Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Psalms 13:2

Clarke's Commentary

Verse Psalms 13:2. Take counsel in my soul — I am continually framing ways and means of deliverance; but they all come to naught, because thou comest not to my deliverance. When a soul feels the burden and guilt of sin, it tries innumerable schemes of self-recovery; but they are all useless. None but God can speak peace to a guilty conscience.

Mine enemy be exalted — Satan appears to triumph while the soul lies under the curse of a broken law.

Bridgeway Bible Commentary

Psalms 11-13 Persevere . . . or give in?

There came a time when David became tired of his continual flight from Saul, not just because it was wearying, but because it was cutting him off from the public worship places of God’s people (1 Samuel 26:19). His spiritual life was weakened and he gave in to the temptation to leave his own country for the safety of enemy Philistia (1 Samuel 27:1). This is the sort of temptation that David considers in Psalms 11:0, the temptation to go along with wrongdoing instead of resisting it.

If people act solely according to common sense, their suggestion in such a crisis will probably be to do what creates least hardship. After all (so the argument runs), if there is no law and order in the community, and if people in positions of power have set themselves to do evil, what can a righteous person gain by trying to resist (11:1-3)? David replies that such action really shows a lack of understanding of God’s holiness and no respect for his authority. God sees and understands all. He will pour out his wrath on the wicked, but he will comfort the faithful with the security of his presence (4-7).

The theme of Psalms 10:0 and 11 continues in Psalms 12:0, and indeed right through to Psalms 17:0. Ungodly people hold all the positions of power and pay no attention to the opinions of those who walk in God’s ways. They maintain their authority and influence only by twisting, ignoring or withholding the truth (12:1-4). But God sees and knows. He promises to protect the godly, and his promises can be trusted (5-6). His people know that their only hope is in him (7-8).

Continual persecution can be hard to bear. It tries the psalmist’s patience to the limit, causing him to cry out to God, almost in despair, asking when will God deliver him from his troubles (13:1-2). If he dies, his enemies will think they have won the battle against him (3-4). However, the very act of crying out to God lightens his burden. It reminds him that the one to whom he cries has bound himself to his people with a covenant love, and he will not fail (5-6).

God’s steadfast love

Frequently the psalmists rejoice in a characteristic of God that RSV translates as ‘steadfast love’, GNB translates as ‘constant love’, and other versions translate as ‘loyalty’, ‘love’, ‘mercy’, ‘kindness’ and ‘loving kindness’. These are all translations of the Hebrew word chesed, which has the meaning of covenant loyalty or faithfulness.

A covenant was an agreement between two parties that carried with it obligations and blessings. Chesed was a particularly strong form of love, which bound a person to be faithful and loyal to the other party in the covenant. In the Psalms the word is used frequently to denote the loyal love and covenant faithfulness that God exercises towards his people through all their trials and joys (e.g Psalms 13:5; Psalms 25:7).

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

THE FIVE LINES OF LAMENT

“How long, O Jehovah? wilt thou forget me forever? How long wilt thou hide thy face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, Having sorrow in my heart all the day? How long shall mine enemy be exalted over me?”

Four times the cry, “How long?” rises from the plaintive lines, the evident distress of the psalmist deriving from his impression that God has forsaken him, hiding his face from him, and that somehow God’s favor at the moment does not rest upon him. This consciousness of separation from God has indeed brought an agony of near-despair to the psalmist.

The reasons for the psalmist’s distress are not far to seek. (1) God is the source of all happiness; (2) he is the source of all wisdom; (3) he is the source of all strength; and (4) he is the source of life itself.W. L. Watkinson, On the Psalms, Vol. 1 (New York: Funk and Wagnalls), p. 50. Because the psalmist feels separated from God, he has (1) sorrow, (2) feels the need of counsel (Psalms 13:2), (3) is weak before his enemy (Psalms 13:2), and (4) has a fear of death itself (Psalms 13:3).

It is strange indeed that children of God are not exempt from such feelings of abandonment and despair, and we are left in wondering as to why it should be so. Perhaps the Lord wishes to drive us to our knees repeatedly that we should ever rely upon Him and not upon ourselves.

One of the most discerning lines we have seen in connection this psalm is the following:

“Prayer is not only the proper reaction of the godly to trouble, it is also the effective medicine against depression in the face of it.”Leslie S. McCaw, The New Bible Commentary, Revised (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1970), p. 458.

In the same vein of thought are these words accredited to Martin Luther:

“Hope itself despairs, and despair yet hopes, and only that unspeakable groaning is audible with which the Holy Spirit, who moves over the waters covered with darkness, intercedes for us.Alexander Maclaren, The Psalms, Vol. I (New York: Eaton and Mains, 1892), p. 118.

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

How long - This refers to the third aspect of the case, or the third phase of the trouble, that is, that he was perplexed and embarrassed, having a deep and heavy sorrow in his heart, and he asks how long this was to continue. “Shall I take counsel in my soul.” This refers to the methods which he endeavored to devise to escape from trouble. He was perplexed, persecuted, and apparently forsaken; and being thus apparently forsaken, he was constrained to attempt to devise some plan for his own deliverance, without interposition or help from on high. He was under a necessity of relying on himself; and he asks “how long” this was to continue, or when he might hope that God would interpose to aid him by his counsels, and thus to deliver him.

Having sorrow in my heart daily - Every day; constantly. That is, there was no intermission to his troubles. The sorrow in his heart seems to have been not merely that which was caused by troubles from without, but also that which sprang from the painful necessity of attempting to form plans for his own relief - plans which seemed to be in vain.

How long shall mine enemy be exalted over me? - This is the fourth form or phase of his trouble, and he asks how long this was to continue. This clause suggests perhaps the exact form of the trial. It was that which arose from the designs of an enemy who persecuted and oppressed the psalmist, and who had done it so effectually that he seemed to have triumphed over him, or to have him completely in his power. All the other forms of the trial - the fact that he seemed to be forgotten; that God had apparently averted his face; that he was left to form plans of deliverance which seemed to be vain, were connected with the fact here adverted to, that an enemy had persecuted him, and had been suffered to gain a triumph over him. Who this enemy was we do not know.

Calvin's Commentary on the Bible

2.How long shall I take counsel in my soul? We know that men in adversity give way to discontent, and look around them, first to one quarter, and then to another, in search of remedies. Especially, upon seeing that they are destitute of all resources, they torment themselves greatly, and are distracted by a multitude of thoughts; and in great dangers, anxiety and fear compel them to change their purposes from time to time, when they do not find any plan upon which they can fix with certainty. David, therefore, complains, that while thinking of different methods of obtaining relief, and deliberating with himself now in one way, and now in another, he is exhausted to no purpose with the multitude of suggestions which pass through his mind; and by joining to this complaint the sorrow which he felt daily, he points out the source of this disquietude. As in severe sickness the diseased would desire to change their place every moment, and the more acute the pains which afflict them are, the more fitful and eager are they in shifting and changing; so, when sorrow seizes upon the hearts of men, its miserable victims are violently agitated within, and they find it more tolerable to torment themselves without obtaining relief, than to endure their afflictions with composed and tranquil minds. The Lord, indeed, promises to give to the faithful “the spirit of counsels” (Isaiah 11:2) but he does not always give it to them at the very beginning of any matter in which they are interested, but suffers them for a time to be embarrassed by long deliberation without coming to a determinate decision, ⁽²⁷¹⁾ or to be perplexed, as if they were entangled among thorns, not knowing whither to turn, ⁽²⁷²⁾ or what course to take. Some explain the Hebrew word יומם, yomam, as meaning all the day long. But it seems to me, that by it is rather meant another kind of continuance, namely, that his sorrow returned, and was renewed every day. In the end of the verse he deplores another evil, that his adversaries triumph over him the more boldly, when they see him wholly enfeebled, and as it were wasted by continual languor. Now this is an argument of great weight in our prayers; for there is nothing which is more displeasing to God, and which he will less bear with, than the cruel insolence which our enemies display, when they not only feast themselves by beholding us in misery, but also rise up the higher against us, and treat us the more disdainfully, the more they see us oppressed and afflicted.

(271) “Mais permet que pour un temps ils s’entortillent en de longs discours sans venir au poinct.” —Fr.

(272) “Ne sachans on se tourner.” — Fr.

Smith's Bible Commentary

Psalms 13:1-6

The thirteenth psalm, to the chief musician. Psalm of David.

How long will thou forget me, O LORD? for ever? how long will thou hide your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? how long shall my enemy be exalted over me? ( Psalms 13:1-2 )

The cry, "O Lord, how long do I go on in this trial? How long, Lord, before You deliver?"

Consider and hear me, O LORD my God: lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death; Lest mine enemy say, I have prevailed against him; and those that trouble me rejoice when I am moved. But I have trusted in thy mercy; and my heart shall rejoice in thy salvation ( Psalms 13:3-5 ).

Comes on strong at the end. He speaks of the confidence of the victory that shall be his.

I will sing unto the LORD, because he hath dealt bountifully with me ( Psalms 13:6 ).

"

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

1. Lament over prolonged suffering 13:1-2

Rhetorical questions expressed David’s frustration and sought to move God to action (cf. Psalms 6:3). God had apparently forgotten His servant or was hiding from him (cf. Exodus 2:24-25). Having no word from the Lord, David had to listen to his own reasoning that he regarded as a poor substitute. In the meantime, his enemy continued to enjoy the upper hand.

"Psalms 13 is indeed a speech of disorientation. Something is terribly wrong in the life of the speaker, and in the life of the speaker with God." [Note: Brueggemann, p. 58.]

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

Psalms 13

Like several of the preceding psalms, this one is also a prayer that the psalmist offered in the midst of affliction. David rested in confidence in the Lord even though he saw no immediate relief from his predicament, possibly illness. This individual lament psalm designed for community use begins with sobbing and ends with singing.

"The Psalm consists of . . . three groups of decreasing magnitude. A long deep sigh is followed, as from a relieved breast, by an already much more gentle and half calm prayer; and this again by the believing joy which anticipates the certainty of being answered. This song as it were casts up constantly lessening waves, until it becomes still as the sea when smooth as a mirror, and the only motion discernible at last is that of the joyous ripple of calm repose." [Note: Delitzsch, 1:199.]

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

How long shall I take counsel in my soul,.... Or "put it" s; to take counsel of good men and faithful friends, in matters of moment and difficulty, is safe and right; and it is best of all to take counsel of God, who is wonderful in it, and guides his people with it; but nothing is worse than for a man to take counsel of his own heart, or only to consult himself; for such counsel often casts a man down, and he is ashamed of it sooner or later: but this seems not to be the sense here; the phrase denotes the distressing circumstances and anxiety of mind the psalmist was in; he was at his wits' end, and cast about in his mind, and had various devises and counsels formed there; and yet knew not what way to take, what course to steer;

[having] sorrow in my heart daily; by reason of God's hiding his face from him; on account of sin that dwelt in him, or was committed by him; because of his distance from the house of God, and the worship and ordinances of it; and by reason of his many enemies that surrounded him on every side: this sorrow was an heart sorrow, and what continually attended him day by day; or was in the daytime, when men are generally amused with business or diversions, as well as in the night, as Kimchi observes;

how long shall mine enemy be exalted over me? even the vilest of men,

Psalms 12:8; this may be understood either of temporal enemies, and was true of David when he was obliged not only to leave his own house and family, but the land of Judea, and flee to the Philistines; and when he fled from Absalom his son, lest he should be taken and slain by him; or of spiritual enemies, and is true of saints when sin prevails and leads captive, and when the temptations of Satan succeed; as when he prevailed upon David to number the people, Peter to deny his master, &c. The Jewish writers t observe that here are four "how longs", answerable to the four monarchies, Babylonian, Persian, Grecian, and Roman, and their captivities under them.

s אשית "ponam", Pagninus, Montanus, Munster, Vatablus. t Jarchi, Midrash in Kimchi, & Abendana in Miclol Yophi in loc.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

To the chief musician. A psalm of David.

      1 How long wilt thou forget me, O LORD? for ever? how long wilt thou hide thy face from me?   2 How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? how long shall mine enemy be exalted over me?   3 Consider and hear me, O LORD my God: lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death;   4 Lest mine enemy say, I have prevailed against him; and those that trouble me rejoice when I am moved.   5 But I have trusted in thy mercy; my heart shall rejoice in thy salvation.   6 I will sing unto the LORD, because he hath dealt bountifully with me.

      David, in affliction, is here pouring out his soul before God; his address is short, but the method is very observable, and of use for direction and encouragement.

      I. His troubles extort complaints (Psalms 13:1; Psalms 13:2); and the afflicted have liberty to pour out their complaint before the Lord,Psalms 102:1 title. It is some ease to a troubled spirit to give vent to its griefs, especially to give vent to them at the throne of grace, where we are sure to find one who is afflicted in the afflictions of his people and is troubled with the feeling of their infirmities; thither we have boldness of access by faith, and there we have parresia--freedom of speech. Observe here,

      1. What David complains of. (1.) God's unkindness; so he construed it, and it was his infirmity. He thought God had forgotten him, had forgotten his promises to him, his covenant with him, his former lovingkindness which he had shown him and which he took to be an earnest of further mercy, had forgotten that there was such a man in the world, who needed and expected relief and succour from him. Thus Zion said, My God has forgotten me (Isaiah 49:14), Israel said, My way is hidden from the Lord,Isaiah 40:27. Not that any good man can doubt the omniscience, goodness, and faithfulness of God; but it is a peevish expression of prevailing fear, which yet, when it arises from a high esteem and earnest desire of God's favour, though it be indecent and culpable, shall be passed by and pardoned, for the second thought will retract it and repent of it. God hid his face from him, so that he wanted that inward comfort in God which he used to have, and herein was a type of Christ upon the cross, crying out, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? God sometimes hides his face from his own children, and leaves them in the dark concerning their interest in him; and this they lay to heart more than any outward trouble whatsoever. (2.) His own uneasiness. [1.] He was racked with care, which filled his head: I take counsel in my soul; "I am at a loss, and am inops consilii--without a friend to advise with that I can put any confidence in, and therefore am myself continually projecting what to do to help myself; but none of my projects are likely to take effect, so that I am at my wits' end, and in a continual agitation." Anxious cares are heavy burdens with which good people often load themselves more than they need. [2.] He was overwhelmed with sorrow, which filled his heart: I have sorrow in my heart daily. He had a constant disposition to sorrow and it preyed upon his spirits, not only in the night, when he was silent and solitary, but by day too, when lighter griefs are diverted and dissipated by conversation and business; nay, every day brought with it fresh occasions of grief; the clouds returned after the rain. The bread of sorrow is sometimes the saint's daily bread. Our Master himself was a man of sorrows. (3.) His enemies' insolence, which added to his grief. Saul his great enemy, and others under him, were exalted over him, triumphed in his distress, pleased themselves with his grief, and promised themselves a complete victory over him. This he complained of as reflecting dishonour upon God, and his power and promise.

      2. How he expostulates with God hereupon: "How long shall it be thus?" And, "Shall it be thus for ever?" Long afflictions try our patience and often tire it. It is a common temptation, when trouble lasts long, to think it will last always; despondency then turns into despair, and those that have long been without joy begin, at last, to be without hope. "Lord, tell me how long thou wilt hide thy face, and assure me that it shall not be for ever, but that thou wilt return at length in mercy to me, and then I shall the more easily bear my present troubles."

      II. His complaints stir up his prayers, Psalms 13:3; Psalms 13:4. We should never allow ourselves to make any complaints but what are fit to be offered up to God and what drive us to our knees. Observe here,

      1. What his petitions are: Consider my case, hear my complaints, and enlighten my eyes, that is, (1.) "Strengthen my faith;" for faith is the eye of the soul, with which it sees above, and sees through, the things of sense. "Lord, enable me to look beyond my present troubles and to foresee a happy issue of them." (2.) "Guide my way; enable me to look about me, that I may avoid the snares which are laid for me." (3.) "Refresh my soul with the joy of thy salvation." That which revives the drooping spirits is said to enlighten the eyes,1 Samuel 14:27; Ezra 9:8. "Lord, scatter the cloud of melancholy which darkens my eyes, and let my countenance be made pleasant."

      2. What his pleas are. He mentions his relation to God and interest in him (O Lord my God!) and insists upon the greatness of the peril, which called for speedy relief and succour. If his eyes were not enlightened quickly, (1.) He concludes that he must perish: "I shall sleep the sleep of death; I cannot live under the weight of all this care and grief." Nothing is more killing to a soul then the want of God's favour, nothing more reviving than the return of it. (2.) That then his enemies would triumph: "Lest my enemy say, So would I have it; lest Saul, lest Satan, be gratified in my fall." It would gratify the pride of his enemy: He will say, "I have prevailed, I have gotten the day, and been too hard for him and his God." It would gratify the malice of his enemies: They will rejoice when I am moved. And will it be for God's honour to suffer them thus to trample upon all that is sacred both in heaven and earth?

      III. His prayers are soon turned into praises (Psalms 13:5; Psalms 13:6): But my heart shall rejoice and I will sing to the Lord. What a surprising change is here in a few lines! In the beginning of the psalm we have him drooping, trembling, and ready to sink into melancholy and despair; but, in the close of it, rejoicing in God, and elevated and enlarged in his praises. See the power of faith, the power of prayer, and how good it is to draw near to God. If we bring our cares and griefs to the throne of grace, and leave them there, we may go away like Hannah, and our countenance will be no more sad,1 Samuel 1:18. And here observe the method of his comfort. 1. God's mercy is the support of his faith. "My case is bad enough, and I am ready to think it deplorable, till I consider the infinite goodness of God; but, finding I have that to trust to, I am comforted, though I have no merit of my own. In former distresses I have trusted in the mercy of God, and I never found that it failed me; his mercy has in due time relieved me and my confidence in it has in the mean time supported me. Even in the depth of this distress, when God hid his face from me, when without were fightings and within were fears, yet I trusted in the mercy of God and that was as an anchor in a storm, by the help of which, though I was tossed, I was not overset." And still I do trust in thy mercy; so some read it. "I refer myself to that, with an assurance that it will do well for me at last." This he pleads with God, knowing what pleasure he takes in those that hope in his mercy,Psalms 147:11. 2. His faith in God's mercy filled his heart with joy in his salvation; for joy and peace come by believing,Romans 15:13. Believing, you rejoice,1 Peter 1:8. Having put his trust in the mercy of God, he is fully assured of salvation, and that his heart, which was now daily grieving, should rejoice in that salvation. Though weeping endure long, joy will return. 3. His joy in God's salvation would fill his mouth with songs of praise (Psalms 13:6; Psalms 13:6): "I will sing unto the Lord, sing in remembrance of what he has done formerly; though I should never recover the peace I have had, I will die blessing God that ever I had it. He has dealt bountifully with me formerly, and he shall have the glory of that, however he is pleased to deal with me now. I will sing in hope of what he will do for me at last, being confident that all will end well, will end everlastingly well." But he speaks of it as a thing past (He has dealt bountifully with me), because by faith he had received the earnest of the salvation and he was as confident of it as if it had been done already.

      In singing this psalm and praying it over, if we have not the same complaints to make that David had, we must thank God that we have not, dread and deprecate his withdrawings, sympathize with those that are troubled in mind, and encourage ourselves in our most holy faith and joy.