Shout - i. e. call for help.

Shutteth out - Or, "shutteth in." God has so closed up the avenues to the place in which he is immured, that his voice can find no egress.

Also when I cry and shout,.... Cry, because of the distress of the enemy within; "shout", or cry aloud for help from others without; as persons in a prison do, to make them hear and pity their case: thus the prophet in his affliction cried aloud to God; was fervent, earnest, and importunate in prayer; and yet not heard:

he shutteth out my prayer; shuts the door, that it may not enter; as the door is sometimes shut upon beggars, that their cry may not be heard. The Targum is,

"the house of my prayer is shut.''

Jarchi interprets it of the windows of the firmament being shut, so that his prayer could not pass through, or be heard; see Lamentations 3:44. The phrase designs God's disregard, or seeming disregard, of the prayer of the prophet, or of the people; and his shutting his ears against it. Of this, as the Messiah's case, see Psalm 22:2.

This distress presses upon him all the more heavily, because, in addition to this, the Lord does not listen to his prayer and cries, but has rather closed His ear; cf. Jeremiah 7:16; Psalm 18:42, etc. שׂתם for סתם (only written here with שׂ), to stop the prayer; i.e., not to prevent the prayer from issuing out of the breast, to restrain supplication, but to prevent the prayer from reaching His ear; cf. Lamentations 3:44 and Proverbs 1:28.

Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my {c} prayer.

(c) This is a great temptation for the godly when they do not see the fruit of their prayers and causes them to think that they are not heard, which thing God uses so that they might pray more earnestly and often.

8. shutteth out-image from a door shutting out any entrance (Job 30:20). So the antitype. Christ (Ps 22:2).

3:1-20 The prophet relates the more gloomy and discouraging part of his experience, and how he found support and relief. In the time of his trial the Lord had become terrible to him. It was an affliction that was misery itself; for sin makes the cup of affliction a bitter cup. The struggle between unbelief and faith is often very severe. But the weakest believer is wrong, if he thinks that his strength and hope are perished from the Lord.