properly · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
covenant
בְּרִ֣יתbe.Rit
H1285
a compact (because made by passing between pieces of fl… · noun, common feminine singular construct
God
אֱלֹהִ֑ים'E.lo.Him
H430
gods in the ordinary sense · noun, common masculine plural absolute
refused
מֵאֲנ֥וּme.'a.Nu
H3985
to refuse · verb, piel perfect, 3rd person common plural
walk
יָלַךְyâlak
H3212
to walk (literally or figuratively)
law
וּ֝בְתוֹרָת֗וֹu.ve.to.ra.To
H8451
a precept or statute · conjunction + preposition + noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
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
Deuteronomy 31:20 For when I shall have brought them into the land which I sware unto their fathers, that floweth with milk and honey; and they shall have eat…
Deuteronomy 31:16 And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers; and this people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of th…
Judges 2:10-12 And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the LORD, nor y…
Nehemiah 9:26-29 Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against thee, and cast thy law behind their backs, and slew thy prophets which testified ag…
2 Kings 17:14-15 Notwithstanding they would not hear, but hardened their necks, like to the neck of their fathers, that did not believe in the LORD their God…
Jeremiah 31:32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt;…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 78:9-39
In these verses,
I. The psalmist observes the late rebukes of Providence that the people of Israel had been under, which they had brought upon themselves by their dealing treacherously with God, Psa 78:9-11. The children of Ephraim, in which tribe Shiloh was, though they were well armed and shot with bows, yet turned back in the day of battle. This seems to refer to that shameful defeat which the Philistines gave them in Eli's time, when they took the ark prisoner, Sa1 4:10, Sa1 4:11. Of this the psalmist here begins to speak, and, after a long digression, returns to it again, Psa 78:61. Well might that event be thus fresh in mind in David's time, above forty years after, for the ark, which…
They kept not the covenant of God,.... Either the covenant of circumcision, which was neglected during their travels through the wilderness, Joshua 5:5 or the covenant made with the people of Israel at Mount Sinai, Exodus 24:7 and this is to be understood not of the children of Ephraim only, but of the Israelites in general, who in many instances broke the covenant, and were not steadfast in it, Psalm 78:37; see Gill on Jeremiah 31:32.
and refused to walk in his law; the law of God, which was given forth by him, by the disposition of angels, through the hands of a mediator, Moses, as a rule of their walk and conversation; but they refused to order their conversation according to it, being u…
Psalm 78:7-11
7. That they might set their hope [314] in God, and not forget the works of God; but keep his commandments. 8. And that they might not be as their fathers, a rebellious [or an apostatising] and a provoking generation; a generation which directed not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not faithful towards God. 9. The children of Ephraim, being armed and shooting with the bow, turned back in the day of battle. 10. They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law. 11. And they forgat his works, and the wonders which he had shown them.
7. That they might set their hope in God. Here the Psalmist points out the use to which the doctrine which he had stated sh…
The Church Fathers
"They did not keep the covenant of God, and in his law they were unwilling to walk, and they forgot his benefits." They rose up against him who regenerated them in baptism. "And his wonders which he showed them: before their fathers the wonders which he did." See the sense of the Scriptures, how from the sons of Ephraim it comes to past histories; so that it shows that what is written, "I will open my mouth in a parable, I will utter propositions from the beginning," was said parabolically.
But what that is which he saith, "they have been turned back in the day of war," the following words do teach, wherein he hath most clearly explained this: "they have not kept," he saith, "the testament of God, and in His law they would not walk." Behold what is, "they have been turned back in the day of war:" they have not kept the testament of God. When they were bending and shooting bows, they did also utter the words of most forward promise, saying, "Whatsoever things the Lord our God hath spoken we will do, and we will hear." "They have been turned back in the day of war:" because the promise of obedience not hearing but temptation doth prove. But he whose spirit hath been trusted with God, keepeth hold on God, who is faithful, and "doth not suffer him to be tempted above that which he is able; but will make with the temptation a way of escape also," that he may be able to endure, and may not be turned back in the day of war. ...Therefore these men have been thus branded: "a generation," he saith, "which hath not directed their heart." It hath not been said, works, but heart. For when the heart is directed, the works are right; but when the heart is not directed, the works are not right, even though they seem to be right. And how the crooked generation hath not directed the heart, hath sufficiently been shown, when he saith, "and the spirit thereof hath not been trusted with God." For God is right: and therefore by cleaving to the right, as to an immutable rule, the heart of a man can be made right, which in itself was crooked. ...
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
Disobedience To God · Provokes his anger — Provokes his anger
Law Of God, The · Refuse to walk in — Refuse to walk in
Self-Will · .Refusing to walk in the ways of God — .Refusing to walk in the ways of God
Self-Will And Stubbornness · Exhibited in: Refusing to walk in the ways of God — Exhibited in: Refusing to walk in the ways of God
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 poet begins very similarly to the poet of Ps 49. He comes forward among the people as a preacher, and demands for his tra a willing, attentive hearing. תּורה is the word for every human doctrine or instruction, especially for the prophetic discourse which sets forth and propagates the substance of the divine teaching. Asaph is a prophet, hence Psa 78:2 is quoted in Mat 13:34. as ῥηθὲν διὰ τοῦ προφήτου.
(Note: The reading διὰ Ἠσαΐ́ου τοῦ προφήτου is, although erroneous, nevertheless ancient; since even the Clementine Homilies introduce this passage as the language of Isaiah.)
He here recounts to the people their history מנּי־קדם, from that Egyptaeo-Sinaitic age of yore to which…
Ephraim, the second son of Joseph, received a special blessing from Jacob (Gen 48:15-20; 49:22-26; Deut 33:13-17). The land that his descendants received included fertile valleys and strategic roads (Judg 8:2). However, the people of Ephraim did not live in obedience to God’s gracious covenant.
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 78:10
They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law;
They kept not the covenant of God. Vows and promises were broken, idols were set up, and the living God was forsaken. They were brought out of Egypt in order to be a people separated unto the Lord, but they fell into the sins of other nations, and did not maintain a pure testimony for the one only true God. And refused to walk in his law. They gave way to fornication, and idolatry, and other violations of the decalogue, and were often in a state of rebellion against the benign theocracy under which they lived. They had pledged themselves at Sinai to keep the law, and then they wilfully disobeyed it, and so became covenant br…
