Bible Strands
Psalms 143:6
I stretch out my hands to You; my soul thirsts for You like a parched land. Selah
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — David addresses God after meditating on past acts of deliverance and immediately before pleading for urgent intervention. The words — The Hebrew פֵּרַשְׂתִּי (perashti) literally means "I have spread out" regarding hands, while נַפְשִׁי (nafshi) denotes "my soul" or "my throat." The thread — The posture of outstretched hands appears in Job 11:13, while the soul’s yearning parallels the language in Psalms 63:1 and the fainting longing described in Psalms 84:2. Why it lands — The text requires a reader to recognize spiritual depletion and respond with direct, unadorned supplication rather than ritual performance.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
I stretch forth my hands unto thee: my soul thirsteth after thee, as a thirsty land. Selah.
Cross-references
- Job 11:13 As for you, if you direct your heart and lift up your hands to Him,
- Psalms 63:1 A Psalm of David, when he was in the Wilderness of Judah. O God, You are my God. Earnestly I seek You; my soul thirsts for You. My body yearns for You in a dry and weary land without water.
- Psalms 84:2 My soul longs, even faints, for the courts of the LORD; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
- Psalms 88:9 My eyes grow dim with grief. I call to You daily, O LORD; I spread out my hands to You.
- Psalms 42:1 For the choirmaster. A Maskil of the sons of Korah. As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul longs after You, O God.
- Psalms 44:20 If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
- Isaiah 26:8 Yes, we wait for You, O LORD; we walk in the path of Your judgments. Your name and renown are the desire of our souls.
- Isaiah 35:7 The parched ground will become a pool, the thirsty land springs of water. In the haunt where jackals once lay, there will be grass and reeds and papyrus.
- John 7:37 On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood up and called out in a loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.