Psalm 103:6-19

6 The Lord works ¹righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed.

7 He made known his ²ways to Moses, his ³acts to the people of Israel.

8 The Lord is ⁴merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

9 ⁵He will not always chide, nor will he ⁶keep his anger forever.

10 He does not deal with us ⁷according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.

11 For ⁸as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his ⁹steadfast love toward ¹⁰those who fear him;

12 as far as the east is from the west, so far does he ¹¹remove our transgressions from us.

13 As ¹²a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion ¹³to those who fear him.

14 For he knows our frame; ^[a] he ¹⁴remembers that we are dust.

15 As for man, his days are like ¹⁵grass; he flourishes like ¹⁶a flower of the field;

16 for ¹⁷the wind passes over it, and ¹⁸it is gone, and ¹⁹its place knows it no more.

17 But ²⁰the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on ²¹those who fear him, and his righteousness to ²²children’s children,

18 to those who ²³keep his covenant and ²⁴remember to do his commandments.

19 The Lord has ²⁵established his throne in the heavens, and his ²⁶kingdom rules over all.

Psalm 103:6-19 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. 103:6 Ps. 146:7
• 2. 103:7 Ex. 33:13; [Ps. 25:4]
• 3. 103:7 [Ps. 78:11; Ex. 34:10]
• 4. 103:8 See Ps. 86:15
• 5. 103:9 Isa. 57:16
• 6. 103:9 Ps. 30:5; Jer. 3:5, 12; Mic. 7:18
• 7. 103:10 Ezra 9:13
• 8. 103:11 See Ps. 36:5
• 9. 103:11 Ps. 117:2
• 10. 103:11 ver. 13, 17; Luke 1:50
• 11. 103:12 [Isa. 38:17; 43:25; Mic. 7:19]
• 12. 103:13 Mal. 3:17
• 13. 103:13 [See ver. 11 above]
• 14. 103:14 Ps. 78:39
• 15. 103:15 Ps. 90:5
• 16. 103:15 See Job 14:2
• 17. 103:16 Isa. 40:7
• 18. 103:16 Ps. 37:36
• 19. 103:16 See Job 7:10
• 20. 103:17 Ps. 25:6
• 21. 103:17 [See ver. 11 above]
• 22. 103:17 Ex. 20:5, 6
• 23. 103:18 Deut. 7:9
• 24. 103:18 Ps. 19:8
• 25. 103:19 Ps. 11:4; 93:2
• 26. 103:19 Ps. 47:2; Dan. 4:17

Footnotes

• [a] 103:14 Or 'knows how we are formed'