Albert Barnes Commentary Psalms 68:6

"God setteth the solitary in families: He bringeth out the prisoners into prosperity; But the rebellious dwell in a parched land." — Psalms 68:6 (ASV)

God setteth the solitary in families – Margin, as in Hebrew, in a house. The word rendered "solitary" properly means one alone, as an only child (Genesis 22:2, Genesis 22:12, Genesis 22:16); and then it means alone, solitary, wretched, forsaken. See the notes at Psalm 22:20. The word rendered “families” would be more literally and better translated as in the margin, houses.

The idea then is not that he constitutes families of those who were solitary and alone, but that to those who are alone in the world—who seem to have no friends, who are destitute, wretched, forsaken—he gives comfortable dwellings. Thus the idea is carried out which is expressed in the previous verse.

God is the friend of the orphan and the widow; and, in like manner, he is the friend of the cast out, the wandering, the homeless; he provides for them a home. The meaning is that he is benevolent and kind, and that those who have no other friend may find a friend in God.

At the same time, however, it is true that the family organization is to be traced to God. It is his original appointment; and all that there is in the family that contributes to the happiness of mankind—all that there is of comfort in the world that depends on the family organization—is to be traced to the goodness of God. Nothing more clearly marks the benevolence and the wisdom of God than the arrangement by which people, instead of being solitary wanderers on the face of the earth, with nothing to bind them in sympathy, in love, and in interest to each other, are grouped together in families.

He bringeth out those which are bound with chains – He releases the prisoners. That is, He delivers those who are unjustly confined in prison and held in bondage. The principles of his administration are opposed to oppression and wrong, and in favor of the rights of man. The meaning is not that he always does this by his direct power, but that his law, his government, his requirements are all against oppression and wrong, and in favor of liberty. So, in Psalm 146:7: The Lord looseth the prisoners. Compare the notes at Isaiah 61:1.

But the rebellious dwell in a dry land – The rebels; all who rebel against him. The word rendered "dry land" means a dry or arid place, a desert. The idea is that the condition of the rebellious, as contrasted with that of those whom God has under his protection, would be as a fertile and well-watered field compared with a desert.

For the one class he would provide a comfortable home; the other, the wicked, would be left as if to dwell in deserts and solitudes. In other words, the difference in condition between those who are the objects of his favor and those who are found in proud rebellion against him would be as great as that between those who have comfortable abodes in a land producing abundance and those who are wretched and homeless wanderers in regions of arid sand.

While God befriends the poor and the needy, while he cares for the widow and the orphan, he leaves the rebel to misery and want. The allusion here is probably to his conducting his people through the desert to the land of promise and of plenty; but the passage still contains a general truth regarding the principles of his administration.