to eat (literally or figuratively) · verb, hiphil perfect, 2nd person masculine singular + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
bread
לֶ֣חֶםLe.chem
H3899
food (for man or beast) · noun, common masculine singular construct
tears
דִּמְעָ֑הdim.'Ah
H1832
weeping · noun, common feminine singular absolute
tears
בִּדְמָע֥וֹתbid.ma.'ot
H1832
weeping · preposition + noun, common feminine plural absolute
drink
וַ֝תַּשְׁקֵ֗מוֹva.tash.Ke.mov
H8248
to quaff · conjunction + verb, hiphil sequential imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
measure
שָׁלִֽישׁsha.Lish
H7991
a triple · noun, common 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
Psalms 42:3 My tears have been my meat day and night, while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God?
Isaiah 30:20 And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity, and the water of affliction, yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any mo…
Psalms 102:9 For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with weeping,
Job 6:7 The things that my soul refused to touch are as my sorrowful meat.
Ezekiel 4:16-17 Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with car…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 80:1-7
The psalmist here, in the name of the church, applies to God by prayer, with reference to the present afflicted state of Israel.
I. He entreats God's favour for them (Psa 80:1, Psa 80:2); that is all in all to the sanctuary when it is desolate, and is to be sought in the first place. Observe, 1. How he eyes God in his address as the Shepherd of Israel, whom he had called the sheep of his pasture (Psa 79:13), under whose guidance and care Israel was, as the sheep are under the care and conduct of the shepherd. Christ is the great and good Shepherd, to whom we may in faith commit the custody of his sheep that were given to him. He leads Joseph like a flock, to the best pastures, and out of the…
Thou feedest them with the bread of tears,.... With tears instead of bread, having none to eat; or their bread is mingled with their tears, "dipped" therein, as the Targum; such was their constant grief, and the occasion of it, that they could not cease from tears while they were eating their meals, and so ate them with them (n):
and givest them tears to drink in great measure; or the wine of tears "three fold", as the Targum. Jarchi interprets it of the captivity of Babylon, which was the third part of the two hundred and ten years of Israel's being in Egypt; which exposition, he says, he learned from R. Moses Hadarsan; but he observes, that some interpret it of the kingdom of Grecia, whic…
Psalm 80:4-7
4. O Jehovah, God of Hosts! how long wilt thou be incensed [387] against the prayer of thy people? 5. Thou hast fed us with bread of tears; and hast given us tears to drink in great measure. 6. Thou hast made us a strife to our neighbors: and our enemies laugh at us among themselves. 7. Turn us again, O God of Hosts! and cause thy face to shine upon us, and we shall be saved.
4 O Jehovah, God of Hosts! God having in the Scriptures freely promised, and so often assured us, that the prayers of his people will not be disappointed, it may excite our surprise to find the faithful here alleging before him, that he continues unpacified, although they betake themselves to him. They co…
The Church Fathers
"You will feed us with the bread of tears, and wilt give us to drink with tears in measure" [Psalm 80:5]. What is, "in measure"? Hear the Apostle: "Faithful is God, who does not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able to bear." [1 Corinthians 10:13] The measure is, according to your powers: the measure is, that you be instructed, not that thou be crushed.
We have said this, brothers, so that you may know that in the Old Testament God's justice orders a year's punishment to make up for the sin of one day. In other words, the people were tormented in the desert for forty years because of the defection of forty days. What will happen to us if, after receiving the grace of Christ who redeemed us with his own blood, we still take pleasure in committing not only slight sins but perhaps even criminal offenses? Therefore, as I have frequently advised, if a person knows he has committed some serious sin, he should have recourse to the remedies of repentance while there is still time and it is within his power to do so. Indeed, conversion in the present life and penance that is fruitfully performed bring a swift cure to wounds of this kind, for repentance not only heals a past wound but also guards the soul against further injury through sin. Now I will add something more. For example, if I am a sinner will I suffer the same punishment if I have offended just once, as I will if I sin twice or a third time and even more frequently? Not at all. The amount of punishment is to be measured according to the manner, number and measure of sin, for God will give us "the bread of tears and tears to drink," but "with ample measure." Every person will then reap the things he sought in this life by sinning more or less.
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
Psalms, Book Of — The present Hebrew name of the book is Tehill’im, “Praises;” but in the actual superscriptions of the psalms the word Tehillah is applied only to one, (Psalms 145:1) ... which is indeed emphatically…
Shoshannim-Eduth — In title of Ps. 80 (R.V. marg., “lilies, a testimony”), probably the name of the melody to which the psalm was to be sung.
Afflictions · God regulates the measure of — God regulates the measure of
Afflictions And Adversities · .God regulates the measure of afflictions — .God regulates the measure of afflictions
Bread · Illustrative: (Of tears,) of sorrow — Illustrative: (Of tears,) of sorrow
Jews, The · All other nations: Rejoiced at calamities of — All other nations: Rejoiced at calamities of
Measures · Illustrative: (Drinking tears in great measure,) of severe afflictions — Illustrative: (Drinking tears in great measure,) of severe afflictions
Tears · FIGURATIVE — FIGURATIVE
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).
In the second strophe there issues forth bitter complaint concerning the form of wrath which the present assumes, and, thus confirmed, the petition rises anew. The transferring of the smoking (עשׁן) of God's nostrils = the hard breathing of anger (Psa 74:1, Deu 29:19), to God Himself is bold, but in keeping with the spirit of the Biblical view of the wrath of God (vid., on Psa 18:9), so that there is no need to avoid the expression by calling in the aid of the Syriac word עשׁן, to be strong, powerful (why art Thou hard, why dost Thou harden Thyself...). The perfect after עד־מתי has the sense of a present with a retrospective glance, as in Exo 10:3, cf. עד־אנה, to be understood after the anal…
The people cry out for rescue from the shame of their recent defeat. The enemy’s victory is less devastating, however, than the knowledge that they themselves are objects of God’s wrath.
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 80:5
Thou feedest them with the bread of tears; and givest them tears to drink in great measure.
"Thou feedest them with the bread of tears." Their meat is seasoned with brine distilled from weeping eyes. Their meals, which were once such pleasant seasons of social merriment, are now like funeral feasts to which each man contributes his bitter morsel. Thy people ate bread of wheat before, but now they receive from thine own hand no better diet than bread of tears. "And givest them tears to drink in great measure." Tears are both their food and their drink, and that without stint. They swallow tierces of tears, and swim in gulfs of grief, and all this by God's own appointment; not because their e…
