the tune “Death of the Son,” but that tune is no longer known. So also with the tunes mentioned in Pss 22, 45, 56–60, 69, 75, and 80.
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9:1 The verb translated praise is translated “thank” in 7:17, suggesting a close connection between Pss 7 and 9 (see 7:17; 8:1-2). With all my heart expresses the psalmist’s deep devotion and commitment (86:12; 111:1; 119:10; 138:1). • I will tell: These stories educate the next generation (78:4; 145:4); when they are not remembered, a generation might easily depart from the Lord (78:11, 32). • The marvelous things include the Lord’s judgments on the enemies of his people (9:4) and his care for the oppressed (9:9). The wonders in creation, in redemption, and in revelation reveal his character and show his power (89:5; 111:4; 119:18, 27). His powerful manifestations evoke public praise (9:1; 26:7; 75:1).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.