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
Jeremiah 30:17 For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the LORD; because they called thee an Outcast, saying, This i…
Psalms 31:11 I was a reproach among all mine enemies, but especially among my neighbours, and a fear to mine acquaintance: they that did see me without f…
Psalms 88:18 Lover and friend hast thou put far from me, and mine acquaintance into darkness.
Job 19:13-19 He hath put my brethren far from me, and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me.
Matthew 26:56 But all this was done, that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled. Then all the disciples forsook him, and fled.
1 Samuel 27:1 And David said in his heart, I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul: there is nothing better for me than that I should speedily esca…
Psalms 69:20 Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I…
Psalms 88:8 Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far from me; thou hast made me an abomination unto them: I am shut up, and I cannot come forth.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 142:4–end
The psalmist here tells us, for our instruction, 1. How he was disowned and deserted by his friends, Psa 142:4. When he was in favour at court he seemed to have a great interest, but when he was made an out-law, and it was dangerous for any one to harbour him (witness Ahimelech's fate), then no man would know him, but every body was shy of him. He looked on his right hand for an advocate (Psa 109:31), some friend or other to speak a good word for him; but, since Jonathan's appearing for him had like to have cost him his life, nobody was willing to venture in defence of his innocency, but all were ready to say they knew nothing of the matter. He looked round to see if any would open their doo…
I looked on my right hand, and beheld,.... On the left, so Kimchi supplies it, and after him Piscator; he looked about him every way to the right and left, to see if he could get any help, or find out any way of deliverance. To this sense the Targum, Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions render the words; and so Kimchi and Aben Ezra understand them: but some render them in the imperative, "look on the right hand, and behold" (n); and consider them; either as spoken to his own soul, to stir up himself to look around him for help and relief; or as an address to God, to look and behold, as in Psalm 80:14; and R. Obadiah reads them, "look, O right hand"; O right hand of God, tha…
Psalm 142:1-4
1. I cried to Jehovah with my voice, with my voice to Jehovah I made supplication. 2. I pour out my meditation before his face: I tell my affliction before his face. 3. When my spirit was perplexed within me, and thou knewest my path: in the way wherein I walked they laid a snare for me. 4. On looking to the right hand, and perceiving, none would know me, refuge failed me, there was none seeking after my soul.
1. I cried [245] to Jehovah, etc. It showed singular presence of mind in David that he was not paralyzed with fear, or that he did not in a paroxysm of fury take vengeance upon his enemy, as he easily might have done; and that he was not actuated by despair to take away…
The Church Fathers
Flight has perished from me. When he was seized by the Jews. And there is no one who seeks after my soul. For they all were shouting: "Crucify, crucify."
I looked to the right hand and saw: and there was no one who knew me. If we make this psalm refer to the Lord, the Lord himself is speaking. All my disciples abandoned me, and fled. One had remained, Peter, who had promised himself, saying, "If I must die for you, I will not abandon you": and he too denied me. Therefore he said, I looked to him on the right hand, and he did not say on the left, because Peter did penance.
"And they were seeking Jesus," but in an evil way. For blessed are they who are seeking Jesus, but in a good way. Those people were seeking Jesus that neither they nor we might have him; but we have received him who withdrew from them. They who are seeking are reproached, they who are seeking are praised; for it is the disposition of the seeker that finds either praise or condemnation. For you have this also in the Psalms: "Let them be confounded and covered with shame who seek my life." These are the ones who seek in an evil way. In another place, however, it says, "Flight has perished from me; and there is no one who seeks after my life." They who seek are blamed; they who do not seek are blamed. Therefore let us seek Christ that we may have him; let us seek him that we may hold him but not that we may kill him. For these people, too, were seeking him precisely in order that they might hold him but that soon they might not have him. "They were seeking, therefore, and they were saying to one another, 'What do you think, that he is not coming to the feast day?' "
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
The prayer of the poet now becomes deep-breathed and excited, inasmuch as he goes more minutely into the details of his straitened situation. Everywhere, whithersoever he has to go (cf. on Psa 143:8), the snares of craftily calculating foes threaten him. Even God's all-seeing eye will not discover any one who would right faithfully and carefully interest himself in him. הבּיט, look! is a graphic hybrid form of הבּט and הבּיט, the usual and the rare imperative form; cf. הביא Sa1 20:40 (cf. Jer 17:18), and the same modes of writing the inf. absol. in Jdg 1:28; Amo 9:8, and the fut. conv. in Eze 40:3. מכּיר is, as in Rut 2:19, cf. Ps 10, one who looks kindly upon any one, a considerate (cf. the…
The psalmist reaches a point of despair (see 77:3), and the Lord cares for him in his distress. The psalmist commits himself to the Lord’s wisdom (see Ps 139) but laments his entrapment by the wicked (5:9-10; 140:5; 141:9; 142:3).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 142:4
I looked on my right hand, and beheld, but there was no man that would know me: refuge failed me; no man cared for my soul.
I looked on my right hand, and beheld, but there was no man that would know me. He did not miss a friend for want of looking for him, nor for want of looking in a likely place. Surely some helper would be found in the place of honour; some one would stand at his right hand to undertake his defence. He looked steadily, and saw all that could be seen, for he "beheld"; but his anxious gaze was not met by an answering smile. Strange to say, all were strange to David. He had known many, but none would know him. When a person is in ill odour it is wonderful how weak the memo…
