to lift · verb, qal imperfect, 1st person common singular
soul
נַפְשִׁ֥יnaf.Shi
H5315
properly · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix
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
Psalms 143:8 Cause me to hear thy lovingkindness in the morning; for in thee do I trust: cause me to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my…
Psalms 86:4 Rejoice the soul of thy servant: for unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.
Psalms 24:4 He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.
1 Samuel 1:15 And Hannah answered and said, No, my lord, I am a woman of a sorrowful spirit: I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but have poured o…
Lamentations 3:41 Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 25:1-7
Here we have David's professions of desire towards God and dependence on him. He often begins his psalms with such professions, not to move God, but to move himself, and to engage himself to answer those professions.
I. He professes his desire towards God: Unto thee, O Lord! do I lift up my soul, Psa 25:1. In the foregoing psalm (Psa 25:4) it was made the character of a good man that he has not lifted up his soul to vanity; and a call was given to the everlasting gates to lift up their heads for the King of glory to come in, Psa 25:1. To this character, to this call, David here answers, "Lord, I lift up my soul, not to vanity, but to thee." Note, In worshipping God we must lift up our souls…
Unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. Either "in prayer", as the Chaldee paraphrase adds (s); and denotes sincere, affectionate, hearty prayer to God, a drawing nigh to him with a true heart: for unless the heart is lifted up, the lifting up of the eyes or hands in prayer is of no avail; see Lamentations 3:41; or by way of offering to the Lord, as some Jewish writers (t) interpret it; David not only presented his body in public worship, but his soul also as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which was his reasonable service; or else as a "depositum", which he committed into the hands of God, to be under his care and protection; and then the sense is the same with Psalm 31:5 (…
Psalm 25:1-3
1. Unto thee, O Jehovah! I have lifted up my soul 2. O my God! I have put my trust in thee; let me not be ashamed; let not mine enemies rejoice over me. 3. Yea, none of those that wait on thee shall be ashamed; but they shall be ashamed that deal falsely without cause.
1. Unto thee, O Jehovah! etc The Psalmist declares at the very outset, that he is not driven hither and thither, after the manner of the ungodly, but that he directs all his desires and prayers to God alone. Nothing is more inconsistent with true and sincere prayer to God, than to waver and gaze about as the heathen do, for some help from the world; and at the same time to forsake God, or not to betake ourselves…
The Church Fathers
"Unto You, O Lord, have I lift up my soul" [Psalm 25:1]: with spiritual longing have I lift up the soul, that was trodden down on the earth with carnal longings.
From all earthly profit, from all the things of this world that seem good, raising my spirit, let me come to you, Lord; I have been lifted up, now not trusting in money, or house, or business, or military might or in my abilities, but I search while trusting in you, so that I will not be ashamed when I depart from this body.… I have lifted my spirit to you so that my spirit may dwell on good things.
This is the first psalm laid out by the Hebrew alphabet.… In the course of the whole book, there are two types of these psalms. The first is the type which is shown to contain the entire alphabet, as Psalms 111, 112 and 119.… The other type is the one that omits letters … such as the present psalm and Psalms 34, 37 and 145.… The alphabetic acrostics are not known as something unusual in the divine Scriptures, for Jeremiah also lamented the captivity of Jerusalem with a lament which repeated the alphabet four times. By doing this, he taught that the sacraments, which are the letters, also indicate for us the mysteries of heavenly matters.… In the entire psalm, the church prays in marvelous supplication, using the figure known as ethopoeia, that it might not appear in God's view to be despicable to its enemies. In the first part, the church asks that it may understand the Lord's instructions and ways. This section contains five letters of the alphabet which we noted. In the second part, the church requests the benefits that he has granted to the holy fathers from beginning of the world; in the third part, the church says that those who keep the Lord's commands are worthy of eternal rewards; it attests that it remains constantly in the same desire; this is where the psalm contains the remaining nine letters.
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
Manna — Heb. man-hu, “What is that?” the name given by the Israelites to the food miraculously supplied to them during their wanderings in the wilderness (Ex. 16:15-35). The name is commonly taken as derived…
Prayer · Is described as: Lifting up the soul — Is described as: Lifting up the soul
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).
The Psalm begins, like Psa 16:1-11; Psa 23:1, with a monostich. Psa 25:2 is the ב strophe, אלהי (unless one is disposed to read בך אלהי according to the position of the words in Psa 31:2), after the manner of the interjections in the tragedians, e.g., oo'moi, not being reckoned as belonging to the verse (J. D. Kצhler). In need of help and full of longing for deliverance he raises his soul, drawn away from earthly desires, to Jahve (Psa 86:4; Psa 143:8), the God who alone can grant him that which shall truly satisfy his need. His ego, which has the soul within itself, directs his soul upwards to Him whom he calls אלהי, because in believing confidence he clings to Him and is united with Him. T…
Ps 25 This individual lament includes instruction in wisdom and a community lament; it begins and ends with an affirmation of trust in the Lord (25:1-3, 15-22). The psalmist prays for guidance (25:4-7) and encourages the godly to practice a lifestyle of wisdom (25:12-14). In addition to the enemies who trouble him, the psalmist confesses his sins (25:7, 11, 18) as part of his anguish. Trust develops with understanding God’s character: He is compassionate, faithful, and good (25:8-10).
25:1-3 The psalmist expresses confidence that the godly will be vindicated and his enemies will not succeed (see 25:15-22).
25:1 The psalmist commits himself to the Lord instead of to idols (see 24:3-4).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 25:1
Unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.
Unto thee, O Lord. See how the holy soul flies to its God like a dove to its cote. When the storm winds are out, the Lord's vessels put about and make for their well remembered harbour of refuge. What a mercy that the Lord will condescend to hear our cries in time of trouble, although we may have almost forgotten him in our hours of fancied prosperity. Unto thee, O Jehovah, do I lift up my soul. It is but a mockery to uplift the hands and the eyes unless we also bring our souls into our devotions. True prayer may be described as the soul rising from earth to have fellowship with heaven; it is taking a journey upon Jacob's ladder, leaving our cares an…
