You love every word that devours, O deceitful tongue.
Parallel translations
- WEB You love all devouring words, you deceitful tongue.
- KJV Thou lovest all devouring words, O thou deceitful tongue.
- NKJV You love all devouring words, You deceitful tongue.
- NASB You love all words that devour, You deceitful tongue.
- NLT You love to destroy others with your words, you liar!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The deceitful tongue delights in words that devour and destroy. It underscores the appetite for harm behind slander.
Overview
David presses the indictment, calling the man's speech 'devouring words' that consume others. The repeated focus on the tongue shows that the heart's evil overflows in speech (Luke 6:45). It is a sober reminder that words reveal and feed the soul's true desires.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 3
- Ps 120:3What will He do to you, and what will be added to you, O deceitful tongue?
- Jas 3:6–9The tongue also is a fire, a world of wickedness among the parts of the body. It pollutes the whole person, sets the course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
- 1 Sam 22:18–19So the king ordered Doeg, “You turn and strike down the priests!” And Doeg the Edomite turned and struck down the priests himself. On that day he killed eighty-five men who wore the linen ephod.
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Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 52:4 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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