Psalm 86:14 Komentář

This psalm is entitled "a prayer of David;" probably it was not penned upon any particular occasion, but was a prayer he often used himself, and recommended to others for their use, especially in a day of affliction. Many think that David penned this prayer as a type of Christ, "who in the days of his flesh offered up strong cries," Heb 5:7. David, in this prayer (according to the nature of that duty), I. Gives glory to God (Psa 86:8-10, Psa 86:12, Psa 86:13). II. Seeks for grace and favour from God, that God would hear his prayers (Psa 86:1, Psa 86:6, Psa 86:7), preserve and save him, and be merciful to him (Psa 86:2, Psa 86:3, Psa 86:16), that he would give him joy, and grace, and strength, and put honour upon him (Psa 86:4, Psa 86:11, Psa 86:17). He pleads God's goodness (Psa 86:5, Psa 86:15) and the malice of his enemies (Psa 86:14). In singing this we must, as David did, lift up our souls to God with application. A Prayer of David.

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 86 A Prayer of David. The title is the same with the Seventeenth Psalm, and the subject of it is much alike: it was written by David, when in distress, and his life was sought after; very likely when he was persecuted by Saul, and fled from him; so Aben Ezra, Jarchi, and Kimchi: and as he was a type of Christ in his afflictions, as well as in his exalted state, it may not be unfitly applied to him, as it is by some interpreters. The Syriac inscription of it is, "for David, when he built an house for the Lord; and a prophecy of the calling of the Gentiles; and moreover, a prayer of a peculiar righteous man.'' Theodoret thinks it predicts the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians, and Hezekiah's hope in God.

O God, the proud are risen against me,.... As all men naturally are, and as all are without the grace of God; and because they are, they deal in proud wrath: as, through the pride of their heart, they seek not after God; so, through the same, they persecute his people, treating them with the utmost contempt, and as the offscouring of all things. Jarchi interprets this particularly of Doeg and Ahithophel: and the assemblies of violent men have sought after my soul; or "terrible" (s) ones, who breathed out nothing but cruelty, threatenings, and slaughter; and who were many, and got together in bodies, and entered into combinations and conspiracies; and whom nothing would satisfy but the taking away of his life, which they sought after; see Psa 22:12. and have not set thee before them; they did not consider the omniscience of God, that he knew and took notice of all they did; nor his omnipresence, that he was everywhere, and there was no fleeing from him; nor his omnipotence, who was able to crush them to pieces; nor his justice, which will render tribulation to them that trouble his; nor his goodness, which should lead to repentance; nor had they any fear of him, nor respect to his glory: in short, they were like the unjust judge, who neither feared God nor regarded men, Luk 18:4. (s) "terribilium", Montanus; so some in Vatablus, Gejerus, Michaelis.

"O God, the transgressors of the law have arisen up against me" [Psalm 86:14]. Whom calls he transgressors of the law? Not the Pagans, who have not received the law: for no one transgresses that which he has not received; the Apostle says clearly, "For where there is no law, there is no prevarication." [Romans 4:15] Transgressors of the law he calls "prevaricators." Whom then do we understand, brethren? If we take this word from our Lord Himself, the transgressors of the law were the Jews....They did not keep the law, and accused Christ as if He transgressed the law. And we know what the Lord suffered. Do you think His Body suffers no such thing now? How can this be? "If they called the Master of the house Beelzebub, how much more those of his household? The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord." The body also suffers transgressors of the law, and they rise up against the Body of Christ. Who are the transgressors of the law? Do the Jews perchance dare to rise up against Christ? No: for it is not they that cause us much trouble. For they have not yet believed: they have not yet owned their salvation. Against the Body of Christ bad Christians rise up, from whom the Body of Christ daily suffers trouble. All schisms, all heresies, all within who live wickedly and engraft their own character on those who live well, and draw them over to their own side, and with evil communications corrupt good manners; these persons "transgressing the law rose up against Me." [1 Corinthians 15:33] Let every pious soul speak, let every Christian soul speak. That one which suffers not this, let it not speak. But if it is a Christian soul, it knows that it suffers evils: if it owns in itself its own sufferings, let it own herein its own voice; but if it is without suffering, let it also be without the voice; but that it may not be without suffering, let it walk along the narrow way, [Matthew 7:14] and begin to live godly in Christ: it must of necessity suffer this persecution. For "all," says the Apostle, "who will live godly in Christ, suffer persecution." [2 Timothy 3:12] "And the synagogue of the powerful have sought after My soul." The synagogue of the powerful is the congregation of the proud. The synagogue of the powerful rose up against the Head, that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, crying and saying with one mouth, Crucify Him, crucify Him: [John 19:6] of whom it is said, "The sons of men, their teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword." They did not strike, but cried: by crying they struck, by crying they crucified Him. The will of those who cried was fulfilled, when the Lord was crucified: "And they did not place You before their eyes." How did they not place Him before them? They did not know Him God. They should have spared him as Man: what they saw, according to this they should have walked. Suppose that He was not God, He was man: was He therefore to be slain? Spare Him a man, and own Him God.

This triumphal song was probably occasioned by the same event as the forty-sixth [see on Psa 46:1, title]. The writer celebrates the glory of the Church, as the means of spiritual blessing to the nation. (Psa 87:1-7) His--that is, God's foundation--or, what He has founded, that is, Zion (Isa 14:32). is in the holy mountains--the location of Zion, in the wide sense, for the capital, or Jerusalem, being on several hills.

The situation is like that in the Psalms of the time of Saul. The writer is a persecuted one, and in constant peril of his life. He has taken Psa 86:14 out of the Elohimic Psa 54:5, and retained the Elohim as a proper name of God (cf. on the other hand Psa 86:8, Psa 86:10); he has, however, altered זרים to זרים, which here, as in Isa 13:11 (cf. however, ibid. Psa 25:5), is the alternating word to עריצים. In Psa 86:15 he supports his petition that follows by Jahve's testimony concerning Himself in Exo 34:6. The appellation given to himself by the poet in Psa 86:16 recurs in Psa 116:16 (cf. Wisd. 9:5). The poet calls himself "the son of Thy handmaid" as having been born into the relation to Him of servant; it is a relationship that has come to him by birth. How beautifully does the Adonaj come in here for the seventh time! He is even from his mother's womb the servant of the sovereign Lord, from whose omnipotence he can therefore also look for a miraculous interposition on his behalf. A "token for good" is a special dispensation, from which it becomes evident to him that God is kindly disposed towards him. לטובה as in the mouth of Nehemiah, Neh 5:19; Neh 13:31; of Ezr 8:22; and also even in Jeremiah and earlier. ויבשׁוּ is just as parenthetical as in Isa 26:11.