Barnes' Notes on Psalms 32:4

A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.

Notes on the Whole Bible
Albert Barnes (1798–1870) · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.

For day and night - I found no relief even at night. The burden was constant, and was insupportable. Thy hand was heavy upon me - Thy hand seemed to press me down. It weighed upon me. See Job 13:21; Psalms 39:10. It was the remembrance of guilt that troubled him, but that seemed to him to be the hand of God. It was God who brought that guilt to his recollection; and God “kept” the recollection of it before his mind, and on his heart and conscience, so that he could not throw it off. My moisture - The word used here - לשׁד leshad - means properly “juice” or “sap,” as in a tree; and then, “vital-moisture,” or, as we should say, “life-blood.” Then it comes to denote vigour or strength. Is turned into the drought of summer - Is, as it were, all dried up. I am - that is, I was at the time referred to - like plants in the heat of summer, in a time of drought, when all moisture of rain or dew is withheld, and when they dry up and wither. Nothing could more strikingly represent the distress of mind under long-continued conviction of sin, when all strength and vigour seem to waste away. return to 'Top of Page'

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