Give us help from trouble: for vain is the help of man.
Parallel translations
- WEB Give us help against the adversary, for the help of man is vain.
- BSB Give us aid against the enemy, for the help of man is worthless.
- NKJV Give us help from trouble, For the help of man is useless.
- NASB Oh give us help against the enemy, For rescue by man is worthless.
- NLT Oh, please help us against our enemies, for all human help is useless.
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
David pleads for God's help against the foe, confessing that human help is worthless. It locates true deliverance in God alone.
Overview
David asks God for aid, plainly stating that the help of man is vain. He renounces reliance on human strength and casts himself wholly on God. This confession reflects the consistent biblical conviction that salvation belongs to the Lord, not to human power.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Ps 146:3Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.
- Ps 108:12Give us help from trouble: for vain is the help of man.
- Ps 130:8And he shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities.
- Ps 124:1–3If it had not been the LORD who was on our side, now may Israel say;
- Isa 30:7For the Egyptians shall help in vain, and to no purpose: therefore have I cried concerning this, Their strength is to sit still.
- Ps 62:1Truly my soul waiteth upon God: from him cometh my salvation.
- Isa 31:3Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit. When the LORD shall stretch out his hand, both he that helpeth shall fall, and he that is holpen shall fall down, and they all shall fail together.
- Ps 25:22Redeem Israel, O God, out of all his troubles.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 60:11 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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