BibleTools.info

Bible Verse Explanations and Resources


Loading...

Psalms 79:1

Adam Clarke
Bible Commentary

The heathen are come into thine inheritance - Thou didst cast them out, and take thy people in; they have cast us out, and now taken possession of the land that belongs to thee. They have defiled the temple, and reduced Jerusalem to a heap of ruins; and made a general slaughter of thy people.

Albert Barnes
Notes on the Whole Bible

O God, the heathen are come into thine inheritance - The nations; a foreign people. See Psalm 2:1, note; Psalm 2:8; note; Psalm 78:55, note. The term is one that would be applicable to the Chaldeans, or Babylonians, and the probable allusion here is to their invasion of the holy land under Nebuchadnezzar. 2 Chronicles 36:17-21.

Thy holy temple have they defiled - They have polluted it. By entering it; by removing the sacred furniture; by cutting down the carved work; by making it desolate. See 2 Chronicles 36:17-18. Compare the notes at Psalm 74:5-7.

They have laid Jerusalem on heaps - See 2 Chronicles 36:19: “And they burnt the house of God, and brake down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces thereof with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels thereof.”

Matthew Henry
Concise Bible Commentary
God is complained to: whither should children go but to a Father able and willing to help them? See what a change sin made in the holy city, when the heathen were suffered to pour in upon them. God's own people defiled it by their sins, therefore he suffered their enemies to defile it by their insolence. They desired that God would be reconciled. Those who desire God's favour as better than life, cannot but dread his wrath as worse than death. In every affliction we should first beseech the Lord to cleanse away the guilt of our sins; then he will visit us with his tender mercies.