Psalms 31:11 - Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Bible Comments

I was a reproach among all mine enemies - That is, he was subjected to their reproaches, or was calumniated and reviled by them. See the notes at Psalms 22:6.

But especially among my neighbors - I was reproached by none more than by my neighbors. They showed special distrust of me, and manifested special unkindness, even more than my enemies did. They turned away from me. They abandoned me. They would not associate with me. They regarded me as a disgrace to them, and forsook me. Compare Job 19:13-15, and the notes at that passage.

And a fear to mine acquaintance - An object of dread or terror, so that they fled from me.

They that did see me without - In the streets, or in public - out of my own house. Not only those in my own dwelling - the members of my family - regarded me in this manner, but passers in the streets - those whom I accidentally met - turned from me and fled in disgust and horror. It is not possible now to determine at what time in the life of the psalmist this occurred, or to ascertain the exact circumstances. There were, doubtless, times when with the saddest feelings he could say that all this was true of him. His troubles in the time of his persecutions by Saul, and still more probably his trials in the time when Absalom rebelled against him, and when he was driven away from his throne and his capital, would furnish an occasion when this would be true. If the latter was the occasion, then we can see how naturally he would connect all this with his “iniquity,” and regard it as the consequence of his sin in the matter of Uriah - a sin which would probably be always in his recollection, and which he would ever onward regard as lying at the foundation of all his afflictions.

Psalms 31:11

11 I was a reproach among all mine enemies, but especially among my neighbours, and a fear to mine acquaintance: they that did see me without fled from me.