Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
(40) הבלי-שוא, “Idols of vanity or falsehood,” i.e., false, or deceitful, or vain idols. הבל means vapor, smoke, breath, vanity, inanity: but in the plural number it is applied for the most part to idols. See Deuteronomy 32:21; 1 Kings 16:13 שוא is a lie, which is vain — useless, and false — deceptive. Marckius renders the words, “Vanitates inanitatis — vanities of inanity’” Junius and Tremelius, “Vanitates mendaces — mendacious vanities;” Septuagint, “ματαια και Ψευδη — vain and false things.” “He thus calls idols,” says an author in Poole’s Syn., “and all those things in which any one, excluding God, trusts; which are nothing, and can do nothing, and which deceive their worshippers.” This is true, that is, that all other things, as well as idols, are, apart from God, vain, and worthless, and deceptive; but the reference here no doubt is to idols. They are not only empty, but deceptive. — Ed. 