Psalm 119:53
NKJV
53
Indignation has taken hold of me
Because of the wicked, who forsake Your law.
KJV
53 Horror hath taken hold upon me because of the wicked that forsake thy law.
The Horror of Wickedness
My Notes
Psalm 119:53 isn’t a theological reflection—it’s a visceral and mournful meditation on justice, mercy, and the destiny of souls.
David was horrified by the sin of the wicked, not just horrified by the sin but the end result of that sin for those people. We serve a just God who will perform what He has said, and that applies to the sinners as well as the saved. The distress that overwhelmed him was caused by the callousness of the people who showed utter disregard for God’s law, His word.
How do we react when we see family, friends, and people on the street who are living lives away from God, ignoring what He has done for us and calmly walking through life rebelling against God? Does their coming end, being exposed to God’s wrath because they consciously ignore the Lord and rebel against Him alarm us to the point where we say or do something that might make them recognize their need for the Lord?
John Gill wrote “Hence such trembling seized the psalmist; and often so it is, that good men tremble more for the wicked than they do for themselves” When we see God’s word being purposefully being despised, and people living in a constant path of disobedience, does it concern us that it effects others who lives are hanging between salvation and eternal punishment?
In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus’s last words to the disciples were
Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen. Matthew 28:19-20 KJV
When we see the lost and horrified by what we know is the end result for those who are lost, part of the “Great Commission” is to reach out and teach them to observe all things that Jesus and the Holy Spirit have shown us and commanded us to do.
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 53, which is in the 7th section, which is called “Zayin ז”. According to the hebrews4christians.com website, the letter Zayin ז is the 7th letter of the Aleph-Bet, having the numeric value of seven. The pictograph for Zayin ז looks like a sword. Since Zayin ז represents both the number seven and a sword, it is not surprising that it is used to divide or cut up time (z’man) into units of sevens:
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Shabbat – the 7th day of the 7-day week (the week of days)
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Shavu’ot – the 49th day after Passover (the week of weeks)
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Tishri – the 7th month of the year (the week of months)
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Shemitah – the 7th year of rest for the land (the week of years)
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Yovel – the 49th year (the week of weeks of years)
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The Millennial Kingdom – the 7th millennium of human history (week of 1,000’s)
The Rabbi’s pronounced “All sevens are blessed”, and the number seven has always been regarded in the Jewish tradition as the number of completion, wholeness, blessing, and rest.
……..Bill
Commentaries:
David Brainerd
“Horror hath taken hold upon me because of the wicked.” I have had clear views of eternity; have seen the blessedness of the godly, in some measure; and have longed to share their happy state; as well as been comfortably satisfied that through grace I shall do so; but, oh, what anguish is raised in my mind, to think of an eternity for those who are without Christ, for those who are mistaken, and who bring their false hopes to the grave with them! The sight was so dreadful I could by no means bear it: my thoughts recoiled, and I said, (under a more affecting sense than ever before,) “Who can dwell with everlasting burnings?”—David Brainerd, 1718-1747.
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Charles Spurgeon
“Horror hath taken hold upon me because of the wicked that forsake thy law.” He was horrified at their action, at the pride which led them to it, and at the punishment which would be sure to fall upon them for it. When he thought upon the ancient judgments of God he was filled with terror at the fate of the godless; as well he might be. Their laughter had not distressed him, but he was distressed by a foresight of their overthrow. Truths which were amusement to them caused amazement to him. He saw them utterly turning away from the law of God, and leaving it as a path forsaken and overgrown from want of traffic, and this forsaking of the law filled him with the most painful emotions: he was astonished at their wickedness, stunned by their presumption, alarmed by the expectation of their sudden overthrow, amazed by the terror of their certain doom.
See Psa 119:106, 158, and note the tenderness which combined with all this. Those who are the firmest believers in the eternal punishment of the wicked are the most grieved at their doom. It is no proof of tenderness to shut one’s eyes to the awful doom of the ungodly. Compassion is far better shown in trying to save sinners than in trying to make things pleasant all round. Oh that we were all more distressed as we think of the portion of the ungodly in the lake of fire! The popular plan is to shut your eyes and forget all about it, or pretend to doubt it, but this is not the way of the faithful servant of God.
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Enduring Word
Indignation has taken hold of me: When the psalmist thought of the wicked – perhaps the proud who held him and others who trusted in God’s word in great derision – it made him indignant. He recognized their great sin: who forsake Your law.
i. Those who deny or depreciate God’s word do just this – they forsake the word of God. Worse yet, they often lead others to do the same. Jesus graphically described the penalty for those who lead others astray (Luke 17:1-2).
(David Guzik)
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Albert Barnes
Horror hath taken hold upon me – Has seized me; has overpowered and overwhelmed me. I shudder; I tremble; I am afraid; I am filled with distress. Luther, “I am burnt up.” The Hebrew word – זלעפה zal‛âphâh – is from a verb meaning “to be hot; to glow”; and the idea in the word is that of violent heat; then, a glow or burning, as of a wind – the “simoom” of the desert. See Psalms 11:6, where the word is translated “horrible tempest,” in the margin, “burning.” The word occurs only in that passage, in the one before us, and in Lamentations 5:10, where it is rendered “terrible (famine),” in the margin, “terrors,” or “storms.” The state referred to here is that of one who sees the storm of burning wind and sand approaching; who expects every moment to be overcome and buried; whose soul trembles with consternation.
Because of the wicked … – Their conduct alarms me, their danger appalls me. Their condition overwhelms me. I see them rebelling against God. I see them exposed to his wrath. I see the grave just before them, and the awful scenes of judgment near. I see them about to be cast off and to sink to endless woe, and my soul is transfixed with horror. The contemplation overwhelms me with uncontrollable anguish. Can such things be? Can people be thus in danger? And can they be calm and composed, when so near such awful horrors? No man can look on the world of despair without horror; no one can truly realize that his fellow men are exposed to the horrors of that abode without having his soul filled with anguish. Strange that all people do not feel thus – that impenitent people can walk along on the verge of the grave and of hell “without” horror – that pious people, good people, praying people, can look upon their friends in that condition without having their souls filled with unutterable anguish. Compare Psalms 119:136; Romans 9:1-4; Luke 19:41.
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John Gill
Horror hath taken hold upon me,…. Trembling, sorrow, and distress, to a great degree, like a storm, or a blustering, scorching, burning wind, as the word signifies, which is very terrible;
because of the wicked that forsake thy law: not only transgress the law of the Lord, as every man does, more or less; but willfully and obstinately despise it, and cast it behind their backs, and live in a continued course of disobedience to it; or who apostatize from the doctrine of the word of God; willfully deny the truth, after they have had a speculative knowledge of it, whose punishment is very grievous, Hebrews 10:26; and now partly on account of the daring impiety of wicked men, who stretch out their hands against God, and strengthen themselves against the Almighty, and run upon him, even on the thick bosses of his bucklers; because of the shocking nature of their sins, the sad examples thereby set to others, the detriment they are of to themselves, and dishonor they bring to God; and partly because of the dreadful punishment that shall be inflicted on them here, and especially hereafter, when a horrible tempest of wrath will come upon them. Hence such trembling seized the psalmist; and often so it is, that good men tremble more for the wicked than they do for themselves; see Psalm 119:120.
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Matthew Henry
1. The character of wicked people; he means those that are openly and grossly wicked: They forsake thy law. Every sin is a transgression of the law, but a course and way of willful and avowed sin is downright forsaking it and throwing it off.
2. The impression which the wickedness of the wicked made upon David; it frightened him, it put him into an amazement. He trembled to think of the dishonor thereby done to God, the gratification thereby given to Satan, and the mischiefs thereby done to the souls of men. He dreaded the consequences of it both to the sinners themselves (and cried out, O gather not my soul with sinners! let my enemy be as the wicked) and to the interests of God’s kingdom among men, which he was afraid would be thereby sunk and ruined. He does not say, “Horror has taken hold on me because of their cruel designs against me,” but “because of the contempt they put on God and his law.” Sin is a monstrous horrible thing in the eyes of all that are sanctified, Jer. 5:30; 23:14; Hos. 6:10; Jer. 2:12.
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Miscellaneous Comments
“Horror.” זלעפה, zilaphah, properly signifies the pestilential burning wind called by the Arabs simoon (see Psa 11:6); and is here used in a figurative sense for the most horrid mental distress; and strongly marks the idea the Psalmist had of the corrupting, pestilential, and destructive nature of sin.
—Note in “Bagster’s Comprehensive Bible“
“Horror.” The word for “horror” signifieth also a tempest or storm. Translations vary; some read it, as Junius, “a storm overtaking one;” Ainsworth, “a burning horror hath seized me,” and expounds it a storm of terror and dismay. The Septuagint, ἀθυμία κατέχε μὲ, “faintness and dejection of mind hath possessed me;” our own translation, “I am horribly afraid;” all translations, as well as the original word, imply a great trouble of mind, and a vehement commotion; like a storm, it was matter of disquiet and trembling to David.
—Thomas Manton.
“Because of the wicked that forsake thy law.” David grieved, not because he was himself attacked, but because the law of God was forsaken; and he bewailed the condemnation of those who so did because they are lost to God. Just as a good father in the madness of his son, when he is ill-used by him, mourns not his own but the misery of the diseased; and he grieves at the contumely, not because it is cast on himself, but because the diseased person knows not what he does in his madness: so a good man, when he sees a sinner neither reverence nor honor the grey hairs of a parent, that to his face he can insult him, that he does not know in the madness of sinning what unbecoming and shameful things he does, grieves for him as one on the point of death, laments him as one despaired of by the physicians. As a good physician in the first place advises, then, even if he receive hard words, though he be beaten, nevertheless as the man is ill he bears with him; and if he be cursed he does not leave, and any medicine that may be applied he does not refuse; nor does he go away as from a stubborn fellow, but strives with all diligence to heal him as one that has deserved well from him, exercising not only the skill of science but also benignity of disposition. Even so, a righteous man, when he is treated with contempt, does not turn away, but when he is calumniated he regards it as madness, not as depravity; and desires rather to apply his own remedy to the wound, and sympathizes, and grieves not for himself but for him who labors under an incurable disease.
—Ambrose.
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Cross-References
Psalm 11:6 (KJV)
6 Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone,
And an horrible tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup.
Nehemiah 13:25 (KJV)
25 And I contended with them, and cursed them, and smote certain of them, and plucked off their hair, and made them swear by God, saying, Ye shall not give your daughters unto their sons, nor take their daughters unto your sons, or for yourselves.
Jeremiah 13:17 (ASV)
17But if ye will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret for your pride; and mine eye shall weep sore, and run down with tears, because Jehovah’s flock is taken captive.
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Closing Thoughts
“To you, O men, I call, And my voice is to the sons of men. O you simple ones, understand prudence, And you fools, be of an understanding heart. Listen, for I will speak of excellent things, And from the opening of my lips will come right things; For my mouth will speak truth; Wickedness is an abomination to my lips. All the words of my mouth are with righteousness; Nothing crooked or perverse is in them. They are all plain to him who understands, And right to those who find knowledge. Receive my instruction, and not silver, And knowledge rather than choice gold; For wisdom is better than rubies, And all the things one may desire cannot be compared with her. Proverbs 8:4-11 NKJV
ז ZAYIN – The power of God’s word to comfort and strengthen. (Completion, Wholeness, Blessing, and Rest.)
49
Remember the word to Your servant,
Upon which You have caused me to hope.
50
This is my comfort in my affliction,
For Your word has given me life.
51
The proud have me in great derision,
Yet I do not turn aside from Your law.
52
I remembered Your judgments of old, O Lord,
And have comforted myself.
53
Indignation has taken hold of me
Because of the wicked, who forsake Your law.
54
Your statutes have been my songs
In the house of my pilgrimage.
55
I remember Your name in the night, O Lord,
And I keep Your law.
56
This has become mine,
Because I kept Your precepts.
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