Psalms 30:11

Psa 30:11 Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness;

Ver. 11. Thou hast turned for me my mourning, &c.] Sustulisti luctum, et laetitiam attulisti. {See Trapp on "Psa 30:5"}

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Psa_30:11-12

Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing.

Easter joy

Here is described a change, complete, and more or less sudden, from sadness to joy. David has escaped a danger which had brought him very near to death; and now he is thankful and exultant. His words are in keeping with what Christians feel, as they pass from the last days of Holy Week into the first hours of Easter. If Easter is associated predominantly with any one emotion, it is with that of joy. And thus, ever since, the Church of Christ has laboured to make the Easter festival, beyond all others, the feast of Christian joy. All that nature and art could furnish has been summoned to express, so far as outward things may, this overmastering emotion of Christian souls worshipping at the tomb of their Risen Lord. All the deliverances of Gods ancient people, from Egypt, from Assyria, from Babylon, are but rehearsals of the great deliverance of all on the Resurrection morning; and each prophet and psalmist that heralds any of them, sounds in Christian ears some separate note of the Resurrection hymn. And this, the joy which fills the soul of the believing Church on Easter Day, has some sort of echo in the world outside; so that those who sit loosely to our faith and hope, and who worship rarely, if ever, before our altars, yet feel that good spirits are somehow in order on Easter morning. For their sakes, as for our own, let us try to take the emotion to pieces, as we find it in a Christian soul; let us ask why it is so natural for Christians to say, this day, with David, Thou hast turned my heaviness into joy: Thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness.

I. The first reason, then, for this Easter joy is the triumph and satisfaction enjoyed by our Lord himself. We follow Him in the stages of His sufferings and death. We sympathize reverently with the awful sorrows of our Adorable Lord and Friend; and thus we enter, in some far-off way, into the sense of triumph, unspeakable and sublime, which follows beyond it. It is His triumph; that is the first consideration; His triumph, who was but now so cruelly insulted and tortured. It is all over now; by a single motion of His Majestic Will, He is risen. And we, as we kneel before Him, think, first of all, of Him. It is His joy which inspires ours; it turns our heaviness into joy, and puts off our sorrow and girds us with gladness. Do I say this is the case? Perhaps it were more prudent to say that it ought to be. For in truth the habit of getting out of and forgetting our miserable selves in the absorbing sense of the beauty and magnificence of God, belongs rather to ancient than to modern Christianity. To those old Christians God was all, man nothing, or well-nigh nothing. Theirs was a disinterested interest in God. With us, we are too prone to value God, not so much for His own sake as for ours. Be it yours to show that my misgiving is unwarranted. You know that pure sympathy with an earthly friends happiness loaves altogether out of consideration the question whether it contributes anything to your own; and in like manner endeavour to say to-day to your Heavenly Friend: It is because Thou, Lord Jesus, hast vanquished Thine enemies, hast overcome death, and hast entered into Thy glory, that Thou hast turned my Lenten heaviness into joy, and put off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness.

II. because of the sense of confidence with which Christs resurrection from the dead invigorates our grasp of Christian truth. The mind loves to rest truth on a secure basis. This is what the old Roman poet meant by saying that the man was really happy who had attained to know the causes of things. The chemist who has at last explained the known effect of a particular drug, by laying bare, upon analysis, an hitherto undiscovered property in it; the historian who has been enabled to show that the conjecture of years rests on the evidence of a trustworthy document; the mathematician on whom has flashed the formula which solves some problem that has long haunted and eluded him; the anatomist who has been able to refer what he had hitherto regarded as an abnormal occurrence to the operation of a recognized law;--these men know what joy is. Now, akin to the joy of students and workers is the satisfaction of a Christian when he steadily dwells on the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Christian Creed is like a tower which rears towards heaven its windows and pinnacles in successive stages of increasing gracefulness. We lavish our admiration first on this detail of it, and then on that; and, while we thus study and admire, we dwell continuously in its upper stories, till at last perhaps a grave question occurs or is suggested to us. What does it all rest upon? What is the foundation-fact on which this structure has been reared in all its august and fascinating beauty? What fact, if removed, would be fatal to it? And the answer is--our Lords Resurrection is one such fact. He was declared to be the Son of God with power by the Resurrection from the dead. Yes; it is here, beside the empty tomb of the Risen Jesus, that Christian faith feels itself on the hard rock of fact; here we break through the tyranny of matter and sense, and rise with Christ into the immaterial world; here we put a term to the enervating alternation of guesses and doubts which prevails elsewhere, and we reach the frontier of the absolutely certain. And we can but answer, Truly, Lord Jesus, by Thy Resurrection Thou hast turned my heaviness into joy: Thou hast put off my sackcloth, and gilded me with gladness.

III. And because of the assurance it gives of our own resurrection. Paganism could only guess and speculate as to the immortality of the soul. It is the Gospel which gives certainty; it has unveiled the immortality of man in his completeness, in body and in soul. Thus shall we recognize our friends in heaven, for they shall wear there the features and the expression which they wore on earth. All men shall rise with their bodies. Joyfully, therefore, do we think of the blessed dead. (Canon Liddon.)

Girded me with gladness.--

Elevation of feeling

For the expression and manifestation of the state in which we are, God has made a rich provision of power. The forehead, the eye, the mouth, the whole face, the hands, the arms, the gait, and especially the voice, are so many instruments and agents of expression; and we are not true to ourselves, we are false to our condition, we are disloyal to God, when we clothe ourselves with a uniform reticence and unexpressiveness of demeanour. The clouds drop their blackness and appear brilliantly coloured and gorgeously gilded when the sun shines on them. The sea casts off its leaden hue and is covered with crisped smiles when the storm is over. The battle-field absorbs the blood which, in the day of war, is spilt on its bosom, and exhibits lovely flowers, or verdant pasture, or golden corn. The earth casts off her winterly attire and puts on her summerly vestments when the time of the singing of birds has come. In like manner there is in human life and experience the turning of mourning into dancing; the putting off of sackcloth and the girding with gladness. (S. Martin.)

Praise continuous

One summer day I watched a lark rise from a field, and I listened with almost rapture to its unequalled song. The bird rose in successive stages, singing while rising and singing while resting, and the last ascent it made caused it to appear like a speck on the blue sky, an almost imperceptible spring of sweet music in the heavens. Nothing appeared wanting to complete the scene but the opening of the heavenly gates to receive this minister of song, that its sacrifice of sweetest sounds might be laid on the altar of God. But while thinking of this consummation the bird began to descend, falling rapidly in successive stages until near the earth, and then flying horizontally until it was lost in its nest. Does not the ascent and descent of this favourite songster represent our praise to God? Our glory is not always silent. We do sometimes sing praise to our God, and we rise into glorious elevations of feeling and of thought. But if we rise high in the morning, we fall low before noon; if we ascend on the Lords day, we sink low on other days. A day will come in which there shall be a final putting off of sackcloth, and a final girding with gladness; and in that day silence shall be broken for ever, and our eternal life shall be one eternal psalm and service of praise. (S. Martin.)

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Psa_31:1-24

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Psa 30:11. Thou hast turned for me, &c. — Having related his prayer, he now declares the gracious answer which God gave him. Thou hast put off my sackcloth — Hast given me occasion to put it off, alluding to the sackcloth which they used to wear in times of mourning, and with which possibly, in an humble compliance with the divine providence, David had clothed himself, in his distress; or, perhaps, he speaks figuratively, and only means that God had taken away his sorrow with the causes of it. And girded me with gladness — Either with garments of gladness, or rejoicing: or with joy, as with a garment, surrounding me on every side; as Psa 18:32, for a similar reason he is said to be girded with strength.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

12. (Psa 30:11). Thou hast turned my lament into a dance for me; thou hast opened my sackcloth and hast girded me (with) joy. To his prayer he now adds the account of its fulfilment. The relief of his distress is described as an exchange of his lament or funeral song for a joyful dance, Compare Jer 31:13, Lam 5:15. In further allusion to the mourning customs of the east, he represents his mourning dress, made of the coarsest hair-cloth, as now opened, i.e. loosened, unfastened, for the purpose of removal, to be replaced not merely by a gay or festive dress, but by joy itself, poetically represented as a garment. See above, on Psa 18:33; Psa 18:40 (32, 39), and compare Isa 61:3.

Joseph Addison Alexander, The Psalms Translated and Explained (1850) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

sackcloth--was used, even by kings, in distress (Ch1 21:16; Isa 37:1) but "gladness," used for a garment, shows the language to be figurative.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 11. Thou hast turned - my mourning into dancing] Rather into piping. I have not prayed in vain. Though I deserved to be cut off from the land of the living, yet thou hast spared me, and the remnant of my people. Thou hast taken away my sackcloth, the emblem of my distress and misery, and girded me with gladness, when thou didst say to the destroying angel, when he stood over Jerusalem ready to destroy it: "It is enough, stay now thy hand;" 2Sa 24:16.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

11. Thou hast turned my mourning into dancing. David concludes the psalm as he had begun it, with thanksgiving. He affirms that it was by the help and blessing of God that he had escaped safe; and he then adds, that the final object of his escape was, that he might employ the rest of his life in celebrating the praises of God. Moreover, he shows us that he was not insensible or obdurate under his afflictions, but mourned in heaviness and sorrow; and he also shows that his very mourning had been the means of leading him to pray to God to deprecate his wrath. Both these points are most worthy of our observation, in order, first, that we may not suppose that the saints are guilty of stoical insensibility, depriving them of all feeling of grief; and, secondly, that we may perceive that in their mourning they were exercised to repentance. This latter he denotes by the term sackcloth. It was a common practice among the ancients to clothe themselves with sackcloth when mourning, This custom was not confined to the Israelites. It was practiced also among the heathen nations. An instance of this is recorded in Jonah 3:5-8. It appears from Plutarch, that this was also sometimes practiced among the Greeks. The Hebrew word for sackcloth is שק, sak; and it is remarkable that the word sak exists in various languages, denoting the same thing. It shows the unaffected character of real sorrow, leading men to neglect the adorning of their persons, when we find several nations manifesting it by wearing the same dismal garb, and employing a word of the same sound to express it.

“Ne monstrant qu’abjection et desplaisanee d’eux-mesmes. — Fr.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(11) Thou hast turned for me.—This verse gives the answer to the prayer. Mourning is literally beating the breast, and therefore dancing forms a proper parallelism; or else, according to one derivation of the word, machôl would suggest piping. (See margin, Psa_149:3; Psa_150:4; see Smith’s Bible Dictionary, under “Dance;” and Bible Educator, vol. ii., p. 70; and comp. Note to Son_6:13.)

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

11. Better, Thou didst turn … didst loose … and gird. He looks back to the moment when his prayer was answered.

mourning … dancing] The gestures of sorrow and joy are contrasted, for mourning means literally the beating of the breast (planctus). Cp. Lam_5:15. In place of the sackcloth which was the mourner’s garb, gladness clothes him like a festal garment. Cp. Isa_61:3.

11, 12. Prayer answered: life prolonged, and its purpose.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Those hast turned for me my mourning into dancing,.... This, with what follows, expresses the success he had in seeking the Lord by prayer and supplication; there was a sudden change of things, as it often is with the people of God; sometimes they are mourning by reason of sin, their own and others; or on account of afflictions; or because of spiritual decays; or through the temptations of Satan; or, as it was the case of the psalmist now, because of the hidings of God's face; but this mourning is exchanged for joy and gladness when the Lord discovers his pardoning love, revives his work in their souls, takes off his afflicting hand from them, rebukes the tempter, and delivers out of his temptations, and shows himself, his grace and favour;

thou hast put off my sackcloth; which was used in mourning for relations, and in times of calamity and distress, and as a token of humiliation and repentance, Gen 37:34;

and girded me with gladness; by these phrases the same thing is signified as before; see Isa 61:3.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Thou hast turned for me - In my behalf. That is, God had heard his prayer; he had brought his troubles to an end; he had caused his sorrows to be succeeded by correspondent joy.

My mourning into dancing - Joy, exultation, every expression of rejoicing, had been made to succeed his deep sorrows. Compare Psa 30:5. It was this which he commemorated at the dedication of his house; this joy succeeding scenes of sorrow that he now called to remembrance as he entered the place which he had reared for a permanent abode. The contrast of his circumstances now - in a palace, with every comfort of plenty and peace around him - with his former circumstances which had been so sad, made it proper for him thus to celebrate the goodness of God.

Thou hast put off my sackcloth - That which I wore, or had girded around me, as an emblem of sorrow, or in the time of my mourning. See Isa 3:24, note; Job 16:15, note; and Mat 11:21, note.

And girded me with gladness - Instead of a girdle of sackcloth he had been clothed in a festive dress, or with such a dress - girded with an elegant girdle - as was worn on joyous and festive occasions. See the notes at Mat 5:38-41.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Having related his prayer, he now declares the gracious answer which God gave him.

Put off my sackcloth, i.e. given me occasion to put off that sackcloth, which they used to wear in times of mourning. See Est 4:1; Psa 35:13; Isa 32:11; Joe 1:13.

With gladness; either with garments of gladness or rejoicing; or with joy, as with a garment surrounding me on every side; as he is for the like reason said to be girded with strength, Psa 18:32.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Ver. 11. Observe the contrast, God takes away the mourning of his people; and what does he give them instead of it? Quiet and peace? Aye, and a great deal more than that. Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing. He makes their hearts to dance at the sound of his name. He takes off their sackcloth. That is good. What a delight to be rid of the habiliments of woe! But what then? He clothes us. And how? With some common dress? Nay, but with that royal vestment which is the array of glorified spirits in heaven. Thou hast girded me with gladness. This is better than to wear garments of silk or cloth of gold, bedight with embroidery and bespangled with gems. Many a poor man wears this heavenly apparel wrapped around his heart, though fustian and corduroy are his only outward garb; and such a man needs not envy the emperor in all his pomp. Glory be to thee, O God, if, by a sense of full forgiveness and present justification, thou hast enriched my spiritual nature, and filled me with all the fulness of God.

Ver. 11. Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness. This might be true of David, delivered from his calamity; it was true of Christ, arising from the tomb, to die no more; it is true of the penitent, exchanging his sackcloth for the garments of salvation; and it will be verified in all us, at the last day, when we shall put off the dishonours of the grave, to shine in glory everlasting. George Horne.

Ver. 11. Thou hast turned. I do so like the ups and downs in the Psalms. Adelaide Newton.

Ver. 11. Thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness. I say with the apostle, "Overcome evil with good, " sorrow with joy. Joy is the true remedy for sorrow. It never had, never could have any other. We must always give the soul that weeps reason to rejoice; all other consolation is utterly useless. Alexander Rodolph Vinet, D.D., 1797-1847.

Ver. 11. Thou hast girded me with gladness. My "sackcloth" was but a loose garment about me, which might easily be put off at pleasure, but my "gladness" is girt about me, to be fast and sure, and cannot leave me though it would; at least none shall be able to take it from me. Sir Richard Baker.

Ver. 11. Transformations. Sudden; complete; divine, thou; personal, "for me; "gracious.

Ver. 11. Holy dancing: open up the metaphor.

Ver. 11. The believer's change of raiment: illustrate by life of Mordecai or Joseph; mention all the garbs the believer is made to wear, as a mourner, a beggar, a criminal, &c.

Psalms 30:12*

Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

11. Dancing—This is not to be taken literally. “Dancing, here, is poetical of joy, or shouts of joy—thanksgiving and songs.”—Hupfeld. See this usage in Jer_31:4; Jer_31:13; Lam_4:15. This sense is confirmed by the parallel word “gladness,” in next hemistich. The Hebrews, especially the women, sang responsively and danced upon great festive occasions, as in Exodus 15; Judges 5; 1Sa_18:6-7; 2Sa_6:14; 2Sa_6:16; but dancing was never permanently attached to their religious worship. See notes on Psa_42:4; Psa_149:3

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Thou hast turned (rather, thou turnedst) for me my mourning into dancing. Suddenly, in a moment, all was changed. The angel ceased to slay. God bade him hold his hand. The Prophet Gad was sent with the joyful news to David, and commanded him at once to build an altar at Jehovah. Then the mourning ceased, and a joyful ceremonial was instituted, of which dancing, as so often, formed a part. (see Exo_15:20 1Sa_18:6 2Sa_6:14-16 Psa_149:3 Jer_31:4) Thou hast put off (rather, didst put off) my sackcloth. That the king had clothed himself in sackcloth on the occasion, is mentioned by the author of Chronicles. (1Ch_21:16) And girded (girdedst) me with gladness. (comp. 1Ch_21:26)

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Sackcloth - Given me occasion to put off that sackcloth, which they used to wear in times of mourning, Esth iv, 1 chap. xxxv, 13 Isaiah xxxii, 11 Joel i, 13. Girded - With joy, as with a garment, surrounding me on every side.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

(Heb.: 30:12-13) In order to express the immediate sequence of the fulfilling of the prayer upon the prayer itself, the otherwise (e.g., Psa 32:5) usual ו of conjunction is omitted; on הפכתּ וגו cf. the echoes in Jer 31:13; Lam 5:15. According to our interpretation of the relation of the Psalm to the events of the time, there is as little reason for thinking of Sa2 6:14 in connection with מחול, as of Ch1 21:16 in connection with שׂקּי. In place of the garment of penitence and mourning (cf. מחגרת שׂק, Isa 3:24) slung round the body (perhaps fastened only with a cord) came a girding up (אזּר, synon. חגר Psa 65:13, whence אזור, חגרה) with joy. The designed result of such a speedy and radical change in his affliction, after it had had the salutary effect of humbling him, was the praise of Jahve: in order that my glory (כּבוד for כּבודי = נפשׁי, as in Psa 7:6; Psa 16:9; Psa 108:2) may sing Thy praises without ceasing (ידּם fut. Kal). And the praise of Jahve for ever is moreover his resolve, just as he vows, and at the same time carries it out, in this Psalm.

Keil & Delitzsch — Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–1891) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API. (Old Testament only.)

You have turned my mourning into dancing

It was customary for the Jews to dance when they were very happy. The abstract nouns "mourning" and "dancing" can be stated as verbs. AT: "You have caused me to stop mourning and to dance with joy instead" (See: Abstract Nouns)

you have removed my sackcloth

Sackcloth was associated with mourning and sorrow. AT: "You have caused me to no longer be sad" (See: Metonymy)

clothed me with gladness

The writer speaks of gladness as if it were a garment that he could put on. AT: "caused me to be glad" (See: Metaphor)

my glory will sing praise to you

Here "my glory" refers to the writer's soul or heart or inner being. This represents the entire person of the writer, who worships God because God has made him glad. AT: "I will sing praise to you" (See: Synecdoche)

translationWords

mourn

sackcloth

clothe

glory

praise

eternity

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.