Psalms 119:78

78 (118-78) Let the proud be ashamed, because they have done unjustly towards me: but I will be employed in thy commandments.

Psalms 119:78 Meaning and Commentary

Psalms 119:78

Let the proud be ashamed
The same persons he before speaks of as accursed, who had him in derision, and forged a lie against him. Here he prays that they might be ashamed of their scoffs and jeers, of their lies and calumnies, the evils and injuries they had done him; that they might be brought to a sense of them, and repentance for them; when they would be ashamed of them in the best manner: or that they might be disappointed of their ends, in what they had done, and so be confounded and ashamed, as men are when they cannot gain their point; or be brought to shame and confusion eternally;

for they dealt perversely with me without a cause;
or, "they perverted me [with] falsehood" F23; that is, they endeavoured to pervert him with lies and falsehood, and lead him out of the right way; or they attempted, by their lies and calumnies, to make him out to be a perverse and wicked man, and pronounced and condemned him as such, without any foundation or just cause for it;

[but] I will meditate in thy precepts;
he was determined, in the strength of grace, that those ill usages should not take off his thoughts from religious things, or divert him from his duty to his God: none of these things moved him; he still went on in the ways of God, in his worship and service, as Daniel did, when in like circumstances.


FOOTNOTES:

F23 (ynwtwe rqv) "mendacio me opprimere quaerunt", Tigurine version; "mendaciis", Piscator, Cocceius, Michaelis.

Psalms 119:78 In-Context

76 (118-76) O! let thy mercy be for my comfort, according to thy word unto thy servant.
77 (118-77) Let thy tender mercies come unto me, and I shall live: for thy law is my meditation.
78 (118-78) Let the proud be ashamed, because they have done unjustly towards me: but I will be employed in thy commandments.
79 (118-79) Let them that fear thee turn to me: and they that know thy testimonies.
80 (118-80) Let my heart be undefiled in thy justifications, that I may not be confounded.
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