Psalms 58:3

THE TYRANTS DESCRIBED

"The wicked are estranged from the womb:

They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.

Their poison is like the poison of a serpent:

They are like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear,

Which hearkeneth not to the voice of charmers,

Charming never so wisely."

"They are estranged from the womb" (Psalms 58:3). Those who see this verse as teaching total hereditary depravity find what is absolutely not in it. "The words `total,' `hereditary,' and `depravity' are not in the Bible, not even in one in a place, much less all three together"![7]

"They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies" (Psalms 58:3). "This, of course, is literally impossible; and those who use this verse to argue for infant depravity surely miss the author's poetic point."[8]

What is meant here is simply that the total lives of the wicked are evil, their very earliest activities having given evidence of it. "The most inventive affection and the most untiring patience cannot change the minds of such wicked men. Nothing remains, therefore, for David, except to pray for their removal."[9]

Leupold pointed out that there is a close connection between Psalms 58:2 and Psalms 58:3. In Psalms 58:2, he addressed them as men open to reason; but in Psalms 58:3, having recognized their stubborn perversity in evil, he refrains from further reasoning with them, and begins to speak "Of them, rather than to them."[10]

"They are like the deaf adder" (Psalms 58:4). The metaphor here is that of a poisonous serpent which cannot be charmed. "It pictures an evil person so intent upon wickedness that he cannot be dissuaded."[11]

The whole point of Psalms 58:3-5 is that the wicked men addressed are already hardened in sin and that the hope of changing them is nil. It is an exercise in futility to pray for the inveterate enemies of God who are intent only upon destruction.