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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Psalms 88:8 - 88:8
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The octastichs are now followed by hexastichs which belong together in pairs. The complaint concerning the alienation of his nearest relations sounds like Job 19:13., but the same strain is also frequently heard in the earlier Psalms written in times of suffering, e.g., Psa 31:9. He is forsaken by all his familiar friends (not: acquaintances, for מְיֻדָּע signifies more than that), he is alone in the dungeon of wretchedness, where no one comes near him, and whence he cannot make his escape. This sounds, according to Lev. 13, very much like the complaint of a leper. The Book of Leviticus there passes over from the uncleanness attending the beginning of human life to the uncleanness of the most terrible disease. Disease is the middle stage between birth and death, and, according to the Eastern notion, leprosy is the worst of all diseases, it is death itself clinging to the still living man (Num 12:12), and more than all other evils a stroke of the chastening hand of God (נֶגַע), a scourge of God (צָרַעַת). The man suspected of having leprosy was to be subjected to a seven days' quarantine until the determination of the priest's diagnosis; and if the leprosy was confirmed, he was to dwell apart outside the camp (Lev 13:46), where, though not imprisoned, he was nevertheless separated from his dwelling and his family (cf. Job, at Job 19:19), and if a man of position, would feel himself condemned to a state of involuntary retirement. It is natural to refer the כָּלֻא, which is closely connected with שַׁתַּנִי, to this separation. עֵינִי, Psa 88:10, instead of עֵינַי, as in Psa 6:8; Psa 31:10 : his eye has languished, vanished away (דָּאַב of the same root as tābescere, cognate with the root of דֹּונַג, Psa 68:3), in consequence of (his) affliction. He calls and calls upon Jahve, stretches out (שִׁטַּח, expandere, according to the Arabic, more especially after the manner of a roof) his hands (palmas) towards Him, in order to shield himself from His wrath and to lead Him compassionately to give ear to him. In Psa 88:11-13 he bases his cry for help upon a twofold wish, viz., to become an object of the miraculous help of God, and to be able to praise Him for it. Neither of these wishes would be realized if he were to die; for that which lies beyond this life is uniform darkness, devoid of any progressive history. With מֵתִים alternates רְפָאִים (sing. רָפָא), the relaxed ones, i.e., shades (σκιαὶ) of the nether world. With reference to יֹודוּ instead of לְהֹודֹות, vid., Ewald, §337, b. Beside חֹשֶׁךְ (Job 10:21.) stands אֶרֶץ נְשִׁיָּה, the land of forgetfulness (λήθη), where there is an end of all thinking, feeling, and acting (Ecc 9:5-6, Ecc 9:10), and where the monotony of death, devoid of thought and recollection, reigns. Such is the representation given in the Old Testament of the state beyond the present, even in Ecclesiastes, and in the Apocrypha (Sir. 17:27f. after Isa 38:18.; Baruch 2:17f.); and it was obliged to be thus represented, for in the New Testament not merely the conception of the state after death, but this state itself, is become a different one.