John Gill Commentary Psalms 144:7

"Stretch forth thy hand from above; Rescue me, and deliver me out of great waters, Out of the hand of aliens;" — Psalms 144:7 (ASV)

Send your hand from above
From the high heavens, as the Targum; that is, exert and display your power in my deliverance, and in the destruction of my enemies; as follows: rid me, and deliver me out of great waters; out of great afflictions, which, for quantity and quality, are like many waters, overflowing and overwhelming; see (Isaiah 43:2); or out of the hands of enemies, many, mighty, and strong, whom he compares to waters; as Aben Ezra, Kimchi, and Ben Melech observe: and so the Targum, "deliver me from the multitudes or armies, that are like to many waters;" see (Revelation 17:1Revelation 17:15) (Isaiah 8:7Isaiah 8:8) (Jeremiah 51:42).

It may be applied to the sorrows and sufferings of Christ, the antitype of David, with which he was overwhelmed; to the billows of divine wrath which went over him; to the floods of ungodly men that encompassed him; and to the whole posse of devils, Satan, and his principalities and powers, that attacked him; see (Psalms 18:4) (Psalms 69:1Psalms 69:2).

from the hand of strange children; which explains what is meant by "great waters": wicked men chiefly; either Gentiles, the children of a people of a strange nation, and of a strange language, and of strange sentiments of religion, and that worship a strange god: such as the Edomites, Moabites, Philistines who were aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise: or else the Israelites, who were degenerated from their ancestors, such of David's subjects that rebelled against him; so the Ziphims are called strangers that rose up against him, (Psalms 54:3).

And such were the enemies of Christ, both the Romans, who were Heathens and aliens; and the people of the Jews, his own countrymen, who were a generation of vipers; see (Acts 4:27Acts 4:28) (Matthew 23:33); such as Juvenal calls ^F12 "filii morum", who inherited the vices of their fathers.

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FOOTNOTES:

• F12: Satyr. 14. v. 52.