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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Psalms 58:6 - 58:6
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The verb הָרַס is used much in the same way in Psa 58:7 as ἀράσσειν (e.g., Iliad, xiii. 577, ἀπὸ δὲ τρυφάλειαν ἄραξεν), which presents a similar onomatope. The form יִמָּֽאֲסוּ is, as in Job 7:5, = יִמַּסּוּ. The Jewish expositors, less appropriately, compare צֹנַֽאֲכֶם, Num 32:24, and בָּֽזְאוּ = בָּֽזְזוּ, Isa 18:2, Isa 18:7; שֹֽׁאֲסַיִךְ, Chethîb, Jer 30:16, and רָֽאֲמָה, Zec 14:10, more nearly resemble it. The treading (bending) of the bow is here, as in Psa 64:4, transferred to the arrows (= כֹּונֵן, Psa 11:2): he bends and shoots off his arrows, they shall be as though cut off in the front, i.e., as inoperative as if they had no heads or points (כְּמֹו as in Isa 26:18). In Psa 58:9 follow two figures to which the apprecatory “let them become” is to be supplied. Or is it perhaps to be rendered: As a snail, which Thou causest to melt away, i.e., squashest with the foot (תֶּמֶס, as in Psa 39:12, fut. Hiph. of מָסָה = מָסַס), let him perish? The change of the number does not favour this; and according to the usage of the language, which is fond of construing הָלַךְ with gerunds and participles, and also with abstract nouns, e.g., הלך תֹּם, הלך קְרִי, the words תֶּמֶס יַֽהֲלֹךְ belong together, and they are also accented accordingly: as a snail or slug which goes along in dissolution, goes on and dissolves as it goes (תֶּמֶס after the form תֶּבֶל form בָּלַל
(Note: In the Phoenician, the Cyprian copper mine Ταμασσός appears to have taken its name from תמס, liquefactio (Levy, Phönizische Studien, iii. 7).)).
The snail has received its name from this apparent dissolving into slime. For שַׁבְּלוּל (with Dag. dirimens for שַׁבְלוּל) is the naked slimy snail or slug (Targum, according to ancient conception, זְחִיל תִּבְלָלָא “the slimeworm”), from שַׁבְלֵל, to make wet, moist.
(Note: “God has created nothing without its use,” says the Talmud, B. Shabbath 77b; “He has created the snail (שׁבלול לכתית) to heal bruises by laying it upon them:” cf. Genesis Rabba, ch. 51 init., where שׁבלול is explained by לימצא, סיליי, כיליי, κογχύλη, σέσιλος, limax. Abraham b. David of Fez, the contemporary of Saadia, has explained it in his Arabico-Hebrew Lexicon by אלחלזון, the slug. Nevertheless this is properly the name of the snail with a house (נרתיק), Talmudic חִלָּזֹון, and even at the present day in Syria and Palestine Arab. ḥlzûn (which is pronounced ḥalezôn); whereas שׁבלול, in conformity with the etymon and with the figure, is the naked snail or slug. The ancient versions perhaps failed to recognise this, because the slug is not very often to be seen in hot eastern countries; but שׁבלול in this signification can be looked upon as traditional. The rendering “a rain-brook or mountain-torrent (Arabic seil sâbil) which running runs away,” would, to say nothing more, give us, as Rosenmüller has already observed, a figure that has been made use of already in Psa 58:8.)
In the second figure, the only sense in which נפל אשׁת belong together is “the untimely birth of a woman;” and rather than explain with the Talmud (B. Môed katan 6b) and Targum (contrary to the accents): as an abortion, a mole,
(Note: The mole, which was thought to have no eyes, is actually called in post-biblical Hebrew אֵשֶׁת, plur. אִישֹׁות (vid., Keelim xxi. 3).)
one would alter אשׁת into אשׁה. But this is not necessary, since the construct form אֵשֶׁת is found also in other instances (Deu 21:11; 1Sa 28:7) out of the genitival relation, in connection with a close coordinate construction. So here, where בַּל־הָזוּ שָֽׁמֶשׁ, according to Job 3:16; Ecc 6:3-5, is an attributive clause to נפל אשׁת (the falling away of a woman = abortions), which is used collectively (Ew. §176, b). The accentuation also harmonizes here with the syntactic relation of the words. In Psa 58:10, אָטָד (plural in African, i.e., Punic, in Dioscorides atadi'n) is the rhamnus or buckthorn, which, like רֹתֶם, the broom, not only makes a cheerful crackling fire, but also produces an ash that retains the heat a long time, and is therefore very useful in cooking. The alternative כְּמֹו - כְּמֹו signifies sive, sive, whether the one or the other. חַי is that which is living, fresh, viz., the fresh, raw meat still having the blood in it, the opposite of מְבֻשָּׁל (1Sa 2:15); חָרֹון, a fierce heat or fire, here a boiling heat. There is no need to understand חרון metonymically, or perhaps as an adjective = charrôn, of boiled meat: it is a statement of the condition. The suffix of יִשְׁעָרֶנּוּ, however, refers, as being neuter, to the whole cooking apparatus, and more especially to the contents of the pots. The rendering therefore is: whether raw or in a state of heat, i.e., of being cooked through, He (Jahve) carries it away as with a whirlwind. Hengstenberg rightly remarks, “To the raw meat correspond the immature plots, and to the cooked the mature ones.” To us, who regard the Psalm as belonging to the time of Absalom, and not, like Hengstenberg, to the time of Saul, the meat in the pots is the new kingship of Absalom. The greater the self-renunciation with which David at that time looked on at the ripening revolt, disclaiming all action of his own, the stronger the confidence with which he expected the righteous interposition of God that did actually follow, but (as he here supposes possible) not until the meat in the pot was almost done through; yet, on the other side, so quickly, that the pots had scarcely felt the crackling heat which should fully cook the meat.