Psalm 120:6

My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

120:5-7 It is very grievous to a good man, to be cast into, and kept in the company of the wicked, from whom he hopes to be for ever separated. See here the character of a good man; he is for living peaceably with all men. And let us follow David as he prefigured Christ; in our distress let us cry unto the Lord, and he will hear us. Let us follow after peace and holiness, striving to overcome evil with good.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace - This trouble is no new thing. It has been long continued, and has become intolerable. Who this was that thus gave him trouble is, of course, now unknown. It is only necessary to remark that there can scarcely be any source of trouble more bitter than that of sustaining such relations to others either in business, or in office, or by family-ties - whether by marriage or by blood - in school, in college, or in corporate bodies - as to expose us always to a quarrel: to be compelled to have constant contact with people of sour, perverse, crooked tempers, who are satisfied with nothing; who are suspicious or envious; who pervert our motives and our conduct; who misrepresent our words; who demand more than is due to them; who refuse to perform what may reasonably be expected of them; and who make use of every opportunity to involve us in difficulties with others. There are many trials in human life, but there are few which are more galling, or more hard to bear than this. The literal rendering of the passage would be, "Long for her has my soul dwelt," etc. That is, long (or too long) for her good - for the welfare of my soul. It has been an injury to me; to my piety, to my comfort, to my salvation. it has vexed me, tried me, hindered me in my progress in the divine life. Nothing would have a greater tendency of this kind than to be compelled to live in the manner indicated above.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6, 7. While those who surrounded him were maliciously hostile, he was disposed to peace. This Psalm may well begin such a series as this, as a contrast to the promised joys of God's worship.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace. The God of peace, against whom their carnal minds are enmity itself; Christ, the Prince of peace, the Man, the Peace, who has made peace by the blood of his cross, whom the world hates; the sons of peace, the quiet in the land, against whom the wicked devise evil things; the Gospel of peace, which the natural man abhors as foolishness; the way of peace, pardon, and salvation by Christ, which carnal men know not, and do not approve of; and the ordinances of the Gospel, which are paths of peace. In short, some are of such restless, quarrelsome, and contentious spirits, that they hate peace with any; are like the troubled sea, that cannot rest; and cannot sleep, unless they do mischief to their fellow creatures: it is very uncomfortable living, especially living long with such. The Targum is,

"my soul hath long dwelt with Edom, hating peace;''

that is, with the Romans or Christians, who are intended; for the Jews understand this psalm of their present captivity.

Geneva Study Bible

My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

6. Too long hath my soul had her dwelling

With the haters of peace.

The sensitive ‘soul’ feels the inhumanity of their conduct.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 6. - My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace; i.e. with the tribes symbolized in the preceding verse by the names "Mesech" and "Kedar," the tribes bordering upon Judea. These were from first to last almost always at war with Israel. Psalm 120:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Since arrows and broom-fire, with which the evil tongue is requited, even now proceed from the tongue itself, the poet goes on with the deep heaving אויה (only found here). גּוּר with the accusative of that beside which one sojourns, as in Psalm 5:5; Isaiah 33:14; Judges 5:17. The Moschi (משׁך, the name of which the lxx takes as an appellative in the signification of long continuance; cf. the reverse instance in Isaiah 66:19 lxx) dwelt between the Black and the Caspian Seas, and it is impossible to dwell among them and the inhabitants of Kedar (vid., Psalm 83:7) at one and the same time. Accordingly both these names of peoples are to be understood emblematically, with Saadia, Calvin, Amyraldus, and others, of homines similes ejusmodi barbaris et truculentis nationibus.

(Note: If the Psalm were a Maccabaean Psalm, one might think משׁך, from משׁך, σύρειν, alluded to the Syrians or even to the Jewish apostates with reference to משׁך ערלה, ἐπισπᾶσθαι τὴν ἀκροβυστίαν (1 Corinthians 7:18).)

Meshech is reckoned to Magog in Ezekiel 38:2, and the Kedarites are possessed by the lust of possession (Genesis 16:12) of the bellum omnium contra omnes. These rough and quarrelsome characters have surrounded the poet (and his fellow-countrymen, with whom he perhaps comprehends himself) too long already. רבּת, abundantly (vid., Psalm 65:10), appears, more particularly in 2 Chronicles 30:17., as a later prose word. The להּ, which throws the action back upon the subject, gives a pleasant, lively colouring to the declaration, as in Psalm 122:3; Psalm 123:4. He on his part is peace (cf. Micah 5:5, Psalm 119:4; Psalm 110:3), inasmuch as the love of peace, willingness to be at peace, and a desire for peace fill his σου; but if he only opens his mouth, they are for war, they are abroad intent on war, their mood and their behaviour become forthwith hostile. Ewald (362, b) construes it (following Saadia): and I-- although I speak peace; but if כּי (like עד, Psalm 141:10) might even have this position in the clause, yet וכי cannot. שׁלום is not on any account to be supplied in thought to אדבּר, as Hitzig suggests (after Psalm 122:8; Psalm 28:3; Psalm 35:20). With the shrill dissonance of שׁלום and מלחמה the Psalm closes; and the cry for help with which it opens hovers over it, earnestly desiring its removal.