Psalm 22:8

He trusted on the LORD that he would deliver him: let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(8) He trusted.—So the LXX. (Comp. Matthew 27:43.) So, too, Ewald among moderns. But generally the form gol (short for gôl) is taken as an imperative. Literally, roll thyself on God. (Comp. Psalm 37:5; Proverbs 16:3, margin.)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

22:1-10 The Spirit of Christ, which was in the prophets, testifies in this psalm, clearly and fully, the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. We have a sorrowful complaint of God's withdrawings. This may be applied to any child of God, pressed down, overwhelmed with grief and terror. Spiritual desertions are the saints' sorest afflictions; but even their complaint of these burdens is a sign of spiritual life, and spiritual senses exercised. To cry our, My God, why am I sick? why am I poor? savours of discontent and worldliness. But, Why hast thou forsaken me? is the language of a heart binding up its happiness in God's favour. This must be applied to Christ. In the first words of this complaint, he poured out his soul before God when he was upon the cross, Mt 27:46. Being truly man, Christ felt a natural unwillingness to pass through such great sorrows, yet his zeal and love prevailed. Christ declared the holiness of God, his heavenly Father, in his sharpest sufferings; nay, declared them to be a proof of it, for which he would be continually praised by his Israel, more than for all other deliverances they received. Never any that hoped in thee, were made ashamed of their hope; never any that sought thee, sought thee in vain. Here is a complaint of the contempt and reproach of men. The Saviour here spoke of the abject state to which he was reduced. The history of Christ's sufferings, and of his birth, explains this prophecy.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

He trusted on the Lord that he would deliver him - Margin, "He rolled himself on the Lord." The margin expresses the true sense of the Hebrew word. The idea is that of being under the pressure of a heavy burden, and of rolling it off, or casting it on another. Hence, the word is often used in the sense of committing to another; entrusting anything to another; confiding in another. Psalm 37:5, "commit thy way unto the Lord;" Margin, as in Hebrew: "Roll thy way upon the Lord." Proverbs 16:3, "commit thy works unto the Lord," Margin, as in Hebrew: "Roll." The language here is the taunting language of his enemies, and the meaning is that he had professed to commit himself to the Lord as if he were his friend; he had expressed confidence in God, and he believed that his cause was sate in His hand. This, too, was actually fulfilled in the ease of the Saviour. Matthew 27:43, "he trusted in God; let him deliver him now, if he will have him." It is one of the most remarkable instances of blindness and infatuation that has ever occurred in the world, that the Jews should have used this language in taunting the dying Redeemer, without even suspecting that they were fulfilling the prophecies, and demonstrating at the very time when they were reviling him that he was the true Messiah.

Let him deliver him - Let him come and save him. Since he professes to belong to God; since he claims that God loves him and regards him as his friend, let him come now and rescue one so dear to him. He is hopelessly abandoned by men. If God chooses to have one so abject, so despised, so forsaken, so helpless, let him come now and take him as his own. We will not rescue him; we will do nothing to save him, for we do not need him. If God wants him, let him come and save him. What blasphemy! What an exhibition of the dreadful depravity of the human heart was manifested in the crucifixion of the Redeemer!

Seeing he delighted in him - Margin, "if he delight in him." The correct rendering is," for he delighted in him." That is, it was claimed by the sufferer that God delighted in him. If this is so, say they, let him come and rescue one so dear to himself. Let him show his friendship for this vagrant, this impostor, this despised and worthless man

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

8. trusted on the Lord—literally, "rolled"—that is, his burden (Ps 37:5; Pr 16:3) on the Lord. This is the language of enemies sporting with his faith in the hour of his desertion.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

He trusted on the Lord; he rolled himself

upon the Lord; where they seem to scoff not only at the thing, but at the expression. Their sense is, He pretended that he did wholly lean, and rest himself, and cast his cares upon God, and quietly and confidently commit all his affairs to his providence, assuring himself of a happy issue from him.

That he would deliver him; or, without any supplement, let him deliver him, as it follows, though the Hebrew words be differing. And so the same thing is twice repeated, to show both the vehemency of their hatred, and their confidence of success against him. They thought his case desperate, and past all hope and remedy.

Seeing he delighted in him, as he useth to allege and boast, but how vainly the event now showeth.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

He trusted on the Lord, that he would deliver him,.... Not that they spoke in a deriding way of the object of his trust, for, as impious as they were, this they did not do; but of his trust in the Lord, which they looked upon to be a false one, as would appear by his not being delivered, as he trusted; but his confidence was a well grounded one, though jeered at by these men, and he was delivered in the Lord's own time and way from all his enemies, and out of all his troubles;

let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him; this is another ironical sarcastic flout, not at God, but at Christ, and at his profession of trust in God, his claim of interest in his favour, and of relation to him as being the Son of his love, in whom he was well pleased; he always was the delight of his Father; he expressed his well pleasedness in him at his baptism, and transfiguration on the mount; he took pleasure in him while he was suffering and dying in the room and stead of his people; and he delivered him, raised him from the dead, and brought him into a large place, because he delighted in him, Psalm 18:19; These very words were said by the Jews concerning Christ, as he hung upon the cross, Matthew 27:43.

Geneva Study Bible

He trusted on the LORD that he would deliver him: let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

8. ‘Roll it upon Jehovah! let him deliver him:

Let him rescue him, for he delighteth in him.’

Ironically they bid the sufferer ‘roll’ i.e. commit his cause to Jehovah. The verb is certainly imperative, as in Psalm 37:5; Proverbs 16:3; though the Versions all give the perfect tense, and the words are quoted in that form in Matthew 27:43. Usage makes it certain that the subject in the last clause is Jehovah, as in Psalm 18:19.

There is a remarkable parallel to this passage in Wis 2:16 ff. The ungodly say of the righteous man: “He maketh his boast that God is his Father. Let us see if his words be true, and let us prove what shall happen in the end of him. For if the just man be the son of God, he will help him, and deliver him from the hand of his enemies.” The whole passage is worth comparing.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 8. - He trusted on the Lord that he would deliver him. This is a translation of the Septuagint Version rather than of the Hebrew text, which runs, Trust in the Lord (literally, Roll [thy care] upon the Lord): let him deliver him. Let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him. St. Matthew has put it on record that this text was actually cited by the scribes and elders who witnessed the Crucifixion, and applied to our Lord in scorn (Matthew 27:43). They quoted apparently from the Septuagint, but with an inaccuracy common at the time, when books were scarce, and persons had to depend on their memory of what they had occasionally heard read. Psalm 22:8

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

(Heb.: 22:7-9)The sufferer complains of the greatness of his reproach, in order to move Jahve, who is Himself involved therein, to send him speedy succour. Notwithstanding his cry for help, he is in the deepest affliction without rescue. Every word of Psalm 22:7 is echoed in the second part of the Book of Isaiah. There, as here, Israel is called a worm, Isaiah 41:14; there all these traits of suffering are found in the picture of the Servant of God, Isaiah 49:7; Isaiah 53:3, cf. Isaiah 50:6, and especially Isaiah 52:14 "so marred was His appearance, that He no longer looked like a man." תּולעת is more particularly the kermes, or cochineal (vermiculus, whence color vermiculi, vermeil, vermiglio); but the point of comparison in the present instance is not the blood-red appearance, but the suffering so utterly defenceless and even ignominious. עם is gen. subj., like גּוי, Isaiah 49:7. Jerome well renders the ἐξουθένωμα λαοῦ of the lxx by abjectio (Tertullian: nullificamen) plebis, not populi. The ἐξεμυκτήρισάν με, by which the lxx translates ילעיגו לי, is used by Luke, Luke 23:35, cf. Luke 16:14, in the history of the Passion; fulfilment and prediction so exactly coincide, that no more adequate expressions can be found in writing the gospel history than those presented by prophecy. In הפטיר בּשׂפה, what appears in other instances as the object of the action (to open the mouth wide, diducere labia), is regarded as the means of its execution; so that the verbal notion being rendered complete has its object in itself: to make an opening with the mouth, cf. פּער בּפה, Job 16:10, נתן בּקול Psalm 68:34; Ges. 138, 1, rem. 3. The shaking of the head is, as in Psalm 109:25, cf. Psalm 44:15; Psalm 64:9, a gesture of surprise and astonishment at something unexpected and strange, not a προσνεύειν approving the injury of another, although נוּע, נוּד, נוּט, νεύ-ω, nu-t-o, nic-to, neigen, nicken, all form one family of roots. In Psalm 22:9 the words of the mockers follow without לאמר. גּל is not the 3 praet. (lxx, cf. Matthew 27:43) like אור, בּושׁ; it is not only in Piel (Jeremiah 11:20; Jeremiah 20:12, where גּלּיתי equals גּלּלתּי, Ew. 121, a) that it is transitive, but even in Kal; nor is it inf. absol. in the sense of the imperative (Hitz., Bttch.), although this infinitive form is found, but always only as an inf. intens. (Numbers 23:25; Ruth 2:16, cf. Isaiah 24:19); but, in accordance with the parallels Psalm 37:5 (where it is written גּול), Proverbs 16:3, cf. Psalm 55:23; 1 Peter 5:7, it is imperat.: roll, viz., thy doing and thy suffering to Jahve, i.e., commit it to Him. The mockers call out this גּל to the sufferer, and the rest they say of him with malicious looks askance. כּי in the mouth of the foes is not confirmatory as in Psalm 18:20, but a conditional ἐάν (in case, provided that).