Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 44:25
For our soul is bowed down to the dust: our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
25. We lie utterly prostrate, crushed and helpless. Cp. Psa 119:25.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For our soul is bowed down to the dust – That is, We are overborne with calamity, so that we sink to the earth. The expression is one that denotes great affliction.
Our belly cleaveth unto the earth – We are like animals that are prone upon the earth, and that cannot rise. The allusion may be to reptiles that cannot stand erect. The figure is intended to denote great prostration and affliction.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 25. Our soul is bowed down] Our life is drawing near to the grave. If thou delay to help us, we shall become extinct.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Our soul, i.e. either our lives or persons; or rather bodies, as it is explained in the next clause, and as the soul is oft taken by a synecdoche, as Num 11:6; Psa 16:10; 106:15, &c.
To the dust; either to the ground, where we lie prostrate at our enemies feet, or to the grave.
Our belly cleaveth unto the earth; we are not only thrown down to the earth, but we lie there like dead carcasses fixed to it, without any ability or hope of rising again.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
For our soul is bowed down to the dust,…. Which may signify great declension in spiritual things, much dejection of mind, and little exercise of grace, Ps 119:25; or a very low estate in temporals; subjection to their enemies; they setting their feet upon their necks, and obliging them to lick the dust of them: and even it may signify nearness to death itself; see Jos 10:24;
our belly cleaveth to the earth; as persons that lie prostrate, being conquered and suppliants.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
25 For our soul is humbled to the dust The people of God again deplore the greatness of their calamities, and in order that God may be the more disposed to help them, they declare to him that they are afflicted in no ordinary manner. By the metaphors which they here employ, they mean not only that they are cast down, but also that they are crushed and laid upon the earth, so that they are not able to rise again. Some take the word soul for the body, so that there would be in this verse a repetition of the same sentiment; but I would rather take it for the part in which the life of man consists; as if they had said, We are cast down to the earth, and lie prostrate upon our belly, without any hope of getting up again. After this complaint they subjoin a prayer, (verse 26,) that God would arise for their help By the word redeem they mean not ordinary kind of help, for there was no other means of securing their preservation but by redeeming them. And yet there can be no doubt, that they were diligently employed in meditating upon the great redemption from which all the deliverances which God is daily effecting in our behalf, when he defends us from dangers by various means, flow as streams from their source. In a previous part of the psalm, they had boasted of the steadfastness of their faith; but to show us that, in using this language, they boasted not in their own merits, they do not claim here some recompense for what they had done and suffered for God. They are contented to ascribe their salvation to the unmerited goodness of God as the alone cause of it.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
Psa 44:25 For our soul is bowed down to the dust: our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
Ver. 25. For our soul, &c. ] Soul and belly (or body), both are oppressed, and lie suppliant at God’s feet; resolved there to live and die together.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
our soul is = we ourselves are. Hebrew. nephesh.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Psa 66:11, Psa 66:12, Psa 119:25, Isa 51:23, Lam 4:5
Reciprocal: Psa 31:9 – my soul Isa 29:4 – thou shalt
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
44:25 For our soul is {s} bowed down to the dust: our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
(s) There is no hope of recovery, unless you raise us up with your hand.