Known me, i.e. known me exactly, as men do those things which they diligently search out. My downsitting and mine uprising; all my postures and motions, my actions and my cessations from action. My thought; all my secret counsels and designs. Afar off; before they are perfectly formed in my mind. Thou knowest what my thoughts will be in such and such circumstances long before I know it, yea, from all eternity. read more
INTRODUCTION“Nowhere,” says Perowne, “are the great attributes of God—His omniscience, His omnipresence, His omnipotence, set forth so strikingly as they are in this magnificent Psalm. Nowhere is there a more overwhelming sense of the fact that man is beset and compassed about by God, pervaded by His Spirit, unable to take a step without His control; and yet nowhere is there a more emphatic assertion of the personality of man as distinct from, not absorbed in the Deity. This is no pantheistie... read more
Psalms 139:1-2 I. Deep indeed and mysterious, far beyond what we can understand, are our own ordinary sleeping and waking; we know not how it is that the soothing quietness which we call sleep steals over the soul and body, nor how the two wake together and begin to act as before. Our sleeping and our waking are beyond our own knowledge and our own power; God keeps both in His own hand. And if our ordinary taking of rest in sleep and rousing up to our work again if these are so strange and... read more
Psalms 139:1-3 The fact that God is always present and knows every minute trifle in our lives, and that His unerring judgment will assuredly take count of every detail of our character and conduct, neither exaggerating nor omitting, but applying absolute justice this truth is one of those which lose force from their very universality. That we should be so little checked, so little awed, in the course of our daily lives, by this perpetual and awful Presence; that we should know God to be looking... read more
DISCOURSE: 734THE OMNIPRESENCE AND OMNISCIENCE OF GODPsalms 139:1-12. O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my down-sitting and mine up-rising; thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou compassest my path, and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways: for there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether. Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot... read more
Psalms 139:1-24 , another psalm of David to the chief musician. As David offers this prayer really unto God, declaring, first of all,O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me ( Psalms 139:1 ).Recognizing that God knows me completely and fully.You know my downsittings and my uprisings ( Psalms 139:2 ),Or you know my ups and my downs.you understand my thoughts afar off ( Psalms 139:2 ).The Hebrew is, "You understand my thoughts in their origins." Before I even think them, You know them. You... read more
This psalm is entitled, a psalm of David. All the Versions agree with the Hebrew in this. It must be regarded as one of the sublimest representations of the Divinity, and particularly with regard to omniscience, ever composed. It also represents the moral perfections of God as the searcher of hearts, and the avenger of crime. It represents the divinity under all the grandeur of the Godhead, by the name Jehovah, associated with the enquiry, Whither shall I go from thy Spirit, or flee from thy... read more
Psalms 139:1-24O Lord, Thou hast searched me, and known me.God’s exhaustive knowledge of manThis lyric has always been the subject of praise. Aben Ezra said there was none like it in the five books. Lord Brougham spoke of it as “that singularly beautiful poem” Herder said that language utterly failed him in its exposition. Erskine of Llinlathen wanted this to be before him on his death-bed. The title ascribes it to David, an ascription corroborated by its originality and majesty and its... read more
Psa 139:2 Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off. Ver. 2. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising ] All my postures, gestures, practices, sive sedeam, sive surgam, whether I sit, stand, walk, lie; thou searchest and knowest all. Some search, but know not; thou dost both; thine eyes behold, thine eyelids try, the children of men, Psalms 11:4 . See Trapp on " Psa 11:4 " Thou understandest my thought ] Heb. my familiar thoughts, such as I... read more
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Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible - Psalms 139:1-24
CXXXIX. God is Everywhere: He Knows Everything— Oh that He would Destroy the Wicked.— This Ps. is among the most spiritual productions of the OT. It deals with the mystery of Divine providence, a theme frequently discussed after the Exile, when the national life had died out and each individual was brought face to face with the difficulties which surrounded him and with the thought of his ultimate fate. Other nations, of course, have engaged in similar speculation, but in very different tone... read more