UNIVERSITY 0^ ILLINOIS LIBRARY Kg URBANA-CHAMBAIGN CENTRAL CIRCULATION AND BOOKSTACKS The person borrowing this material is re- sponsible for its renewal or return before the Latest Date stamped below. You may be charged a minimum fee of $75.00 for each non-returned or lost item. Theft, mutilation, or defacement of library materials can be causes for student disciplinary action. All materials owned by the University of Illinois Library are the property of the State of Illinois and are protected by Article 16B of llUnois Criminal Law and Procedure, TO RENEW, CALL (217) 333-8400. University of Illinois Library at Urbana-Champaign When renewing by phone, write new due date below previous due date. L162 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS: FEOM PRIMITIYE AND MEDIJIYAL WKITERS ; AND FEOM THE OP THE EOMAN, MOZAEABIC, AMBEOSIAN, GALLICAN, GEBEK, COPTIC, AEMENIAN, AND SYEIAC EITES. BY THE REV. J. M. NEALE, D.D., SOMETIME WAEDEN- OF SACKVILLE COLLEGE, EAST GEINSTEAD, AND THE EEV. R. F. LITTLEDALE, LL.D., SOMETIME SCHOLAR OF TEINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN. VOL. III. PSALM LXXXI. TO PSALM CXYIIL SECOND EDITION. LONDON : JOSEPH MASTEES & CO., 78, NEW BOND STREET. MDCCCLXXIV. LONDON : PRINTED BY J. MASTERS AND CO., ALBION BUILDINGS, BARTHOLOMEW CLOSE, Y>3 A ^. COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Title. To the Chief Musician upon Gittith, A Psalm of Asaph. Chaldee Targum : For praise, upon the harp brought from Gath, by the hand of Asaph. LXX. : To the end, for the presses, A Psalm of Asaph. Vulgate : To the Conqueror, [on the fifth of the Sabbath] for the presses, A Psalm of Asaph. Syriac : Of Asaph, when Dayid was making ready by him for the festivals. Arg. Thomas. That we ought to sing of Cheist with all our mind on spiritual trumpets. The "Voice of the Holy Ghost to the people. Concerning the Holy Ghost. This Psalm relates to Pentecost, and the answer of Christ. Further, the Voice of the Apostles to the people. The Voice of Christ touching judgment to come. The Voice of the Apostles, Ven. Bede. The fifth of the Sabbath is the fifth day from the Sabbath, which is called Jove's Day by the Gentiles, and by us the fifth week-day ; wherefore God said : Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, andfoivl that mayfly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven; mystically denoting that there should be born persons of various merit from the waters of Baptism. The intention, then, of the title is of this sort ; To the end, is to signify Christ the Lord ; For the presses, the Church tried by persecutors ; Asaph, the congregation, the fifth of the Sabbath, Baptism. Whence we gather that the Psalm will speak of the regenerate congregation in the Church of the Lord. Hence too it is that Asaph is speaking historically to the Jews, but he is better understood spiritually by the Christian people. In the first part of the Psalm Asaph speaketh to the faithful, that they may sound the praises of God on divers musical instru- ments for benefits many times received. Sing ye merrily to God our strength, Sfc. In the second part are the words of the Lord, threat- ening them against the worship of idols, that He alone may be adored Who is wont to repay : Sear, O My people. In the third part Asaph speaks again, rebuking unbelievers for being deceitful, though God's gifts have been abundantly bestowed on them. The haters of the Lord should have been found liars ^ ^c. III. B PSALM LXXXI. Argument. 698811 2 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. EuSEBius OF CtBSAEEA. The calling of the Gentiles, and in- struction touching the things which befell the former people. S. Athanasius. a Psalm of exhortation, and, to some extent, of command. Vaeious Uses. Gregorian. Friday : Matins. [Corpus Christi : III. Nocturn." Monastic. Thursday : II. Noct. [Corpus Christi : II. Nocturn.] Parisian. Thursday : Lauds. [Corpus Christi : III. Nocturn/ Lyons. Friday : Lauds. Ambrosian. Tuesday of Second Week : III. Nocturn. [Cir- cumcision : Matins.] Quignon. Wednesday : Lauds. Antiphons. Gregorian. Sing ye * to G-OD our strength. [Corpus Christi : The Lord fed us * with tlie fatness of wheat, and with honey out of the rock did He satisfy us.] Monastic. As Gregorian. Parisian. Hear, * O My people, and I will testify unto thee, I am the Lord thy God. [Corpus Christi : He fed them with the fatness of wheat, and with honey out of the rock did He satisfy them.] Lyoyis. As Gregorian. Ambrosian. Be merciful ^ unto our sins, O Lord. [Circum- cision : Thou shalt not worship any other god, I am the Lord thy God.] Mozarabic. As Gregorian. 1 Sing we merrily unto God our strength : make a cheerful noise unto the God of Jacob. ^ The words are in the first instance addressed by Asaph, chief precentor of the Temple, to the musicians and singers, as directions for their guidance and encouragement on the occasion of a great festival, and then they apply to the whole body of the faithful, teaching them the duty of speaking to themselves in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in their hearts unto the Lord. The Psalm itself forms the natural continuation of the pre- ceding one, wherein the Church sends up her cry for the Advent of Christ. Now she, as it were, beholds Him com- ing, and making an end, and therefore calls on His true fol- lowers to abandon all worldly thoughts and cares, and to rejoice in the Lord alway. Ye, then, who heretofore have been exulting in the world your deceiver, and in the devil your deserter, and in the belly, your seducer, exult hence- forth in G-OD your strength. And even if your voice and powers should fail you in the loud singing which is God's due, yet, as He may be praised in many ways, rejoice ^ There is a trifling error in the I verse, corrected by all the other Prayer Book rendering of this | translations ; we should be ye. Agellius. A. Eph. V. 19. S. Albert. Magnus. Phil. iv. 4. E. PSALM LXXXI. 3 (Yulg. S. Hieron.) in your inward heart, and He will accept such service with equal readiness. Further, the God in Whom you are called to rejoice is the God of Jacob, of D. C. the wrestler, the God of those who will strive in prayer and struggle against sin, not of the sluggard and fainthearted. 2 Take the psalm, bring hither the tabret : the merry harp with the lute. S. Augustine, commenting on the contrast between the ^ words take and give, (albeit such an opposition barel}^ exists in the Hebrew), explains the first clause of this verse as an allegory of the mutual relations between a Christian teacher and his flock. The hearers are to tctke the psalm, to receive the living, oral instruction from his mouth ; and in their turn, they are to bring the tabret, or rather, Jcettle-drum, which, being made of the skin of a dead animal, denotes carnal things ; that is, they are to minister to their teacher's bodily needs, according to that saying of the Apostle ; " If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall i Cor. ix. u. reap your carnal things?" S. Bruno works out this idea s. Bruno more deeply. Tahe from God Himself that psahn, which of Carth. yourselves you cannot have, the quickening spirit of inno- cence and holiness which comes of His mercy alone. Give Him the tabret, that is, mortification of your flesh by fasts Origen. and vigils, typified by the slain beast whose skin produces s. Greg. m. the sound. Cardinal Hugo sums up the reasons why the Mor. 33. drum is a type of bodily mortification, in his usual fashion, Hugo Card, with a distich : Terret aves, tenuis, fragilis, cava, mortua, lenis, Tensa, cutis, lignis, verbere, sicca, sonans. Slender, frail, hollow, dead, smooth, scaring birds, Strained skin and wood, dry, sounding with a blow. They are more nearly agreed in explaining the latter clause ; the pleasant psaltery with the harp. (Yulg. LXX.) The psaltery, observes S. Augustine, differs from the harp in A. having its sounding-board above the strings, which we strike from below ; whereas the sounding-board of the harp is lower than the strings. The first, then, means the preaching of God's Word, and is thus described as pleasant, while the latter denotes our good works done on earth, necessary to fulfil that pleasantness. And in this wise the divinely quick- s. Bruno ened human spirit is, as it were, the psaltery made vocal with c^^^h. God's psalm, and thus pleasant to Him, while the lowliness wherewith He is obeyed is shadowed by the harp, sounding from below. Ayguan gives a slightly different turn to the Ay. thought, by pointing out that the psaltery or decachord, with its ten strings struck by the hand, is a type of the Ten Commandments carried out in action. B 2 4 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. De Wette. Hengsten- berg. Targum. Numb, xxix, 1. Hupfeld. Kampf- hausen. 1 Kings xii. 32. Ezek. xlv. 25. 2Chron.v.3, Neh. viii. 14 Honorius. Titelman, Gen.xxii.l3 Exod. xix. 19. Rev. i. 10. S. Matt, xxiv. 31. 1 Cor. XV. 52, 1 Thess. iv. 16. 3 Blow up the trumpet in the new-moon : even in the time appointed, and upon our solemn feast day. There has been much discussion among modern critics, as to the special festival referred to here. Some, dwelling on the allusion, later in the Psalm, to the Exodus, will have it that the Passover is meant. But there seems no adequate reason for departing from the Chaldee, which expressly names the new moon of the month Tizri, the first day of the J ewish civil year, as it also was of the Sabbatical year, and of the vear of jubilee, although occurring in the seventh month of the ordinary ecclesiastical computation. This day is particularly • described in the Law as a " day of blowing the trumpets," a ceremony which formed no part of the Paschal feast, and the J ews, always singularly tenacious of ancient tradition, still actually use the present Psalm in the office of this day. The solemnities of the seventh month did not end, however, with the Feast of Trumpets. The tenth day was the great Day of Atonement, when the most august of the Mosaic sacrifices took place, and on the fifteenth day (that of the full moon [medio mense, S. Hieron.] held by the best critics to be the true rendering of riDSZl, not time appointed), came the chief est festival of the Law, the Feast of Tabernacles, which is the solemn feast-day of the Psalm, and is described as the feast in more than one place in Scripture. It was the greatest festival, because it denoted the perfect rest of the Land of Promise, (whereas the Passover indicated merely the escape from the house of bondage, and the first setting out in quest of Canaan,) thus typifying for Christians the eternal peace of Heaven, won by the bloodshedding of the Lamb of God. Eeasons have been sought for the special significance of trumpets at this great festival, and two in particular are dwelt on by Jewish writers. One, that trumpets of horn were used in memory of the oblation of Isaac, when the substi- . tuted ram was caught by his horns in a thicket ;^ the other, that the giving of the Law is commemorated, as we read, When the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice." So again, the Divine utterance is similarly de- scribed in the Apocalypse : " I heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying, I am Alpha and Omega." And thrice the trumpet-sound is mentioned, by the Loed . Himself and His Apostle, as the signal of the second Ad- vent to Judgment. A favourite exposition, then, of this verse with the early ^ It is to be noted that the word for trumpet in this verse is nDiMj^ the curving horn or /cepa- rivT], as S. Jerome explains it, distinguished from the straight tube or (rdXiriy^^ "TJ^^n, which is the term applied to the silver trumpets of the convocation. PSALM LXXXI. 5 commentators, is that it is a call to loud proclamation of the Gospel (according to the saying, "Lift up thy voice like a isa. iviii. i. trumpet") in the new life which Christ has given us, a life Ay. not without its anxieties and changes here, and thus aptly denoted by the moon. Or, as another yet more beautifully takes it, the new moon is the Church, enlightened by Christ her true Sun. In this the trumpet-call of preachers began, Honorius. on our solemn feast day of the Resurrection, the renewal of Z. our creation; and yet again, still louder, when the fiery tongues of Pentecost came down. And then we may take s. Cyrii. it by anagoge, of that great rejoicing which shall be at the ^^^^'l^ consummation of all things, when the Archangel himself will sound the trumpet, when a new heaven appears, when the Feasts of Tabernacles and of Dedication shall be united in one, what time the great Voice shall say, " Behold, the taber- Rev. xxi. 3. nacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God." And, coming to the individual soul, we are well reminded that the two silver trumpets of Hugo card, the Jewish camp called the people to banquets, to battles, and to sacred festivals, and that in like manner the preaching of the Gospel calls believers to the Holy Eucharist, to resist- ance against temptation and sin, and to the unending bliss of heaven. Not merely by the mouth of the priesthood, but by that of every believer who has seen a new light rest on his soul, who has kept the solemn feast-day of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost within him, and who may well say, D. C. come hither, and hearken, all ye that fear God ; and I will Ps. ixvi. u. tell you what He hath done for my soul." 4 For this was made a statute for Israel : and a law of the God of Jacob. For the word tD^U/D, here translated latv, the LXX. and Vulgate more literally read judgment, which draws the fol- lowing comment from S. Augustine : Where there is a sta- tute, there is judgment. For they who sinned under the Law shall be judged by the Law. And the Lord Christ, Word made flesh, is the Giver of the statute : For judg- s. John ix. ment I am come into this world, that they which see not ^Q. might see, and that they which see might be made blind." Thus we are warned that the Lawgiver and the Judge are s. Bruno one, and that the commands He lays upon us are not merely Carth. subject for meditation by Israel, the contemplative saints, but for practical operation by Jacob, the saints of active Kfe, Ric. Hamp. and as the final test for all at the Doom. In the literal sense, the clause reminds the hearers that no new rule, nor Ageiiius. one of human invention, is being laid down, but that a Divine and ancient precept is enforced, when all people are called on to make God's promises known. 6 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Ay. R. Kimchi. De Muis. Hupfeld. Rosen- miiller. Exod. xi. 4. 5 This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony : when he came out of the land of Egypt, and had heard a strange language. There is more than one difficulty in this verse, although its apparent meaning is obvious here and in all the principal versions. The sense on the surface, as taken by the majority of ancient commentators, and not a few modern ones, refers to the Exodus, and the intercourse with foreign nations which followed on it. But the Chaldee paraphrast, H. Kimchi, and Targum. the best recent critics, understand it otherwise. The first explains the whole passage of the patriarch Joseph, not of the Jewish nation (especially the powerful tribe of Ephraim, as represented by him) ; and paraphrases thus : " He laid a testimony upon Joseph, that he should not draw nigh unto his master's wife, in the day when he went out of the house of bondage, and ruled over the whole land of Egypt," and that on the anniversary, as a Kabbinical tradition alleges, of Isaac's deliverance. And this fits in with the words of Gren. xli. 45, " Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt." R. Kimchi, followed by some eminent moderns, takes the second clause thus : When God toent out against the land of Egyjpt, for the slaughter of the first-born, as it is written, " About midnight will I go out into the midst of Egypt." Fur- ther, the last clause of the verse in the Hebrew is in the first person, not (as the previous one) in the third, and runs, I heard the voice of one unhnoion. This would present no difficulty, were it not that in the immediately following verse the first person recurs, personifying God Himself, Who cannot be meant as the speaker of these particular words. The passage is thus a very difficult one, and is variously ex- plained, either as spoken in the person of Israel dwelling amongst the alien Egyptians, for whom they needed an in- terpreter ; or, again, as referring to the Divine voice made known in the plains of Egypt and afterwards heard from Sinai ; or, lastly, that it is a sudden exclamation of the Psalmist, announcing his reception of the oracle of God, given in the succeeding verses, according to the analogy of the vision of Eliphaz the Temanite. Turning now to the mystical exposition, let us hear S. Augustine : Joseph is in- A. terpreted increase. And as J oseph was sold into Egypt, so Christ cometh to the Gentiles. Joseph was exalted there after his troubles, and Christ is glorified with us after the passion of the Martyrs. The Gentiles, then, belong to our isa. liv. 1. true J oseph, and are fitly styled increase, because the child- ren of the desolate are many more than of her which hath an husband." The testimony of Joseph coming out of Eg3rpt, means the vow of those who pass through the Hed sea of Baptism, ruddy with the blood of Christ, and are thus freed from those sins, their enemies, which would soon destroy R. Kimchi. Rosen- muller. Hupfeld. L. de Dieu. De Wette. Delitzsch . Job iv. l6. PSALM LXXXI. 7 them. On the other side of that flood, the Catechumens will learn mysteries now hidden from them, and will hear a tongue lohich they know not, the precepts of the JN^ew Testa- Q. ment, delivered, literally, in a language differing from that of the Law. Cardinal Hugo most beautifully reminds us Hugo Card, that J oseph himself never left Egypt alive, but that only his bones were carried up into the Land of Promise, whence this Exod. xiii. verse may well be taken of the Martyrs, who despise the life ^9- of this world, and dying to it, pass to their true country, there to learn the Unknown Song. Yet another reminds us L. of the great increase of the Church on that first Day of Pen- tecost, when the Apostles were heard speaking in unknown ^^^^ jj g tongues, according to the exact dialect of each hearer in the crowd. 6 I eased his shoulder from the burden : and his hands were delivered from making the pots. Here the Yoice of G-od Himself declares His benefits to- wards His people. But this direct address is lost in the LXX. and Yulgate, which read. He removed his back from the burdens. The sense is the same, and we are well re- minded by the Doctor of Grrace that none can do this thing A. save He Who saith, " Come unto Me all ye that labour and s. Matt. xi. are heavy laden, and I will give you rest ;" Who alone takes 28. the grievous load of sin away from those who seek His aid. In the second clause the LXX. and Yulgate read. His hands served in the basket; doubtless the baskets of osier or of palm- leaves still used in Egypt for carrying loads, and employed A. like the hod of European bricklayers, and also for carrying manure to the fields. The term thus embraces all servile labour, from which Cheist sets us free. And the basket will then be an emblem of the despised and lowly in this world, whom the Loed nevertheless fills with the fragments of His Flesh ; and when He chose His twelve humble Apostles, He then filled twelve baskets with good things from His own table. Further, as baskets are used for carrying away the accumulated dust and filth of houses, so those who are still living in sin are said to have their hands toiling in bas- kets, which toil ends when Cheist delivers them from that bondage. And if we keep to the idea of the building labour imposed on the Hebrews, we shall remember that sinners, Honorius. while in the darkness of Egypt, are busily engaged in rear- ing up the walls of the mystical Babylon, contrary to that prayer of the Church, " Build Thou the walls of Jerusalem." ps. \\, ]8. There are some who take the latter clause of the verse in a good sense, as the occupation to which the ransomed slaves voluntarily turned, and thus one reminds us that spiritual Hugro Card, persons, busied in hearing confession, toil in the baskets, by cleansing the hearts of sinners from defilement : while an- Rjc. Hamp. other will have it that the basket is a type of charity, because A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. it contains and embraces many things, and those whom God sets free must needs toil therein to please Him. But these interpretations will not stand with the literal sense of the Ageiiius. passage. More to the point is the remark that this verse Quesnei. gives the reason for the sounding of trumpets, the warrior instrument, forbidden to slaves. As freemen and warriors, the Hebrews were at liberty to sound it, and its notes there- fore fitly ushered in the year of J ubilee, when all debts were cancelled and all bondmen were released. 7 Thou calledst upon me in troubles, and I de- livered thee : and heard thee what time as the storm fell upon thee. Observe how ti^oubles are the necessary forerunners of de- s. thrysost. liverancc, for, as a great Saint teaches us, a grain of wheat Horn. 3 sup. shut up in the husk, cannot come out till it is ground, and so ^ ' man can scarcely be set free from worldly difficulties, which, like husks, entangle him, unless he be chastened with some In Ps. xxii. trouble. Not a light one either, for, as S. Augustine says very well. When you are under medical treatment, and feel the fire and steel, you cry out, but the surgeon does not listen to your wishes, he heeds only your cure. It is thus, then, that God hears us in trouble and delivers us, for He Himself sends the trouble as the very means to make us call on Him s. Thomas and thus gain our safety. And in this sense one, at whose l^^pis- feet tens of thousands have been glad to sit, tells us, " When Nowt.^*^' any tribulation comes on thee, then Cheist meets thee with His Cross, and shows thee the way to the kingdom of heaven, whither thou oughtest to go." Therefore the time of trouble is the time of life, according to the pithy J ewish proverb, " When Israel is in the brick-kiln, then comes Moses." What time as the stoj^m fell on thee. The A.Y. correctly, and nearly in accord with the LXX. and Vulgate, reads, I L. answered thee in the secret place of thunder. That is, as they Ageiiius. diversely take it, either in the actual passage of the Red Sea, Exod. xiv. when God looked out of the pillar of cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians, or when He spoke to Israel out of the thick darkness amidst thunders from Sinai. And this latter Targum. is the Chaldee view, for the paraphrase runs, " I heard thee in the hidden place of the house of My majesty, when the A. fiery wheels sounded before Me." God hears us too in the Haymo. secret place of tempest, when storms of temptation and trial are raging within our hearts, and the waves of sin appear likely to wash over us. Some take the clause as though it meant in a place hidden from the storm,^ and then tell us of Hugo Card, the calm which reigned in the souls of the Martyrs, while the fiercest whirlwinds of heathen rage broke upon their bodies. ^ This is the sense of the word "»np in Isaiah xxxii. 2, D;^^ "inp, " a covert from the tempest." PSALM LXXXI. 9 8 I proved thee also ; at the waters of strife. The literal reference is to the murmuring of the people in Exod. xvii. E/ephidim, when Moses had to bring water for them out of ^' ^' ^' the rock, and in the double name given to the scene we find the two members of the verse, Massah telling that Israel was proved, and Meribah that the test ended in strife. For strife, the LXX. and Vulgate read contradiction or gamsaymfj . s. Bruno And this is mystically explained in three ways. It is taken carth. of the waters of Baptism, in which Christians are called on to renounce and gainsay all evil, and thereby to be in their turn q contradicted by unbelievers ; of the trials of the Church by the gainsapng of heathen persecutors without or heretical teachers within, necessary for the proving of the Saints ; or, most deeply of all, that it is uttered of Him Who was a sign A. to be spoken against. Who stretched out His hands all day s. Luke ii. upon the Cross to a disobedient and gainsaying people. Who suffered the stream of water and blood to flow from His isa. ixv. 2. pierced side when He proved His nation, and was answered Heb. x. 21. with strife. And yet again, as another teaches us, the bil- s. Ambros. lows of passion and bitter thoughts which well in our hearts, are waters of strife, which only Cheist can lull and calm, by g ^^^^ ^^-^ treading them under His feet, as He comes to us in the 25. darkness. 9 Hear, O my people, and I will assure thee, O Israel : if thou wilt hearken unto me, 10 There shall no strange god be in thee : neither shalt thou worship any other god. Lorinus dwells at some length on the prominence which L. even Pagan religions gave to this precept, by discouraging the worship of alien deities, and aptly cites, amidst a crowd of other testimonies, that Law of the Twelve Tables : " Let them not worship foreign gods. Let no one have gods apart, nor new ones. Let them not even privately worship gods brought from abroad, unless invited by the State ; and let them worship those who have always been held celestial." But the particular turn given by the LXX., Vulgate, and Arabic versions to the word strange, which they render new, recent, (a sense which the word does admit in Isaiah xxviii. 21,) gives occasion to much comment, justified \\\ its scope by the parallel passage in the Song of Moses : " They i^^^ut. xxxii. sacrificed unto devils, not to GrOD ; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not." A new god, notes S. Augustine, is one made in A. time ; but our God is not new, for He is from eternity to eternity. And our Christ may be new as Man, but ever- lasting as God. For what is tliere before the beginning ? B 3 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. S. Bruno Carth. Lu. s. Johni. 1. And yet "in the beginning was tlie Woed, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." And He, our Christ, is the Word made flesh, that He might dwell amongst us. Heathen idols are costly, are of silver and gold, precious and shining, but they are new, fresh out of a workshop. The Arian Christ is new, for he exists only in time, and is posterior to the Father. The god of the Mani- chees is new, for he is an unsuccessful struggler against the powers of darkness and corruption, and is not the Almighty, the Uncreated Light, the perfectly Holy. Christians, too, may err in the same spirit, though not in the same way, by making idols of their appetites, their sins, or even of any of God's temporal gifts. And as none of these, for the most part, holds its worshipper long faithful, so the act of change from one to another sets up a 7i€w god on the deposition of the old. Yet again, it may be fitly taken of new heresies, alien from the Catholic faith, which result, sooner or later, in leading their followers away from God. And it is in warning of the deep spiritual blessing of cleaving to Him, that He says / tvill assure thee, or as the A.V. more forcibly and exactly, with LXX. and Vulgate, turns it, I loill testify unto thee : that is, I will solemnly pledge the fulfilment of My promises, swearing by Myself. And so runs a similar passage of Holy Writ : " The Angel of the Lord protested unto Joshua, saying. Thus saith the Lord of hosts ; If thou wilt walk in M}^ ways, and if thou wilt keep My charge, then thou shalt also judge My house." And what that means, we s. Matt. xix. ^^^y l(?arn from yet another place : " Yerily, I say unto you, 28. that ye which have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man shall sit in the throne of His glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." Honorius. Hugo Card. Zech. iii. 6. 11 I am the Lord thy God^ who brought thee out of the land of Egypt : open thy mouth wide^ and I shall fill it. Literally, it is spoken of the miraculous food provided for those who had left behind them the flesh-pots of Egypt and gone out into the wilderness at the voice of God. Spiritually, they tell us that it is spoken of the soul rather than of the body. I Myself, thy Lord and God, have brought thee out of the darkness and bondage of thy sins, wherefore open thou thy orius. '^outh tvide, as the young of a bird open their beaks to receive the food their parents bring them, and I shall Jill it with A. good things. Open it by breaking down the vain idols within thine heart, which cramp and narrow thee, and give thyself room to love and praise Me. Open it tvide, by preaching the Gospel loudly and clearly, by warning sinners plainly, by praising God worthily, and I will fill thee with PSALM LXXXI. 11 all spiritual grace. And thus we see the meaning of those words of the Apostle, " O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open 2 Cor. vi. unto you, our heart is enlarged. Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own bowels. ... Be ye also C. enlarged, be ye not unequally yoked together with unbe- lievers." I will fill it, not merely with grace, but with My- Hugo Card, self. For, as S. Augustine most deeply says, "A soul which inPs. cxviii. is capable of containing God, nothing less than God can fill.'* Wherefore He gives Himself as our Food in the Holy Sacra- Pseudo- ment, and truly is it said of the Christian mouth which has fed upon such dainties, " Full of grace are thy lips, because ps. xiv. 3. God hath blessed thee for ever." He bids us open our mouths wide in yet another way, by asking boldly in prayer origen. for whatever we need, assuring us that the greater and more Ay. aspiring are our petitions, the more abundantly shall they be fulfilled. We have, further, in this verse, two things to note particularly. First, the easiness of God's conditions ; for Titeiman. there is nothing less troublesome than opening the mouth. He does not say, " Stretch out thy hands to labour, and I will fill them," but only. Open thy mouth loide. Next, the lavish- ness of God's promise. He does not say, " Open thy mouth, and I will put somewhat therein, and will not suffer it to be empty," but I will fill it, however widely thou mayest open it, doing far beyond all thou canst ever hope for. And so the Apostle confesses, saying, " Unto Him that is able to do Eph. m. 20. exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, unto Him be glory in the Church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen." What, then, asks Hichard Ricard. Vic of S. Victor, is this mouth of the inner man, save the heart's torin. longing ? But all the dainties of Egypt cannot fill this mouth, for all the riches of the world are not enough to con- tent carnal desire. See how small a part of the human body the fleshly mouth is, and what a narrow opening. Who can fail to see that it is so small that one morsel of bread is enough to fill it ? But the whole world is not so much to the desire of the heart, as the morsel of bread is to the bodily mouth, for the one does fill, but the other does not. And thus we come back to that saying of S. Augustine, that nothing save God Himself can satisfy our craving. So it is quaintly ex- pressed by an old writer : The whole round world is not enough to fill The heart's three corners, but it craveth still ; Only the Trinity, that made it, can Suffice the vast triangled heart of man. But observe, that the words are spoken only to those who -j^ have come out of the land of JEgypt. While they remain in Phiup de la darkness, they cannot see the food offered to their lips, till Gr^ve. they hearken to the Wise Man, " Open thine eyes, and thou prov.'xxJ^ls shalt be satisfied with bread." While we continue in sin, we Francis Quarles. School of the Heart. Epigr. 10. A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. cannot avail ourselves of the promise, but when we once fight against the foes of our souls, we can say with Hannah, Sam. ii. 1. " My mouth is enlarged over mine enemies, because I rejoice in Thy salvation." Bellarmine. R. David. Agellius. P. S. Matt, xxi. 38. Lu. Hugo Card. Hos. iv. 14. Rom. i. 28. Bellarmine. 12 But my people would not hear my voice : and Israel would not obey me. 13 So I gave them up unto their own hearts' lusts : and let them follow their own imaginations. It is not only disobedience, but ingratitude which God charges on His rebellious people. Servants and slaves count it an honour when their masters deign to converse familiarly with them, but Israel, mere dust and ashes, stops his ears against the voice of the God of all gods. Not once only, as the Rabbins point out, but in the wilderness, in the days of the Judges, in the times of the kings after David and Solo- mon, until they were driven into exile and their temple burnt, they would not hear. Observe, too, that as the charge seems brought especially against the house of Joseph, so it was the tribe of Ephraim which formed the mainstay of the idolatrous northern kingdom, after the rebellion against He- hoboam. But the words are still more forcibly applied to the rejection of Christ by the Jews. Beforetime, they had stopped their ears against the voices of the Prophets, they had beaten and slain the messengers of the Lord of the vine- yard, but now their cry was, " This is the heir, come, let us kill Him." Nor are they alone in their sin. Again and again He is rejected still by His people, those whom He pur- chased with His own Blood. He stands at the door and knocks, saying, " Open, O man, recognize the voice of the Lord thy God ; I will that thou open for Me to enter, and thou wilt not. Evil is that servant who will not shelter his Master." So I gave tJiem up to their own hearts* lusts. The aper- tures of the "press" are now opened, to let the dregs and lees fall out, that they may be cast away. For I gave them up, the LXX. and Yulgate, with little difference of meaning, read I sent them aioay, loosing, as it were, the reins which held them in check, and suffering them to run riot at their will. And this appears more than once in Holy Writ as the sternest of God's earthly judgments : " I will not punish your daughters when they commit whoredom, nor your spouses when they commit adultery," is the warning spoken by the ProxDhet, and the Apostle confirms him, adding "Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient." Wherefore is added, I let them follow their own imaginations, or, as the LXX. and Vulgate read. They loill go in their oivn inventions or desires : thereby heap- PSALM LXXXI. 13 ing up fresh indignation for themselves, by adding sin upon sin to their previous wickedness. 14 0 that my people would have hearkened unto me : for if Israel had walked in my ways^ 15 I should soon have put down their enemies : and turned my hand against their adversaries. Lorinus points out how the wording of these verses asserts L. the freedom of the human will, as the only other explanation possible is to charge God with ignorance of the future, and although his argument is to a great extent based on the word jperlmjps^ which the Vulgate inserts in verse 15, yet the mean- ing he enforces is sufficiently borne out by the actual text. And S. Augustine wisely teaches us that the words also make A. against false excuses. Israel might say, I sin, it is true, but not willingly, rather by reason of compulsion from the devil it is that I follow my own imaginations. But if Israel would but hear the voice of the Loed, He would soon put down all such spiritual enemies, and give us the victory. Observe further, that the two clauses of the former verse are not mere repetition, but denote two distinct stages of obedience. Ay. Hearing the word, without walking in its ways, is of no use. Herod listened gladly to John Baptist, but obeyed the daughter of Herodias rather than him. Felix communed often with Paul during two years, but though trembling at Acts xxiv. the Apostle's reasoning as to righteousness, temperance, and 26. judgment to come, yet took not on him at last the Gospel yoke. I should soon have put dow7i their enemies. For soon, the LXX. reads. In the nothing, the Vulgate, not very difEerently, Hugo Card. for nothing {pro nihilo.) That is, as they variously explain it, (and first rightly) as a very easy thing ; or else, unto no- thing, by utterly destroying them ; or yet 2ig2cm, freely, that is, without any merit or price on the part of Israel as a reason for having God as its champion, in contrast, as is well pointed Titeiman. out, to the great trouble and outlay in hiring allies and buy- ing off invaders, which the Jews were compelled to be at when left to their own devices on several occasions in their history. And turned My hand against their adversaries. They take the Hand of God, for the most part, as denoting merely His power. One special force is, however, given to it, by interpreting it of the Loed Jesus. The words will p. then point to His offer to the J ews of the headship over the nations, not only during His own three years of preaching, but by the voice of His Apostles for nearly forty more ; until, on their final refusal to hear, the Homans were suffered to take away their place and nation, and the kingdom of the Church was transferred to the Gentiles. 16 The haters of the Lord should have been found liars : but their time should have endured for ever. 14 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Hupfeld. Kampf- hausen. Rosen- m tiller. c. A. R. Ishaki. R. Aben- Ezra. Hupfeld. R. Kimchi. De Wette. L. p. The first clause ought to run, The haters of the Lord should have lied unto him, that is, unto Israel ; crouching before the chosen people with unwilling and hypocritical submis- sion, and denying all intention of war or resistance. But the LXX. and Vulgate reading, The enemies of the Lord have lied unto Him, is explained differently from this. It is, writes one of the earlier commentators, spoken of false be- lievers, not of the heathen, who cannot be said to lie to God, inasmuch as they have given Him no pledges ; but the un- faithful, who have broken their promises, shall be cast into hell, where their time shall endure for ever. And that because they take up again those things which they renounced in baptism ; the world, the flesh, and the devil, so that their last end is worse than the first. This interpretation squares in the latter clause with the view of some Rabbins and modern critics that the whole verse refers to God's enemies, and that the time of their punishment is unending, in that no restora- tion will be vouchsafed them. But others take it as the Prayer Book version, and as contrasting the enduring pros- perity of God's people with the sufferings of their adversaries. And then we may explain it, as not a few do, of the lying of the Jews in promising obedience to the Messiah, and yet denying Him when He came, so as to be rejected, and their dispensation brought to a close, while that of the Gospel en- dures for ever, not only to the end of the world, but through the ages of eternity. 17 He should have fed them also with the finest wheat-flour : and with honey out of the stony rock should I have satisfied thee. Titelman. Bochart, Hierozo. Bellarmine. Ay. S. Thomas Aquin. De Ven. Sac, Opusc. 68, cap. xxxii. The literal reference is to the produce of Canaan, to its rich harvests of corn, and to the honey made by the wild bees in the clefts of the rocks, which serve them as hives ; though some are found to refer the words as they run in the LXX. and Vulgate, He fed them tvith the fat of wheat and satisfied them toitli honey out of the rock, to the manna in the wilder- ness and the sweet water brought forth by the stroke of Moses' rod. But, save for a glance at one meaning of honey as denoting the sweetness of Divine wisdom, the expositors all agree in taking this verse mystically of the Blessed Sacra- ment, the fine wheat-offering and sweet banquet of all be- lieving souls, springing in both kinds from the Hock, which is Cheist. So the Angelic Doctor : "As the Eock signifieth the incorruptible Body of Cheist, so the honey from the Hock is the sweet Blood of Cheist, which the faithful suck in from Cheist's Body." Accordingly, the Psalm is ap- pointed for recitation on the feast of Corpus Cheisti, with this verse for the Antiphon, as well as making part of the Hesponsory at the Little Hours. PSALM LXXXII. 15 Wherefore : Glory be to tlie Father, our Strength : glory be to the Son, Who feeds us with the fatness of wheat ; glory be to the Holy G-host, Who fills our mouth with a merry song unto the God of Jacob. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be : world without end. Amen. Collects. Open, O Lord, the mouths of Thy humble servants to show Ludoiph. forth Thy praise, that leaving the works of Egypt behind, we may rejoice in the confession of Thy Name. (1.) Unto Thee, O Lord, our Strength, we pray with the cheer- Mozarahic. ful noise of faith and hope, that our petition, poured forth in trouble, may draw nigh unto Thine ears : that Thou may est in Thy goodness be present with the prayers of each one of us to deliver us ; and when Thou hast rescued us, grant us a burning desire to attain unto Thee, and with harmonious de- votion to sing aloud to the Unity of the threefold Majesty, so that, alway busied in Thy praise, and following the paths of Thy commandments, we may obtain in Thee the adornments of exultation, the comforts of life, and the crown of faith. (11.) Let us sing merrily unto Thee, O Lord, Whom we acknow- Mozarabic. ledge and confess to be our Strength ; for which cause we take a cheerful noise unto Thee in our longings, a psalm in our teaching, we give back a drum in our mortification ; for in praising Thee we keep festival and take delight in making mention of Thy wondrous works. Grant, therefore, O Lord, that we who tell of Thy bounties may also win Thy rewards. (11.) O Lord, cause Thy people to hear Thy voice, open our D. C. mouth, and fill it with the praise of Thy grace, that in the trouble of this present life Thou mayest hearken when we call upon Thee, and Thou mayest deliver us from every as- sault of our enemies and from the storm which endeth not. (1.) PSALM LXXXII. Title. A Psalm of Asaph. Syriac : Of Asaph, an invective against the ungodly Jews. Argument. Arg. Thomas. That Christ is to be acknowledged as alone Almighty in the midst of the Gods. The Voice of the Church to the Jews. The Voice of the Holy Ghost by the Prophet to the A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. princes. And the Voice of the Church concerning the Jews and her own evil rulers. The Voice of the Holy Q-host to the people. They are blamed who turn aside to evil and feign themselves judges among disputants. Wlien he goeth in unto the strangers. Ven. Bede. Asaph denotes the Synagogue, which attained to behold the Lord the Saviour in bodily presence. Asaph speaks throughout the Psalm against the Jews, concerning the Advent of Christ ; in the first portion, warning them that the Lord had taken His stand in the midst of them ; and therefore that they ought not to admit the fellowship of sinners. Ood standeth in the congregation of princes. In the second part, he warns them to un- derstand that He, Who in the flesh He took on Him seemed poor and needy, is very Christ. Defend the poor and fatherless. In the third part he says, that they were honoured so as to become sons of God, but that by their own sin they had fallen into the snares of death. I said, Ye are Gods, <^c. EusEBius of C^sarea. a rebuke of the princes of the Jewish nation, and a prophecy concerning the G-entiles. S. Athanasius. a Psalm inflicting shame. Various Uses. Gregorian. Friday : Matins. Monastic. Thursday : II. Nocturn. Parisian. Wednesday : Nones. Lyons. Saturday : Terce. Ambrosian. Wednesday of Second Week : I. Nocturn. Quignon. Wednesday : Nones. Aktiphons. Gregorian. As preceding Psalm. Monastic. Thou only * art the Most Highest over all the earth. Parisian. The Lord is my refuge * and my God is the strength of my confidence. Ambrosian. Thou shalt inherit ^ among all nations. Mozarabic. Judge the poor and fatherless, * justify the lowly and needy. 1 God standeth in the congregation of princes : he is a Judge among gods. Of princes. The literal Hebrew, followed by all the principal versions (except the Syriac, which has of Angels, and Aquila, who agrees with this and A. Y., reading tV^vpcDv) is of gods. Bieek. And hereupon is a division of opinion. One view, mainly H°^f"w* confined to a few modem critics, follows the Syriac, iden- ^ ' tifies Gods with Angels, and supposes the object of the Psalm to be a rebuke for negligence of duty, admiaistered ia heaven to those ministering spirits who, as we read in the Book of Dan. X. 13, Daniel, are set over kingdoms and nations. The other, which ..is that of the Chaldee Targum, the Fathers in general, and 2?°Ma?\n ^ost critics, sees a reference to earthly ofi&cers alone, (as we judges. find in another place, " Thou shalt not revile the gods, nor PSALM LXXXII. 17 curse the ruler of thy people,") and, as S. Augustine points A. out, primarily to the synagogue of gods, (LXX. and Vulgate) or whole people of Israel, as God's Son and chosen nation, Exod. iv. 22. and therefore higher than other tribes of the earth ; and then to the Christian Church as the successor to the privileges of J acob. And God the Son did in truth stand incarnate amidst C. the Jewish synagogue and the Christian Church, according to that saying of the Baptist, " There standeth One among s. John i. you. Whom ye know not." He is said to stand, because of His immutability. His power, His abiding presence, and also s. Aibertivs because of His promptness in act, to decide for the right, and to help the poor, as He did S. Stephen. But one commen- tator draws a yet deeper lesson from the word stand. He Apreiims. reminds us that it is for the judge to sit, and for the litigants or accused to stand ; as it is written, " Moses sat to judge the Exod. xviii. people : and the people stood by Moses from the morning until the evening." It is then a solemn warning for judges to remember, that whatever cause is before them is God's cause, since right and wrong are at stake in it, and that by acquitting the guilty, or condemning the innocent, they pass sentence against God Himself. And the synagogue of the Chief Priests, scribes, and Pharisees did in very deed so con- Z. demn God Himself, when He stood in the midst of them in human form. He is a judge among gods. Or, as the LXX. and Vulgate read, He judgeth the gods in the midst. That is, in the literal sense. He reviews the sentences of inferior judges, who are but His vicars, and will openly condemn them at the Ageiiius. Doom for any false judgment they may have given on earth. But the version which S. Augustine and Cassiodorus had before them reads. He discerneth the Gods in the midst. That is, as one will have it, Christ stands between the Prophets Honorius. of the Old Testament, who foreshowed Him, and the Apostles of the New, who preached Him, being Himself the dividing and yet uniting link between them. Or again, He discerns, by selecting, His Apostles and Evangelists and all His Saints, C from a guilty world, and leading them to the kingdom of heaven. In heaven itself He discerns too, by distributing s. Greg, rewards to each Saint according to his merit, appointing them ^g^Bapt^* ^ their several grades of blessedness. There is another ren- dering of the first clause, adopted by some, God standeth in the congregation of God. And then we may fitly take it as no pleonasm, nor yet as denoting the presence of the Most High among His people on earth, but the exaltation of the Man Christ Jesus, as God in heaven, in the presence of the Cocceius. Eternal Father, in the midst of the assembly of the Saints triumphant, for " lo, in the midst of the throne and of the • 6- four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain." A striking illustration of the whole verse is afforded by . that custom of the ancient Councils, still adhered to by the iiex^Epist. Holy Eastern Church in all solemn assemblies, of placing Synod. 18 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. the Book of tlie G-ospels in tlieir midst, as a symbol of the unseen presence of Cheist. And when accusations against some Bishops were offered to Constantine the G-reat at the Council of Nice, he tore them up, saying, " Ye have been given as gods to us by God, and it is not fitting that a man should judge gods, but only He of Whom it is written, God standeth in the synagogue of the gods, He is a judge among gods'' 2 How long will ye give wrong judgment : and accept the persons of the ungodly ? How long ? For already, throughout your history, ye have resisted, outraged, and slain the servants of the Lord of the vineyard, the prophets of God. Will you carry on your re- bellion and false judgment against His Son, and lay mur- derous hands upon the Heir, though He be very God ? And accept the persons of the ungodly, saying, on the one hand, " Not this Man, but Barabbas," and on the other, " We have no king but Ciesar." Several of the Latin commentators dwell on the wording of the Vulgate in the latter clause of the verse, take the faces of sinners, and explain it as a rebuke for imitating the wicked, whether the evil J ews of old time who slew the prophets, or the yet more evil chief priests who conspired against Christ. In this sense they urge that the first half of the verse refers to those rulers who actually con- demned the Lord, and the latter to the multitude which might easily have rescued Him, but preferred to follow the lead of His powerful enemies. Cardinal Hugo dwells on the appli- cation of the words to unfaithful prelates in the Christian Church, who fall into that old worst sin of the house of Levi, and " have been partial in the law," not bearing in mind the Wise Man's counsel : " Seek not to be judge, being not able to take away iniquity ; lest at any time thou fear the person of the mighty, and lay a stumbling-block in the way of thine uprightness." 3 Defend the poor and fatherless : see that such as are in need and necessity have right. 4 Deliver the out-cast and poor : save them from the hand of the ungodly. These words are, they tell us, an appeal to the Jewish people to deliver out of the hands of His cruel enemies Him Who became poor and needy for their sakes, and to save Him from a painful and unmerited death. But a few hours before, and " the chief priests and scribes sought how they might kill Him ; for they feared the people," and now that the crisis had come, the people proved to be " dumb dogs, that cannot bark," when the wolves were gathering around the Lamb of A. Honorius. S. John xviii. 40; xix. 15. c. The Gloss. Ay. Hugo Card. Pseudo- Hieron. Mai. ii. 9. L. Ecclus. vii. 6. A. S. Luke xxii. 2. Isa. Ivi. 10. PSALM LXXXII. 19 God ; when " the righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to ^^a. ivii. i. heart.'* He was not only poor for our sakes, but an orphan, Honorius. (LXX.) one with no father on earth, with no mother in hea- ven ; and who left Himself not merely destitute of all earthly iiaymo. succour, but endured that last mysterious pang, when He cried, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" s. Matt. Outcast, (LXX. and Vulg. poor.) There is a pathetic variant ^^vii. 46. here in some -^thiopic copies, which read the lonely one, fitly spoken of Him Who trod the winepress of His Passion alone, isa. ixiii. 3. when all the disciples forsook Him and fled. Observe, more- over, that it is not enough for a judge to be inflexibly upright in his mere sentence. It is his duty to see that it be carried out, and not set aside by favour or violence. He is iosee that Beiiarmine. such as are in need and necessity have right, and not merely a claim to be righted, he is to deliver them out of the hand of the ungodly. Pilate achieved the first part of the counsel ; he defended the Poor and Needy seven times against the chief priests and the mob ; he gave right judgment, saying, "I find s. John xix. no fault in Him ;" but he did not see that He had right ; he 4. did not deliver Him out of the power of His enemies. 5 They will not be learned nor understand^ but walk on still in darkness : all the foundations of the earth are out of course. Will not he learned. A.Y. more exactly, with the old A. versions. They hnoio not. " For had they known it, they 1 cor. ii. 8. would not have crucified the Loed of Glory." And because they walked on still in darhness, they chose Barabbas in His stead, but that " blindness in part is happened unto Israel, Rom. xi. 25. until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in." Whence is added, all the foundations of the earth are moved (A.Y. marg.) because thereupon began that great stirring among the nations, whereof the earthquake which rent the rocks at the Cruci- s. Matt, fixion was the forewarning and type. And those foundations still will he moved (LXX. and Yulg.) the shaking will never end till the gathering in of the nations is accomplished by the Church. There are two other mystical explanations of ^. the latter clause, one that it refers to earthly potentates and men of merely secular desires, who shall be moved, either with wonder at lowliness, poverty, and sorrow being volun- tarily chosen by the Loed as His own lot, or with terror at Ric. Hamp. the judgment to come upon them, because when the Light shone in the darkness, they refused to comprehend it ; the D. C. other, that it is a prophecy of the terrible devastation of the Holy City and the entire land of Israel at the hand of the Romans, as a punishment for rejecting the Savioue. The A^^eiiius. literal sense makes a distinction between the ignorance and the dulness charged on the false judges ; the first accusation. They Icnoio not, having reference to their neglect of studying the law they have to administer, while oior understand im- 20 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. plies haste, inconsiderateness, and negligence in the inves- tigation of any particular cause ; the just decision of which might be arrived at by honest diligence of inquiry, without Calvin. ^^.7 gi*eat legal information. But when haste and ignorance unite, then all the foundations of the earth are out of course^ because the basis of society and all confidence in authority is rudely shaken. And so a heathen poet sings in like case : Kol 5i/ca KOI irdvTa irdXiu arpecpcTai, aydpdcri n^u d6\iai j3ou\al, dewp 5' ovk4ti Trio'Tis &pap€. Back flow the sacred rivers to their source, And right and all things veer around their course, Crafty are men in counsel, and no more GoD-plighted faith abides as once of yore. 6 I have said, Ye are gods : and ye are all the children of the most Highest. 7 But ye shall die like men : and fall like one of the princes. There is a divergence of opinion as to these two verses, whether they are to be taken as addressed to the same per- sons, or to two different companies. S. Augustine, who men- tions both views, inclines to the second, alleging that the earlier verse is spoken to the elect, whom Cheist welcomes s.Matt.xxv. to the kingdom of His Father ; the latter to the reprobate, ^'^^ commanded to depart into everlasting fire. If addressed to the same persons, the sense will not be very different, but will run thus : "I have set you in a place of high dignity and trust, which ye have abused, and I will punish you with disgrace and death," and then, turning to the spiritual sense, " I have given you the choice of everlasting blessedness, and have granted you the adoption of sons, but ye have rejected My salvation, and shall perish in your sins." Herein t/e shall die like men^ because of your human frailty, and fall like one of the jprinces, because of your haughty pride, which will bring you down as it did Satan, who fell like lightning from heaven, where he had been one of the princes. There is no practical difference, whether we take the words as spoken by GrOD Himself, or by the Psalmist in the spirit of prophetic s. Bruno rebuke and denunciation. One commentator subdivides the Carth. second verse, and sees in it a distinction of judgment between the less guilty Jewish multitude, who acquiesced in Cheist's condemnation, and are therefore adjudged to die like men, while the more guilty chief priests are to fall like one of the princes, into the more terrible punishment of the devil, for wisd. vi. 6. mighty men shall be mightily tormented." We must bear in mind the use the Loed Himself made of this verse in defending Himself from the charge of blasphemy, Eurip. Medea. PSALM LXXXII. 21 arguing that if Holy Writ gave tlie name of gods even to unrigliteous judges, there could be no unfitness in His assuming the title Son of God, seeing that He was holy, and commissioned more directly by God than they had been. " Is it not written in your law, ' I said. Ye are gods ?' If he s. john x. called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the 35. Scripture cannot be broken ; say ye of Him Whom the Fa- THEE hath sanctified, and sent into the world. Thou blas- phemest ; because I said, I am the Son of God ?" And so doing, we shall see the fitness of that other explanation, which takes the whole passage of the election and subsequent cast- ing off of Israel. The chosen people were gods, as the one nation which knew good and evil ; even the children of the Gen. iii. 5, most Highest, as being named by Him thus : "Israel is My son, ^ even My first-born," but they died like men, either like their own father Adam (Heb., S. Hieron.) through disobedience, or cocceius. like the Gentiles around them, falling too like one of the princes of the various empires which had risen and set on the world's horizon during the progress of their own history. Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, had come and gone, and now Israel's national existence was to be swept away also, deservedly, in its turn. 8 Arise, O God, and judge thou the earth : for thou shalt take all heathen to thine inheritance. Arise then, O Sole-begotten Son of God, slain by ungodly Honorius. men, and buried in the grave, arise on the third day from the D. C. dead, and sending Thy judgment on the wicked land, the sordid and earthly hearts which rejected Thee : take to Thy- self all nations for an inheritance, in the stead of that one re- bellious people which would not have Thee to reign over it. Arise also now from Thy slumber in the tempest-tossed bark of Thy Church, in judgment against her worldly foes, and cause her to preach Thee among all nations ; arise to final judgment, coming with all Thy Saints, gathered from east s. Cyprian, and west, from north and south, out of all kindreds and tongues, and nations, and peoples, now militant here in earth, then to be triumphant and blessed in heaven. Wherefore : Glory be to the Fathee, Who is a J udge among gods ; glory be to the Son, Who shall arise to judge the earth ; glory be to the Holy Ghost, Who hath said to the faithful by the mouth of His prophet, '* Ye are gods, and ye are all the children of the most Highest." As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be : world without end. Amen. Collects. Grant us, O Loed, according to Thy precept, to abstain Ludoiph. from wrong judgment ; and to minister to the needs of the A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. poor, that we may attain to be joined unto tlie number of Thy children. (1.) Mozarabic. O Christ, our GoD, make us ever ready to aid the poor and needy, and to keep Thy law, that abounding in works of mercy, we may become the fellows of the heavenly citizens. Through. (11.) Mozarabic. Arise, O LoED, Who judgest the earth, and as Thou dwell- est in loving ownership of the faith of all nations, sufEer us not to abide in darkness, but cause us to see the light of Thy truth, that we may build the foundations of our faith not upon the sand, which the whirlwind may cast down, but on the rock, whose strength Thou art. Through. (11.) Mozarabic. Arise, O GoD, and judge the earth, that Thou Who rulest over all the Gentiles mayest be believed by those who cruci- fied Thee, to have risen again, that the two nations may unite in love, when Thou bindest the circumcision and the uncir- cumcision together in the bond of Christian faith. Through. (11.) Mozarabic. Arise, O GoD, Who judgest the earth, and rule with Thine arm of might those whom Thou hast vouchsafed to purchase by the victory of the Cross, and let the devout thanksgiving of them for whom the shedding of Thy precious Blood serves as redemption be offered unto Thee. And let us, who believe in Thy Passion for our redemption, who confess Thy glorious Resurrection, and proclaim Thine Ascension to the heavens, and await in awe Thy coming in terrible return, hasten joy- fully to Thine Advent when the trumpet shall sound. And Thou, O most merciful Lord, deliver from the burnings of hell those whom Thou seest thus celebrating Thy holy rites, and grant that we may be partakers of a glorious resurrec- tion. Through Thy mercy. (11.) D. C. ^ God, from Whom every good work proceedeth and is strong, justify us with the spirit of righteousness and strength, that never giving wrong judgment, nor accepting the persons of the ungodly, we may alway strive to do that which is right and pleasing unto Thee. Through. (1.) PSALM LXXXIII. Title. A Song or Psalm of Asaph. Argument. Arg. Thomas. That Christ is the most High dweUer over all the earth. The Voice of the Church to the Lord concerning the Jews, and of sons, and of all persecutors. The Voice of the Church to the Lord concerning the Jews and the sons of men. The Pro- phet, concerning Christ, showeth that He reigneth over all nations here and in the judgment to come. Concerning persecutors. PSALM LXXXIII. 23 Ven. Bede. a Song of a Psalm is when, after a prelude on an instrument, the sound of a singing voice is heard, following and keeping time with the instrument, imitating the strains of the psaltery with the tones of the voice. And because a Song mysti- cally signifies contemplation of Divine wisdom ; but a Psalm^ which is produced by the hands, means the fulfilling of action, that is rightly called A Song of a Psalm wherein knowledge and instruction are united with effectiveness in good works, according to that saying, " If thou desire wisdom, keep the commandments, and the Lord shall give her unto thee a wonderful token whereof was manifest in Cornelius the centurion. As to what a Psalm of a Song is and means, has been already said in the twenty-ninth (xxx.) Psalm. Asa]ph^ inasmuch as he had already foretold many things touch- ing the Lord's Incarnation, is now in the first portion about to speak of His second Advent ; beseeching Him, that as His enemies are to be greatly uplifted by means of Antichrist at the end of the world. His judgment ought to come quickly, lest the prolonged licence of that most grievous foe should avail to lay the whole Church waste. O God, who shall he like unto Thee ? keep not still silence y S(c. In the second portion he in treats, under the simili- tude of certain names, that vengeance may be taken upon them, through a desire for their correction, not with eagerness to curse them. Do Thou to them as unto the Madianites. EusEBius or C^SAREA. A supplication for the people which had suffered heavy things, and a prophecy touching the end of God's enemies. S. Athanasius. a Psalm of address, and prayer, and supplica- tion. Various Uses. Gregorian. Friday : Matins. Monastic. Thursday : IT. Nocturn. Parisian. Saturday : Matins. Lyons. Thursday : Nones. Amhrosian. Wednesday of Second Week : I. Nocturn. Quignon. Thursday : Nones. Antiphons. Gregorian. "I Thou only ^ art the most Highest over all the Monastic, J earth. Parisian. For the thought of man * will give thanks to Thee, and the remains of thought will keep holiday unto Thee. Amhrosian. As preceding Psalm. Mozarahic. Let the nations know that Thy Name is the Lord * and that Thou art only the most Highest over all the earth. 1 Hold not thy tongue^ O God^ keep not still silence : refrain not thyself^ O God. The first clause of this verse runs in most of the older translations, (LXX., Yulg., -^thiop., Syr., Arab.,) 0 6roc?, 24 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Didymus. S. Matt. V. 48. 1 S. John iii. 2. A. Ps. xlv. 7- Haymo. Remigius. S. Albertus Magnus. Exod. XV. 11. Honorius. Isa. xiv. 14. S.Bonavent Isa. liii. S. Matt, xxvi. 63. S. Basil. M. Agellius. who shall he like unto Thee ?^ Likeness, comments a G-reek Father, is of two kinds, according to substance, which is identity ; and according to quality, which is merely resem- blance. In the first sense, no one can be like God save He Who is con substantial with God, but in the other manner all saints made perfect can be like Him ; for the Loed Himself has counselled us, " Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." And we are assured that this can come to pass, for the Beloved Disciple tells us that "when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is." Like Him then, of Whom is said, "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever, a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of Thy kingdom, Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity, wherefore, O God, Thy God hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness." Like Him then, precisely because He willed to be like us, and like the meanest of us here, taking on Him the form of a slave, crucified along with thieves. Yet, although we may attain thus to the likeness of His glorified Manhood, none can be like Him in the glory of the Father. None can be like Him when He returns in His divine majesty, as it is written, " Who is like unto Thee, O Lord, among the gods? who is like Thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders ?" Least of all can that Wicked One, the Antichrist, attain to such resemblance, albeit he hath said, " I will be like the Most High," for he shall be smitten when the Lord comes again to judgment, when He will Tceep not still silence, but will utter His terrible voice so that all creation shall hear. And observe that He kept silence and refrained Himself here on earth in threefold . fashion : There was His silence of speech before Pilate, when " as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so He openeth not His mouth." There was His silence of act in the garden, when He said unto Peter, " Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels .P" There was His silence of will in His voluntary acceptance and endurance of death for us. But now His Church is sore troubled by her enemies, and would fain hear His voice bidding waves and winds be still, and commanding the evil spirits to depart into the abyss. 2 For lo, thine enemies make a murmuring : and they that hate thee have lift up their head. A murmuring, or rather, with S. Jerome and the A.Y., a tumult, a loud, vague noise, as the roaring of the sea, such as an advancing army makes with the clashing of its weapons, the braying of its instruments, and the shouts of its soldiers. ^ Taking "'pi as though = n^ra'i, and the negative as an inter- rogative. PSALM LXXXIII. 25 And accordingly the LXX. and Vulgate agree in translating xiteiman. the passage have sounded (^'x^o'aj', sonuerunt.) Sounded^ not spoken, observes S. Augustine, because it is the voice of irra- tional passion, not of intelligent, articulate reason, which the enemies of God utter. At first they are secret in their whis- -Z. perings and incitements to error and iniquity, but when they think themselves strong enough for open war against the s. Aibertus Faith, then they sound and preach their falsehood loudly. Magpius. And this His enemies, the chief priests, did, when after se- cretly inciting the multitude against Him, they caused it to break forth with the cry, " Crucify Him, crucify Him." B. Have lift up their head. That is, they have assumed a pos- ture of bold attack, rising up from their former depression or obscurity, and this either by setting their head, that is, their R. mere human reason and faculties, against Almighty power D. C. and wisdom, or by choosing themselves a captain, which is A. Antichrist. 3 They have imagined craftily against thy people : and taken counsel against thy secret ones. They note here two degrees of enmity, that directed by C. unbelievers against the Faith in general, and that more par- ticular hostility with which the chief saints of GrOD are pur- sued, those secret ones whom He hides under the shadow of s. Aibertus His wings, whom He guards in peril as He did Noah in the Magnus, ark, David in the cave, Elisha in Dothan, Athanasius in the very ship which bore his pursuers ; whom He compasses ^akius. about with His own majesty to save them, as Alexander Severus folded Ulpian in the imperial purple when the Prae- torians sought his life. Yet again, the words apply with especial force to those rulers of the Jews who imagined craftily agauist their own people, by leading them away from their Teacher, poisoning their minds towards Him, and took counsel ofttimes agamst the Hidden Wisdom of God, till "^^^^^^ot. they put Him to death. 4 They have said, Come and let us root them out, that they be no more a people : and that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance. Here is the sound of which the second verse told us ; the § Aibertus inner hatred breaking out into outward speech. And observe Magnus, the bitterness of that hatred. The Egyptian tyrant did not Hugo Card, go so far as this, at any rate in his first plottings against the E^od. i. i6. children of Israel. He was content to prevent their rapid multiphcation, lest they should be too strong for their task- masters, and was willing that they should live, albeit as bondslaves. But the enmity of ungodliness against the Faith can be satisfied with nothing less than the total extirpation III. c 26 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. of believers, either through martyrdom or apostasy. They ask how the Church, which is gathered out of all nations, can fitly be here spoken of as but one people, and they answer their own inquiry by reminding us that Christians are the true spiritual descendants of Abraham, are born again alike in the one font of baptism, have one will and one King, and are citizens of one heavenly country. Their enemies would even, were it possible, abolish the very memory of the past, and cause men to forget that Israel, the " Prince with God," the Lord J esus Christ Himself, once walked on earth, or that the people which takes its name from Him ever had a place amongst mankind. So it was in the great Tenth Per- secution, so in the overthrow of the Church of J apan, so in France under the Terror. And to each and all the true children of Israel re-echo Tertullian's noble saying, "The more we are mowed down, the more numerous we become, blood is the seed of Christians." 5 For they have cast their heads together with one consent : and are confederate against thee; 6 The tabernacles of the Edomites, and the Is- maelites : the Moabites^ and Hagarens ; 7 Gebal, and Ammon^ and Amalek : the Philis- tines, with them that dwell at Tyre. 8 Assur also is joined with them : and have holpen the children of Lot. The enumeration of the peoples engaged in this confederacy against Israel has given rise to much discussion as to the date and occasion of the Psalm. A very few, with no good reason, include it amongst the Davidic portion of the Psalter. R. Kimchi, followed by several of the earlier critics, assigns it to the reign of Jehoshaphat, when Ammon, Moab, and the Edomites of Mount Seir did unite against J udah, others to Sennacherib's raid in Hezekiah's time, while several of the Fathers, followed by some eminent moderns, take it of the league made by Sanballat, with the Arabians, Ammonites, and Ashdodites, against the rebuilding of Jerusalem by Ne- liemiah. And others bring it lower down, taking it to be a Maccabee Psalm. The mention of Assyria, and indeed of Amalek, makes this last conjecture quite untenable, for the Assyrian empire (here apparently only growing into strength) had been succeeded by the Babylonian, Persian, and Mace- donian dynasties long before the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, while the Amalekites, a very feeble remnant after Saul's great victory, were totally extirpated by the children of Si- meon in the days of Hezekiah, which excludes the post- Captivity view also. But whatever be the historical and literal sense of the passage, there is little diversity in the PSALM LXXXIII. mystical explanation of it, as denoting the various classes of GtOd's enemies, who would fain lay waste and destroy His Church. Following in the track of S. Augustine, they seek for special lessons in the meaning of the proper names, though often erring as to their true signification. They remind us A. that the tabernacles of the Edomites point to the unstable and transitory aims of men of earthly and cruel minds, typi- C. fied by the "red clay" which Adam or Edom denotes. The Ishmaelites are expounded as signifying those who obey themselves only, and not God. But the name Ishmael means "heard of GtOD," and we may therefore better take the sense to be those false Christians brought near to God in His or- dinances, as was Ishmael by the rite of circumcision, but who nevertheless mock at the deeper mysteries of His pro- Gen. xxi. 9. mise, and therefore lose their share of His inheritance. Moah, too, meaning seed of the father, is a type of such as have illicitly entered into the fold of the Church, claiming to be lawful members of the Christian family, but who have ^--^ohnx. 1. climbed over the wall of the sheepfold, and not come in by the door. If the Hagarenes be named after Hagar, they will rank in the same class as the Ishmaelites, with, however, the special mark of flight attached to them, shunning, like Jonah, the call of God, going out, like their ancestress, from the trials of God's house to the sorer cross of self -chosen suffer- ing in the desert of unbelief. The interpretation S. Augus- tine gives to this name, for an uncertain reason,^ is that it denotes strangers and proselytes, who do not heartily submit to the laws of their new country, but retain an alien mind. Gehal, which is very diversely explained by the ancient commentators, seems to signify a boundary, and may then well denote those who busy themselves altogether with finite and temporal things, to the exclusion of such as are eternal and infinite. Ammon and Amalek, two of the earliest and most inveterate foes of Israel, are fitly grouped together, and once more signify for us revolted kin, not original aliens, for the one, springing like Moab from Lot, was of the race of Terah, Abraham's father ; and the other, derived from a grandson of Esau, had the blood of both Abraham and Isaac Gen. xxxvi. m its vems. Ammon, a name derived from a root ^Qi^, 12. " to gather together," is a type of the multitude in all ages, averse to any check on its pleasures and caprices, fickle, and often cruel, and most opposed to such as set before it a lofty standard of principle and action. Amalek, "the strangler of the people," an apt name for that nation of which the LoED said : " Remember what Amalek did unto thee hj the Deut.xxv. way, when ye were come forth out of Egypt ; how he met ^7- thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, when thou wast faint and weary, and feared not God ;" is the type of all crafty and treacherous foes of the Church or of the soul, ^ Perhaps his informant read Dnan^, instead of onjn, c 2 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. and in particular of those evil thoughts which attack us in seasons of languor and depression, when there is little vigour of mind or body to resist them. All these alienated kindred of the spiritual Israel league themselves with the Philistines, " strangers" or " wanderers," open and original foes of the chosen people, types of the heathen and of undisguised and open sin. They combine with them that dwell at Tyre; those hard and " rocky" souls which have no soil wherein the seed of the Word can take root. 8 Assur also is joined with them : and have holpen the children of Lot. Assyria, like Egypt at an earlier period of Jewish history, is put for the idolatrous world-power in rebellion against God, for the organisation of human strength and self-will ungoverned by religious principles, for the unbelieving State, and it consistently lends its help and is an arm (Heb., S. Hieron.) not to the children of light, but to the children of Lot, that is, of " darkness," because Lot signifies a " veil" or " covering." The Latin commentators, for the most part following S. Augustine, by interpreting Assur as " elated" or "oppressing," and Lot as "backsliding," see in this place the devil and his angels, the allies of heathen and of false brethren. As to the literal meaning, it is enough to observe that if Assur here means, as is most probable, the empire of Nineveh, it is the earliest appearance of that state in Western Theodoret. Asia. But Tlicodoret takes it to mean the Samaritan colo- nists under Sanballat, who joined mth Tobiah the Ammonite, and the Philistines of Ashdod, and the Edomite and Ish- Neh.iv. niaclite Arabians under Geshem, to prevent the rebuilding s. Aibertiis Jerusalem. The total number of the confederates named Magnus. is eleven, the mystical type of sin, because it is just one more than ten, the number of the precepts in the Decalogue, and thus denotes transgression of the moral law. Each bat- talion has its own especial banner and device as it marches to war against the Saints. The heretics bear a wolf ; schis- matics a screech-owl, hated of all the birds ; the proud dis- play a unicorn ; the slothful a dormouse ; hypocrites a scor- pion, stinging with its tail ; the wrathful have a lion ; the covetous a mole, which ceases not to grub beneath the earth ; the gluttonous bear a swine ; the envious a tiger ; the impure an ass ; the desperate a man hanging by a cord. 9 But do thou to them as unto the Madianites : unto Sisera^ and unto Jabin at the brook of Kison; 10 Who perished at Endor ; and became as the dung of the earth. L. Here the tone of the Psalm changes, and the prophet calls A. S. Matt, xiii. 20. Pseudo- Hieron. PSALM LXXXIII. 29 on God to renew His old loving-kindness, and to fight the battles of Israel. How memorable the overthrow of the Midianites was, may be gathered from the reference to it in Isaiah's great prophecy of the Incarnation : " For Thou hast ^ broken the yoke of his burden, and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian." It is to be remembered that the special kind of suffering inflicted upon Israel by Midian was not a permanent military tyranny, like that of the Philistines, but famine, caused by sudden j^d^. yi. 3. raids made upon the crops by overwhelming forces. And hereupon the greatest- mystical divine of the ancient Church Hom^^vii in reminds us that Israel suffered such things because, being jud. carnally minded, it was as " he that soweth to his flesh, [who] shall of his flesh reap corruption ;" whereas they who aim higher receive the blessing, " He that soweth to the Spirit ^i- s. shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." These are the fields which the Midianites cannot destroy, nor so much as reach. And in Gideon's great battle against Midian in the valley of Moreh, he had to fight with Amalek also, and with the J"dg.vii. 12, Children of the East, the Ishmaelite allies of his foe ; that the odds might be so overwhelming as to prove the divine origin of the deliverance wrought by the three hundred with their pitchers and lamps ; fit precursors of the little band of disciples who under Him of "Whom Gideon, " the hewer down" of idols, was but a type, stormed the intrenchments and routed the forces of Paganism, after the shattered clay of the Sacred Humanity displayed the Light of Light to the darkened world. And observe that Midian, which means " strife," aptly denotes a world lying in anarchy, and capable of being brought into order by none save the Prince of Peace. Origen, who explains the word to mean " outside judgment," Origen. takes it as denoting all who live without the Law. From the rout of Midian the Psalmist passes to the earlier defeat of the Canaanites in their last great stand against Israel. Here too the proper names employed give a mystical signification. Sisera denotes "battle-array," Jahin is the "wise" or "understanding," KisJion the "winding" or " crooked" stream. Power and organization, craft and skill, artifice and stratagem are in vain against the Loed. He conquered Sisera, and that by the " hand of a woman," first, Judg. iv. 9. w^hen the Maiden at Nazareth reversed the curse of Eve's disobedience, in saying, " Behold the handmaid of the Loed, g ^^^^ . be it unto me according to thy word ;" and next, when the 33. mystical Bride of the Lamb overcame the world through suf- fering. Jabin is the type of the carnal understanding, into origen. whose power we are delivered, when we refuse to learn a Hom. iv. in higher wisdom. And so speaks the Apostle : " Even as they ^^^^ ^ 28. did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a mind void of judgment, to do those things which are not convenient." But this wisdom, which " descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish," Cheist, A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. S. James iii. 15. 1 Cor. i. 19. Prudeiitius. S. Venant. Fortunat. The Hymn, Punge lingua. Who is tlic Power of God and the Wisdom of G-od, destroys ; " For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent." And this He did at Kishon, meeting the tortuous craft, the " thousand meanderings," of the old serpent, with Divine and superior intelligence. So, in the great Passiontide hymn, we read : For the work of our salvation Needs would have liis order so, And tlie multiform deceiver's Art by art would overthrow, And from thence would bring the medicine Wlience the insult of tlie foe. Wherefore it aptly follows. Who perished at En-dor} For JEn- dor mc^iw^ the "well of the dwelling," the very source and habitation of the powers of evil, the grave and hell, which were spoiled and made a show of openly, after they had admitted their Conqueror in the guise of a captive ; since which time they have become as the dung of the earthy not merely in that Christians can afford to contemn powers in- vested with unspeakable dread to others, but that as dung is profitable to fertilise the ground, so the very temptations of the evil one and the pains of death are used l3y G-od as means for the growth and perfection of the Saints. Evil men, too, perish at JEJndor, when they abide by their own springs alone, when they say, like Naaman, " Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel ?" refuse the waters of regeneration, which alone can cleanse Hugo Card, the leprosy of their souls ; and become as the dung of the earth by persevering in coarse, foul, and degrading sin. Haymo. S. Bruno Carth. A. 2 Kings V. 12. Make them and their princes like yea, make all their princes like as Oreb and Zeba and 11 Zeb : Salmana ; 12 Who say, Let us take to ourselves : the houses of God in possession. The details of Gideon's great victory, resulting not only in the rout of the armies of Midian, but in the slaughter of four princes of that nation, are recalled, in prayer that God 1 Some unnecessary difficulty has been raised about this refe- rence, as though it were the only record of a battle not else- where named. But Joshua xvii. 11, names En-dor as lying in the portion of Manasseh toge- ther with Taanach and Me- giddo, which two are coupled by Deborah in her song as the scene of the victory over Jabin. There is thus no need to imagine a second battle, as the rout may very well have spread over all three districts. PSALM LXXXIII. 31 may work equal deliverance for His peojDle again. Oreh, g Albert us the "raven," and Zeeh, tlie "wolf," are types of the un- Magnus, clean and rapacious powers of evil. Zehah is a " victim" or " sacrifice," but not in honour of God, rather such as is eccIus. condemned by the Wise Man, " Whoso bringeth an offering xxxiv. 20. of the goods of the poor, doetli as one who killeth a son before Pseudo- his father's eyes." Salmana ov Zdi\mmm2i, the " shadowless" i^^eron. or " shelter-forbidden," is that evil one who is the enemy and the opposite of tlie Man Who is " as the shadow of a isa. xxxii. great Hock in a weary land," a " shadow from the heat, when ^ ' the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall." All these, gathering themselves together against the people of God, desire to drive them from their heritage. What, then, r. Kimchi. are these especial houses of God which they would fain seize ? Muis. The first answer given is that the words apply to the whole land of Israel, comparing the language of Jehoshaphat, "And 2 Chron. xx. now, behold, the children of Ammon and Moab, and Mount Seir . . . come to cast us out of Thy possession, which Thou hast given us to inherit." Others take it of the city of Je- rusalem, and more particularly of the Temple, with which agree the LXX. reading, the altar, and the Vulgate, the sanctuary. The Chaldee paraphrast and S. Jerome extend Targum. the meaning somewhat further, by rendering severally eve^^y ^' ^ure thing of God, and the beauty of God. But the words have a yet deeper import for us, when we remember that saying of the Apostle, " What agreement hath the temple of 2 Cor. vi. 16. God with idols ? for ye are the temples of the living God," as we shall then recognise the attempt of the evil spirits and their wicked allies on earth to bring the bodies and souls of Cheist's people into subjection to sin. But the sanctuary Ay. which we possess having the sacramental mysteries stored within it, the sacred Flesh and precious Blood, the graces of the Spieit's might, the perennial fountain, and the light Di- Amobius. vine, is too strong for them to take, unless it is betrayed from within.^ 13 O my God, make them like unto a wheel : and as the stubble before the wind. ^ Two Cardinals of mediseval times (Joannes Vitalis and Hugo of S. Cher) interpret this text of the nepotism of great nobles, ecclesiastic and lay, making the dignities, benefices, and goods of the Church the hereditary feolis of their families, the apanages of their children ; and the latter of them applies his censure more particularly to the greed of the Roman Court of his day, aver- ring that the Romans not only kept the Popedom in their own hands, but nominated some of themselves to every vacant pre- bend in Christendom, to the in- jury of episcopal rights, and the ruin of the Church. Lorinus hints at this passage, but is too discreet to quote it, recommend- ing his readers to peruse it for themselves. 32 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Like unto a loheel. So all the older versions, while modern critics, translating, some tvJdrlwind, and others rolling chaff or thistledown, with reference to Isaiah xvii. 13, do not prac- tically affect the inner meaning. The toheel is explained as an emblem of short-lived and unstable earthly prosperity, followed by spiritual destruction, because the hinder part of the wheel rises, and yet leaves behind what it has just touched, while tlie fore-part, typical of the future, is always sinking, and as being circular and having no end, denotes the worm that dietli not. And whereas there is something of solidity in the wheel : the stiihhle, on the other hand, is light, feeble, and incapable of offering any resistance to the storm. Others, again, instead of loheel, translate the LXX. rpox^s as a child's tojp, which is made to revolve quickly by lashing it, an emblem of sinners under the scourge of G-od. But there is no reason to depart from the usual rendering. The idea is a common-place amongst heathen writers, and occurs also in Ecclesiasticus, " The heart of the foolish is like a cart-wheel, and his thoughts are like a rolling axle- tree." 14 Like as the fire that burneth up the wood : and as the flame that consuraeth the mountains, 15 Persecute them even so with thy tempest : and make them afraid with thy storm. This is the true connection of these verses, not taking the fourteenth with the preceding one, according to the Prayer Book punctuation. The fire and flame are ascribed to the Judgment-day in particular, as denoting the terrible wrath of G-OD against sin, but are not thereby excluded from all reference to temporal punishment. The wood is taken by some to mean all savage, uncultured, and obstinate heathens, and the onountains as denoting the haughty and exalted. And observe that the latter clause of the fourteenth verse intensifies the meaning, because the freer play of the winds upon lofty heights makes a fire among the timber fiercer and more de- structive than it can be on the level. So Homer : ovp€OS 4v KOpv^fjSf €KaO€j/ 5e re (paipf.rai avyq. As a fierce flame enkindles a vast wood On the hill-tops, whose blaze is seen afar. Cardinal Hugo, agreeing in the latter explanation, prefers to take the ^uood as the opposite idea to an orchard, and as de- noting wealthy persons who bear no fruit, and are barren in good works.^ Some have seen a reference to volcanoes in the ^ This, he observes, is spe- I every one who has much to do cially true of the Romans, as | with the Curia knows well. And PSALM LXXXIII. 33 flame that hurneth up the mountains , but there is no reason to suppose a Hebrew poet of so distant a day familiar with Cocceius. such an idea. The storm and tempest are taken universally by the old commentators to denote the irresistible wrath of God against impenitent sinners, and as signifying the terrors of the Doom. But the wording of the very next verse might well have induced some of them to add a milder explanation. The whole series of petitions may be taken in a good sense as praying for the conversion of sinners, whom God can make like unto those wheels which were guided by the spirit of the Living Creatures in Ezekiel's vision, bearing upon Ezek. i. 15. them the likeness of a sapphire throne, whereon sitteth the Man. They may be caught away by the wind, to speed on God's errand, as Philip was when borne away from his Ethiopian convert to the city of Azotus, and the fire which Acts viu. 39. lighted on the Apostles in fiery tongues may so baptize them Acts ii. 3. with its purifying flame as to kindle them with burning love, destroying the wood, hay, stubble, but causing the fine gold 1 cor. iii. 12. to come out bright and clean from all dross. Wherefore is added : 16 Make their faces ashamed, O Lord : that they may seek thy Name. More exactly, with A.V., LXX., and Vulgate, Fill their faces loith shame. That is, in the literal sense, that they may Titeiman. lose all confidence in their idols, and acknowledge the God of the Jews to be mightier than their gods, " because there Dan. iii. 29. is no other God that can deliver after this sort." And one reminds us wisely that it is sometimes better for a Christian to fall, that he may be ashamed, and so seeh the Name of Ay. Jesus as his one hope and stay, rather than stand, and Lu. be filled with spiritual pride in his own strength. It is therefore spoken by the Prophet, " O daughter of Zion, thou Mic. iv. 10. shalt go even to Babylon, there shalt thou be delivered." Hugo card. And this, too, is the aim and purpose of spiritual penalties ^• and excommunications, such as that which shut Miriam out Numb. xii. of the camp for seven days, as also of that shame which ^'*> attends confession of sin, a " shame which is glory and Eccius. iv. grace," not like the false shame of concealment, which is additional sin. And on this a Saint observes, " In this way s. Greg, one can arm his soul with the weaj^ons of shame, for whoso ^y^s. Horn, indicts himself by open mention of his secret faults, hath the ^ memory of his shame as a guide for the future conduct of his life." But as only some of these evil-doers will be softened and turned to God by His chastisements in this world, while others will be the more hardened, it follows : he points Lis observations by meekly quoting the words of EUphaz the Temanite : " For the congregation of hypocrites C shall be desolate, and fire shall consume the tabernacles of bri- bery." (Job XV. 34.) 34 A COMMKNTARY ON THE PSALMS. 17 Let them be confounded and vexed ever more and more : let them be put to shame, and perish. 18 And they shall know that thou, whose Name is Jehovah : art only the most Highest over all the earth. We have in tliese words set before us the doom of the Q finally impenitent, who will see the overthrow of their hiug s. Bruno Anticlirist, and tlie dominion of the Son of Man established Garth. over all creation, and who will then pass from His judgment- seat to their place of punishment. But, as before, a milder interpretation is not wanting nor unfit, and we shall perhaps better construe the whole passage in connection with the sixteenth verse. Here we see shadowed out one great dif- ference between the Old and the New Covenant, the seve- rance made between earthly and spiritual well-being. To the Jew, so long as he was obedient to the Law, came victory and ease, while foreign tyranny, heavy exactions, and inces- sant suffering were tlie penalties for hacksliding. But the Gospel offers itself to the mourner, the hungry, and the out- cast, rather than to those who rejoice and are full of bread. And thus it has been usually a time of sorrow and distress in a nation when it has received the Faith. So it was with Judaea itself, so with the Koman empire, so with England, Hugo Card, when the heathen Penda warred against the Cross. Let them then be confounded, when they reflect upon their guilt, and that more and more, by increasing sensitiveness of conscience, and a gradually higher standard of holiness ; or for ever and ever (A.Y., LXX., and Yulg.,) by never again returning to D. C. their wickedness, and so let i\\Qm perish, by dying to sin and to themselves, that they may live to Christ, and know that Cocceius. He Whose Name is J ehovah, is only the Most Highest over all the earth ; and especially that none save He, no earthly \^ potentate whatever, may dare to claim the Headship of His Church. His Name is JeJiovah, for He is Very God of Very Phil. ii. 9. GrOD ; He is the Most Highest, for God hath highly exalted A. Him, and given Him a Name which is above every name. But it may be asked. Why Highest over all the earth, rather than over all the heavens ? And the answer is, to quell the Eccius. X. 9. pride of man, who is earth, and will return to earth. " Why is earth and ashes proud .P" Not justly for itself, but be- cause God stooped to that earth and ashes, and taking it to Ps viii 5 Himself, crowned man, heretofore lower than the angels, with glory and worship, and set Him over all the works of creation. And therefore : Glory be to the Fathee, Whose Name is J ehovah ; glory be to the Son, the King of Israel, Who only is Highest over all the earth ; glory be to the Holy Ghost, the Flame which PSALM LXXXIII. 35 burnt up with love those mountains of God, the Apostles and Martyrs. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be : world without end. Amen. Collects. Take away from us, O Loed, all superfluity of error, that Ludoiph. leaving the tribes of sin behind us, we may fear Thee only. Who dwellest most Highest over all the earth. Through. (1.) Let the Gentiles, for whom Thou didst hang upon the Mozarabic. rood of the Cross, know, O Cheist, that Thy Name is the Loed, and let knowledge bring them back to their Maker, as ignorance gave them up to sloth, that they may be converted through knowledge of the faith, and rejoice in the hope of glory. (11.) Arise, O God, keep not still silence, refrain not Thyself ; Mozarabic. but as they who hate Thee have lift up their head, fill their faces with shame, that being confounded, they may seek Thy Name ; and save Thy people, that they may know the testi- mony of Thy might ; be gracious unto Thine inheritance, Who art only the most Highest over all the earth. (11.) O God, who is like unto Thee in goodness or in might ? Mozarabic. Thou Who teacliest Thy Saints with Thy goodness, and de- fendest them with Thy might, Who bridle st the foaming mouths of their enemies, and hearkenest to the prayers of Thy servants. Grant us, who trust in Thy goodness, some small share of good works, to keep us safe from the counsel of our enemies, to wash us from sin, and make us well- pleasing unto Thee, that Thou mayest bring us to ever- lasting glory. Who art only the most Highest over all the earth. (11.) O Loed our Redeemer, make Thine enemies as a wheel, Mozarabic. them to whom the mystery of Thy Cross is foolishness, that they may be scattered as stubble before the face of the wind, and that an abiding-place for ever may be granted unto them that believe, or shall hereafter believe in Thee. (11.) Look, O Loed, upon Thy people, and be exalted in Thy Mozarabic majesty above them that hate Thee, and drive into headlong ruin those who hasten to attack Thy faithful ones, that con- founded and put to shame, they may know that Thou only art most Highest over all the earth. (11.) O God of celestial majesty, unto Whom none is like, de- D. C. stroy us not out of the nation of the elect, by reason of the multitude of our sins, but, of Thy merciful goodness, cause our names to be counted amongst Israel for evermore. Through. (1.) 36 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. PSALM LXXXIV. Title. To the Chief Musician upon Gittith, A Psalm for the sons of Korah. LXX. and Vulgate : To the end, for the presses, a Psalm for the sons of Kore. Chaldee Targum : For praise, upon the harp brought from Gath, by the hands of the sons of Korah, a hymn. Argument. Arg. Thomas. That Christ opens the kingdom of the heavenly house. Concerning them who have attained the Faith. To them who shall attain a dwelling in the house of the Lord. The Voice of Christ to the Father on behalf of the Church. A Psalm to be read along with the Gospel of S. Matthew. Unto them who have attained the Faith. The Advent of Christ in Manhood, and concerning the Churches. A prayer over the field. Ven. Bede. Three Psalms, viii., Ixxx. (81) and Ixxxiii. (84) are entitled for the presses^ that is, for the sufferings of the Holy Church. And therein the numbers eight and eighty denote the hope of future resurrection, witli the number ten, signifying the penny (denarms) of everlasting life, which the Church shall receive after her afflictions, like a wine-cellar after the press. And this is that most blessed end, whicli is. included in all the titles which are worded for the presses. And in that Ixxxiii. is the last Psalm which is named for the presses, this shows that the resurrection of the Church is hallowed in tlie vision of the Holy Trinity, when the God of gods shall he seen in Sion. The sons of Korah are the sons of the Cross, as has been already said ; or, as Arnobius ex- pounds it, whereas in the previous psalm they who desired to seize on the sanctuary of God were confounded and perished, and ex- cited loathing and produced hindrances to charity and other vir- tues, now, on the other hand, that the Lord reigns in us, who once were sons of Korah the rebel, we became sons of God, our evil fathers having been swallowed up by the earth ; and we, who aforetime thought to bear the fire of lust and avarice, strange to God, now kindled with the fire of divine love, say, O hoiv amiable are Thy dwellings, Thoti Lord of Hosts. This explanation of Arnobius is supported by the fact, that in the first, second, and third places wherein the sons of Korah are named in the title. Understanding is added at the same time ; but in the third place, as though these sons of Korah had been rebuked on stricter inquiry, it is thus written : For them who shall he changed, the sons of Korah, for un- derstanding. These soyis of Korah, in the first part of the psalm, declare their unutterable longing for the Church. O hoiv amiahle are Thy divellings, O Lord I In the second clause, they confess that he is happy, to whom the Lord gives help, and whom He causes to attain to the grace of Confession. Blessed is the man whose strength is in Thee. In the third place, they say that it is far better to dwell obscure in the House of the Lord than to enter the tabernacle of sinners with any worldly honours. For one day in Thy courts, &c. Syriac Psalter. Of the sons of Korah, which David composed PSALM LXXXIV. when he was going fortli of Sion to worship in the House of the Lord. It is said also to be a prophecy of Christ and of His Church. EusEBius OF C^SAREA. A prophecj of Christ and of His Church. S. Athanasius. a Psahn of glorifying in tlie Lord. Various Uses. Gregorian. Friday : Matins. [Corpus Christi : III. Nocturn. Dedication of a Churcli : II. Nocturn. Sacred Heart : III. Noc- turn.] Monastic, Thursday: II. Nocturn. [Corpus Christi : II. Noc- turn. Dedication of Church : II. Nocturn.] Ambrosian. Wednesday of Second Week : I. Nocturn. Parisian. Thursday : Terce. Lyons. Friday: Terce. Quignon. Wednesday : Vespers. Eastern Church. Nones. Antiphons. Gregorian. Ferial : As preceding Psalm. [Corpus Christi : From Thine Altar ^ O Lord, we receive Christ, in Whom our heart and flesh rejoice. Dedication : This is none other ^ than the House of G-OD,and the gate of Heaven. Sacred Heart : GrOD loveth mercy and truth * the Lord will give grace and worship.] Monastic. Ferial : Thou hast blessed * O Lord, Thy land. [Corpus Christi : As Gregorian. Dedication : The temple of God is holy, it is GtOd's husbandry, it is God's building.] Parisian. I believe ^ verily to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Ambrosian. As Psalm Ixxxii. Mozarabic. My heart and my flesh rejoice in the living God. 1 O how amiable are thy dwellings : thou Lord of hosts ! 2 My soul hath a desire and longing to enter into the courts of the Lord : my heart and my flesh re- joice in the living God. For dwellings f the A. Y. more exactly, with LXX. and Vulgate, reads tabe^macles, and thus suggests a contrast be- tween these moveable tents and the permanent courts of the second verse. "There are," observes S. Bernard, comment- serm. in ing on this passage, " three conditions of holy souls ; to wit, fest. bmn. first in the corruptible body ; secondly, without the body ; ss. 3. thirdly, in the glorified bod}^ First in warfare, next in rest, thirdly in perfect blessedness ; first, that is to say, in taber- nacles, secondly, in coitrts, thirdly in the House of the Loed. O how amiable are Thy tabernacles, Thou Lord of Hosts 1 But His courts are much more desirable, so that he adds. My soul hath a desire and longing for the courts of the Lord. Yet 38 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Cd. Titelman. Ps. xxxiv. 7) A. V. E. ApoUina- rius. S. Cyprian, de Morta- litate. S. Hieron. in Zach. xiv, A. 2 Cor. V. 1. S. Hieron. Ep. 28. Ay. S.John xiv. 2. 1 Kings vii. 12. S. Athana- sius. Titelman. S. Albertus Magnus. Hugo Card. Numb, xxiv. 5. Anonym. Grsec. S. Hieron. Epitaph. Nepotiani. as even in these courts there is some imperfection, altogether blessed are they who dwell in Thy House, O Lord." Some, however, reading the whole of the first verse in close connec- tion, see in the tabernacles the abiding-place of the armies of heaven, for we read in another psalm, " The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him, and de- livereth them." Heaven is like a camp, for it is strong and secure from the enemy, and because there, as in an earthly army in time of warfare, there is neither marrying nor giv- ing in marriage. And tliis is the view most dwelt upon by the earlier commentators. As tlie Jews in their captivity at/ Babylon longed for a sight of the Holy City, for its feast of.' • tabernacles, and its solemn rites in the Temple ; so the saints, exiles here on earth from their country, long to flee thither and be at rest. Hence it is that this Psalm has been so often ^ on the lips o£ dying Christians, eager to depart and be with Christ, for they "know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." Ac- cordingly, these verses were recited by S. Paula as she lay on her death-bed, and they form still a part of the Burial Office for Priests in the Western Church. Note too that the plural taheriiacles points to the "many mansions" in our Father's House, while the word courts, imj^lying size and spaciousness, assures us that there will be room there for all who desire to enter in. Wherefore it is written of Solomon's house, that " the great court round about was with three rows of hewed stones," because the circular form is the most capacious of all. There are other senses, too, in which we may take the words. The tabernacles may well denote the Churches of God ; the outer courts here on earth of His great temple in the heaven, plural, as locally separate, just as were the various detached portions of the great House in Sion, and yet one, as belonging and united to it only. Again ; just as Gen- tiles who are struck with the beauty of the Gospel, and desire to enter into the Church of God, so devout Christians look with admiration and love upon the Religious life, the warrior tents of the active Orders, the peaceful courts of the contem- plative ones ; exclaiming with Balaam, " How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel." Yet again, as God is pleased to dwell within His Saints, all those who have made their souls a fitting habitation for Him, are taber- nacles which excite the love, the longing, and the emulation of less perfect followers of the Lamb. Finally, the words may be taken by us in that primary sense which they bore for the Jews, love for the house wherein we worship God, and desire not only to seek Him therein, but to show our zeal by costly adornment and sedulous decoration of His shrine. Give all thou canst, high heaven rejects the lore Of nicely -calculated less or more ; PSALM LXXXIV. 39 So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense Words- These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof lonnetF.'^''^' Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells, xliii. Where light and shade repose, where music dwells Lingering — and wandering on as loth to die ; Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof That they were born for immortality. My soul hath a desire and longincf. Here once more the Prayer Book version is too weak. The A. Y. rightly trans- lates, with all the old versions, instead of longing, My soul Eusebius faints. Not from weakness doth she faint, observes an early Csesanen. writer, but because of passionate love, for this is the wont of lovers parted from those they love. We may desire hea- venly things, and yet not faint for them, comments S. G-re- gory the Great, so long as we are held back by earthly plea- s. Greg, sures, but we both desire and faint when our eagerness for the highest blessings causes us to die to ourselves. And this fainting, which causes us to lose our own strength, is the true means for acquiring the strength, of God. We fail, and cease s. Ambros. to be what we were before, but become something better and stronger, as the grape, forced out of its form and nature in the presses of which the title speaks, becomes rich wine fit A. for storage in the cellars. They remind us how often in Honorius. Holy Writ we read of the bodily suffering which great spi- L. ritual visions entail, how the Queen of Sheba had " no more 1 Kings x. 5. spirit in her," when she beheld Solomon in all his glory ; how Dan. viii. 27. "Daniel fainted and was sick certain days" after Gabriel's s. Lukeix. revelation to him; how Peter "knew not what he said," as 33. he looked on his transfigured Loed ; how Paul could not tell ^ ^' whether his trance were in the body or out of the body. They count up seven reasons for this eager longing after the Hugo Card, heavenly Jerusalem, namely, its freedom, its pure and perfect joy, its bestowal of wishes, its endless and unbroken peace, its complete security, its unvarying health, its glorious com- panionship. Many a divine and many a poet has endeavoured to give some faint expression to this craving of the soul, and perhaps none more effectively than the Cluniac monk : Jerusalem the glorious ! Bernard. The glory of the elect ! Cluniac O dear and future vision Rhythmus. That eager hearts expect : Even now by faith I see thee : Even here thy walls discern : To thee my thoughts are kindled, And pant, and strive, and yearn. Jerusalem the only, That lookest from heaven below, In thee is all my glory, In me is all my woe ; 40 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. Hugo Card. The Gloss. A. Rom. xii. 12. Prov. xiii. 12. S. Albertus Magnus. S. Augus- linus, Horn. 33. S. Thomas Aquinas. S. Fulgen- tius ad Tra- simundum. S. Luke ix. 58. Targum. A. And though my body may not, My spirit seeks thee fain, Till flesh and earth return me To earth and flesh again. My heart and my flesh. That is, my soul and my body. And tlie words prove the grade of saintliness whicli the true disciple may reach even here, that the flesh can be so sub- dued to the spirit as not to rebel, but to obey its higher im- pulses. Rejoice, but how, if desire and fainting precede ? The Apostle will tell us, " Eejoicing in hope, patient in tribu- lation, continuing instant in prayer." Yet again, the Wise Man teaches us that "hope deferred maketh the heart sick." How can we then justly use the word rejoice? The reply is twofold, or rather but one. First, that God gives His faithful ones, who are patient in tribulation, a foretaste of future glory, enough to sustain and gladden them, that they may continue in prayer. Next, as a great Saint observes, the soul " doth not rejoice in this world, in riches, in honour, in luxury, in drunkenness, in dead vanities, nor in vanities which will quickly die, together with the love of them, but in the living God. Why did he not say simply ' in God,' instead of adding, * in the living God P' In order to show that every- thing which belongs not to the worship of God we ought to account as dead." And, finally, we may take these verses as spoken in the person of Christ Himself, eaten up with zeal for the House of God, and Whose unstained Body co- incided with every volition of His perfect soul, while both were inseparably joined to the Godhead of the Woed in hy- postatic union. 3 Yea, the sparrow hath found her an house, and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young : even thy altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God. The exile would say that the very birds, mere irrational creatures, are suffered to dwell habitually within the most sacred precincts of that temple which he, God's servant, is forbidden to approach. And the verse thus foreshadows those pathetic words of the Saviour, " Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not w^here to lay His head." There is some variation of the readings here, as regards the particular birds named. The Targum explains them as the dove and the turtle, and inter- prets the reference to the altar as merely denoting the use of these birds in sacrifice. The other ancient versions agree with the English as regards the first word, but translate the second as turtle, like the Chaldee. S. Augustine allegorizes the verse, not without beauty, as follows : He has been speaking of two things which rejoice, his heart and his flesh, PSALM LXXXIV. 41 and he has set over against these, two parables drawn from . birds, the sparrow and the turtle ; the one denoting the lieart, and the other the flesh. The sparrow hath found her an house ; my heart hath found her an house. She plies her wings with the virtues of her life, faith, hope, and charity, wherewith she may fly to her house ; and when she comes thither, she will abide there, and the complaining note of the sparrow which is here, will not be there. For the sparrow is a complaining bird, of which is said in another Psalm, " As a sparrow that sitteth alone upon the house-top." 7* She flieth from the house-top to the house. Only let her be on the top, and spurn her carnal dwelling, she will then have a heavenly, an eternal house, and there will end her moan. He ascribes young to the turtle, that is, to the flesh. The turtle hath found a nest where she may lay her young. The house is for ever, the nest but for a while ; and that nest is the Church militant on earth, the true faith, the Catholic faith, wherein Christians bring forth the fruit of good works. Again ; some explain the sparrow of the Saints of active Hugo Card, life, reminding us that it leaves the barren wood to dwell close to the houses of men, and that it is the bird, "HSV? used in the rite of atonement for leprosy, and thus a type of the abandonment of sin and pursuit of holiness ; while the turtle f as the constant emblem of chaste love and yet of D. C. mournfulness, denotes the penitent Saints of the contem- Ay. plative life. Cardinal Hugo, according to his wont, sums up the qualities which make the sparrow a fit type of devout souls, in a distich, thus : Prole potens, hominum vicinus, et hostia leprae, Callidus, et cantans, hyemans, cibus est, volat, ignit. Fruitful, a friend of man, the leper's sacrifice, Wise, tuneful, migrates not, is food, flies, fires. One other interpretation sees in the sparrow, with its lofty s. Greg, flight, Chkist Himself, seeking, at the Ascension, His house ^^i^'i^^^^* in the highest heavens, while His faithful spouse, the Church, sighing for Him in her exile here, lovingly brings up her young in the nest of peaceful meditation. And with the former of these two notions agrees that old hymn addressed to our Lord : Aye passer salutaris, Psalt. Jesu. Qui frequenter immolaris Super tuis sacris aris, Nunquam tarn en consummaris. Hailj O sparrow of salvation. Thou which oft art made oblation At Thine holy altar's station, Rite which hath no termination. 42 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. S. August. Horn. 33. iElian. Var. Hist. V. 17. Herod, i. 159. Le Blanc. Honorius. S. Bern. Serm. in Cant. Ixi. S. Albert. Magn. Haymo. Hugo Card, S. Augustine gives another reason than this, taking, as he^ does in another place, both sparrow and turtle as types of Christ. Our Saviour, observes he, is compared to a sparrow, because it is a very insignificant bird, as He first taught us humility, and as the turtle is the chastest of birds, so He first taught us purity. If we translate the word meaning "freedom," as swalloiVf which seems the most exact rendering, we then get a mystical contrast of another kind. The sparrow, keeping close at all times to the houses, denotes the faithful soul abiding steadfastly in the Church on earth ; the sioalloio, a migrating bird, and the sicift, a variety of it, which is in perpetual motion, and rarely touches the ground, will serve as the type of ransomed pilgrim souls which seek a better country, and seldom come in contact with earthly and carnal thoughts. Thine altars. The altar, as the most sacred part of the temple, is put for the whole building, around and about which the sparrows and swallows made their nests and flut- tered in security. We are told how even heathens looked on the birds which so trusted themselves, as it were, to di- vine protection as sacred and inviolate ; how one man was slain for harming a sparrow which had sheltered itself in a temple of ^sculapius ; how another drove out the sparrows from a sacred fane as a parable in action to shame those who proposed to deliver up a suppliant to his enemies ; and we may well believe that not less reverence was exhibited by the Jews. Interpreting the two birds of Christian souls, we may take the altars here in the most literal sense, with a true and deep meaning, as referring to the tables whence the heavenly banquet is dispensed for our refreshment, whereon lies that Body which gathers the eagles together. Or we may take the altars as denoting the human Soul and Body of Christ, on which the sacrifices of the faithful are daily offered, and wherein we shall have our eternal mansions, as we shelter in His side. And so the last of the Fathers exclaims : " O happy clefts, which build up faith in the Resurrection and in the Divinity of Christ ! ' My Lord,' saith Thomas, ' and my GrOD Whence came this oracle, save out of the clefts of the Rock ? Herein the sparrow hath found her an house, and the turtle a nest where she may lay her young. Herein the dove guards herself, and fearlessly looks on the wheeling hawk." As there were two principal altars in the Temple, those of burnt-offering and of incense, so Christ represents both to us, inasmuch as we offer up in Him our active works and the sacrifice of our animal passions, as well as the per- fume of meditation and prayer. Or we may extend the word to denote all the sacraments and holy rites of the Church, which are the nest wherein devout souls abide, and where they raise their young. And as Christ suffered on PSALM LXXXIV. 43 the altar of the Cross, so all those who take up that Cross, and offer on it their affections and lusts, being crucified to the world, and imitating His Passion, make it their nest, where they shelter under His outspreading wings. Yet again ; when they pass from the sufferings of this world, j^y^ their souls await their consummation and final bliss under the golden altar of God in heaven, their safe haven after a Rev. vi. 9. stormy ocean. But if Cheist be the speaker, and we are to look for His abiding-place, more than one interpretation is B. open to us. His altars will be, first, the will of His Fathee, on which He offered up His own will and His life ; next, they will be His Saints, whose life is a daily sacrifice, and in whom He is pleased to dwell ; and finally, we may take the altars, as in the case of His people, of the heavenly country itself. Note, then, the various epithets by which it Hugo Card, is described in the psalm. It is styled tabernacles, because of the indwelling ; courts, by reason of spaciousness ; house, as a place of quiet ; nest, because of security ; altars, by reason of the perfect oblation. And the delightsomeness of this happy land consists not even in all these, but because there is the palace of King and my God, in "Whose pre- sence is the fulness of joy. 4 Blessed are they that dwell in thy house : they will be alway praising thee. In the literal sense, this expresses the longing of the exiles AgeiUus. in a heathen land for the solemn rites of the Temple, and con- trasts the happiness of those Priests and Levites who served in the sanctuary with the misery of such as are cut off from all participation in the daily service of God. The words ma}^ Titeiman. then fitly be applied by us to the happiness of those who are faithful members of the Church on earth, and especially, as some will have it, to the inmates of Eeligious houses, whose Hugo Card, special task is the continual offering of the sacrifice of praise. But the highest sense is that which sees in the house that heavenly dwelling which is for all time, vast, spacious, and unshaken ; not like the frail and narrow nest in which we Beiiarmine. make our abode here on earth. And observe, remarks S. Augustine, that all earthly happiness springs out of action or possession. ISTecessity is the mother of all inventions, and , we are unable to imagine any riches or any felicity which ''■ does not depend on our doing or obtaining something. What \ then does heaven offer us ? The possession of GrOD, and the \ unceasing task of praising Him. Our business there will be \ the unending Alleluia. Nor let any one fear that weariness s. Bemai-d. Yes, God my King and portion, In fulness of His grace, We there shall see for ever, And worship face to face. Bern. Cluniac. Rhythmus. 44 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. and satiety must come of this ; for praise can only cease Le Blanc, when love ceases, or when wonder ceases. But as our love and knowledge of God will grow to all eternity, inasmuch as the subject-matter is infinite, the praise will be always new always ardent, always delightful. 5 Blessed is the man, whose strength is in thee : in whose heart are thy ways. Beiiarmine. As the preceding verse taught us the blessedness of frui- tion, so this one teaches the blessedness of hope. They are blessed wlio need no more holj), who have attained their crown and rest, but he is blessed too in his degree, who is toiling onwards, leaning on the everlasting Arm, towards his 'lome. I7i tohose heart are Thy ways. The word Thy is not in the Hebrew, and though giving a very true sense, adopted by many, limits unnecessarily the scope of the meaning here. The literal rendering is, Hujhways are in their heart. The highway y a paved and solid road, contrasted with a mere path, miry, uneven, and short, is taken by the Chaldee paraphrast as denoting confidence in God. But a somewhat wider meaning is given by comparing the words of the two great Prophets : of whom the one, speaking of Christ's kingdom, says : " And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called, The way of holiness ; the unclean shall not pass over it, but it shall be for those : the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein. No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it shall not be found there ; but the redeemed shall walk there." Jeremiah, calling on his nation to repent, cries aloud, " Set thee up way- marks, make thee high heaps : set thine heart towards the highway, even the way which thou wentest ; turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities." It is thus the way of salvation, the whole course of obedience to the will of God in self rdenial and holiness of life ; the chart of which must be indelibly printed in the pilgrim's heart, that he may not stray from the one track which leads to the hea- venly city. And with this squares very well that literalist interpretation, not without its fitness and beauty, which sees here a reference to the J ews in distant places, setting their faces towards J erusalem as the three great festivals drew on, and making their preparations to take the road which led thither. And remembering what is in truth the King's high- way, Who it is that hath said, " I am the Way," we come to the truest and deepest sense of all, for blessed are they who have Him in their hearts. But the LXX. and Vulgate turn the latter clause of the verse, He hath appointed goings-up ava^aa^Ls, ascensiones) in his heart. Here too we have a literal meaning assigned, not very different in its force from that already cited, that these goings-up, instead of applying to the elevated roadways, mean here the "terraces" or " stairs" R. Kimchi. 1 Rosen- mllller. Targum. Isa. XXXV. J Jer. xxxi. 21. Aben-Ezra. De Wette. Vatablus. S. John xiv. PSALM LXXXIV. 45 which. Solomon made for the temple with the algum-trees, Aj^eiiius. ki.hL«..k^ 2Chron.ix. for w^hich stairs the same word ill /DP is used. But what n. these goingS'up may mean for us, let us hear. One tells us A. that we ascend by love, and love only ; another that each C. sin repented and conquered is a fresh step on which we tread Hugo Card, as we leave it behind in mounting ; while a third specifies three great terraces of ascent, to wit, humility, works of mercy, and contemplation, which have severally ten, six, (ac- cording to the older computation of the works of mercy,) and Aibertus seven grades. There are various other interpretations given Magnus, of these steps, but they differ only by indicating divers vir- Ay. tues and good works as specially intended, and may well be summed up under the three heads of the purgative, illumina- Honorius. tive, and unitive ways of salvation. And man can appoint in his heart such a going-up by the co-operation of grace and ^ gruno free-will. He can appoint it, that is, set his resolve towards carth. it, but he cannot accomplish it of himself. ISTo one can do so, save He Who hath said, " No man hath ascended up s. John m. to heaven, but He that came down from heaven, even the '3- Son of Man, which is in heaven." And He too is that vieyra. Blessed One, Whose strength was in His Father, and Who, even here in the valley of weeping, had already ordained His going-up on high to reign. 6 Who going through the vale of misery^ use it for a well : and the pools are filled with water. The LXX. and Vulgate are at variance here with the Eng- lish version. Both agree in coupling the first part of the verse with the preceding one, as explaining the place of going-iip, and read the clause thus. In the valley of loeeping. That is, the spot whence our going-up must begin is in this A. present life of humiliation and suffering ; the press wherein the grapes must be crushed into wine, the depth whence we must commence to climb to the mountain's summit. Then q follows, in the place lohich he appointed. That is, as they -j^* severally take it, in the place which man, by his sin, has made what it now is, a place of sorrow and pain ; or if we take he to mean God, then this world is the place which He has appointed for our education and cleansing. They take Haymo. also a further and more beautiful view, by understanding the phrase as meaning, into (not barely in) the place which Se appointed. That is, we are going through the valley of weep- ing, as mere passing travellers, not to abide there, but we are going into the kingdom prepared for us from the begin- ning of the world, there to dwell for evermore. The true sense of the passage seems to point to the zeal and resolu- tion which overcome all obstacles in the way. It should run thus : Passing through the vale of loeeplng, they make it a well, and the early rain covers it with blessing. The 46 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. valley throngli which the pilgrims journey to Jerusalem is arid and waterless, and there is therefore no use in sinking wells. But cisterns or tanks can be formed on the surface by diligent toil, so as of the whole valley to make a well, and the early rain then covers with blessing this valley with its artificial ^00^5 and fills them. And this holds es- pecially of those who are set in some place where there is a Calvin. dearth of the Word and Sacraments of the Church, but who set themselves at all costs to obtain the water of salvation to quench the thirst of their souls. It is not on earth, so far as they are concerned, but must come to them from heaven ; all they can do is to make ready in faith for its reception, and trust to God so to bless them with His rain, that they who have gone forth weeping, and bearing good seed, may come Ps. cxxvi. 7- again with joy, and bring their sheaves with them. With this agree the words that follow in the Vulgate and LXX. which, instead of the pools are filled toith water, read./b;' the laiogiver will bestow blessing. He Who gave the Law as a press and a burden to afflict us, will give us grace and bless- ing in its stead, that after our trouble we may have joy. A. There is a curious Jewish interpretation of the whole passage Targum. to the effect that sinners, when beginning to repent, as they pass through the valley, will weep so copiously as to make the whole place a well of water, and will then break out into blessings upon the Lord Who taught them the way by which they refused to go, and hath now afflicted them for their cor- rection. 7 They will go from strength to strength : and unto the God of gods appeareth every one of them in Sion. From strength to strength. These words have been fre- quently translated from troop to troojp, and explained of the zeal of the new pilgrims, who hasten on so fast along the way, as to overtake and pass company after company of their pre- decessors, who at first had left them far behind. Thus the publicans and harlots pressed before the priests and lawyers into the kingdom of heaven ; thus weak women, like S. Faith, advanced into the noble army of Martyrs when men shrank back afraid ; thus too, the great array of the Saints grows ever larger, according to that saying, "At that time day by day there came to David to help him, until it was a great host, like the host of GrOD ;" until the number of the elect is complete, and all appear together in Sion. But a more usual interpretation of the passage is to see here a special blessing promised to the pilgrims, that whereas in other journeys men become weaker and weaker as they draw near the close, those who seek Jerusalem will grow in vigour as they march, and will reach the Holy City in perfected strength. They will Cocceius. De Muis. S. Matt, xxi. 31. I Chron. xii. 22. Hupfeld. PSALM LXXXIV. 47 go from the strength of the Law to that of Grace ; they will q ascend the ladder of holiness, adding one virtue to another ; they will pass from the strength of action to that of contem- H. plation ; they will pass from humility to grief for sin, and so ^ to full repentance and amendment, from the strength of con- flict in this world to the strength of sinlessness in the w^orld to come. So again, we may pass from the lower stages of Z. holiness, from the commoner virtues, necessary for all men to s. Hieron. salvation, to the higher practice of those Evangelical counsels addressed to but a few ; we are to go on " growing up into Him in all things, which is the Head, even Cheist." And ^p^- observe that it is said Thei/ loill go, showing that not the will gjanc and affection alone, but the actions of our life must co-operate with God's grace in this ascent of the soul. Wherefore the LoED saith in one place, " If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell all thou hast, and give to the poor, . . . and come, and fol- ^^^^-^ix. low Me ;" and again in another, "Arise, take up thy bed, and ^ ^^^^^ go unto thine house." And the immediate goal of such pro- g.' gress is the vision of God. Even here, in Sion, the place of expectation, we can spiritually contemplate Him, and still s. Bruno more perfectly in the open vision of the heavenly Sion, where we may see Him face to face. To those under the Law the ^o^o^^"^^- words telling of the God of gods in Sion, were a prophecy of L'- the visible appearance of the Incarnate Savioue in the earthly Jerusalem, to those under Grace they are no less clear in promising His presence in Jerusalem which is above, the mother of us all, to see Him Who is God of gods on earth, that is, of those true Saints of His, who are gods in their likeness unto Him ; Who is God of gods in heaven, Eternal above the seraphim. In a glass, through types and riddles, Dwelling here, we see alone : Then serenely, purely, clearly, We shall know as we are known. Fixing our enlightened vision On the glory of the Throne. There the Trinity of Persons Unbeclouded shall we see ; There the Unity of Essence Perfectly revealed shall be : Wliile we hail the Threefold Grodhead, And the simple Unity. And therefore, in his eagerness for this full enjoyment of s. Bruno the Beatific Vision, the singer bursts into a rapture of prayer : The Hymn, Quisquis valet. 8 O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer : hearken, O God of Jacob. 48 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. 9 Behold^ O God our defender the face of thine Anointed. and look upon Hengsten- berg. Ewald. R. Ishaki. Honorius. P. S. Basil. Theodoiet. L. A. C. S. Thomas Aquin. The Rhythm, Adoro Te. The words of this verse have been taken to signify that the Anointed himself is the speaker in the Psalm, and this, in connection with the ]DOssible Babylonian date, on which the Greek Fathers dwell, has suggested the idea that the im- prisoned J ehoiachin may be the author. But the Jewish commentators, for the most part, look on it as a mere appeal to the memory of David, and a prayer for help, for his sake, perhaps especially to his descendant, Zerubbabel, Prince of the Captivity, and thus, in a sense, the Anointed of the LoED. My jprayer, my one longing, is for Thee ; hearken then, O God of Jacob, God of the wrestUng, struggling soul which strives after Thee, and turn Jacob into Israel, pre- valent with Thee, a prince of Thy kingdom, a spectator of Thy glory. Be our Defender in our contests with the enemy who would fain keep us back from Thee ; and if we be un- worthy to make our petition, look upon the face of Thine Anointed, as He stands, our Great High Priest, before the mercy-seat, and for His dear merits, grant the longing of our hearts. And while some dwell on the word /ace in this verse as especially denoting the Manhood of Christ, by which He became known to His brethren, others, especially of the Eastern Fathers, apply the words to Christians, who are the body of the Lord, members of Him, flesh of His Flesh, and who have put on Him at Baptism ; and thus interpret the words of a prayer that the Father will behold His Son in us, and be gracious to us for His sake. Or, as the Father always looks upon Christ the Son, Christ desires us to pray that He may so look on Him as to cause Him to be looked upon by others, to be known, believed, and worshipped by them, so that men may go from strength to strength, till they at last see the God of gods in Sion. So again, we may take the words as our own prayer to our dear Master Himself, "Who hath made us His Anointed, with regal and sacerdotal unction, true kings and priests, and then the cry is that He, Who hath given us so much, may give us more. Thus, one of His truest servants exclaims : Jesu, Whom thus veiled I must see below. When shall that be granted which I long for so ; That at last beholding Thine uncovered face, Thou wouldst satisfy me with Thy fullest grace ? 10 For one day in thy courts : is better than a thousand. 11 I had rather be a door-keeper in the house of my God : than to dwell in the tents of ungodli- ness. PSALM LXXXIV. 49 Better, because the one day of Heaven liatli neitlier yester- Q. day nor to-morrow, because no night dims its brightness, no end overtakes it. Observe too, that the words may not be merely applied in general fashion to the attractions of God's service in His Church here on earth to the Jew of old, or the Ageiiius. Christian now, but they may be taken in a special way as looking to Cheist's first Advent. The number a thousand not only stands often in Scripture to denote totality and per- fection, and thus a dispensation of G-od, but it almost j)re- cisely marks the number of years which elapsed from the completion of Solomon's Temple till the Nativity of the LoED ; only one day in the sight of God. But the single day on which the heavenly hosts chanted their anthem over the manger in Bethlehem was better than all the festivals and rejoicings of the Mosaic code in its fourteen centuries of pre- vious existence. A door-Jceeper. Literally, I had rather stand on the threshold. But the Prayer Book version gives the true sense. This is a Korhite Psalm, and the descen- Bossuet. dants of Korah were, in fact, porters, and " keepers of the i Chron. ix. gates of the tabernacle, and keepers of the entry," as well as being permitted to swell the chorus of the inspired singers of Israel. On the love which the Saints have shown for the lowliest tasks in God's house, let us hear S. Paulinus of Nola: Illic dulce jugum, leve onus, blandumque feremus Servitium sub te, Domine, etsi Justus iniquis Non eges servis : tamen et patiere et amabis Qualescunque tibi, Christo donaute, dicatos, Et foribus servire tuis, tua limina mane Mundicie curare sines, et nocte vicissim Excubiis servire piis et munere in isto Claudere promeritam, defesso corpore, vitam. There easy yokes, light burden, service soft We shall have with Thee, Lord, although no need Hast Thou, the Righteous, of ungodly slaves ; But Thou wilt suffer and wilt love all those Vowed to Thee by Christ's gift to serve at morn, Cleansing Thy gates and thresholds, and at night Keeping pure watch by turns, and in this charge Closing a holy life with worn-out frame. Even heathens were not insensible to this kind of happiness. The Greek poet makes his hero sing, as he sweeps the thres- hold of Apollo's temple : Ka\6v 76 rhv ttouov, S) 4»o7)8e, (Tol rrph Bo/jlcov Xarpcvco Tifjicov [xat^r^lov edpav K\€Lvbs 5' 6 irOPOS jJLOl, d^olffLV ZovKav x^p' ^X^^^j oh QvaTOis, aW' adapdroLs' III. D Tn Natali S. Felicis. Euripid.Ion . 128. 50 A COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. €V