Psalms 39:4

The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible

Contextual Overview

¹For the choirmaster. For Jeduthun. A Psalm of David. I said, "I will watch my ways so that I will not sin with my tongue; I will guard my mouth with a muzzle as long as the wicked are present." ²I was speechless and still; I held my peace, even from good, and my sorrow was stirred. ³My heart grew hot within me; as I mused, the fire burned. Then I spoke with my tongue: ⁴"Show me, O LORD, my end and the measure of my days. Let me know how fleeting my life is.⁵You, indeed, have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing before You. Truly each man at his best exists as but a breath. Selah ⁶Surely every man goes about like a phantom; surely he bustles in vain; he heaps up riches not knowing who will haul them away.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

make: Psalms 90:12, Psalms 119:84, Job 14:13

how frail I am: or, what time I have here

Reciprocal: Job 7:1 - Is there Job 14:5 - his days 1 Corinthians 7:29 - the time

Cross-References

Genesis 15:2
But Abram replied, "O Lord GOD, what can You give me, since I remain childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?"

Genesis 18:3
"My lord," said Abraham, "if I have found favor in your sight, please do not pass your servant by.

Genesis 19:19
Your servant has indeed found favor in your sight, and you have shown me great kindness by sparing my life. But I cannot run to the mountains; the disaster will overtake me, and I will die.

Genesis 24:2
So Abraham instructed the chief servant of his household, who managed all he owned, "Place your hand under my thigh,

Genesis 32:5
I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, menservants, and maidservants. I have sent this message to inform my master, so that I may find favor in your sight.'"

Genesis 33:8
"What do you mean by sending this whole company to meet me?" asked Esau. "To find favor in your sight, my lord," Jacob answered.

Genesis 33:10
But Jacob insisted, "No, please! If I have found favor in your sight, then receive this gift from my hand. For indeed, I have seen your face, and it is like seeing the face of God, since you have received me favorably.

Genesis 39:4
Joseph found favor in his sight and became his personal attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household and entrusted him with everything he owned.

Genesis 39:5
From the time that he put Joseph in charge of his household and all he owned, the LORD blessed the Egyptian's household on account of him. The LORD's blessing was on everything he owned, both in his house and in his field.

Genesis 39:8
But he refused. "Look," he said to his master's wife, "with me here, my master does not concern himself with anything in his house, and he has entrusted everything he owns to my care.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Lord, make me to know mine end,.... Not Christ, the end of the law for righteousness, as Jerom interprets it; nor how long he should live, how many days, months, and years more; for though they are known of God, they are not to be known by men; but either the end of his afflictions, or his, latter end, his mortal state, that he might be more thoughtful of that, and so less concerned about worldly things, his own external happiness, or that of others; or rather his death; see Job 6:11; and his sense is, that he might know death experimentally; or that he might die: this he said in a sinful passionate way, as impatient of his afflictions and exercises; and in the same way the following expressions are to be understood;

and the measure of my days, what it [is]; being desirous to come to the end of it; otherwise he knew it was but as an hand's breadth, as he says in Psalms 39:5;

[that] I may know how frail I [am]; or "what time I have here"; or "when I shall cease to be" u; or, as the Targum is, "when I shall cease from the world"; so common it is for the saints themselves, in an angry or impatient fit, to desire death; see Job 7:15; and a very rare and difficult thing it is to wish for it from right principles, and with right views, as the Apostle Paul did, Philippians 1:23.

u מה חדל אני "quanti aevi ego", Montanus; "quamdiu roundanus ero", Vatablus; "quam brevis temporis sim", Musculus.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Lord, make me to know mine end - This expresses evidently the substance of those anxious and troubled thoughts Psalms 39:1-2 to which he had been unwilling to give utterance. His thoughts turned on the shortness of life; on the mystery of the divine arrangement by which it had been made so short; and on the fact that so many troubles and sorrows had been crowded into a life so frail and so soon to terminate. With some impatience, and with a consciousness that he had been indulging feelings on this subject which were not proper, and which would do injury if they were expressed “before men,” he now pours out these feelings before God, and asks what is to be the end of this; how long this is to continue; when his own sorrows will cease. It was an impatient desire to know when the end would be, with a spirit of insubmission to the arrangements of Providence by which his life had been made so brief, and by which so much suffering had been appointed.

And the measure of my days, what it is - How long I am to live; how long I am to bear these accumulated sorrows.

That I may know how frail I am - Margin: “What time I have here.” Prof. Alexander renders this: “when I shall cease.” So DeWette. The Hebrew word used here - חדל châdêl - means “ceasing to be;” hence, “frail;” then, destitute, left, forsaken. An exact translation would be, “that I may know at what (time) or (point) I am ceasing, or about to cease.” It is equivalent to a prayer that he might know when these sufferings - when a life so full of sorrow - would come to an end. The language is an expression of impatience; the utterance of a feeling which the psalmist knew was not right in itself, and which would do injury if expressed before men, but which the intensity of his feelings would not permit him to restrain, and to which he, therefore, gives utterance before God. Similar expressions of impatience in view of the sufferings of a life so short as this, and with so little to alleviate its sorrows, may be seen much amplified in Job 3:1-26; Job 6:4-12; Job 7:7; Job 14:1-13. Before we blame the sacred writers for the indulgence of these feelings, let us carefully examine our own hearts, and recall what has passed through our own minds in view of the mysteries of the divine administration; and let us remember that one great object of the Bible is to record the actual feelings of men - not to vindicate them, but to show what human nature is even in the best circumstances, and what the human heart is when as yet but partially sanctified.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Psalms 39:4. Lord, make me to know mine end — I am weary of life; I wish to know the measure of my days, that I may see how long I have to suffer, and how frail I am. I wish to know what is wanting to make up the number of the days I have to live.