Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 10:2
The wicked in [his] pride doth persecute the poor: let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined.
2. The general sense of the first clause is that given by R.V.:
In the pride of the wicked the poor is hotly pursued;
or possibly, is consumed, by fear, anxiety, and distress.
In the second clause there is a double ambiguity. The verb taken may be rendered as a wish or as a statement of fact; and its subject may be the ‘wicked’ or the ‘poor.’ Hence either, as A.V.,
let them (the wicked) be taken in the devices that they have imagined: or, as LXX, Vulg., R.V. marg.:
they (the poor) are taken in the devices that they (the wicked) have imagined.
With the first rendering comp. Psa 7:15-16, Psa 9:16: but the second is on the whole preferable. It gives a good parallelism to the first line of the verse; and a further description of the wrongs of the poor suits the context better than a parenthetical cry for retribution.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
The wicked in his pride – Margin: In the pride of the wicked he doth. The margin is a literal translation of the Hebrew; but the sense is the same. The meaning is, that the fact that the wicked persecuted the poor, in the case referred to, was to be traced to his pride, haughtiness, ambition; that is, in pursuing his own selfish and ambitious purposes, he became utterly regardless of the rights and comforts of others. He esteemed their interest and happiness as unworthy of regard in comparison with his own aims and purposes, and trampled down all their rights in prosecuting his own ends. The term wicked here – in the original in the singular number, rasha, though perhaps used collectively – means properly the wicked one, or the wicked man, and doubtless refers to some enemy that David had in his eye, and from whom he was at that time suffering wrong. It is not possible now to ascertain with certainty who this was; but as the whole description proceeds in the singular number Psa 10:3-11, it is most natural to suppose that this refers to one individual.
Doth persecute the poor – yidelaq any. Prof. Alexander renders this, burns the sufferer. Luther, muss der Elende leiden – must the afflicted suffer. DeWette: angstigen sich die Elenden. The Latin Vulgate: When the impious (man) is proud, the poor (man) is burned: incenditur pauper. So the Septuagint. Gesenius (Lexicon) supposes it means, to burn with anguish. Horsley renders it, In the exaltation of the impious one the helpless is consumed. But it seems to me that our common version has expressed the true sense. The word rendered persecuteth – dalaq – means properly to burn, to flame; then to burn with love, with anger; then to burn after anyone, to persecute. See it; explained in the notes at Psa 7:13. According to the most natural application of the word here, it would seem to mean, In the pride of the wicked, he persecutes the poor or the afflicted; that is, he burns after him; he is inflamed against him; he hotly pursues him. The word poor in this place – any – means the afflicted; the crushed; the downtrodden; those in circumstances of humiliation and poverty. The psalmist doubtless refers to himself as a poor and persecuted man; and the time in his life would seem to be when he was without a protector or friend, probably before he came to the throne.
Let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined – The artifice, plan, or scheme, which they have formed. That is, they have formed a scheme to take advantage of, or to destroy others; and the psalmist prays that, as a just retribution, this very calamity may come upon them. No man could have a right to complain if the mischief and wrong which he had devised for others should be brought upon himself; and if it were certain that this in all eases would occur, there could be nothing that would so effectually deter men from wrongdoing. The psalmist, then, simply prays that justice might be done. Compare Psa 5:10, note; Psa 7:15-16, notes. The plural form of the verb is used here, but it is not certain that the psalmist had more than one enemy in view, for on expressing his feelings toward that one enemy he may have designed to use language which would be applicable to all in similar circumstances.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 2. The wicked in his pride] On no principle of nature or reason can we account for a wicked man persecuting a humble follower of God because of his religion. The devil hates godliness; and the wicked man hates it also, because the devil is in his heart.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
In his pride; through pride of heart; which makes him forget God, Psa 10:4, and despise the poor, and oppress others, either because they oppose or dislike his wicked courses, or that he may have more fuel for his pride or ambition. Or, in his exaltation. This is the use that he makes of that power and authority to which thou hast advanced him, to persecute those whom he should protect and cherish. He seems to point at Saul or his courtiers.
Doth persecute with great fervency and burning fury, as the word signifies.
The poor, to wit, me, who am through their tyranny poor, and destitute, and miserable, and therefore the more proper object for thy compassion, and others who favour my righteous cause.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
2. Literally, “In pride ofthe wicked they (the poor or humble, Psa 10:17;Psa 12:5) shall be taken in thedevices they (the proud) have imagined.”
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
The wicked in [his] pride doth persecute the poor,…. The “poor” is the good and gracious man, who is commonly poor in this world’s things, and is sensibly poor in spirit, or sensible of his spiritual poverty; or he is so called because “afflicted”, as the word signifies; and he is afflicted because he is poor: these two characters generally go together. The “wicked” man is the wicked one, the lawless one, the man of sin, and son of perdition, antichrist, the great persecutor of Christ’s poor saints and faithful witnesses, more or less, ever since he has been in power; and which arises from the “pride” of his heart, not bearing that any should refuse to pay homage to him, contradict his will, or dissent from him. The word s signifies to follow after, to pursue, as Jarchi, Aben Ezra, Kimchi, and Ben Melech, interpret it; and “to pursue hotly”, as it is rendered in
Ge 31:36; and denotes the vehemence and heat of his wrath and fury, with which antichrist persecutes the followers of the Lamb; hence persecution is compared to the heat of the sun, Mt 13:6; Some render the words, “through the pride of the wicked the poor is burned”, or “the poor burns” t: which may be understood either literally, of the burning of the martyrs of Jesus by antichrist, as here in Queen Mary’s days; and which was foretold, that some of the saints should fall by flame, as well as by sword, captivity, and spoil; and to which that part of the description of Christ answers, whose feet are said to be like fine brass, as if it burned in a furnace; and which is prefaced to the epistle to the church at Thyatira, which is an emblem of the apostate church: see Da 11:33; or figuratively, of the poor saints burning with grief at the pride and wickedness of the man of sin, and with zeal for the honour and glory of God; see 2Co 11:29 So 8:6;
let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined: we read the words as a petition; and so the sense is, let the wicked persecutors be taken in the wicked and crafty schemes which they have devised for the hurt of others, as they are, or will be; see Ps 9:15. But the psalmist is not yet come to petitions, nor does he until Ps 10:12; but is all along describing the wickedness of the wicked one. It seems better therefore to render the words as do the Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions, “they are taken in the devices that they have imagined”: and the meaning is, that the poor, who are persecuted by the wicked, are taken by their crafty schemes they lay for them, as Jarchi interprets it, and are put to death by them. So these words show the issue and event of persecution: and this sense best agrees with the boasted success of the wicked man Ps 10:3.
s “fervide persequitur”, Junius Tremellius, Piscator “ferventer”, Gejerus; so Ainsworth. t “Incenditur”, V. L. “ardet”, Tigurine version, Muis, Cocceius.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
2. The ungodly in his pride, etc Before uttering his prayer against the ungodly, the Psalmist briefly sets forth their wickedness in cruelly vexing the afflicted, for no other reason but because they disdain and despise them, through the pride with which they are inflated. And their cruelty is not a little enhanced from this, that, forgetful of all humanity, they contemptuously triumph over the poor and afflicted, mocking them and inflicting injuries upon them. (193) Cruelty is, indeed, always proud, yea, rather, pride is the mother of all wrongs; for if a man did not through pride magnify himself above his neighbors, and through an overweening conceit of himself despise them, even common humanity would teach us with what humility and justice we ought to conduct ourselves towards each other. But David here intended to state that the only cause why the ungodly, whom he accuses, exercise their cruelty against the wretched and the needy, from whom they receive no provocation, is the pride and arrogance of their own spirits. Let every one, therefore, who desires to live justly and unblameably with his brethren, beware of indulging or taking pleasure in treating others disdainfully; and let him endeavor, above all things, to have his mind freed from the disease of pride. The word דלק, dalak, signifies to suffer persecution, as well as to persecute; and, therefore, some prefer translating the words, The poor is persecuted in the pride of the ungodly. (194) They may also not improperly be rendered thus, The poor burns in the pride of the ungodly, because this is the more common signification of the word. The pride of the wicked, like fire, devours the poor and afflicted.
(193) “ En se mocquant d’eux et les outrageant.” — Fr.
(194) דלק, dalak, signifies two things, to persecute, and to be set on fire; and though we render it in the former sense, and so apply it to רשע , rasha, the wicked, in the active tense, — the wicked persecutes the poor, yet the ancient interpreters generally render it in the passive, and apply it to עני, anay, the poor, that in the pride of the wicked he is set on fire, that is, brought into great tribulation.” — Hammond. The word used by the Septuagint is ἐμπυριζέται. There may be an allusion in the Hebrew word to the fires which persecutors have kindled for burning to death the confessors and martyrs of Christ.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(2) The wicked.Better, in the pride of the wicked, the sufferer burns. (So LXX., Aquila, Symmachus, and Vulg.) Not to be taken of indignation felt by the sufferers, but literally of the afflictions they endure. The Authorised Version rendering of the next clause takes the wicked as the subject of the verb; but it preserves the parallelism better, and is more in accordance with the rest of the psalm (Psa. 10:8-10), to understand it of the humble, the singular changing to the plural in the subject when supplied: they (the sufferers) are taken (the verb is in the present) in the plot which they (the wicked) have devised.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
2. Wicked The man who breaks law and departs from right with knowledge and of set purpose. The term is used five times in the psalm. It is not an ideal picture, but a living description of an actual state of society under the misrule and outrages of the worst conceivable men.
Poor This is the oppressed class, the opposite of the “wicked.” The title includes the ideas both of humble and afflicted; and under different original words is given seven times. Called, also, the “innocent,” “fatherless,” “oppressed.” Psa 10:8; Psa 10:14; Psa 10:17.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Here is an awful description in part of the ungodly, as it concerns God’s people, how his hatred against God is manifested. There is, there must be, an everlasting and irreconcilable enmity in the seed of the serpent to the seed of the woman. ‘I will put’, saith God, ‘enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed’. Gen 3:15 . Hence the Redeemer saith, Marvel not if the world hate you. Joh 15:18-19 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 10:2 The wicked in [his] pride doth persecute the poor: let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined.
Ver. 2. The wicked in his pride doth persecute, &c. ] Heb. hotly pursueth ( . Chrysost.), and that out of his pride, the true cause of persecution, whatever else is pretended. And this is fitly here alleged, and urged as an argument to move God to make haste. See Deu 32:27 : The saints fare the better for the insolence and outrage of their enemies, whose ruin is thereby accelerated, and somewhat God will do the sooner for his people, lest the enemy exalt himself, Psa 140:8 , and say, Our hand is high, the Lord hath not done this.
Let them be taken in the devices, &c.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
The wicked = a lawless one. Hebrew. rasha”. App-44.
persecute = hotly pursue.
the poor = an oppressed one. Compare Psa 10:18, and Psa 9:9. Hebrew. ‘ani. See note on Pro 6:11.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
The wicked: etc. Heb. In the pride of the wicked he doth, etc. Psa 31:18, Psa 36:11, Psa 59:12, Psa 119:5, Psa 119:69, Psa 119:85, Psa 119:122, Psa 140:5, Exo 9:17, Exo 18:11, Isa 10:12, Isa 10:13, Isa 14:13, Isa 14:16, Jer 43:2
let: Psa 7:16, Psa 9:15, Psa 9:16, Pro 5:22
Reciprocal: Exo 1:10 – Come on Num 31:8 – Balaam 1Ki 18:10 – whither my lord Psa 7:15 – and is Psa 11:2 – lo Psa 21:11 – imagined Psa 31:20 – from Psa 52:1 – boastest Psa 58:9 – as Psa 73:8 – speak wickedly Psa 94:4 – boast Psa 101:5 – an high Psa 109:16 – persecuted Pro 11:27 – he that seeketh Pro 26:27 – diggeth Isa 38:17 – thou hast cast Hab 1:13 – wherefore Mar 4:38 – carest 1Th 1:5 – but Jam 2:6 – Do
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Psa 10:2. The wicked in his pride The pride of his heart which makes him forget God, despise the poor, and oppress others: Hebrew, , begaa-vath, in his exaltation; doth persecute the poor With great earnestness and burning fury, as the verb , dalak, here used, signifies: as if he had said, The use which he makes of that power and authority to which thou hast advanced him is to persecute those whom he ought to protect and cherish.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
David pictured the wicked who oppress the righteous in graphic terms in this section of verses. They are proud, boastful, greedy, blasphemous, arrogant, haughty, self-sufficient, prosperous, careless about God, belligerent, self-confident, complacent, abusive, deceitful, oppressive, destructive, mischievous, and wicked. They opposed both God and His people with their speech, as well as in their actions.