reject · verb, qal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
abhorred
וַתִּמְאָ֑סva.tim.'As
H3988
to spurn · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular
wroth
הִ֝תְעַבַּ֗רְתָּhit.'a.Bar.ta
H5674
to cross over · verb, hithpael perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
anointed
מְשִׁיחֶֽךָme.shi.Che.kha
H4899
anointed · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd 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
1 Chronicles 28:9 And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the LORD searchet…
Deuteronomy 32:19 And when the LORD saw it, he abhorred them, because of the provoking of his sons, and of his daughters.
Psalms 89:51 Wherewith thine enemies have reproached, O LORD; wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of thine anointed.
Psalms 106:40 Therefore was the wrath of the LORD kindled against his people, insomuch that he abhorred his own inheritance.
2 Samuel 1:21 Ye mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew, neither let there be rain, upon you, nor fields of offerings: for there the shield of the might…
2 Samuel 15:26 But if he thus say, I have no delight in thee; behold, here am I, let him do to me as seemeth good unto him.
2 Chronicles 12:1-12 And it came to pass, when Rehoboam had established the kingdom, and had strengthened himself, he forsook the law of the LORD, and all Israel…
Psalms 44:9-26 But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame; and goest not forth with our armies.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 89:38–end
In these verses we have,
I. A very melancholy complaint of the present deplorable state of David's family, which the psalmist thinks hard to be reconciled to the covenant God made with David. "Thou saidst thou wouldst not take away thy lovingkindness, but thou hast cast off." Sometimes, it is no easy thing to reconcile God's providences with his promises, and yet we are sure they are reconcilable; for God's works fulfil his word and never contradict it. 1. David's house seemed to have lost its interest in God, which was the greatest strength and beauty of it. God had been pleased with his anointed, but now he was wroth with him (Psa 89:38), had entered into covenant with the family, but now,…
But thou hast cast off,.... Here begin objections to what is before said, and swore to; even to the everlasting love of God, to Christ, and to his seed, to the unchangeableness and unalterableness of the covenant, and to the continuance and perpetuity of the kingdom and church of Christ, taken from the dealings of the Lord with the Messiah and his people; which were made either by the psalmist, under a spirit of prophecy, foreseeing what would come to pass; or by the apostles and church of Christ, about the time of his sufferings and death, and after; when he seemed to be "cast off", and rejected by the Lord, particularly when he forsook him, and hid his face from him, Matthew 27:46, as when…
Psalm 89:38-45
38. But thou hast abhorred and rejected him; thou hast been angry against thy anointed. 39. Thou hast made the covenant of thy servant to cease; [553] thou hast profaned his crown to the earth. 40. Thou hast broken down all his walls; thou hast made his fortresses a ruin. 41. All who pass by the way have spoiled him: he has been a reproach to his neighbors. 42. Thou hast exalted the right hand of his oppressors; thou hast caused all his enemies to rejoice. 43. Thou hast also blunted the edge of his sword, and hast not made him to stand in battle. 44. Thou hast effaced his splendor, and cast his throne to the ground. 45. Thou hast shortened the days of his youth; thou hast cov…
The Church Fathers
These promises, so sure, so firm, so open, so unquestioned, were made concerning Christ. For although some are mysteriously veiled, yet some are so clear, that all that is obscure is easily revealed by them. Such being the case, see what follows: "But You have approved and brought to nothing and forsaken Your Anointed" [Psalm 89:38]. "You have overthrown the testament of Your servant, and profaned His holiness on the ground" [Psalm 89:39]. "You have broken down all His hedges, and made His strongholds a terror" [Psalm 89:40]....How is this? You have promised all those things: and You have brought to pass their reverse. Where are now the promises which but a little before filled us with delight? Which we so joyfully applauded, which we so fearlessly made our boast of? It is as if one promised, and another destroyed. And this is the mystery: for the words are not "another," but "You," Thou who promised, who even swore in condescension to human doubt, You have promised this, and done thus! Whence shall I get Your oath, where shall I find Your promise fulfilled? Would then God promise, or swear thus falsely? And yet why then these promises, and these acts? I answer, that He acted thus in fulfilment of those promises. But who am I, to say this? Let us see therefore whether it is the language of the Truth; what I say will not then be without foundation. It was David to whom the fulfilment of these promises in his seed, that is, in Christ, was promised: and as they were addressed to David, men expected their completion in David. Further, lest when any Christian asserted these promises to have referred to Christ, another by applying them to David, because he described the fulfilment of all of them in David, might thus err; He cancelled them in David, thus obliging us when we see them unfulfilled in David, to look to another quarter for their fulfilment. Thus also in the case of Esau and Jacob, we find the elder worshipped by the younger, though it is written, "The elder shall serve the younger;" [Genesis 25:23] so when you see it unfulfilled in those two brothers, you look for two peoples in whom to discover the completion of what God in His truth deigns to promise. "From the fruit of your body," says the Lord unto David, "shall I set upon your sea." He promised from his seed something for evermore: and, Solomon, born to him, became master of such wisdom, that the…
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
Ezrahite — A title given to Ethan (1 Kings 4:31; Ps. 89, title) and Heman (Ps. 88, title). They were both sons of Zerah (1 Chr. 2:6).
Hermon — A peak, the eastern prolongation of the Anti-Lebanon range, reaching to the height of about 9,200 feet above the Mediterranean. It marks the north boundary of Palestine (Deut. 3:8, 4:48; Josh. 11:3,…
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).
Now after the poet has turned his thoughts towards the beginnings of the house of David which were so rich in promise, in order that he might find comfort under the sorrowful present, the contrast of the two periods is become all the more sensible to him. With ואתּה in Psa 89:39 (And Thou - the same who hast promised and affirmed this with an oath) his Psalm takes a new turn, for which reason it might even have been ועתּה. זנח is used just as absolutely here as in Psa 44:24; Psa 74:1; Psa 77:8, so that it does not require any object to be supplied out of Psa 89:39. נארתּה in Psa 89:40 the lxx renders kate'strepsas; it is better rendered in Lam 2:7 ἀπετίναξε; for נאר is synonymous with נער,…
You are angry: The harshness of God’s wrath perplexes the psalmist.
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 89:38
But thou hast cast off and abhorred, thou hast been wroth with thine anointed.
But thou hast cast off and abhorred. The Lord had promised not to cast off the seed of David, and yet it looked as if he had done so, and that too in the most angry manner, as if he loathed the person of the king. God's actions may appear to us to be the reverse of his promises, and then our best course is to come before him in prayer and put the matter before him just as it strikes our apprehension. We are allowed to do this, for this holy and inspired man did so unrebuked, but we must do it humbly and in faith. Thou hast been wroth with thine anointed. He deserved the wrath, doubtless, but the Psalmist's point…
