Psalms 35:12

Psa 35:12 They rewarded me evil for good [to] the spoiling of my soul.

Ver. 12. They rewarded me evil for good] To render good for evil is divine, good for good is human, evil for evil is brutish; but evil for good is devilish.

To the spoiling of my soul] i.e. To the depriving me of that life which I have so often hazarded to save theirs. Intentant caedem (Kimchi). Or, this their devilish dealing with me, erat mihi quasi mors amarum, was as bitter as death to me.

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.

12. (Psa 35:12) They repay me evil for good—bereavement to my soul. "If given up to them, I have nething to expect but a continued recompence of evil for good, extending even to the loss of what is most essential to my being and well-being." The word translated bereavement commonly means loss of children, but is here used metaphorically for the most extreme and lamentable destitution.

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

To have taken from me all comfort and brought me into despair.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Though they rendered evil for good, he showed a tender sympathy in their affliction.

spoiling--literally, "bereavement." The usual modes of showing grief are made, as figures, to express his sorrow.

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 12. To the spoiling of my soul] To destroy my life; so נפש nephesh should be translated in a multitude of places, where our translators have used the word soul.

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

12. They render me evil for good. David again shows that the malice of his enemies was of a very aggravated character, because they not only oppressed him wrongfully, seeing he was innocent, and had given them no occasion of offense, but also because even those who had received much enjoyment and many favors from him, recompensed him in a very strange and ungrateful manner. Such disgraceful conduct wounds the feelings of good men very severely, and seems quite intolerable. But it is an inexpressibly great consolation when we can testify before God, that we have attempted by every means in our power to soothe the minds of our enemies, and to bow them to gentleness, although, notwithstanding, they are hurried on by insatiable cruelty in desiring our hurt; for God will not suffer this barbarous and brutal ingratitude to pass unpunished. Their cruelty is farther expressed when it is said that they endeavored to bereave (for so it is properly in the Hebrew “Ont tasch, de rendre orpheline car il y a ainsi proprement en Hebrieu.” — Fr.

“When the Orientals,” says Boothroyd, “pray seriously in grief, they hide their face in their bosom: and to this custom the Psalmist here alludes. Rabbi Levi, Dathe, and others, explain it in like manner.”

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.

(12) To the spoiling of my soul.—Literally, desolation to my soul. We may paraphrase,

“They rewarded me evil for good,

Which to me was desolation.”

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

12. They rewarded &c.] Better, as R.V., they reward. As in the preceding verse he speaks of what is still going on. His enemies are guilty of the basest ingratitude. Cp. Psa_38:20; Psa_109:5; Pro_17:13. Saul confessed that he had treated David thus (1Sa_24:17 ff.).

to the spoiling of my soul] Render as R.V., to the bereaving of my soul: or perhaps, it is bereavement to my soul. Such conduct makes him feel as desolate as the childless mother.

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.

They rewarded me evil for good,.... For the good David did in killing Goliath, and slaying his ten thousands of the Philistines, and thereby saving his king and country, Saul and his courtiers envied him, and sought to slay him: so our Lord Jesus Christ, for all the good he did to the Jews, by healing their bodies of diseases, and preaching the Gospel to them for the benefit of their souls, was rewarded with reproaches and persecutions, and at last with the shameful death of the cross; and in like manner are his people used; but this is an evil that shall not go unpunished; see Pro 17:13. It is added,

to the spoiling of my soul; or "to the bereaving of it" (t); causing it to be fatherless; that is, to the bereaving it of its joy, peace, and comfort; so fatherless is put for comfortless, Joh 14:18; or to the taking away of his soul, which being separated from the body, its companion is left alone, as one that is fatherless.

(t) "orbitatem", Montanus, Vatablus, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius, Gejerus, Michaelis; so Ainsworth.

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

They rewarded me evil for good - They recompensed, or returned evil instead of good. The manner in which they did it he states in the following verses.

To the spoiling of my soul - Margin, “depriving.” The Hebrew word means “the being forsaken,” or “abandoned.” The idea is, that owing to this conduct he was forsaken or abandoned by all in whom he might have put confidence.

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

For good; for the good offices which did to divers of them when I had favour and power in Saul’s court and camp.

To the spoiling of my soul, i.e. to the stripping of my person of all my comforts and hopes, and of my life itself.

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

Ver. 12. They rewarded me evil for good. This is devilish; but men have learned the lesson well of the old Destroyer, and practise it most perfectly. To the spoiling of my soul. They robbed him of comfort, and even would have taken his life had it not been for special rescues from the hand of God. The wicked would strip the righteous naked to their very soul: they know no pity. There are only such limits to human malice as God himself may see fit to place.

Ver. 12. They rewarded me evil for good. For the good David did in killing Goliath, and slaying his ten thousands of Philistines, and thereby saving his king and country, Saul and his courtiers envied him, and sought to slay him: so our Lord Jesus Christ, for all the good he did to the Jews, by healing their bodies of diseases, and preaching the gospel to them for the benefit of their souls, was rewarded with reproaches and persecutions, and at last with the shameful death of the cross; and in like manner are his people used, but this is an evil that shall not go unpunished: see Pr 17:13. John Gill.

Ver. 12. To the spoiling of my soul. They robbed not his body of goods but his soul of consolation. They bereaved his soul (that is the word), like a widow who loses her children in whom she delighted and found succour. They were not content with injuring his estate, but they were for ruining the man himself by their undeserved malice, they attacked him in name and reputation, which were as dear to him as his sons and daughters, or even as his soul. It is evermore an injury to the soul to be attacked with slander, it puts a man into a warring attitude, endangers his peace of mind, imperils his enjoyment of quiet contemplation, and tends to interrupt his communion with God. Thus the spiritual nature is despoiled and suffers bereavement. C. H. S.

Ver. 12. How a soul may be robbed.

Psalms 35:13*

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

12. Spoiling of my soul—Bereaving “my soul.” The word is used only of the bereavement of a mother of her children, or a wild beast of her young.

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

They rewarded me evil for good (comp. ver. 13). Among those who slandered him were persons with whose troubles he had sympathized, and for whom he had prayed with fasting when they were sick. His worst persecutor, Saul, admitted the charge here made. "Thou art more righteous than I," he said; "for thou hast rewarded me good, whereas I have rewarded thee evil". (1Sa_24:17) To the spoiling of my soul; or, the desolating of my soul. The result of his enemies" machinations against him was to make him a fugitive and a wanderer, to separate him from the friend whom he tenderly loved, from his wife, his parents, and the greater part of his acquaintance.

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