Psalms 143:1-6

A Cry for Help

A Davidic psalm.

1 Lord, hear my prayer. In Your faithfulness listen to my plea, and in Your righteousness answer me.

2 Do not bring Your servant into judgment,^[a] for no one alive is righteous in Your sight.^[b]

3 For the enemy has pursued me, crushing me to the ground, making me live in darkness like those long dead.^[c]

4 My spirit is weak within me; my heart is overcome with dismay.

5 I remember the days of old; I meditate on all You have done; I reflect on the work of Your hands.^[d]

6 I spread out my hands to You; I am like parched land before You. Selah

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Psalms 143:1-6 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 143

\\<>\\. This psalm was composed by David when he fled from Absalom his son, according to the title of it in Apollinarius, the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Ethiopic, and Arabic versions; so R. Obadiah Gaon: and of the same opinion is Theodoret and others. The sense he had of his sins, and his deprecating God's entering into judgment with him for them, seems to confirm it; affliction from his own family for them being threatened him, 2Sa 12:9-11; though Kimchi thinks it was written on the same account as the former, and at the same time, namely, when he was persecuted by Saul; and what is said in Ps 142:2,4, seems to agree with it. The Syriac inscription is, ``when the Edomites came against him;'' which is very foreign, since these were subdued by him.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Footnotes 4

[a]. Jb 14:3; Ec 12:14
[b]. Rm 3:23
[c]. Lm 3:6
[d]. Ps 77:12; 119:15; 145:5