Let not my enemies gloat over me without cause, nor those who hate me without reason wink in malice.
David's enemies are not mere dupes swept along by Saul's court; he distinguishes carefully between those thoughtlessly caught up in hatred through ignorance and those deliberate malefactors who wickedly conspired to destroy an innocent man for favor. Against the latter, he calls on God for justice, knowing his own innocence and relying on God's promise spoken through Samuel.
AI summary
Commenting on Psalm 35:1-28
He earnestly prays that as they have no cause for their enmity, they may have no cause for triumph either in his folly, sin, or overthrow. "Neither let them wink with the eye that hale me without a cause." The winking of the eye was the low-bred sign of congratulation at the ruin of their victim, and it may also have been one of their...
In these verses, as before, I. David describes the great injustice, malice, and insolence, of his persecutors, pleading this with God as a reason why he should protect him from them and appear against them. 1. They were very unrighteous; they were his enemies wrongfully, for he never gave them any provocation: They hated him without a cause; nay, for that for which they ought...
Commenting on Psalm 35:17-28