Psalms 42

Psalms 42:2

Tongue - Under his fair and plausible speeches, mischief is hid and covered. Vanity - Or, injury, the vexation or oppression of other men.

Psalms 42:3

Sitteth - Not within the villages, but in the ways bordering upon them, or leading to them, as robbers use to do. Are set - Heb. Are hid. He watches and looks out of his lurking - place. He alludes still to the practices of robbers.

Psalms 42:5

Croucheth - Like a lion (for he continues the same metaphor) which lies close upon the ground, partly that he may not be discovered, and partly that he may more suddenly and surely lay hold on his prey.

Psalms 42:8

Contemn - Why dost thou by giving them impunity, suffer and occasion them to despise thee?

Psalms 42:9

Requite - Heb. to give (to restore or pay the mischief which they have done to others) with thy hand, by thy own extraordinary providence, because the oppressed were destitute of all other succours. Fatherless - Of such as have no friend or helper, one kind of them being put for all.

Psalms 42:10

Seek - Search for it, and punish these wicked atheists. ‘Till - No such wickedness be left in the world, or at least in the church.

Psalms 42:11

Is king - To whom it belongs to protect his subjects. Therefore his peoples case is never desperate, seeing he ever lives to help them. The heathen - The Canaanites; whom God, as king of the world, expelled, and gave their land to his people. By which great example he confirms his faith and hope for the future. His land - Out of Canaan, which God calls his land, because he gave it to them, and fixed his presence and dwelling in it.