Psalms 119:70

Their heart is as fat as grease; but I delight in thy law. THEIR HEART IS AS FAT AS GREASE - as obese as fat (Deuteronomy 32:15): a mind reprobate [incapable of judging and appreciating, noun (G3563) adokimon (G96), Romans 1:28 ] (Psalms 17:10; Psalms 73:7) - stupid and insensible as to spiritual things (Isaiah 6:10;...

65-72 However God has dealt with us, he has dealt with us better than we deserve; and all in love, and for our good. Many have knowledge, but little judgment; those who have both, are fortified against the snares of Satan, and furnished for the service of God. We are most apt to wander from God, when we are easy in the world. We should leave our concerns to the disposal of God, seeing we know not what is good for us. Lord, thou art our bountiful Benefactor; incline our hearts to faith and obedience. The psalmist will go on in his duty with constancy and resolution. The proud are full of the world, and its wealth and pleasures; these make them senseless, secure, and stupid. God visits his people with affliction, that they may learn his statutes. Not only God's promises, but even his law, his percepts, though hard to ungodly men, are desirable, and profitable, because they lead us with saf...

Verse Psalms 119:70. _THEIR HEART IS AS FAT AS GREASE_] They are egregiously stupid, they have fed themselves without fear; they are become _flesh-brutalized_, and given over to vile affections, and have no kind of _spiritual relish_: but _I delight in thy law _- I have, through thy goodness, a _spiritual feeling_ and a spiritual appetite....

THEIR HEART IS AS FAT AS GREASE - They are prospered. They have health, property, influence, comforts of all kinds. heaven appears to smile upon them, and it seems as if it were one effect of a wicked course of life to make people prosperous. See Psalms 17:10, note; Psalms 73:7, note. BUT I DELIGHT IN THY LAW - Though its observance should not be attended by any such results as seem to follow wickedness, though I am poor, emaciated, pale - disappointed, slandered, persecuted - though my lot in life is among the lowly and the despised - yet I will adhere to my purpose to keep thy law. It is, and it shall be, my delight, whatever may be the effects of so observing it. See...

EXPOSITION This is an "alphabetic psalm" of a more stringent character than any other. It consists of twenty-two stanzas, each of eight verses, every verse in each stanza beginning with its own proper letter—those of stanza 1 with _aleph_,_ _the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet; those of stanza 2 with _both_,_ _the second letter; and so on. The writer, having thus fettered himself, moves with some difficulty, but still has produced what has been justly called "a sweetly monotonous meditation" (Cheyne). He takes the Law for his one and only subject, and, further, seems to have bound himself, almost absolutely, to introduce the word "Law," or something which he regards as a synonym of "Law," into every verse. The synonyms are nine in number— 1. TORAH, "the Law"_ _itself; but not merely the Law given on Mount Sinai; rather, God's law in the widest sense, all whereby he

THEIR HEART IS AS FAT AS GREASE,.... Or tallow, a lump of it, fat or grease congealed. That is, the heart of the above proud persons, who abounded in riches, were glutted with the things of this world; had more than heart could wish, and so became proud and haughty: or their hearts were gross, sottish, senseless, and stupid, as persons fat at heart are; or as creatures over fat, which have little or no feeling: so these had no knowledge of the law of God, no sense of their duty, no remorse of conscience for sin; their hearts were hardened, and they past feeling, and given up to a reprobate mind; see Isaiah 6:9; The Targum is, "the imagination of their heart is become gross as fat:'' the Septuagint is, "curdled like milk"; that is, hardened, as Suidas s interprets it; [BUT] I DELIGHT IN THY LAW; after the inward man; as the apostle did,...

Psalms 119:64. _The earth, O LORD, is full of thy mercy: teach me thy statutes. Thou hast dealt well with thy servant, O LORD, according unto thy word. Teach me good judgment and knowledge: for I have believed thy commandments. Before I was afflicted I went astray:_ Prosperity had been to the psalmist like the gap in the hedge through which the sheep wander from the shepherd; but affliction had been to him like the prickly bushes that often stop the sheep from wandering still further, so he says, «Before I was afflicted I went astray:» Psalms 119:67. _But now have I kept thy word._ What a benefit, then, affliction had been to him; and what a blessing it often is to us! So, instead of dreading it, as we usually do, we ought to welcome it, and be on the look

Psalms 119 The Law Written on Their Hearts and the Praise of the Word This is the longest and most perfect Psalm in the whole collection. It is an alphabetical acrostic. It is composed of 22 sections, each having eight verses, 176 verses in all. Each section begins with a different letter of the alphabet and each verse of the different sections begins also with the corresponding letter of the section. Eight times each letter of the alphabet is mentioned in the 22 sections. The number eight in the Word has the meaning of resurrection, death is gone and life has come. Israel has passed from death to life and now extols the Word and the Law of God. The time has come when it is fulfilled what the Lord spoke through Jeremiah concerning the new covenant, “I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts.” We behold then in this Psalm the joy of Israel in knowing the Word

CXIX. PRAISE OF THE LAW. This is the longest and most artificial Ps. in the whole collection. It is divided into twenty-two strophes, each beginning with one of the twenty-two letters of the Heb. alphabet in regular order. Again each strophe contains eight verses, and each verse begins with the same letter which introduces the strophe. The number of strophes then is determined by the number of the Heb. letters. But what of the eight verses in each strophe? The Psalmist had derived from a kindred Ps., viz. Psalms 19, the eight synonyms for the conception Word of God and impresses these terms on his readers by introducing them all into each stanza of his work. So Cheyne, in his _Book of Psalms_ (1904), following D. H. Mü ller. It is right, however, to bear in mind that this theory involves considerable, though by no means extravagant or arbitrary, changes in the received text both of Psalm...

THEIR HEART IS AS FAT AS GREASE— Or, _Is gross, as with fat._ Or, _Gross as fat._ Houb. By this fatness of the heart, stupidity, dullness, and earthly-mindedness are designed, as _pinguis Minerva_ signifies among the Latins. The lean, membraneous parts, are, according to the naturalists, the only sensitive ones. It has been well observed, that the translation of this place in our Liturgy, _Their heart is as fat as brawn,_ is very improper; because, swine's flesh not being eaten among the Jews, they could have no knowledge of brawn; nor is there a word in their language to express it. JOD....