Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 119:159
Consider how I love thy precepts: quicken me, O LORD, according to thy lovingkindness.
159. Consider how &c.] Lit. see that &c.; or possibly (cp. Psa 119:153), look upon me, for I love thy precepts.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Consider how I love thy precepts – Search me. Behold the evidence of my attachment to thy law. This is the confident appeal of one who was conscious that he was truly attached to God; that he really loved his law. It is similar to the appeal of Peter to the Saviour Joh 21:17, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. A man who truly loves God may make this appeal without impropriety. He may be so confident – so certain – that he has true love for the character of God, that he may make a solemn appeal to him on the subject – as he might appeal to a friend, to his wife, to his son, to his daughter, with the utmost confidence that he loved them. A man ought to have such love for them, that he could affirm this without hesitation or doubt; a man ought to have such love for God, that he could affirm this with equal confidence and propriety.
Quicken me … – See the notes at Psa 119:25.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
I love thy precepts; which was the cause of my grief for their violation of them.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
159. (Compare Psa 119:121-126;Psa 119:153-155).
quicken me, O Lord, accordingto thy lovingkindness (Ps119:88). This prayer occurs here for the ninth time, showing adeep sense of frailty.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Consider how I love thy precepts,…. How ardently and affectionately, how cordially and sincerely, Ps 119:127; and that was the reason why he was so grieved and distressed when wicked men transgressed and despised them;
quicken me, O Lord, according to thy loving kindness;
[See comments on Ps 119:88].
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
159 Consider how I love thy precepts: quicken me, O LORD, according to thy lovingkindness.
Here is, 1. David’s appeal to God concerning his love to his precepts: “Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love them; consider it then, and deal with me as thou usest to deal with those that love thy word, which thou hast magnified above all thy name.” He does not say, “Consider how I fulfil thy precepts;” he was conscious to himself that in many things he came short; but, “Consider how I love them.” Our obedience is pleasing to God, and pleasant to ourselves, only when it comes from a principle of love. 2. His petition thereupon: “Quicken me, to do my duty with vigour; revive me, keep me alive, not according to any merit of mine, though I love thy word, but according to thy lovingkindness;” to that we owe our lives, nay, that is better than live itself. We need not desire to be quickened any further than God’s lovingkindness will quicken us.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
159. Behold, O Jehovah how I have loved thy commandments. What I have state before must be remembered — that when the saints speak of their own piety before God they are not chargeable with obtruding their own merits as the ground of their confidence; but they regard this as, a settled principle, that God, who distinguishes his servants from the profane and wicked, will be merciful to them because they seek him with their whole heart. Besides, an unfeigned love of God’s law is an undoubted evidence of adoption, since this love is the work of the Holy Spirit. The Prophet, therefore, although he arrogates nothing to himself, very properly adduces his own piety for the purpose, of encouraging himself to entertain the more assured hope of obtaining his request, through the grace of God which he had experienced. At the same time we are taught that there can be no true keeping of the law but what springs from free and spontaneous love. God demands voluntary sacrifices, and the commencement of a good life is to love him, as Moses declares, (Deu 10:12,)
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And now, O Israel! what doth the Lord require of thee, but to love him.”
The same thing is also repeated in the summary of the law: (Deu 6:5,) “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God.” For this reason David has previously stated, that the law of God was not only precious but also delightful to him. Now as in keeping the law it behoves us to begin with voluntary obedience, so that nothing may delight us more than the righteousness of God, so on the other hand, it must not be forgotten that a sense of the free goodness of God and of his fatherly love is indispensably necessary in order to our hearts being beheld to this affection. So far are the bare commandment’s from winning men to obey them, that they rather frighten them away. Hence it is evident, that it is only when a man shall have tasted the goodness of God from the teaching of the law, that he will apply his heart to love it in return. The frequency with which the Prophet repeats the prayer, that God would quicken him, teaches us that he knew well the frailty of his own life, so that in his estimation men live only in so far as God every moment breathes life into them. Besides, it is probable that he had been continually besieged by many deaths, to the end he might the more earnestly betake himself to the fountain of life. He again rests his faith upon the goodness of God as its foundation — quicken me according to thy loving-kindness — from which we perceive how far he was from boasting of his own merits when he protested in the preceding sentence that he loved God’s law.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
Psa 119:159 Consider how I love thy precepts: quicken me, O LORD, according to thy lovingkindness.
Ver. 159. Consider how I love thy precepts ] And love facilitateth duty, helping us over all the hardship of holiness. It yieldeth also much boldness to a man to offer it to God, as here, for a proof of his sincerity.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Consider: Psa 119:97, Psa 119:153, 2Ki 20:3, Neh 5:19, Neh 13:22
quicken: Psa 119:88
Reciprocal: Psa 119:5 – General Psa 119:25 – quicken Psa 119:40 – quicken Psa 119:167 – soul Gal 5:17 – the flesh
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
119:159 Consider how I {d} love thy precepts: quicken me, O LORD, according to thy lovingkindness.
(d) It is a sure sign of our adoption, when we love the Law of God.