Psalm 21:10

Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the children of men.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(10) Their fruit.—More fully, “fruit of the womb” (Psalm 127:3; Psalm 132:11).

Benson Commentary

Psalm 21:10-11. Their fruit shalt thou destroy — Their children. God will take away both root and branch; the parents and all that wicked race. For they intended evil against thee — That is, against God; not directly, but by consequence, because it was against David, whom God had anointed, or against the Messiah, of whom he was a type, and against the Lord’s people, injuries done to whom, God takes to be done to himself, Zechariah 2:8. They imagined a mischievous device, which they are not able to perform — This clause seems to be added to teach us this great and necessary lesson, that men are justly punished by God for their wicked intentions, although they be hindered from the execution of them, contrary to what some Jewish doctors, and others, have taught. “Vengeance came upon the Jews to the uttermost, because of their intended malice against Christ. They, like Joseph’s brethren, thought evil against him, but they were not able to perform it, for God meant it unto good, to bring it to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive, Genesis 50:20. So let all the designs of ungodly men against thy church, O Lord, through thy power of bringing good out of evil, turn to her advantage; and let all men be convinced that no weapon formed against thee can prosper.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

21:7-13 The psalmist teaches to look forward with faith, and hope, and prayer upon what God would further do. The success with which God blessed David, was a type of the total overthrow of all Christ's enemies. Those who might have had Christ to rule and save them, but rejected him and fought against him, shall find the remembrance of it a worm that dies not. God makes sinners willing by his grace, receives them to his favour, and delivers them from the wrath to come. May he exalt himself, by his all-powerful grace, in our hearts, destroying all the strong-holds of sin and Satan. How great should be our joy and praise to behold our Brother and Friend upon the throne, and for all the blessings we may expect from him! yet he delights in his exalted state, as enabling him to confer happiness and glory on poor sinners, who are taught to love and trust in him.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Their fruit - Their offspring; their children; their posterity, for so the parallelism demands. The "fruit" is that which the tree produces; and hence, the word comes to be applied to children as the production of the parent. See this use of the word in Genesis 30:2; Exodus 21:22; Deuteronomy 28:4, Deuteronomy 28:11, Deuteronomy 28:18; Psalm 127:3; Hosea 9:16; Micah 6:7.

Shalt thou destroy from the earth - Thou shalt utterly destroy them. This is in accordance with the statement so often made in the Scriptures, and with what so often occurs in fact, that the consequences of the sins of parents pass over to their posterity, and that they suffer in consequence of those sins. Compare Exodus 20:5; Exodus 34:7; Leviticus 20:5; Leviticus 26:39; compare the notes at Romans 5:12-21.

And their seed - Their posterity.

From among the children of men - From among men, or the human family. That is, they would be entirely cut off from the earth. The truth taught here is, that the wicked will ultimately be destroyed, and that God will obtain a complete triumph over them, or that the kingdom of righteousness shall be at length completely established. A time will come when truth and justice shall be triumphant, when all the wicked shall be removed out of the way; when all that oppose God and his cause shall be destroyed, and when God shall show, by thus removing and punishing the wicked, that he is the Friend of all that is true, and good, and right. The "idea" of the psalmist probably was that this would yet occur on the earth; the "language" is such, also, as may be applied to that ultimate state, in the future world, when all the wicked shall be destroyed, and the righteous shall be no more troubled with them.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10. fruit—children (Ps 37:25; Ho 9:16).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Their fruit; either,

1. The fruit of their labours. Or rather,

2. Their seed or children, as it is explained in the next branch, oft called a man’s fruit, as Deu 28:4 Psalm 127:3 132:11 Lamentations 2:20. God will take away both root and branch, the parents and all that wicked race.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Their fruit shall thou destroy from the earth,.... Meaning the offspring of wicked men; the fruit of the womb, Psalm 127:3; the same with their seed in the next clause:

and their seed from among the children of men; see Psalm 37:28; which must be understood of such of their seed, and offspring as are as they were when born; are never renewed and sanctified, but are like their parents; as the Jews were, their parents were vipers, and they were serpents, the generation of them; and were the children of the devil, and did his works: now these passages had their accomplishment in the Jews, when the day of God's wrath burnt them up, and left them neither root nor branch, Malachi 4:1; and in the Pagan empire, when every mountain and island were moved out of their places, and the Heathen perished out of the land, Revelation 6:14; and will be further accomplished when the Lord shall punish the wicked woman Jezebel, the antichristian harlot, and kill her children with death, Revelation 2:23; see Psalm 104:35.

Geneva Study Bible

Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the children of men.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

10. Even their posterity shall be utterly destroyed. Cp. Psalm 9:5; Psalm 37:28. Fruit = children, ‘the fruit of the womb’ (Lamentations 2:20).

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 10. - Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth; i.e. their offspring or progeny. Joab, by David' s orders, remained in Edom "until he had cut off every male" (1 Kings 11:16). And their seed from among the children of men. The second clause, as so often, re-echoes the first; without adding anything to it. Psalm 21:10

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

(Heb.: 21:10-11) Hitherto the Psalm has moved uniformly in synonymous dipodia, now it becomes agitated; and one feels from its excitement that the foes of the king are also the people's foes. True as it is, as Hupfeld takes it, that לעת פּניך sounds like a direct address to Jahve, Psalm 21:10 nevertheless as truly teaches us quite another rendering. The destructive effect, which in other passages is said to proceed from the face of Jahve, Psalm 34:17; Leviticus 20:6; Lamentations 4:16 (cf. ἔχει θεὸς ἔκδικον ὄμμα), is here ascribed to the face, i.e., the personal appearing (2 Samuel 17:11) of the king. David's arrival did actually decide the fall of Rabbath Ammon, of whose inhabitants some died under instruments of torture and others were cast into brick-kilns, 2 Samuel 12:26. The prospect here moulds itself according to this fate of the Ammonites. כּתנּוּר אשׁ is a second accusative to תּשׁיתנו, thou wilt make them like a furnace of fire, i.e., a burning furnace, so that like its contents they shall entirely consume by fire (synecdoche continentis pro contento). The figure is only hinted at, and is differently applied to what it is in Lamentations 5:10, Malachi 4:1. Psalm 21:10 and Psalm 21:10 are intentionally two long rising and falling wave-like lines, to which succeed, in Psalm 21:11, two short lines; the latter describe the peaceful gleaning after the fiery judgment of God that has been executed by the hand of David. פּרימו, as in Lamentations 2:20; Hosea 9:16, is to be understood after the analogy of the expression פּרי הבּטן. It is the fate of the Amalekites (cf. Psalm 9:6.), which is here predicted of the enemies of the king.