Psalms 71:20

WEB

You, who have shown us many and bitter troubles, you will let me live. You will bring us up again from the depths of the earth.

KJV

Thou, which hast shewed me great and sore troubles, shalt quicken me again, and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth.

Commentary

Thou, which hast showed me great and sore troubles,.... Or, "made him to see" (g); that is, to experience. David had his troubles, and these were great, both as to quantity and quality; and very grievous and hard to be borne, and were very trying and afflictive: some outward, such as he endured when persecuted by Saul; and afterwards in his own family, though the incest of Ammon, the murder of him by Absalom, and Absalom's rebellion against him; the curses of Shimei, and the bic kerings of the sons of Zeruiah; with many others: and some inward, arising from the corruptions of his heart, the hidings of God's face, and the temptations of Satan. His experience of all which he ascribes, not to instruments or second causes, but to God himself; who had either laid them upon him, or suffered them to befall him, for wise ends of his glory, and his servant's good. There is in this clause and the following, a "Keri" and a "Cetib"; according to the "Cetib", or writing in the text, it is, "who hast showed us"; and so the Targum renders it: but according to the "Keri" in the margin, and the points, it is as we read; so it is in the Septuagint and Oriental versions, and both may be retained; for David's troubles, and those of other saints, are much the same; shalt quicken me again; either raise him from so great a death of afflictions, in which he seemed to be as a dead man, both by himself and others, to a more comfortable and happy state and condition, in which he might live more free from vexation and trouble: or, in a spiritual sense, quicken him, being dead and lifeless, in the exercise of grace, and discharge of duty; which is usually done by the word and ordinances, and to purpose, by the discoveries of the love of God, which excite grace, and animate to duty. And this is God's work, and may be called a quickening again in distinction from the first quickening, when dead in trespasses and sins; and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth; expressive of a very low estate, either of body or mind, into which he had been brought; see Psa 130:1 . Could the psalm be understood of Christ, this and the preceding clause might be applied to his resurrection from the dead; see Eph 4:9 ; and to the resurrection of the saints; on which the faith of Christ and his people is exercised, (g) "fecisti me videre", Vatablus, Cocceius, Gejerus; "videre et experiri fecisti nos", Michaelis.