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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPaul Kretzmann Commentary - Psalms 35:11 - 35:18
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The Hypocrisy and Malice of the Wicked
v. 11. False witnesses, literally, "witnesses of violence," did rise up, with unjust accusations; they laid to my charge things that I knew not, of which he knew himself to be innocent.
v. 12. They rewarded me evil for good, which he, on his part, was trying to show them, to the spoiling of my soul, to make his soul bereaved, to make him friendless, to isolate him.
v. 13. But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth, in sympathetic mourning for their trouble; I humbled my soul with fasting, in making their sorrow his own; and my prayer returned into mine own bosom, for he was bowed forward so far, with his head lowered, that his voice sounded against his own bosom. Thus he had entreated for his enemies in the greatest earnestness and humility.
v. 14. I behaved myself as though he, the enemy in distress, had been my friend or brother; I bowed down heavily, in dust and ashes, so that he appeared squalid and dirty, as one that mourneth for his mother, in the very deepest grief.
v. 15. But in mine adversity, his halting, lameness, said of any deep distress, they rejoiced, and gathered themselves together, to witness the spectacle of his great trouble; yea, the abjects, contemptible, degraded persons, gathered themselves together against me, and I knew it not, people of whom he had till then not even taken notice; they did tear me and ceased not, attacked him with scorn and laughter, and were not silent;
v. 16. with hypocritical mockers in feasts, those who love to make sport of a poor sufferer by cracking biting jokes at his expense, they gnashed upon me with their teeth, in a gesture of sneering contempt, probably also with stammering of distorted things.
v. 17. Lord, how long wilt Thou look on? namely, without doing something to effect deliverance for him. Rescue my soul from their destruction, my darling, literally, "my only one," from the lions, from the wild and ravenous people who were treating him so contemptuously.
v. 18. I will give Thee thanks in the great congregation, paying his vows of thanksgiving with all the other believers; I will praise Thee among much people, people. of numbers and might. The congregation of believers may seem small and weak in the eyes of the world, but before the Lord and in His might they are invincible.