Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/3_500_e.lzh/3_534.TXT

Text File | 1995-01-24 | 6KB | 114 lines

\*Ver. 1. \\Lord, how are they increased that trouble
me\\? &c.] David's enemies increased in the conspiracy
against him, \\#2Sa 15:12\\; the hearts of the
men of Israel were after Absalom, and against him.
Christ's enemies increased when Judas with a multitude
came to take him; when the body of the common
people cried out, Crucify him; when the assembly
of the wicked enclosed him, and pierced his hands
and his feet. And the enemies of God's people are
many; the men of this world are against them; legions
of devils oppose them; and they have swarms of sins
in their own hearts; and all these give trouble. David's
enemies troubled him; he wept as he went up
the hill, to think that his own son should seek to destroy
him; that his subjects, whom he had ruled so
long with clemency, and had hazarded his person in
war for their defence, and to protect them in their
civil and religious rights, should rebel against him.
Christ's enemies troubled him, when they bound and
led him away as a malefactor; when they spit upon
him, smote and buffeted him; when they scourged and
crucified him, and mocked at him. The enemies of the
saints are troublers of them; in the world, and from the
men of it, they have tribulation; Satan's temptations
give them much uneasiness and distress; and their indwelling
sins cause them to cry out, O! wretched men
that we are. This address is made to the Lord, as the
Lord God omniscient, who knew the case to be as it
was, and who had a concern in it not being without
his will, but according to it, he having foretold it, and
as he who only could help out of it: and the psalmist
delivers it in a complaining way, and in an expostulatory
manner; reasoning the case why it should
be so, what should be the reason of it, for what end
and purpose it was; and as wondering at it, suggesting
his own innocence, and how undeserving he was
to be treated in such a way;
\*\\many [are] they that rise
up against me\\; many in quantity, and great in quality,
great in the law, in wisdom, in riches, and in
stature, as Jarchi interprets it; such as Ahithophel
and others, who rose up against David in an hostile
manner, to dispossess him of his kingdom, and to destroy
his life. And many were they that rose up
against Christ; the multitude came against him as a
thief, with clubs and staves: the men of this world
rise up against the saints with their tongues, and sometimes
with open force and violence; Satan, like a
roaring lion, seeks to devour them, and their own
fleshly lusts war against them.

\*Ver. 2. \\Many there be which say of ray soul\\, &c.]
Or %to my soul% {u},the following cutting words, which
touched to the quick, reached his very heart, and
like a sword pierced through it:
\*\\[there is] no help
for him in God\\; or %no salvation% {w}: neither in this
world, nor in that which is to come, as Kimchi explains
it. David's enemies looked upon his case to be
desperate; that it was impossible he should ever extricate
himself from it; yea, that God himself either
could not or would not save him. And in like manner
did the enemies of Christ say, when they had got him
upon the cross; see \\#Mt 27:43\\; and how frequent
is it for the men of the world to represent the saints
as in a damnable state! and to call them a damned
set and generation of men, as if there was no salvation
for them? and how often does Satan suggest unto
them, that there is no hope for them, and they may
as well indulge themselves in all sinful lusts and pleasures?
and how often do their own unbelieving hearts
say to them, that there is no salvation in Christ for
them, though there is for others; and that they have
no interest in the favour of God, and shall be eternally
lost and perish? And this account is concluded with
the word
\*\\selah\\, which some take to be a musical note;
and so the Septuagint render it \~diaqalma\~, which Suidas {x}
interprets the change of the song, of the note or tune
of it; and the rather it may be thought to be so, since
it is only used in this book of Psalms, and in the prayer
of Habakkuk, which was set to a tune, and directed
to the chief singer. Kimchi derives it from a root
which signifies %to lift up%, and supposes that it denotes
and directs to an elevation, or straining of the voice,
at the place where this word stands. Others understand
it as a pause, a full stop for a while; and as a
note of attention, either to something that is remarkably
bad and distressing, as here; or remarkably good,
and matter of rejoicing, as in \\#Ps 3:4,8\\. Others consider
it as an affirmation of the truth of any thing,
good or bad; and render it %verily%, %truly%, as, answering
to %Amen%; so be it, so it is, or shall be; it is the truth
of the thing: to this sense agrees Aben Ezra. But
others render it %for ever%, as the Chaldee paraphrase;
and it is a tradition of the Jews {y}, that wherever it
is said, %netzach%, %selah%, and %ed%, there is no ceasing, it is
for ever and ever; and so then, according to this rule,
the sense of David's enemies is, that there was no
help for him in God for ever. A very learned man {z}
has wrote a dissertation upon this word; in which he
endeavours to prove, that it is a name of God, differently
used, either in the vocative, genitive, and
dative cases; as, O Selah, O God, or of God, or to
God, &c. as the sense requires.

{u} \^yvpnl\^ \~th quch mou\~, Sept. %animae meae%, V. L. Pagninus, Montanus,
Musculus, Gejerus, Michaelis; so the Targum.
{w} \^htewvy Nya\^ %non est salus%, V. L. Pagninus, Montanus; %non ulla
salus%, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Ainsworth.
{x} In voce \~diaq\~.
{y} T. Bab. Erubin, fol. 54. 1. Vid. Ben Melech in loc.
{z} Paschii Dissertatio de Selah, p. 670. in Thesaur. Theolog. Philolog
par 1.