Psalms 109:6-19
EXPOSITION Verse 6. Set thou a wicked man over him. What worse punishment could a man have? The proud man cannot endure the proud, nor the oppressor brook the rule of another like himself. The righteous in their patience find the rule of the wicked a sore bondage; but those who are full of resentful passions, and haughty aspirations, are slaves indeed when men of their own class have the whip hand of them. For Herod to be ruled by another Herod would be wretchedness enough, and yet what retribution could be more just? What unrighteous man can complain if he finds himself governed by one of like character? What can the wicked expect but that their rulers should be like themselves? Who does not admire the justice of God when he sees fierce Romans ruled by Tiberius and Nero, and Red Republicans governed by Marat and Robespierre? And let Satan stand at his right hand. Should not like come to like? Should not the father of lies stand near his children? Who is a better right hand friend for an adversary of the righteous than the great adversary himself? The curse is an awful one, but it is most natural that it should come to pass: those who serve Satan may expect to have his company, his assistance, his temptations, and at last his doom. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 6. Set thou a wicked man over him, etc. Here commences that terrible series of maledictions, unparalleled in Holy Writ, as directed against an individual sinner, albeit it is little more than a special reduplication of the national woes denounced in Leviticus 26:1-46 and Deuteronomy 28:1-68. --Neale and Littledale. Verse 6. Set thou a wicked man over him. The first thing that the Psalmist asks is, that his foe might be subjected to the evil of having a man placed over him like himself: -- a man regardless of justice, truth, and right; a man who would respect character and propriety no more than he had himself done. It is, in fact, a prayer that he might be punished in the line of his offences. It cannot be wrong that a man should be treated as he treats others; and it cannot be in itself wrong to desire that a man should be treated according to his character and deserts, for this is the object of all law, and this is what all magistrates and legislators are endeavouring to secure. -- Albert Barnes. Verse 6. Over HIM. Consider what would have been the effect if these denunciations had been made against the sins of men and not, as they are in these passages, against the sinners. Men would have said, "My sin is denounced, not me." What a license would have been given to sin! The depraved nature would have said, "if I am not condemned, but only my sin, I can do as I like; I shall not be called to account for it. I love sin and can go on in it." This is what men would have said. There would have been no effort to get rid of it. Why should there be; if only sin is condemned and not the sinner? But man's sin is identified with himself, and this makes him tremble. God's wrath rests on him because of his sin. Condemnation is awaiting him because of his sin. This makes him anxious to get rid of it. -- Frederick Whitfield. Verse 6. Let Satan stand at his right hand. It appears to have been the custom at trials before the Jewish tribunals for a pleader to stand at the right hand of the accused: See Zec 3:1, where are described Joshua the High Priest, standing before the Angel of Jehovah, and the adversary (!jv, Satan, as here) standing at his right hand to oppose him. See also Psalms 109:31. --John Le Clerc, 1657-1736. Verse 6. Let Satan stand at his right hand. Hugo observes that the Devil is on the left hand of those whom he persecutes in temporal things: on the right of those whom he rules in spiritual things: before the face of those who are on their guard against his wiles: behind those who are not foreseeing and prudent: above those whom he treads down: below, and beneath the feet of those who tread him down. A recent Spanish author, (Peter Vega. On the Penitential Psalms.) writing in that language, thinks that there cannot be anything worse than that man who diligently and of set purpose injures others by speaking deceitfully, by surrounding with speeches of hatred, by attacking without cause, by slandering, by returning evil for good, and hatred for love: therefore, in this place it is desired that a wicked man may be set over such a one, and the devil at his right hand; as if he should be doomed to take the lowest place because he is the worst. -- Lorinus. Verse 6. At his right hand. The strength or force of the body shows itself principally in the right hand. Therefore, he who wishes to obstruct another, and to hinder his endeavour, stands at his right hand; and thus easily parries his stroke or attempt. This I consider to be the most simple meaning of this passage which shows that God represses and restrains the raging of the enemies of the Church, who withstand each other by their opposing efforts, either from envy or from other causes. Thus, 2 Samuel 17:1-29, the counsels of Ahithophel are broken by Hushai; and in our day we see that the counsels and attempts of our enemies have been frequently and wonderfully restrained by the hindrances they have give one to the other: in which matter the goodness of God is to be discerned. -- Mollerus. Verse 6. He begins to prophesy what they should receive for their great impiety, detailing their lot in such a manner as if he wished its realization from a desire of revenge: while he declareth what was to happen with the most absolute certainty, and what of God's justice would worthily come upon such. Some not understanding this mode of predicting the future under the appearance of wishing evil, suppose hatred to be returned for hatred, and an evil will for an evil will: since in truth it belongeth to few to distinguish in what way the punishment of the wicked pleaseth the accuser, who longeth to satiate his enmity; and in how widely different a way it pleaseth the judge, who with a righteous mind punishes sins. For the former returneth evil for evil, but the judge when he punishes does not return evil for evil, since he returneth justice to the unjust; and what is just is surely good. He therefore punishes not from delight in another's misery, which is evil for evil, but from love of justice, which is good for evil. Let not then the blind pervert the light of the Scriptures imagining that God doth not punish sins: nor let the wicked flatter themselves, as if he rendered evil for evil. Let us therefore hear the sequel of this divine composition; and in the words of one who seemeth to wish ill, let us recognise the predictions of a prophet; and let us see God making a just retribution, raising our mind up to his eternal laws. --Augustine. Verse 6-19. These terrible curses are repeated with many words and sentences, that we may know that David has not let these words fall rashly or from any precipitate impulse of mind; but, the Holy Spirit having dictated, he employs this form of execration that it may be a perpetual prophecy or prediction of the bitter pains and destruction of the enemies of the Church of God. Nor does David imprecate these punishments so much on his own enemies and Judas the betrayer of Christ; but that similar punishments await all who fight against the kingdom of Christ. --Mollerus. Verse 6-20. I had also this consideration, that if I should now venture all for God, I engaged God to take care of my concerns; but if I forsook him and his ways for fear of any trouble that should come to me or mine, then I should not only falsify my profession, but should count also that my concerns were not so sure, if left at God's feet, while I stood to and for his name, as they would be if they were under my own tuition (or care) though with the denial of the way of God. This was a smarting consideration, and was as spurs unto my flesh. This Scripture (Psalms 109:6-20.) also greatly helped it to fasten the more upon me, where Christ prays against Judas, that God would disappoint him in all his selfish thoughts, which moved him to sell his master: pray read it soberly. I had also another consideration, and that was, the dread of the torments of hell, which I was sure they must partake of, that for fear of the cross to shrink from their profession of Christ, his words, and laws, before the sons of men. I thought also of the glory that he had prepared for those that, in faith, and love, and patience, stood to his ways before them. These things, I say, have helped me, when the thoughts of the misery that both myself and mine might for the sake of my profession be exposed to hath lain pinching on my mind. --John Bunyan. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 6. It is the law of retribution to punish the wicked by means of the wicked. -- Starke. EXPOSITION Verse 7. When he shall be judged, let him be condemned. He judged and condemned others in the vilest manner, he suffered not the innocent to escape; and it would be a great shame if in his time of trial, being really guilty, he should be allowed to go free. Who would wish Judge Jeffries to be acquitted if he were tried for perverting justice? Who would desire Nero or Caligula to be cleared if set at the bar for cruelty? When Shylock goes into court, who wishes him to win his suit? And let his prayer become sin. It is sin already, let it be so treated. To the injured it must seem terrible that the black hearted villain should nevertheless pretend to pray, and very naturally do they beg that he may not be heard, but that his pleadings may be regarded as an addition to his guilt. He has devoured the widow's house, and yet he prays. He has put Naboth to death by false accusation and taken possession of his vineyard, and then he presents prayers to the Almighty. He has given up villages to slaughter, and his hands are red with the blood of babes and maidens, and then he pays his vows unto Allah! He must surely be accursed himself who does not wish that such abominable prayers may be loathed of heaven and written down as new sins. He who makes it a sin for others to pray will find his own praying become sin. When he at last sees his need of mercy, mercy herself shall resent his appeal as an insult. "Because that he remembered not to show mercy", he shall himself be forgotten by the God of grace, and his bitter cries for deliverance shall be regarded as mockeries of heaven. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 7. Let his prayer become sin. As the clamours of a condemned malefactor, not only find no acceptance, but are looked upon as an affront to the court. The prayers of the wicked now become sin, because soured with the leaven of hypocrisy and malice; and so they will in the great day, because then it will be too late to cry, "Lord, Lord, open unto us." --Matthew Henry. Verse 7. Let his prayer become sin. Evidently his prayer in reference to his trial for crime; his prayer that he might be acquitted and discharged. Let it be seen in the result that such a prayer was wrong; that it was in fact, a prayer for the discharge of a bad man -- a man who ought to be punished. Let it be seen to be what a prayer would be if offered for a murderer, or violator of the law, -- a prayer that he might escape or not be punished. All must see that such a prayer would be wrong, or would be a "sin"; and so, in his own case, it would be equally true that a prayer for his own escape would be "sin." The Psalmist asks that, by the result of the trial, such a prayer might be seen to be in fact a prayer for the protection and escape of a bad man. A just sentence in the case would demonstrate this; and this is what the Psalmist prays for. --Albert Barnes. Verse 7. Let his prayer become sin. Kimchi in his annotations thus explains these words: i.e., "let it be without effect, so that he does not get what he asks for; let him not hit the mark at which he aims": for ajx sometimes has the meaning to miss. -- Wolfgang Musculus. Verse 7. Let his prayer become sin. St. Jerome says that Judas's prayer was turned into sin, by reason of his want of hope when he prayed: and thus it was that in despair he hanged himself. --Robert Bellarmine. Verse 7. Let his prayer become sin. The prayer of the hypocrite is sin formally, and it is sin in the effect, that is, instead of getting any good by it, he gets hurt, and the Lord instead of helping him because he prays, punishes him because of the sinfulness of his prayers. Thus his prayer becomes sin to him, because he receives no more respect from God when he prays than when he sins. And sin doth not only mingle with his prayer (as it doth with the prayers of the holiest), but his prayer is nothing else but a mixture or mingle mangle (as we speak) of many sins. --Joseph Caryl. Verse 7. Let his prayer become sin. We should be watchful in prayer lest the most holy worship of God should become an abomination: Isaiah 1:15 66:3 James 4:3 Hosea 7:14 Amos 5:23. If the remedy be poisoned, how shall the diseased be cured? --Martin Geier. Verse 7-19. These and the following verses, although they contain terrible imprecations, will become less dreadful if we understand them as spoken concerning men pertinaciously cleaving to their vices, against whom only has God threatened punishments; not against those who repent with all their heart, and become thoroughly changed in life. --John Le Clerc. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 7. When may prayer become sin. From what is sought, how sought, by whom sought, and wherefore sought. EXPOSITION Verse 8. Let his days be few. Who would desire a persecuting tyrant to live long? As well might we wish length of days to a mad dog. If he will do nothing but mischief the shortening of his life will be the lengthening of the world's tranquillity. "Bloody and deceitful men shall not live out half their days", -- this is bare justice to them, and great mercy to the poor and needy. And let another take his office. Perhaps a better man may come, at any rate it is time a change were tried. So used were the Jews to look upon these verses as the doom of traitors, of cruel and deceitful mind, that Peter saw at once in the speedy death of Judas a fulfilment of this sentence, and a reason for the appointment of a successor who should take his place of oversight. A bad man does not make an office bad: another may use with benefit that which he perverted to ill uses. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 8. Let his days be few. By "his days", he meant the days of his apostleship, which were few; since before the passion of our Lord, they were ended by his crime and death. And as if it were asked, What then shall become of that most sacred number twelve, within which our Lord willed, not without a meaning, to limit his twelve first apostles? he at once addeth, and let another take his office. As much as to say, let both himself be punished according to his desert, and let his number be filled up. And if any one desire to know how this was done, let him read the Acts of the Apostles. -- Augustine. Verse 8. Let another take his office. So every man acts, and practically prays, who seeks to remove a bad and corrupt man from office. As such an office must be filled by some one, all the efforts which he puts forth to remove a wicked man tend to bring it about that "another should take his office", and for this it is right to labour and pray. The act does not of itself imply malignity or bad feeling, but is consistent with the purest benevolence, the kindest feelings, the strictest integrity, the sternest patriotism, and the highest form of piety. --Albert Barnes. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 8. Let his days be few. Sin the great shortener of human life. After the flood the whole race lived a shorter time; passion and avaricious care shorten life, and some sins have a peculiar power to do this, lust, drunkenness, & c. EXPOSITION Verse 9. Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. This would inevitably be the case when the man died, but the psalmist uses the words in an emphatic sense, he would have his widow "a widow indeed", and his children so friendless as to be orphaned in the bitterest sense. He sees the result of the bad man's decease, and includes it in the punishment. The tyrant's sword makes many children fatherless, and who can lament when his barbarities come home to his own family, and they too, weep and lament. Pity is due to all orphans and widows as such, but a father's atrocious actions may dry up the springs of pity. Who mourns that Pharaoh's children lost their father, or that Sennacherib's wife became a widow? As Agag's sword had made women childless none wept when Samuel's weapon made his mother childless among women. If Herod had been slain when he had just murdered the innocents at Bethlehem no man would have lamented it even though Herod's wife would have become a widow. These awful maledictions are not for common men to use, but for judges, such as David was, to pronounce over the enemies of God and man. A judge may sentence a man to death whatever the consequences may be to the criminal's family, and in this there will be no feeling of private revenge, but simply the doing of justice because evil must be punished. We are aware that this may not appear to justify the full force of these expressions, but it should never be forgotten that the case supposed is a very execrable one, and the character of the culprit is beyond measure loathsome and not to be met by any common abhorrence. Those who regard a sort of effeminate benevolence to all creatures alike as the acme of virtue are very much in favour with this degenerate age; these look for the salvation of the damned, and even pray for the restoration of the devil. It is very possible that if they were less in sympathy with evil, and more in harmony with the thoughts of God, they would be of a far sterner and also of a far better mind. To us it seems better to agree with God's curses than with the devil's blessings; and when at any time our heart kicks against the terrors of the Lord we take it as a proof of our need of greater humbling, and confess our sin before our God. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 9. Let his children be fatherless. Helpless and shiftless. A sore vexation to many on their death beds, and just enough upon graceless persecutors. But happy are they who, when they lie dying, can say as Luther did, "Domine Deus gratias ago tibi quod velueris me esse pauperem, et mendicum, & c. Lord God, I thank thee for my present poverty, but future hopes. I have not an house, lands, possessions, or monies to leave behind me. Thou hast given me wife and children; behold, I return them back to thee, and beseech thee to nourish them, teach them, keep them safe, as hitherto thou hast done, O thou father of the fatherless, and judge of widows." --John Trapp. Verse 9-10,12-13. "His children;" "his posterity." Though in matters of a civil or judicial character, we have it upon the highest authority that the children are not to be made accountable for the fathers, nor the fathers for the children, but every transgressor is to bear the penalty of his own sin; yet, in a moral, and in a social and spiritual sense, it is impossible that the fathers should eat sour grapes, and yet that the children's teeth should not be set on edge. The offspring of the profligate and the prodigal may, and often do, avoid the specific vices of the parent; but rarely, if ever, do they escape the evil consequences of those vices. And this reaction cannot be prevented, until it shall please God first to unmake and then to remodel his whole intelligent creation. --T. Dale, in a Sermon to Heads of Families, 1839. Verse 9-13. Under the Old Covenant, calamity, extending from father to son, was the meed of transgression; prosperity, vice versa, of obedience: (see Solomon's prayer, 2 Chronicles 6:23): and these prayers of the psalmist (cf. Psalms 10:13,12:1 58:10, etc.) may express the wish that God's providential government of his people should be asserted in the chastisement of the enemy of God and man. --Speaker's Commentary. EXPOSITION Verse 10. Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg. May they have neither house nor home, settlement nor substance; and while they thus wander and beg may it ever be on their memory that their father's house lies in ruins, -- let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. It has often been so: a race of tyrants has become a generation of beggars. Misused power and abused wealth have earned the family name universal detestation, and secured to the family character an entail of baseness. Justice herself would award no such doom except upon the supposition that the sin descended with the blood; but supreme providence which in the end is pure justice has written many a page of history in which the imprecation of this verse has been literally verified. We confess that as we read some of these verses we have need of all our faith and reverence to accept them as the voice of inspiration; but the exercise is good for the soul, for it educates our sense of ignorance, and tests our teachability. Yes, Divine Spirit, we can and do believe that even these dread words from which we shrink have a meaning consistent with the attributes of the Judge of all the earth, though his name is LOVE. How this may be we shall know hereafter. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 10. Let his children be continually vagabonds. The word used in the sentence pronounced upon Cain, Genesis 4:12. Compare Psalms 59:11,15. --William Kay. Verse 10. Let them seek, etc. Horsley renders this clause, Let them be driven out from the very ruins of their dwellings, and remarks that the image is that of "vagabonds seeking a miserable shelter among the ruins of decayed or demolished buildings, and not suffered to remain even in such places undisturbed." Verse 9-10. When we consider of whom this Psalm is used there will be no difficulty about it. No language could be more awful than that of Psalms 109:6-19. It embraces almost every misery we can think of. But could any man be in a more wretched condition than Judas was? Could any words be too severe to express the depth of his misery -- of him, who, for three whole years, had been the constant attendant of the Saviour of mankind; who had witnessed his miracles, and had shared his miraculous powers; who had enjoyed all the warnings, all the reproofs of his love, and then had betrayed him for thirty pieces of silver? Can we conceive a condition more miserable than that of Judas? And this Psalm is a prophecy of the punishment that should overtake him for his sin. S. Peter, in the Acts of the Apostles, quotes part of this psalm, and applies it to Judas: he applies it as a prophecy of the punishment he should suffer on the betrayal of the Son of God. It is probable that in this psalm, when it uses the word children, it does not mean those who are his offspring by natural descent, but those who resemble him, and who partake with him in his wickedness. This is a common meaning of the word sons, or children, in Holy Scripture. As where our blessed Lord tells the Jews, Ye are of your father the devil, he could not mean that the Jews were the natural descendants of the devil, but that they were his children because they did his works. Again, when they are called Abraham's children, it means those who do the works of Abraham. So in this psalm, where it is foretold that fearful punishment should happen to Judas for the betrayal of his Lord, and should be extended to his children, it means his associates, his companions, and imitators in wickedness. --F.H. Dunwell, in "A Tract on the Commination Service", 1853. Verse 10, 12-13. It is for public ends that the psalmist prayed that the families of the wicked might be involved in their ruin. These are very terrible petitions; but it is God, not man, who has appointed these calamities as the ordinary consequences of persistence in wickedness. It is God, not man, who visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, to the third and fourth generations. It is because this is the ordinary portion of the transgressors, and that thus in God's wonted way his abhorrence of the transgressions of his enemies might be marked, that the psalmist prays for these calamities. He asks God to do what he had declared he would do, and this for public ends, for he says: "I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth; yea, I will praise him among the multitude. For he shall stand at the right hand of the poor, to save him from those that condemn his soul", Psalms 109:30-31. --R.A. Bertram, in "The Imprecatory Psalms", 1867. Verse 10-13. Many penurious fathers are so scraping for their children, that they ravish the poor children of God; but the hand of the Lord shall be against their young lions. Nahum 2:13. They join house to house, and field to field, but their children shall be "vagabonds and beg", "seeking their bread out of their desolate places." How many a covetous mole is now digging a house in the earth for his posterity, and never dreams of this sequel, that God should make those children beggars, for whose sake their fathers had made so many beggars! This is a quittance which the sire will not believe, but as sure as God is just the son shall feel. Now if he had but leave to come out of hell for an hour, and see this, how should he curse his folly! Sure, if possible, it would double the pain of his infernal torture. Be moderate, then, ye that so insatiately devour, as if you had an infinite capacity: you overload your stomachs, it is fit they should be disburdened in shameful spewing. How quickly doth a worldly minded man grow a defrauder, from a defrauder to a usurer, from a usurer to an oppressor, from an oppressor to an extortioner! If his eyes do but tell his heart of a booty, his heart will charge his hand, and he must have it, Micah 2:2. They do but see it, like it, and take it. Observe their due payment. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath: they got all by extortion, they shall lose all by extortion. They spoiled their neighbours, strangers shall spoil them. How often hath the poor widow and orphan cried, wept, groaned to them for mercy, and found none! They have taught God how to deal with themselves; let there be none to extend mercy to them. They have advanced houses for a memorial, and dedicated lands to their own names, Psalms 49:11; all to get them a name; and even in this they shall be crossed: In the next generation their name shall be quite put out. --Thomas Adams. EXPOSITION Verse 11. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath. A doom indeed. Those who have once fallen into the hands of the usurer can tell you what this means: it were better to be a fly in the web of a spider. In the most subtle, worrying, and sweeping manner the extortioner takes away, piece by piece, his victim's estate, till not a fraction remains to form a pittance for old age. Baiting his trap, watching it carefully, and dexterously driving his victim into it, the extortioner by legal means performs unlawful deeds, catches his bird, strips him of every feather, and cares not if he die of starvation. He robs with law to protect him, and steals with the magistrate at his back: to fall into his clutches is worse than to be beset by professed thieves. And let the strangers spoil his labour, -- so that his kindred may have none of it. What with hard creditors and pilfering strangers the estate must soon vanish! Extortion drawing one way, and spoliation the other, a known moneylender and an unknown robber both at work, the man's substance would soon disappear, and rightly so, for it was gathered by shameless means. This too has been frequently seen. Wealth amassed by oppression has seldom lasted to the third generation: it was gathered by wrong and by wrong it is scattered, and who would decree that it should be otherwise? Certainly those who suffer beneath high handed fraud will not wish to stay the retribution of the Almighty, nor would those who see the poor robbed and trampled on desire to alter the divine arrangements by which such evils are recompensed even in this life. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 11. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath. Note: he is most miserable who falls into the hands of usurers; for they will flay him alive and drain his blood. The Romans, that they might deter the citizens from usury, placed a statue of Marsyas in the Forum or law court, by which they signified that those who came into the hands of usurers would be skinned alive; and to show that usurers, as the most unjust litigants, deserved hanging, they placed a rope in the hand of the figure. --Le Blanc. Verse 11. Catch. This refers to the obligations between creditors and debtors, and he calls these snares, by which, as it were, the insolvent debtors are caught, and at last come to servitude. --Mollerus. EXPOSITION Verse 12. Let there be none to extend mercy unto him. He had no mercy, but on the contrary, he crushed down all who appealed to him. Loath to smite him with his own weapon, stern justice can do no otherwise, she lifts her scales and sees that this, too, must be in the sentence. Neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children. We are staggered to find the children included in the father's sentence, and yet as a matter of fact children do suffer for their father's sins, and, as long as the affairs of this life are ordered as they are, it must be so. So involved are the interests of the race, that it is quite impossible in all respects to view the father and the child apart. No man among us could desire to see the fatherless suffer for their deceased father's fault, yet so it happens, and there is no injustice in the fact. They share the parent's ill gotten gain or rank, and their aggrandizement is a part of the object at which he aimed in the perpetration of his crimes; to allow them to prosper would be an encouragement and reward of his iniquity; therefore, for these and other reasons, a man perishes not alone in his iniquity. The ban is on his race. If the man were innocent this would be a crime; if he were but commonly guilty it would be excessive retribution; but when the offence reeks before high heaven in unutterable abomination, it is little marvel that men devote the man's whole house to perpetual infamy, and that so it happeneth. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 12. Let there be none to extend mercy to him. He does not say, None who shall shew, but none who shall "extend" kindness to him. The extending of kindness is, when after a friend's death it is shown to his children, and true friendship is of this sort, that the kindness which friends shewed to each other while alive is maintained, not extinguished with the death of the friend. --Wolfgang Musculus. Verse 12. Let there be none to extend mercy to him. Let God in his justice set off all hearts from him that had been so unreasonably merciless. Thus no man opened his mouth to intercede for Haman; Judas was shaken off by the priests, and bid see to himself, etc. --John Trapp. EXPOSITION Verse 13. Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out. Both from existence and from memory let them pass away till none shall know that such a vile brood ever existed. Who wishes to see the family of Domitian or Julian continued upon earth? Who would mourn if the race of Tom Paine or of Voltaire should come to an utter end? It would be undesirable that the sons of the utterly villainous and bloodthirsty should rise to honour, and if they did they would only revive the memory of their father's sins. EXPOSITION Verse 14. This verse is, perhaps, the most terrible of all, but yet as a matter of fact children do procure punishment upon their parents' sins, and are often themselves the means of such punishment. A bad son brings to mind his father's bad points of character; people say, "Ah, he is like the old man. He takes after his father." A mother's sins also will be sure to be called to mind if her daughter becomes grossly wicked. "Ah", they will say, "there is little wonder, when you consider what her mother was." These are matters of everyday occurrence. We cannot, however, pretend to explain the righteousness of this malediction, though we fully believe in it. We leave it till our heavenly Father is pleased to give us further instruction. Yet, as a man's faults are often learned from his parents, it is not unjust that his consequent crimes should recoil upon him. EXPOSITION Verse 15. Again, he wishes that his father's sins may follow up the transgressor and assist to fill the measure of his own iniquities, so that for the whole accumulated load the family may be smitten with utter extinction. A king might justly wish for such an end to fall upon an incorrigible brood of rebels; and of persecutors, continuing in the same mind, the saints might well pray for their extinction; but the passage is dark; and we must leave it so. It must be right or it would not be here, but how we cannot see. Why should we expect to understand all things? Perhaps it is more for our benefit to exercise humility, and reverently worship God over a hard text, than it would be to comprehend all mysteries. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 15. Let them be before the Lord continually. The fearful punishment of sinners is, to be always under the eye of an angry God: then the soul of the sinner is dismayed at its own deformity. --Le Blanc. Verse 15. Let them be before the Lord continually. Lafayette, the friend and ally of Washington, was in his youth confined in a French dungeon. In the door of his ceil there was cut a small hole, just big enough for a man's eye; at that hole a sentinel was placed, whose duty it was to watch, moment by moment, till he was relieved by a change of guard. All Lafayette saw was the winking eye, but the eye was always there; look when he would, it met his gaze. In his dreams, he was conscious it was staring at him. "Oh", he says, "it was horrible; there was no escape; when he lay down and when he rose up, when he ate and when he read, that eye searched him." --"New Cyclopaedia of Illustrative Anecdote", 1875. Verse 15-19, 29. Strict justice, and nothing more, breathes in every petition. Cannot you say, Amen! to all these petitions? Are you not glad when the wicked man falls into the ditch he has made for another's destruction, and when his mischief returns upon his own head? But you say, "These petitions are unquestionably just, but why did not the psalmist ask, not for justice, but for mercy?" The answer is, that in his public capacity, he was bound to think first about justice. No government could stand upon the basis of forgiveness, justice must always go before mercy. Suppose that in the course of the next session Parliament should decree that henceforth, instead of justice being shown to thieves, by sending them to prison, they should be treated charitably, and compelled to restore one half of what they stole, what would honest men say about the government? The thieves would doubtless be very complimentary, but what would honest men say? Why, they would say the government had altogether failed of its function, and it would not live to be a week older. And just so, the psalmists were bound first of all to seek for the vindication and establishment of justice and truth. Like the magistrates of today, they considered first the well being of the community. This they had in view in all the calamities they sought to bring upon wrong doers. --R.A. Bertram. EXPOSITION Verse 16. Because that he remembered not to shew mercy. Because he had no memory to show mercy the Judge of all will have a strong memory of his sins. So little mercy had he ever shown that he had forgotten how to do it, he was without common humanity, devoid of compassion, and therefore only worthy to be dealt with after the bare rule of justice. But persecuted the poor and needy man. He looked on poor men as a nuisance upon the earth, he ground their faces, oppressed them in their wages, and treated them as the mire of the streets. Should he not be punished, and in his turn laid low? All who know him are indignant at his brutalities, and will glory to see him overthrown. That he might even slay the broken in heart. He had malice in his heart towards one who was already sufficiently sorrowful, whom it was a superfluity of malignity to attack. Yet no grief excited sympathy in him, no poverty ever moved him to relent. No, he would kill the heart broken and rob their orphans of their patrimony. To him groans were music, and tears were wine, and drops of blood precious rubies. Would any man spare such a monster? Will it not be serving the ends of humanity if we wish him gone, gone to the throne of God to receive his reward? If he will turn and repent, well: but if not, such a up as tree ought to be felled and cast into the fire. As men kill mad dogs if they can, and justly too, so may we lawfully wish that cruel oppressors of the poor were removed from their place and office, and, as an example to others, made to smart for their barbarities. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 16. Because. Why, what is the crime? Because that he remembered not to shew mercy, etc. See what a long vial full of the plagues of God is poured out upon the unmerciful man! --Thomas Watson. Verse 16. But persecuted the poor. If any man will practise subtraction against the poor, God will use it against him, and take his name out of the book of life. If he be damned that gives not his own, what shall become of him that takes away another man's? (Augustine.) If judgment without mercy shall be to him that shows no mercy (James 2:13) where shall subtraction and rapine appear? Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let strangers spoil his labour, Psalms 109:11: there is one subtraction, his estate. Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out, Ps 109:13: there is another subtraction, his memory. Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children, Psalms 109:12: there is another subtraction, a denial of all pity to him and his, Let him be condemned: and let his prayer become sin, Psalms 109:7: there is another subtraction, no audience from heaven. Let another take his office; there is a subtraction of his place: let his days be few, Psalms 109:8: there is a subtraction of his life. Let him be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous, Psalms 69:28; there is the last, the subtraction of his soul. This is a fearful arithmetic: if the wicked add sins, God will add plagues. If they subtract from others their rights, God shall subtract from them his mercies. --Thomas Adams. EXPOSITION Verse 17. As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him. Deep down in every man's soul the justice of the lex talionis is established. Retaliation, not for private revenge, but as a measure of public justice, is demanded by the psalmist and deserved by the crime. Surely the malicious man cannot complain if he is judged by his own rule, and has his corn measured with his own bushel. Let him have what he loved. They are his own chickens, and they ought to come home to roost. He made the bed, let him lie on it himself. As he brewed, so let him drink. So all men say as a matter of justice, and though the higher law of love overrides all personal anger, yet as against the base characters here described even Christian love would not wish to see the sentence mitigated. As he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him. He felt no joy in any man's good, nor would he lift a hand to do another a service, rather did he frown and fret when another prospered or mirth was heard under his window; what, then, can we wish him? Blessing was wasted on him, he hated those who gently sought to lead him to a better mind; even the blessings of providence he received with murmurs and repinings, he wished for famine to raise the price of his corn, and for war to increase his trade. Evil was good to him, and good he counted evil. If he could have blasted every field of corn in the world he would have done so if he could have turned a penny by it, or if he could thereby have injured the good man whom he hated from his very soul. What can we wish for him? He hunts after evil, he hates good; he lays himself out to ruin the godly whom God has blessed, he is the devil's friend, and as fiendish as his patron; should things go well with such a being? Shall we "wish him good luck in the name of the Lord?" To invoke blessings on such a man would be to participate in his wickedness, therefore let blessing be far from him, so long as he continues what he now is. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 17. Cursing is both good and bad. For we read in the Scriptures that holy men have often cursed. Indeed none can offer the Lord's Prayer rightly without cursing. For when he prays, "Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done", etc., he must include in the same outpouring of his desires all that is opposed to these, and say, cursed and execrated and dishonoured must all other names be, and all kingdoms which are opposed to thee must be destroyed and rent in pieces, and all devices and purposes formed against thee fall to the ground. --Martin Luther. Verse 17. As he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him. He was a wolf in clothing of the lamb, That stole into the fold of God, and on The blood of souls, which he did sell to death, Grew fat; and yet, when any would have turned Him out, he cried, "Touch not the priest of God." And that he was anointed, fools believed; But knew, that day, he was the devil's priest, Anointed by the hands of Sin and Death, And set peculiarly apart to ill -- While on him smoked the vials of perdition, Poured measureless. Ah, me! What cursing then Was heaped upon his head by ruined souls, That charged him with their murder, as he stood With eye, of all the unredeemed, most sad, Waiting the coming of the Son of Man! --Robert Pollok. Verse 17-19. Possibly Psalms 109:17-18 describe as fact what Psalms 109:19 amplifies in a wish, or prayer. "He loved cursing, and it loved him in return, and came to him: he delighted not in blessing, and it was far from him. He clothed himself with cursing as with a garment, and, it permeated his inmost parts as water, as the refreshing oil with which the body is anointed finds a way into marrow and bones." The images are familiar; the daily dress, the water that permeates daily every part of the body, the oil used daily for nourishment (Ps 104:15) and gladness (Psalms 23:5). In the wish that follows (Psalms 109:19), the mantle, or garment, which is always worn, and the girdle or belt with which the accursed one is always girded, are substituted, apparently, for more general terms. -- Speakers Commentary. Verse 17-19. As the loss of the soul is a loss peculiar to itself, and a loss double, so it is a loss most fearful, because it is attended with the most heavy curse of God. This curse lieth in a deprivation of all good, and in a being swallowed up of all the most fearful miseries that a holy and just and eternal God can righteously inflict, or lay upon the soul of a sinful man. Now let reason here come in and exercise itself in the most exquisite manner; yea, let him now count up all, and all manner of curses and torments that a reasonable and an immortal soul is, or can be made capable of, and able to suffer, and when he has done, he shall come infinitely short of this great anathema, this master curse which God has reserved amongst his treasuries, and intends to bring out in that day of battle and war, which he proposes to make upon damned souls in that day. And this God will do, partly as a retaliation, as the former, and partly by way of revenge.- Deuteronomy 32:41-422 Thessalonians 1:7-9
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