Charles Ellicott Commentary Psalms 39:11

"When thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, Thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth: Surely every man is vanity. Selah" — Psalms 39:11 (ASV)

When. —This is unnecessary. With judgments for sin You chasten a man.

Rebukes. —The word rendered “reproofs” in Psalms 38:14, where see the note.

Beauty. —Literally, Something desirable. (See the margin.) You, like a moth (consuming a garment: see the Prayer Book Version), cause his desirable things to melt. (For the image, singularly apt and natural in a country where “changes of clothing” were so prized and hoarded up as wealth, compare Job 13:28; Matthew 6:19; James 5:2.)