Psalms 9:5
Verse
Context
I Will Give Thanks to the LORD
4For You have upheld my just cause; You sit on Your throne judging righteously. 5You have rebuked the nations; You have destroyed the wicked; You have erased their name forever and ever. 6The enemy has come to eternal ruin, and You have uprooted their cities; the very memory of them has vanished.
Summary
Commentary
- Keil-Delitzsch
- John Gill
- Tyndale
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
(Heb.: 9:6-7) The strophe with ג, which is perhaps intended to represent ד and ה as well, continues the confirmation of the cause for thanksgiving laid down in Psa 9:4. He does not celebrate the judicial act of God on his behalf, which he has just experienced, alone, but in connection with, and, as it were, as the sum of many others which have preceded it. If this is the case, then in Psa 9:6 beside the Ammonites one may at the same time (with Hengstenb.) think of the Amalekites (Sa1 8:12), who had been threatened since the time of Moses with a "blotting out of their remembrance" (Exo 17:14; Deu 25:19, cf. Num 24:20). The divine threatening is the word of omnipotence which destroys in distinction from the word of omnipotence that creates. רשׁע in close connection with גּוים is individualising, cf. Psa 9:18 with Psa 9:16, Psa 9:17. ועד is a sharpened pausal form for ועד, the Pathach going into a Segol (קטן פתח); perhaps it is in order to avoid the threefold a-sound in לעולם ועד (Ngelsbach 8 extr.). In Psa 9:7 האויב (with Azla legarme) appears to be a vocative. In that case נתשׁתּ ought also to be addressed to the enemy. But if it be interpreted: "Thou hast destroyed thine own cities, their memorial is perished," destroyed, viz., at the challenge of Israel, then the thought is forced; and if we render it: "the cities, which thou hast destroyed, perished is the remembrance of them," i.e., one no longer thinks of thine acts of conquest, then we have a thought that is in itself awkward and one that finds no support in any of the numerous parallels which speak of a blotting out and leaving no trace behind. But, moreover, in both these interpretations the fact that זכרם is strengthened by המּה is lost sight of, and the twofold masculine זכרם המּה is referred to ערים (which is carelessly done by most expositors), whereas עיר, with but few exceptions, is feminine; consequently זכרם המה, so far as this is not absolutely impossible, must be referred to the enemies themselves (cf. Psa 34:17; Psa 109:15). האויב might more readily be nom. absol.: "the enemy - it is at end for ever with his destructions," but חרבּה never has an active but always only a neuter signification; or: "the enemy - ruins are finished for ever," but the signification to be destroyed is more natural for תּמם than to be completed, when it is used of ruinae. Moreover, in connection with both these renderings the retrospective pronoun (חרבותיו) is wanting, and this is also the case with the reading חרבות (lxx, Vulg., Syr.), which leaves it uncertain whose swords are meant. But why may we not rather connect האויב at once with תּמּוּ as subject? In other instances תּמּוּ is also joined to a singular collective subject, e.g., Isa 16:4; here it precedes, like הארב in Jdg 20:37. חרבות לנצח is a nominative of the product, corresponding to the factitive object with verbs of making: the enemies are destroyed as ruins for ever, i.e., so that they are become ruins; or, more in accordance with the accentuation: the enemy, destroyed as ruins are they for ever. With respect to what follows the accentuation also contains hints worthy of our attention. It does not take נתשׁתּ (with the regular Pathach by Athnach after Olewejored, vid., on Psa 2:7) as a relative clause, and consequently does not require זכרם המה to be referred back to ערים. We interpret the passage thus: and cities (viz., such as were hostile) thou hast destroyed (נתשׁ evellere, exstirpare), perished is their (the enemies') memorial. Thus it also now becomes intelligible, why זכרם, according to the rule Ges. 121, 3, is so remarkably strengthened by the addition of המּה (cf. Num 14:32; Sa1 20:42; Pro 22:19; Pro 23:15; Eze 34:11). Hupfeld, whose interpretation is exactly the same as ours, thinks it might perhaps be the enemies themselves and the cities set over against one another. But the contrast follows in Psa 9:8 : their, even their memorial is perished, while on the contrary Jahve endures for ever and is enthroned as judge. This contrast also retrospectively gives support to the explanation, that זכרם refers not to the cities, but to האויב as a collective. With this interpretation of Psa 9:7 we have no occasion to read זכרם מהמּה (Targ.), nor זכר מהמּה (Paul., Hitz.). The latter is strongly commended by Job 11:20, cf. Jer 10:2; but still it is not quite admissible, since זכר here is not subjective (their own remembrance) but objective (remembrance of them). But may not ערים perhaps here, as in Psa 139:20, mean zealots = adversaries (from עיר fervere, zelare)? We reply in the negative, because the Psalm bears neither an Aramaising nor a North Palestinian impress. Even in connection with this meaning, the harshness of the ערים without any suffix would still remain. But, that the cities that are, as it were, plucked up by the root are cities of the enemy, is evident from the context.
John Gill Bible Commentary
O thou enemy,.... Which some understand of Goliath, though we do not read of any desolations made by him, nor of any cities destroyed by him; nor by the Israelites upon his death, and the flight of the Philistines on that account; Jarchi interprets it of Esau and his posterity, who shall be destroyed in future time, to which he applies, Eze 35:9; other Jewish writers (c) think Amalek is intended, whose destruction they suppose will be in the days of the Messiah, and then will this Scripture be fulfilled: and as these all prefigured antichrist, as before observed, he seems to be designed, and not Satan, as some Christian interpreters have thought, that enemy of Christ, personal and mystical, of the church, and every true believer; and so is antichrist, he opposes himself to God, and all that is called God; he is one that is contrary to Christ, as his name signifies, to his persons, offices, grace, and kingdom; who blasphemes the name of God, his tabernacle, and his saints; destructions are come to a perpetual end; which may be understood either of the destructions and desolations made by antichrist, the havoc he has made in the world, treading under foot the holy city, the church, destroying the earth and the inhabitants of it, the bodies, souls, and estates of men; but now the psalmist prophetically declares the end of them to be come, his forty two months, or one thousand two hundred and sixty days or years, will be up, and he will go on no more desolating and destroying; see Rev 11:2; or of the destructions and desolations made upon him by the pouring out of the seven vials upon the antichristian states, upon the seat of the beast, and upon both Pope and Turk, the eastern and western antichrist; when in the issue the beast, and the false prophet with him, will be taken and cast alive into a lake of fire; see Rev 19:20; and so this phrase denotes that the destruction of antichrist will be consummate, his ruin will be complete, and there will be an utter end of him. Some, instead of "desolations", by the change of a point read "swords", and Ben Labrat or R. Donesh says (d) that he found it so written in an ancient book; and so reads Jarchi, though he takes notice of the other reading also; and so read the Septuagint, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic versions; and then the sense is, swords shall fail, they shall be no more made use of to destroy men with, they shall be beaten into ploughshares; for upon the destruction of the man of sin there will be a profound peace in the world; see Isa 2:4. Some (e) read these words interrogatively, "are destructions come to a perpetual end?" that is, which the enemy antichrist designed to bring upon the people of God? no, they are not; he may imagine they are, when the two witnesses are slain; and may think he has then made an entire slaughter, and a complete destruction of the saints; but he will be mistaken, these witnesses will rise again, and ascend up to heaven in the sight of their enemies, and to the great terror of them, Rev 11:10; and thou hast destroyed cities, or "hast thou destroyed cities?" that is, as antichrist threatened and intended, namely, to destroy all the cities and churches of Christ; but, alas! he will never be able to do it, they are built on a rock against which the gates of hell can never prevail: but it is better to read the words affirmatively, and interpret them not of the enemy, but of God, and of him destroying the cities of the enemy; for, at the pouring out the seventh and last vial, the great city, the whole antichristian jurisdiction, will be divided into three parts, and utterly perish; and the cities of the Pagan and Mahometan nations will fall, and particularly Babylon the great city will come in remembrance before God, and be utterly destroyed, Rev 16:19; their memorial is perished with them; they shall not be returned or built any more, but shall be like a millstone cast into the sea, and be found no more at all, Eze 35:9. Some (f) read this clause by way of interrogation as the others, "is their memorial perished with them?" no, the righteous are in everlasting remembrance, even those churches which the Romish antichrist has made havoc of, as the Albigenses and Waldenses; the memory of them is still precious. (c) Midrash Tillim in loc. Tzeror Hammor, fol. 150. 2. (d) Apud Aben Ezra in loc. (e) So Piscator, Cocceius, Ainsworth. (f) Sic Genevenses, Diodatus, Bueerus, Cocceius.
Psalms 9:5
I Will Give Thanks to the LORD
4For You have upheld my just cause; You sit on Your throne judging righteously. 5You have rebuked the nations; You have destroyed the wicked; You have erased their name forever and ever. 6The enemy has come to eternal ruin, and You have uprooted their cities; the very memory of them has vanished.
- Scripture
- Sermons
- Commentary
- Keil-Delitzsch
- John Gill
- Tyndale
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
(Heb.: 9:6-7) The strophe with ג, which is perhaps intended to represent ד and ה as well, continues the confirmation of the cause for thanksgiving laid down in Psa 9:4. He does not celebrate the judicial act of God on his behalf, which he has just experienced, alone, but in connection with, and, as it were, as the sum of many others which have preceded it. If this is the case, then in Psa 9:6 beside the Ammonites one may at the same time (with Hengstenb.) think of the Amalekites (Sa1 8:12), who had been threatened since the time of Moses with a "blotting out of their remembrance" (Exo 17:14; Deu 25:19, cf. Num 24:20). The divine threatening is the word of omnipotence which destroys in distinction from the word of omnipotence that creates. רשׁע in close connection with גּוים is individualising, cf. Psa 9:18 with Psa 9:16, Psa 9:17. ועד is a sharpened pausal form for ועד, the Pathach going into a Segol (קטן פתח); perhaps it is in order to avoid the threefold a-sound in לעולם ועד (Ngelsbach 8 extr.). In Psa 9:7 האויב (with Azla legarme) appears to be a vocative. In that case נתשׁתּ ought also to be addressed to the enemy. But if it be interpreted: "Thou hast destroyed thine own cities, their memorial is perished," destroyed, viz., at the challenge of Israel, then the thought is forced; and if we render it: "the cities, which thou hast destroyed, perished is the remembrance of them," i.e., one no longer thinks of thine acts of conquest, then we have a thought that is in itself awkward and one that finds no support in any of the numerous parallels which speak of a blotting out and leaving no trace behind. But, moreover, in both these interpretations the fact that זכרם is strengthened by המּה is lost sight of, and the twofold masculine זכרם המּה is referred to ערים (which is carelessly done by most expositors), whereas עיר, with but few exceptions, is feminine; consequently זכרם המה, so far as this is not absolutely impossible, must be referred to the enemies themselves (cf. Psa 34:17; Psa 109:15). האויב might more readily be nom. absol.: "the enemy - it is at end for ever with his destructions," but חרבּה never has an active but always only a neuter signification; or: "the enemy - ruins are finished for ever," but the signification to be destroyed is more natural for תּמם than to be completed, when it is used of ruinae. Moreover, in connection with both these renderings the retrospective pronoun (חרבותיו) is wanting, and this is also the case with the reading חרבות (lxx, Vulg., Syr.), which leaves it uncertain whose swords are meant. But why may we not rather connect האויב at once with תּמּוּ as subject? In other instances תּמּוּ is also joined to a singular collective subject, e.g., Isa 16:4; here it precedes, like הארב in Jdg 20:37. חרבות לנצח is a nominative of the product, corresponding to the factitive object with verbs of making: the enemies are destroyed as ruins for ever, i.e., so that they are become ruins; or, more in accordance with the accentuation: the enemy, destroyed as ruins are they for ever. With respect to what follows the accentuation also contains hints worthy of our attention. It does not take נתשׁתּ (with the regular Pathach by Athnach after Olewejored, vid., on Psa 2:7) as a relative clause, and consequently does not require זכרם המה to be referred back to ערים. We interpret the passage thus: and cities (viz., such as were hostile) thou hast destroyed (נתשׁ evellere, exstirpare), perished is their (the enemies') memorial. Thus it also now becomes intelligible, why זכרם, according to the rule Ges. 121, 3, is so remarkably strengthened by the addition of המּה (cf. Num 14:32; Sa1 20:42; Pro 22:19; Pro 23:15; Eze 34:11). Hupfeld, whose interpretation is exactly the same as ours, thinks it might perhaps be the enemies themselves and the cities set over against one another. But the contrast follows in Psa 9:8 : their, even their memorial is perished, while on the contrary Jahve endures for ever and is enthroned as judge. This contrast also retrospectively gives support to the explanation, that זכרם refers not to the cities, but to האויב as a collective. With this interpretation of Psa 9:7 we have no occasion to read זכרם מהמּה (Targ.), nor זכר מהמּה (Paul., Hitz.). The latter is strongly commended by Job 11:20, cf. Jer 10:2; but still it is not quite admissible, since זכר here is not subjective (their own remembrance) but objective (remembrance of them). But may not ערים perhaps here, as in Psa 139:20, mean zealots = adversaries (from עיר fervere, zelare)? We reply in the negative, because the Psalm bears neither an Aramaising nor a North Palestinian impress. Even in connection with this meaning, the harshness of the ערים without any suffix would still remain. But, that the cities that are, as it were, plucked up by the root are cities of the enemy, is evident from the context.
John Gill Bible Commentary
O thou enemy,.... Which some understand of Goliath, though we do not read of any desolations made by him, nor of any cities destroyed by him; nor by the Israelites upon his death, and the flight of the Philistines on that account; Jarchi interprets it of Esau and his posterity, who shall be destroyed in future time, to which he applies, Eze 35:9; other Jewish writers (c) think Amalek is intended, whose destruction they suppose will be in the days of the Messiah, and then will this Scripture be fulfilled: and as these all prefigured antichrist, as before observed, he seems to be designed, and not Satan, as some Christian interpreters have thought, that enemy of Christ, personal and mystical, of the church, and every true believer; and so is antichrist, he opposes himself to God, and all that is called God; he is one that is contrary to Christ, as his name signifies, to his persons, offices, grace, and kingdom; who blasphemes the name of God, his tabernacle, and his saints; destructions are come to a perpetual end; which may be understood either of the destructions and desolations made by antichrist, the havoc he has made in the world, treading under foot the holy city, the church, destroying the earth and the inhabitants of it, the bodies, souls, and estates of men; but now the psalmist prophetically declares the end of them to be come, his forty two months, or one thousand two hundred and sixty days or years, will be up, and he will go on no more desolating and destroying; see Rev 11:2; or of the destructions and desolations made upon him by the pouring out of the seven vials upon the antichristian states, upon the seat of the beast, and upon both Pope and Turk, the eastern and western antichrist; when in the issue the beast, and the false prophet with him, will be taken and cast alive into a lake of fire; see Rev 19:20; and so this phrase denotes that the destruction of antichrist will be consummate, his ruin will be complete, and there will be an utter end of him. Some, instead of "desolations", by the change of a point read "swords", and Ben Labrat or R. Donesh says (d) that he found it so written in an ancient book; and so reads Jarchi, though he takes notice of the other reading also; and so read the Septuagint, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic versions; and then the sense is, swords shall fail, they shall be no more made use of to destroy men with, they shall be beaten into ploughshares; for upon the destruction of the man of sin there will be a profound peace in the world; see Isa 2:4. Some (e) read these words interrogatively, "are destructions come to a perpetual end?" that is, which the enemy antichrist designed to bring upon the people of God? no, they are not; he may imagine they are, when the two witnesses are slain; and may think he has then made an entire slaughter, and a complete destruction of the saints; but he will be mistaken, these witnesses will rise again, and ascend up to heaven in the sight of their enemies, and to the great terror of them, Rev 11:10; and thou hast destroyed cities, or "hast thou destroyed cities?" that is, as antichrist threatened and intended, namely, to destroy all the cities and churches of Christ; but, alas! he will never be able to do it, they are built on a rock against which the gates of hell can never prevail: but it is better to read the words affirmatively, and interpret them not of the enemy, but of God, and of him destroying the cities of the enemy; for, at the pouring out the seventh and last vial, the great city, the whole antichristian jurisdiction, will be divided into three parts, and utterly perish; and the cities of the Pagan and Mahometan nations will fall, and particularly Babylon the great city will come in remembrance before God, and be utterly destroyed, Rev 16:19; their memorial is perished with them; they shall not be returned or built any more, but shall be like a millstone cast into the sea, and be found no more at all, Eze 35:9. Some (f) read this clause by way of interrogation as the others, "is their memorial perished with them?" no, the righteous are in everlasting remembrance, even those churches which the Romish antichrist has made havoc of, as the Albigenses and Waldenses; the memory of them is still precious. (c) Midrash Tillim in loc. Tzeror Hammor, fol. 150. 2. (d) Apud Aben Ezra in loc. (e) So Piscator, Cocceius, Ainsworth. (f) Sic Genevenses, Diodatus, Bueerus, Cocceius.