Psalms 31:9

“For all our days are passed away in thy wrath, etc.] The life of man is rather measured by days than by months or years; and these are but few, which pass away or “decline” f1301 as the day does towards the evening; (see <240604>Jeremiah 6:4) or “turn away their face”, as the word f1302 may be rendered: they turn their backs upon us, and not the face to us; so that it is a hard thing to get time by the forelock; and these, which is worst of all, pass away in the “wrath” of God. This has a particular reference to the people of Israel in the wilderness, when God had swore in his wrath they should not enter into the land of Canaan, but wander about all their days in the wilderness, and be…”

“mine eye, &c.--denotes extreme weakness (compare Psa 6:7). grief--mingled sorrow and indignation (Psa 6:7). soul and . . . belly--the whole person.”

“Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble - The nature and sources of his trouble are specified in the verses following. He seems to have regarded all his trouble as the result of sin, either the sin of his heart, of which he alone was conscious, or of some open act of sin, that had been the means of bringing this affliction upon him, Psalms 31:10. As a consequence of this, he says that he was subjected to the reproach of his enemies, and shunned by his neighbors and his acquaintances; that he was forgotten by them like a dead man out of mind; that he was exposed to the slander of others, and that they conspired against his life, Psalms 31:11-13. In view of all this he calls earnestly…”

“Grief - With continual weeping. Psalms 31:10”

“31:9-13 In this prayer for mercy, the psalmist wedges a description of the intensity of suffering and the pain of rejection between two affirmations of trust (31:6, 14).”

“mine: Psa 6:7, Psa 88:9; Job 17:7; Lam 4:17, Lam 5:17 my soul: Psa 6:1, Psa 6:2, Psa 22:14, Psa 22:15, Psa 38:1-10, Psa 44:25, Psa 73:14, Psa 73:26, Psa 88:3-5, Psa 102:3-5, Psa 107:10; Job 33:19-22 Psalms 31:10”

“(Heb.: 31:10-14) After the paean before victory, which he has sung in the fulness of his faith, in this second part of the Psalm (with groups, or strophes, of diminishing compass: 6. 5. 4) there again breaks forth the petition, based upon the greatness of the suffering which the psalmist, after having strengthened himself in his trust in God, now all the more vividly sets before Him. צר־לּי, angustum est mihi, as in Psa 69:18, cf. Psa 18:7. Psa 31:10 is word for word like Psa 6:8, except that in this passage to עיני, the eye which mirrors the state of suffering in which the sensuous perception and objective receptivity of the man are concentrated, are added נפשׁ, the soul forming the nexus…”