Psalms 119:113 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

SAMECH Ver. 113. Thoughts -this word signifies thoughts, Job 4:13, Job 20:2, or opinions, 1 Kings 18:21; which being indifferent to good and evil, is here taken in an evil sense, for vain thoughts, as we render it, or for thoughts, or opinions, or devices of men differing from or opposite to God's law, as may be gathered from the next clause, where God's law is opposed to these, and as some both Jewish and Christian expositors understand it. Nor is it unusual in the Hebrew text for one and the same word to be taken both in a good and an ill sense in several places; whereof we have one instance in a word of the same signification with this, mezimmah, which signifies a thought, and is sometimes taken in a good sense, as Proverbs 1:4, Proverbs 3:8 8:12 13:16 Jeremiah 51:11; but elsewhere in a bad sense, as Job 21:27 Psalms 10:2,4 Pr 12:2 14:17. The like hath been observed concerning another Hebrew word of the same or near signification, hormah which is taken in a good sense, Proverbs 1:4, Proverbs 13:16, &c., and in an ill sense, as Exodus 21:14 Joshua 9:4 Job 5:13. And the like may be said concerning this word also. But the ancient interpreters understand this word not of things, but of persons, and so it may be understood of men that think evil, that devise wicked devices, or that have false and evil opinions, opposite to God's law, or tending to seduce men from it.