Psalms 60:1 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

O God, thou hast cast us off So highly had our sins provoked thy divine majesty, that thou didst reject or forsake us, so as to withdraw thy gracious and powerful presence from us, and no longer to go forth with our armies. Thus the Psalm begins with a melancholy memorial of the many disgraces and disappointments with which God had, for some years past, chastised the people. For, during the reign of Saul, especially in the latter part of it, and during David's struggle with the house of Saul, while he reigned over Judah only, the affairs of the kingdom were much perplexed, and the neighbouring nations were very vexatious to them. Thou hast scattered us Hebrew, פרצתנו, peratztanu, thou hast broken us; partly by that dreadful overthrow by the Philistines, 1 Samuel 31., and partly by the civil war in our own country between Judah and Israel. Thou hast been displeased And thy displeasure, caused by our sins, has been the source of all our sufferings. Whatever our trouble may be, and whoever may be the instruments of it, we must own the righteous hand of God in it. O turn thyself to us again Be at peace with us; smile upon and take part with us, and we shall again have prosperity.