Psalms 119:109
I constantly take my life in my hands, yet I do not forget Your law.
BSB
ASV
My soul is continually in my hand; Yet do I not forget thy law.
KJV
My soul is continually in my hand: yet do I not forget thy law.
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
My soul is continually in my hand - נפשי naphshi, my life; that is, it is in constant danger, every hour I am on the confines of death. The expression signifies to be in continual danger. So Xenarchus in Athenaeus, lib. xiii., c. 4: Εν τῃ χειρι την ψυχην εχοντα, “having the life in the hand;” which signifies continual danger and jeopardy. There is some thing like this in the speech of Achilles to Ulysses, Hom. Il. ix., ver. 322: - Αιει εμην ψυχην παραβαλλομενος πολεμιζειν· “Always presenting my life to the dangers of the fight.” My soul is in thy hand, is the reading of the Syriac, Septuagint, Ethiopic, and Arabic; but this is a conjectural and useless emendation.
My soul is continually in my hand - The Septuagint renders this, “My soul is always in thy hands,” but the Hebrew will not admit of this construction. The idea in the original is that his soul - his life - was always in jeopardy. The expression seems to be proverbial. Anything taken in the hand is liable to be rudely snatched away. Thus a casket of jewels, or a purse of gold in the hand, may at any moment be seized by robbers. See the notes at Job 13:14. Compare 1Sa 19:5; Jdg 12:3. The meaning here is, that his life was constantly in danger. Yet do I not forget thy law - Notwithstanding the danger to which I am exposed, and the care necessary to defend my life, I do not allow my mind to be turned from meditating on thy law, nor do I suffer any danger to deter me from obeying it. Compare the notes at Psa 119:61.
The walk8
Follow this verse’s cross-references two steps out. Each card is a verse this one points to, and beneath it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several different paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it. Every stop shows its own words, and every stop is a page.
Through
1 Corinthians 15:31I face death every day, brothers, as surely as I boast about you in Christ Jesus our Lord.
leads to
We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.
As it is written: “For Your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
For it seems to me that God has displayed us apostles at the end of the procession, like prisoners appointed for death. We have become a spectacle to the whole world, to angels as…
For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh—
Through
Judges 12:3When I saw that you would not save me, I risked my life and crossed over to the Ammonites, and the LORD delivered them into my hand. Why then have you come today to…
leads to
He took his life in his hands when he struck down the Philistine, and the LORD worked a great salvation for all Israel. You saw it and rejoiced, so why would you sin against…
Reached by 2 independent paths from here.
When the woman came to Saul and saw how distraught he was, she said to him, “Look, your maidservant has obeyed your voice. I took my life in my hands and did as you…
Reached by 2 independent paths from here.
Through
1 Samuel 19:5He took his life in his hands when he struck down the Philistine, and the LORD worked a great salvation for all Israel. You saw it and rejoiced, so why would you sin against…
leads to
But Eleazar and David stationed themselves in the middle of the field and defended it. They struck down the Philistines, and the LORD brought about a great victory.
But Saul ordered, “No one shall be put to death this day, for today the LORD has worked salvation in Israel.”
