Psalm 120:2

Deliver my soul, O LORD, from lying lips, and from a deceitful tongue.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(2) Deliver . . .—This is the cry for help of which mention has just been made. The thought is one we have met frequently. Of all the elements of bitterness which made up the lot of Israel under foreign dominion, taunts and calumnies seem to have made the deepest wound, and left the most lasting scar. This was “the torture prolonged from age to age,” under which we hear psalmist after psalmist raising his cry for deliverance.

Benson Commentary

Psalm 120:2-4. Deliver my soul from lying lips — From the unjust censures and malicious slanders of mine enemies; and from a deceitful tongue — Which covers mischievous designs under pretences of kindness. What shall be given unto thee — By the righteous Judge of heaven and earth; thou false tongue — O thou false accuser, or slanderer, or whosoever thou art, that art guilty of any such like practices? Sharp arrows of the mighty —

The wrath and vengeance of the almighty God, which in Scripture, and particularly in this book, is often compared to arrows, as Psalm 7:13-14, &c., and here to arrows of the mighty, that is, arrows shot by the hands of a strong man; and to coals, Psalm 140:10, and here to coals of juniper, which burn very fiercely, and retain their heat for a long time. And the psalmist may possibly express himself in these words, to show the suitableness of the punishment to the sin. As if he had said, As thy tongue shoots arrows, (as calumnies are often called,) and kindles coals, so thou shalt bring God’s arrows and coals, kindled by the fire of his wrath, upon thyself.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

120:1-4 The psalmist was brought into great distress by a deceitful tongue. May every good man be delivered from lying lips. They forged false charges against him. In this distress, he sought God by fervent prayer. God can bridle their tongues. He obtained a gracious answer to this prayer. Surely sinners durst not act as they do, if they knew, and would be persuaded to think, what will be in the end thereof. The terrors of the Lord are his arrows; and his wrath is compared to burning coals of juniper, which have a fierce heat, and keep fire very long. This is the portion of the false tongue; for all that love and make a lie, shall have their portion in the lake that burns eternally.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Deliver my soul, O Lord - My soul is harassed and distressed. Perhaps the meaning also may be, My life is in danger. Or, if it refers to the soul as such, then it means that everything pertaining to his soul was deeply affected by the course which was pursued. He was maligned, slandered, misrepresented, deceived, and he had no comfort or peace.

From lying lips - False, deceitful, slanderous. Compare the notes at Psalm 31:18.

And from a deceitful tongue - From a tongue whose statements cannot be relied on; whose words are deceptive; whose promises are false. David was often called to experience troubles of this sort; and this is a kind of trial which may come upon anyone in a form which he can no more anticipate or prevent than he can the coming of a "mist from the ocean." No man can certainly guard against the influence of falsehood; no man can be sure that all that will be said to him is true; no man can be certain that all the promises made to him - save those made to him by God - will be performed.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2, 3. Slander and deceit charged on his foes implies his innocence.

tongue—as in Ps 52:2, 4.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

From lying lips; from the unjust censures and malicious slanders of mine enemies, who traduce me as an egregious hypocrite, as a rebel and traitor.

From a deceitful tongue; which covereth mischievous designs with pretences of kindness.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips, and from a deceitful tongue. Not from such lips, and such a tongue of his own, which David abhorred; though every good man desires to be kept from speaking lies and deceit; nor from the company of those who have such lips and tongues, which he was determined should not dwell with him; but from the malignity of them, from being hurt in his character and reputation by them; God can restrain them, and prevent the ill influence of them when he pleases, Psalm 31:20. Such were the lips and tongues of Doeg the Edomite, Psalm 52:2, and of Saul's courtiers, who insinuated to him that David sought his hurt, 1 Samuel 24:9; and of the Scribes and Pharisees, that flattered Christ to his face, and reproached him to the people; and of Judas, that betrayed him with "Hail, master", Matthew 26:49; and of the false witnesses suborned against him; and of false teachers, deceitful workers, that lie in wait to deceive, and, by their good words and fair speeches, do deceive the hearts of the simple; and of antichrist and his followers, who, as they are given up to believe a lie, speak lies in hypocrisy; and of Satan the father of lies, and who is the old serpent, the devil, that deceives the whole world: and to be delivered from the bad effects of such lips and tongues is very desirable.

Geneva Study Bible

Deliver my soul, O LORD, from lying lips, and from a deceitful tongue.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

2. Cp. Psalm 52:1-4; Micah 6:12.

2–4. The earnestness of the prayer and the severity of the condemnation point to a person or a party, fomenting feud and strife in the community by calumny and false accusations, and resolutely refusing all attempts to promote harmony.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 2. - Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips. Such as Sanballat's (Nehemiah 6:6 - 8). And from a deceitful tongue; literally, a tongue that is fraud - a mere variant of the expression in the preceding clause. Psalm 120:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

According to the pointing ויּענני, the poet appears to base his present petition, which from Psalm 120:2 onwards is the substance of the whole Psalm, upon the fact of a previous answering of his prayers. For the petition in Psalm 120:2 manifestly arises out of his deplorable situation, which is described in Psalm 120:5. Nevertheless there are also other instances in which ויענני might have been expected, where the pointing is ויּענני (Psalm 3:5; Jonah 2:3), so that consequently ויּענני may, without any prejudice to the pointing, be taken as a believing expression of the result (cf. the future of the consequence in Job 9:16) of the present cry for help. צרתה, according to the original signification, is a form of the definition of a state or condition, as in Psalm 3:3; Psalm 44:27; Psalm 63:8, Jonah 2:10, Hosea 8:7, and בּצּרתה לּי equals בּצּר־לּי, Psalm 18:7, is based upon the customary expression צר לּי. In Psalm 120:2 follows the petition which the poet sends up to Jahve in the certainty of being answered. רמיּה beside לשׁון, although there is no masc. רמי (cf. however the Aramaic רמּי, רמּאי), is taken as an adjective after the form טריּה, עניּה, which it is also perhaps in Micah 6:12. The parallelism would make לשׁון natural, like לשׁון מרמה in Psalm 52:6; the pointing, which nevertheless disregarded this, will therefore rest upon tradition. The apostrophe in Psalm 120:3 is addressed to the crafty tongue. לשׁון is certainly feminine as a rule; but whilst the tongue as such is feminine, the לשׁון רמיה of the address, as in Psalm 52:6, refers to him who has such a kind of tongue (cf. Hitzig on Proverbs 12:27), and thereby the לך is justified; whereas the rendering, "what does it bring to thee, and what does it profit thee?" or, "of what use to thee and what advancement to thee is the crafty tongue?" is indeed possible so far as concerns the syntax (Ges. 147, e), but is unlikely as being ambiguous and confusing in expression. It is also to be inferred from the correspondence between מה־יּתּן לך וּמה־יּסיף לך and the formula of an oath כּה יעשׂה־לּך אלהים לכה יוסיף, 1 Samuel 3:17; 1 Samuel 20:13; 1 Samuel 25:22; 2 Samuel 3:35; Ruth 1:17, that God is to be thought of as the subject of יתן and יסיף: "what will," or rather, in accordance with the otherwise precative use of the formula and with the petition that here precedes: "what shall He (is He to) give to thee (נתן as in Hosea 9:14), and what shall He add to thee, thou crafty tongue?" The reciprocal relation of Psalm 120:4 to מה־יתן, and of. Psalm 120:4 with the superadding עם to מה־יסיף, shows that Psalm 120:4 is not now a characterizing of the tongue that continues the apostrophe to it, as Ewald supposes. Consequently Psalm 120:4 gives the answer to Psalm 120:3 with the twofold punishment which Jahve will cause the false tongue to feel. The question which the poet, sure of the answering of his cry for help, puts to the false tongue is designed to let the person addressed hear by a flight of sarcasm what he has to expect. The evil tongue is a sharp sword (Psalm 57:5), a pointed arrow (Jeremiah 9:7), and it is like a fire kindled of hell (James 3:6). The punishment, too, corresponds to this its nature and conduct (Psalm 64:4). The "mighty one" (lxx δυνατός) is God Himself, as it is observed in B. Erachin 15b with a reference to Isaiah 42:13 : "There is none mighty by the Holy One, blessed is He." He requites the evil tongue like with like. Arrows and coals (Psalm 140:11) appear also in other instances among His means of punishment. It, which shot piercing arrows, is pierced by the sharpened arrows of an irresistibly mighty One; it, which set its neighbour in a fever of anguish, must endure the lasting, sure, and torturingly consuming heat of broom-coals. The lxx renders it in a general sense, σὺν τοῖς ἄνθραξι τοῖς ἐρημικοῖς; Aquila, following Jewish tradition, ἀρκευθίναις; but רתם, Arabic ratam, ratem, is the broom-shrub (e.g., uncommonly frequent in the Belkâ).