My zeal hath consumed me, because mine enemies have forgotten thy words.
This psalm pursues two chief ends: to exhort God's children toward a holy life, and to establish the Law as the rule and form of true worship. The psalmist weaves in promises to animate believers to live justly, and complaints against the wicked who despise the Law, lest the faithful be corrupted by their example. Though he moves from one matter to another, the composition is not a heap of scattered thoughts, but holds together by a living connection.
AI summary
Commenting on Psalm 119:1-176
Here is, 1. The great contempt which wicked men put upon religion: My enemies have forgotten thy words. They have often heard them, but so little did they heed them that they soon forgot them, they willingly forgot them, not only through carelessness let them slip out of their minds, but contrived how to cast them behind their backs.
Trouble and anguish have taken hold on me,.... Or, "found me" (a). Outward troubles and inward distress; troubles arising from his enemies, the men of the world, that hated and persecuted him; and from a body of sin and death, from the temptations of Satan, and divine desertions; some from without, and others from within; troubles both of body and mind, which is what all...