Psalms 84:3

Psa. 84:3. "Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars." The expletive even, which is not in the original, hurts the sense. "Thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King, and my God," seems to be a distinct sentence from the foregoing, and comes in as an ardent exclamation, expressing the longing of David's soul after God's altars, as is rather to be added to the foregoing verse, where the psalmist had said, "My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God;" and then his thoughts of the birds having a nest, and so living distinguished from him, a poor exile, that was cast out of house and home, and had not where to lay his head, and was banished from God's house, which is the worst part of his banishment: this comes in, as it were, in a parenthesis, and then follows the exclamation, "Thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God!" Such an interpretation is exceedingly agreeable with the context, and the frame the psalmist was in.

Psa. 84:9