Psalms 78:33
in Psalms 78So He ended their days in futility, and their years in sudden terror.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Therefore their days did he consume in vanity, And their years in terror.
KJV
Therefore their days did he consume in vanity, and their years in trouble.
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This verse in Psalms 78
Commentary
11 notes on this verseThis site's exposition
they kept on sinning
on Psalms 78:32-39
They kept on sinning, and when He slew them they sought Him, then remembered that God was their Rock. Their repentance reached the mouth and stopped, and their hearts stayed disloyal to His covenant. He forgave them anyway, remembering they were flesh.
This site's exposition
their years in sudden terror
Albert Barnes gave the Hebrew for the second line as in terror, the alarms of a vast desert. He saw the verse fulfilled in the wandering of Numbers 14:33, which went on until the generation that came out of Egypt had died. Their days went nowhere.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers2 voices
"And in their days failed in vanity." Though they might, if they had believed, have had days in truth without failing, with Him to whom has been said, "Your years shall not fail." Therefore, "their days failed in vanity, and their years with haste." For the whole life of mortal men is hastening, and that which seems to be longer is but a vapour of somewhat longer duration.
"And in their days failed in vanity." Though they might, if they had believed, have had days in truth without failing, with Him to whom has been said, "Your years shall not fail." Therefore, "their days failed in vanity, and their years with haste." For the whole life of mortal men is hastening, and that which seems to be longer is but a vapour of somewhat longer duration.
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
Therefore their days did he consume in vanity,....
Note, Those that sin still must expect to be in trouble still. And the reason why we spend our days in so much vanity and trouble, why we live with so little comfort and to so little purpose, is because we do not live by faith. Under these rebukes they professed repentance, but they were not cordial and sincere in this profession.
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
proposed
Though there were partial reformations after chastisement, and God, in pity, withdrew His hand for a time, yet their general conduct was rebellious, and He was thus provoked to waste and destroy them, by long and fruitless wandering in the desert.
4 more voices on this verse
The Nineteenth Century4 voices
Therefore their days did he consume in vanity. Apart from faith life is vanity. To wander up and down in the wilderness was a vain thing indeed, when unbelief had shut them out of the promised land. It was meet that those who would not live to answer the divine purpose by believing and obeying their God should be made to live to no purpose, and to die before their time, unsatisfied, unblessed. Those who wasted their days in sin had little cause to wonder when the Lord cut short their lives, and sware that they should never enter the rest which they had despised. And their years in trouble. Weary marches were their trouble, and to come to no resting place was their vanity. Innumerable graves were left all along the track of Israel, and if any ask, "Who slew all these?" the answer must be, "They could not enter in because of unbelief." Doubtless much of the vexation and failure of many lives results from their being sapped by unbelief, and honeycombed by evil passions. None live so fruitlessly and so wretchedly as those who allow sense and sight to override faith, and their reason and appetite to domineer over their fear of God. Our days go fast enough according to the ordinary lapse of time, but the Lord can make them rust away at a bitterer rate, till we feel as if sorrow actually ate out the heart of our life, and like a canker devoured our existence. Such was the punishment of rebellious Israel, the Lord grant it may not be ours.
Therefore their days did he consume in vanity. Apart from faith life is vanity. To wander up and down in the wilderness was a vain thing indeed, when unbelief had shut them out of the promised land. It was meet that those who would not live to answer the divine purpose by believing and obeying their God should be made to live to no purpose, and to die before their time, unsatisfied, unblessed.
Their days did he consume in vanity - By causing them to wander forty years in the wilderness, vainly expecting an end to their labor, and the enjoyment of the promised rest, which, by their rebellions, they had forfeited.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
Therefore their days did he consume in vanity - He suffered them to spend their days - the days of that entire generation - in vain and fruitless wanderings in the desert. Instead of leading them at once to the promised land, they were kept there to wear out their life in tedious monotony, accomplishing nothing - wandering from place to place - until all the generation that had come out of Egypt had died. And their years in trouble - literally, “in terror.” Amidst the troubles, the alarms, the terrors of a vast and frightful desert. Sin - rebellion against God - leads to a course of life, and a death, of which these gloomy, sad, and cheerless wanderings in the desert were a striking emblem.
The words behind it
5 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| וַיְכַל־ | vaykhal- | and he brought to an end | H3615 → | 208 times |
| בַּהֶ֥בֶל | bahevel | in <the> futility | H1892 → | 73 times |
| יְמֵיהֶ֑ם | yemeihem | days their | H3117 → | 2304 times |
| וּ֝שְׁנוֹתָ֗ם | ushenotam | and years their | H8141 → | 877 times |
| בַּבֶּהָלָֽה׃ | babehalah | in <the> sudden terror | H928 → |
וַיְכַל־and he brought to an end
vaykhal-H3615 →208 times
בַּהֶ֥בֶלin <the> futility
bahevelH1892 →73 times
יְמֵיהֶ֑םdays their
yemeihemH3117 →2304 times
וּ֝שְׁנוֹתָ֗םand years their
ushenotamH8141 →877 times
בַּבֶּהָלָֽה׃in <the> sudden terror
babehalahH928 →
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Numbers 14:29Your bodies will fall in this wilderness—all who were numbered in the census, everyone twenty years of age or older—because you have grumbled against Me.
it leads to
- 1 Corinthians 10:5
Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, for they were struck down in the wilderness.
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Numbers 1:45
So all the Israelites twenty years of age or older who could serve in Israel’s army were counted according to their families.
- Numbers 26:64
Among all these, however, there was not one who had been numbered by Moses and Aaron the priest when they counted the Israelites in the Wilderness of Sinai.
- Hebrews 3:17
And with whom was God angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness?
- Jude 1:5
Although you are fully aware of this, I want to remind you that after Jesus had delivered His people out of the land of Egypt, He destroyed those who did not believe.
- 1 Corinthians 10:5
Through
Numbers 14:35I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will surely do these things to this entire wicked congregation, which has conspired against Me. They will meet their end in the wilderness, and there they will…
it leads to
- Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Does He speak and not act? Does He promise and not fulfill?
- Numbers 26:65
For the LORD had told them that they would surely die in the wilderness. Not one was left except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.
- Hebrews 3:19
So we see that it was because of their unbelief that they were unable to enter.
- Numbers 23:19
Where this verse is studied
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About Psalms
This page draws on 9 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 78; Charles Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, Vol. 3; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Calvin, Commentary on the Book of Psalms; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.