Psalm 79:2

The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(2) In addition to references in Margin see Deuteronomy 28:26.

Saints.—Heb., chasîdîm. (See Note, Psalm 16:10.) Here with definite allusion to the Assdœans of 1 Maccabees 7.

Benson Commentary

Psalm 79:2-3. The dead bodies of thy servants — Either, 1st, Of thy faithful and holy servants, whom they used as cruelly as the worst of the people. Or, 2d, Of the Jews in general, whom, though most of them were wicked, he calls God’s servants and saints, because they were such by profession; and some of them were really such; and the Chaldeans neither knew nor regarded those that were so, but promiscuously destroyed all that came in their way; have they given to be meat to the fowls, &c. — By casting them out, like dung upon the earth, and not suffering any to bury them. This is the fourth of those calamities which are bewailed in this Psalm: and a dreadful one it is. For “to behold, or even imagine,” as Dr. Horne observes, “the heaps of slaughtered bodies lying unburied, and exposed to birds and beasts of prey, is inexpressibly shocking to humanity.” Their blood they shed like water — Plentifully and contemptuously, valuing it no more than common water; and there was none to bury them — Because their friends, who should have done it, were either slain or fled, or were not permitted, or durst not undertake to perform that office to them.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

79:1-5 God is complained to: whither should children go but to a Father able and willing to help them? See what a change sin made in the holy city, when the heathen were suffered to pour in upon them. God's own people defiled it by their sins, therefore he suffered their enemies to defile it by their insolence. They desired that God would be reconciled. Those who desire God's favour as better than life, cannot but dread his wrath as worse than death. In every affliction we should first beseech the Lord to cleanse away the guilt of our sins; then he will visit us with his tender mercies.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The dead bodies of thy servants ... - They have slain them, and left them unburied. See 2 Chronicles 36:17. This is a description of widespread carnage and slaughter, such as we know occurred at the time when Jerusalem was taken by the Chaldeans. At such a time, it is not probable that the Chaldeans would pause to bury the slain, nor is it probable that they would give opportunity to the captive Hebrews to remain to bury them. That would occur, therefore, which often occurs in war, that the slain would be left on the field to be devoured by wild animals and by the fowls of heaven.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2, 3. (Compare Jer 15:3; 16:4).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Of thy servants; either,

1. Of thy faithful and holy servants, whom they used as cruelly as the worst of the people. Or,

2. Of the Jews, whom, though the generality of them were very wicked, he calleth God’s servants and saints, because they were all such by profession, and some of them were really such; and the Chaldeans did never know nor regard those that were so, but promiscuously destroyed all that came in their way. Given to be meat unto the fowls of heaven, by casting them out like dung upon the face of the earth, and not suffering any to bury them.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven,.... For such there were, both at the time of the Babylonish captivity, and in the times of Antiochus, who were good men, and served the Lord, and yet suffered in the common calamity. Nicanor, a general of Demetrius, in the time of the Maccabees, seems to have been guilty of such a fact as this, since, when he was slain, his tongue was given in pieces to the fowls, and the reward of his madness was hung up before the temple, as in the Apocrypha:

"And when he had cut out the tongue of that ungodly Nicanor, he commanded that they should give it by pieces unto the fowls, and hang up the reward of his madness before the temple.'' (2 Maccabees 15:33)

the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth; this clause and the following verse are applied to a case in the times of the Maccabees, when sixty men of the Assideans were slain, religious, devout, and holy men, so called from the very word here translated "saints";

"Now the Assideans were the first among the children of Israel that sought peace of them:'' (1 Maccabees 7:13)

"The flesh of thy saints have they cast out, and their blood have they shed round about Jerusalem, and there was none to bury them.'' (1 Maccabees 7:17)

Geneva Study Bible

The {b} dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth.

(b) The prophets show to what extremities God sometimes allows his Church to fall to exercise their faith, before he sets his hand to deliver them.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

2. The horrors of a remorseless slaughter were aggravated by the disgrace of the corpses being left unburied, in accordance with the threats of the law (Deuteronomy 28:26) and prophets (Jeremiah 7:33; Jeremiah 8:2; Jeremiah 9:22; Jeremiah 15:3; Jeremiah 16:4; Jeremiah 19:7).

thy servants … thy saints] These titles are not meant to plead Israel’s merits, but Israel’s relationship to God in virtue of His covenant with them (Psalm 74:20; Psalm 50:5).

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 2. - The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to Be meat unto the fowls of the heaven. A common incident of warfare (see the Assyrian sculptures, passim). The flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth; or, of the land. Hyaenas and jackals would dispute the flesh of the slain with vultures and crows. Psalm 79:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Psalm begins with a plaintive description, and in fact one that makes complaint to God. Its opening sounds like Lamentations 1:10. The defiling does not exclude the reducing to ashes, it is rather spontaneously suggested in Psalm 74:7 in company with wilful incendiarism. The complaint in Psalm 79:1 reminds one of the prophecy of Micah, Micah 3:12, which in its time excited so much vexation (Jeremiah 26:18); and Psalm 79:2, Deuteronomy 28:26. עבדיך confers upon those who were massacred the honour of martyrdom. The lxx renders לעיים by εἰς ὀπωροφυλάκιον, a flourish taken from Isaiah 1:8. Concerning the quotation from memory in 1 Macc. 7:16f., vid., the introduction to Psalm 74. The translator of the originally Hebrew First Book of the Maccabees even in other instances betrays an acquaintance with the Greek Psalter (cf. 1 Macc. 1:37, καὶ ἐξέχεαν αἷμα ἀθῷον κύκλῳ τοῦ ἁγιάσματος). "As water," i.e., (cf. Deuteronomy 15:23) without setting any value upon it and without any scruple about it. Psalm 44:14 is repeated in Psalm 79:4. At the time of the Chaldaean catastrophe this applied more particularly to the Edomites.