Psalms 78:49

Cast - Worn-out; old; cast-off.

Indignation - Wrath; anger.

By sending evil angels - This is the first mention we have of evil angels. There is no mention of them in the account we have of the plagues of Egypt in the Book of Exodus, and what they were we cannot tell: but by what the psalmist says here of their operations, they were the sorest plague that God had sent; they were marks or the fierceness of his anger, wrath, indignation, and trouble. Some think the destroying angel that slew all the first-born is what is here intended; but this is distinctly mentioned in Psalm 78:61. An angel or messenger may be either animate or inanimate; a disembodied spirit or human being; any thing or being that is an instrument sent of God for the punishment or support of mankind.

He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger ... - This verse is designed to describe the last, and the most dreadful of the plagues that came upon the Egyptians, the slaying of their first-born; and hence, there is such an accumulation of expressions: anger - fierce anger - wrath - indignation - trouble. All these expressions are designed to be emphatic; all these things were combined when the first-born were slain. There was no form of affliction that could surpass this; and in this trial all the expressions of the divine displeasure seemed to be exhausted. It was meant that this should be the last of the plagues; it was meant that the nation should be humbled, and should be made willing that the people of Israel should go.

By sending evil angels among them - There is reference here undoubtedly to the slaying of the first-born in Egypt. Exodus 11:4-5; Exodus 12:29-30. This work is ascribed to the agency of a destroyer (Exodus 12:23; compare Hebrews 11:28), and the allusion seems to be to a destroying angel, or to an angel employed and commissioned to accomplish such a work. Compare 2 Samuel 24:16; 2 Kings 19:35. The idea here is not that the angel himself was evil or wicked, but that he was the messenger of evil or calamity; he was the instrument by which these afflictions were brought upon them.

78:49 Evil angels - Whom God employed in producing these plagues.