Psalms 118:12 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

Like bees; in great numbers, and with great and potent fury, and to their own ruin, as bees do when they fly about a man, and leave their stings in him. They are quenched: so this word is used Job 6:17, Job 18:5,6 21:17. Or, as the LXX. and Chaldee render it, they burnt or flamed, i.e. raged against me like fire, as it follows. And this is supposed to be one of those Hebrew verbs, which have not only divers, but contrary significations. As the fire of thorns; which flameth out terribly, and makes a crackling noise, and burneth fiercely, but quickly spends itself without any considerable or lasting effect. For; or, but, as this very particle is frequently used, and here twice in this very phrase, Psalms 118:10,11. So as the former part of the verse notes their hostile attempt, this notes their ill success and utter ruin. Here is an inversion of words in this last clause, which is not unusual in the Hebrew text. Although these words may be, and are by a learned man of our own, rendered as they lie in the Hebrew, I trust (which word may easily be understood out of Psalms 118:8,9) in the name of the Lord, therefore (for so the Hebrew chi is oft rendered, and is so taken by the Chaldee in this place) I shall destroy them, or cut them off.