Psalms 118:17,18 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

I shall not die, &c.— These verses express how near death he thought himself to have been. I shall not die, i.e. as I had feared. God had given him some correction, namely, by endangering his person, and putting him in fear, or possibly permitting him to receive some hurt; but had not suffered him to be slain. Perhaps this danger may be that mentioned, 2 Samuel 15:17. When a thing is intended to be described in a striking manner, it is generally done in the Hebrew by a repetition of the same terms a little varied, or, what comes to the same thing, by being expressed both affirmatively and negatively, as here and in many other places. See Mudge, and Durell's Parallel Prophesies, p. 115.