My Notes Authors Matthew Henry - Commentary on the Whole Bible In these verses we have,
I. David’s prayers against his enemies, and all the enemies of God’s church and people; for it is as such that he looks upon them, so that he was actuated by a public spirit in praying against them, and not by any private revenge. 1. He prays that they might be disabled to do any further mischief (v. 6): Break their teeth, O God! Not so much that they might not feed themselves as that they might not be able to make prey of others, Ps. iii. 7. He does not say, “Break their necks” (no; let them live to repent, slay them not, lest my people forget), but, “Break their teeth, for they are lions, they are young lions, that live by rapine.” 2. That they might be disappointed in the plots they had already laid, and might not gain their point: “When he bends his bow, and takes aim to shoot his arrows at the upright in heart, _let them be as cut in pieces, _v. 7. Let them fall at his feet, and never come near the mark.” 3. That they and their interest might waste and come to nothing, that they might melt away as waters that run continually; that is, as the waters of a land-flood, which, though they seem formidable for a while, soon soak into the ground or return to their channels, or, in general, as water spilt upon the ground, which cannot be gathered up again, but gradually dries away and disappears. Such shall the floods of ungodly men be, which sometimes make us afraid (Ps. xviii. 4); so shall the proud waters be reduced, which threaten to go over our soul, Ps. cxxiv. 4, 5. Let us by faith then see what they shall be and then we shall not fear what they are. He prays (v. 8) that they might melt as a snail, which wastes by its own motion, in every stretch it makes leaving some of its moisture behind, which, by degrees, must needs consume it, though it makes a path to shine after it. He that like a snail in her house is plenus sui—full of himself, that pleases himself and trusts to himself, does but consume himself, and will quickly bring himself to nothing. And he prays that they might be like the untimely birth of a woman, which dies as soon as it begins to live and never sees the sun. Job, in his passion, wished he himself had been such a one (Job iii. 16), but he knew not what he said. We may, in faith, pray against the designs of the church’s enemies, as the prophet does (Hos. ix. 14, Give them, O Lord! what wilt thou give them? Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts), which explains this prayer of the psalmist.