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3.How long will ye continue mischief? The Hebrew word תהותתו tehotethu, (412) which I have translated continue, or lengthen out, mischief, is rendered by some, to meditate, or imagine mischief, while others suppose an allusion to the putting forth of the tongue in sign of mockery. It has been rendered also, to rush upon, or assault. The sense of the passage seems to be, How long will ye meditate evil against a man, and persist in mischievous devices for accomplishing his ruin? He has in view the obstinate malice of his enemies, moving every stone for his destruction, and forming new plans daily for effecting it. The instruction to be learned from his experience is, that we should exercise patience, even when our enemies show unwearied cruelty in their attempts to destroy us, and are instigated by the devil to incessant artifices for our persecution. We may just advert to the meaning of the figure which is subjoined. Some think that the wicked are compared to a bowing wall, because it threatens every moment to fall to the ground, and they, upon every sin which they commit, tend more and more downwards, till they are precipitated into destruction. But it would seem as if the allusion were somewhat different. A wall, when ill built, bulges out in the center, presenting the appearance of nearly twice its actual breadth; but, as it is hollow within, it soon falls to ruins. The wicked, in like manner, are dilated with pride, and assume, in their consultations, a most formidable appearance; but David predicts that they would be brought to unexpected and utter destruction, like a wall badly constructed, and hollow in the interior, which falls with a sudden crash, and is broken by its own weight into a thousand pieces. (413) The word גדר,gader, which I have rendered, a fence, means, properly, an enclosure built of slight and insufficient materials; (414) and an epithet is added still more to express the violence and impetuosity of their fall. The Psalmist, then, would teach us that, high as our enemies may appear to stand, and proud and swelling as their denunciations may be, they shall be suddenly and signally overthrown, like a smitten wall.
(412) Hammond observes, that this verb “ but once used in the Scriptures, and so will not be easily interpreted but either by the notion which we find put upon it by the ancient interpreters, or else by the Arabic use of it.” The Chaldee renders it, raise tumults; the Syriac, stir up, instigate, incite, orprovoke; the Septuagint and Vulgate, assail, or rush upon; and the Arabic, use violence or injustice Gesenius gives the sense of the Septuagint. Kimchi and Aben Ezra read, pravitatis cogitabitis “ Walid compares תהותתו with the Arabic תהתהתו, with t, not with th, which signifies to multiply words; and so he would have it, according to the use of it in that tongue, to signify speaking much against, backbiting, defaming, spreading evil reports of, lashing out with your tongues against, for hurt. What he thus observes of תהותתו, with t, not th, may have place also with the word, as we have it; for the root with ת, th also in Arabic signifies mentiri ,to lie, and confusion, injustice, violence; which as well agree to his sense as that of the root with t. ” When David says, against a man, and uses also the third person in the fourth verse, it is of himself that he speaks. “Against a man; i e. , against me, a man like yourselves, whom common hmnanity obliges you to pity; a single man, who is no fit match for you.” —Poole ’s Annotations
(413) Isaiah has also made use of this image to express sudden and utter destruction, (Isa_30:13.)
(414) In the East it is common for the inhabitants to enclose their vineyards and gardens with hedges, consisting of various kinds of shrubs, and particularly such as are armed with spines. They have also mounds of earth-walls about their gardens. Rawwolff describes the gardens about Jerusalem as surrounded by mud-walls, not above four feet high, easily climbed over, and washed down by rain in a very little time. Stone-walls are also frequently used. Thus Egmont or Heyman, describing the country about Saphet, a celebrated city of Galilee, tells us, “ country round it is finely improved, the declivity being covered with vines, supported by low walls. —Harmer ’s Observations, volume 2, pp. 216-219. Doubdan describes some of these in the Holy Land as built of loose stones, without any cement to join them. The original word probably means some such “” as this. Indeed, it always appears to denote a wall of stones: sometimes in express contradistinction to the hedge, or thorny fence. — See Parkhurst ’s Lexicon, on גדר