Kommentar zu Tehillim 141:13

the lifting of my hands What I lift up my hands to You.

O Lord, place a guard for my mouth when I pray before You, that I should speak poetically, that it should be acceptable.

the portal of my lips That is the upper lip (like portals of my lips).

Do not incline my heart May my heart not be inclined toward evil.

and may I not partake of their feasts And I shall not sit at their feasts.

May a righteous man strike me with kindness and reprove me It is better that a true and righteous prophet reprove me and chastise me, for all his blows and his reproof are kindness.

may the oil of the anointment of my head not turn my head away The royal oil that was poured onto my head, as it is said (above 23:5): “You anointed my head with oil,” should not turn my head away from the reproof of the righteous man, to go and eat bread with the workers of iniquity.

for as long as For as long as my prayer is in my mouth, it is about the evils of the workers of iniquity, that I should not stumble on them.

Their judges were led astray by [their hearts of] stone For the judges and leaders of these [people] have been led astray from the good way by the evil inclination and the heart of stone, and it is as hard as a rock.

although they heard my words [my] pleasant [words], which I speak of the commandments, and they do not repent of their evil way. Our Rabbis in the Baraitha of Sifrei (Deut. 3: 23) interpreted it concerning Moses and Aaron, but I cannot reconcile the end of the verse with its beginning. I can perhaps reconcile it and say that in stubbornness, these people equal the stubbornness of those through whom Moses and Aaron died through the rock, for these too heard the pleasant words but do not repent.

As one who chops wood.

and splits on the ground So were our bones scattered to reach the entrance of death because of the evils of the transgressors.

Chops Heb. פלח, an expression of splitting, as (Job 16:13): “He splits my kidneys.”

For to You, etc., are my eyes This goes back to the above verses (3f.): Place a guard for my mouth...Do not incline...for to You...are my eyes, etc.

do not cast out my soul Heb. אל תער. Do not cast me from before You, like (Gen. 24:20): “and emptied (ותער) her pitcher into the watering trough.”

May the wicked fall...into his nets May the wicked man himself fall into his nets that he spreads at my feet.