to hide (by covering) · verb, hiphil imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular
face
פָּנֶיךָ֮pa.nei.Kha
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine singular
troubled
יִֽבָּהֵ֫ל֥וּןyi.ba.He.Lun
H926
to tremble inwardly (or palpitate) · verb, niphal imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural + paragogic nun
away
תֹּסֵ֣ףto.Sef
H622
to gather for any purpose · verb, qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular
breath
ר֭וּחָםRu.chom
H7307
wind · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
die
יִגְוָע֑וּןyig.va.'Un
H1478
to breathe out · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural + paragogic nun
return
יְשׁוּבֽוּןye.shu.Vun
H7725
to turn back (hence · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural + paragogic nun
dust
עֲפָרָ֥ם'a.fa.Ram
H6083
dust (as powdered or gray) · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Job 34:14-15 If he set his heart upon man, if he gather unto himself his spirit and his breath;
Ecclesiastes 12:7 Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.
Psalms 146:4 His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.
Genesis 3:19 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto…
Psalms 30:7 LORD, by thy favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong: thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled.
Psalms 90:3 Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return, ye children of men.
Acts 17:25 Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things;
Job 10:9 Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay; and wilt thou bring me into dust again?
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 104:19-30
We are here taught to praise and magnify God,
I. For the constant revolutions and succession of day and night, and the dominion of sun and moon over them. The heathen were so affected with the light and influence of the sun and moon, and their serviceableness to the earth, that they worshipped them as deities; and therefore the scripture takes all occasions to show that the gods they worshipped are the creatures and servants of the true God (Psa 104:19): He appointed the moon for seasons, for the measuring of the months, the directing of the seasons for the business of the husbandman, and the governing of the tides. The full and change, the increase and decrease, of the moon, exactly observe…
Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled,.... God may be said to hide his face from the creatures when he withholds their food from them, when there is a scarcity of provisions, a famine in the land; when there is no pasture for them to feed on, nor brooks of water to drink of; then are they troubled or perplexed, as in Joel 1:18 and know not what to do, nor where to go for help, but faint, and sink, and die. So in a spiritual sense when God hides his face from his people, removes his Shechinah, or divine Majesty and Presence, as the Targum here; and withdraws the influences of his grace and Spirit; or when they have no food for their souls, or what they have is not blessed, then are they tro…
Psalm 104:27-30
27. All things wait upon thee, that thou mayest give them food in their season. 28. Thou shalt give it to them, and they shall gather it: thou shalt open thy hand, and they shall be filled [or satiated] with good. 29. Thou shalt hide thy face, and they shall be afraid: thou shalt take away their spirit, and they shall die, and return to their dust. 30. Thou shalt send forth thy spirit, and they shall be created: [197] and thou shalt renew the face of the earth.
27. All these wait upon thee The prophet here again describes God as acting the part of the master of a household, and a foster-father towards all sorts of living creatures, by providing liberally for them. He had sa…
The Church Fathers
You will take away their spirit, and they shall fail. He signifies the consummation of the world, when at the command of the Lord all things are destroyed, as it is written: "Earth you are, and into the earth you shall go."
And again to Moses: "I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob." God "is not the God of the dead," of those who have died and will never be again. Rather, he is the God of the living, whose souls live in his hand and whose bodies will by the resurrection live again. And David, the ancestor of God, says to God, "You shall take away their breath, and they shall fail and shall return to their dust." See how it is a question of their bodies. Then he adds, "You shall send forth your spirit, and they shall be created; and you shall renew the face of the earth."
So when the Spirit was moving on the water, the creation was without grace; but after this world being created underwent the operation of the Spirit, it gained all the beauty of that grace wherewith the world is illuminated. And that the grace of the universe cannot abide without the Holy Spirit the prophet declared when he said, "You will take away your Spirit, and they will fail and be turned again into their dust. Send forth your Spirit, and they shall be made, and you will renew all the face of the earth." Not only, then, did he teach that no creature can stand without the Holy Spirit but also that the Spirit is the Creator of the whole creation.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Death — May be simply defined as the termination of life. It is represented under a variety of aspects in Scripture: (1.) “The dust shall return to the earth as it was” (Eccl. 12:7). (2.) “Thou takest away…
Providence — Literally means foresight, but is generally used to denote God’s preserving and governing all things by means of second causes (Ps. 18:35; 63:8; Acts 17:28; Col. 1:17; Heb. 1:3). God’s providence…
Corruption · .After — .After
Death · .RETURNING TO DUST — .RETURNING TO DUST
Death, Natural · Is described as: Returning to dust — Is described as: Returning to dust
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Fixing his eye upon the sea with its small and great creatures, and the care of God for all self-living beings, the poet passes over to the fifth and sixth days of creation. The rich contents of this sixth group flow over and exceed the decastich. With מה־רבּוּ (not מה־גּדלוּ, Psa 92:6) the poet expresses his wonder at the great number of God's works, each one at the same time having its adjustment in accordance with its design, and all, mutually serving one another, co-operating one with another. קנין, which signifies both bringing forth and acquiring, has the former meaning here according to the predicate: full of creatures, which bear in themselves the traces of the Name of their Creator…
When you give them your breath: Life on earth is only possible as the Lord’s gift, symbolized by his breath (Hebrew ruakh, “breath, wind, spirit”). The Lord’s Spirit is the agent of renewal (Isa 32:15-20).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 104:29
Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust.
Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled. So dependent are all living things upon God's smile, that a frown fills them with terror, as though convulsed with anguish. This is so in the natural world, and certainly not less so in the spiritual: saints when the Lord hides his face are in terrible perplexity. Thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. The breath appears to be a trifling matter, and the air an impalpable substance of but small importance, yet, once withdrawn, the body loses all vitality, and crumbles back to the earth from which it was originally tak…
