Psalms 34:10

The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger,.... According to Apollinarius, "the needy rich, whom famine presses;'' see Job 4:10; but they that seek the Lord; by prayer, diligently, with their whole

The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing. The young lions.

The young lions; either, 1. Properly: see . Or, 2. Metaphorically so called, the great potentates of the earth, who are oft so called, as . Shall not want any good thing, which is necessary and truly good for them, all circumstances considered; of which God alone is a competent judge. And therefore although God doth usually take a special care to supply the wants of good men, and hath oft done it by extraordinary ways, when ordinary have failed, yet sometimes he knows, and it is certainly true, that wants and crosses are more needful and useful to them than bread, and in such cases it is a greater mercy of God to deny them supplies than to grant them.

Psalms 34:10 The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the LORD shall not want any good [thing].Ver. 10. The young lions do lack and suffer hunger] And yet they will have it, if it is to be had. Haec est sceleratorum imago, saith Beza. Lionlike wicked oppressors, rich cormorants, as the Septuagint render it, who live on the spoil of poor people, and are never satisfied, do yet perish with famine, as Eliphaz saith of the old lion, Job 4:11; and come oft to great poverty, so that they pine away and miserably perish, Donec misere tabescant (Beza.) But they that seek the Lord] That, content with his blessing alone, seek not their nourishment any other way but from his hand, and will rather lie in the dust than rise by evil principles; these have an autarky, a self-sufficiency, such as godliness is never without, 1 Timothy 6:6. Some Rabbis say (Aben Ezra in loc.) that the servants of Achish had almost famished David (under pretence haply of reducing him to his right mind), but God sustained him by miracle, as he did Elias, 1 Kings 17:6; 1 Kings 17:14 Shall not want any good thing] Want they may, this or that, which they may think would be good for them; but God knoweth it to be otherwise; or else they should be sure of it. Of good nothing followeth of itself but good, but if by accident any evil followeth, yet it is turned into good to such as seek the Lord in sincerity.

(10) Young lions.—See Note, Psalms 17:12. The young lion is the emblem of power and self-resource. Yet these sometimes lack, but the earnest seekers after Divine truth and righteousness never. Instead of “lions,” the LXX. and Vulgate have “the rich.”

Verse 10. The young lions do lack] Instead of כפירים kephirim, the young lions, one of Kennicott's MSS. has כבירים cabbirim, "powerful men." The Vulgate, Septuagint, AEthiopic, Syriac, Arabic, and Anglo-Saxon have the same reading. Houbigant approves of this; and indeed the sense and connection seem to require it. My old Psalter reads: - The Ryche had nede; and thai hungerd: but sekand Lard sal noght be lessed of alle gode. That es, says the paraphrase, with outen lessyng thai sal have God; that es alle gode; for in God is al gode.

10. The young lions] Best understood literally, not as a metaphor for the rich (LXX πλούσιοι, though possibly from a different reading), or powerful oppressors (Psalms 35:17). The sense is that the strongest beasts of prey, most capable of providing for themselves, may suffer want (Job 4:11); not so God’s people. Cp. Psalms 23:1. For the touching connexion of these words with St Columba’s last hours see Ker’s Psalms in History and Biography, p. 62. He was transcribing the Psalter, and at this verse he laid down his pen. “Here at the end of the page I must stop; what follows let Baithen write.” “The last verse he had written,” says his biographer Adamnan, “was very applicable to the saint who was about to depart, and to whom eternal good shall never be wanting; while the one that followeth is equally applicable to the father who succeeded him, the instructor of his spiritual children.” 11ff. If such are the blessings promised to those who fear the Lord, how essential to know what the fear of the Lord is! Accordingly the poet adopts the language of a teacher and addresses his sons. So the teacher in Proverbs 1-8 constantly addresses his disciples as sons (Psalms 4:1), or my son.

The young lions do lack and suffer hunger - That is, they often do it, as compared with the friends of God. The allusion is especially to the “young” lions who are not able to go forth themselves in search of food.

10. Young lions—The lion is referred to as being the strongest beast of the forest known to Palestine, and hence able to secure his food; and the young lion is one in full strength and agility,