Psalm 140:3

They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent; adders' poison is under their lips. Selah.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(3) Comp. Psalm 64:3; Psalm 58:4; Psalm 52:2; Psalm 10:7.

Adders.—The Hebrew word is peculiar to this place, and is explained by Gesenius to be a compound of two words, to represent “that which rolls itself up and lies in ambush.” “Besides the cobra and the cerastes, several other species of venomous snakes are common in Syria, and we may apply the name, either generically or specifically, to the vipers. Two species, Vipera ammodytes and Vipera euphratica, we found to be very common. The former of these was known to Linnæus as inhabiting Palestine. They are plainlycoloured serpents, with broad flat heads and suddenly-contracting tails” (Tristram, Nat. Hist. of the Bible, p. 275). The LXX. and Vulg. read “asp.” (Comp. Romans 3:13.)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

140:1-7 The more danger appears, the more earnest we should be in prayer to God. All are safe whom the Lord protects. If he be for us, who can be against us? We should especially watch and pray, that the Lord would hold up our goings in his ways, that our footsteps slip not. God is as able to keep his people from secret fraud as from open force; and the experience we have had of his power and care, in dangers of one kind, may encourage us to depend upon him in other dangers.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent - Compare the notes at Psalm 64:3. The idea here is, that since the tongue of the serpent "seems" to be sharp, pointed, adapted to penetrate (and probably the original reference in the image was derived from that idea), the wound inflicted is by the serpent's tongue - "as if" with a hard, penetrating point. It is now known, however, that it is by a tooth - a single tooth, made flexible for the purpose - at the root of which a small bag containing the poison is located, which is injected through an orifice in the tooth into the wound. The meaning here is, that the words spoken by such persons - by their tongues - were like the poison produced by the bite of a serpent.

Adders' poison is under their lips - The asp or adder is among the most poisonous of serpents. Thus, Cleopatra of Egypt is said to have destroyed her own life by an asp, which she had concealed for that purpose. This passage is quoted in Romans 3:13, as a proof of human depravity. See the notes at that verse.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

3. sharpened … like a serpent—not like a serpent does, but they are thus like a serpent in cunning and venom.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

They have sharpened their tongues; their malicious hearts stirred up their tongues to utter vile slanders against me. Like a serpent; either whetting their tongues, as serpents are said to whet theirs when they are about to bite; or rather, using words as sharp and piercing as the sting of a serpent.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent,.... Which Kimchi says it does before it bites. Aristotle (i) observes, that the tip or extreme point of a serpent's tongue is as small as a hair, and so exceeding sharp and piercing. Arama interprets this of the sharpness and cunning of the serpent; and particularly the serpent that deceived Eve, and spake cunningly to her. "For God knoweth", &c. and may design the calumnies and detractions, which were sharp as a razor; as swords, and spears, and arrows, and as the tongue of a serpent, Psalm 57:4; and the subtlety of false teachers, and deceitful workers; and the sharp and cutting words of wicked men against Christ and his people, Jde 1:15;

adder's poison is under their lips; which may signify the malignity of sin in wicked men, which comes from the old serpent the devil; is latent in men; very infectious, like poison, and deadly and incurable, but by the grace of God, and blood of Christ: and may describe particularly the mischief of the tongue, which is a little member, as the asp is a little creature; but very mischievous, full of deadly poison, which lurks in it, lies under it, and which spitting out, it stupifies and kills insensibly; as do the calumnies of wicked men, and the doctrines of false teachers; see Romans 3:13. The Targum is,

"the poison of the spider;''

though it is said (k) the spider is not venomous.

Selah; on this word; see Gill on Psalm 3:2.

(i) Hist. Animal. l. 2. c. 17. (k) Philosoph. Transact. abridged, vol. 2. p. 800. & vol. 5. par. 1. p. 24.

Geneva Study Bible

They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent; {c} adders' poison is under their lips. Selah.

(c) He shows the weapons the wicked use, when power and force fail them.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

3. They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent] The lying tongue is elsewhere compared to the sword or arrow which wounds (Psalm 52:2; Psalm 55:21; Psalm 57:4; Psalm 59:7; Psalm 64:3), or the serpent which inflicts a poisonous bite (Psalm 58:3-4); and here the Psalmist combines the metaphors. They deliberately prepare to inflict a deadly wound by slander.

adder’s poison is under their lips] Hidden like the poison gland of the asp. The words are quoted in Romans 3:13, from the LXX.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 3. - They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent (comp. Psalm 52:2; Psalm 57:4; Psalm 59:7; Psalm 64:3). Adders' poison is under their lips (comp. Psalm 58:4; Romans 3:15). The meaning is that their tongues inflict wounds which are as painful as poisoned wounds. The pause-sign, "selah," marks off the first stanza. Psalm 140:3

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The assimilation of the Nun of the verb נצר is given up, as in Psalm 61:8; Psalm 78:7, and frequently, in order to make the form more full-toned. The relative clause shows that אישׁ חמסים is not intended to be understood exclusively of one person. בּלב strengthens the notion of that which is deeply concealed and premeditated. It is doubtful whether יגוּרוּ signifies to form into troops or to stir up. But from the fact that גּוּר in Psalm 56:7; Psalm 59:4, Isaiah 54:15, signifies not congregare but se congregare, it is to be inferred that גּוּר in the passage before us, like גּרה (or התגּרה in Deuteronomy 2:9, Deuteronomy 2:24), in Syriac and Targumic גּרג, signifies concitare, to excite (cf. שׂוּר together with שׂרה, Hosea 12:4.). In Psalm 140:4 the Psalm coincides with Psalm 64:4; Psalm 58:5. They sharpen their tongue, so that it inflicts a fatal sting like the tongue of a serpent, and under their lips, shooting out from thence, is the poison of the adder (cf. Sol 4:11). עכשׁוּב is a ἅπαξ λεγομ. not from כּשׁב (Jesurun, p. 207), but from עכשׁ, Arab. ‛ks and ‛kš, root ‛k (vid., Fleischer on Isaiah 59:5, עכּבישׁ), both of which have the significations of bending, turning, and coiling after the manner of a serpent; the Beth is an organic addition modifying the meaning of the root.

(Note: According to the original Lexicons Arab. ‛ks signifies to bend one's self, to wriggle, to creep sideways like the roots of the vine, in the V form to move one's self like an adder (according to the Ḳamûs) and to walk like a drunken man (according to Neshwn); but Arab. ‛kš signifies to be intertwined, knit or closely united together, said of hairs and of the branches of trees, in the V form to fight hand to hand and to get in among the crowd. The root is apparently expanded into עכשׁוב by an added Beth which serves as a notional speciality, as in Arab. ‛rqûb the convex bend of the steep side of a rock, or in the case of the knee of the hind-legs of animals, and in Arab. charnûb (in the dialect of the country along the coast of Palestine, where the tree is plentiful, in Neshwn churnûb), the horn-like curved pod of the carob-tree (Ceratonia Siliqua), syncopated Arab. charrûb, charrûb (not charûb), from Arab. charn, cogn. qarn, a horn, cf. Arab. chrnâyt, the beak of a bird of prey, Arab. chrnûq, the stork [vid. on Psalm 104:17], Arab. chrnı̂n, the rhinoceros [vid. on Psalm 29:6], Arab. chrnuı̂t, the unicorn [vid. ibid.]. - Wetzstein.)