How long, LORD? wilt thou hide thyself for ever? shall thy wrath burn like fire?
-The suppliant here turns from lamentation to prayer, that the Lord would remove the present prostration of David's house and people, as being apparently so at variance with His covenant and promise.
Verse 46. How long, Lord? - How long wilt thou permit thy elect people to be so down-trodden? The cry of Verse 46. How long, Lord? - How long wilt thou permit thy elect people to be so down-trodden? The cry of the afflicted Church in all ages (Revelation 6:10), and of her intercessor (Zechariah 1:12).
Wilt thou hide thyself for ever? Shall thy wrath burn like fire? - (cf. Psalms 79:5.)
Verse 47. Remember how short my time is - in Beautiful contrast to "How long ... forever?" (Psalms 89:46;) literally, 'Remember I, what (is my) life' or existence. Compare Psalms 39:5, 'mine age is as non- existence before thee.' Wilt thou be long angry, and my lifetime so short? Compare Job's similar plea, Job 7:6-7; Job 14:1-3. The remembrance of man's short-lived frailty has been often a consideration with our compassionate God, that He should not prolong His anger toward us (Psalms 78:39). God is too loving to fill up with sufferings His people's short span.
Wherefore hast thou made all men in vain? They will have been made in vain, so far as well-being in this life is concerned, if thou shouldst give them up to unceasing misery here. In relation to Israel, which is the main reference, the sense is, If God's covenant with David's house and people were to fail, the blessings to the world at large, which depend on the covenant with David, would not be realized and man would have been created in vain. Therefore, it was necessary, for the honour of Him that makes nothing in vain, that they should be realized in Messiah, the Son of David, in part at His first coming, more fully at His second coming.
Verse 48. What man is he that liveth, and shall not see death? shall he deliver his soul from the hand of the grave? - `the hand (i:e., the power) of Sheol,' or Hades. My life is short (Psalms 89:47), and I cannot, any more than other men, deliver myself from the stroke of death therefore, Lord come to my help speedily, ere I die. Faith tells us that both the literal and the spiritual Israel shall rise again-the former from national and religious, the latter from physical death, (Ezekiel 36:1-38.)
Verse 49. Lord, where are thy former loving-kindnesses? Faith here rallies, by an appeal to God's former stipulations of loving- kindness to David, which in part he had carried into effect in David's lifetime-a pledge of His faithfulness to the rest of His promise.
Verse 50. Remember, Lord, the reproach of thy servants; how I do bear in my bosom (the reproach of) all the mighty people. So the Chaldaic. But it is better to suppose no ellipsis-`how I do bear in my bosom all the many peoples;' i:e., that I bear the burden of hostile multitudes (invaders) in the midst of my land Shortly before the final invasion by Nebuchadnezzar, "the Lord sent against him (Jehoiakim) bands of the Chaldees ... Syrians ... Moabites, and ... children of Ammon and sent them against Judah to destroy it" (2 Kings 24:2). This seems to fix the date of this psalm to the third year of Jehoiakim's reign, about 607 BC Compare Psalms 79:1; cf. note, Psalms 89:44. In the days of Anti-christ, Israel restored shall suffer similarly from the conspiracy of peoples invading her land, and shall complain to God.
Verse 51. Wherewith thine enemies have reproached, O Lord ... the foot-steps of thine anointed. "THINE" is emphatic: in reproaching him, they virtually reproach THEE; because he is "thine anointed." "The footsteps" are virtually, they reproach him wherever he goes.