--- title: "Psalms 88 - Study King James Bible with clarkes commentary" description: "Read Psalms 88 with clarkes commentary commentary. 1 O LORD God of my salvation, I have cried day and night before thee: 2 Let my prayer come before thee: incline thine ear unto my cry; 3 For my soul is fu" image: "/_app/immutable/assets/missing.C7wGMEZ6.jpg" url: "https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88" --- [ Read](/kjv/psalms/88)[ Commentary](/study/psalms/88)[ Interlinear](/interlinear/psalms/88) Audio 1 O LORD God of my salvation, I have cried day *and* night before thee:** 2 Let my prayer come before thee: incline thine ear unto my cry; 3 For my soul is full of troubles: and my life draweth nigh unto the grave. 4 I am counted with them that go down into the pit: I am as a man *that hath* no strength: 5 Free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, whom thou rememberest no more: and they are cut off from thy hand.* 6 Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. 7 Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and thou hast afflicted *me* with all thy waves. Selah. 8 Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far from me; thou hast made me an abomination unto them: *I am* shut up, and I cannot come forth. 9 Mine eye mourneth by reason of affliction: LORD, I have called daily upon thee, I have stretched out my hands unto thee. 10 Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? shall the dead arise *and* praise thee? Selah. 11 Shall thy lovingkindness be declared in the grave? *or* thy faithfulness in destruction? 12 Shall thy wonders be known in the dark? and thy righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? 13 But unto thee have I cried, O LORD; and in the morning shall my prayer prevent thee. 14 LORD, why castest thou off my soul? *why* hidest thou thy face from me? 15 I *am* afflicted and ready to die from *my* youth up: *while* I suffer thy terrors I am distracted. 16 Thy fierce wrath goeth over me; thy terrors have cut me off. 17 They came round about me daily like water; they compassed me about together.* 18 Lover and friend hast thou put far from me, *and* mine acquaintance into darkness. [Psalms 87](/study/psalms/87) [Psalms 89](/study/psalms/89) ## Commentary To verse 1 Perhaps the *title* of this Psalm, which is difficult enough, might be thus translated: "A Poem to be sung to the conqueror, by the sons of Korah, responsively, in behalf of a distressed person; to give instruction to Heman the Ezrahite." *Kennicott* says this Psalm has *three* titles, but the last only belongs to it; and supposes it to be the prayer of a person shut up in a separate house, because of the leprosy, who seems to have been in the last stages of that distemper; this disease, under the Mosaic dispensation, being supposed to come from the immediate stroke of God. *Calmet* supposes it to refer to the captivity; the Israelitish nation being represented here under the figure of a person greatly afflicted through the whole course of his life. By some *Heman* is supposed to have been the author; but who he was is not easy to be determined. *Heman* and *Ethan* whose names are separately prefixed to this and the following Psalm, are mentioned as the grandsons of Judah by his daughter-in-law Tamar, [1 Chronicles 2:6](/kjv/1-chronicles/2/6), for they were the sons of Zerah, his immediate son by the above. "And Tamar, his daughter-in-law, bare him Pharez and Zerah," [1 Chronicles 2:4](/kjv/1-chronicles/2/4). "And the sons of Zerah Zimri, and Ethan, and Heman, and Calcol, and Dara, (or Darda,") [1 Chronicles 2:6](/kjv/1-chronicles/2/6). If these were the same persons mentioned [1 Kings 4:31](/kjv/1-kings/4/31), they were *eminent in wisdom*; for it is there said that Solomon's wisdom "excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt. For he was wiser than all men; than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, and Chalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol," [1 Kings 4:30-31](/kjv/1-kings/4/30-31). Probably *Zerah* was also called *Mahol*. If the Psalms in question were written by these men, they are the *oldest* poetical compositions extant; and the *most ancient part of Divine revelation*, as these persons lived at least *one hundred and seventy years* before Moses. This may be true of the *seventy-eighth* Psalm; but certainly not of the following, as it speaks of transactions that took place long afterwards, at least as late as the days of *David*, who is particularly mentioned in it. Were we sure of Heman as the author, there would be no difficulty in applying the whole of the Psalm to the state of the Hebrews in Egypt, persecuted and oppressed by Pharaoh. But to seek or labour to reconcile matters contained in the *titles* to the Psalms, is treating them with too much respect, as many of them are wrongly placed, and none of them Divinely inspired. Verse [Psalms 88:1](/kjv/psalms/88/1). ***O Lord God of my salvation*** — This is only the *continuation of prayers and supplications* already often sent up to the throne of grace. ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#website","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com","name":"Real Bible Believers","description":"RBB","publisher":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#/schema/person/e966585dde703268e7f6ae890ea98509"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/search?q={search_term_string}","query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88#primaryimage","inLanguage":"en-US","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/_app/immutable/assets/missing.C7wGMEZ6.jpg","contentUrl":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/_app/immutable/assets/missing.C7wGMEZ6.jpg","width":672,"height":448,"caption":"Real Bible Believers"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88#webpage","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88","name":"Psalms 88 - Study King James Bible with clarkes commentary","isPartOf":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88#primaryimage"},"author":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#/schema/person/e966585dde703268e7f6ae890ea98509"},"description":"Read Psalms 88 with clarkes commentary commentary. 1 O LORD God of my salvation, I have cried day and night before thee: 2 Let my prayer come before thee: incline thine ear unto my cry; 3 For my soul is fu","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/","name":"Home"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study","name":"Study Bible"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary","name":"clarkes commentary"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":4,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms","name":"Psalms"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":5,"item":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/study/clarkes-commentary/psalms/88","name":"88"}}]},{"@type":["Person","Organization"],"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#/schema/person/e966585dde703268e7f6ae890ea98509","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#personlogo","inLanguage":"en-US","url":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/android-chrome-512x512.png","contentUrl":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/android-chrome-512x512.png","width":512,"height":512},"logo":{"@id":"https://realbiblebelievers.com/#personlogo"},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/RBiblebeliever","https://www.facebook.com/RBibleBelievers"]}]} ```