They break your people in pieces, Yahweh, and afflict your heritage.
Parallel Translations
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They break your people in pieces, Yahweh, and afflict your heritage.
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They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage.
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They crush Thy people, O LORD, and afflict Thy heritage.
Cross-references (18)
Passages linked to Psalms 94:5 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Isaiah 3:15 What do you mean that you crush my people, and grind the face of the poor?” says the Lord, Yahweh of Armies.
- Psalms 79:2-3 They have given the dead bodies of your servants to be food for the birds of the sky, the flesh of your saints to the animals of the earth. They have shed their blood like water around Jerusalem. There was no one to bury them.
- Exodus 2:23-24 In the course of those many days, the king of Egypt died, and the children of Israel sighed because of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up to God because of the bondage. God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.
- Psalms 7:2 lest they tear apart my soul like a lion, ripping it in pieces, while there is no one to deliver.
- Psalms 14:4 Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and don’t call on Yahweh?
- Psalms 44:22 Yes, for your sake we are killed all day long. We are regarded as sheep for the slaughter.
- Psalms 74:8 They said in their heart, “We will crush them completely.” They have burned up all the places in the land where God was worshiped.
- Psalms 74:19-20 Don’t deliver the soul of your dove to wild beasts. Don’t forget the life of your poor forever. Honor your covenant, for haunts of violence fill the dark places of the earth.
- Psalms 79:7 for they have devoured Jacob, and destroyed his homeland.
- Psalms 129:2-3 many times they have afflicted me from my youth up, yet they have not prevailed against me. The plowers plowed on my back. They made their furrows long.
- Isaiah 52:5 “Now therefore, what do I do here,” says Yahweh, “seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Those who rule over them mock,” says Yahweh, “and my name is blasphemed continually all day long.
- Jeremiah 22:17 But your eyes and your heart are only for your covetousness, for shedding innocent blood, for oppression, and for doing violence.”
- Jeremiah 50:11 “Because you are glad, because you rejoice, O you who plunder my heritage, because you are wanton as a heifer that treads out the grain, and neigh as strong horses;
- Jeremiah 51:20-23 “You are my battle ax and weapons of war. With you I will break the nations into pieces. With you I will destroy kingdoms. With you I will break in pieces the horse and his rider. With you I will break in pieces the chariot and him who rides therein. With you I will break in pieces man and woman. With you I will break in pieces the old man and the youth. With you I will break in pieces the young man and the virgin. With you I will break in pieces the shepherd and his flock. With you I will break in pieces the farmer and his yoke. With you I will break in pieces governors and deputies.
- Jeremiah 51:34 “Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon has devoured me. He has crushed me. He has made me an empty vessel. He has, like a monster, swallowed me up. He has filled his mouth with my delicacies. He has cast me out.
- Micah 3:2-3 You who hate the good, and love the evil; who tear off their skin, and their flesh from off their bones; who also eat the flesh of my people, and peel their skin from off them, and break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as meat within the cauldron.
- Revelation 11:3 I will give power to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy one thousand two hundred sixty days, clothed in sackcloth.”
- Revelation 17:6 I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. When I saw her, I wondered with great amazement.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (14 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 5 They break in pieces thy people, O Jehovah!…
5 They break in pieces thy people, O Jehovah! Having spoken of their discourse or language as vain-glorious and shameless, he proceeds to speak of their deeds, in cruelly persecuting the Church. It is hard that even the subjects of heathen princes should be subjected to unjust persecution, but a more intolerable thing still, that those who are God’s own people, his peculiar inheritance, should be trampled under the foot of tyranny. The prayer before us is one which, as I have already remarked, is given with the intention that we should prefer it ourselves, when we or others may be persecuted by wicked men, and especially intestine enemies. Our safety is dear to the Lord, not only as we are men, the workmanship of his hand, but as we are his peculiar heritage; and this should lead us, when wronged at any time, to betake ourselves to God with the more confidence. It is farther added — that they spare not the widow, and the orphan, and murder the stranger God, while he has commanded us in general to cultivate equity and justice in our common intercourse, has commended the orphan, widow, and stranger, to our peculiar care, as being more exposed to injury, and therefore more entitled to humanity and compassion. To treat such objects with cruelty argues a singular degree of impiety, and contempt of divine authority, and is not only an outrage of common justice, but the infraction of a privilege of special protection which God has condescended to cast around them. They who are chargeable with such conduct, particularly provoke the divine anger. As to little children especially, their helplessness and tender age will even protect them from being attacked by dogs and wild beasts. And what shall we think of the monstrous inhumanity of men, who would make them the objects of their assault? We have here a specimen of the dreadful state of matters which must then have prevailed in the Church of God. The law was there, and the ordinances of divine appointment, yet we see to what an awful extent every species of wickedness abounded. Let us beware lest we fall into a similar state of corruption, and should it so happen under our own observation that men persecute the stranger, seize the widow, and rob the fatherless, let us, in imitation of the Psalmist, who would have us alleviate their misfortunes, pray God to undertake their defense.
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 Seeing the Church was then so sore oppressed, it…
Seeing the Church was then so sore oppressed, it ought not to seem strange to us, if we see it so now, and therefore we must call to God, to take our cause in hand.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Psa 94:5 They break in pieces thy people, O…
Psa 94:5 They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage.
Ver. 5. They break in pieces thy people] They make potsherds of them. And this is the best use they make of thy patience; break it off, therefore.
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 Those righteous persons whom thou hast chosen for thy…
Those righteous persons whom thou hast chosen for thy portion or inheritance.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain They break in pieces thy people, O Lord,.... Not…
They break in pieces thy people, O Lord,.... Not the Israelites, as Kimchi; but the church of Christ, by their anathemas, cruel edicts, and persecutions; by confiscating their goods, imprisoning their persons, putting them to cruel deaths; and by such means think to "wear out" the saints of the most High, the Lord's covenant and peculiar people; which is mentioned as an aggravation of their sin, and as an argument with the Lord to arise on their behalf:
and afflict thine heritage; the church, styled God's heritage, Pe1 5:3, whom the Lord has chosen for his inheritance; and are dear to him, as his portion, his jewels, and even as the apple of his eye; and yet these are afflicted all manner of ways by their persecuting enemies, as Israel was of old in Egypt.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 5. They break in pieces thy people] This…
Verse 5. They break in pieces thy people] This was true of the Babylonians. Nehuchadnezzar slew many; carried the rest into captivity; ruined Jerusalem; overturned the temple; sacked, pillaged, and destroyed all the country.
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 94:5-7. They afflict thy heritage — Those righteous…
Psa 94:5-7. They afflict thy heritage — Those righteous persons whom thou hast chosen for thy portion or inheritance. They slay the widow, &c. — Whom common humanity obliged them to spare, pity, and relieve. Yet they say, The Lord shall not see — Their meeting with impunity and prosperity in their impious and barbarous practices makes them ready to doubt, or to deny, the providence of God in the government of his church and of the world. Neither doth the God of Jacob regard it — Though there are such evident demonstrations of the divine interpositions in favour of Jacob, and of his watchful care over them as his people, yet, for all that, they fancy he does not regard, nor will call them to any account for their doings.
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 They break in pieces thy people - They tread…
They break in pieces thy people - They tread down; they grind; they crush. The Hebrew word is often used as meaning to crush under foot; to trample on; and hence, it means to oppress. Lam 3:34; Isa 3:15.
And afflict - To wit, by oppression and wrong. If this refers to foreigners, it means that they did this by invasion and by the ravages of war.
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Thine heritage - Thy people, regarded as an inheritance or possession. See Psa 28:9, note; Psa 33:12, note; Psa 68:9, note; Psa 74:2, note; Isa 19:25, note; Isa 47:6, note; 1Pe 5:3, note.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 5. Break in pieces—Crush.
5. Break in pieces—Crush.
Afflict—Literally, Cast down to the ground, bring low. The phrase answers to “break in pieces,” crush, in the preceding member.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 5. They break in pieces] Or, crush (as Isa_3:15;…
5. They break in pieces] Or, crush (as Isa_3:15; Pro_22:22), by violence and extortion. Thy people … thine inheritance, as in Psa_28:9. Cp. Deu_4:20.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (5) Break in pieces.—Or, crush. (See Isa_3:15, where the…
(5) Break in pieces.—Or, crush. (See Isa_3:15, where the word is in parallelism with “grind the faces of the poor.”)
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 They break in pieces thy people, O Lord; or,…
They break in pieces thy people, O Lord; or, "crush," "oppress". (comp. Isa_3:15 Pro_22:22, where the verb is evidently used, not of foreign foes, but of domestic oppressors) And afflict thine heritage; or, "thine inheritance those whom thou hast taken to be thy "peculiar people", (Deu_14:2) thine own exclusive possession.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Charles H. Spurgeon 1885 · Public Domain Ver. 5. They break in pieces thy people, O…
Ver. 5. They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, grinding them with oppression, crushing them with contempt. Yet the men they break in pieces are God's own people, and they are persecuted because they are so; this is a strong plea for the divine interposition.
And afflict thine heritage, causing them sorrowful humiliation and deep depression of heart. The term, "thine heritage, "marks out the election of the saints, God's peculiar interest and delight in them, his covenant relation, of long standing, to them and their fathers; this also is a storehouse of arguments with their faithful God. Will he not defend his own? Will a man lose his inheritance, or permit it to be contemptuously despoiled? Those who are ground down, and trampled on, are not strangers, but the choice and chosen ones of the Lord; how long will he leave them to be a prey to cruel foes
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Ver. 5. They break in pieces thy people. They tread down; they grind; they crush. The Hebrew word is often used as meaning to crush under foot; to trample on; and hence it means to oppress. La 3:34, Isa 3:15. Albert Barnes.
Ver. 5-10.
1. High handed oppression by the wicked (Ps 94:5-6).
2. Hard hearted indifference to Divine supervision (Ps 94:7).
3. Clear headed demonstration of the Divine cognisance and vengeance (Ps 94:8-10). C.A.D.
Psalms 94:6*
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 afflict the nation
afflict the nation
Here the metonym "nation" refers to the people of the nation. AT: "afflict the people of the nation" (See: Metonymy)
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They crush
The psalmist speaks of powerful people treating powerless people badly as if it were crushing them or breaking them in pieces. See how "break in pieces" is translated in Psalms 72:4. AT: "They completely destroy" or "They greatly harm" (See: Metaphor)
the widow
"women whose husbands have died"
the fatherless
"children without fathers"
the God of Jacob does not take notice of it
"the God of Israel does not see what we do"
translationWords
people of God
afflicted
nation
Jacob
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.