When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then thou knewest my path;
in the way wherein I walked have they privily laid a snare for me.
I looked on _my_ right hand, and beheld, but _there was_ no man that
would know me; refuge failed me; no man cared for my soul.
I cried unto thee, O LORD: I said, Thou _art_ my refuge, _and_ my
portion in the land of the living.
Attend unto my cry; for I am brought very low: deliver me from my
persecutors: for they are stronger than I.
Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name: the righteous
shall compass me about; for thou shall deal bountifully with me.
This Psalm is a prayer; wherein the Psalmist, being now surrounded
with peril on every side, cries unto God out of prison, as it were, by
reason of the great cruelty and malice of false teachers, who
persecuted him on account of the word.
As the people of Israel were a stiff-necked people, their Cainish
malice and bitterness had so hardened them, that they stoned,
rejected, and killed the true prophets, on account of their preaching
of the word, and maintaining the true worship of God; and had given
themselves up to hypocrisy and idolatry; and all this, their histories
of them testify; as does Christ also, (Matt. xxiii.) and Stephen.
(Acts vii.)
Hence, as these things were fully known, so we find most of the Psalms
grievously complaining of the cruel malice of false prophets and
hypocrites. And just in the same way, from the very beginning,
hypocrites and false teachers have afflicted the true church of God;
and the true saints in all ages found it necessary to cry unto God
continually, against all such hypocrites and Cainish pretenders to
saintship. All this is abundantly testified by the histories of the
times of Elijah and king Ahab and Jezebel; when all the true prophets
of the Lord were compelled to flee and to hide themselves, to escape
the furious cruelty of these adversaries; all which histories might
have been adduced as examples in this Psalm. And the recent times of
the Arian heresy afford also a plain example of the same persecution
and malice, when all the catholic bishops were compelled to flee; for
Satan neither can nor will endure the pure word of God!