Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother; thou slanderest thine own mother’s son.
Speaking against a brother and slandering one's own mother's son, one's closest kin, are marked as the sins of the wicked, standing together with giving the mouth and tongue to evil and framing deceit. To sit and speak is to sit in judgment upon a brother, and it includes deliberate, studied efforts to injure his reputation. Such speech is an expression of hatred and of wrongdoing in the speaker.
God reproves this course and exposes it, bringing secret and dishonorable wrongdoing to light, keeping it recorded, and at last setting it in order before the eyes of the offender for judgment. He calls the offender to repentance and to confession, and instead of magnifying the supposed faults of others each one is to examine his own character, correct his own wrongs, and set a guard upon his lips.
In its wider setting the psalm displays the greatness of God and warns all who are working on the side of Satan that they are incurring a fearful loss. Those given to anarchy and to war and strife will in the last great day see how many souls were lost because they failed to take their stand under the rule of Christ.
Speaking against a brother and slandering one's own mother's son, one's closest kin, are marked as the sins of the wicked, standing together with giving the mouth and tongue to evil and framing deceit. To sit and speak is to sit in judgment upon a brother, and it includes deliberate, studied efforts to injure his reputation. Such speech is an expression of hatred and of wrongdoing in the speaker.
God reproves this course and exposes it, bringing secret and dishonorable wrongdoing to light, keeping it recorded, and at last setting it in order before the eyes of the offender for judgment. He calls the offender to repentance and to confession, and instead of magnifying the supposed faults of others each one is to examine his own character, correct his own wrongs, and set a guard upon his lips.
In its wider setting the psalm displays the greatness of God and warns all who are working on the side of Satan that they are incurring a fearful loss. Those given to anarchy and to war and strife will in the last great day see how many souls were lost because they failed to take their stand under the rule of Christ.