Charles Ellicott Commentary Psalms 129:6

"Let them be as the grass upon the housetops, Which withereth before it groweth up;" — Psalms 129:6 (ASV)

Which withereth afore it groweth up. —This clause, with its Aramaic colouring, probably contains a textual error. The context seems certainly to require the meaning “before it is plucked up,” and many scholars get this meaning out of the Hebrew verb used elsewhere of “plucking off a shoe” and “drawing a sword.” They give, which is no doubt legitimate, an impersonal sense to the active verb, “which withers before one pulls it up.” The Septuagint (received text), the Vulgate, Theodotion, and the Quinta favour this rendering.

On the other hand, the image of grass withering before it comes to maturity is exactly what we should expect here, growing as it does without soil (compare to the “seed on the rock” in the parable of the sower), and suggests a more complete and sudden destruction of the enemies, who perish before the abortive plans of evil can be carried out.

The rendering of the Authorised Version is therefore to be retained, and is actually supported by Aquila, Symmachus, the Sexta, and in various readings of the Septuagint.

A thatched cottage in our country might present the picture suggested by the verse, but it was much more familiar where the housetops were flat and plastered with a composition of mortar, tar, ashes, and sand, which, unless carefully rolled, would naturally become covered with weeds. Indeed, in many cases, especially on the poorest sort of houses, the roof would be little better than hard mud. For similar allusions compare to 2 Kings 19:26 and Isaiah 37:27.