Psalms 86:14

“O God, the proud are risen against me, etc.] As all men naturally are, and as all are without the grace of God; and because they are, they deal in proud wrath: as, through the pride of their heart, they seek not after God; so, through the same, they persecute his people, treating them with the utmost contempt, and as the offscouring of all things. Jarchi interprets this particularly of Doeg and Ahithophel: and the assemblies of violent men have sought after my soul; or “terrible” f1225 ones, who breathed out nothing but cruelty, threatenings, and slaughter; and who were many, and got together in bodies, and entered into combinations and conspiracies; and whom nothing would satisfy but the…”

“O God, the proud are risen against me - People who are self-confident, ambitious, haughty; who do not regard the welfare or the rights of others; who are disposed to trample down all others in order that they may accomplish their own purposes; these are the people who have opposed me and sought my life. This would apply either to the time of Saul or of Absalom. In both these cases there were men who would correspond to this description. And the assemblies of violent men - Margin,” terrible.” The Septuagint and the Vulgate render this, “the synagogue of the wicked.” The word rendered violent means properly terrible, inspiring terror; then, violent, fierce, lawless, tyrants. The idea here is…”

“86:14-17 The arrogant exist both inside and outside the community. The psalmist asks for a vision of God’s character; God is so great that just a glimpse of his goodness will shut the mouths of the wicked.”

“O God: Psa 36:11, Psa 54:3, Psa 119:51, Psa 119:69, Psa 119:85, Psa 140:5; Sa2 15:1-12 assemblies: Sa2 16:20-23, Sa2 17:1, Sa2 17:14; Mat 26:3, Mat 26:4, Mat 27:1, Mat 27:2; Act 4:27, Act 4:28 violent: Heb. terrible and have: Psa 10:4, Psa 10:11, Psa 10:13, Psa 14:4, Psa 36:1; Eze 8:12, Eze 9:9 Psalms 86:15”

“The situation is like that in the Psalms of the time of Saul. The writer is a persecuted one, and in constant peril of his life. He has taken Psa 86:14 out of the Elohimic Psa 54:5, and retained the Elohim as a proper name of God (cf. on the other hand Psa 86:8, Psa 86:10); he has, however, altered זרים to זרים, which here, as in Isa 13:11 (cf. however, ibid. Psa 25:5), is the alternating word to עריצים. In Psa 86:15 he supports his petition that follows by Jahve's testimony concerning Himself in Exo 34:6. The appellation given to himself by the poet in Psa 86:16 recurs in Psa 116:16 (cf. Wisd. 9:5). The poet calls himself "the son of Thy handmaid" as having been born into the relation to…”