Psalm 66:9

Which holdeth our soul in life, and suffereth not our feet to be moved.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(9) Which holdeth . . .—The LXX. literally, which putteth our soul into life, i.e., keeps us alive, as the parallelism shows.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

66:8-12 The Lord not only preserves our temporal life, but maintains the spiritual life which he has given to believers. By afflictions we are proved, as silver in the fire. The troubles of the church will certainly end well. Through various conflicts and troubles, the slave of Satan escapes from his yoke, and obtains joy and peace in believing: through much tribulation the believer must enter into the kingdom of God.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Which holdeth our soul in life - Margin, as in Hebrew, putteth. That is, He has put (or placed) us in a state of safety. The word rendered "in life" means literally "among the living." The word soul here is equivalent to us - ourselves; and the idea is, that he keeps us among the living. What is here said of this special deliverance is true of all people at all times, that they owe the fact that they are among the living to the care of God; or, it is because he puts them among the living, or keeps them alive.

And suffereth not our feet to be moved - That is, from their firm position of safety. The idea is taken from one who is walking, and who is kept from slipping or falling.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

9. holdeth … in life—literally, "putteth our soul in life"; that is, out of danger (Ps 30:3; 49:15).

to be moved—(Compare Ps 10:6; 55:22).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Which holdeth our soul in life; who by a succession of miracles of mercy hath kept us alive in the midst of a thousand deaths, to which we were exposed, and hath restored us to life, when we were like dead men, and dry bones scattered at the mouth of the grave.

To be moved, to wit, so as to fall into mischief and utter ruin, as our enemies designed.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Which holdeth our soul in life,.... Or, "putteth our soul in life" (b), or "among the living", which is not to be understood of infusing a living soul in man, nor of the preservation of natural life, which is common to all men; but of appointing and ordaining them unto eternal life, as the Targum; and of procuring it for them by Christ; and of implanting a principle of spiritual life in them, by his Spirit and grace; and of the preservation of the principle of life, that it be not lost; and of giving them a right and title to eternal life, and that itself: all which are a sufficient reason, and powerful argument, to bless our God, and praise his name. It follows:

and suffereth not our feet to be moved; that is, not to be greatly moved; or if moved so as to slip and fall, yet not so as to fall finally and totally; see Psalm 55:22.

(b) "qui posuit", V. L. Pagninus, Musculus, Vatablus; "ponene", Montanus; "qui ponit", Gejerus, Michaelis.

Geneva Study Bible

Which {f} holdeth our soul in life, and suffereth not our feet to be moved.

(f) He signifies some special benefit that God had showed to his Church of the Jews, in delivering them from some great danger: of which he promises that the Gentiles will also be partakers.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

9. Who hath set our soul in life,

And not suffered our foot to be moved.

The nation was on the point of death and ruin, but God preserved and upheld it. The tenses indicate that the words are not the statement of a general truth (as A.V. renders them), but refer particularly to the deliverance from the trial described in the following verses.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 9. - Which holdeth our soul in life; rather, which setteth (or, hath set) our soul in life - implying a previous condition of great danger. And suffereth not our feet to be moved. In allusion, perhaps, to a threatened captivity. Psalm 66:9

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The character of the event by which the truth has been verified that the God who redeemed Israel out of Egypt still ever possesses and exercises to the full His ancient sovereign power, is seen from this reiterated call to the peoples to share in Israel's Gloria. God has averted the peril of death and overthrow from His people: He has put their soul in life (בּחיּים, like בּישׁע in Psalm 12:6), i.e., in the realm of life; He has not abandoned their foot to tottering unto overthrow (mowT the substantive, as in Psalm 121:3; cf. the reversed construction in Psalm 55:23). For God has cast His people as it were into a smelting-furnace or fining-pot in order to purify and to prove them by suffering; - this is a favourite figure with Isaiah and Jeremiah, but is also found in Zechariah 13:9; Malachi 3:3. Ezekiel 19:9 is decisive concerning the meaning of מצוּדה, where הביא במצודות signifies "to bring into the holds or prisons;" besides, the figure of the fowling-net (although this is also called מצוּדה as well as מצודה) has no footing here in the context. מצוּדה (vid., Psalm 18:3) signifies specula, and that both a natural and an artificial watch-post on a mountain; here it is the mountain-hold or prison of the enemy, as a figure of the total loss of freedom. The laying on of a heavy burden mentioned by the side of it in Psalm 66:11 also accords well with this. מוּעקה, a being oppressed, the pressure of a burden, is a Hophal formation, like מטּה, a being spread out, Isaiah 8:8; cf. the similar masculine forms in Psalm 69:3; Isaiah 8:13; Isaiah 14:6; Isaiah 29:3. The loins are mentioned because when carrying heavy loads, which one has to stoop down in order to take up, the lower spinal region is called into exercise. אנושׁ is frequently (Psalm 9:20., Psalm 10:18; Psalm 56:2, Isaiah 51:12; 2 Chronicles 14:10) the word used for tyrants as being wretched mortals, perishable creatures, in contrast with their all the more revolting, imperious, and self-deified demeanour. God so ordered it, that "wretched men" rode upon Israel's head. Or is it to be interpreted: He caused them to pass over Israel (cf. Psalm 129:3; Isaiah 51:23)? It can scarcely mean this, since it would then be in dorso nostro, which the Latin versions capriciously substitute. The preposition ל instead of על is used with reference to the phrase ישׁב ל: sitting upon Israel's head, God caused them to ride along, so that Israel was not able to raise its head freely, but was most ignominiously wounded in its self-esteem. Fire and water are, as in Isaiah 43:2, a figure of vicissitudes and perils of the most extreme character. Israel was nigh to being burnt up and drowned, but God led it forth לרויה, to an abundant fulness, to abundance and superabundance of prosperity. The lxx, which renders εἰς ἀναψυχήν (Jerome absolutely: in refrigerium), has read לרוחה; Symmachus, εἰς εὐρυχωρίαν, probably reading לרחבה (Psalm 119:45; Psalm 18:20). Both give a stronger antithesis. But the state of straitness or oppression was indeed also a state of privation.