This Psalm is an earnest prayer; and it complains, with deep feelings
of sorrow, of those horrible evils which Satan causes in the church by
a false and crafty tongue: that is, by that virulent and truly
serpentine tongue which boasts of God and the worship of God, and
never instructs any one in the truth, nor leads them to God.
For false teachers cause infinite and terrible evils in the church;
and like giants with immense weapons in their hands, they never strike
without inflicting some mighty wound: or, like fire-brands cast into a
grove of juniper trees, they consume in all directions, with a sudden
and devouring flame. And just so, the common people often burst out
into one general flame, even by the throwing in among them of one
single spark of false and wicked doctrine; and not only do they blaze
forth with a sudden flame of their minds and spirits, but even greatly
admire the error and the hypocrisy. For all doctrines of this kind, as
being more congenial to human reason than the truth of God, quickly
please men; as Paul saith, 2 Tim. iv. “They will heap to themselves
teachers, having itching ears.”
Mesech are the nations nigh unto Jerusalem itself, towards the north;
where the Tartars now are. And Kedar are the Arabs, to the east of
Jerusalem. These nations are types of all enemies and heretics who
oppose themselves as adversaries to the true church. The Mesech of
Christians, at this time are the Turks, who derive their origin from
the Tartars. And the Kedar are Mahomet and the Saracens; for they are
from Arabia. These with their Alcoran have oppressed and laid waste
the Gospel in many places: and that fire of wicked doctrine, broke out
into a mighty blaze, just like a brand cast into a thicket of juniper
trees.