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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Psalms 88:13 - 88:13
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He who complains thus without knowing any comfort, and yet without despairing, gathers himself up afresh for prayer. With וַאֲנִי he contrasts himself with the dead who are separated from God's manifestation of love. Being still in life, although under wrath that apparently has no end, he strains every nerve to struggle through in prayer until he shall reach God's love. His complaints are petitions, for they are complaints that are poured forth before God. The destiny under which for a long time he has been more like one dying than living, reaches back even into his youth. מִנֹּעַר (since נֹעַר is everywhere undeclined) is equivalent to מִנְּעֻרַי. The ἐξηπορήθην of the lxx is the right indicator for the understanding of the ἅπαξ λ.ε.γ. אָפוּנָה. Aben-Ezra and Kimchi derive it from פֶּן, like עָלָה from עַל,
(Note: The derivation is not contrary to the genius of the language; the supplementing productive force of the language displayed in the liturgical poetry of the synagogue, also changes particles into verbs: vid., Zunz, Die synagogaie Poesie des Mittelalters, S. 421.)
and assign to it the signification of dubitare. But it may be more safely explained after the Arabic words Arab. afana, afina, ma'fûn (root 'f, to urge forwards, push), in which the fundamental notion of driving back, narrowing and exhausting, is transferred to a weakening or weakness of the intellect. We might also compare פָּנָה, Arab. faniya, “to disappear, vanish, pass away;” but the ἐξηπορήθην of the lxx favours the kinship with that Arab. afina, infirma mente et consilii inops fuit,
(Note: Abulwalîd also explains אָפוּנָה after the Arabic, but in a way that cannot be accepted, viz., “for a long time onwards,” from the Arabic iffân (ibbân, iff, afaf, ifâf, taiffah), time, period - time conceived of in the onward rush, the constant succession of its moments.)
which has been already compared by Castell. The aorist of the lxx, however, is just as erroneous in this instance as in Psa 42:5; Psa 55:3; Psa 57:5. In all these instances the cohortative denotes the inward result following from an outward compulsion, as they say in Hebrew: I lay hold of trembling (Isa 13:8; Job 18:20; Job 21:6) or joy (Isa 35:10; Isa 51:11), when the force of circumstances drive one into such states of mind. Labouring under the burden of divine dispensations of a terrifying character, he finds himself in a state of mental weakness and exhaustion, or of insensible (senseless) fright; over him as their destined goal before many others go God's burnings of wrath (plur. only in this instance), His terrible decrees (vid., concerning בעת on Psa 18:5) have almost annihilated him. צִמְּתֻתוּנִי is not an impossible form (Olshausen, §251, a), but an intensive form of צִמְּתוּ, the last part of the already inflected verb being repeated, as in עָֽהֲבוּ הֵבוּ, Hos 4:18 (cf. in the department of the noun, פִּיפִיֹּות, edge-edges = many edges, Psa 149:6), perhaps under the influence of the derivative.
(Note: Heidenheim interprets: Thy terrors are become to me as צְמִתֻת (Lev 25:23), i.e., inalienably my own.)
The corrections צִמְתְּתֻנִי (from צִמְתֵת) or צִמְּתַתְנִי (from צִמֵּת) are simple enough; but it is more prudent to let tradition judge of that which is possible in the usage of the language. In Psa 88:18 the burnings become floods; the wrath of God can be compared to every destroying and overthrowing element. The billows threaten to swallow him up, without any helping hand being stretched out to him on the part of any of his lovers and friends. In v. 19a to be now explained according to Job 16:14, viz., My familiar friends are gloomy darkness; i.e., instead of those who were hitherto my familiars (Job 19:14), darkness is become my familiar friend? One would have thought that it ought then to have been מְיֻדָּעִי (Schnurrer), or, according to Pro 7:4, מֹודָעִי, and that, in connection with this sense of the noun, מחשׁך ought as subject to have the precedence, that consequently מְיֻדָּעַי is subject and מַחְשָׁךְ predicate: my familiar friends have lost themselves in darkness, are become absolutely invisible (Hitzig at last). But the regular position of the words is kept to if it is interpreted: my familiar friends are reduced to gloomy darkness as my familiar friend, and the plural is justified by Job 19:14 : Mother and sister (do I call) the worm. With this complaint the harp falls from the poet's hands. He is silent, and waits on God, that He may solve this riddle of affliction. From the Book of Job we might infer that He also actually appeared to him. He is more faithful than men. No soul that in the midst of wrath lays hold upon His love, whether with a firm or with a trembling hand, is suffered to be lost.