The sins in Canaan: the failing to exterminate the idolatrous peoples and sharing in their idolatry. In Psalm 106:34 the poet appeals to the command, frequently enjoined upon them from Exodus 23:32. onwards, to extirpate the inhabitants of Canaan. Since they did not execute this command (vid., Judges 1:1), that which it was intended to prevent came to pass: the heathen became to them a snare (mowqeesh), Exodus 23:33; Exodus 34:12; Deuteronomy 7:16. They intermarried with them, and fell into the Canaanitish custom in which the abominations of heathenism culminate, viz., the human sacrifice, which Jahve abhorreth (Deuteronomy 12:31), and only the demons (שׁדים, Deuteronomy 32:17) delight in. Thus then the land was defiled by blood-guiltiness (חנף, Numbers 35:33, cf. Isaiah 24:5; Isaiah 26:21), and they themselves became unclean (Ezekiel 20:43) by the whoredom of idolatry. In Psalm 106:40-43 the poet (as in Nehemiah 9:26.) sketches the alternation of apostasy, captivity, redemption, and relapse which followed upon the possession of Canaan, and more especially that which characterized the period of the judges. God's "counsel" was to make Israel free and glorious, but they leaned upon themselves, following their own intentions (בּעצתם); wherefore they perished in their sins. The poet uses מכך (to sink down, fall away) instead of the נמק (to moulder, rot) of the primary passage, Leviticus 26:39, retained in Ezekiel 24:23; Ezekiel 33:10, which is no blunder (Hitzig), but a deliberate change.

Psalm 106:44 Parallel Commentaries

Judges 2:18 And when the LORD raised them up judges, then the LORD was with the judge...

Judges 3:9 And when the children of Israel cried to the LORD, the LORD raised up a deliverer to the children of Israel, who delivered them...

Judges 4:3 And the children of Israel cried to the LORD: for he had nine hundred chariots of iron...

Judges 6:6-10 And Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites; and the children of Israel cried to the LORD...

Judges 10:10-16 And the children of Israel cried to the LORD, saying, We have sinned against you, both because we have forsaken our God...

1 Samuel 7:8-12 And the children of Israel said to Samuel, Cease not to cry to the LORD our God for us...

2 Kings 14:26,27 For the LORD saw the affliction of Israel, that it was very bitter: for there was not any shut up, nor any left...

Nehemiah 9:27 Therefore you delivered them into the hand of their enemies, who vexed them: and in the time of their trouble, when they cried to you...