Psalm 94:6

They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(6) Stranger.—The mention of the stranger as one friendless and helpless (Exodus 22:21), under the tyranny of the great, seems to imply that domestic, and not foreign oppression, is the grievance.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

94:1-11 We may with boldness appeal to God; for he is the almighty Judge by whom every man is judged. Let this encourage those who suffer wrong, to bear it with silence, committing themselves to Him who judges righteously. These prayers are prophecies, which speak terror to the sons of violence. There will come a day of reckoning for all the hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against God, his truths, and ways, and people. It would hardly be believed, if we did not witness it, that millions of rational creatures should live, move, speak, hear, understand, and do what they purpose, yet act as if they believed that God would not punish the abuse of his gifts. As all knowledge is from God, no doubt he knows all the thoughts of the children of men, and knows that the imaginations of the thoughts of men's hearts are only evil, and that continually. Even in good thoughts there is a want of being fixed, which may be called vanity. It concerns us to keep a strict watch over our thoughts, because God takes particular notice of them. Thoughts are words to God.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless - To do this is everywhere represented as a special crime, and as especially offensive to God from the fact that these classes are naturally feeble and unprotected. See the notes at Isaiah 1:17; Psalm 68:5; Psalm 82:3.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

5, 6. thy people [and] thine heritage—are synonymous, the people being often called God's heritage. As justice to the weak is a sign of the best government, their oppression is a sign of the worst (De 10:18; Isa 10:2).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Whom common humanity obliged them to spare, and pity, and relieve.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

They slay the widow and the stranger,.... Who are so both in a literal and figurative sense, such who are weak and feeble, helpless and friendless; or who are deprived of their faithful pastors, who were as husbands and fathers to them, and who profess themselves pilgrims and strangers here; these the followers of the man of sin have inhumanly put to death, supposing they did God good service:

and murder the fatherless; having slain the parents in a cruel and barbarous manner, murder their infants; or figuratively such who are as orphans, destitute of their spiritual fathers, who were the instruments of begetting them in Christ, and of nourishing them with the words of faith and good doctrine; with the blood of these the whore of Rome has often made herself drunk, and therefore blood shall be given her to drink, Revelation 17:5.

Geneva Study Bible

They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

6. A proverbial expression for inhumanity and treachery. They do not scruple to murder the most defenceless, and those whose lives, by the traditions of Semitic hospitality, should have been inviolable. “From the earliest times of Semitic life the lawlessness of the desert … has been tempered by the principle that the guest is inviolable.… To harm a guest, or to refuse him hospitality, is an offence against honour, which covers the perpetrator with indelible shame.” Robertson Smith, Rel. of Semites, p. 76. Cp. Exodus 22:21-22; Psalm 10:14; Malachi 3:5.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 6. - They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless (comp. Isaiah 1:17-23; Isaiah 10:2; Ezekiel 22:6-9; Malachi 3:5; also Psalm 10:8-10). Psalm 94:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The second strophe describes those over whom the first prays that the judgment of God may come. הבּיע (cf. הטּיף) is a tropical phrase used of that kind of speech that results from strong inward impulse and flows forth in rich abundance. The poet himself explains how it is here (cf. Psalm 59:8) intended: they speak עתק, that which is unrestrained, unbridled, insolent (vid., Psalm 31:19). The Hithpa. התאמּר Schultens interprets ut Emiri (Arab. 'mı̂r, a commander) se gerunt; but אמיר signifies in Hebrew the top of a tree (vid., on Isaiah 17:9); and from the primary signification to tower aloft, whence too אמר, to speak, prop. effere equals effari, התאמּר, like התימּר in Isaiah 61:6, directly signifies to exalt one's self, to carry one's self high, to strut. On ודכּאוּ cf. Proverbs 22:22; Isaiah 3:15; and on their atheistical principle which ויּאמרוּ places in closest connection with their mode of action, cf. Psalm 10:11; Psalm 59:8 extrem. The Dagesh in יּהּ, distinct from the Dag. in the same word in Psalm 94:12, Psalm 118:5, Psalm 118:18, is the Dag. forte conjunct. according to the rule of the so-called דחיק.