*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Keep me as the apple of the eye - Preserve me; guard me; defend me, as one defends that which is to him most precious and valuable. In the original there is a remarkable strength of expression, and at the same time a remarkable confusion of gender in the language. The literal translation would be, "Keep me as the little man - the daughter of the eye." The word "apple" applied to the eye means the pupil, the little aperture in the middle of the eye, through which the rays of light pass to form an image on the retina ("Johnson, Webster"); though "why" it is called the "apple" of the eye the lexicographers fail to tell us. The Hebrew word - אישׁון 'ı̂yshôn - means properly, "a little man," and is given to the apple or pupil of the eye, "in which, as in a mirror, a person sees his own image reflected in miniature." This comparison is found in several languages. The word occurs in the Old Testament only in Deuteronomy 32:10; Psalm 17:8; Proverbs 7:2; where it is rendered "apple;" in Proverbs 7:9, where it is rendered "black;" and in Proverbs 20:20, where it is rendered "obscure." The other expression in the Hebrew - "the daughter of the eye" - is derived from a usage of the Hebrew word "daughter," as denoting that which is dependent on, or connected with (Gesenius, Lexicon), as the expression "daughters of a city" denotes the small towns or villages lying around a city, and dependent on its jurisdiction, Numbers 21:25, Numbers 21:32; Numbers 32:42; Joshua 17:11. So the expression "daughters of song," Ecclesiastes 12:4. The idea here is, that the little image is the "child" of the eye; that it has its birth or origin there. The prayer of the psalmist here is, that God would guard him, as one guards his sight - an object so dear and valuable to him.
Hide me under the shadow of thy wings - Another image denoting substantially the same thing. This is taken from the care evinced by fowls in protecting their young, by gathering them under their wings. Compare Matthew 23:37. Both of the comparisons used here are found in Deuteronomy 32:10-12; and it is probable that the psalmist had that passage in his eye - "He instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye; as an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings; so the Lord alone did lead him." Compare also Psalm 36:7; Psalm 57:1; Psalm 61:4; Psalm 63:7; Psalm 91:1, Psalm 91:4.
Keep me as the apple of the eye - Or, as the black of the daughter of eye. Take as much care to preserve me now by Divine influence, as thou hast to preserve my eye by thy good providence. Thou hast entrenched it deeply in the skull; hast ramparted it with the forehead and cheek-bones; defended it by the eyebrow, eyelids, and eyelashes; and placed it in that situation where the hands can best protect it.
Hide me under the shadow of thy wings - This is a metaphor taken from the hen and her chickens. See it explained at large in the note on Matthew 23:37 (note). The Lord says of his followers, Zac 2:8 : "He that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of mine eye." How dear are our eyes to us! how dear must his followers be to God!
Keep me as the apple of the eye,.... Which is weak and tender, and is hurt and put to pain, and made uneasy by every little thing that annoys it, and than which nothing is more dear to a man, or he is more careful of preserving from being hurt; and fitly represents the weak estate and condition of God's people, his affection for them, and tender care of them; who as he has provided tunics for the eye, and guarded it with eyebrows, so he has taken care for the safety of his dear children, Deuteronomy 32:10;
hide me under the shadow of thy wings; alluding either to the wings of the cherubim over the mercy seat, where God granted his presence; so the Targum paraphrases it,
"under the shadow of thy Shechinah hide me;''
or to birds, who cover their young ones with their wings to save them from birds of prey; see Psalm 91:1. From such passages perhaps the Heathens had their notion of presenting their gods with wings (f).
(f) Vid. Cuperi Apotheos. Homer. p. 169, &c.
Being compassed with enemies, David prays to God to keep him in safety. This prayer is a prediction that Christ would be preserved, through all the hardships and difficulties of his humiliation, to the glories and joys of his exalted state, and is a pattern to Christians to commit the keeping of their souls to God, trusting him to preserve them to his heavenly kingdom. Those are our worst enemies, that are enemies to our souls. They are God's sword, which cannot move without him, and which he will sheathe when he has done his work with it. They are his hand, by which he chastises his people. There is no fleeing from God's hand, but by fleeing to it. It is very comfortable, when we are in fear of the power of man, to see it dependent upon, and in subjection to the power of God. Most men look on the things of this world as the best things; and they look no further, nor show any care to provide for another life. The things of this world are called treasures, they are so accounted; but to the soul, and when compared with eternal blessings, they are trash. The most afflicted Christian need not envy the most prosperous men of the world, who have their portion in this life. Clothed with Christ's righteousness, having through his grace a good heart and a good life, may we by faith behold God's face, and set him always before us. When we awake every morning, may we be satisfied with his likeness set before us in his word, and with his likeness stamped upon us by his renewing grace. Happiness in the other world is prepared only for those that are justified and sanctified: they shall be put in possession of it when the soul awakes, at death, out of its slumber in the body, and when the body awakes, at the resurrection, out of its slumber in the grave. There is no satisfaction for a soul but in God, and in his good will towards us, and his good work in us; yet that satisfaction will not be perfect till we come to heaven.
Similar figures, denoting the preciousness of God's people in His sight, in Deuteronomy 32:10-11; Matthew 23:37.
The covenant relationship towards Himself in which Jahve has placed David, and the relationship of love in which David stands to Jahve, fully justified the oppressed one in his extreme request. The apple of the eye, which is surrounded by the iris, is called אישׁון, the man (Arabic insân), or in the diminutive and endearing sense of the termination on: the little man of the eye, because a picture in miniature of one's self is seen, as in a glass, when looking into another person's eye. בּת־עין either because it is as if born out of the eye and the eye has, as it were, concentrated itself in it, or rather because the little image which is mirrored in it is, as it were, the little daughter of the eye (here and Lamentations 2:18). To the Latin pupilla (pupula), Greek κόρη, corresponds most closely בּבת עין, Zac 2:12, which does not signify the gate, aperture, sight, but, as בּת shows, the little boy, or more strictly, the little girl of the eye. It is singular that אישׁון here has the feminine בּת־עין as the expression in apposition to it. The construction might be genitival: "as the little man of the apple of the eye," inasmuch as the saint knows himself to be so near to God, that, as it were, his image in miniature is mirrored in the great eye of God. But (1) the more ozdinary name for the pupil of the eye is not בּת עין, but אישׁון; and (2) with that construction the proper point of the comparison, that the apple of the eye is an object of the most careful self-preservation, is missed. There is, consequently, a combination of two names of the pupil or apple of the eye, the usual one and one more select, without reference to the gender of the former, in order to give greater definition and emphasis to the figure. The primary passage for this bold figure, which is the utterance of loving entreaty, is Deuteronomy 32:10, where the dazzling anthropomorphism is effaced by the lxx and other ancient versions;
(Note: Vid., Geiger, Urschrift und Ueberstezungen der Bibel, S. 324.)
cf. also Sir. 17:22. Then follows another figure, taken from the eagle, which hides its young under its wings, likewise from Deut 32, viz., Psalm 17:11, for the figure of the hen (Matthew 23:37) is alien to the Old Testament. In that passage, Moses, in his great song, speaks of the wings of God; but the double figure of the shadow of God's wings (here and in Psalm 36:8; Psalm 57:2; Psalm 63:8) is coined by David. "God's wings" are the spreadings out, i.e., the manifestations of His love, taking the creature under the protection of its intimate fellowship, and the "shadow" of these wings is the refreshing rest and security which the fellowship of this love affords to those, who hide themselves beneath it, from the heat of outward or inward conflict.
From Psalm 17:9 we learn more definitely the position in which the psalmist is placed. שׁדד signifies to use violence, to destroy the life, continuance, or possession of any one. According to the accentuation בּנפשׁ is to be connected with איבי, not with יקּפוּ, and to be understood according to Ezekiel 25:6 : "enemies with the soul" are those whose enmity is not merely superficial, but most deep-seated (cf. ἐκ ψυχῆς, Ephesians 6:6; Colossians 3:23). The soul (viz., the hating and eagerly longing soul, Psalm 27:12; Psalm 41:3) is just the same as if בנפשׁ is combined with the verb, viz., the soul of the enemies; and איבי נפשׁי would therefore not be more correct, as Hitzig thinks, than בנפשׁ איבי, but would have a different meaning. They are eager to destroy him (perf. conatus), and form a circle round about him, as ravenous ones, in order to swallow him up.
*More commentary available at chapter level.