Psalm 109:23
 Psalm 109:23 
New International Version (©2011)
I fade away like an evening shadow; I am shaken off like a locust.

New Living Translation (©2007)
I am fading like a shadow at dusk; I am brushed off like a locust.

English Standard Version (©2001)
I am gone like a shadow at evening; I am shaken off like a locust.

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
I am passing like a shadow when it lengthens; I am shaken off like the locust.

King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
I am gone like the shadow when it declineth: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

Holman Christian Standard Bible (©2009)
I fade away like a lengthening shadow; I am shaken off like a locust.

International Standard Version (©2012)
I am fading away like a shadow late in the day; I am shaken off like a locust.

NET Bible (©2006)
I am fading away like a shadow at the end of the day; I am shaken off like a locust.

Aramaic Bible in Plain English (©2010)
My steps have declined like the shadow and I am driven like locusts!

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
I fade away like a lengthening shadow. I have been shaken off like a grasshopper.

King James 2000 Bible (©2003)
I am gone like the shadow when it declines: I am shaken off like the locust.

American King James Version
I am gone like the shadow when it declines: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

American Standard Version
I am gone like the shadow when it declineth: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

Douay-Rheims Bible
I am taken away like the shadow when it declineth: and I am shaken off as locusts.

Darby Bible Translation
I am gone like a shadow when it lengtheneth; I am tossed about like the locust;

English Revised Version
I am gone like the shadow when it declineth: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

Webster's Bible Translation
I am gone like the shadow when it declineth: I am tossed up and down as the locust.

World English Bible
I fade away like an evening shadow. I am shaken off like a locust.

Young's Literal Translation
As a shadow when it is stretched out I have gone, I have been driven away as a locust.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

109:21-31 The psalmist takes God's comforts to himself, but in a very humble manner. He was troubled in mind. His body was wasted, and almost worn away. But it is better to have leanness in the body, while the soul prospers and is in health, than to have leanness in the soul, while the body is feasted. He was ridiculed and reproached by his enemies. But if God bless us, we need not care who curses us; for how can they curse whom God has not cursed; nay, whom he has blessed? He pleads God's glory, and the honour of his name. Save me, not according to my merit, for I pretend to none, but according to thy-mercy. He concludes with the joy of faith, in assurance that his present conflicts would end in triumphs. Let all that suffer according to the will of God, commit the keeping of their souls to him. Jesus, unjustly put to death, and now risen again, is an Advocate and Intercessor for his people, ever ready to appear on their behalf against a corrupt world, and the great accuser.


Pulpit Commentary

Verse 23. - I am gone like the shadow when it declineth; rather, lille a shodow (comp. Psalm 102:11). When shadows "decline," they are just about to cease and disappear. I am tossed up and down as the locust; or, "I am carried away" - swept off, i.e., or just ready to be swept off, from the face of the earth (see Exodus 10:19; Joel 2:20; Nahum 3:17).


Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

I am gone like the shadow when it declineth,.... When the sun is setting, and the shadow is going off; man's life is often compared to a shadow, because fleeting, momentary, and soon gone, 1 Chronicles 29:15 and death is expressed by going the way of all flesh; and by going to the grave, the house for all living, a man's long home, Joshua 23:14 and so is the death of Christ, Luke 22:22, it may be rendered, "I am made to go" (h), denoting the violent death of Christ, who was cut off out of the land of the living, and whose life was taken away from the earth, Isaiah 53:8.

I am tossed up and down as the locust; or "shaken out" (i) by the wind, as the locust is by the east wind, and carried from place to place, Exodus 10:13, or when a swarm of them by a strong wind are crowded together and thrown upon one another; or like the grasshopper, which leaps from hedge to hedge, and has no certain abode: and such was the case of Christ here on earth; and especially it may have respect not only to his being sometimes in Judea and sometimes in Galilee, sometimes in the temple and sometimes in the mount of Olives; but to his being tossed about after his apprehension, when he was led to Annas, and then to Caiaphas, then to Pilate, then to Herod, then delivered to the soldiers, and by them led to Calvary, and crucified.

(h) "cogor abire", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius; "abire factus sum", Gejerus, Michaelis. (i) "excussus sum", Montanus, Vatablus Gejerus, Michaelis; "excutior", Tigurine version, Musculus, Cocceius.


Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

23. like the shadow—(Compare Ps 102:11).

tossed up and down—or, "driven" (Ex 10:19).


Psalm 109:23 Parallel Commentaries

Psalm 109:23 NIV
Psalm 109:23 NLT
Psalm 109:23 ESV
Psalm 109:23 NASB
Psalm 109:23 KJV

Bible Hub: Online Parallel Bible


God of My Praise, Don't Remain Silent
22For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me. 23I am gone like the shadow when it declines: I am tossed up and down as the locust. 24My knees are weak through fasting; and my flesh fails of fatness. …

Exodus 10:19 And the LORD changed the wind to a very strong west wind, which caught up the locusts and carried them into the Red Sea. Not a locust was left anywhere in Egypt.
Job 39:20 Do you make it leap like a locust, striking terror with its proud snorting?
Psalm 102:11 My days are like the evening shadow; I wither away like grass.
Psalm 144:4 They are like a breath; their days are like a fleeting shadow.