Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 78:66

And he smote his enemies in the hinder parts: he put them to a perpetual reproach.

66. And he smote &c.] Render with R.V., And he smote his adversaries backward, a general allusion to the victories over the Philistines and other enemies of Israel under Samuel, Saul, and David. The A.V. follows Jewish authorities in seeing a reference to 1Sa 5:6 ff.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

And he smote his enemies in the hinder part – From behind; that is, as they fled. There are two ideas here: one, that they fled at his approach, or turned their backs; the other, that as they fled, he smote and destroyed them.

He put them to a perpetual reproach – As discomfited; as defeated and scattered; as unable to contend with him. The allusion is, probably, to the victories of David, occurring after the events related in the preceding verses.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Verse 66. He smote his enemies in the hinder part] This refers to the hemorrhoids with which he afflicted the Philistines. See the note on 1Sa 5:6-10.

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

Smote his enemies in the hinder part, with the disease of the emerods, which was both painful and shameful. He caused them to perpetuate their own reproach by sending back the ark of God with their golden emerods, the lasting monuments of their shame.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

66. And he smote . . . partor,”struck His enemies’ back.” The Philistines never regainedtheir position after their defeats by David.

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

And he smote his enemies in the hinder parts,…. Not the Israelites, as Kimchi interprets it, but the Philistines, who in another battle were put to flight, and turned their backs, and so were smitten in their hinder parts; or rather this has reference to the Philistines being smitten with haemorrhoids, or piles in their posteriors, while the ark was retained a captive by them, 1Sa 5:6, and so the Targum paraphrases it,

“and he smote them that troubled them with haemorrhoids in their posteriors;”

the Greek version, as quoted by Suidas c, is, “he smote his enemies on the back parts of the seat”; signifying, he says, a disease, modestly expressed:

he put them to a perpetual reproach; either by causing their idol Dagon to fall before his ark, and be broken upon the threshold of the house of the idol; in memory of which the priests ever after, nor any that came in thither, trod upon the threshold, 1Sa 5:3, or rather through their sending golden images of their haemorrhoids, and golden mice along with the ark, which were reserved to their perpetual reproach: other instances of the Lord’s regard to Israel follow, in providing a proper place for the ark, and appointing a suitable governor over the people.

c In voce .

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

(66) He smote.Possibly an allusion to 1Sa. 5:9, or else to the repeated defeats of the Philistines under Saul and David.

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

66. He smote his enemies in the hinder parts The language admits of a twofold sense. First, that of wounding a retreating enemy in the back an ineffaceable disgrace. Secondly, of smiting them with the painful and loathsome disease called the hemorrhoids as God did the Philistines. 1Sa 5:6-7; 1Sa 5:12 ; 1Sa 6:4, where see notes. The disease was reproachful both in its nature and severity, for the purpose was, as stated, to “put them to endless shame.”

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