Let them wander up and down for meat, and grudge if they be not satisfied.
Parallel translations
- WEB They shall wander up and down for food, and wait all night if they aren’t satisfied.
- BSB They scavenge for food, and growl if they are not satisfied.
- NKJV They wander up and down for food, And howl if they are not satisfied.
- NASB They wander about for food And murmur if they are not satisfied.
- NLT They scavenge for food but go to sleep unsatisfied.
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 wicked wander hungry through the night, never satisfied. Their restless emptiness contrasts with the contentment of those who trust God.
Overview
Like scavenging dogs that prowl for food and growl when unsatisfied, the wicked find no lasting fulfillment. Their endless craving pictures the emptiness of a life apart from God. This sets up the bright contrast of the next verses, where David rests secure and rejoicing in the Lord.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- Job 15:23He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where is it? he knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.
- Ps 109:10Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
- Job 30:1–7But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.
- Lam 5:9We gat our bread with the peril of our lives because of the sword of the wilderness.
- Isa 56:11Yea, they are greedy dogs which can never have enough, and they are shepherds that cannot understand: they all look to their own way, every one for his gain, from his quarter.
- Lam 4:4–5The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst: the young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them.
- Lam 4:9–10They that be slain with the sword are better than they that be slain with hunger: for these pine away, stricken through for want of the fruits of the field.
- Mic 3:5Thus saith the LORD concerning the prophets that make my people err, that bite with their teeth, and cry, Peace; and he that putteth not into their mouths, they even prepare war against him.
- Deut 28:48Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies which the LORD shall send against thee, in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things: and he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck, until he have destroyed thee.
- Matt 24:7–8For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
- Deut 28:53–58And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters, which the LORD thy God hath given thee, in the siege, and in the straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee:
- 2 Kgs 6:25–29And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until an ass’s head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a cab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
- Isa 8:21And they shall pass through it, hardly bestead and hungry: and it shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themselves, and curse their king and their God, and look upward.
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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 59:15 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.