1Â Thou hast become favourable, Jehovah, to Thy land,Thou hast turned back the captivity of Jacob.2Â Thou hast taken away the iniquity of Thy people,Thou hast covered all their sin.3Â Thou hast drawn in all Thy wrath,Thou hast turned Thyself from the glow of Thine anger.4Â Turn us, O God of our salvation,And cause Thine indignation towards us to cease.5Â For ever wilt Thou be angry with us?Wilt Thou stretch out Thine anger to generation after generation?6Â Wilt Thou not revive us again,That Thy people may rejoice in Thee?7Â Show us, Jehovah, Thy loving-kindness,And give us Thy salvation.8Â I will hear what God, Jehovah, will speak,For He will speak peace to His people and to His favoured [ones];Only let them not turn again to folly.9Â Surely near to them who fear Him is His salvation,That glory may dwell in our land.10 Loving-kindness and Troth have met together,Righteousness and Peace have kissed [each other],11 Troth springs from the earth,And Righteousness looks down from heaven.12 Yea, Jehovah will give that which is good,And our land will give her increase.13 Righteousness shall go before Him,And shall make His footsteps a way.
The outstanding peculiarity of this psalm is its sudden transitions of feeling. Beginning with exuberant thanksgiving for restoration of the nation(vv. 1-3), it passes, without intermediate gradations, to complaints of God's continued wrath and entreaties for restoration (vv. 4-7), and then as suddenly rises to joyous assurance of inward and outward blessings. The condition of the exiles returned from Babylon best corresponds to such conflicting emotions. The book of Nehemiah supplies precisely such a background as fits the psalm. A part of the nation had returned indeed, but to a ruined city, a fallen Temple, and a mourning land, where they were surrounded by jealous and powerful enemies. Discouragement had laid hold on the feeble company; enthusiasm had ebbed away; the harsh realities of their enterprise had stripped off its imaginative charm; and the mass of the returned settlers had lost heart as well as devout faith. The psalm accurately reflects such a state of circumstances and feelings, and may, with some certitude, be assigned, as it is by most commentators, to the period of return from exile.
It falls into three parts, of increasing length,—the first, of three verses (vv. 1-3), recounts God's acts of mercy already received; the second, of four verses (vv. 4-7), is a plaintive prayer in view of still remaining national afflictions; and the third, of six verses, a glad report by the psalmist of the Divine promises which his waiting ear had heard, and which might well quicken the most faint-hearted into triumphant hope.
In the first strophe one great fact is presented in a threefold aspect, and traced wholly to Jehovah. "Thou hast turned back the captivity of Jacob." That expression is sometimes used in a figurative sense for any restoration of prosperity, but is here to be taken literally. Now, as at first, the restored Israel, liketheir ancestors under Joshua, had not won the land by their own arm, but "because God had a favour unto them," and had given them favour in the eyes of those who carried them captive. The restoration of the Jews, seen from the conqueror's point of view, was a piece of state policy, but from that of the devout Israelite was the result of God's working upon the heart of the new ruler of Babylon. The fact is stated in ver. 1; a yet more blessed fact, of which it is most blessed as being a token, is declared in ver. 2.
The psalmist knows that captivity had been chastisement, the issue of national sin. Therefore he is sure that restoration is the sign of forgiveness. His thoughts are running in the same line as in Isa. xl. 2, where the proclamation to Jerusalem that her iniquity is pardoned is connected with the assurance that her hard service is accomplished. He uses two significant words for pardon, both of which occur in Psalm xxxii. In ver. 2asin is regarded as a weight pressing down the nation, which God's mercy lifts off and takes away; in ver. 2bit is conceived of as a hideous stain or foulness, which His mercy hides, so that it is no longer an offence to heaven. Ver. 3 ventures still deeper into the sacred recesses of the Divine nature, and traces the forgiveness, which in act had produced so happy a change in Israel's position, to its source in a change in God's disposition. "Thou hast drawn in all Thy wrath," as a man does his breath, or, if the comparison may be ventured, as some creature armed with a sting retracts it into its sheath. "Thou hast turned Thyself from the glow of Thine anger" gives the same idea under another metaphor. The word turn has a singular fascination for this psalmist. He uses it five times (vv. 1, 3, 4, 6—lit., wilt Thou not turn, quicken us?—and 8). God'sturning from His anger is the reason for Israel's returning from captivity.
The abruptness of the transition from joyous thanksgiving to the sad minor of lamentation and supplication is striking, but most natural, if the psalmist was one of the band of returning exiles, surrounded by the ruins of a happier past, and appalled by the magnitude of the work before them, the slenderness of their resources, and the fierce hostility of their neighbours. The prayer of ver. 4, "Turn us," is best taken as using the word in the same sense as in ver. 1, where God is said to have "turned" the captivity of Jacob. What was there regarded as accomplished is here conceived of as still to be done. That is, the restoration was incomplete, as we know that it was, both in regard to the bulk of the nation, who still remained in exile, and in regard to the depressed condition of the small part of it which had gone back to Palestine. In like manner the petitions of ver. 5 look back to ver. 3, and pray that the anger which there had been spoken of as passed may indeed utterly cease. The partial restoration of the people implied, in the psalmist's view, a diminution rather than a cessation of God's punitive wrath, and he beseeches Him to complete that which He had begun.
The relation of the first to the second strophe is not only that of contrast, but the prayers of the latter are founded upon the facts of the former, which constitute both grounds for the suppliant's hope of answer and pleas with God. He cannot mean to deliver by halves. The mercies received are incomplete; and His work must be perfect. He cannot be partially reconciled, nor have meant to bring His people back to the land, and then leave them to misery. So thecontrast between the bright dawning of the Return and its clouded day is not wholly depressing; for the remembrance of what has been heartens for the assurance that what is shall not always be, but will be followed by a future more correspondent to God's purpose as shown in that past. When we are tempted to gloomy thoughts by the palpable incongruities between God's ideals and man's realisation of them, we may take a hint from this psalmist, and, instead of concluding that the ideal was a phantasm, argue with ourselves that the incomplete actual will one day give way to the perfect embodiment. God leaves no work unfinished. He never leaves off till He has done. His beginnings guarantee congruous endings. He does not half withdraw His anger; and, if He seems to do so, it is only because men have but half turned from their sins. This psalm is rich in teaching as to the right way of regarding the incompleteness of great movements which, in their incipient stages, were evidently of God. It instructs us to keep the Divine intervention which started them clearly in view; to make the shortcomings, which mar them, a subject of lowly prayer; and to be sure that all which He begins He will finish, and that the end will fully correspond to the promise of the beginning. A "day of the Lord" which rose in brightness may cloud over as its hours roll, but "at eventide it shall be light," and none of the morning promise will be unfulfilled.
The third strophe (vv. 8-13) brings solid hopes, based upon Divine promises, to bear on present discouragements. In ver. 8 the psalmist, like Habakkuk (ii. 1), encourages himself to listen to what God will speak. The word "I will hear" expresses resolve or desire, and might be renderedLet me hear, orI wouldhear. Faithful prayer will always be followed by patient and faithful waiting for response from God. God will not be silent, when His servant appeals to Him with recognition of His past mercies, joined with longing that these may be perfected. No voice will break the silence of the heavens; but, in the depths of the waiting soul, there will spring a sweet assurance which comes from God, and is really His answer to prayer, telling the suppliant that "He will speak peace to His people," and warning them not to turn away from Him to other helps, which is folly. "His favoured ones" seems here to be meant as coextensive with "His people." Israel is regarded as having entered into covenant relations with God; and the designation is the pledge that what God speaks will be "peace." That word is to be taken in its widest sense, as meaning, first and chiefly, peace with Him, who has "turned Himself from His anger"; and then, generally, well-being of all kinds, outward and inward, as a consequence of that rectified relation with God.
The warning of ver. 8cis thought by some to be out of place, and an emendation has been suggested, which requires little change in the Hebrew—namely, "to those who have turned their hearts towards Him." This reading is supported by the LXX.; but the warning is perfectly appropriate, and carries a large truth—that the condition of God's speaking of peace is our firm adherence to Him. Once more the psalmist uses his favourite word "turn." God had turned the captivity; He had turned Himself from His anger; the psalmist had prayed Him to turn or restore the people, and to turn and revive them, and now He warns against turning again to folly. There is always danger of relapse in those who have experienced God'sdelivering mercy. There is a blessed turning, when they are brought from the far-off land to dwell near God. But there is a possible fatal turning away from the Voice that speaks peace, and the Arm that brings salvation, to the old distance and bondage. Strange that any ears, which have heard the sweetness of His still small Voice whispering Peace, should wish to stray where it cannot be heard! Strange that the warning should ever be required, and tragic that it should so often be despised!
After the introductory ver. 8, the substance of what Jehovah spoke to the psalmist is proclaimed in the singer's own words. The first assurance which the psalmist drew from the Divine word was that God's salvation, the whole fulness of His delivering grace both in regard to external and in inward evils, is ever near to them that fear Him. "Salvation" here is to be taken in its widest sense. It means, negatively, deliverance from all possible evils, outward and inward; and, positively, endowment with all possible good, both for body and spirit. With such fulness of complete blessings, they, and they only, who keep near to God, and refuse to turn aside to foolish confidences, shall be enriched. That is the inmost meaning of what God said to the psalmist; and it is said to all. And that salvation being thus possessed, it would be possible for "glory"—i.e., the manifest presence of God, as in the Shechinah—to tabernacle in the land. The condition of God's dwelling with men is their acceptance of His salvation. That purifies hearts to be temples.
The lovely personifications in vv. 10-13 have passed into Christian poetry and art, but are not clearly apprehended when they are taken to describe the harmonious meeting and co-operation, in Christ'sgreat work, of apparently opposing attributes of the Divine nature. No such thoughts are in the psalmist's mind. Loving-kindness and Faithfulness or Troth are constantly associated in Scripture as Divine attributes. Righteousness and Peace are as constantly united, as belonging to the perfection of human character. Ver. 10 seems to refer to the manifestation of God's Loving-kindness and Faithfulness in its first clause, and to the exhibition of His people's virtues and consequent happiness in its second. In all God's dealings for His people, His Loving-kindness blends with Faithfulness. In all His people's experience Righteousness and Peace are inseparable. The point of the assurance in ver. 10 is that heaven and earth are blended in permanent amity. These four radiant angels "dwell in the land." Then, in ver. 11, there comes a beautiful inversion of the two pairs of personifications, of each of which one member only reappears. Troth or Faithfulness, which in ver. 10 came into view principally as a Divine attribute, in ver. 11 is conceived of as a human virtue. It "springs out of the earth"—that is, is produced among men. All human virtue is an echo of the Divine, and they who have received into their hearts the blessed results of God's Faithfulness will bring forth in their lives fruits like it in kind. Similarly, Righteousness, which in ver. 10 was mainly viewed as a human excellence, here appears as dwelling in and looking down from heaven, like a gracious angel smiling on the abundance of Faithfulness which springs from earth. Thus "the bridal of the earth and sky" is set forth in these verses.
The same idea is further presented in ver. 12, in its most general form. God gives that which is good, both outward and inward blessings, and, thus fructifiedby bestowments from above, earth yields her increase. His gifts precede men's returns. Without sunshine and rain there are no harvests. More widely still, God gives first before He asks. He does not gather where He has not strawed, nor reap what He has not sown. Nor does He only sow, but He "blesses the springing thereof"; and to Him should the harvest be rendered. He gives before we can give. Isa. xlv. 8 is closely parallel, representing in like manner the co-operation of heaven and earth, in the new world of Messianic times.
In ver. 13 the thought of the blending of heaven and earth, or of Divine attributes as being the foundation and parents of their human analogues, is still more vividly expressed. Righteousness, which in ver. 10 was regarded as exercised by men, and in ver. 11 as looking down from heaven, is now represented both as a herald preceding God's royal progress, and as following in His footsteps. The last clause is rendered in different ways, which all have the same general sense. Probably the rendering above is best: "Righteousness shall make His footsteps a way"—that is, for men to walk in. All God's workings among men, which are poetically conceived as His way, have stamped on them Righteousness. That strong angel goes before Him to clear a path for Him, and trace the course which He shall take. That is the imaginative expression of the truth—that absolute, inflexible Righteousness guides all the Divine acts. But the same Righteousness, which precedes, also follows Him, and points His footsteps as the way for us. The incongruity of this double position of God's herald makes the force of the thought greater. It is the poetical embodiment of the truth, that the perfection of man's character and conduct liesin his being an "imitator of God," and that, however different in degree, our righteousness must be based on His. What a wonderful thought that is, that the union between heaven and earth is so close that God's path is our way! How deep into the foundation of ethics the psalmist's glowing vision pierces! How blessed the assurance that God's Righteousness is revealed from heaven to make men righteous!
Our psalm needs the completion, which tells of that gospel in which "the Righteousness of God from faith is revealed for faith." In Jesus the "glory" has tabernacled among men. He has brought heaven and earth together. In Him God's Loving-kindness and Faithfulness have become denizens of earth, as never before. In Him heaven has emptied its choicest good on earth. Through Him our barrenness and weeds are changed into harvests of love, praise, and service. In Him the Righteousness of God is brought near; and, trusting in Him, each of us may tread in His footsteps, and have His Righteousness fulfilled in us "who walk, not after the flesh, but after the spirit."
1Â Bow down Thine ear, Jehovah, answer me,For I am afflicted and poor.2Â Keep my soul, for I am favoured [by Thee],Save Thy servant, O Thou my God,That trusts in Thee.3Â Be gracious to me, Lord,For to Thee I cry all the day.4Â Rejoice the soul of Thy servant,For to Thee, Lord, do I lift up my soul.5Â For Thou, Lord, art good and forgiving,And plenteous in loving-kindness to all who call on Thee.6Â Give ear, Jehovah, to my prayer,And take heed to the voice of my supplications.7Â In the day of my straits will I call [on] Thee,For Thou wilt answer me.8Â There is none like Thee among the gods, O Lord,And no [works] like Thy works.9Â All nations whom Thou hast madeShall come and bow themselves before Thee,And shall give glory to Thy Name,10 For great art Thou and doest wonders,Thou art God alone.11 Teach me, Jehovah, Thy way,I will walk in Thy troth,Unite my heart to fear Thy Name.12 I will thank Thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart,And I will glorify Thy Name for ever.13 For Thy loving-kindness is great towards me,And Thou hast delivered my soul from Sheol beneath.14 O God, the proud have risen against me,And a crew of violent men have sought after my soul,And have not set Thee before them.15 But Thou, Lord, art a God compassionate and gracious,Long-suffering and plenteous in loving-kindness and troth.16 Turn to me and be gracious to me,Give Thy strength to Thy servant,And save the son of Thy handmaid.17 Work for me a sign for good,That they who hate me may see and be ashamed,For Thou, Jehovah, hast helped me and comforted me.
This psalm is little more than a mosaic of quotations and familiar phrases of petition. But it is none the less individual, nor is the psalmist less heavily burdened, or less truly beseeching and trustful, because he casts his prayer into well-worn words. God does not give "originality" to every devout man; and He does not require it as a condition of accepted prayer. Humble souls, who find in more richly endowed men's words the best expression of their own needs, may be encouraged by such a psalm. Critics may think little of it, as a mere cento; but God does not refuse to bow His ear, though He is asked to do so in borrowed words. A prayer full of quotations may be heartfelt, and then it will be heard and answered. This psalmist has not only shown his intimate acquaintance with earlier devotional words, but he has woven his garland with much quiet beauty, and has blended its flowers into a harmony of colour all his own.
There is no fully developed strophical arrangement but there is a discernible flow of thought, and the psalm may be regarded as falling into three parts.
The first of these (vv. 1-5) is a series of petitions, each supported by a plea. The petitions are the well-worn ones which spring from universal need, and there is a certain sequence in them. They begin with "Bow down Thine ear," the first of a suppliant's desires, which, as it were, clears the way for those which follow.Trusting that he will not ask in vain, the psalmist then prays that God would "keep" his soul as a watchful guardian or sentry does, and that, as the result of such care, he may be saved from impending perils. Nor do his desires limit themselves to deliverance. They rise to more inward and select manifestations of God's heart of tenderness, for the prayer "Be gracious" asks for such, and so goes deeper into the blessedness of the devout life than the preceding. And the crown of all these requests is "Rejoice the soul of Thy servant," with the joy which flows from experience of outward deliverance and of inward whispers of God's grace, heard in the silent depths of communion with Him. It matters not that every petition has parallels in other psalms, which this singer is quoting. His desires are none the less his, because they have been shared by a company of devout souls before him. His expression of them is none the less his, because his very words have been uttered by others. There is rest in thus associating oneself with an innumerable multitude who have "cried to God and been lightened." The petition in ver. 1 is like that in Psalm lv. 2. Ver. 2 sounds like a reminiscence of Psalm xxv. 20; ver. 3 closely resembles Psalm lvii. 1.
The pleas on which the petitions are grounded are also beautifully wreathed together. First, the psalmist asks to be heard because he is afflicted and poor (compare Psalm xl. 17). Our need is a valid plea with a faithful God. The sense of it drives us to Him; and our recognition of poverty and want must underlie all faithful appeal to Him. The second plea is capable of two interpretations. The psalmist says that he isChasid; and that word is by some commentators taken to meanone who exercises, and by othersone who is thesubject of, Chesed—i.e., loving-kindness. As has been already remarked on Psalm iv. 3, the passive meaning—i.e., one to whom God's loving-kindness is shown—is preferable. Here it is distinctly better than the other. The psalmist is not presenting his own character as a plea, but urging God's gracious relation to him, which, once entered on, pledges God to unchanging continuance in manifesting His loving-kindness. But, though the psalmist does not plead his character, he does, in the subsequent pleas, present his faith, his daily and day-long prayers, and his lifting of his desires, aspirations, and whole self above the trivialities of earth to set them on God. These are valid pleas with Him. It cannot be that trust fixed on Him should be disappointed, nor that cries perpetually rising to His ears should be unanswered, nor that a soul stretching its tendrils heavenward should fail to find the strong stay, round which it can cling and climb. God owns the force of such appeals, and delights to be moved to answer, by the spreading before Him of His servant's faith and longings.
But all the psalmist's other pleas are merged at last in that one contained in ver. 5, where he gazes on the revealed Name of God, and thinks of Him as He had been described of old, and as this suppliant delights to set to his seal that he has found Him to be—good and placable, and rich in loving-kindness. God is His own motive, and Faith can find nothing mightier to urge with God, nor any surer answer to its own doubts to urge with itself, than the unfolding of all that lies in the Name of the Lord. These pleas, like the petitions which they support, are largely echoes of older words. "Afflicted and poor" comes, as just noticed, from Psalm xl. 17. The designation of "onewhom God favours" is from Psalm iv. 3. "Unto Thee do I lift up my soul" is taken verbatim from Psalm xxv. 1. The explication of the contents of the Name of the Lord, like the fuller one in ver. 15, is based upon Exod. xxxiv. 6.
Vv. 6-13 may be taken together, as the prayer proper, to which vv. 1-5 are introductory. In them there is, first, a repetition of the cry for help, and of the declaration of need (vv. 6, 7); then a joyful contemplation of God's unapproachable majesty and works, which insure the ultimate recognition of His Name by all nations (vv. 8-10); then a profoundly and tenderly spiritual prayer for guidance and consecration—wants more pressing still than outward deliverance (ver. 11); and, finally, as in so many psalms, anticipatory thanksgivings for deliverance yet future, but conceived of as present by vivid faith.
Echoes of earlier psalms sound through the whole; but the general impression is not that of imitation, but of genuine personal need and devotion. Ver. 7 is like Psalm xvii. 6 and other passages; ver. 8ais from Exod. xv. 11; ver. 8bis modelled on Deut. iii. 24; ver. 9, on Psalm xxii. 27; ver. 11a, on Psalm xxvii. 11; ver. 11b, on Psalm xxvi. 3; "Sheol beneath" is from Deut. xxxii. 22. But, withal, there are unity and progress in this cento of citations. The psalmist begins with reiterating his cry that God would hear, and in ver. 7 advances to the assurance that He will. Then in vv. 8-10 he turns from all his other pleas to dwell on his final one (ver. 5) of the Divine character. As, in the former verse, he had rested his calm hope on God's willingness to help, so now he strengthens himself, in assurance of an answer, by the thought of God's unmatched power, the unique majesty of His worksand His sole Divinity. Ver. 8 might seem to assert only Jehovah's supremacy above other gods of the heathen; but ver. 10 shows that the psalmist speaks the language of pure Monotheism. Most naturally the prophetic assurance that all nations shall come and worship Him is deduced from His sovereign power and incomparableness. It cannot be that "the nations whom Thou hast made" shall for ever remain ignorant of the hand that made them. Sooner or later that great character shall be seen by all men in its solitary elevation; and universal praise shall correspond to His sole Divinity.
The thought of God's sovereign power carries the psalmist beyond remembrance of his immediate outward needs, and stirs higher desires in him. Hence spring the beautiful and spiritual petitions of ver. 11, which seek for clearer insight into God's will concerning the psalmist's conduct, breathe aspirations after a "walk" in that God-appointed way and in "Thy troth," and culminate in one of the sweetest and deepest prayers of the Psalter: "Unite my heart to fear Thy Name." There, at least, the psalmist speaks words borrowed from no other, but springing fresh from his heart's depths. Jer. xxxii. 39 is the nearest parallel, and the commandment in Deut. vi. 5, to love God "with all thine heart," may have been in the psalmist's mind; but the prayer is all his own. He has known the misery of a divided heart, the affections and purposes of which are drawn in manifold directions, and are arrayed in conflict against each other. There is no peace nor blessedness, neither is any nobility of life possible, without whole-hearted devotion to one great object; and there is no object capable of evoking such devotion or worthy to receive it, except Him who is "God alone."Divided love is no love. It must be "all in all, or not at all." With deep truth, the command to love God with all the heart is based upon His Unity—"Hear, O Israel: The Lord thy God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart" (Deut. vi. 4). The very conception of religion requires that it should be exclusive, and should dominate the whole nature. It is only God who is great enough to fill and engage all our capacities. Only the mass of the central sun is weighty enough to make giant orbs its satellites, and to wheel them in their courses. There is no tranquillity nor any power in lives frittered away on a thousand petty loves. The river that breaks into a multitude of channels is sucked up in the sand without reaching the ocean, and has no force in its current to scour away obstructions. Concentration makes strong men; consecration makes saints. "This one thing I do" is the motto of all who have done anything worthy. "Unite my heart to fear Thy Name" is the prayer of all whose devotion is worthy of its object, and is the source of joy and power to themselves. The psalmist asks for a heart made one with itself in the fear of God, and then vows that, with that united heart, he will praise his delivering God. As in many other psalms, he anticipates the answers to his prayers, and in ver. 13 speaks of God's loving-kindness as freshly manifested to him, and of deliverance from the dismal depths of the unseen world, which threatened to swallow him up. It seems more in accordance with the usage in similar psalms to regard ver. 13 as thus recounting, with prophetic certainty, the coming deliverance as if it were accomplished, than to suppose that in it the psalmist is falling back on former instances of God's rescuing grace.
In the closing part (vv. 14-17), the psalmist describes more precisely his danger. He is surrounded by a rabble rout of proud and violent men, whose enmity to him is, as in so many of the psalms of persecuted singers, a proof of their forgetfulness of God. Right against this rapid outline of his perils, he sets the grand unfolding of the character of God in ver. 15. It is still fuller than that in ver. 5, and, like it, rests on Exod. xxxiv. Such juxtaposition is all that is needed to show how little he has to fear from the hostile crew. On one hand are they, in their insolence and masterfulness, eagerly hunting after his life; on the other is God with His infinite pity and loving-kindness. Happy are they who can discern high above dangers and foes the calm presence of the only God, and, with hearts undistracted and undismayed, can oppose to all that assails them the impenetrable shield of the Name of the Lord! It concerns our peaceful fronting of the darker facts of life, that we cultivate the habit of never looking at dangers or sorrows without seeing the helping God beside and above them.
The psalm ends with prayer for present help. If God is, as the psalmist has seen Him to be, "full of compassion and gracious," it is no presumptuous petition that the streams of these perfections should be made to flow towards a needy suppliant. "Be gracious tome" asks that the light, which pours through the universe, may fall on one heart, which is surrounded by earth-born darkness. As in the introductory verses, so in the closing petitions, the psalmist grounds his prayer principally on God's manifested character, and secondarily on his own relation to God. Thus in ver. 16 he pleads that he is God's servant, and "the son of Thy handmaid" (compare Psalm cxvi. 16). That expressiondoes not imply any special piety in the psalmist's mother, but pleads his hereditary relation as servant to God, or, in other words, his belonging by birth to Israel, as a reason for his prayers being heard. His last petition for "a sign" does not necessarily mean a miracle, but a clear manifestation of God's favour, which might be as unmistakably shown by an every-day event as by a supernatural intervention. To the devout heart, all common things are from God, and bear witness for Him. Even blind eyes and hard hearts may be led to see and feel that God is the helper and comforter of humble souls who trust in Him. A heart that is made at peace with itself by the fear of God, and has but one dominant purpose and desire, will long for God's mercies, not only because they have a bearing on its own outward well-being, but because they will demonstrate that it is no vain thing to wait on the Lord, and may lead some, who cherished enmity to God's servant and alienation from Himself, to learn the sweetness of His Name and the security of trust in Him.
1Â His foundation on the holy mountains,2Â The gates of Zion Jehovah lovesMore than all the dwellings of Jacob.3Â Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God. Selah.4Â I will proclaim Rahab and Babylon as those who know Me:"Behold Philistia and Tyre, with Cush;This one was born there."5Â And of Zion it shall be said,"Man after man was born in her,"And He, the Most High, shall establish her.6Â Jehovah shall reckon when He writes down the peoples,"This one was born there." Selah.7Â And singers and dancers [shall chant],"All my fountains are in Thee."
One clear note sounds in this remarkable psalm. Its single theme is the incorporation of ancestral foes and distant nations with the people of God. Aliens are to be enrolled as home-born citizens of Jerusalem. In modern words, the vision of a universal Church, a brotherhood of humanity, shines radiant before the seer. Other psalmists and prophets have like insight into the future expansion of the nation, but this psalm stands alone in the emphasis which it places upon the idea of birth into the rights of citizenship. This singer has had granted to him a glimpse of two great truths—the universality of the Church, and the mode of entrance into it by receptionof a new life. To what age of Israel he belonged is uncertain. The mention of Babylon as among the enemies who have become fellow-citizens favours the supposition of a post-exilic date, which is also supported by resemblances to Isa. xl.-lxvi.
The structure is simple. The psalm is divided by Selah into two strophes, to which a closing verse is appended. The first strophe bursts abruptly into rapturous praise of Zion, the beloved of God. The second predicts the gathering of all nations into her citizenship, and the closing verse apparently paints the exuberant joy of the festal crowds, who shall then throng her streets.
The abrupt beginning of the first strophe offends some commentators, who have tried to smooth ver. 1 into propriety and tameness, by suggesting possible preliminary clauses, which they suppose to have dropped out. But there is no canon which forbids a singer, with the rush of inspiration, either poetic or other, on him, to plunge into the heart of his theme. Ver. 1 may be construed, as in the A.V. and R.V. (text), as a complete sentence, but is then somewhat feeble. It is better to connect it with ver. 2, and to regard "His foundation upon the holy mountains" as parallel with "the gates of Zion," and as, like that phrase, dependent on the verb "loves." Hupfeld, indeed, proposes to transfer "Jehovah loves" from the beginning of ver. 2, where it now stands, to the end of ver. 1, supplying the verb mentally in the second clause. He thus gets a complete parallelism:—
His foundation upon the holy mountains Jehovah loves,The gates of Zion before all the dwellings of Jacob.
His foundation upon the holy mountains Jehovah loves,The gates of Zion before all the dwellings of Jacob.
But this is not necessary; for the verb may as wellbe supplied to the first as to the second clause. The harshness of saying "His foundation," without designating the person to whom the pronoun refers, which is extreme if ver. 1 is taken as a separate sentence, is diminished when it is regarded as connected with ver. 2, in which the mention of Jehovah leaves no doubt as to whose the "foundation" is. The psalmist's fervent love for Jerusalem is something more than national pride. It is the apotheosis of that emotion, clarified and hallowed into religion. Zion is founded by God Himself. The mountains on which it stands are made holy by the Divine dwelling. On their heads shines a glory before which the light that lies on the rock crowned by the Parthenon or on the seven hills of Rome pales. Not only the Temple mountain is meant, but the city is the psalmist's theme. The hills, on which it stands, are emblems of the firmness of its foundation in the Divine purpose, on which it reposes. It is beloved of God, and that, as the form of the word "loves" shows, with an abiding affection. The "glorious things" which are spoken of Zion may be either the immediately following Divine oracle, or, more probably, prophetic utterances such as many of those in Isaiah, which predict its future glory. The Divine utterance which follows expresses the substance of these. So far, the psalm is not unlike other outpourings in praise of Zion, such as Psalm xlviii. But, in the second strophe, to which the first is introductory, the singer strikes a note all his own.
There can be no doubt as to who is the speaker in ver. 4. The abrupt introduction of a Divine Oracle accords with a not infrequent usage in the Psalter, which adds much to the solemnity of the words. If we regard the "glorious things" mentioned in ver. 3as being the utterances of earlier prophets, the psalmist has had his ears purged to hear God's voice, by meditation on and sympathy with these. The faithful use of what God has said prepares for hearing further disclosures of His lips. The enumeration of nations in ver. 4 carries a great lesson. First comes the ancient enemy, Egypt, designated by the old name of contempt (Rahab,i.e.pride), but from which the contempt has faded; then follows Babylon, the more recent inflicter of many miseries, once so detested, but towards whom animosity has died down. These two, as the chief oppressors, between whom, like a piece of metal between hammer and anvil, Israel's territory lay, are named first, with the astonishing declaration that God will proclaim them as among those who know Him. That knowledge, of course, is not merely intellectual, but the deeper knowledge of personal acquaintance or friendship—a knowledge of which love is an element, and which is vital and transforming. Philistia is the old neighbour and foe, which from the beginning had hung on the skirts of Israel, and been ever ready to utilise her disasters and add to them. Tyre is the type of godless luxury and inflated material prosperity, and, though often in friendly alliance with Israel, as being exposed to the same foes which harassed her, she was as far from knowing God as the other nations were. Cush, or Ethiopia, seems mentioned as a type of distant peoples, rather than because of its hostility to Israel. God points to these nations—some of them near, some remote, some powerful and some feeble, some hereditarily hostile and some more or less amicable with Israel—and gives forth the declaration concerning them, "This one was born there."
God's voice ceases, and in ver. 5 the psalmist takesup the wonderful promise which he has just heard. He slightly shifts his point of view: for while the nations that were to be gathered into Zion were the foremost figures in the Divine utterance, the Zion into which they are gathered is foremost in the psalmist's, in ver. 5. Its glory, when thus enriched by a multitude of new citizens, bulks in his eyes more largely than their blessedness. Another shade of difference between the two verses is that, in the former, the ingathering of the peoples is set forth as collective or national incorporation, and, in me latter,—as the expression "man after (orby) man" suggests,—individual accession is more clearly foretold. The establishment of Zion, which the psalmist prophesies, is the result of her reinforcement by these new citizens. The grand figure of ver. 6 pictures God as taking a census of the whole world; for it is "the peoples" whom He numbers. As he writes down each name, He says concerning it, "This one was born there." That list of citizens is "the Book of the Living." So "the end of all history is that Zion becomes the metropolis of all people" (Delitzsch).
Three great truths had dawned on this psalmist, though their full light was reserved for the Christian era. He had been led to apprehend that the Jewish Church would expand into a world-wide community. If one thinks of the gulfs of hatred and incompatibility which parted the peoples in his day, his clear utterance of that great truth, the apprehension of which so far transcended his time, and the realisation of which so far transcends ours, will surely be seen to be due to a Divine breath. The broadest New Testament expression of Universalism does not surpass the psalmist's confident certainty, "There is neither Greek nor Jew,barbarian, Scythian," says no more than he said. More remarkable still is his conception of the method by which the nations should be gathered in to Zion. They are to be "born there." Surely there shines before the speaker some glimmering ray of the truth that incorporation with the people of God is effected by the communication of a new life, a transformation of the natural, which will set men in new affinities, and make them all brethren, because all participant of the same wondrous birth. It would be anachronism to read into the psalm the clear Christian truth "Ye must be born again," but it would be as false a weakening of its words to refuse to see in them the germ of that truth. The third discovery which the psalmist has made, or rather the third revelation which he has received, is that of the individual accession of the members of the outlying nations. The Divine voice, in ver. 4, seems to speak of birth into citizenship as national; but the psalmist, in ver. 6, represents Jehovah as writing the names of individuals in the burgess-roll, and of saying in regard to each, as He writes, "This one was born there." In like manner, in ver. 5, the form of expression is "Man after man," which brings out the same thought, with the addition that there is an unbroken series of new citizens. It is by accession of single souls that the population of Zion is increased. God's register resolves the community into its component units. Men are born one by one, and one by one they enter the true kingdom. In the ancient world the community was more than the individual. But in Christ the individual acquires new worth, while the bands of social order are not thereby weakened, but made more stringent and sacred. The city, whose inhabitants have one by one been won by its King, andhave been knit to Him in the sacred depths of personal being, is more closely "compact together" than the mechanical aggregations which call themselves civil societies. The unity of Christ's kingdom does not destroy national characteristics any more than it interferes with individual idiosyncrasies. The more each constituent member is himself, the more will he be joined to others, and contribute his special mite to the general wealth and well-being.
Ver. 7 is, on any interpretation, extremely obscure, because so abrupt and condensed. But probably the translation adopted above, though by no means free from difficulty or doubt, brings out the meaning which is most in accordance with the preceding. It may be supposed to flash vividly before the reader's imagination the picture of a triumphal procession of rejoicing citizens, singers as well as dancers, who chant, as they advance, a joyous chorus in praise of the city, in which they have found all fountains of joy and satisfaction welling up for their refreshment and delight.
1 Jehovah, God of my salvation,By day, by night I cry before Thee.2 Let my prayer come before Thy face,Bow Thine ear to my shrill cry.3 For sated with troubles is my soul,And my life has drawn near to Sheol.4 I am counted with those that have gone down to the pit,I am become as a man without strength.5 [I am] free among the dead,Like the slain that lie in the grave,Whom Thou rememberest no more,But they are cut off from Thy hand.6 Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit,In dark places, in the deeps.7 Upon me Thy wrath presses hard,And [with] all Thy breakers Thou hast afflicted [me]. Selah8 Thou hast put my familiar friends far from me,Thou hast made me an abomination to them,I am shut up so that I cannot come forth.9 My eye wastes away because of affliction,I have called on Thee daily, Jehovah,I have spread out my palms to Thee,10 For the dead canst Thou do wonders?Or can the shades arise [and] praise Thee? Selah.11 In the grave can Thy loving-kindness be told,And Thy faithfulness in destruction?12 Can Thy wonders be made known in darkness,And Thy righteousness in the land of forgetfulness?13 But I, I have cried unto Thee, Jehovah,And in the morning my prayer comes to meet Thee.14 Why, Jehovah, dost Thou cast off my soul,[And] hidest Thy face from me?15 Afflicted am I and at the point of death from [my] youth,I have borne Thy terrors [till] I am distracted.16 Over me have Thy [streams of] wrath passed,Thy horrors have cut me off.17 They have compassed me about like waters all the day.They have come round me together.18 Thou hast put far from me lover and friend,My familiar friends are—darkness.
A psalm which begins with "God of my salvation" and ends with "darkness" is an anomaly. All but unbroken gloom broods over it, and is densest at its close. The psalmist is so "weighed upon by sore distress," that he has neither definite petition for deliverance nor hope. His cry to God is only a long-drawn complaint, which brings no respite from his pains nor brightening of his spirit. But yet to address God as the God of his salvation, to discern His hand in the infliction of sorrows, is the operation of true though feeble faith. "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him," is the very spirit of this psalm. It stands alone in the Psalter, which would be incomplete as a mirror of phases of devout experience, unless it had one psalm expressing trust which has ceased to ask or hope for the removal of lifelong griefs, but still clasps God's hand even in the "darkness." Such experience is comparatively rare, and is meant to be risen above. Therefore this psalm stands alone. But it is not unexampled, and all moods of the devout life would not find lyrical expression in the book unless this deep note was once sounded.
It is useless to inquire what was the psalmist's affliction. His language seems to point to physical disease, of long continuance and ever threatening a fatal termination; but in all probability sickness is asymbol here, as so often. What racked his sensitive spirit matters little. The cry which his pains evoked is what we are concerned with. There is little trace of strophical arrangement, and commentators differ much in their disposition of the parts of the psalm. But we venture to suggest a principle of division which has not been observed, in the threefold recurrence of "I cry" or "I call," accompanied in each case by direct address to Jehovah. The resulting division into three parts gives, first, the psalmist's description of his hopeless condition as, in effect, already dead (vv. 1-8); second, an expostulation with God on the ground that, if the psalmist is actually numbered with the dead, he can no more be the object of Divine help, nor bring God praise (vv. 9-12); and, third, a repetition of the thoughts of the first part, with slight variation and addition.
The central portion of the first division is occupied with an expansion of the thought that the psalmist is already as good as dead (vv. 3b-6). The condition of the dead is drawn with a powerful hand, and the picture is full of solemn grandeur and hopelessness. It is preceded in vv. 1, 2, by an invocation which has many parallels in the psalms, but which here is peculiarly striking. This saddest of them all has for its first words the Name which ought to banish sadness. He who can call on Jehovah as the God of his salvation possesses a charm which has power to still agitation, and to flush despair with some light of hope as from an unrisen sun. But this poet feels no warmth from the beams, and the mists surge up, if not to hide the light, yet to obscure it. All the more admirable, then, the persistence of his cry; and all the more precious the lesson that Faith is not to let presentexperience limit its conceptions. God is none the less the God of salvation and none the less to be believed to be so, though no consciousness of His saving power blesses the heart at the moment.
Ver. 1bis obscure. Psalm xxii. 2 and other places suggest that the juxtaposition of day and night is meant to express the continuity of the psalmist's prayer; but, as the text now stands, the first part of the clause can only mean "In the time (day) when I cry," and the second has to be supplemented so as to read "[My cry comes] before Thee." This gives a poor meaning, and there is probability in the slight emendation on the word forday, which is required in order to make it an adverb of time equivalent to "In the day," as in the passage already quoted. Another emendation, adopted by Graetz, Bickell, and Cheyne, changes "God of" into "my God," and "my salvation" into "I cry" (the same word as in ver. 13), and attaches "by day" to the first clause. The result is,—