Psalms 109:6 - Meaning and Application

David singles out one man here, someone worse than the rest and the leader of them. He speaks in a devout and godly way, not from personal bitterness, but from zeal for God and hatred of sin. He also has Christ’s enemies in view, especially Judas, who betrayed Jesus and whose sin was greater than Pilate’s, the Roman governor who condemned him (John 19:11). David foretells and pronounces this man’s ruin, and Christ later calls Judas “a son of perdition,” that is, one marked for destruction.

Calvin says it was a hateful abuse, common in his day among Franciscan friars and other monks, for someone with a grudge to hire them to curse a neighbor each day using these verses. He even tells of a woman in France who, after falling out with her only son, hired friars to curse him in these same words. It is hard to imagine a greater evil than using the language of Scripture to give voice to a wicked passion, or to stir up conflict with words taken from God’s own altar.

These imprecations are very severe, but they are against those whom God has already condemned unless they repent and give him glory. Here the bad man is first pictured as being brought into court and sentenced like a criminal, with all the horror of trial and condemnation (Psalm 109:6-7). “Set a wicked man over him” means, in part, that God may let one wicked person punish another. God often uses one sinner as a rod against another, to spoil the spoilers and deal falsely with those who have dealt falsely.

Some take “the wicked one” to mean Satan, and then this was fulfilled in Judas, into whom Satan entered, first to drive him into sin and then into despair. Others understand it as his own evil heart or conscience standing against him. Let Satan stand at his right hand, that place of support and defense, and let him have no help there. In that case the man is helpless, because he has no advocate who can say, “The Lord rebuke you, Satan” (Zechariah 3:1-2). When he is judged by people, let his usual tricks fail him; when he stands before God’s judgment, let him still be found guilty.

Let his prayer become sin, like the cries of a condemned man that are not only refused but treated as an insult to the court. Wicked people’s prayers become sin now because they are mixed with hypocrisy and hate, and they will be sin in the great day too, because it will then be too late to cry, “Lord, Lord, open to us.” Let everything turn against him, even the things that seem best, and let them all work to his harm.

Once he is condemned, let him be executed like a known criminal. Let his life be cut short, and let his days be few (Psalm 109:8). Bloody and deceitful people often do not live out half their days. Let another take his office, his place of service and honor. Peter applies this to Judas when Matthias was chosen to replace him among the apostles (Acts 1:20). Those who misuse trust and responsibility rightly lose their office to someone who will be faithful.

Let his family be broken and left in grief. Let his wife become a widow and his children fatherless because of his untimely death (Psalm 109:9). By their wickedness, wicked men often bring ruin on the very wives and children they should have cared for. If the children had enough to live on, they might still be secure, but here they are left as wanderers and beggars. They have no stable home, no sure meal, and no settled place to stay. They creep out of ruined places with fear, like animals from a den, to look for bread (Psalm 109:10), because they know people have reason to hate them for their father’s sake.

Let his estate be ruined too, as the property of criminals is often taken away (Psalm 109:11). Let the extortioner seize all he has, and let strangers, who have no claim by kinship, take over the fruit of his labor, whether because of his crimes or his debts. Let his posterity be miserable. Fatherless children are sometimes cared for by the mercy of others, but this wicked man showed no mercy, so let none be shown to his children when he is gone (Psalm 109:12). The children of wicked parents often suffer because people shut their hearts against them, though they should not, since the children are not guilty of their father’s sin.

Let his memory be shameful and forgotten (Psalm 109:13). Let his descendants be cut off, and let his end be destruction, as Dr. Hammond puts it. In the next generation, let their name be erased, or remembered with contempt and anger, and let a lasting mark of disgrace remain on it (Psalm 109:15). Sin is what brings some people to shameful deaths and ruins other families and estates, leaving poverty, shame, and misery to their children. Dr. Hammond applies this also to the final scattering and ruin of the Jewish nation for crucifying Christ. Their rulers and people were cut off, their land was laid waste, and their descendants became fugitives and wanderers.

The harshness of these imprecations is justified by the cause behind them. To support the prayer for vengeance on the sinner’s children, the Psalm also brings in the sins of his ancestors, his fathers’ iniquity and his mother’s sin (Psalm 109:14-15). God often visits such guilt on the children and grandchildren, and he is not unjust in doing so. When sin has long run in a family line, the curse rightly follows it.

In this way, all the innocent blood that had been shed on the earth, from righteous Abel onward, was required from that hostile generation. By putting Christ to death, they filled up the guilt of their fathers and stored up just as long a trail of judgment behind them as the trail of guilt that had gone before. They had already agreed to this when they said, “His blood be on us and on our children.”

To show why such curses on the sinner himself are just, the psalm points back to his own sin, the thing that called for judgment. He had loved cruelty, so blood should be given to him to drink (Psa 109:16). He did not remember to show mercy. He ignored the reasons that should have moved him to pity, and he forgot the people who needed compassion. Instead, he persecuted the poor, whom he should have protected and helped, and he killed the brokenhearted, whom he should have comforted and healed. This is a truly barbaric man, fit only to face ruin.

He also loved cursing, so let the curse come on his head (Psa 109:17-19). He hurled curses at those beyond the reach of his cruelty, but those empty and foolish words will return on him. He did not delight in blessing. He took no pleasure in wishing others well, or in seeing others do well. He would not speak a kind word or do a kind deed for anyone, so let every good thing stay far from him.

He clothed himself with cursing. He wore it like an ornament and took pride in it, because he could frighten those around him with the curses he handed out so freely. He also trusted in it like armor, thinking it would protect him from the insults of those he feared. Then let him have enough of it. If he loved cursing, let God's curse enter him like water and swell him like a man with dropsy. Let it soak into his bones like oil.

God’s word of curse is living and powerful, and it reaches between joints and marrow. It works deeply and effectively. It grips the soul. It is a piercing thing, and there is no remedy against it. Let it surround him on every side like a garment (Psa 109:19). Let God’s curse on him become his shame, just as his cursing of others was his pride. Let it cling to him like a belt, and let him never be free of it. Let it be to him like the water of jealousy, which made the belly swell and the thigh rot.

This points to the complete ruin of Judas, and to the spiritual judgments that came on the Jews for crucifying Christ. The psalm ends its calls for judgment with a solemn Amen, which means more than “May it be so.” It means, “I know it will be so.” “Let this be the Lord’s reward to my adversaries” (Psa 109:20). And this will be the reward of all who oppose the Lord Jesus. His enemies, who will not have him rule over them, will be brought out and slain before him. He will also repay trouble to those who trouble his people.