Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 31:22
For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee.
22. For I said &c.] But as for me, I said In my haste (or, alarm). Humbly he confesses his want of faith in the hour of trial, when he thought himself out of God’s sight, and contrasts it with God’s goodness. Cp. Psa 30:6; Psa 116:2. With 22 a cp. Jon 2:4: with 22 b cp. Psa 28:2.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For I said in my haste – In my fear; my apprehension. The word rendered haste means properly that terror or alarm which causes one to flee, or to endeavor to escape. It is not haste in the sense of an opinion formed too quickly, or formed rashly; it is haste in the sense of terror leading to sudden flight, or an effort to escape. See an illustration of this idea in the case of David himself, in 1Sa 23:26.
I am cut off – That is, I shall certainly be cut off or destroyed.
From before thine eyes – Either, in thy very presence; or, so that I shall not be admitted into thy presence. I shall be cut down, and suffered no more to come before thee to worship thee. Compare the notes at Psa 6:5.
Nevertheless thou heardest … – Contrary to my apprehensions, I was heard and delivered. Gods mercy went beyond the psalmists faith – as it often does to His people now, far beyond what they hope for; far beyond what they even pray for; far beyond what they believe to be possible; so far beyond all this, as to make the result, as in the case of David Psa 31:21, a matter of wonder and astonishment.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 31:22
For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before Thine eyes: nevertheless Thou heartiest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto Thee.
Consolation for the despairing
I am as a watcher on the sea beach, telescope in hand, keeping guard for an appointed time. The watcher looks through his glass again and again, but a glance contents him so far as most of yonder gallant vessels are concerned, which are now in the offing; but by and by, his glass remains steadily ate his eye; his gaze is fixed, and in a few moments he gives a signal to his fellows, and they launch their boat. The explanation is, that he has noted signals of distress in one of the craft and, therefore, he has bestirred himself for her help. And so, too, the preacher is on the look-out for distress signals, and would render help where souls bound for eternity are foundering in doubt, ready to despair.
I. deep inward sorrow. The man who wrote it was pained at his heart, and there are many in like ease now. How came they so? Some are constitutionally depressed and desponding. Others are so, through great trial. Some, through secret sin unconfessed, which has festered into misery. Hurtful teaching, unwise ministry, often adds sorrow to the heart. And when the spirit sinks, the depression of men takes its own form according to what they are. In religious men it will take a religious form. It did so in the author of this psalm. What more dreadful apprehension could there be than this–I am cut off from before Thine eyes. Many good men have felt like that. But God brings good out of it for the man himself and for others through him.
II. the rash expression of this sorrow. I said in my haste. David, more than once, spoke hastily. He had better have bitten his tongue. Better count a dozen before we speak when our minds are agitated. But such speech rests on altogether insufficient grounds.
1. Sad and distressful circumstances. But these do not prove that God has cast you away. If so, then God cast away His own Son. The foxes had holes and, etc.
2. Feelings. But what more fluctuating and unstable than they? The wind does not veer more fitfully than does the current of our emotions. And yet despairing people are obstinate in their convictions. You cannot persuade them. For the declaration that God has forsaken us, or any man who seeks Him, is diametrically opposed to Scripture. There is not one text which advises any man to despair of the mercy of God. It is dishonouring God to think so. Jesus says, I can save. The sinner says, You cannot, and thus makes Christ a liar.
III. A pleading cry. When David feared that he was cut off from God, he was wise enough to take to crying. It is a significant word. It tells of pain. Red eyes often relieve breaking hearts, and to cry unto God is a real relief. Prayer is the surest and most blessed vent for the soul. And then there came–
IV. A cheerful result. Thou heartiest, etc. This blessing went beyond the promise. The promise is to believing prayer. But even when He meets with unbelieving ones, He gives faith, and so saves them. We are like lost children and cry, and God will not leave us to die in the dark. God heard David, then He will hear you and me. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
A hasty expression penitently retracted
I said in my haste, etc. That is a bit of genuine experience honestly told. How glad we ought to be that David never fell into the hand of an ordinary biographer, for then we had never been told what here we read. But it is comforting to find that even great men act at times as we often do. The experience of such a man as David cannot but be very instructive. Now in this text listen–
I. To an utterance of unbelief. I said in my haste, I am cut off from before Thine eyes. Note here–
1. That unbelief is generally talkative.
I said. He had better not even have thought it, but if he did think of it he had far best not say it. I have heard it said, If it is in the mind it may as well come out, but this is not true. If I had a rattlesnake in a box on this platform, I think you would none of you vote for the creature being let loose. Poison in a phial is deadly, but it will hurt no one until the cork is drawn, and then we cannot tell how far the mischief will go. If thou hast an ill thought, repent of it, but do not repeat it. Do as David did in another case, when he had a very ugly thought; he said, If I should speak thus I shall offend against the generation of thy children. So he would not put his thought into words lest he should do harm. Alas, unbelief does not understand holding its tongue. It will prattle.
2. Its utterances are generally hasty. There was no reason for saying such a thing at all, and certainly not for being in a hurry to say it; for he said unto God, I am cut off from before Thine eyes. But was it true? See if it be founded on fact; see whether after all you have not made a mistake. John Bunyan says of the pilgrim that he was much tumbled up and down in his thoughts. It means that he was in much confusion of mind. But why in such haste to write your blunders down. What a man says in his haste he generally has to repent at his leisure. Hasty deeds and hasty words make up the most horrible parts of human history.
3. They are often the result of quick temper. I fear we professing Christians are often out of temper with God. Too often such blasphemy enters into the human heart.
4. And are frequently exaggerated. See what David says here, I am cut off, etc. No, David, no. It is not so. You are cut off from much you love, but not from God. Some people always talk big about everything. There must be a very narrow line, fine as a razors edge, between a lie and the unguarded expressions of exaggeration. Some people talk about their trials on a scale of a mile to the inch. Their afflictions are awful, they are dreadful, they are without parallel. They are altogether quite equal to Job and Jeremiah rolled into one. If you try to comfort them they will tell you at once that you do not know anything about the great deeps whereon they are doing business; you are only knee deep in the waters of trouble. Such is the way of unbelief. Let us leave it off.
5. They dishonour God. David does, as it were, blame God. Before Thy very eyes I have suffered this. There never was a godly man cut off from God yet, and there never will be. If any of us have uttered words of unbelief let us call them back and drown them in our tears. But we have here also–
II. an effort of struggling faith.
1. He prayed to God. He says, Thou heardest the voice of my supplications, etc. Oh, child of God, cry to a smiting God. Cry to God even when He seems to cast thee off. Sink or swim, live or die, do not doubt thy God, but still pray.
2. He prayed in downright earnest. His was a crying prayer. That is the prayer which is neither said nor sung, but cried; it drops from the eyes in tears. The words of a child the mother may not listen to, but let it cry and see if she will act come. And–
3. God heard his prayer. God dealt with David not according to his unbelief, but his faith. His faith was small, but it was true. Thou who art in trouble, whoever thou mayest be, listen not to the voice of Satan who tempts thee to cease prayer. Do not say, God will not hear me; remember the words, Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord.
III. A testimony of gratitude. Nevertheless Thou heardest the voice of my supplications. God acted in the reverse way to David.
1. He spoke, but God did not speak. He was a listener. Thou heartiest. Not a word came from God: there had been too many words in the business already.
2. And there was no haste in God. God was quietly hearing while His petulant servant was fiercely complaining. It is a great thing for a minister who visits his people to be a good listener. The afflicted value this quality above gold. Such hearing has tender and precious sympathy in it. Hence the Scriptures say of God, O Thou that hearest prayer. David does not cease to wonder that in his unhappy condition he had yet been regarded of the Lord: Thou heartiest the voice of my supplication. How beautiful that is! Further–
3. There was no exaggeration with God. Unbelief exaggerates, but God does not. On the contrary, He diminishes the evil of His servants, till it comes to nothing.
4. And He did not dishonour His servants prayer. He might have done so, but did not. He might have said, If he thinks I have forsaken him, let it be so. But God did not do so. Look at the word never-the-less, what it tells of the graciousness of God.
Conclusion.
1. Repent heartily of every hard thought we have had of God.
2. Earnestly pray that if we think so wrongly we may keep our mouth as with a bridle.
3. Pray without ceasing, always pray let come what will.
4. Let us always speak well of the Lords mercy. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Faith shaken
1. The faith of the godly may be shaken, and the strongest faith may sometimes show its infirmity.
2. Though faith be shaken, yet it is fixed in the root, as a tree beaten by the wind, keeping strong grips of good ground; though faith seem to yield, yet it faileth not, and even when it is at the weakest, it is uttering itself in some act, as a wrestler; for here the expression of Davids infirmity in faith is directed to God, and his earnest prayer joined with it.
3. Praying faith, how weak soever, shall not be misregarded of God.
4. There may be in a soul at one time both grief oppressing, and hope upholding: both darkness of trouble, and the light of faith; both desperately doubting, and strong gripping of Gods truth and goodness; both a fainting and a fighting; a seeming yielding in the fight, and yet a striving of faith against all opposition; both a foolish haste, and a settled staidness of faith; as here, I said in my haste, etc. (D. Dickson.)
The eloquence of a cry
If you were walking the streets and heard or saw a poor child crying, you would be far more affected by it than by the oration of the pretended mechanic who is eloquently stating his wants to the dwellers on both sides of the way. A poor child crying in the dark, under your window, in mid-winter, in the snow, would move your pity and obtain your help. Even if it were a foreigner, and knew not a single word of English, you would fully feel its pleading. The eloquence of a cry is overwhelming, pity owns its power, and lends her aid. There is a chord in human nature which responds to a childs cry, and there is something in the Divine nature which is equally touched by prayer. The Lord will not suffer a young raven to cry in vain, and much less will He suffer men who are made in His own image to cry to Him in the bitterness of their hearts, and find Him deaf to their entreaties. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 22. I said in my haste] Not duly adverting to the promise of God, I was led to conclude that my enemies were so strong, so numerous, and had so many advantages against me, that I must necessarily fall into and by their hands; however, I continued to pray, and thou didst hear the voice of my supplication.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
In my haste, i.e. in my hasty flight from Saul, when he and his men had almost encompassed me, 1Sa 23:26, which happened presently after his deliverance in and from the strong city of Keilah. Or, in my fear, or trembling, when my passion took away my consideration, and weakened my faith.
Cut off from before thine eyes, i.e. cast out of thy sight, and out of the care of thy gracious providence; my case is desperate. Or, cut off whilst thou lookest on, and dost not pity nor help me.
Thou heardest the voice of my supplications; my fears were quickly confuted by thy gracious answer to my prayers.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
22. For I saidliterally, “AndI said,” in an adversative sense. I, thus favored, wasdespondent.
in my hastein myterror.
cut off . . . eyesfromall the protection of Thy presence.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
For I said in my haste,…. When he made haste to get away for fear of Saul, 1Sa 23:26; and so the Targum renders it, “I said when I sought to flee away”; or else he said this hastily and rashly, in the hurry of his mind, being in the utmost confusion and distress, as in Ps 116:11;
I am cut off from before thine eyes; his case was very bad, he was reduced to the utmost extremity, and his faith was as low; he thought it was all over with him, and there was no way of escape, nor hope of it; and that he was like a branch cut off, ready to be cast into the fire; that he was cut off from the house of God, and from communion with him; that he would never look upon him more, and he should never enjoy his presence: this instance of weakness and unbelief is mentioned to illustrate the goodness of God, and to make his kindness appear to be the more marvellous in the salvation of him; so sometimes the Lord suffers his people to be in the utmost distress, and their faith to be at the lowest ebb, when he appears to their help, and makes it manifest that their salvation is by his own arm, and of his own good will, and not by them, or for any goodness of theirs;
nevertheless, thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee; for though faith was very low, and unbelief strongly prevailed, yet he was not so far gone as to stop praying; for though he saw no rational way of escape, and feared the Lord would take no notice of him; yet he knew that nothing was impossible with him, and therefore he still looked up to him, as Jonah did when he thought himself in a like condition, Jon 2:4; and such was the grace and goodness of God, that he did not despise but regard his prayer, though attended with so much weakness and unbelief.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
22. And I said in my fear. David here confesses that for his distrust he deserved to be deserted by God and left to perish. It is true that to confess this before men he felt to be a shameful thing; but that he may the more fully illustrate the grace of God to him, he hesitates not to publish the shame of his fault. He repeats almost the same acknowledgement in Psa 116:11, “I said in my haste, All men are liars.” I am aware that the Hebrew word חפז, chaphaz, is explained by some as meaning flight; as if David, in fleeing from death, because he was unable to make resistance, was stricken with this fear. But I refer it rather to his trouble of mind. Whether, therefore, we translate it haste or fear, it means that he had been, as it were, carried headlong to entertain the thought that he was neglected by God. And this haste is opposed to calm and deliberate consideration; for although David was stricken with fear, he did not faint under the trial, and this persuasion did not continue fixed in his mind. For we know that the faithful are often disquieted by fears and the heat of impatience, or driven headlong as it were by their too hasty or precipitate wishes, but afterwards they come to themselves. That David’s faith had never been overthrown by this temptation appears from the context, for he immediately adds, that God had heard the voice of his supplications; but if his faith had been extinguished, he could not have brought his mind earnestly to engage in prayer, and therefore this complaint was only a lapse of the tongue uttered in haste. Now if peevish hastiness of thought could drive this holy prophet of God, a man who was adorned with so many excellencies, to despair, how much reason have we to fear, lest our minds should fail and fatally ruin us? This confession of David, as we have already observed, serves to magnify the grace of God; but at the same time he sufficiently shows, in the second clause of the verse, that his faith, although severely shaken, had not been altogether eradicated, because he ceased not meanwhile to pray. The saints often wrestle in this manner with their distrust, that partly they may not despond, and that partly they may gather courage and stimulate themselves to prayer. Nor does the weakness of the flesh, even when they are almost overthrown, hinder them from showing that they are unwearied and invincible champions before God. But although David stoutly resisted temptation, he nevertheless acknowledges himself unworthy of God’s grace, of which he in some measure deprived himself by his doubt. For the Hebrew particle אכן, aken, is here to be understood adversatively and rendered yet, intimating that David had been preserved without any desert of his own, inasmuch as God’s immeasurable goodness strove with his unbelief. But as it is a sign of affirmation in Hebrew, I have thought proper to translate it, Yet truly. I have no doubt that he opposes his language to the various temptations with which, it is probable, his mind had been driven hither and thither.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(22) In my haste . . .Literally, in my fleeing away in fear. Jerome, Aquila, and Symmachus, in my confusion.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 31:22 For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee.
Ver. 22. For I said in my haste, I am cut off, &c. ] A frightful and sinful saying, doubtless, full of diffidence and despair. See the like Psa 116:11 Job 9:16 Jdg 13:22 Joh 2:4Joh 2:4 . Thus he spake when he, trembling, fled, and was posting away.
Nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplication
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
eyes. Figure of speech Anthropopatheia. App-6.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
I said: Psa 116:11, 1Sa 23:26, 1Sa 27:1
I am: Psa 31:17, *marg. Psa 88:16, Isa 6:5, *marg Psa 38:10-12, Psa 49:14, Job 35:14, Lam 3:54, Lam 3:55, Eze 37:11, Jon 2:4
nevertheless: Psa 6:9, 2Ch 33:11-13, Jon 2:7-9, Heb 5:7
Reciprocal: Job 20:2 – and for Psa 28:6 – General Psa 34:4 – sought Psa 37:8 – fret Psa 77:10 – This is Psa 88:5 – cut Isa 33:18 – heart Isa 38:11 – General Isa 38:12 – he will cut Isa 40:27 – sayest Isa 49:14 – The Lord Lam 3:18 – General Luk 11:10 – General 1Jo 5:14 – he
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
31:22 For I said in my {q} haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee.
(q) And so by my rashness and infidelity deserved to have been forsaken.