Psalm 52:5

God shall likewise destroy thee for ever, he shall take thee away, and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place, and root thee out of the land of the living. Selah.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(5) Destroy.—Better, tear down, as if of a building.

Take thee away.—Better, lay hold of thee. The Hebrew word is always used of taking a live coal from the hearth. Notice, however, that the exactly opposite is intended of our “pluck a brand from the burning.” Here the idea is of pulling the house-fire to pieces, and so extinguishing domestic life.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

52:1-5 Those that glory in sin, glory in their shame. The patience and forbearance of God are abused by sinners, to the hardening of their hearts in their wicked ways. But the enemies in vain boast in their mischief, while we have God's mercy to trust in. It will not save us from the guilt of lying, to be able to say, there was some truth in what we said, if we make it appear otherwise than it was. The more there is of craft and contrivance in any wickedness, the more there is of Satan in it. When good men die, they are transplanted from the land of the living on earth, to heaven, the garden of the Lord, where they shall take root for ever; but when wicked men die, they are rooted out, to perish for ever. The believer sees that God will destroy those who make not him their strength.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

God shall likewise destroy thee for ever - Margin, "beat thee down." The Hebrew word means to "tear, to break down, to destroy:" Leviticus 14:45; Judges 6:30. The reference here is not to the "tongue" alluded to in the previous verses, but to Doeg himself. The language in the verse is intensive and emphatic. The main idea is presented in a variety of forms, all designed to denote utter and absolute destruction - a complete and entire sweeping away, so that nothing should be left. The word "here" used would suggest the idea of "pulling down" - as a house, a fence, a wall; that is, the idea of completely "demolishing" it; and the meaning is, that destruction would come upon the informer and slanderer "like" the destruction which comes upon a house, or wall, or fence, when it is entirely pulled down.

He shall take thee away - An expression indicating in another form that he would be certainly destroyed. The verb used here - חתה châthâh - is elsewhere used only in the sense of taking up and carrying fire or coals: Isaiah 30:14; Proverbs 6:27; Proverbs 25:22. The idea here "may" be that he would be seized and carried away with haste, as when one takes up fire or coals, he does it as rapidly as possible, lest he should be burned.

And shall pluck thee out of thy dwelling-place - literally, "out of the tent." The reference is to his abode. The allusion here in the verb that is used - נסח nâsach - is to the act of pulling up plants; and the idea is, that he would be plucked up as a plant is torn from its roots.

And root thee out of the land of the living - As a tree is torn up from the roots and thus destroyed. He would be no more among the living. Compare Psalm 27:13. All these phrases are intended to denote that such a man would be utterly destroyed.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

5. likewise—or, "so," "also," as you have done to others God will do to you (Ps 18:27). The following terms describe the most entire ruin.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Likewise, i.e. totally and unavoidably, as thou didst destroy the priests.

Pluck thee, i.e. violently, and irresistibly, and suddenly remove thee, as the Hebrew word signifies.

Out of thy dwelling-place; from thy house and lands, and all the wages of thy unrighteousness. Or, out of his (i.e. the Lord’s) tabernacle; in which thou didst seek and take the matter of thy slanders, and from which thou didst cut off the Lord’s priests. Therefore God shall excommunicate thee from his presence, and from the society of the faithful.

Root thee out; though thou seemest to have taken very deep rooting, and to be the more firmly settled for this barbarous cruelty, yet God shall pluck thee up by the very roots, and destroy thee both root and branch.

Out of the land of the living; out of this world, as the phrase is taken, Isaiah 53:8 Ezekiel 32:32, and elsewhere; which was very terrible to him, who had all his portion in this world.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

God shall likewise destroy thee for ever,.... As a just retaliation for the mischief done to others; or, "therefore God shall destroy" (z), &c. even body and soul in hell, with an everlasting destruction, which will be the case of every wicked man, and particularly of the antichristian party, Revelation 14:10; the word is used of breaking down the house in which the leprosy was, Leviticus 14:45; and denotes the utter extinction of Doeg's family, and the irrecoverable ruin of antichrist, Revelation 18:21;

he shall take thee away; as fire from the hearth, Isaiah 30:14; or as burning coals from the altar: a word from the root here used signifies a censer: and the meaning is, that as his tongue was a fire, and set on fire of hell, and he was as a burning coal, he was fit for nothing but to be cast into everlasting burnings;

and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place; "tent", or "tabernacle" (a); referring to the tents of shepherds, he being the chief of Saul's shepherds, or to some stately palace he had built for himself to dwell in, upon his advancement at court; or rather to the tabernacle of the Lord, where he had been an hypocritical worshipper; but now should be cut off from the church of God, as a rotten member, and cast out of the tabernacle of Jacob, Malachi 2:12; while David flourished as an olive tree in the house of the Lord, Psalm 52:8;

and root thee out of the land of the living. In retaliation for his rooting out Ahimelech's family, and the inhabitants of Nob; so in like manner he and his should be destroyed root and branch, and not see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, nor enjoy eternal life in the world to come.

Selah; on this word; see Gill on Psalm 3:2. The Targum renders the word "Selah" here "for ever", as in Psalm 52:3.

(z) , Sept. "propterea", V. L. "idcirco etiam", Piscator; "ideo etiam", Michaelis. (a) "de tabernaculo", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Musculus; "e tentorio", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius.

Geneva Study Bible

God shall likewise {c} destroy thee for ever, he shall take thee away, and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place, and {d} root thee out of the land of the living. Selah.

(c) Though God forbear for a time, yet at length he will recompense your falsehood.

(d) Even though you seem to be never so sure settled.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

5. likewise] We might have expected therefore, as P.B.V. following Vulg. loosely renders: but likewise is significant. There is a correspondence and equivalence between the sin and its punishment Cp. Micah 2:1-10, where the idea is worked out that the heartless oppressors who have driven the poor from their homes will be driven from the land into exile.

The doom of the wicked man is forcibly described by various figures. He fancies himself securely intrenched in the fortress of his wealth, but God will break him down (Jdg 8:9) and that for ever, so that there will be no restoration of the ruins. He is at ease in his home, but God will take him as a man takes a coal from the hearth with tongs or shovel, and plucking him out of his dwelling, drive him forth as a homeless wanderer (Deuteronomy 28:63; Proverbs 2:22; Job 18:14, R.V.). He is “spreading himself like a green tree in its native soil” (Psalm 37:35), but God will uproot him out of the land of the living. Cp. for the phrase Jeremiah 11:19; and note the contrast between the fate of the wicked and the future of the Psalmist (Psalm 52:8).

The verbs in this verse might be rendered as in the LXX, as a prayer, “May God destroy thee” &c.; but the rendering in the future is preferable. Sentence is pronounced in a tone of prophetic authority. Cp. Isaiah 22:17 ff.

Selah marks the conclusion of the first part of the Psalm.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 5. - God shall likewise destroy thee for ever. As thy "devouring words" have been the destruction of many, so shall God, in return, "destroy thee" (literally, pull thee down) "for ever" - destroy thee, i.e., with a complete and final destruction. He shall take thee away; rather, seize thee (Kay, Cheyne), and pluck thee out of thy dwelling-place; literally, out of thy tent (comp. Job 18:14; 1 Kings 12:16). And root thee out of the land of the living. Destroy thee, root and branch, as thou didst destroy the entire house of Ahimelech (1 Samuel 22:17-19). Psalm 52:5

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The announcement of the divine retribution begins with גּם as in Isaiah 66:4; Ezekiel 16:43; Malachi 2:9. The אהל is not, as one might suppose, the holy tent or tabernacle, that he has desecrated by making it the lurking-place of the betrayer (1 Samuel 21:7), which would have been expressed by מאהלו, but his own dwelling. God will pull him, the lofty and imperious one, down (נתץ, like a tower perhaps, Judges 8:9; Ezekiel 26:9) from his position of honour and his prosperity, and drag him forth out of his habitation, much as one rakes a coal from the hearth (חתה Biblical and Talmudic in this sense), and tear him out of this his home (נסח, cf. נתק, Job 18:14) and remove him far away (Deuteronomy 28:63), because he has betrayed the homeless fugitive; and will root him out of the land of the living, because he has destroyed the priests of God (1 Samuel 22:18). It then proceeds in Psalm 52:8 very much like Psalm 40:4, Psalm 40:5, just as the figure of the razor also coincides with Psalms belonging to exactly the same period (Psalm 51:8; Psalm 57:5, cf. לטשׁ, Psalm 7:13). The excitement and indignant anger against one's foes which expresses itself in the rhythm and the choice of words, has been already recognised by us since Psalm 7 as a characteristic of these Psalms. The hope which David, in Psalm 52:8, attaches to God's judicial interposition is the same as e.g., in Psalm 64:10. The righteous will be strengthened in the fear of God (for the play of sounds cf. Psalm 40:4) and laugh at him whom God has overthrown, saying: Behold there the man, etc. According to Psalm 58:11, the laughing is joy at the ultimate breaking through of justice long hidden and not discerned; for even the moral teaching of the Old Testament (Proverbs 24:17) reprobates the low malignant joy that glories at the overthrow of one's enemy. By ויּבטח the former trust in mammon on the part of the man who is overtaken by punishment is set forth as a consequence of his refusal to put trust in God, in Him who is the true מעוז equals Arab. m‛âḏ, hiding-place or place of protection (vid., on 31;3, Psalm 37:39, cf. Psalm 17:7; Psalm 22:33). הוּה is here the passion for earthly things which rushes at and falls upon them (animo fertur).