Psalms 30:11
For my life is wasted with grief: and my years in sighs. My strength is weakened through poverty and my bones are disturbed.
Open Psalms 30:11 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Quoniam defecit in dolore vita mea, et anni mei in gemitibus. Infirmata est in paupertate virtus mea, et ossa mea conturbata sunt.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- ὅτι ἐξέλιπεν ἐν ὀδύνῃ ἡ ζωή μου, καὶ τὰ ἔτη μου ἐν στεναγμοῖς· ἠσθένησεν ἐν πτωχίᾳ ἡ ἰσχύς μου, καὶ τὰ ὀστᾶ μου ἐταράχθησαν.
- Hebrew (WLC) shown from Psalms 31:11
- כִּ֤י כָל֪וּ בְיָג֡וֹן חַיַּי֮ וּשְׁנוֹתַ֪י בַּאֲנָ֫חָ֥ה כָּשַׁ֣ל בַּעֲוֺנִ֣י כֹחִ֑י וַעֲצָמַ֥י עָשֵֽׁשׁוּ
Haydock's commentary
Poverty. Septuagint have read áni instead of haoni, "my iniquity," which seems less accurate, as David had not offended Saul. Symmachus has "malice," (Calmet) or "ill-treatment," kakosin. (Haydock)
We may form some judgment of David's distress, from his being obliged to eat the consecrated bread at Nobe. (Calmet)
Yet without making any change in the Hebrew, we may explain it in the sense of the Vulgate, as áve signifies to be "bent down." (Berthier)
"Chastisements waste my strength." (Pr. disc.)
Jesus was a man of sorrows. (Berthier)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Augustine Book XI, Chapter IX
11. In this Beginning, O God, hast Thou made heaven and earth, in Thy Word, in Thy Son, in Thy Power, in Thy Wisdom, in Thy Truth, wondrously speaking and wondrously making. Who shall comprehend? who shall relate it? What is that which shines through me, and strikes my heart without injury, and I both shudder and burn? I shudder inasmuch as I am unlike it; and I burn inasmuch as I am like it. It is Wisdom itself that shines through me, clearing my cloudiness, which again overwhelms me, fainting from it, in the darkness and amount of my punishment. …
St Augustine Book XI, Chapter XXIX
39. But “because Thy loving-kindness is better than life,” behold, my life is but a distraction, and Thy right hand upheld me in my Lord, the Son of man, the Mediator between Thee, The One, and us the many, in many distractions amid many things, that through Him I may apprehend in whom I have been apprehended, and may be recollected from my old days, following The One, forgetting the things that are past; and not distracted, but drawn on, not to those things which shall be and shall pass away, but to those things which are before, not distractedly, but intently, I follow on for the prize of my heavenly calling, where I may hear the voice of Thy praise, and contemplate Thy delights, neither coming nor passing away. But now are my years spent in mourning. And Thou, O Lord, art my comfort, my Father everlasting. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm XXXI
11. “For my life hath failed in pain” ( ver 10 ). For my life is to confess Thee, but it failed in pain, when the enemy had said, Let them be tortured until they deny Him. “And my years in groanings.” The time that I pass in this world is not taken away from me by death, but abides, and is spent in groanings. “My strength hath been weakened by want.” I want the health of this body, and racking pains come on me: I want the dissolution of the body, and death forbears to come: and in this want my confidence hath been weakened. “And my bones have been disturbed.” And my stedfastness hath been disturbed.
St John Cassian The Twelve Books on the Institutes of the Cœnobia, and the Remedies for the Eight Principal Faults, Chapter I. How our fourth conflict is against the sin of anger, and how many evils this passion produces
In our fourth combat the deadly poison of anger has to be utterly rooted out from the inmost comers of our soul. For as long as this remains in our hearts, and blinds with its hurtful darkness the eye of the soul, we can neither acquire right judgment and discretion, nor gain the insight which springs from an honest gaze, or ripeness of counsel, nor can we be partakers of life, or retentive of righteousness, or even have the capacity for spiritual and true light: “for,” says one, “mine eye is disturbed by reason of anger.” Nor can we become partakers of wisdom, even though we are considered wise by universal consent, for “anger rests in the bosom of fools.” Nor can we even attain immortal life, although we are accounted prudent in the opinion of everybody, for “anger destroys even the prudent.” Nor shall we be able with clear judgment of heart to secure the controlling power of righteous …