Psalms 35:12

12 They pay me back with evil, even though I was good to them. They leave me without hope.

Psalms 35:12 Meaning and Commentary

Psalms 35:12

They rewarded me evil for good
For the good David did in killing Goliath, and slaying his ten thousands of the Philistines, and thereby saving his king and country, Saul and his courtiers envied him, and sought to slay him: so our Lord Jesus Christ, for all the good he did to the Jews, by healing their bodies of diseases, and preaching the Gospel to them for the benefit of their souls, was rewarded with reproaches and persecutions, and at last with the shameful death of the cross; and in like manner are his people used; but this is an evil that shall not go unpunished; see ( Proverbs 17:13 ) . It is added,

[to] the spoiling of my soul;
or "to the bereaving of it" ^F20; causing it to be fatherless; that is, to the bereaving it of its joy, peace, and comfort; so fatherless is put for comfortless, ( John 14:18 ) ; or to the taking away of his soul, which being separated from the body, its companion is left alone, as one that is fatherless.

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FOOTNOTES:

F20 (lwkv) "orbitatem", Montanus, Vatablus, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius, Gejerus, Michaelis; so Ainsworth.

Psalms 35:12 In-Context

10 My whole being will cry out, "Who is like you, Lord? You save poor people from those who are too strong for them. You save poor and needy people from those who rob them."

11 Mean people come forward to give witness against me. They ask me things I don't know anything about.

12 They pay me back with evil, even though I was good to them. They leave me without hope.

13 But when they were sick, I put on black clothes. I made myself low by going without food. My prayers for them weren't always answered.

14 So I went around crying as if I were crying over my friend or relative. I bowed my head in sadness as if I were sobbing over my mother.