Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Psalms 35:12

Clarke's Commentary

Verse Psalms 35:12. To the spoiling of my soul — To destroy my life; so נפש nephesh should be translated in a multitude of places, where our translators have used the word soul.

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

Psalms 35:0 Against false accusers

It seems that this psalm also was written during the time of David’s flight from Saul. Much of his suffering during that time was because of the false accusations made against him by influential people in Saul’s court. (See introductory notes to Psalms 7:0.)

Since David’s enemies have the ferocity of men in battle, David asks God to deal with them accordingly and fight against them as a warrior (1-3). He prays that they might be turned back, scattered and brought to ruin (4-6), for they have persecuted him without cause (7-8). God alone can defend him against his attackers (9-10).
David’s sorrow is the more painful when he remembers that those who now fight against him are those whom he helped, sympathized with and prayed for when they were sick or in trouble (11-14). They are hoping that David will soon be caught, so that they can pounce on him and destroy him. He knows that only God can keep him going and preserve him from their attacks (15-18). They plot evil and make false accusations against him (19-21), but he trusts that God will not allow them to gain the victory (22-25). His desire is that evil will be conquered and that righteousness will triumph (26-28).

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

"Unrighteous witnesses rise up; They ask me of things that I know not. They reward me evil for good, To the bereaving of my soul. But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth: I afflicted my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into my own bosom. I behaved myself as though it had been my friend or brother: I bowed down mourning, as one that bewaileth his mother. But in mine adversity they rejoiced, and gathered themselves together: The abjects gathered themselves together against me, and I knew it not; They did tear me, and ceased not: Like the profane mockers in feasts, They gnashed upon me with their teeth. Lord, how long wilt thou look on? Rescue my soul from their destructions, My darling from the lions. I will give thee thanks in the great assembly: I will praise thee among much people."

"In this Part 2 of the psalm, persons whom the psalmist had befriended in their sickness, turn against him bearing false witness against him."The Layman's Bible Commentary, Vol. 9, p. 67.

"They ask me of things that I know not" These former friends, now false witnesses against David, "Were claiming to be witnesses of violent deeds that David was supposed to have done; and they kept raising questions as if he had done those deeds, but of which David had no knowledge whatever."H. C. Leupold, p. 288.

"They reward me evil for good" "What David complains of in 12a, we hear Saul confess in 1 Samuel 24:18; thus David's charges of ingratitude are here well founded."F. Delitzsch, Vol. V, p. 424.

"My prayer returned into my own bosom" Translators have had difficulty knowing exactly what this means. Beginning with Martin Luther, some have rendered it, "prayed most earnestly";H. C. Leupold, p. 291. and others have taken it to mean that, "The prayer would return unanswered to him or as a blessing upon himself as in Matthew 10:13."Derek Kidner, Vol. 1. p. 143. The latter understanding seems better to us.

"The abjects gathered themselves together against me" The dictionary defines `abjects' as `sunk to a low degree,' `mean,' or `despicable.' Dummelow, on the basis of Job 30:1; Job 30:6, described these people as, "the most worthless outcasts."J. R. Dummelow's Commentary, p. 343. As Rawlinson said, "It is a matter of common knowledge that when men of high position fall into misfortunes, the base and vulgar crowd always turns against them with scoffing, jeers and every sort of contumely."The Pulpit Commentary, Vol. 8, 267.

"I will give thee thanks in the great assembly" As in all three sections of this psalm, the conclusion again promises praise and thanksgiving to God for the deliverance which the psalmist is sure he shall receive.

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

They rewarded me evil for good - They recompensed, or returned evil instead of good. The manner in which they did it he states in the following verses.

To the spoiling of my soul - Margin, “depriving.” The Hebrew word means “the being forsaken,” or “abandoned.” The idea is, that owing to this conduct he was forsaken or abandoned by all in whom he might have put confidence.

Calvin's Commentary on the Bible

12.They render me evil for good. David again shows that the malice of his enemies was of a very aggravated character, because they not only oppressed him wrongfully, seeing he was innocent, and had given them no occasion of offense, but also because even those who had received much enjoyment and many favors from him, recompensed him in a very strange and ungrateful manner. Such disgraceful conduct wounds the feelings of good men very severely, and seems quite intolerable. But it is an inexpressibly great consolation when we can testify before God, that we have attempted by every means in our power to soothe the minds of our enemies, and to bow them to gentleness, although, notwithstanding, they are hurried on by insatiable cruelty in desiring our hurt; for God will not suffer this barbarous and brutal ingratitude to pass unpunished. Their cruelty is farther expressed when it is said that they endeavored to bereave (for so it is properly in the Hebrew ⁽⁷¹⁰⁾) the soul of a meek and peaceable man; that is to say, to deprive it of comfort, and render it so desolate as to overwhelm it with despair and destroy it. David afterwards recounts certain acts of kindness which he had done them, and which, if they had had any sense of equity and humanity, ought to have been as so many sacred bonds of mutual love. He does not say that he aided them with money or with goods, or that he had by some other means exercised liberality towards them, for it may sometimes happen that when the hand is open the heart may be shut; but he mentions certain tokens of true and genuine love — that he lamented their misfortunes before God, and was troubled for them, as if he had mourned for the death of his mother; and, finally, that he felt for and took an interest in them as if they had been his own brothers. Since then he had thus laid them under high obligations to him, of what baser ingratitude could they be guilty than to vomit against him in his adversity the poison of their hatred? With respect to the meaning of the words, I take the term sickness, in this place, to signify metaphorically any kind of trouble or sorrow. David’s meaning is, that as often as any calamity had befallen them he was a partaker of their grief. A good evidence of this was the prayer which he says he poured out into his own bosom. The proper meaning of the expression is, that he did not ostentatiously utter his prayers aloud before men, like many who pretend much more affection than they really feel, but that by praying in secret, and without making the world privy to it, he showed that he was sincerely and from the heart distressed by reason of their affliction. As we say that a man rejoices in his own bosom, who is satisfied with the secret and inward feeling of his heart, without declaring it to others, so also one may be said to weep or pray in his own bosom, who pours not forth his tears and prayers before men to secure their favor, but, contented with having God alone for his witness, conceals his emotions in his own heart. I do not, however, deny that in this manner of speaking there is expressed the attitude of one who prays, as if the Psalmist had said, that he bowed down his body, and prayed with his head hanging down, and his arms folded, as men in heaviness are accustomed to do. ⁽⁷¹¹⁾ But this especially we ought to regard as his meaning, that there was no dissimulation in his prayer. Some think that there is an imprecation in his words, and they explain them in this sense. Lord, if it is true that I have not desired all prosperity to them, let all mischief fall upon me: but this is a forced explanation. There is still another exposition, which has as little plausibility in it; and it is this: Because I profited nothing by praying for them, the fruit of my prayer returned to myself. The sense, which is more in unison with the purpose and also the words of the prophet, is, I prayed for them just as I pray for myself. But what I have already advanced concerning the secret affection of the Psalmist will, I hope, prove satisfactory to the judicious reader. With respect to sackcloth and fasting, he used them as helps to prayer. The faithful pray even after their meals, and do not observe fasting every day as necessary for prayer, nor consider it needful to put on sackcloth whenever they come into the presence of God. But we know that those who lived in ancient times resorted to these exercises when any urgent necessity pressed upon them. In the time of public calamity or danger they all put on sackcloth, and gave themselves to fasting, that by humbling themselves before God, and acknowledging their guilt, they might appease his wrath. In like manner, when any one in particular was afflicted, in order to excite himself to greater earnestness in prayer, he put on sackcloth and engaged in fasting, as being the tokens of grief. When David then, as he here tells us, put on sackcloth, it was the same as if he had taken upon himself the sins of his enemies, in order to implore from God mercy for them, while they were exerting all their power to accomplish his destruction. Although we may reckon the wearing of sackcloth and sitting in ashes among the number of the legal ceremonies, yet the exercise of fasting remains in force amongst us at this day as well as in the time of David. When God, therefore, calls us to repentance, by showing us signs of his displeasure, let us bear in mind that we ought not only to pray to him after the ordinary manner, but also to employ such means as are fitted to promote our humility. In conclusion, the Psalmist says that he behaved and acted towards them as if each of them had been his brother.

(710) “Ont tasch, de rendre orpheline car il y a ainsi proprement en Hebrieu.” — Fr.

(711) “When the Orientals,” says Boothroyd, “pray seriously in grief, they hide their face in their bosom: and to this custom the Psalmist here alludes. Rabbi Levi, Dathe, and others, explain it in like manner.”

Smith's Bible Commentary

Psalms 35:1-28

Psalms 35:1-28 :

Plead my cause, O LORD, with them that strive with me: fight against them that fight against me. Take hold of shield and buckler, stand up for my help. Draw out also the spear, and stop the way against them that persecute me: say unto my soul, I am thy salvation. Let them be confounded and put to shame that seek after my soul: let them be turned back and brought to confusion that devise my hurt ( Psalms 35:1-4 ).

So this is one of those psalms where David is praying God's judgment and all against his enemies.

Let them be as chaff before the wind: and let the angel of the LORD chase them. Let their way be dark and slippery: let the angel of the LORD persecute them ( Psalms 35:5-6 ).

I really wouldn't want to be one of David's enemies. He really has the Lord on their tails.

For without cause have they hid for me their net in a pit, which they without cause have digged for my soul. Let destruction come upon him at unawares; and let his net that he hath hid catch himself: into that very destruction let him fall. And my soul shall be joyful in the LORD: it shall rejoice in his salvation. All my bones shall say, LORD, who is like unto thee, which deliverest the poor from him that is too strong for him, yea, the poor and the needy from him that spoileth him? ( Psalms 35:7-10 )

And now another prophecy relating to Christ.

False witnesses did rise up; they laid to my charge things that I knew not. They rewarded me evil for good to the spoiling of my soul. But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth: I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into mine own bosom. I behaved myself as though he had been my friend or brother: I bowed down heavily, as one that mourns for his mother. But in mine adversity they rejoiced ( Psalms 35:11-15 ),

Now David is saying, "I was so good to them when they were in trouble. I wept and I was there to help and all. But as for me, when I was in adversity they rejoiced."

they gathered themselves together: yea, the abjects gathered themselves together against me together, and I knew it not; they tore me and ceased not: With hypocritical mockers in the feasts, they gnashed upon me with their teeth. LORD, how long are you just going to stand there looking? rescue my soul from their destructions, my darling from the lions. I will give thee thanks in the great congregation: and I will praise thee among much people. Let not them that are my enemies wrongfully rejoice over me: neither let them wink with the eye that hate me without a cause. For they speak not peace: but they devise deceitful matters against them that are quiet in the land. Yea, they opened their mouth wide against me, and said, Aha, aha, our eyes have seen it ( Psalms 35:15-21 ).

The "aha, aha" was evidently a nasty kind of a derisive thing. We don't think of it today saying, "aha, aha" as being such an evil, contemptuous kind of thing, but in those days, man, it was really evil and contemptuous. Now I don't know what the content was of the "aha, aha," but it was something they hated to hear. It was an awful thing when you say, "aha, aha." They really would get upset.

Now when Elisha was going up the hill, little kids came up from Bethel saying, "aha, aha, ye old bald man!" And he turned around and cursed them. And the she bears came out and ripped them up. So, "aha, aha" was a bad thing to say, and as I say, I don't know what the whole connotation of the "aha, aha" might be, but the hypocritical mockers speaking against David.

This thou hast seen, O LORD: keep not silence: O LORD, be not far from me. Stir up thyself, and awake to my judgment, even to my cause, my God and my Lord. Judge me, O LORD my God, according to thy righteousness; and let them not rejoice over me. Let them not say in their hearts, Ah, so would we have it: let them not say, We have swallowed him up. Let them be ashamed and brought to confusion together that rejoice at my hurt: let them be clothed with shame and dishonor that magnify themselves against me. Let them shout for joy, and be glad, that favor my righteous cause: yea, let them say continually, Let the LORD be magnified, which hath pleasure in the prosperity of his servant. And my tongue shall speak of thy righteousness and thy praise all the day long ( Psalms 35:22-28 ). "

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

Psalms 35

David lamented the unjustified opposition of his enemies in this psalm and called on God to deliver him. It is really a combination of three laments. The language alternates between legal and military terminology.

"Whether or not this psalm was written as a companion to Psalms 34, it is well placed next to it, not only because of some verbal affinities and contrasts (notably ’the angel of the Lord’, Psalms 34:7; Psalms 35:5-6, found nowhere else in the Psalter), but because it speaks out of the kind of darkness which has just been dispelled in the former psalm. The deliverance celebrated in that psalm is now seen to be not invariably swift or painless, but subject, if God wills, to agonizing delays." [Note: Ibid., p. 142.]

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

The psalmist’s malicious enemies were repaying him evil for the good he had done them. They were evidently also charging him falsely.

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

2. A lament over unjust opposition 35:11-18

In the first section of the psalm, the emphasis is on petition, but in this one it is on lament.

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

They rewarded me evil for good,.... For the good David did in killing Goliath, and slaying his ten thousands of the Philistines, and thereby saving his king and country, Saul and his courtiers envied him, and sought to slay him: so our Lord Jesus Christ, for all the good he did to the Jews, by healing their bodies of diseases, and preaching the Gospel to them for the benefit of their souls, was rewarded with reproaches and persecutions, and at last with the shameful death of the cross; and in like manner are his people used; but this is an evil that shall not go unpunished; see Proverbs 17:13. It is added,

[to] the spoiling of my soul; or "to the bereaving of it" t; causing it to be fatherless; that is, to the bereaving it of its joy, peace, and comfort; so fatherless is put for comfortless, John 14:18; or to the taking away of his soul, which being separated from the body, its companion is left alone, as one that is fatherless.

t שכול "orbitatem", Montanus, Vatablus, Junius Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius, Gejerus, Michaelis so Ainsworth.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

      11 False witnesses did rise up; they laid to my charge things that I knew not.   12 They rewarded me evil for good to the spoiling of my soul.   13 But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth: I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into mine own bosom.   14 I behaved myself as though he had been my friend or brother: I bowed down heavily, as one that mourneth for his mother.   15 But in mine adversity they rejoiced, and gathered themselves together: yea, the abjects gathered themselves together against me, and I knew it not; they did tear me, and ceased not:   16 With hypocritical mockers in feasts, they gnashed upon me with their teeth.

      Two very wicked things David here lays to the charge of his enemies, to make good his appeal to God against them--perjury and ingratitude.

      I. Perjury, Psalms 35:11; Psalms 35:11. When Saul would have David attainted of treason, in order to his being outlawed, perhaps he did it with the formalities of a legal prosecution, produced witnesses who swore some treasonable words or overt acts against him, and he being not present to clear himself (or, if he was, it was all the same), Saul adjudged him a traitor. This he complains of here as the highest piece of injustice imaginable: False witnesses did rise up, who would swear anything; they laid to my charge things that I knew not, nor ever thought of. See how much the honours, estates, liberties, and lives, even of the best men, lie at the mercy of the worst, against whose false oaths innocency itself is no fence; and what reason we have to acknowledge with thankfulness the hold God has of the consciences even of bad men, to which it is owing that there is not more mischief done in that way than is. This instance of the wrong done to David was typical, and had its accomplishment in the Son of David, against whom false witnesses did arise, Matthew 26:60. If we be at any time charged with what we are innocent of let us not think it strange, as though some new thing happened to us; so persecuted they the prophets, even the great prophet.

      II. Ingratitude. Call a man ungrateful and you can call him no worse. This was the character of David's enemies (Psalms 35:12; Psalms 35:12): They rewarded me evil for good. A great deal of good service he had done to his king, witness his harp, witness Goliath's sword, witness the foreskins of the Philistines; and yet his king vowed his death, and his country was made too hot for him. This is to the spoiling of his soul; this base unkind usage robs him of his comfort, and cuts him to the heart, more than anything else. Nay, he had deserved well not only of the public in general, but of those particular persons that were now most bitter against him. Probably it was then well known whom he meant; it may be Saul himself for one, whom he was sent for to attend upon when he was melancholy and ill, and to whom he was serviceable to drive away the evil spirit, not with his harp, but with his prayers; to others of the courtiers, it is likely, he had shown this respect, while he lived at court, who now were, of all others, most abusive to him. Herein he was a type of Christ, to whom this wicked world was very ungrateful. John 10:32. Many good works have I shown you from my Father; for which of those do you stone me? David here shows,

      1. How tenderly, and with what a cordial affection, he had behaved towards them in their afflictions (Psalms 35:13; Psalms 35:14): They were sick. Note, Even the palaces and courts of princes are not exempt from the jurisdiction of death and the visitation of sickness. Now when these people were sick, (1.) David mourned for them and sympathized with them in their grief. They were not related to him; he was under no obligations to them; he would lose nothing by their death, but perhaps be a gainer by it; and yet he behaved himself as though they had been his nearest relations, purely from a principle of compassion and humanity. David was a man of war, and of a bold stout spirit, and yet was thus susceptible of the impressions of sympathy, forgot the bravery of the hero, and seemed wholly made up of love and pity; it was a rare composition of hardiness and tenderness, courage and compassion, in the same breast. Observe, He mourned as for a brother or mother, which intimates that it is our duty, and well becomes us, to lay to heart the sickness, and sorrow, and death of our near relations. Those that do not are justly stigmatized as without natural affection. (2.) He prayed for them. He discovered not only the tender affection of a man, but the pious affection of a saint. He was concerned for their precious souls, and, since he helped them with his prayers to God for mercy and grace; and the prayers of one who had so great an interest in heaven were of more value than perhaps they knew or considered. With his prayers he joined humiliation and self-affliction, both in his diet (he fasted, at least from pleasant bread) and in his dress; he clothed himself with sackcloth, thus expressing his grief, not only for their affliction, but for their sin; for this was the guise and practice of a penitent. We ought to mourn for the sins of those that do not mourn for them themselves. His fasting also put an edge upon his praying, and was an expression of the fervour of it; he was so intent in his devotions that he had no appetite to meat, nor would allow himself time for eating: "My prayer returned into my own bosom; I had the comfort of having done my duty, and of having approved myself a loving neighbour, though I could not thereby win upon them nor make them my friends." We shall not lose by the good offices we have done to any, how ungrateful soever they are; for our rejoicing will be this, the testimony of our conscience.

      2. How basely and insolently and with what a brutish enmity, and worse than brutish, they had behaved towards him (Psalms 35:15; Psalms 35:16); In my adversity they rejoiced. When he fell under the frowns of Saul, was banished the court, and persecuted as a criminal, they were pleased, were glad at his calamities, and got together in their drunken clubs to make themselves and one another merry with the disgrace of this great favourite. Well, might he call them abjects, for nothing could be more vile and sordid than to triumph in the fall of a man of such unstained honour and consummate virtue. But this was not all. (1.) They tore him, rent his good name without mercy, said all the ill they could of him and fastened upon him all the reproach their cursed wit and malice could reach to. (2.) They gnashed upon him with their teeth; they never spoke of him but with the greatest indignation imaginable, as those that would have eaten him up if they could. David was the fool in the play, and his disappointment all the table-talk of the hypocritical mockers at feasts; it was the song of the drunkards. The comedians, who may fitly be called hypocritical mockers (for which does a hypocrite signify but a stage-player?) and whose comedies, it is likely, were acted at feasts and balls, chose David for their subject, bantered and abused him, while the auditory, in token of their agreement with the plot, hummed, and gnashed upon him with their teeth. Such has often been the hard fate of the best of men. The apostles were made a spectacle to the world. David was looked upon with ill-will for no other reason than because he was caressed by the people. It is a vexation of spirit which attends even a right work that for this a man is envied of his neighbour,Ecclesiastes 4:4. And who can stand before envy?Proverbs 27:4.