Psalm 95:9

When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(9) Proved me.—Properly, of trying metals. This term is used of man’s attitude towards Providence, both in a good and bad sense (Malachi 3:10; Malachi 3:15).

And saw my work.—Better (as in Isaiah 49:15), Yea, they saw my works, watched, that is, God’s dealings with ever the same readiness to murmur and repine, and try the Divine patience.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

95:7-11 Christ calls upon his people to hear his voice. You call him Master, or Lord; then be his willing, obedient people. Hear the voice of his doctrine, of his law, and in both, of his Spirit: hear and heed; hear and yield. Christ's voice must be heard to-day. This day of opportunity will not last always; improve it while it is called to-day. Hearing the voice of Christ is the same with believing. Hardness of heart is at the bottom of all distrust of the Lord. The sins of others ought to be warnings to us not to tread in their steps. The murmurings of Israel were written for our admonition. God is not subject to such passions as we are; but he is very angry at sin and sinners. That certainly is evil, which deserves such a recompence; and his threatenings are as sure as his promises. Let us be aware of the evils of our hearts, which lead us to wander from the Lord. There is a rest ordained for believers, the rest of everlasting refreshment, begun in this life, and perfected in the life to come. This is the rest which God calls his rest.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

When your fathers - Your ancestors. See this verse explained in the notes on Hebrews 3:9.

Tempted me - Tried me; tried my patience, to see how much I would bear. This does not mean, as it commonly does now with us, to place inducements before one to lead him into sin, but to try one - to put his patience to the test. This they did, in the case referred to, by their obduracy and evil conduct.

Proved me - See the notes at Hebrews 3:9. "And saw my work." Though they constantly saw my work; saw my gracious interpositions; saw what I was doing for their own good.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

8-11. warning against neglect; and this is sustained by citing the melancholy fate of their rebellious ancestors, whose provoking insolence is described by quoting the language of God's complaint (Nu 14:11) of their conduct at Meribah and Massah, names given (Ex 17:7) to commemorate their strife and contention with Him (Ps 78:18, 41).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

When; or, in which place; which may belong either to Meribah and Massah, or to the wilderness last mentioned. Or, surely, as this word is oft used in Scripture, as hath been observed once and again.

And saw; or, although or after that they saw or had seen; which is added as a just and great aggravation of their unbelief, after such a sensible and evident experience of God’s power and goodness to them.

My works; both my works of mercy, which gave them abundant cause to trust me; and my works of justice, for which they had reason to fear and please me. Heb. my work, to wit, that great and stupendous work of bringing my people out of Egypt with a strong hand, and of conducting them safely through the Red Sea into the wilderness, and of destroying the Egyptians. For not many more of God’s great works were done before they came to Meribah.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

When your fathers tempted me,.... Or, "where" (i); that is, in the wilderness, particularly at Meribah and Massah; it was Christ they tempted, as appears from 1 Corinthians 10:9.

proved me: had proof of his power, goodness, and mercy, in providing for them, and in the preservation of them: or "tried" (k) him, his patience, longsuffering, and forbearance, by their repeated provocations of him:

and saw my work; his work of judgment upon their enemies the Egyptians, by inflicting plagues upon them, and by the destruction of Pharaoh and his host at the Red sea; and his work of goodness to them, in bringing them out of bondage, leading them through the Red sea safely, raining manna about their tents, and giving them water out of the rock; or particularly his work in consuming them in the wilderness, as he swore he would, and which they saw with their eyes, and was near forty years a doing. The Syriac version joins the "forty years" at the beginning of the next verse to this; the phrase standing in such a situation as to be connected with both, and is true of each; so the apostle uses it both ways, Hebrews 3:9.

(i) "quo", Pagninus, Montanus; "ubi", V. L. Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Gejerus, so Ainsworth. (k) "explorarunt me", Tigurine version, Piscator, Gejerus.

Geneva Study Bible

When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

9. The Israelites tempted and tried God by faithless doubts of His goodness and arbitrary demands that He should prove His power (Exodus 17:2; Exodus 17:7; Psalm 78:18; Psalm 78:41; Psalm 78:56).

and saw my work] While they on their part tempted God, He on His part was ever working out His providential plan, by mercy and by chastisement. But it suits the context better to render, Though they had seen my work. (For the construction cp. Nehemiah 6:1.) Though they had just had proof of God’s power and goodwill in the Exodus, it had not taught them to trust Him. Cp. Numbers 14:22.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 9. - When your fathers tempted me (see Exodus 17:2, 7). Proved me; or, "tested me" - put my power and goodness to the proof. And (rather, even) saw my work; i.e. "saw the water gush forth from the rock, when at my command Moses struck it" (Exodus 17:6). Psalm 95:9

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The second decastich begins in the midst of the Masoretic Psalm 95:7. Up to this point the church stirs itself up to a worshipping appearing before its God; now the voice of God (Hebrews 4:7), earnestly admonishing, meets it, resounding from out of the sanctuary. Since שׁמע בּ signifies not merely to hear, but to hear obediently, Psalm 95:7 cannot be a conditioning protasis to what follows. Hengstenberg wishes to supply the apodosis: "then will He bless you, His people;" but אם in other instances too (Psalm 81:9; Psalm 139:19; Proverbs 24:11), like לוּ, has an optative signification, which it certainly has gained by a suppression of a promissory apodosis, but yet without the genius of the language having any such in mind in every instance. The word היּום placed first gives prominence to the present, in which this call to obedience goes forth, as a decisive turning-point. The divine voice warningly calls to mind the self-hardening of Israel, which came to light at Merמbah, on the day of Massah. What is referred to, as also in Psalm 81:8, is the tempting of God in the second year of the Exodus on account of the failing of water in the neighbourhood of Horeb, at the place which is for this reason called Massah u-Merı̂bah (Exodus 17:1-7); from which is to be distinguished the tempting of God in the fortieth year of the Exodus at Merı̂bah, viz., at the waters of contention near Kadesh (written fully Mê-Merı̂bah Kadesh, or more briefly Mê-Merı̂bah), Numbers 20:2-13 (cf. on Psalm 78:20). Strictly כמריבה signifies nothing but instar Meribae, as in Psalm 83:10 instar Midianitarum; but according to the sense, כּ is equivalent to כּעל. Psalm 106:32, just as כּיום is equivalent to כּביום. On אשׁר, quum, cf. Deuteronomy 11:6. The meaning of גּם־ראוּ פעלי is not they also (גם as in Psalm 52:7) saw His work; for the reference to the giving of water out of the rock would give a thought that is devoid of purpose here, and the assertion is too indefinite for it to be understood of the judgment upon those who tempted God (Hupfeld and Hitzig). It is therefore rather to be rendered: notwithstanding (ho'moos, Ew. 354, a) they had ( equals although they had, cf. גם in Isaiah 49:15) seen His work (His wondrous guiding and governing), and might therefore be sure that He would not suffer them to be destroyed. The verb קוּט coincides with κοτέω, κότος. בּדּור .ען, for which the lxx has τῇ γενεᾷ ἐκείνη, is anarthrous in order that the notion may be conceived of more qualitatively than relatively: with a (whole) generation. With ואמר Jahve calls to mind the repeated declarations of His vexation concerning their heart, which was always inclined towards error which leads to destruction - declarations, however, which bore no fruit. Just this ineffectiveness of His indignation had as its result that (אשׁר, not ὅτι but ὥστε, as in Genesis 13:16; Deuteronomy 28:27, Deuteronomy 28:51; 2 Kings 9:37, and frequently) He sware, etc. (אם equals verily not, Gesen. 155, 2, f, with the emphatic future form in n which follows). It is the oath in Numbers 14:27. that is meant. The older generation died in the desert, and therefore lost the entering into the rest of God, by reason of their disobedience. If now, many centuries after Moses, they are invited in the Davidic Psalter to submissive adoration of Jahve, with the significant call: "To-day if ye will hearken to His voice!" and with a reference to the warning example of the fathers, the obedience of faith, now as formerly, has therefore to look forward to the gracious reward of entering into God's rest, which the disobedient at that time lost; and the taking possession of Canaan was, therefore, not as yet the final מנוּחה (Deuteronomy 12:9). This is the connection of the wider train of thought which to the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews Heb 3:1, Hebrews 4:1, follows from this text of the Psalm.