Psalms 78:34,35 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

When he slew them Or condemned them to be slain; then they sought him Confessed their sin, begged pardon, and prayed to him to deliver them from the threatened destruction. When some were slain, others, in a fright, cried for mercy, and promised to be obedient in future: And they returned Namely, from their idols, unto the outward worship of God: or, being moved with fear, they ceased, for the present, from their grossly wicked courses, but stopped short of true repentance, and a thorough conversion to God. And inquired early after God Speedily and earnestly sought to him for deliverance from their temporal calamities and troubles, and for safety and comfort, as even wicked men, in such cases, frequently do. And they remembered that God was their rock Their support and defence, and therefore, as they now found they needed him, they would flee for help to him; and the high God their Redeemer Who had brought them out of Egypt, and wrought out many deliverances for them, and to whom therefore they might still apply for aid in their distresses. They considered that he, and he alone, had preserved them in all their former exigences, and that he only could now help them, and not those idols, nor the creatures which they had preferred before him: and therefore, being driven by absolute necessity, they fled to him for relief.