blood (as that which when shed causes death) of man or… · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
shed
שָׁפְכ֬וּsha.fe.Khu
H8210
to spill forth (blood · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
water
כַּמַּ֗יִםka.Ma.yim
H4325
water · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
about
סְֽבִ֘יב֤וֹתse.Vi.Vot
H5439
(as noun) a circle · noun, common both genders plural construct
Jerusalem
יְֽרוּשָׁלִָ֗םye.ru.sha.Lim
H3389
Jerushalaim or Jerushalem · proper noun, a place name
bury
קוֹבֵֽרko.Ver
H6912
to inter · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
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 14:16 And the people to whom they prophesy shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword; and they shall have…
Jeremiah 16:4 They shall die of grievous deaths; they shall not be lamented; neither shall they be buried; but they shall be as dung upon the face of the…
Revelation 11:9 And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their d…
Psalms 79:10 Wherefore should the heathen say, Where is their God? let him be known among the heathen in our sight by the revenging of the blood of thy s…
Psalms 141:7 Our bones are scattered at the grave’s mouth, as when one cutteth and cleaveth wood upon the earth.
Jeremiah 8:1-2 At that time, saith the LORD, they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the pries…
Jeremiah 15:3 And I will appoint over them four kinds, saith the LORD: the sword to slay, and the dogs to tear, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beast…
Jeremiah 25:33 And the slain of the LORD shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, n…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 79:1-5
We have here a sad complaint exhibited in the court of heaven. The world is full of complaints, and so is the church too, for it suffers, not only with it, but from it, as a lily among thorns. God is complained to; whither should children go with their grievances, but to their father, to such a father as is able and willing to help? The heathen are complained of, who, being themselves aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, were sworn enemies to it. Though they knew not God, nor owned him, yet, God having them in chain, the church very fitly appeals to him against them; for he is King of nations, to overrule them, to judge among the heathen, and King of saints, to favour and protect them.
I.…
Their blood have they shed like water round about Jerusalem,.... Without any concern of mind, or remorse of conscience; without any fear of God or man; as if it had been so much water only; and this they shed in great abundance: from the Apocrypha:
"And when he had taken all away, he went into his own land, having made a great massacre, and spoken very proudly.'' (1 Maccabees 1:24)
"And spake peaceable words unto them, but all was deceit: for when they had given him credence, he fell suddenly upon the city, and smote it very sore, and destroyed much people of Israel.'' (1 Maccabees 1:30)
"Thus they shed innocent blood on every side of the sanctuary, and defiled it:'' (1 Maccabees 1:37)
"…
Psalm 79:1-4
1. O God! the heathen [or the nations] have come into thy inheritance; they have defiled the temple of thy holiness; they have laid Jerusalem in heaps. 2. They have given the dead bodies of thy servants for food to the fowls of the heaven; the flesh of thy meek ones to the beasts of the earth. 3. They have shed their blood like water, around Jerusalem: and there was none to bury them. 4. We have been a reproach to our neighbors; a scorn and a derision to them that are around us.
1. O God! the heathen have come into thy inheritance. Here the prophet, in the person of the faithful, complains that the temple was defiled, and the city destroyed. In the second and third verses, he…
The Church Fathers
"They have poured forth their blood like water," that is, abundantly and wantonly, "in the circuit of Jerusalem" [Psalm 79:3]. If we herein understand the earthly city Jerusalem, we perceive the shedding of their blood in the circuit thereof, whom the enemy could find outside the walls. But if we understand it of that Jerusalem, concerning whom has been said, "many more are the sons of her that was forsaken, than of her that has the husband," [Isaiah 54:1] the circuit thereof is throughout the universal earth. For in that lesson of the Prophet, wherein is written, "many more are the sons of her that was forsaken, than of her that has the husband:" a little after unto the same is said, "and He that has delivered you, shall be called the God of Israel of the universal earth." [Isaiah 54:5] The circuit then of this Jerusalem in this Psalm must be understood as follows: so far as at that time the Church had been expanded, bearing fruit, and growing in the universal world, when in every part thereof persecution was raging, and was making havoc of the Martyrs, whose blood was being shed like water, to the great gain of the celestial treasuries. But as to that which has been added, "and there was no one to bury:" it either ought not to seem to be an incredible thing that there should have been so great a panic in some places, that not any buriers at all of holy bodies came forward: or certes that unburied corpses in many places might lie long time, until being by the religious in a manner stolen they were buried.
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
Jews, The · Denunciations against those who: Slaughtered — Denunciations against those who: Slaughtered
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 with a plaintive description, and in fact one that makes complaint to God. Its opening sounds like Lam 1:10. The defiling does not exclude the reducing to ashes, it is rather spontaneously suggested in Psa 74:7 in company with wilful incendiarism. The complaint in Psa 79:1 reminds one of the prophecy of Micah, Mic 3:12, which in its time excited so much vexation (Jer 26:18); and Psa 79:2, Deu 28:26. עבדיך confers upon those who were massacred the honour of martyrdom. The lxx renders לעיים by εἰς ὀπωροφυλάκιον, a flourish taken from Isa 1:8. Concerning the quotation from memory in 1 Macc. 7:16f., vid., the introduction to Ps 74. The translator of the originally Hebrew Firs…
Ps 79 This lament describes the occasion of Jerusalem’s fall in 586 BC. The early history of Israel’s rebellions described in Ps 78 provoked God’s wrath, resulting in the desolation of Zion described here as the defilement of the Temple and the disgraced bodies that littered the landscape. The psalmist then prays for forgiveness and rescue (79:8-9), as well as for God to pay back the nation’s enemies (79:12-13). Other psalms lamenting the Exile include Pss 42–44, 102, 107, 126, 137.
79:1-4 The poet laments the desecration of the Temple and the success of the enemy.
79:1 your special possession: This phrase might refer to the land, the Temple (see 61:5), or the people (see 79:2; 78:71).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 79:3
Their blood have they shed like water round about Jerusalem; and there was none to bury them.
"Their blood have they shed like water round about Jerusalem." The invaders slew men as if their blood was of no more value than so much water; they poured it forth as lavishly as when the floods deluge the plains. The city of holy peace became a field of blood. "And there was none to bury them." The few who survived were afraid to engage in the task. This was a serious trial and grievous horror to the Jews, who evinced much care concerning their burials. Has it come to this, that there are none to bury the dead of thy family, O Lord? Can none be found to grant a shovelful of earth with which to co…
