1 MAKE HASTE, O GOD, TO DELIVER ME; MAKE HASTE TO HELP ME, O LORD.
Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver me: O LORD, make haste to help me. Let them be ashamed and confounded together that seek after my soul to destroy it; let them be driven backward and put to shame that wish me evil. Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame that say unto me, Aha, aha. Let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee: let such as love thy salvation say continually, The LORD be magnified. But I am poor and needy; yet the Lord thinketh upon me: thou art my help and my deliverer; make no tarrying, O my God.
Moreover Ahithophel said unto Absalom, Let me now choose out twelve thousand men, and I will arise and pursue after David this night: And I will come upon him while he is weary and weak handed, and will make him afraid: and all the people that are with him shall flee; and I will smite the king only: And I will bring back all the people unto thee: the man whom thou seekest is as if all returned: so all the people shall be in peace. And the saying pleased Absalom well, and all the elders of Israel. Then said Absalom, Call now Hushai the Archite also, and let us hear likewise what he saith. And when Hushai was come to Absalom, Absalom spake unto him, saying, Ahithophel hath spoken after this manner: shall we do after his saying? if not; speak thou. And Hushai said unto Absalom, The counsel that Ahithophel hath given is not good at this time. For, said Hushai, thou knowest thy father and his men, that they be mighty men, and they be chafed in their minds, as a bear robbed of her whelps in the field: and thy father is a man of war, and will not lodge with the people. Behold, he is hid now in some pit, or in some other place: and it will come to pass, when some of them be overthrown at the first, that whosoever heareth it will say, There is a slaughter among the people that follow Absalom. And he also that is valiant, whose heart is as the heart of a lion, shall utterly melt: for all Israel knoweth that thy father is a mighty man, and they which be with him are valiant men. Therefore I counsel that all Israel be generally gathered unto thee, from Dan even to Beersheba, as the sand that is by the sea for multitude; and that thou go to battle in thine own person. So shall we come upon him in some place where he shall be found, and we will light upon him as the dew falleth on the ground: and of him and of all the men that are with him there shall not be left so much as one. Moreover, if he be gotten into a city, then shall all Israel bring ropes to that city, and we will draw it into the river, until there be not one small stone found there. And Absalom and all the men of Israel said, The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel. For the LORD had appointed to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel, to the intent that the LORD might bring evil upon Absalom. Then said Hushai unto Zadok and to Abiathar the priests, Thus and thus did Ahithophel counsel Absalom and the elders of Israel; and thus and thus have I counseled. Now therefore send quickly, and tell David, saying, Lodge not this night in the plains of the wilderness, but speedily pass over; lest the king be swallowed up, and all the people that are with him. Now Jonathan and Ahimaaz stayed by Enrogel; for they might not be seen to come into the city: and a wench went and told them; and they went and told king David. Nevertheless a lad saw them, and told Absalom: but they went both of them away quickly, and came to a man's house in Bahurim, which had a well in his court; whither they went down. And the woman took and spread a covering over the well's mouth, and spread ground corn thereon; and the thing was not known. And when Absalom's servants came to the woman to the house, they said, Where is Ahimaaz and Jonathan? And the woman said unto them, They be gone over the brook of water. And when they had sought and could not find them, they returned to Jerusalem. And it came to pass, after they were departed, that they came up out of the well, and went and told king David, and said unto David, Arise, and pass quickly over the water: for thus hath Ahithophel counseled against you.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Psalms 70
Commentary on Psalms 70 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Cry of a Persecuted One for Help
This short Psalm, placed after Ps 69 on account of the kindred nature of its contents (cf. more especially v. 6 with Psalms 69:30), is, with but few deviations, a repetition of Psalms 40:14. This portion of the second half of Ps 40 is detached from it and converted into the Elohimic style. Concerning להזכּיר , at the presentation of the memorial portion of the mincha , vid., Psalms 38:1. It is obvious that David himself is not the author of the Psalm in this stunted form. The לדוד is moreover justified, if he composed the original Psalm which is here modified and appropriated to a special liturgical use.
We see at once at the very beginning, in the omission of the רצה (Psalms 40:14), that what we have here before us is a fragment of Ps 40, and perhaps a fragment that only accidentally came to have an independent existence. The להצּילני , which was under the government of רצה , now belongs to הוּשׁה , and the construction is without example elsewhere. In Psalms 70:3 (= Psalms 40:15) יחד and לספּותהּ are given up entirely; the original is more full-toned and soaring. Instead of ישׁמּוּ , torpescant , Psalms 70:4 has ישׁוּבוּ , recedant (as in Ps 6:11, cf. Psalms 9:18), which is all the more flat for coming after יסגו אחור . In Psalms 70:4 , after ויאמרים the לי , which cannot here (cf. on the contrary, Psalms 35:21) be dispensed with, is wanting.
ויאמרו instead of יאמרו is unimportant. But since the divine name Jahve is now for once chosen side by side with Elohim , it certainly had a strong claim to be retained in Psalms 70:5 . Instead of תּשׁועתך we have ישׁועתך here; instead of עזרתי , here עזרי . And instead of אדני יחשׁב לי we have here אלהים חוּשׁה־לּי - the hope is turned into petition: make haste unto me , is an innovation in expression that is caused by the taking over of the לי .