Psalm 43:2

For thou art the God of my strength: why dost thou cast me off? why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

43:6-11 The way to forget our miseries, is to remember the God of our mercies. David saw troubles coming from God's wrath, and that discouraged him. But if one trouble follow hard after another, if all seem to combine for our ruin, let us remember they are all appointed and overruled by the Lord. David regards the Divine favour as the fountain of all the good he looked for. In the Saviour's name let us hope and pray. One word from him will calm every storm, and turn midnight darkness into the light of noon, the bitterest complaints into joyful praises. Our believing expectation of mercy must quicken our prayers for it. At length, is faith came off conqueror, by encouraging him to trust in the name of the Lord, and to stay himself upon his God. He adds, And my God; this thought enabled him to triumph over all his griefs and fears. Let us never think that the God of our life, and the Rock of our salvation, has forgotten us, if we have made his mercy, truth, and power, our refuge. Thus the psalmist strove against his despondency: at last his faith and hope obtained the victory. Let us learn to check all unbelieving doubts and fears. Apply the promise first to ourselves, and then plead it to God.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

For thou art the God of my strength - See Psalm 18:2, note; Psalm 28:7, note.

Why dost thou cast me off? - As if I were none of thine; as if I were wholly abandoned. Compare the notes at Psalm 22:1. The word rendered "cast off" - זנח zânach - is a word which implies strong disgust or loathing: "Why dost thou cast me off as a loathsome or disgusting object?" Compare Revelation 3:16. The Hebrew word means properly to be foul, to be rancid, to stink: then, to be loathsome or abominable; and then, to treat or regard anything as such. Compare Hosea 8:3, Hosea 8:5; Isaiah 19:6.

Why go I mourning ... - See the notes at Psalm 42:9. This expression, with others of a similar character, renders it morally certain that this psalm was composed by the same person, and with reference to the same circumstances, as the former.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2. God of my strength—by covenant relation my stronghold (Ps 18:1).

cast me off—in scorn.

because—or, "in," that is, in such circumstances of oppression.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

For thou art the God of my strength,.... Who being the strong and mighty God was able to deliver and save him, as well as to plead his cause; and was the author and giver of strength, natural and spiritual, to him; and was the strength of his heart, life and salvation; and is a good reason why he committed his cause unto him;

why doest thou cast me off? this is the language of unbelief: it being what was not in reality, only in appearance: the psalmist was ready to conclude he was cast off and rejected of God, because he was afflicted and left in a desolate condition by him, and he did not immediately arise to his help and deliverance, and had withdrawn the light of his countenance from him; but God does not cast off or reject any of his people; they always continue in his love, and in his covenant, and in the hands of his Son; they are always in his sight and family, and shall never perish eternally; and whoever casts them off, or casts them out, he will not;

why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? See Gill on Psalm 42:9.

Geneva Study Bible

For thou art the God of my strength: why dost thou cast me off? why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

2. the God of my strength] Or, my stronghold God: my natural refuge and protector. Cp. Psalm 18:2; Psalm 42:9. But facts seem to contradict faith, and the expostulation of Psalm 42:9 is repeated in a stronger form: Why hast thou cast me off (Psalm 44:9; Psalm 44:23)? and in the next line a more emphatic form of the verb go is used, meaning go about by myself.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 2. - For thou art the God of my strength; i.e. the God in whom is all my strength (Psalm 28:7). Why dost thou cast me off? An equivalent to the "Why hast thou forgotten me?" of Psalm 42:9. Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? Repeated, with the variation of a single word, from Psalm 42:9. Psalm 43:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Elohimic Judica (the introit of the so-called Cross or Passion Sunday which opens the celebritas Passionis), with which the supplicatory and plaintive first strophe of the Psalm begins, calls to mind the Jehovic Judica in Psalm 7:9; Psalm 26:1; Psalm 35:1, Psalm 35:24 : judge me, i.e., decide my cause (lxx κρῖνόν με, Symmachus κρῖνόν μοι). ריבה has the tone upon the ultima before the ריבי which begins with the half-guttural ר, as is also the case in Psalm 74:22; Psalm 119:154. The second prayer runs: vindica me a gente impia; מן standing for contra in consequence of a constr. praegnans. לא־חסיד is here equivalent to one practising no חסד towards men, that is to say, one totally wanting in that חסד, by which God's חסד is to be imitated and repaid by man in his conduct towards his fellow-men. There is some uncertainty whether by אישׁ one chief enemy, the leader of all the rest, is intended to be mentioned side by side with the unloving nation, or whether the special manner of his enemies is thus merely individualised. עולה means roguish, mischievous conduct, utterly devoid of all sense of right. In Psalm 43:2 the poet establishes his petition by a twofold Why. He loves God and longs after Him, but in the mirror of his present condition he seems to himself like one cast off by Him. This contradiction between his own consciousness and the inference which he is obliged to draw from his afflicted state cannot remain unsolved. אלהי מעזּי, God of my fortress, is equivalent to who is my fortress. Instead of אלך we here have the form אתהלּך, of the slow deliberate gait of one who is lost in his own thoughts and feelings. The sting of his pain is his distance from the sanctuary of his God. In connection with Psalm 43:3 one is reminded of Psalm 57:4 and Exodus 15:13, quite as much as of Psalm 42:9. "Light and truth" is equivalent to mercy and truth. What is intended is the light of mercy or loving-kindness which is coupled with the truth of fidelity to the promises; the light, in which the will or purpose of love, which is God's most especial nature, becomes outwardly manifest. The poet wishes to be guided by these two angels of God; he desires that he may be brought (according tot he Chethb of the Babylonian text יבואוני, "let come upon me;" but the אל which follows does not suit this form) to the place where his God dwells and reveals Himself. "Tabernacles" is, as in Psalm 84:2; Psalm 46:5, an amplificative designation of the tent, magnificent in itself and raised to special honour by Him who dwells therein.