Psalm 88:3 For my soul is full of troubles: and my life draws near to the grave. Two Hemans attained eminence in Israel. One was a singer, the other was a sage (1 Chronicles 15:16-22; 1 Chronicles 25:5; 1 Kings 4:31). The two facts which filled Heman's soul with trouble were by no means unusual facts. They were — 1. The growing infirmities, the frailties and Sicknesses, of age (ver 7); and — 2. The loss of friends, or the supposed alienation of friends, which often accompanies age, especially when it is sick and weary of the world (vers. 8-18). These are common facts, but they are none the more welcome for being common when they come home to us personally. Our sage broods over them, resents them, as we all do at times, and laments his feebleness and isolation. Nay, as he traces all the facts and events of human life to the hand of God, he charges God with all the responsibility, all the pains and bitterness of them, and concludes that even this great Friend has forgotten him; or has turned against him. With all his wisdom he has been, as he confesses (ver. 5). Of a sceptical and misgiving temperament from his youth up. Two ways in which we may view the contents of the psalm — either making the best of them, or making the worst of them, in so far at least as they bear on the character and aim of the author of the psalm. We are not bound to adopt Heman's views, or even to sympathize with them. Much in the Bible was written for our warning and admonition. If we bring a generous spirit to the interpretation of this song, or elegy, we may recall the familiar maxim: "In much wisdom is much sorrow." A thoughtful mind is a pensive mind. The more a man sees of human life, the more he feels how much there is in it which is wrong, foolish, base, disappointing, if not hopelessly corrupt and bad. So we shall begin to make excuse for Heman. Let us remember also that in much sorrow there is much discipline, and discipline by which a wise man should profit. Do you, do all men, resent the wrongs of time? Remember that resentment, then, as well as the wrongs which provoke it; and consider what a happy omen lies in the fact that men do hate and resent that which is wrong, and both love and demand that which is just and right. Those who decry "mere human wisdom" are very likely to conclude that Heman the sage was punished for his largeness and freedom of thought, that he was abandoned to the guidance of his own wisdom in order that he might learn how little it could do for him in the greatest emergencies of life, how little, therefore, it was worth. I see no reason to judge him thus harshly. I find much in this psalm to lead us to a more kindly judgment. But, doubtless, there are many among us to whom such a description would apply. (Samuel Cox, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: For my soul is full of troubles: and my life draweth nigh unto the grave.WEB: For my soul is full of troubles. My life draws near to Sheol. |
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