Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 109:10
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek [their bread] also out of their desolate places.
10. let them seek &c.] And seek (their bread) far from their ruined home. Let the wicked man’s home become a ruin, and his children have to get their living away from it. The LXX however points to the reading, and let them be driven out of their ruined home.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg – Let them continually wander about with no home – no fixed habitation. Let them be compelled to ask their daily food at the hand of charity. Here we enter on a part of the psalm which is more difficult to be reconciled with a proper feeling than the portions which have been considered. It is, indeed, a frequent consequence of crime that the children of those who are punished are vagabonds and beggars, but this is not a necessary consequence; and there seems here, therefore, to be a mixture of personal feeling, or a feeling of revenge. This runs through the remaining portion of the imprecatory part of the psalm. I confess that it is difficult to explain this without admitting that the expressions are a record only of what actually occurred in the mind of a man, truly pious, but not perfect – a man who thus, to illustrate the workings of the mind even when the general character was holy, was allowed to record his own feelings, though wrong, just as he would record the conduct of another, or his own conduct, though wrong, as a simple matter of fact – a record of what actually was felt. The record may be exactly correct; the sentiment recorded may have been wholly incapable of vindication. See the General Introduction, Section 6 (6).
Let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places – In places uninhabited by man; in barren regions; in deserts: let them be compelled to live on the scanty food which they may pick up there – the roots, or the wild fruits, which will simply keep them alive. See the notes at Job 30:4.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 10. Let his children – beg] The father having lost his office, the children must necessarily be destitute; and this is the hardest lot to which any can become subject, after having been born to the expectation of an ample fortune.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Vagabonds; having no certain place of abode; which is a grievous curse in itself, Gen 4:12,14; Isa 16:2.
And beg: this increaseth their misery.
Desolate places; into which they are fled for fear and shame, as not daring to show their faces amongst men.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg,…. Wander from place to place, begging their bread: this is denied of the children of good men in David’s time, Ps 37:25 yet was threatened to the children of Eli, 1Sa 2:36 and was very likely literally true of the children of Judas; and was certainly the case of multitudes of the children of the Jews, the posterity of them that crucified Christ, at the time of their destruction by the Romans; when great numbers were dispersed, and wandered about in various countries, as vagabonds, begging their bread from door to door; which is reckoned a by them a great affliction, and very distressing.
Let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places; either describing, as Kimchi thinks, the miserable cottages, forlorn and desolate houses, in which they lived, and from whence they went out to everyone that passed by, to ask relief of them; or it may be rendered,
because of their desolate places b; or, “after them”; so the Targum, “after their desolation was made”; when their grand house was left desolate, their temple, as our Lord said it should, and was, Mt 23:38, and all their other houses in Jerusalem and in Judea; then were they obliged to seek their bread of others elsewhere, and by begging. The Syriac version wants this verse.
a Mifchar Hapeninim apud Buxtorf. Florileg. Heb. p. 262, 263. b So De Dieu, Gejerus, and some in Michaelis.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(10) Be continually vagabonds.Wander and wander about would better reproduce the original.
Desolate places.Rather, ruins. They are imagined creeping out of the ruins of their homes to beg. But there was a different reading, followed by the LXX. and Vulg., let them be driven out of their homes. This reading involves but a slight literal change. Comp.,
Worse evil yet I pray for on my spouse;
Let him still live, through strange towns roam in want,
Exiled, suspected, cowering, with no home.
SENECA: Med., i. 19.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
10. Continually vagabonds Hebrew, wandering, his sons shall wander: without a fixed habitation, homeless: the condition to which David had been already reduced by the treachery and falsehood of his enemy. The same word expresses David’s exilement (Psa 56:8) and Cain’s punishment, (Gen 4:12; Gen 4:14,) where, “for fugitive and vagabond,”
the Septuagint have , groaning and trembling. The parallel passage is Psa 59:11; Psa 59:15, where also the same word occurs. The consequences of crime and impiety often reappear in the offspring of the wicked, according to the declarations of Exo 20:5; Exo 34:7, and of this the psalmist now forewarns them. “Every consequence of sin is a punishment, and every punishment is from the living God. And is not man permitted to desire that God should do what he really does, provided he desires it in that sense in which God does it? ” Tholuck.
Out of their desolate places “Out of” should here read from, that is, far from. The fall of the wicked father brings ruin and desolation upon the household, and from, far from, the ruins of a home from which they are shaken out, they wander up and down, and ask and search for bread. See Psa 37:25. A description of human poverty and wretchedness which has not a parallel.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Psa 109:10. Let them seek their bread Let them be driven from their ruinous habitations. Green.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Psa 109:10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek [their bread] also out of their desolate places.
Ver. 10. Let his children be continually vagabonds ] Let them wandering wander, as Gen 4:12 Cain’s curse. Let them rogue about, – et timida voce rogare cibos. This is many times a token of God’s wrath.
Out of their desolate places
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
vagabonds = wanderers.
seek their bread also out. Septuagint and Vulg, read “driven out”.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Psa 109:10-13
Psa 109:10-13
“Let his children be vagabonds, and beg;
And let them seek their bread out of their desolate places.
Let the extortioner catch all that he hath;
And let strangers make spoil of his labor.
Let there be none to extend kindness to him; Neither let there be any to have pity on his fatherless children.
Let his posterity be cut off;
In the generation following let their name be blotted out.”
These imprecations run counter to the Christian conception that all young children are innocent. As Jesus stated it, “Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for unto such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”
“Let strangers make spoil of his labor” (Psa 109:11). It becomes clear here why David prayed that it might be a wicked judge who would try his enemy and sentence him to death. “The strangers, not subject to Hebrew law, would take advantage of his condemnation to death and appear with all kinds of claims against his estate, whether valid or not. It would matter little, for the claims would be sustained by the wicked judge, to whom they will give a share of the spoil.
“Let his posterity be cut off … their name be blotted out” (Psa 109:13). “His prayer is that his orphaned children will be reprobates, banished from home, doomed to a speedy death, because of destitution, exposure and hunger.”
E.M. Zerr:
Psa 109:10. These wishes seem cruel, but they were in line with other harsh measures that David sometimes used against those who opposed the Lord’s people.
Psa 109:11. An extortioner is a man who forces another to pay an unreasonable sum in payment of a debt or in the purchase of some necessity of life. Spoil his labor means to rob him of the fruits of his labor.
Psa 109:12. I would make the same comment on this verse as I did on Psa 109:10.
Psa 109:13. It has always been a natural desire to have children. It is also usual to hope for a continuation of one’s children (posterity) through the coming years. The severe wish, therefore, that David expresses in this verse is in line with some others already commented upon above.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Psa 37:25, Gen 4:12-14, 2Sa 3:29, 2Ki 5:27, Job 24:8-12, Job 30:3-9, Isa 16:2
Reciprocal: Gen 4:14 – fugitive Job 15:23 – wandereth Job 18:12 – hungerbitten Job 20:10 – seek Job 30:5 – driven Psa 59:15 – wander Act 19:13 – vagabond