Psalms 78:36
in Psalms 78But they deceived Him with their mouths, and lied to Him with their tongues.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
But they flattered him with their mouth, And lied unto him with their tongue.
KJV
Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth, and they lied unto him with their tongues.
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This verse in Psalms 78
Commentary
11 notes on this verseA commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth - The word rendered “flatter” means properly “to open;” and hence, “to be open; to be ingenious or frank;” and then, to be easily persuaded, to be deluded, to be beguiled; and hence, also, in an active form, to persuade, to entice, to seduce, to beguile, to delude. The meaning here is, that they attempted to deceive by their professions, or that their professions were false and hollow. Those professions were the mere result of affliction. They were based on no principle; there was no true love or confidence at the foundation. Such professions or promises are often made in affliction. Under the pressure of heavy judgments, the loss of property, the loss of friends, or the failure of health, people become serious, and resolve to give attention to religion. It is rarely that such purposes are founded in sincerity, and that the conversions apparently resulting from them are true conversions. The Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate render the phrase here, “They loved with their mouth.” And they lied unto him with their tongues - They made promises which they did not keep.
This 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
they deceived Him with their mouths
Barnes traced deceived to a root meaning to open, then to entice. Henry read the words of their mouths as a bargain to end the wrath, lies meant to be broken once the death passed. He said the rack drew them all out.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers2 voices
Lastly, here let us see the words following: "And they loved Him," he says, "in their mouth, and in their tongue they lied unto Him" [Psalm 78:36]. "But their heart was not right with Him, and they were not counted faithful in His Testament" [Psalm 78:37]. One thing on their tongue, another thing in their heart He found, unto whom the secret things of men are naked, and without any impediment He saw what they loved rather. Therefore the heart is right with God, when it does seek God for the sake of God. For one thing he desired of the Lord, the same he will require, that he may dwell always in the House of the Lord, and may meditate on the pleasantness of Him. Unto Whom says the heart of the faithful, I will be filled, not with the flesh-pots of the Egyptians, nor with melons and gourds, and garlick and onions, which a generation crooked and embittering did prefer even to bread celestial, [Exodus 16:3] nor with visible manna, and those same winged fowls; but, "I will be filled, when Your glory shall be made manifest." For this is the inheritance of the New Testament, wherein they were not counted faithful; whereof however the faith even at that time, when it was veiled, was in the elect, and now, when it has already been revealed, it is not in many that are called. "For many have been called, but few are elect." [Matthew 20:16] Of such sort therefore was the generation crooked and embittering, even when they were seeming to seek God, loving in mouth, and in tongue lying; but in heart not right with God, while they loved rather those things, for the sake of which they required the help of God.
A commentator
Clement of RomeClement's First Letter to the Corinthians, Chapter 15 · Written before 99.
proposed
Let us cleave, therefore, to those who cultivate peace with godliness, and not to those who hypocritically profess to desire it.
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
): They did but flatter him with their mouth, as if they thought by fair speeches to prevail with him to revoke the sentence and remove the judgment, with a secret intention to break their word when the danger was over; they did not return to God with their whole heart, but feignedly, Jer. iii. All their professions, prayers, and promises, were extorted by the rack.
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens
Nevertheless, they did flatter him with their mouth,....
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.
3 more voices on this verse
The Nineteenth Century3 voices
Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth. Bad were they at their best. False on their knees, liars in their prayers. Mouth worship must be very detestable to God when dissociated from the heart: other kings love flattery, but the King of kings abhors it. Since the sharpest afflictions only extort from carnal men a feigned submission to God, there is proof positive that the heart is desperately set on mischief, and that sin is ingrained in our very nature. If you beat a tiger with many stripes you cannot turn him into a sheep. The devil cannot be whipped out of human nature, though another devil, namely, hypocrisy may be whipped into it. Piety produced by the damps of sorrow and the heats of terror is of mushroom growth; it is rapid in its springing up—"they enquired early after God"—but it is a mere unsubstantial fungus of unabiding excitement. And they lied unto him with their tongues. Their godly speech was cant, their praise mere wind, their prayer a fraud. Their skin deep repentance was a film too thin to conceal the deadly wound of sin. This teaches us to place small reliance upon professions of repentance made by dying men, or upon such even when the basis is evidently slavish fear, and nothing more. Any thief will whine out repentance if he thinks the judge will thereby be moved to let him go scot free.
Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth. Bad were they at their best. False on their knees, liars in their prayers. Mouth worship must be very detestable to God when dissociated from the heart: other kings love flattery, but the King of kings abhors it. Since the sharpest afflictions only extort from carnal men a feigned submission to God, there is proof positive that the heart is desperately set on mischief, and that sin is ingrained in our very nature. If you beat a tiger with many stripes you cannot turn him into a sheep.
Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth - What idea could such people have of God, whom they supposed they could thus deceive? They promised well, they called him their God, and their fathers’ God; and told him how good, and kind, and merciful he had been to them. Thus, their mouth flattered him. And they said that, whatever the Lord their God commanded them to do, they would perform. And they lied unto him - I think the Vulgate gives the true sense of the Hebrew: Dilexerunt eum in ore suo; et lingua sua mentiti Bunt ei, - “They loved him with their mouth; and they lied unto him with their tongue.” “That is,” says the old Psalter, “thai sayde thai lufed God, bot thai lighed, als thair dedes schewes; for thai do noght als thai hight; for when God ceses to make men rad; than cese thai to do wele.”
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| וַיְפַתּ֥וּהוּ | vayfatuhu | and they deceived him | H6601 → | |
| בְּפִיהֶ֑ם | befihem | with mouth their | H6310 → | 498 times |
| וּ֝בִלְשׁוֹנָ֗ם | uvilshonam | and with tongue their | H3956 → | 117 times |
| יְכַזְּבוּ־ | yekhazevu- | they lied | H3576 → | 16 times |
| לֽוֹ׃ | lo | to him |
וַיְפַתּ֥וּהוּand they deceived him
vayfatuhuH6601 →
בְּפִיהֶ֑םwith mouth their
befihemH6310 →498 times
וּ֝בִלְשׁוֹנָ֗םand with tongue their
uvilshonamH3956 →117 times
יְכַזְּבוּ־they lied
yekhazevu-H3576 →16 times
לֽוֹ׃to him
lo
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
Isaiah 29:13Therefore the Lord said: “These people draw near to Me with their mouths and honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me. Their worship of Me is but rules taught…
it leads to
- Jeremiah 12:2
You planted them, and they have taken root. They have grown and produced fruit. You are ever on their lips, but far from their hearts.
- Ezekiel 33:31–33
So My people come to you as usual, sit before you, and hear your words; but they do not put them into practice. Although they express love with their mouths, their hearts pursue dishonest…
- Mark 7:2–13
and they saw some of His disciples eating with hands that were defiled—that is, unwashed.
- Matthew 15:2–9
“Why do Your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They do not wash their hands before they eat.”
- Jeremiah 3:10
Yet in spite of all this, her unfaithful sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but only in pretense,” declares the LORD.
- Jeremiah 12:2
Through
Ezekiel 33:31So My people come to you as usual, sit before you, and hear your words; but they do not put them into practice. Although they express love with their mouths, their hearts pursue dishonest…
it leads to
- Matthew 13:22
The seed sown among the thorns is the one who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.
- Psalms 78:36–37
But they deceived Him with their mouths, and lied to Him with their tongues.
- James 1:22–24
Be doers of the word, and not hearers only. Otherwise, you are deceiving yourselves.
- Matthew 13:22
Where this verse is studied
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About Psalms
This page draws on 10 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 (1832-1869); Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments; Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 78; Charles Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, Vol. 3; Clement of Rome, Clement's First Letter to the Corinthians, Chapter 15; 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.