Psalms 52:5

likewise We might have expected therefore, as P.B.V. following Vulg. loosely renders: but likewiseis significant. There is a correspondence and equivalence between the sin and its punishment Cp. Micah 2:1-10, where the idea is worked out that the heartless oppressors who have driven the poor from their homes will be driven from the land into exile.

The doom of the wicked man is forcibly described by various figures. He fancies himself securely intrenched in the fortress of his wealth, but God will break him down(Judges 8:9) and that for ever, so that there will be no restoration of the ruins. He is at ease in his home, but God will take him as a man takes a coal from the hearth with tongs or shovel, and plucking him out of his dwelling, drive him forth as a homeless wanderer (Deuteronomy 28:63; Proverbs 2:22; Job 18:14, R.V.). He is "spreading himself like a green tree in its native soil" (Psalms 37:35), but God will uproot him out of the land of the living. Cp. for the phrase Jeremiah 11:19; and note the contrast between the fate of the wicked and the future of the Psalmist (Psalms 52:8).

The verbs in this verse might be rendered as in the LXX, as a prayer, "May God destroy thee" &c.; but the rendering in the future is preferable. Sentence is pronounced in a tone of prophetic authority. Cp. Isaiah 22:17 ff.

Selahmarks the conclusion of the first part of the Psalm.