Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 129:3

The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows.

3. Plowers have plowed upon my dock ] A bold metaphor for cruel maltreatment. Israel is imagined as thrown prostrate upon its face, while the remorseless foe drives the plough up and down over it, brutally lacerating its back. Cp. the similar figure in Isa 51:23. The use of the metaphor may have been facilitated by the common identification of the people with the land, and it may be intended to suggest the thought of the slave’s back torn and furrowed by the lash (Isa 50:6). We are reminded also of Mic 3:12, and of the story that a plough was driven over the site of the Temple by Terentius Rufus after the capture of Jerusalem by Titus, and again by Hadrian after the suppression of Bar Cocheba’s revolt.

they made long their furrows ] According to Delitzsch, the word means more exactly the strip of land which is ploughed at one time, but the meaning will be the same: they did their cruel work thoroughly and spared nothing.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

The plowers plowed upon my back – The comparison here is undoubtedly taken from the plowing of land, and the idea is that the sufferings which they had endured were such as would be well represented by a plow passing over a field, tearing up the sod; piercing deep; and producing long rows or furrows. The direct allusion would seem to be to stripes inflicted on the back, as if a plow had been made to pass over it; and the meaning is, that they had been subjected to sufferings as slaves or criminals were when the lash cut deep into the flesh. Probably the immediate thing in the mind of the psalmist was the hard bondage of the children of Israel in Egypt, when they were subjected to all the evils of servitude.

They made long their furrows – On my back. The word used here, and rendered made long – ‘arak, means to make long, to prolong, to extend in a right line, and it may be used either in the sense of making long as to extent or space, or making long in regard to time, prolonging. The latter would seem to be the meaning here, as it is difficult to see in what sense it could be said that stripes inflicted on the back could be made long. They might, however, be continued and repeated; the sufferings might be prolonged sufferings as well as deep. It was a work of long-continued oppression and wrong.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Verse 3. The plowers plowed upon my back] It is possible that this mode of expression may signify that the people, during their captivity, were cruelly used by scourging, c. or it may be a sort of proverbial mode of expression for the most cruel usage. There really appears here to be a reference to a yoke, as if they had actually been yoked to the plough, or to some kind of carriages, and been obliged to draw like beasts of burden. In this way St. Jerome understood the passage; and this has the more likelihood, as in the next verse God is represented as cutting them off from these draughts.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

Ploughed upon my back; they have not only thrown me down, and trod me under foot, but have cruelly tormented me, wounded and mangled me, and had no more pity upon me than the ploughman hath upon the earth which he cuts up at his pleasure. He saith,

upon my back, either because they did literally scourge the captives upon their backs with such cords as are mentioned Psa 129:4, although we do not read that the Israelitish captives were thus used by any of their enemies; or by way of allusion to that usage, which made a sort of furrows in their backs, upon which they used to lay on their strokes.

They made long their furrows; they oft repeated their injuries and prolonged my torments.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

3, 4. The ploughing is afigure of scourging, which most severe physical infliction aptlyrepresents all kinds.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

The ploughers ploughed upon my back,…. “Sinners”, as the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, and Arabic versions, render it; such that plough iniquity, and sow wickedness, Job 4:8; which may be understood of their carrying Israel captive, when they put yokes and bonds upon their necks, as upon oxen when they plough, as Arama interprets it; or it may design the destruction of their high places, signified by the back, such as the temple, the royal palace, and houses of their nobles, burnt with fire; yea, it was predicted that Zion should be ploughed as a field, Mic 3:12; and the Jews say that Turnus Rufus, the Roman general, as they call him, did plough up Jerusalem. The Syriac version is, “they whipped” their whips or scourges; with which many of the Israelites were scourged in the times of the Maccabees, Heb 11:36. And the Messiah himself, who gave his back to the smiters, and was buffeted and scourged by them, Isa 50:6; and many of his apostles and followers, Mt 10:17. The Targum renders it

“upon my body;”

and Aben Ezra says the phrase is expressive of contempt and humiliation, and compares with it Isa 51:23;

they made long their furrows; which signify afflictions, and the pain their enemies put them to, and the distress they gave them; as no affliction is joyous, but grievous, but like the rending and tearing up the earth with the plough; and also the length and duration of afflictions; such were the afflictions of Israel in Egypt and in Babylon, and of the church of God under Rome Pagan and Papal; but, as the longest furrows have an end, so have the most lasting afflictions. The Syriac version is, “they prolonged their humiliation”, or “affliction”; Kimchi says the meaning is,

“they would give us no rest from servitude and bondage.”

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Elsewhere it is said that the enemies have driven over Israel (Psa 66:12), or have gone over its back (Isa 51:23); here the customary figurative language in Job 4:8 (cf. Hos 10:13) is extended to another figure of hostile dealing: without compassion and without consideration they ill-treated the stretched-forth back of the people who were held in subjection, as though it were arable land, and, without restraining their ferocity and setting a limit to their spoiling of the enslaved people and country, they drew their furrow-strip ( , according to the Ker ) long. But does not signify (as Keil on 1Sa 14:14 is of opinion, although explaining the passage more correctly than Thenius) the furrow (= , ), but, like Arab. manat , a strip of arable land which the ploughman takes in hand at one time, at both ends of which consequently the ploughing team ( ) always comes to a stand, turns round, and ploughs a new furrow; from , to bend, turn (vid., Wetzstein’s Excursus II p. 861). It is therefore: they drew their furrow-turning long (dative of the object instead of the accusative with Hiph., as e.g., in Isa 29:2, cf. with Piel in Psa 34:4; Psa 116:16, and Kal Psa 69:6, after the Aramaic style, although it is not unhebraic). Righteous is Jahve – this is an universal truth, which has been verified in the present circumstances; – He hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked ( as in Psa 2:3; here, however, it is suggested by the metaphor in Psa 129:3, cf. Job 39:10; lxx , i.e., ), with which they held Israel bound. From that which has just been experienced Israel derives the hope that all Zion’s haters (a newly coined name for the enemies of the religion of Israel) will be obliged to retreat with shame and confusion.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

3. The ploughers have ploughed upon my back. (110) Here the Prophet, by an apparent similitude, embellishes his preceding statement respecting the grievous afflictions of the Church. He compares the people of God to a field through which a plough is drawn. He says that the furrows were made long, so that no corner was exempted from being cut up by the ploughshare. These words vividly express the fact — that the cross has always been planted on the back of the Church, to make long and wide furrows.

In the subsequent verse a ground of consolation under the same figure is subjoined, which is, that the righteous Lord hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked The allusion is to a plough, which, as we all know, is tied with cords to the necks of the oxen. The language very aptly conveys the idea, that the wicked, — since they would never have become tired or satiated in exercising their cruelty, and also in consequence of their being well armed, — were prepared to proceed farther, but that the Lord, in a way altogether unexpected, repressed their fury, just as if a man should unyoke oxen from the plough by cutting in pieces the cords and thongs which tied them to it. Hence we perceive what is the true condition of the Church. As God would have us contentedly to take his yoke upon us, the Holy Spirit not unfitly compares us to an arable field, which cannot make any resistance to its being cut, and cleaved, and turned up by the ploughshare. Should any one be disposed to indulge in greater refinement of speculation, he might say that the field is ploughed to prepare it for receiving the seed, and that it may at length bring forth fruit. But in my opinion the subject to which the Prophet limits his attention is the afflictions of the Church. The epithet righteous, with which he honors God, must, in a suitableness to the scope of the passage, be explained as implying that, although God may seem to dissemble for a time, yet he never forgets his righteousness, so as to withhold relief from his afflicted people. Paul in like manner adduces the same reason why God will not always suffer them to be persecuted,

“

Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you; and to you who are troubled rest with us.” (2Th 1:6,)

It is a point worthy of special notice, that the welfare of the Church is inseparably connected with the righteousness of God. The Prophet, also, wisely teaches us that the reason why the enemies of the Church did not prevail, was because God brought to nothing their enterprises, and did not suffer them to go beyond what he had determined in his own mind.

(110) According to Archbishop Seeker, this refers to severe scourging; and those who have witnessed this cruel infliction tell us that the allusion is most expressive, the long weals or wounds left by the scourges at each stroke being most aptly compared either to furrows, or (as the original admits) to the ridges between the furrows. With respect to the alleged incongruity of ploughing, and making long furrows on the back, the Archbishop observes, “ Lacerare et secare tercum are Latin phrases, and ploughing is not much stronger, to express a severe scourging.” The language of the Psalmist may, however, without allusion to any particular species of persecuting violence, be, as Calvin understands it, simply a strong image of cruel oppression. “The persecutors of Israel,” says Walford, “are compared to ploughmen; because as they cut up, and as it were torture the surface of the earth, so did the adversaries greatly and grievously distress these afflicted people.”

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

(3) Furrows.The Hebrew word only occurs once besides, in 1Sa. 14:14, where the margin renders as here, furrowa rendering which plainly there is not intelligible. Half a furrow of an acre of land, as a space in which twenty men were killed, gives no clear idea to the mind. But Dr. J. G. Wettstein, in his excursus at the end of Delitzschs Commentary, explains the maan to be the strip of ground which the ploughman takes in hand at one time, and round which consequently at the end of each furrow the plough turns. Delitzschs furrow-strip, therefore, more exactly reproduces the word, though here doubtless it is used with a poetic freedom and may be translated furrow. The double image, suggesting the lash given to a slave, and at the same time the actual and terrible imprints of oppression left on the country as well as the race, is as striking as poetry ever produced. It, in fact, combines two separate prophetic figures, Isa. 1:6; Isa. 51:23.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

3. Ploughed upon my back In Psa 66:11-12 and Isa 51:23, the figure of riding over the prostrate bodies of the people is used, which is here exchanged for ploughing furrows upon their backs, in both which the lowest degree of degradation and helpless misery is expressed.

Made long their furrows Which, as opposed to short furrows, would seem to indicate an excess, or prolongation, of cruelty. Short furrows, not exceeding about two hundred feet, according to Wetzstein, was, and is now, the custom in Arab tillage. The word for “furrow” occurs elsewhere only in 1Sa 14:14, where the Hebrew “half a furrow, a yoke of land,” means half the landstrip “which a yoke of oxen could plough in a day.” In the psalm before us, the word is in the plural. The back is here conceived to be a field divided up into several , or landstrips for ploughing, but the preterit of the verbs indicates that the psalmist is speaking of miseries from which the people had now escaped.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Psa 129:3. The ploughers ploughed, &c. That is, “They reduced us to a state of abject slavery, and used us most cruelly in it. The ploughers ploughed, &c. they scourged us so severely, that the marks remained for a long while after, like the traces of a plough; and in this were represented the sufferings of the Lord Christ, who would meet with the like inhuman treatment.” The same idea is continued in the next verse: The cords, rendered by Green the plough cords, mean those with which the yokes were tied. The sense is, “God hath delivered us from the yoke and tyranny of our enemies.”

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

Surely here we find Christ most emphatically pointed out: Jesus, the Prophet, described as giving his back to the smiters; and in the hall of Pilate we know that Jesus was scourged. Isa 50:6 ; Joh 19:1 .

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Psa 129:3 The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows.

Ver. 3. The plowers plowed upon my back ] Which was never without some cross upon it, yea, some plough passing over it. The Church is God’s husbandry; and he will be sure to plough his several, whatever becometh of the wild waste. She is his threshingfloor, Isa 21:10 , and hath but little rest or respite. Enemies are flails to thresh off our husks, files to brighten our graces, ploughs and harrows, without which we should bear but a very thin crop. God’s people do , sow the seed of prayer in the long furrows which those ploughers made on their backs; like as the Jews in their feasts break their glasses, as Jerusalem was broken.

They made long their furrows ] Heb. furrow; as if there were totum pro vulnere corpus. Here, haply, the psalmist alludeth to those exquisite torments whereunto many of the martyrs were put, sulcati fidiculis.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)