Psalm - 88:4



4 I am counted among those who go down into the pit. I am like a man who has no help,

Verse In-Depth

Explanation and meaning of Psalm 88:4.

Differing Translations

Compare verses for better understanding.
I am counted with them that go down into the pit: I am as a man that hath no strength:
I am reckoned with them that go down into the pit; I am as a man that hath no help,
I am counted among them that go down to the pit: I am become as a man without help,
I am reckoned with them that go down into the pit; I am as a man that hath no strength:
I have been reckoned with those going down to the pit, I have been as a man without strength.
I am numbered among those who go down into the earth; I have become like a man for whom there is no help:
For my soul is sated with troubles, And my life draweth nigh unto the grave.

*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.


Historical Commentaries

Scholarly Analysis and Interpretation.

I am counted with them that go down into the pit - I am so near to death that I may be reckoned already as among the dead. It is so manifest to others that I must die - that my disease is mortal - that they already speak of me as dead. The word "pit" here means the grave - the same as Sheol in the previous verse. It means properly
(1) a pit,
(2) a cistern, Genesis 37:20,
(3) a prison or dungeon, Isaiah 24:22,
(4) the grave, Psalm 28:1; Psalm 30:4; Isaiah 38:18.
I am as a man that hath no strength - Who has no power to resist disease, no vigor of constitution remaining; who must die.

I am counted with them, etc. - I am as good as dead; nearly destitute of life and hope.

I am counted with them that go down into the pit,.... With the dead, with them that are worthy of death, with malefactors that are judicially put to death, and are not laid in a common grave, but put into a pit together: thus Christ was reckoned and accounted of by the Jews; the sanhedrim counted him worthy of death; and the common people cried out Crucify him; and they did crucify him between two malefactors; and so he was numbered or counted with transgressors, and as one of them, Isaiah 53:3.
I am as a man that hath no strength; for his "strength" was "dried up like a potsherd", Psalm 22:15, though he was the mighty God, and, as man, was made strong by the Lord for himself.

go . . . pit--of destruction (Psalm 28:1).
as a man--literally, "a stout man," whose strength is utterly gone.

Counted - l am given up by my friends for a lost man.

*More commentary available at chapter level.


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