Psalm 102:10

Because of thine indignation and thy wrath: for thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(10) Indignation and thy wrath.—Comp. Psalm 90:7. The last part of the clause is a figure taken from the action of a whirlwind. (Comp. Job 27:20-21; Job 30:22.)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

102:1-11 The whole word of God is of use to direct us in prayer; but here, is often elsewhere, the Holy Ghost has put words into our mouths. Here is a prayer put into the hands of the afflicted; let them present it to God. Even good men may be almost overwhelmed with afflictions. It is our duty and interest to pray; and it is comfort to an afflicted spirit to unburden itself, by a humble representation of its griefs. We must say, Blessed be the name of the Lord, who both gives and takes away. The psalmist looked upon himself as a dying man; My days are like a shadow.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Because of thine indignation and thy wrath - Hebrew, "From the face of thine indignation," etc. That is - he regarded all his sufferings as proof of the indignation and wrath of God against him. See Psalm 90:7-9.

For thou hast lifted me up - In former times. Thou hadst given me prosperity; thou hadst given me an elevated and honorable place among men.

And cast me down - Thou hast brought me into a low condition, and I feel it all the more from the fact that I had enjoyed prosperity. Compare the notes at Psalm 30:7. The passage, however, is susceptible of another interpretation: "Thou hast lifted me up, and cast me away." That is, Thou hast lifted me from the ground as a storm or tempest takes up a light thing, and hast whirled me away. This idea occurs in Isaiah 22:18. See the notes at that passage. The former, however, seems to me to be the more correct interpretation.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10. lifted … cast me down—or, "cast me away" as stubble by a whirlwind (Isa 64:6).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Because of thine indignation and thy wrath; because I do not only conflict with men, but with the Almighty God, and with his anger.

For thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down; as a man lifts up a person or thing as high as he can, that he may cast it down to the ground with greater force. Or he aggravates his present reproach and misery by the consideration of that great honour and happiness to which God had formerly advanced him, as Job did, Job 29 Job 30, and the church, Lamentations 1:7.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Because of thine indignation and thy wrath,.... This was the burden of his complaint, what gave him the greatest uneasiness; not so much the reproach of his enemies, and his other outward afflictions, as the sense he had of God's wrath and indignation. The people of God are as deserving of his wrath as others; and when they are awakened to a sense of sin and danger, or the law enters into their consciences, it works wrath there, and leaves nothing but a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, till comfort is given; and under afflictive providences they are very ready to conclude, that the wrath of God is upon them; but this is only their apprehension of things; it is not in reality: for God has not appointed them to wrath, and has swore he will not be wroth with them; Christ has bore it for them, in their room and stead; and being justified by his blood and righteousness, they are saved from it; but then the sense they have of it is very terrible, and there is no rest, peace, and comfort in their souls, while under the apprehensions of it:

for thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down; as a man that, in wrestling, has the advantage of his antagonist, lifts him up as high as he can, that he may throw him with the greater force upon the ground; in like manner the psalmist thought the Lord was dealing with him: or this may express his changeable state and condition, sometimes lifted up, and sometimes cast down, and which is the case of every believer, more or less; all have their liftings up, and their castings down: when God first calls them by his grace, he raises them from a low estate, lifts them up out of an horrible pit, takes them from the dunghill, sets them among princes to inherit the throne of glory: when he comforts them with the consolations of his Spirit, he is the lifter up of their heads; when he grants his presence, and lifts up the light of his countenance: when he discovers his love, and makes their mountain to stand strong; when he shows them their interest in himself, as their covenant God, in Christ, as their Redeemer and Saviour, and grants them the communion of the Holy Ghost; and when their graces are in lively exercise, then is it a time of lifting up: and they are cast down when corruptions prevail, when grace is weak, when God hides his face, and when afflictions lie heavy on them: this was now the case of the psalmist, and perhaps the remembrance of his liftings up in former times was an aggravation of it.

Geneva Study Bible

Because of thine {h} indignation and thy wrath: for thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down.

(h) He shows that not only the afflictions moved him, but chiefly the feeling of God's displeasure.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

10. This suffering is the punishment of sin. The storm of God’s wrath has swept Israel away from its own land, and flung it down helpless in the land of exile. Thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down (A.V.) has been taken to mean that the bitterness of Israel’s present humiliation is intensified by the recollection of its past exaltation (cp. Lamentations 2:1), but it suits the context better to render For thou hast taken me up and flung me away, a metaphor from a hurricane. Cp. Job 27:21; Job 30:22; Isaiah 64:6. The same word is used of the banishment of Israel in Jeremiah 7:15, &c.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 10. - Because of thine indignation and thy wrath. "The bitterest ingredient of our cup of sorrow," says Dean Johnson, "is to know that it is owing to Jehovah's wrath and fierce anger for sin." For thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down. "Elevated me," i.e. "only to cast me down, and so make my affliction the greater." The allusion is probably to the former prosperity of the speaker, and of Israel generally, in their own land, and their present misery in Babylon (compare, however, Job 27:21; Job 30:22). Psalm 102:10

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Ashes are his bread (cf. Lamentations 3:16), inasmuch as he, a mourner, sits in ashes, and has thrown ashes all over himself, Job 2:8; Ezekiel 27:30. The infected שׁקּוי has שׁקּוּ equals שׁקּוּו for its principal form, instead of which it is שׁקּוּי in Hosea 2:7. "That Thou hast lifted me up and cast me down" is to be understood according to Job 30:22. First of all God has taken away the firm ground from under his feet, then from aloft He has cast him to the ground - an emblem of the lot of Israel, which is removed from its fatherland and cast into exile, i.e., into a strange land. In that passage the days of his life are כּצל נטוּי, like a lengthened shadow, which grows longer and longer until it is entirely lost in darkness, Psalm 109:23. Another figure follows: he there becomes like an (uprooted) plant which dries up.