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E.W. Bullinger

E.W. Bullinger's Companion Bible Notes - Psalms 51:2

Wash: as a garment, Hebrew. kabas. Heb form = multiply to wash = wash thoroughly. iniquity. Hebrew. 'avah. App-44 . cleanse: i.e. pronounce ceremonially clean. sin. Hebrew. chata'. App-44 , read more

Thomas Coke

Thomas Coke Commentary on the Holy Bible - Psalms 51:2

Psalms 51:2. Wash me thoroughly, &c.— The original כבסני ברבה hereb kabseini is, multiply, or, in multiplying, wash me from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin; for the word multiply refers to both verbs, wash me and cleanse me, and is well rendered in our version by thoroughly wash me; as a garment often washed is thoroughly cleansed from its impurity. This form of expression is frequent in the Old Testament. See Isaiah 1:16. The meaning of the Psalmist is, that God, by repentance... read more

Thomas Constable

Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Psalms 51:1-19

Psalms 51In this penitential individual lament psalm (cf. Psalms 6, 32, 38, 102, 130, , 143) David confessed the sins he committed against Bathsheba and Uriah. It is a model of confession that has become popular with God’s people. Since we all sin so often and need to confess frequently, this psalm is a help and comfort to us all.Psalms 32 proposed the need to confess sin, and Psalms 51:5 of that poem is a brief statement of confession. But Psalms 51 moves closer to "the center of the crisis of... read more

Thomas Constable

Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Psalms 51:2

The biblical writers often compared a person’s deeds to the clothing he wears because that is what other people see when they look at us. David asked God to wash away his iniquity (moral evil) like dirt that was on his garment (behavior). Cleansing is a term that comes from the tabernacle ritual. Those who came into God’s presence to worship and serve Him had to be clean. David correctly viewed his sin (falling short of what God requires) as making the worship and service of a holy God... read more

John Dummelow

John Dummelow's Commentary on the Bible - Psalms 51:1-19

Title.—(RV) ’For the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David: when Nathan the prophet’ came unto him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.’ It is impossible not to feel the general appropriateness of this Ps. to the occasion mentioned in the title, and there is no historic OT. figure except David to whom we can point as an illustration of the great sin and deep penitence which are the theme of the Ps. The theory that the speaker is the nation of Israel hardly accounts for the highly personal tone of the... read more

Charles John Ellicott

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Psalms 51:2

(2) Wash me thoroughly.—Literally, Wash me much, whether we follow the Hebrew text or the Hebrew margin. The two clauses of the verse are not merely antithetic. The terms wash and cleanse seem to imply respectively the actual and the ceremonial purification, the former meaning literally to tread, describing the process of washing clothes (as blankets are washed to this day in Scotland) by trampling them with the feet, the latter used of the formal declaration of cleanliness by the priest in the... read more

William Nicoll

Expositor's Dictionary of Texts - Psalms 51:1-19

Psalms 51:0 Verse 8. 'Thou tellest my wanderings; put thou my tears into thy bottle: are they not in thy book?' a verse frequently in the mouth of Archbishop Usher, one of the best and most learned men of his time born in Dublin, 1580, driven to and fro through England and Ireland amid the troubles in Church and State, during one of the most troublous times in our history, and at length finding the rest he often sighed for at Reigate in England, 1655, after he had preached the Gospel for... read more

William Nicoll

Expositor's Bible Commentary - Psalms 51:1-19

Psalms 51:1-19THE main grounds on which the Davidic authorship of this psalm is denied are four. First, it is alleged that its conceptions of sin and penitence are in advance of his stage of religious development; or, as Cheyene puts it, "David could not have had these ideas" ("Aids to Dev. Study of Crit.," 166). The impossibility depends on theory which is not yet so established as to be confidently used to settle questions of date. Again, the psalmist’s wail, "Against Thee only have I... read more

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