Psalm 139:10

Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(10) Even there . . .—The expressions “lead me,” “hold me,” are elsewhere used of the protecting and guiding providence of God (Psalm 5:8; Psalm 23:3; Psalm 27:11; Psalm 73:24). And yet the psalmist speaks here as if he were a guilty being trying to escape from the Divine notice. The truth is a profound one. Even when God discovers and overtakes those who guiltily try to hide from Him, it is to take them under His loving care.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

139:7-16 We cannot see God, but he can see us. The psalmist did not desire to go from the Lord. Whither can I go? In the most distant corners of the world, in heaven, or in hell, I cannot go out of thy reach. No veil can hide us from God; not the thickest darkness. No disguise can save any person or action from being seen in the true light by him. Secret haunts of sin are as open before God as the most open villanies. On the other hand, the believer cannot be removed from the supporting, comforting presence of his Almighty Friend. Should the persecutor take his life, his soul will the sooner ascend to heaven. The grave cannot separate his body from the love of his Saviour, who will raise it a glorious body. No outward circumstances can separate him from his Lord. While in the path of duty, he may be happy in any situation, by the exercise of faith, hope, and prayer.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Even there shall thy hand lead me - I shall find thee there; thy hand would be upon me; I should not have gone from thy presence.

And thy right hand shall hold me - Still hold me; still be laid upon me. I should find myself there, as certainly as here, in thy hand; and in the same sense - either to seize upon me if I went astray, or to protect me, if obedient, supported by thee in all the perils of the flight. God, still the same - the same in all respects - would be with me there as he is here.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

PSALM 139

Ps 139:1-24. After presenting the sublime doctrines of God's omnipresence and omniscience, the Psalmist appeals to Him, avowing his innocence, his abhorrence of the wicked, and his ready submission to the closest scrutiny. Admonition to the wicked and comfort to the pious are alike implied inferences from these doctrines.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

I could neither go thither without thy conduct, nor subsist there without thy powerful support, and much less could I go out of try sight; for a man may see many things which, are out of his power.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Even there shall thy hand lead me,.... For he could not get there with all the assistance of the wings of the morning, could they be had, without the leadings of divine Providence; and when there, being a good man, should experience the leadings of divine grace; let the people of God be where they will, he heads them as a parent his child, teaching him to go; and as a shepherd his flock, into green pastures, and to fountains of living water; he leads to himself, and to his Son by his Spirit; into communion and fellowship with them, and to a participation of all blessings grace; guides them with his counsel, and directs all their ways and going;

and thy right hand shall hold me; the Lord lays hold on his people, and apprehends them for himself, and claims his interest in them; he holds them in his ways, that they slip and fall not; he upholds them with the right hand of his righteousness, and they are safe; and he holds them from going into or on in wrong ways to their hurt.

Geneva Study Bible

Even there shall thy hand {f} lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

(f) Your power holds me so fast that there is no way I can escape from you.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

10. The thought in this context is not primarily that wherever he goes God’s providential care accompanies him, but that there is no place in the universe where he can escape from the control and authority of God. “Dextra Dei ubique.”

Psalm 139:10

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The future form אסּק, customary in the Aramaic, may be derived just as well from סלק (סלק), by means of the same mode of assimilation as in יסּב equals יסבּב, as from נסק (נסק), which latter is certainly only insecurely established by Daniel 6:24, להנסקה (cf. להנזקת, Ezra 4:22; הנפּק, Daniel 5:2), since the Nun, as in להנעלה, Daniel 4:3, can also be a compensation for the resolved doubling (vid., Bernstein in the Lexicon Chrestom. Kirschianae, and Levy s.v. נסק). אם with the simple future is followed by cohortatives (vid., on Psalm 73:16) with the equivalent אשּׂא among them: et si stratum facerem (mihi) infernum (accusative of the object as in Isaiah 58:5), etc. In other passages the wings of the sun (Malachi 4:2) and of the wind (Psalm 18:11) are mentioned, here we have the wings of the morning's dawn. Pennae aurorae, Eugubinus observes (1548), est velocissimus aurorae per omnem mundum decursus. It is therefore to be rendered: If I should lift wings (נשׂא כנפים as in Ezekiel 10:16, and frequently) such as the dawn of the morning has, i.e., could I fly with the swiftness with which the dawn of the morning spreads itself over the eastern sky, towards the extreme west and alight there. Heaven and Hades, as being that which is superterrestrial and subterrestrial, and the east and west are set over against one another. אחרית ים is the extreme end of the sea (of the Mediterranean with the "isles of the Gentiles"). In Psalm 139:10 follows the apodosis: nowhere is the hand of God, which governs everything, to be escaped, for dextera Dei ubique est. ואמר (not ואמר, Ezekiel 13:15), "therefore I spake," also has the value of a hypothetical protasis: quodsi dixerim. אך and חשׁך belongs together: merae tenebrae (vid: Psalm 39:6.); but ישׁוּפני is obscure. The signification secured to it of conterere, contundere, in Genesis 3:15; Job 9:17, which is followed by the lxx (Vulgate) καταπατήσει, is inappropriate to darkness. The signification inhiare, which may be deduced as possible from שׁאף, suits relatively better, yet not thoroughly well (why should it not have been יבלעני?). The signification obvelare, however, which one expects to find, and after which the Targum, Symmachus, Jerome, Saadia, and others render it, seems only to be guessed at from the connection, since שׁוּף has not this signification in any other instance, and in favour of it we cannot appeal either to נשׁף - whence נשׁף, which belongs together with נשׁב, נשׁם, and נפשׁ - or to עטף, the root of which is עת (עתה), or to צעף, whence צעיף, which does not signify to cover, veil, but according to Arab. ḍ‛f, to fold, fold together, to double. We must therefore either assign to ישׁוּפני the signification operiat me without being able to prove it, or we must put a verb of this signification in its place, viz., ישׂוּכני (Ewald) or יעוּפני (Bttcher), which latter is the more commendable here, where darkness (חשׁך, synon. עיפה, מעוּף) is the subject: and if I should say, let nothing but darkness cover me, and as night (the predicate placed first, as in Amos 4:13) let the light become about me, i.e., let the light become night that shall surround and cover me (בּעדני, poetic for בּעדי, like תּחתּני in 2 Samuel 22) - the darkness would spread abroad no obscurity (Psalm 105:28) that should extend beyond (מן) Thy piercing eye and remove me from Thee. In the word יאיר, too, the Hiphil signification is not lost: the night would give out light from itself, as if it were the day; for the distinction of day and night has no conditioning influence upon God, who is above and superior to all created things (der Uebercreatrliche), who is light in Himself. The two כ are correlative, as e.g., in 1 Kings 22:4. חשׁיכה (with a superfluous Jod) is an old word, but אורה (cf. Aramaic אורתּא) is a later one.