The observation of Psa 73:4 is pursued further in Psa 73:5 : whilst one would have thought that the godly formed an exception to the common wretchedness of mankind, it is just the wicked who are exempt from all trouble and calamity. It is also here to be written אינמו, as in Psa 59:14, not אינימו. Therefore is haughtiness their neck-chain, and brutishness their mantle. ענק is a denominative from ענק = αὐχήν: to hang round the neck; the neck is the seat of pride (αὐχεῖν): haughtiness hangs around their neck (like ענק, a neck-ornament). Accordingly in Psa 73:6 המס is the subject, although the interpunction construes it differently, viz., “they wrap round as a garment the injustice belonging to them,” in order, that is, to avoid the construction of יעטף (vid., Ps 65:14) with למו; but active verbs can take a dative of the object (e.g., אהב ל ,, רפא ל) in the sense: to be or to grant to any one that which the primary notion of the verb asserts. It may therefore be rendered: they put on the garment of violence (שׁית חמס like בּגדי נקם, Isa 59:17), or even by avoiding every enallage numeri: violence covers them as a garment; so that שׁית is an apposition which is put forth in advance.
Verses 7-10
The reading עונמו, ἡ ἀδικία αὐτῶν (lxx (cf. in Zec 5:6 the עינם, which is rendered by the lxx in exactly the same way), in favour of which Hitzig, Böttcher, and Olshausen decide, “their iniquity presses forth out of a fat heart, out of a fat inward part,” is favoured by Psa 17:10, where חלב obtains just this signification by combination with סגר, which it would obtain here as being the place whence sin issues; cf. ἐξέρχεσθαι ἐκ τῆς καρδίας, Mat 15:18.; and the parallelism decides its superiority. Nevertheless the traditional reading also gives a suitable sense; not (since the fat tends to make the eyes appear to be deeper in) “their eyes come forward prae adipe,” but, “they stare forth ex adipe, out of the fat of their bloated visage,” מחלב being equivalent to מחלב פּניהם, Job 15:27. This is a feature of the character faithfully drawn after nature. Further, just as in general τὸ περίσσευμα τῆς καρδίας wells over in the gestures and language (Mat 12:34), so is it also with their “views or images of the heart” (from שׂכה, like שׂכוי, the cock with its gift of divination as speculator): the illusions of their unbounded self-confidence come forth outwardly,
