Psalm 119:21 NKJV
21
You rebuke the arrogant, the cursed,
Who wander from Your commandments.
My Thoughts
In Psalm 119:21, David reflects on God’s rebuke of the proud and cursed individuals who stray from His commandments. This verse highlights the theme of pride as a root of disobedience, emphasizing that only those with humble hearts are obedient to God’s laws. Commentaries from Charles Spurgeon and other scholars reinforce the notion that pride leads to a lack of awareness of divine judgment. The text serves as a reminder of the consequences of arrogance and the importance of adhering to God’s guidance to avoid being subjected to His rebuke.
Note: Psalm 119 is an acrostic pattern. There are 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet; each of the 22 sections is given a letter of the Hebrew alphabet, and each line in that section begins with that letter. Today, we’re looking at verse 21 which is in the 3rd section which is called Gimel ג. According to the hebrews4christians.com website: “the letter Gimmel is the third letter of the “Aleph-Bet”, having the numerical value of three. The pictograph for Gimmel is a camel. In the Talmud it is said that the Gimmel symbolizes a rich man running after a poor man (the next letter Dalet) to give him tzedakah (charity).”
…..Bill
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Commentaries:
Charles Spurgeon
“Thou hast rebuked the proud that are cursed.” This is one of God’s judgments: he is sure to deal out a terrible portion to men of lofty looks. God rebuked Pharaoh with sore plagues, and at the Red Sea, “In the foundations of the world were discovered at thy rebuke, O Lord.” In the person of the naughty Egyptian, he taught all the proud that he will certainly abase them. Proud men are cursed men: nobody blesses them, and they soon become a burden to themselves. In itself, pride is a plague and torment. Even if no curse came from the law of God, there seems to be a law of nature that proud men should be unhappy men. This led David to abhor pride; he dreaded the rebuke of God and the curse of the law. The proud sinners of his day were his enemies, and he felt happy that God was in the quarrel as well as he.
“Which do err from thy commandments.” Only humble hearts are obedient, for they alone will yield to rule and government. Proud men’s looks are high, too high to mark their own feet and keep the Lord’s way. Pride lies at the root of all sin: if men were not arrogant, they would not be disobedient.
God rebukes pride even when the multitudes pay homage to it, for he sees in it rebellion against his own majesty, and the seeds of yet further rebellions. It is the sum of sin. Men talk of an honest pride; but if they were candid they would see that it is of all sins the least honest, and the least becoming in a creature, and especially in a fallen creature: yet so little do proud men know their own true condition under the curse of God, that they set up to censure the godly, and express contempt for them, as may be seen in the next verse. They are themselves contemptible, and yet they are contemptuous towards their betters. We may well love the judgments of God when we see them so decisively leveled against the haughty upstarts who would fain lord it over righteous men; and we may well be of good under the rebukes of the ungodly since their power to hurt us is destroyed by the Lord himself. “The Lord rebuke thee“ is answer enough for all the accusations of men or devils.
In the fifth of the former octave, the Psalmist wrote, “I have declared all the judgments of thy mouth,” and here he continues in the same strain, giving a particular instance of the Lord’s judgments against haughty rebels. In the next two portions, the fifth verses deal with lying and vanity, and pride is one of the most common forms of those evils.
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Enduring Word
You rebuke the proud: Those who stray from God’s commandments are both proud (their disobedience is evidence of willfulness) and cursed (no good can come from their disobedience). (Guzik)
i. “Let the histories of Cain, Pharaoh, Haman, Nebuchadnezzar, and Herod exhibit the proud under the rebuke and curse of God.” (Bridges)
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Albert Barnes
Thou hast rebuked the proud – Compare Psalms 9:5. The meaning is that God had done this not by word but by deed. The proud were everywhere rebuked by God, alike in his law, and in his providence. The connection seems to be this: the psalmist is meditating on the benefit or advantage of keeping the law of God; of a humble, pious life. His mind naturally adverts to what would be the opposite of this – or to this in contrast with an opposite course of life; and he says, therefore, that God had in every way, and at all times, manifested his displeasure against that class of people. Such a course, therefore, must be attended with misery; but the course which he proposed to pursue must be attended with happiness.
That are cursed – The accursed; those who are regarded and treated by God as accursed, or as objects of his disapprobation.
Which do err from thy commandments – Who depart from thy law. The sense is, “I propose and intend to keep thy law. As a motive to this, I look at the consequences which must follow from disobeying it. I see it everywhere in the divine treatment of those who do disregard that law. They are subject to the displeasure – the solemn rebuke – of God. So all must be who disregard his law; and it is my purpose not to be found among their number.”
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John Gill
Thou hast rebuked the proud,…. Which some understand of the fallen angels, who, in proud wrath, left their habitations, because they would not be subject to the Son of God in human nature; wherefore he scattered them in the imaginations of their hearts, and cast down these mighty ones into hell, where they are reserved in chains of darkness to the judgment of the great day. Others of the Scribes and Pharisees in Christ’s time, this psalm being suited, as is thought, to Gospel times, who were proud of their own righteousness, and despised others less holy than themselves, and submitted not to the righteousness of Christ, whom he often rebuked, and at last punished. Rather all proud atheistical persons, profane and wicked men, are meant; who, Pharaoh like, say, who is the Lord that we should obey him? who reckon, their tongues to be their own, and employ them both against God and men, and regard neither: these God resists, sets himself against, and sooner or later severely punishes; for in the things they deal proudly he is above them, Exodus 18:11;
[that are] cursed which do err from thy commandments; according to the law of God, being transgressors of it, and will hear the awful sentence, “go, ye cursed,” Matthew 25:41. The Targum, Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, and all the Oriental versions, join this with the next clause: “cursed are they which do err from thy commandments”; from the way of them, not observing them; from the end of them, Christ, not looking to him for righteousness.
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Matthew Henry
Here is,
1. The wretched character of wicked people. The temper of their minds is bad. They are proud; they magnify themselves above others. And yet that is not all: they magnify themselves against God, and set up their wills in competition with and opposition to the will of God, as if their hearts, and tongues, and all, were their own. There is something of pride at the bottom of every willful sin, and the tenor of their lives is no better: They do err from thy commandments, as Israel, that did always err in their hearts; they err in judgment, and embrace principles contrary to thy commandments, and then no wonder that they err in practice, and willfully turn aside out of the good way. This is the effect of their pride; for they say, What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? As Pharaoh, Who is the Lord?
2. The wretched case of such. They are certainly cursed, for God resists the proud; and those that throw off the commands of the law lay themselves under its curse (Gal. 3:10), and he that now beholds them afar off will shortly say to them, Go, you cursed. The proud sinners bless themselves; God curses them; and, though the most direful effects of this curse are reserved for the other world, yet they are often severely rebuked in this world: Providence crosses them, vexes them, and, wherein they dealt proudly, God shows himself above them; and these rebukes are earnests of worse. David took notice of the rebukes proud men were under, and it made him cleave the more closely to the word of God and pray the more earnestly that he might not err from God’s commandments. Thus, saints get good by God’s judgments on sinners.
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The Pulpit Commentaries
Thou hast rebuked the proud. It is difficult to connect this with the preceding. But perhaps the link may be found in the double sense of mishpatim, “judgments,” which includes verbal sentences against sinners delivered in the Law, and also actual sentences upon them in deed and fact. These last are in the writer’s mind in the present verse—such judgments as those upon Pharaoh (Exodus 14:23-31), Zerah (2 Chronicles 14:9-15), and Sennacherib (2 Kings 19:32-37). That are cursed. This clause is questioned as metrically redundant. But Hebrew metrology is scarcely as yet an exact science. And the clause finds its justification in Deuteronomy 27:26. Which do err from thy commandments. Such error brings under a curse those who commit it. If it be a blessed thing to walk in God’s Law (Deuteronomy 27:1), it must be a cursed thing to transgress against it.
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Miscellaneous Quotes
“Thou hast rebuked the proud.” Let the histories of Cain, Pharaoh, Haman, Nebuchadnezzar, and Herod exhibit the proud under the rebuke and curse of God. He abhors their persons and their offerings: he “knows them afar off,” he “resisteth them:” “he scattereth them in the imaginations of their hearts.” Yet more especially hateful are they in his sight, when cloaking themselves under a spiritual garb,—”which say, Stand by thyself, come not near to me: for I am holier than thou. These are a smoke in my nose, a fire that burneth all the day.” David and Hezekiah are instructive beacons in the church, that God’s people, whenever they give place to the workings of a proud heart, must not hope to escape his rebuke. “Thou wast a God that forgavest them, though thou tookest vengeance on their inventions:” Psa 99:8.
—Charles Bridges.
“Thou hast rebuked the proud.” David addeth another reason whereby he is more enflamed to pray unto God and to address himself unto him to be taught in his word; to wit, when he seeth that he hath so “rebuked the proud.” For the chastisement and punishments which God layeth upon the faithless and rebellious should be a good instruction for us; as it is said that God hath executed judgment, and that the inhabitants of the land should learn his righteousness. It is not without cause that the prophet Isaiah also hath so said; for he signifieth unto us that God hath by divers and sundry means drawn us unto him, and that chiefly when he teacheth us to fear his majesty. For without it, alas, we shall soon become like unto brute beasts: if God lay the bridle on our necks, what license we will give unto ourselves experience very well teacheth us. Now God, seeing that we are so easily brought to run at random, sendeth us examples, because he would bring us to walk in fear and carefully.
—John Calvin.
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Cross-References
Deuteronomy 27:26 (KJV )
26 Cursed be he that confirmeth not all the words of this law to do them. And all the people shall say, Amen.
Psalm 119:78 (KJV )
78 Let the proud be ashamed; for they dealt perversely with me without a cause:
But I will meditate in thy precepts.
Galatians 3:10 (KJV )
10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.
Daniel 4:37 (KJV )
37 Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the King of heaven, all whose works are truth, and his ways judgment: and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.
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Closing Thoughts
My son, give attention to my words; Incline your ear to my sayings. Do not let them depart from your eyes; Keep them in the midst of your heart; For they are life to those who find them, And health to all their flesh. Keep your heart with all diligence, For out of it spring the issues of life. Put away from you a deceitful mouth, And put perverse lips far from you. Let your eyes look straight ahead, And your eyelids look right before you. Ponder the path of your feet, And let all your ways be established. Do not turn to the right or the left; Remove your foot from evil. Proverbs 4:20-27 NKJV
Gimel ג: The word of God and the trials of life.
17
Deal bountifully with Your servant,
That I may live and keep Your word.
18
Open my eyes, that I may behold
Wondrous things from Your law.
19
I am a stranger in the earth;
Do not hide Your commandments from me.
20
My soul is crushed with longing
After Your ordinances at all times.
21
You rebuke the arrogant, the cursed,
Who wander from Your commandments.
22
Take away reproach and contempt from me,
For I observe Your testimonies.
23
Even though princes sit and talk against me,
Your servant meditates on Your statutes.
24
Your testimonies also are my delight;
They are my counselors.
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