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I am like a pelican of the wilderness. I have become as an owl of the waste places.
Verse Takeaways
1
A Vivid Picture of Isolation
Commentators explain that the psalmist chooses the pelican and the owl to paint a vivid picture of profound isolation and melancholy. These birds were known for inhabiting desolate wildernesses and ruins, away from community. Like them, the psalmist feels cut off, enveloped in a sorrow that, as one scholar notes, is "sombre" and "austere," making him a mournful creature seeking solitude.
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Psalms
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7
18th Century
Presbyterian
I am like a pelican of the wilderness - A bird in the midst of desolation becomes a striking image of loneliness and distress. The …
19th Century
Anglican
Pelican. See Leviticus 11:18.
It has been objected that the pelican, being a water-bird, cannot, therefore, be the kâat…
Baptist
For my days are consumed like smoke, and my bones are burned as an hearth. My heart is smitten, and withered like grass; so that I forget to ea…
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16th Century
Protestant
I have become like a pelican of the wilderness. Instead of rendering the original word as pelican, some translate it as bitte…
17th Century
Reformed Baptist
I am like a pelican of the wilderness It may be so called, to distinguish it from another of the same name that live…
The whole word of God is of use to direct us in prayer; but here, as often elsewhere, the Holy Spirit has put words into our mouths. Here is a pray…
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