Albert Barnes Commentary Psalms 107:40

"He poureth contempt upon princes, And causeth them to wander in the waste, where there is no way." — Psalms 107:40 (ASV)

He pours contempt upon princes - He treats them as if they were common people; he pays no regard in his providence to their station and rank. They are subjected to the same needs as others; they meet with reverses like others; they become captives like others; they sicken and die like others; they are laid in the grave like others; and, with the same offensiveness, they turn back to dust. Between monarchs and their subjects, masters and their slaves, mistresses and their handmaidens, rich men and poor men, beauty and deformity, there is no distinction in the pains of sickness, in the pangs of dying, in the loathsomeness of the grave.

The process of corruption goes on in the most splendid coffin, and beneath the most costly monument which art and wealth can erect, as well as in the plainest coffin, and in the grave marked by no stone or memorial. What can more strikingly show contempt for the trappings of royalty, for the adornings of wealth, for the stars and garters of nobility, for coronets and crowns, for the diamonds, the pearls, and the gold that decorate beauty, than that which occurs in a grave! The very language used here, alike in the Hebrew and in our translation, is found in (Job 12:21).

The word rendered princes properly means “willing, voluntary, prompt;” and is then applied to the generous, to the noble-minded, to those who give liberally. It then denotes one of noble rank, as the idea of rank in the mind of the Orientals was closely connected with the notion of liberality in giving. Thus it comes to denote one of noble birth, and might be applied to any of exalted rank.

And causes them to wander in the wilderness - Margin, void place. The Hebrew word תהו (tôhû) means properly wasteness, desolateness; emptiness, vanity. See (Genesis 1:2; Job 26:7; Isaiah 41:29; Isaiah 44:9; Isaiah 49:4). Here it means an empty, uninhabited place; a place where there is no path to guide; a land of desolation. The reference seems to be to the world beyond the grave; the land of shadows and night. .

Where there is no way - literally, no way. That is, no well-trodden path. All must soon go to that pathless world.