Psalms 88:17
All day long they engulf me like water; they enclose me on every side.
BSB
ASV
They came round about me like water all the day long; They compassed me about together.
KJV
They came round about me daily like water; they compassed me about together.
"They have surrounded me like water all the day." The Jews in the waves of persecutions. "They surrounded me together." The Pharisees with the priests. Pilate with the princes and the peoples.
They came round about me daily like water,.... That is, the terrors of the Lord, the sorrows of death and hell, Psa 18:4, this was the Messiah's case, when it was with him as is expressed Psa 69:1, they compassed me about together; as waters coming from many places, from all quarters, meet together, and together surround a person or place in such circumstances was Christ, when the bulls of Bashan beset him around, and the assembly of the wicked enclosed him, and innumerable evils encompassed him about, Psa 22:12.
They came round about me daily like water. My troubles, and thy chastisement poured in upon me, penetrating everywhere, and drowning all. Such is the permeating and pervading power of spiritual distress, there is no shutting it out; it soaks into the soul like the dew into Gideon's fleece; it sucks the spirit down as the quicksand swallows the ship; it overwhelms it as the deluge submerged the green earth. They compassed me about together. Griefs hemmed him in. He was like the deer in the hunt, when the dogs are all around and at his throat. Poor soul!
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
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
Psalms 22:16For dogs surround me; a band of evil men encircles me; they have pierced my hands and feet.
leads to
And, as another Scripture says: “They will look on the One they have pierced.”
Then I will pour out on the house of David and on the people of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and prayer, and they will look on Me, the One they have pierced. They…
When they had crucified Him, they divided up His garments by casting lots.
So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he replied, “Unless I see the nail marks in His hands, and put my finger where the nails have been, and put…
When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they divided His garments into four parts, one for each soldier, with the tunic remaining. It was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom.
Through
Psalms 116:3The ropes of death entangled me; the anguish of Sheol overcame me; I was confronted by trouble and sorrow.
leads to
I am bent and brought low; all day long I go about mourning.
The cords of death encompassed me; the torrents of chaos overwhelmed me.
You have laid me in the lowest Pit, in the darkest of the depths.
