My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me,
My confusion is continually before me ... For the voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth - (Jeremiah 3:25; Psalms 69:7.) The ravages of the Edomite in the Holy Land, continually before the eyes of Israel at the time which the psalm commemorates, covered the face of the people of God with shame and "confusion." Not merely was there violence, but 'blasphemy' in the wanton attack. The feeling of the pagan, and especially of Edom, on account of the old grudge, was that of religious, as well as civil, hatred of Israel.
Thus Amalek attacked Israel after the exodus from Egypt, because of Israel's claim to be the people of God; the war was a religious war (Exodus 17:16, margin): 'Because the hand of Amalek is against the throne of the Lord, therefore the Lord hath war with Amalek from generation to generation.' Compare Psalms 68:16, where the high hills of pagandom are represented as envying the Lord's hill, Zion. This explains why the guilt of the pagan foe is regarded by the Lord's prophets as so deadly, and why so terrible a penalty was laid upon them. In the ulterior sense, all the foes who reproach and blaspheme God in the person of His people are meant.
By reason of the enemy and avenger. Satan is the great "enemy and avenger" (Psalms 8:2, note), who acts through the countless opponents of the Church in all ages, from Amalek and Edom to Antiochus Epiphanes, and thence to the last Antichrist.
The fourth strophe.-The Church pleads her faithfulness to God's covenant as the ground for expecting deliverance from the present anomalies.