They have left the bodies of your servants as food for the birds of heaven. The flesh of your godly ones has become food for the wild animals.
Parallel translations
- WEB They have given the dead bodies of your servants to be food for the birds of the sky, the flesh of your saints to the animals of the earth.
- KJV The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth.
- BSB They have given the corpses of Your servants as food to the birds of the air, the flesh of Your saints to the beasts of the earth.
- NKJV The dead bodies of Your servants They have given as food for the birds of the heavens, The flesh of Your saints to the beasts of the earth.
- NASB They have given the dead bodies of Your servants to the birds of the sky as food, The flesh of Your godly ones to the animals of the earth.
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 enemy left God's people unburied, exposed to scavengers. The desecration deepened the horror of the disaster.
Overview
The dead were given 'to be food for the birds' and beasts, an unburied disgrace that intensified the calamity. To deny burial was a profound dishonor in that culture. The psalm voices the suffering of God's 'saints' under judgment and the longing for the One who would one day conquer death itself.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Jer 7:33The dead bodies of this people shall be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth; and no one shall frighten them away.
- Jer 34:20I will even give them into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of those who seek their life. Their dead bodies will be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth.
- Jer 16:4“They shall die grievous deaths: they shall not be lamented, neither shall they be buried; they shall be as dung on the surface of the ground; and they shall be consumed by the sword, and by famine; and their dead bodies shall be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth.”
- Deut 28:26Your dead body will be food to all birds of the sky, and to the animals of the earth; and there will be no one to frighten them away.
- Jer 15:3“I will appoint over them four kinds,” says Yahweh: “the sword to kill, and the dogs to tear, and the birds of the sky, and the animals of the earth, to devour and to destroy.
- Jer 19:7“‘“I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place; and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life: and their dead bodies will I give to be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth.
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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 79:2 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.