Psalms 103:8-18

8 The LORD is ¹compassionate and gracious, ²Slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness.

9 He ³will not always strive with us, Nor will He ⁴keep His anger forever.

10 He has ⁵not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.

11 For as high ⁶as the heavens are above the earth, So great is His lovingkindness toward those who fear Him.

12 As far as the east is from the west, So far has He ⁷removed our transgressions from us.

13 Just ⁸as a father has compassion on his children, So the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him.

14 For ⁹He Himself knows our frame; He ¹⁰is mindful that we are but ¹¹dust.

15 As for man, his days are ¹²like grass; As a ¹³flower of the field, so he flourishes.

16 When the ¹⁴wind has passed over it, it is no more, And its ¹⁵place acknowledges it no longer.

17 But the ¹⁶lovingkindness of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness ¹⁷to children's children,

18 To ¹⁸those who keep His covenant And remember His precepts to do them.

Psalms 103:8-18 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 103

\\<>\\. The Targum adds, ``spoken in prophecy,'' as doubtless it was, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Some think it was written by David, after a fit of illness, and his recovery from it, since he speaks of his diseases being healed, and his youth renewed; for which reason the Syriac interpreter suggests it was written in his old age; for he makes the subject of the psalm to be, ``concerning coldness which prevailed upon him in old age;'' but rather he wrote it when his heart was warm with a sense of the love of God, and spiritual blessings of grace flowing from thence; and in it celebrates and sings the benefits of New Testament times; and it is a psalm suitable to be sung by every believer, under a quick sense of divine favours: wherefore the above interpreter better adds, ``also an instruction and thanksgiving by men of God;'' whom the psalmist may very well be thought to personate, even in Gospel times; and much rather than the Jews in captivity, as Kimchi thinks.

Cross References

• 1. Exodus 34:6; Numbers 14:18; Nehemiah 9:17; Psalms 86:15; Jonah 4:2; James 5:11
• 2. Psalms 145:8; Joel 2:13; Nahum 1:3
• 3. Psalms 30:5; Isaiah 57:16
• 4. Jeremiah 3:5, 12; Micah 7:18
• 5. Ezra 9:13; Lamentations 3:22
• 6. Psalms 36:5; Psalms 57:10
• 7. 2 Samuel 12:13; Isaiah 38:17; Isaiah 43:25; Zechariah 3:9; Hebrews 9:26
• 8. Malachi 3:17
• 9. Isaiah 29:16
• 10. Psalms 78:39
• 11. Genesis 3:19; Ecclesiastes 12:7
• 12. Psalms 90:5; Isaiah 40:6; 1 Peter 1:24
• 13. Job 14:2; James 1:10, 11
• 14. Isaiah 40:7
• 15. Job 7:10; Job 8:18; Job 20:9
• 16. Psalms 25:6
• 17. Exodus 20:6; Deuteronomy 5:10; Psalms 105:8
• 18. Deuteronomy 7:9; Psalms 25:10

Footnotes

• [a]. Or "revere"
• [b]. Or "revere"
• [c]. I.e. what we are made of
• [d]. Or "revere"
• [e]. I.e. faithfulness to His gracious promises