Psalms 73:13-23

13 Meanwhile, I've kept my heart pure for no good reason; I've washed my hands to stay innocent for nothing.
14 I'm weighed down all day long. I'm punished every morning.
15 If I said, "I will talk about all this," I would have been unfaithful to your children.
16 But when I tried to understand these things, it just seemed like hard work
17 until I entered God's sanctuary and understood what would happen to the wicked.
18 You will definitely put them on a slippery path; you will make them fall into ruin!
19 How quickly they are devastated, utterly destroyed by terrors!
20 As quickly as a dream departs from someone waking up, my Lord, when you are stirred up, you make them disappear.
21 When my heart was bitter, when I was all cut up inside,
22 I was stupid and ignorant. I acted like nothing but an animal toward you.
23 But I was still always with you! You held my strong hand!

Psalms 73:13-23 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 73

\\<>\\. It seems by the title that Asaph was the penman of this psalm, as it is certain that he was a composer of psalms and hymns; see 2Ch 29:30, though it may be rendered, "a psalm for Asaph", or "unto Asaph" {a}; and might have David for its author, as some think, who, having penned it, sent it to Asaph, to be made use of by him in public service; see 1Ch 16:7, and so the Targum paraphrases it, ``a song by the hands of Asaph;'' the occasion of it was a temptation the psalmist fell into, through the prosperity of the wicked, and the afflictions of the righteous, to think there was nothing in religion, that it was a vain and useless thing; under which he continued until he went into the house of God, and was taught better; when he acknowledged his stupidity and folly, and penned this psalm, to prevent others falling into the same snare, and to set forth the goodness of God to his people, with which it begins.

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