For our soul is humbled to the dust The people of God again deplore the greatness of their calamities, and in order that God may be the more disposed to help them, they declare to him that they are afflicted in no ordinary manner. By the metaphors which they here employ, they mean not only that they are cast down, but also that they are crushed and laid upon the earth, so that they are not able to rise again. Some take the word soul for the body, so that there would be in this verse a repetition of the same sentiment; but I would rather take it for the part in which the life of man consists; as if they had said, We are cast down to the earth, and lie prostrate upon our belly, without any hope of getting up again. After this complaint they subjoin a prayer, (verse 26,) that God would arise for their help By the word redeem they mean not ordinary kind of help, for there was no other means of securing their preservation but by redeeming them. And yet there can be no doubt, that they were diligently employed in meditating upon the great redemption from which all the deliverances which God is daily effecting in our behalf, when he defends us from dangers by various means, flow as streams from their source. In a previous part of the psalm, they had boasted of the steadfastness of their faith; but to show us that, in using this language, they boasted not in their own merits, they do not claim here some recompense for what they had done and suffered for God. They are contented to ascribe their salvation to the unmerited goodness of God as the alone cause of it.

For our soul is bowed down to the dust - That is, We are overborne with calamity, so that we sink to the earth. The expression is one that denotes great affliction.
Our belly cleaveth unto the earth - We are like animals that are prone upon the earth, and that cannot rise. The allusion may be to reptiles that cannot stand erect. The figure is intended to denote great prostration and affliction.

Our soul is bowed down - Our life is drawing near to the grave. If thou delay to help us, we shall become extinct.

For our soul is (s) bowed down to the dust: our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
(s) There is no hope of recovery, unless you raise us up with your hand.

For our soul is bowed down to the dust,.... Which may signify great declension in spiritual things, much dejection of mind, and little exercise of grace, Psalm 119:25; or a very low estate in temporals; subjection to their enemies; they setting their feet upon their necks, and obliging them to lick the dust of them: and even it may signify nearness to death itself; see Joshua 10:24;
our belly cleaveth to the earth; as persons that lie prostrate, being conquered and suppliants.

Our soul - Our persons. Our belly - We are not only thrown down to the earth, but we lie there like dead carcases.