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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "//www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="//www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width; initial-scale=1.0;"/><title>Psalm 56 Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers</title><link rel="canonical" href="https://biblehub.com/commentaries/expositors/psalms/56.htm" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/5001com.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="../spec.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 4800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 4800px)" href="/4801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1550px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1550px)" href="/1551.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1250px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1250px)" href="/1251.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1050px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1050px)" href="/1051.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 900px), only screen and (max-device-width: 900px)" href="/901.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 800px)" href="/801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 575px), only screen and (max-device-width: 575px)" href="/501.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-height: 450px), only screen and (max-device-height: 450px)" href="/h451.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/print.css" type="text/css" media="Print" /><script type="application/javascript" src="https://scripts.webcontentassessor.com/scripts/8a2459b64f9cac8122fc7f2eac4409c8555fac9383016db59c4c26e3d5b8b157"></script><script src='https://qd.admetricspro.com/js/biblehub/biblehub-layout-loader-revcatch.js'></script><script id='HyDgbd_1s' src='https://prebidads.revcatch.com/ads.js' type='text/javascript' async></script><script>(function(w,d,b,s,i){var cts=d.createElement(s);cts.async=true;cts.id='catchscript'; 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The alternative of rejecting the inscription appears less objectionable. We have no clue, however, either to the person of the author or his time (beyond the general picture of danger and hostility), and the language rather gives the idea of large combined forces than of individual foes, especially in the prayer of <a href="/psalms/56-7.htm" title="Shall they escape by iniquity? in your anger cast down the people, O God.">Psalm 56:7</a>. Probably the speaker is here again only the mouthpiece of oppressed and suffering Israel. The poetical form is irregular, but is plainly marked by the refrain in <a href="/psalms/56-3.htm" title="What time I am afraid, I will trust in you.">Psalm 56:3</a>; <a href="/psalms/56-11.htm" title="In God have I put my trust: I will not be afraid what man can do to me.">Psalm 56:11</a>.<p><span class= "ital">Title—See </span>Psalms 4, 16, Title.<p><span class= "bld">Upon Jonath-elem-rechokim</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., upon a silent dove of distant </span>(<span class= "ital">places</span>)<span class= "ital">. </span>Of the conjectures on the meaning of this Title it is in accordance with the conclusions accepted in other cases to take the one which makes it the first words of some well-known song to the tune of which this psalm might be sung.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-1.htm">Psalm 56:1</a></div><div class="verse">To the chief Musician upon Jonathelemrechokim, Michtam of David, when the Philistines took him in Gath. Be merciful unto me, O God: for man would swallow me up; he fighting daily oppresseth me.</div>(1) <span class= "bld">Man . . .</span>—Heb., <span class= "ital">enôsh, </span>either as in <a href="/psalms/9-19.htm" title="Arise, O LORD; let not man prevail: let the heathen be judged in your sight.">Psalm 9:19</a>, “mortal man,” or, contemptuously, “a rabble, a multitude.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-2.htm">Psalm 56:2</a></div><div class="verse">Mine enemies would daily swallow <i>me</i> up: for <i>they be</i> many that fight against me, O thou most High.</div>(2) <span class= "bld">Swallow me up.</span>—The root idea of the Hebrew word so rendered is by no means clear. In many passages where it is used the meaning given here by the LXX., “trample on,” will suit the context quite as well as, or even better than, the meaning, “pant after,” given in the Lexicons. (See <a href="/job/5-5.htm" title="Whose harvest the hungry eats up, and takes it even out of the thorns, and the robber swallows up their substance.">Job 5:5</a>; <a href="/isaiah/42-14.htm" title="I have long time held my peace; I have been still, and refrained myself: now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once.">Isaiah 42:14</a>; <a href="/ecclesiastes/1-5.htm" title="The sun also rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to his place where he arose.">Ecclesiastes 1:5</a>; <a href="/amos/2-7.htm" title="That pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek: and a man and his father will go in to the same maid, to profane my holy name:">Amos 2:7</a>; <a href="/amos/8-4.htm" title="Hear this, O you that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail,">Amos 8:4</a>.) And this sense of bruising by trampling also suits the cognate verb, <span class= "ital">shûph, </span>used only three times (<a href="/genesis/3-15.htm" title="And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; it shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.">Genesis 3:15</a>; <a href="/job/9-17.htm" title="For he breaks me with a tempest, and multiplies my wounds without cause.">Job 9:17</a>; <a href="/psalms/139-11.htm" title="If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.">Psalm 139:11</a>). Symmachus also here has “bruise,” or “grind.” On the other hand in <a href="/psalms/119-131.htm" title="I opened my mouth, and panted: for I longed for your commandments.">Psalm 119:131</a>; <a href="/job/7-2.htm" title="As a servant earnestly desires the shadow, and as an hireling looks for the reward of his work:">Job 7:2</a>, &c, we want the idea of “haste” or “desire.” Possibly the original meaning of “trample” may have passed through the sense of physical haste to that of passion. Or we may even get the sense of “greedily devouring” by the exactly similar process by which we come to talk of devouring the road with speed. The same verb is used in the next verse with an object.<p><span class= "bld">Fighting.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">devouring. </span>(Comp. <a href="/psalms/35-1.htm" title="Plead my cause, O LORD, with them that strive with me: fight against them that fight against me.">Psalm 35:1</a>.)<p><span class= "bld">O thou most High.</span>—Heb., <span class= "ital">marôm, </span>which is here not a vocative, but an adverbial accusative, “proudly,” in pride.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-3.htm">Psalm 56:3</a></div><div class="verse">What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee.</div>(3) What time.—Heb., <span class= "ital">yôm, </span>apparently with same meaning as <span class= "ital">beyôm </span>in <a href="/psalms/56-10.htm" title="In God will I praise his word: in the LORD will I praise his word.">Psalm 56:10</a>, “in the day.”<p><span class= "bld">I am afraid . . .</span>—No doubt the right reading: is, “I cry.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-4.htm">Psalm 56:4</a></div><div class="verse">In God I will praise his word, in God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me.</div>(4) <span class= "bld">In God.</span>—This verse, which forms the refrain (<a href="/context/psalms/56-11.htm" title="In God have I put my trust: I will not be afraid what man can do to me.">Psalm 56:11-12</a> are wrongly separated), is as it stands hardly intelligible, and the text is rendered suspicious by the fact that the LXX. read “my words,” instead of “his word,” and by the omission of the suffix altogether in <a href="/psalms/56-11.htm" title="In God have I put my trust: I will not be afraid what man can do to me.">Psalm 56:11</a>, where the first clause of the refrain is doubled. The obvious treatment of the verse is to take the construction as in <a href="/psalms/44-8.htm" title="In God we boast all the day long, and praise your name for ever. Selah.">Psalm 44:8</a>, “I praise God with my word,” <span class= "ital">i.e., </span>in spite of all my enemies I find words to praise God.<p><span class= "bld">I will not.</span>—Rather, <span class= "ital">I fear not What can flesh do?</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-5.htm">Psalm 56:5</a></div><div class="verse">Every day they wrest my words: all their thoughts <i>are</i> against me for evil.</div>(5) <span class= "bld">Wrest.</span>—Properly, <span class= "ital">afflict; </span>and so some, “injure my cause.” But “torture my words” is intelligible.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-6.htm">Psalm 56:6</a></div><div class="verse">They gather themselves together, they hide themselves, they mark my steps, when they wait for my soul.</div>(6) <span class= "bld">They hide themselves.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">they set spies.</span><p><span class= "bld">Mark my steps.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">watch my heels. </span>(See <a href="/psalms/49-5.htm" title="Why should I fear in the days of evil, when the iniquity of my heels shall compass me about?">Psalm 49:5</a>; <a href="/psalms/89-51.htm" title="With which your enemies have reproached, O LORD; with which they have reproached the footsteps of your anointed.">Psalm 89:51</a>.)<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-7.htm">Psalm 56:7</a></div><div class="verse">Shall they escape by iniquity? in <i>thine</i> anger cast down the people, O God.</div>(7) <span class= "bld">Shall they . . .</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">upon iniquity escape to them</span>; the meaning of which is by no means clear. The ancient versions do not help us. If we adopt a slight change of reading, viz., <span class= "ital">palles </span>for <span class= "ital">pallet, </span>the meaning will be clear, <span class= "ital">for iniquity thou wilt requite them.</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-8.htm">Psalm 56:8</a></div><div class="verse">Thou tellest my wanderings: put thou my tears into thy bottle: <i>are they</i> not in thy book?</div>(8) <span class= "bld">Wanderings.</span>—Rather, in the singular, <span class= "ital">wandering, </span>which, from the parallelism with “tears,” must mean “mental restlessness,” the “tossings to and fro of the mind.” Symmachus, “my inmost things.”<p><span class= "bld">Put thou my tears into thy bottle.</span>—There is a play of words in the original of “bottle,” and “wandering.” We must not, of course, think of the <span class= "ital">lachrymatories, </span>as they are called, of glass, which have been found in Syria (see Thomson, <span class= "ital">Land and Book, </span>page 103). If these were really in any way connected with “tears,” they must have formed part of funeral customs. The LXX., “Thou hast put my tears before thee,” and Symmachus and Jerome, “put my tears in thy sight,” suggest a corruption of the text; but, in any case, the poet’s feeling here is that of Constance in Shakespeare’s <span class= "ital">King John</span>—<p>“His grandam’s wrongs, and not his mother’s shames,<p>Draw these heaven-moving pearls from his poor eyes,<p>Which heaven shall take in nature of a fee;<p>Ay, with those crystal beads Heaven shall be brib’d<p>To do him justice and revenge on you.”<p><span class= "bld">Book.</span>—As in <a href="/psalms/139-16.htm" title="Your eyes did see my substance, yet being imperfect; and in your book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.">Psalm 139:16</a>. Some prefer “calculation.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-12.htm">Psalm 56:12</a></div><div class="verse">Thy vows <i>are</i> upon me, O God: I will render praises unto thee.</div>(12) <span class= "bld">Thy vows</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e.</span>, vows made <span class= "ital">to Thee, </span>but the form is most unusual. For the thought comp. <a href="/psalms/22-25.htm" title="My praise shall be of you in the great congregation: I will pay my vows before them that fear him.">Psalm 22:25</a>; <a href="/psalms/50-14.htm" title="Offer to God thanksgiving; and pay your vows to the most High:">Psalm 50:14</a>.<p><span class= "bld">I will render</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., </span>in fulfilment of the vows.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/psalms/56-13.htm">Psalm 56:13</a></div><div class="verse">For thou hast delivered my soul from death: <i>wilt</i> not <i>thou deliver</i> my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living?</div>(13) <span class= "bld">Wilt thou not deliver?</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">hast thou not delivered?</span><p><span class= "bld">From falling.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">front a thrust.</span><p><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers<br /><br />Text Courtesy of <a href="//biblesupport.com" target="_top">BibleSupport.com</a>. 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