Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 119:103
How sweet are thy words unto my taste! [yea, sweeter] than honey to my mouth!
103. Cp. Psa 19:10; Job 23:12; Joh 4:32; Joh 4:34.
my taste ] Lit. my palate.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
How sweet are thy words unto my taste … – Margin, as in Hebrew, palate. The reference is to the taste, perhaps because the sense of taste was supposed to reside in the palate. The Hebrew word may include also the whole of the inside of the mouth. The word rendered sweet does not occur elsewhere. It properly means to be smooth, and hence, is applied to kind or agreeable words. On the sentiment here, see the notes at Psa 19:10.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 119:103
How sweet are Thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
The best Christmas fare
I like this way of describing the reception of Gods Word as a matter of eating, for a man cannot eat Gods Word without living.
There is a reality about the faith which eats; there is a something there most sure, which contains the elements of salvation, for tasting is a spiritual sense which implies nearness. This idea of tasting Gods Word contains the thought of receptiveness. A man may hear a thing and, as we say, it goes in at one ear and out at the other; but that which a man gets into his mouth till he tastes it, and it is sweet to his palate, well, he has received that. Tasting is also a personal matter. There is no possibility of my eating for you.
I. I call your attention to an exclamation. The text contains two notes of exclamation or admiration. It is evidently the utterance of one who is somewhat surprised, one who has a thought which he cannot adequately express. The thought is also one which gives much delight to the writer, for he exclaims, How sweet, etc.
1. It is a matter of wonder to many to find the Gospel so sweet when the soul first tastes it.
2. This may also be the exclamation of a soul cheered by still tasting the Gospel.
3. I reckon that this language of exclamation and admiration will also come from the most advanced saint, increasing in knowledge of the Gospel, the believer who has studied the Word of God most earnestly, and who has had the deepest experience in it. Other books are soon done with, but the Bible is never fully understood.
II. Take the text as a statement, a cool statement of matters of fact. He never speaks more than the truth even when he is most emphatic, so that I am sure that David means to tell us here that Gods words were sweet to him.
1. They were unutterably sweet: How sweet! but he does not tell us how sweet they were. There is no describing the flavours of a royal banquet, there is no picturing to a man who has not the sense of smell the fragrance of a delicious perfume; and you must personally know the sweetness of the Word of God, for to us it is positively unutterable.
2. This much, however, the psalmist does utter: he tells us that Gods words are surpassingly sweet, for, says he, They are sweeter than honey.
3. He also says that all Gods words are thus unutterably sweet to him.
4. And at all times.
III. A repetition. How sweet are Thy words unto my taste! Well, that is all right, David; we understand you. Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth! Is not that saying the same thing twice over? Yes, and intentionally so, because Gods Word is sweet to His people in many ways, and many times over.
1. As I have already said to you, it is very sweet in its reception. When we first take it into our heart, and feed upon it, it is very precious; but, spiritually, men are something like ruminating animals, they have the power of feeding again, and again, and again, on that which they have once received.
2. But do you not think that the repetition in the text means something else, namely, that while, first of all, Christs Word is very sweet to cur taste, there is another sweetness when we get it into our mouth, not so much for our own eating, as speaking of it to others? There is great sweetness about the declaration of Gods words.
3. There is a very special sweetness about preaching Christ, in the public proclamation of His Word. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Scripture as honey
I. Honey is exceedingly sweet to the taste (Jdg 14:18).
II. Honey, if it be added or put into other things that are bitter, will take away in a great measure their bitterness. So when the soul is under affliction, temptation, persecution, for Christs sake, if God be pleased to add some of the sweet promises of the Word–how wonderfully is the bitter abated.
III. But notwithstanding that honey is so sweet and pleasant, yet there are some men who do not care for it. Sinners are so glutted with the filthy trash of this world that they loathe the honeycomb.
IV. Naturalists affirm that honey is of a healing nature, and serves for a great number of uses.
V. Honey is also of a purifying efficacy. (Anon.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 103. Sweeter than honey to my mouth!] What deep communion must this man have had with his Maker! These expressions show a soul filled with God. O Christians, how vastly superior are our privileges! and alas! how vastly inferior in general, are our consolations, our communion with God, and our heavenly-mindedness!
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The study and obedience of thy words yields me more satisfaction and delight than any worldly men find in their sensual pleasures.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
How sweet are thy words unto my taste!…. Who had a spiritual one; and could discern perverse things, and could taste how good and gracious the Lord is: and so his words were sweet unto him; the doctrines of grace, the truths of the Gospel, were delightful and pleasant to him; like unadulterated milk, desirable by him: like good wine, that goes down sweetly; like good food, that is exceeding palatable; or like honey, and even sweeter than that, as follows. And that words “may be tasted [and] eaten”, is not only agreeable to Scripture language, Jer 15:16; but to classical writers g;
[yea, sweeter] than honey to my mouth; not only had they the nourishing nature and the refreshing virtue of honey, but the sweetness of it; yea, exceeded it in sweetness; see Ps 19:10.
g “Mea dicta devorato”, Plauti Asinaria, Act. 3. Sc. 3. v. 59. “Edi sermonem tuum”, ib. Aulularia, Act. 3. Sc. 6. v. 1. “Gustare ego ejus sermonem volo”, ib. Mostellaria, Act. 5. Sc. 1. v. 15.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
103 How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth! 104 Through thy precepts I get understanding: therefore I hate every false way.
Here is, 1. The wonderful pleasure and delight which David took in the word of God; it was sweet to his taste, sweeter than honey. There is such a thing as a spiritual taste, an inward savour and relish of divine things, such an evidence of them to ourselves, by experience, as we cannot give to others. We have heard him ourselves, John iv. 42. To this scripture-taste the word of God is sweet, very sweet, sweeter than any of the gratifications of sense, even those that are most delicious. David speaks as if he wanted words to express the satisfaction he took in the discoveries of the divine will and grace; no pleasure was comparable to it. 2. The unspeakable profit and advantage he gained by the word of God. (1.) It helped him to a good head: “Through thy precepts I get understanding to discern between truth and falsehood, good and evil, so as not to mistake either in the conduct of my own life or in advising others.” (2.) It helped him to a good heart: “Therefore, because I have got understanding of the truth, I hate every false way, and am stedfastly resolved not to turn aside into it.” Observe here, [1.] The way of sin is a false way; it deceives, and will ruin, all that walk in it; it is the wrong way, and yet it seems to a man right, Prov. xiv. 12. [2.] It is the character of every good man that he hates the way of sin, and hates it because it is a false way; he not only refrains his feet from it (v. 101), but he hates it, has an antipathy to it and a dread of it. [3.] Those who hate sin as sin will hate all sin, hate every false way, because every false way leads to destruction. And, [4.] The more understanding we get by the word of God the more rooted will our hatred of sin be (for to depart from evil, that is understanding, Job xxviii. 28), and the more ready we are in the scriptures the better furnished we are with answers to temptation.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
103. O how sweet have been thy words to my palate! He again repeats what he had previously stated in different words, that he was so powerfully attracted by the sweetness of the Divine Law, as to have no desire after any other delight. It is possible that a man may be affected with reverence towards the Law of God; but no one will cheerfully follow it, save he who has tasted this sweetness. God requires from us no slavish service: he will have us to come to him cheerfully, and this is the very reason why the prophet commends the sweetness of God’s word so often in this psalm. If it is demanded in what sense he declares that he took such sweet delight in God’s Law, which, according to the testimony of Paul, (1Co 3:9,) does nothing else but strike fear into men, the solution is easy: The prophet does not speak of the dead letter which kills those who read it, but he comprehends the whole doctrine of the Law, the chief part of which is the free covenant of salvation. When Paul contrasts the Law with the Gospel, he speaks only of the commandments and threatening. Now if God were only to command, and to denounce the curse, the whole of his communication would, undoubtedly, be deadly. But the prophet is not here opposing the Law to the Gospel; and, therefore, he could affirm that the grace of adoption, which is offered in the Law, was sweeter to him than honey; that is to say, that no delight was to him equal to this. What I have previously said must be remembered, that the Law of God will be unsavory to us, or, at least, that it will never be so sweet to us, as to withdraw us from the pleasures of the flesh, until we have struggled manfully against our own nature, in order to subdue the carnal affections which prevail within us.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
Psa 119:103 How sweet are thy words unto my taste! [yea, sweeter] than honey to my mouth!
Ver. 103. How sweet are thy words unto my taste! ] Heb. to my palate; Syr. coelis gutturis mei, the roof of the mouth resembleth heaven. Epicurus was worthily blamed by Ennius for that dum palate quid sit optimum iudicabat, coeli palatium non suspexerit, while he looked so much to his palate, he looked not at all to the heavenly palace. David was no hog of his herd; he had sweetmeats to feed on that the world was not aware of.
Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
sweet = smooth, or agreeable. Not the same word as in Psa 19:10.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
sweet: Psa 19:10, Psa 63:5, Job 23:12, Pro 3:17, Pro 8:11, Pro 24:13, Pro 24:14, Son 1:2-4, Son 5:1
taste: Heb. palate
Reciprocal: Neh 8:12 – because Job 6:6 – taste Psa 34:8 – taste Psa 119:113 – thy law Pro 2:10 – General Pro 16:24 – an Pro 22:18 – it is Son 5:16 – mouth Eze 3:3 – it was Luk 18:30 – manifold more Joh 4:32 – I have Rom 12:2 – good Heb 5:14 – their 1Jo 5:3 – and Rev 10:10 – sweet
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Psa 119:103-104. How sweet are thy words to my taste! Observe, reader, there is such a thing as a spiritual taste, an inward savour and relish of divine things; such an evidence of them to ourselves, by experience, as we cannot give to others. To this taste the word of God is sweet; yea, sweeter than any of the gratifications of sense, even those that are most delicious. David here speaks as if he wanted words to express the satisfaction he took in the discoveries of the divine will and grace: he judged no pleasure to be comparable to it. Through thy precepts I get understanding True, useful, and saving knowledge; therefore Because that discovers to me, as the wickedness, so the folly and mischief of such practices; I hate every false way Every thing which is contrary to that rule of truth and right, all false doctrine and worship, and all sinful courses.