Why does the psalm say I fell apart until I said it out loud?
Look at the order in the psalm. First comes silence: "When I kept silent, my bones wore away." Then a decision: "I said, I will confess my wrongdoing." Then relief: "and You lifted the guilt of my sin."
Rashi (the classic commentator, France, died 1105) says the silence means holding back from confessing. The bones wore away from sighing and worry all day, because David was afraid of the punishment. Radak (Rabbi David Kimchi, Provence, around 1200) reads it the same way: worry. On verse 4, "Your hand was heavy on me," both say the same: fear of what God would do. In their reading, the weight in these verses is not a disease or an attack. It is worry and dread.
Rashi connects the turning point to a particular moment. When David finally said to Natan the prophet, "I have sinned," Natan answered that Hashem had also removed the sin.
Why say it out loud to God, who already knows? Radak sees the question coming. The psalm says "I will make it known to You." He explains that God knows what is hidden, so this is the way people talk. It means confessing with the mouth, in front of God, and not covering it up.
That matches Jewish law. The Rambam (Maimonides, who died in 1204) rules that confession is a commandment done with words, not only regret. The Vidui prayer goes into that.
One limit. Radak does not say the words work by themselves. He says forgiveness comes when the person confesses and returns with a whole heart.
Tehillim 32:3-5,Rashi on Tehillim 32:3 and 32:5,Radak on Tehillim 32:3 and 32:5,Shmuel II 12:13,Rambam, Laws of Repentance 1:1If I did something wrong, do I have to tell people or can I keep it private?
The first verse of this psalm says happy is the one whose sin is "covered." But a verse in Mishlei says the one who covers his wrongdoing will not succeed. The Gemara notices the clash and gives two ways to solve it.
One answer splits it by whether the sin is already public. The other, in the name of Rav Nachman, splits it by who was wronged: sins between people, or sins between a person and God.
The Rambam rules the way the second answer splits it, and he quotes our verse. For a wrong against another person, he calls it a great credit to admit it openly, even to others: "I wronged so-and-so." Someone who hides it out of pride has not finished returning. For a wrong between you and God, you do not need to announce it. He calls revealing it brazen. Tell God the details. In front of others, speak in general terms. He ends with our verse: it is good for him that his wrong was not exposed.
The Gemara also sets Moshe next to David. Moshe said: let my failing be written, and the Gemara points to the verse where God says why Moshe would not bring the people into the Land. David said: let my failing not be written, and he quotes this verse.
So the sources do not say "always tell" or "never tell." They split by who was hurt and who already knows.
Tehillim 32:1,Mishlei 28:13,Yoma 86b,Rambam, Laws of Repentance 2:5,Bamidbar 20:12Does this psalm mean bad things happen to me because I did something wrong?
In the psalm, David ties his pain to his sin: "Your hand was heavy on me." But notice who is speaking. It is David, about himself. And in verse 8, Radak and Metzudat David (a classic commentary on Tanach from the 1700s) say he turns to others and tells them what he saw himself: he sinned, returned, prayed, and it helped.
On verses 9 and 10, Metzudat David reads the pain as a kind of cleaning. He says understand that the pain that comes is meant to clean away sin, and do not kick against it. A person who fights that pain gets many pains. A person who trusts Hashem understands it is for his good, because it clears away the wrong. That is one commentator's reading.
Now the Gemara. Rava (some say Rav Chisda) teaches: if a person sees suffering coming upon him, he should examine his actions. Notice the wording: it is about a person looking at his own suffering and his own actions.
And the Gemara does not stop there. If he examines and finds nothing, he can blame neglect of Torah study. If he looks into that and finds nothing either, he should know these are afflictions of love, and it quotes: "the one Hashem loves, He corrects."
So two things are held together. In the psalm, David speaks from his own experience. The Gemara says that when it is your own pain, look at yourself first, and that sometimes there is nothing to find.
Tehillim 32:3-4 and 32:8-10,Radak on Tehillim 32:8,Metzudat David on Tehillim 32:8-10,Berakhot 5a