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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Psalms 116:5 - 116:5
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With “gracious” and “compassionate” is here associated, as in Psa 112:4, the term “righteous,” which comprehends within itself everything that Jahve asserts concerning Himself in Exo 34:6. from the words “and abundant in goodness and truth” onwards. His love is turned especially toward the simple (lxx τὰ νήπια, cf. Mat 11:25), who stand in need of His protection and give themselves over to it. פְּתָאיִם, as in Pro 9:6, is a mode of writing blended out of פְּתָאִים and פְּתָיִים. The poet also has experienced this love in a time of impotent need. דַּלֹּותִי is accented on the ultima here, and not as in Psa 142:7 on the penult. The accentuation is regulated by some phonetic or rhythmical law that has not yet been made clear (vid., on Job 19:17).
(Note: The national grammarians, so far as we are acquainted with them, furnish no explanation. De Balmis believes that these Milra forms דַּלֹּותִי, בַּלֹּותִי, and the like, must be regarded as infinitives, but at the same time confirms the difference of views existing on this point.)
יְהֹושִׁיעַ is a resolved Hiphil form, the use of which became common in the later period of the language, but is not alien to the earlier period, especially in poetry (Ps 45:18, cf. Psa 81:6; 1Sa 17:47; Isa 52:5). In Psa 116:7 we hear the form of soliloquy which has become familiar to us from Psa 42:1; Ps 103. שׁוּבִי is Milra here, as also in two other instances. The plural מְנוּחִים signifies full, complete rest, as it is found only in God; and the suffix in the address to the soul is ajchi for ajich, as in Psa 103:3-5. The perfect גָּמַל states that which is a matter of actual experience, and is corroborated in Psa 116:8 in retrospective perfects. In Psa 116:8-9 we hear Ps 56:14 again amplified; and if we add Psa 27:13, then we see as it were to the bottom of the origin of the poet's thoughts. מִן־דִּמְעָה belongs still more decidedly than יהושׁיע to the resolved forms which multiply in the later period of the language. In Psa 116:9 the poet declares the result of the divine deliverance. The Hithpa. אֶתְהַלֵּךְ denotes a free and contented going to and fro; and instead of “the land of the living,” Psa 27:13, the expression here is “the lands (אַרְצֹות), i.e., the broad land, of the living.” There he walks forth, with nothing to hinder his feet or limit his view, in the presence of Jahve, i.e., having his Deliverer from death ever before his eyes.