John Calvin Commentary Psalms 73:8

"They scoff, and in wickedness utter oppression: They speak loftily." — Psalms 73:8 (ASV)

They become insolent, and wickedly talk of extortion. Some take the verb ימיקו, yamicu, in an active transitive sense, and explain it as meaning that the wicked soften—that is to say, make others timid, or frighten and intimidate them. But as the idiom of the language also allows it to be understood in the neuter sense, I have adopted the interpretation that agreed best with the scope of the passage: namely, that the wicked, forgetting they are men, and by their unbounded audacity trampling underfoot all shame and honesty, do not conceal their wickedness but, on the contrary, loudly boast of their extortion.

And indeed, we see that wicked men, after having for some time had everything prosper according to their desires, cast off all pretense and take no pains to conceal themselves when about to commit iniquity, but loudly proclaim their own turpitude. “What!” they will say, “is it not in my power to deprive you of all that you possess, and even to cut your throat?” Robbers, it is true, can do the same thing; but then they hide themselves for fear.

These giants, or rather inhuman monsters, of whom David speaks, on the contrary, not only imagine that they are exempt from subjection to any law, but, unmindful of their own weakness, foam furiously, as if there were no distinction between good and evil, between right and wrong. If, however, the other interpretation should be preferred—that the wicked intimidate the simple and peaceable by boasting of the great oppressions and outrages they can perpetrate upon them—I do not object to it.

When the poor and the afflicted find themselves at the mercy of these wicked men, they cannot help but tremble and, so to speak, melt and dissolve upon seeing them in possession of so much power. With respect to the expression, They speak from on high, it implies that they pour forth their insolent and abusive speech upon the heads of all others. As proud men, who disdain to look directly at anyone, are said, in the Latin tongue, despicere, and in the Greek, Katablepein, that is, to look down; so David introduces them as speaking from on high, because it seems to them that they have nothing in common with other men, but think themselves a distinct class of beings and, as it were, little gods.