Psalms 58:2

2 No! You think only of the evil you can do, and commit crimes of violence in the land.

Psalms 58:2 Meaning and Commentary

Psalms 58:2

Yea, in heart ye work wickedness
So far were they from speaking righteousness, and judging uprightly. The heart of man is wickedness itself; it is desperately wicked, and is the shop in which all wickedness is wrought; for sinful acts are committed there as well as by the tongue and hand, as follows. This phrase also denotes their sinning; not with precipitancy, and through surprise; but with premeditation and deliberation; and their doing it heartily, with good will, and with allowance, and their continuance and constant persisting in it;

ye weigh the violence of your hands in the earth;
they were guilty of acts of violence and oppression, which, of all men, judges should not be guilty of; whose business it is to plead the cause of the injured and oppressed, to right their wrongs, and to protect and defend them: these they pretended to weigh in the balance of justice and equity, and committed them under a show of righteousness; they decreed unrighteous decrees, and framed mischief by a law; and this they did openly, and everywhere, throughout the whole land.

Psalms 58:2 In-Context

1 Do you rulers ever give a just decision? Do you judge everyone fairly?

2 No! You think only of the evil you can do, and commit crimes of violence in the land.

3 Evildoers go wrong all their lives; they tell lies from the day they are born.

4 They are full of poison like snakes; they stop up their ears like a deaf cobra,

5 which does not hear the voice of the snake charmer, or the chant of the clever magician.