Psalms 38:2

"For your arrows have pierced me, your hand presses hard on me."

Key Reflection

In Psalm 38:2, David uses vivid imagery to describe his suffering, comparing it to being wounded by God’s own arrows and subjected to a crushing hand. This metaphor conveys the intensity of divine judgment or affliction while also hinting at a deeper spiritual reality of God's presence in one's trials, even when they feel unbearable.

From the Scholars: Barnes' Notes

For thine arrows stick fast in me -See the notes atJob 6:4. The word rendered “stick fast” -נחתnâchath- means properly to go or come down; to descend; and the literal idea here would be, “thine arrows come down upon me.” It is not so much the idea of their “sticking fast” when in the wound or flesh; it is that they come down upon one, and pierce him. The meaning is, that he was afflicted “as if” God had wounded him with arrows - arrows which pierced deep in his flesh. Compare the notes atPsalms 45:5. The allusion is to the disease with which he was afflicted.

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