My God, Why?
But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people. Psalm 22:6 · Berean Standard Bible
The psalmist compares himself to a worm—the lowest, most powerless, most despicable thing—and says everyone around him shares that contempt.
The suffering has stripped away dignity. He's not just in pain; he's been humiliated publicly. The image of a worm isn't poetic—it's how low his actual situation has brought him in the eyes of others.
The psalmist, describing the depth of his degradation.
This language of dehumanization later becomes intensely relevant to Jesus's crucifixion—the ultimate public shame and rejection.
The psalmist abruptly returns to his present degradation, describing himself as less than human—a worm rather than a person—scorned and despised by his community.
The *Yet* (וְאָנֹכִי, ve-anokhi) marks a jarring contrast between ancestral vindication and present abjection. To be *a worm* (תוֹלַעַת, tolaat) invokes Job's comparable language (Job 25:6) and evokes the deepest social disgrace in ancient Near Eastern context—worms represented decay, contamination, and absolute powerlessness. The *scorned by men and despised by the people* (נִקְלֵה אָדָם וּבְזוּי עָם, nikleh adam u-vezui am) employs terms that denote active social rejection, not mere misfortune. Medieval Jewish exegetes like Radak read this as the precise experience of galut (exile), while Christian commentators perceived here the humiliation Christ endured.
The psalmist, experiencing social ostracism that magnifies his physical suffering through communal alienation.
In Christian hermeneutics, particularly patristic readings, this verse prefigures Christ's humiliation—his becoming *nothing*, as Paul would later articulate in Philippians 2, his emptying (*kenosis*) taking him beneath human dignity to demonstrate love's radical extent.
4In You our fathers trusted; they trusted and You delivered them.
5They cried out to You and were set free; they trusted in You and were not disappointed.
6But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people.
7All who see me mock me; they sneer and shake their heads:
8“He trusts in the LORD, let the LORD deliver him; let the LORD rescue him, since He delights in him.”
Read all of Psalm 22 — Begins with a cry Jesus echoes on the cross. The anguish is real — but so is the turn toward praise that comes at the end.
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