4 I am reckoned with them that go down into the pit; I am as a man that hath no strength:
{[A Psalm] of David.} Unto thee, Jehovah, do I call; my rock, be not silent unto me, lest, [if] thou keep silence toward me, I become like them that go down into the pit.
Answer me speedily, O Jehovah; my spirit faileth: hide not thy face from me, or I shall be like unto them that go down into the pit.
What profit is there in my blood, in my going down to the pit? shall the dust praise thee? shall it declare thy truth?
I am forgotten in [their] heart as a dead man; I am become like a broken vessel.
Behold, instead of peace I had bitterness upon bitterness; but thou hast in love delivered my soul from the pit of destruction; for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back. For not Sheol shall praise thee, nor death celebrate thee; they that go down into the pit do not hope for thy truth.
then will I bring thee down, with them that go down to the pit, to the people of old time, and will cause thee to dwell in the lower parts of the earth, in places desolate of old, with them that go down to the pit, that thou be not inhabited; and I will set glory in the land of the living.
for we being still without strength, in [the] due time Christ has died for [the] ungodly.
But we ourselves had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not have our trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead;
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Psalms 88
Commentary on Psalms 88 Matthew Henry Commentary
Psalm 88
This psalm is a lamentation, one of the most melancholy of all the psalms; and it does not conclude, as usually the melancholy psalms do, with the least intimation of comfort or joy, but, from first to last, it is mourning and woe. It is not upon a public account that the psalmist here complains (here is no mention of the afflictions of the church), but only upon a personal account, especially trouble of mind, and the grief impressed upon his spirits both by his outward afflictions and by the remembrance of his sins and the fear of God's wrath. It is reckoned among the penitential psalms, and it is well when our fears are thus turned into the right channel, and we take occasion from our worldly grievances to sorrow after a godly sort. In this psalm we have,
Those who are in trouble of mind may sing this psalm feelingly; those that are not ought to sing it thankfully, blessing God that it is not their case.
A song or psalm for the sons of Korah, to the chief musician upon Mahalath Leannoth, Maschil of Heman the Ezrahite.
Psa 88:1-9
It should seem, by the titles of this and the following psalm, that Heman was the penman of the one and Ethan of the other. There were two, of these names, who were sons of Zerah the son of Judah, 1 Chr. 2:4, 6. There were two others famed for wisdom, 1 Ki. 4:31, where, to magnify Solomon's wisdom, he is said to be wiser than Heman and Ethan. Whether the Heman and Ethan who were Levites and precentors in the songs of Zion were the same we are not sure, nor which of these, nor whether any of these, were the penmen of these psalms. There was a Heman that was one of the chief singers, who is called the king's seer, or prophet, in the words of God (1 Chr. 25:5); it is probable that this also was a seer, and yet could see no comfort for himself, an instructor and comforter of others, and yet himself putting comfort away from him. The very first words of the psalm are the only words of comfort and support in all the psalm. There is nothing about him but clouds and darkness; but, before he begins his complaint, he calls God the God of his salvation, which intimates both that he looked for salvation, bad as things were, and that he looked up to God for the salvation and depended upon him to be the author of it. Now here we have the psalmist,
Psa 88:10-18
In these verses,