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THE BOOK OF PSALMS

THE BOOK OF PSALMS
WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
BY
W. F. COBB, D.D.

METHUEN & CO.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON

Pirst Published in 1905

PREFACE
r I lO add another Commentary on the Psalms of David to
-*- the many excellent commentaries already in use is an
undertaking which calls for a word of explanation. This is to
be found rather in the point from which the present work is
viewed than in any contribution it makes to the materials
from which the Psalms may be illustrated. Those materials are
to be found in the works of Hebrew scholars, such as Delitzsch,
Rosenmuller, Perowne, Duhm, Hitzig, or Olshausen, in great
fulness. The use, however, made by these writers of their
material is determined to a large extent by their prepossessions
in favour of traditional theology — Duhm is of course an excep
tion. This is especially true of the excellent English commentary
of Kirkpatrick — ^who in the main is a follower of Baethgen, and
to a slightly less extent of that of Jennings and Lowe.
In the absence of any extended work in English which treats
the Psalms of David freely as documents of religion in its
historical setting, apart from the after-thoughts of theology,
and from the meaning read into them by Christian writers, the
present work is modestly put forth. For reasons which duly
appear in the notes on the several Psalms the Psalter is treated
as a collection of documents which, as the Hymn Book of the
Second Temple, illustrate the type of piety which immediately
preceded the birth of Christianity.

vi PREFACE
The writer has dravm attention to the need of a more
thorough reconstruction of the text, but has not felt able to
do more than suggest emendations where the condition of the
present text speaks plainly of corruption. He has erred on
the side of conservatism because of the hazardous character of
conjectural emendations, wherever objective data are wanting,
as they too often are wanting in the criticism of the Psalter.
If ever such data are forthcoming they will be found in the
history of the three centuries B.C. rather than in any period
preceding them. A recognition of this lies, it is believed,
behind any successful attempt to elucidate the poems which
are called conventionally by the name of David.
The author desires to express his acknowledgments to the
reader of the Oa/mhridge University Press whose vigilance has
saved the printed page from many disfigurements.

CONTENTS PAGE
Preface  ^
Introduction  ^^
Diacritical Marks  ^i
Authorities  ^^^
Abbreviations  ^"*^"
Text and Commentary  1
Index  ^^^

INTRODUCTION
1. The Form of the Psalter.
The N.T. following the LXX speaks of the "Book of the Psahns"
(Lk. 20^ Acts 1^). The O.T. name is simply T'hilUm— pra«ses, for
which by a copyist's error T'philllm — prayers, was written at the close
of Book n. The full Synagogue title is Sepher T'hiUlm— 6ooA of
praises. Had the regular plural Sepher T'hill6th been used, it would
have described the Book as one containing songs of praise, instead of
one to be used as a praise book. The difference is that between
Hymn Book and Book of Hymns ; between Hymns Ancient cmd
Modern and Roundell Palmer's Book of Praise.
In the Hebrew Bible the Psalter is the first Book of the third
division, the Hagiographa, and consists of 150 Psalms, to which the
LXX add another "outside the number," being an autograph Psalm of
David -"when he fought his duel with Goliath."
These 150 Psalms are divided into five Books :

Book I

consists of Psalms

1— 41.

» n

JJ

)j

42— 72.

» in

JJ

JJ

73— 89.

» rvr

JJ

JJ

90—106.

» V

))

JJ

107—150.

The first four of these Books have each a doxology at the end, and
Book V is closed by a Psalm which is itself a doxology. But it is
evident that the division between Psalms 72 and 73 and between
Psalms 106 and 107 is not original, so that the original division was
into three Books, 1—41 ; 42 — 89 ; and 90-150. The further division
into five was made in all probability after the analogy of the Penta
teuch.

X INTRODUCTION
Many of the Psalms have superscriptions which name the author.
A few have none.
Book I : Psalms 1 and 2 are without superscription.
„ „ 3 — 41 are ascribed to David.
Book II: Psahns 51—72 (—66, 67) to David \
„ II : „ 42—49 to Korah j- Elohim Psalms.
„ ni: „ (50), 73—83 to Asaph |
,, 84 — 89 form a supplement.
Books IV and v: Psalms 90 — 150 are miscellaneous.
The name of the author is introduced by the "Lamed auctoris,"
e.g. I'D^vid. But as I'AsS-ph, TKhSr^h mean that the Psalm bearing this
superscription was taken from a collection of Psalms belonging to the
Asaph choir, or the Korah choir, so it is probable that I'DSrvid denotes
a Psalm taken from a "David-collection," and says nothing about the
authorship. David's name occurs at the head of 73 Psalms (= all in
Book I, except 1, 2, 10, and 33; 51—65; 68—70; 86, 101, 103, 108
—110; 122, 124, 131, 133, 138—145), that of Moses is prefixed to
Psahn 90; of Solomon to 72, 127; of Heman to 88 and Ethan to 89.
In commenting on the Psalms reasons will appear for refusing to accept
the authority of the superscriptions, and all that need be said here is
that (1) contradictory superscriptions (e.g. to Ps. 88) ; (2) the tendency
of the LXX to assign to David nameless Psalms ; (3) and anachronisms
(such as the mention of the Temple in a supposed Davidic Psalm);
and (4) Aramaic modes of speech, combine to show that the evi
dence of the superscriptions must be rejected as late guesses at the
authorship. They betray the beHefs of their period, but nothing
more. But the superscriptions contain also terms descriptive of the Psalms
themselves. These are as follows : (1) Mizm6r ; which is prefixed to
57 Psalms = a song with instrumental accompaniment ; (2) Shir ; pre
fixed 30 times = a song of any kind ; (3)MascMl; which is prefixed to
13 Psalms and denotes some kind of "skilful song"; (4) Micht^m;
6 times, meaning unknown; (5) ShiggMdn, Ps. 7 (? Dithyramb) ; and
(6) T'hilM, praise, Ps. 145.
Besides these we find a number of more or less unintelligible terms
prescribing the mode of music to be used (of which Selah is the best
known) and a few which are of the nature of rubrics. Of these latter
Ps. 92 bears Yjdm hashshabbath, for ihe Sabbath-Day; 38 and 70
I'hasklr./o/- a memorial, i.e. at the offering of incense ; while 120—134

INTRODUCTION xi
— the Psalter within the Psalter — are described by a term which means
Pilgrim-Songs. The problem of the text of the Psalter is in many respects as difficult
as that of the origin and growth of the Synoptic Gospels. It is one too
to which English commentators as a whole have contributed very little.
Yet passages abound in the Psalter which thrust the problem obtru
sively to the front. In deaHng with them the following canons rule :
(1) Where the M.T. gives a good sense it should stand; (2) Where the
text is open to suspicion, as e.g. when a hapax legomenon occurs and is
of doubtful meaning, then contemporary, or earlier parallels should be
considered, together with the versions; (3) Where the metre is dis
turbed corruption may be suspected; (4) Where an alphabetic Psalm
is broken up, corruption is certain ; (5) And in every, case due regard
must be had to the testimony of the history which lies as a background
behind the Psalter, and every part of it. Even when these canons are
kept in mind, and emendations are cautiously made, much uncertainty
must stiU remain. It must be long yet before a satisfactory text of
the Psalter can be established.

2. The Content of the Psalter.
TVliatever feeling the heart of man entertains towards God is in
turn expressed in the Psalter. It may be described as being the
expression of the ' God-consciousness ' of the Jewish Church. Luther
compares man's heart to a ship on the open sea exposed to winds from
aU four quarters of the compass. It is agitated by fear and anxiety,
grief and sorrow, hope and rashness, assurance and joy. All find the
finest expression in the Psalter — ' Would'st thou see the holy Christian
Church painted with life-like colour and form, placed in one small
picture, then take to thee the Psalter ; there thou hast a fine, clear and
pure mirror, which will show thee what Christianity is.' We shall
have occasion to notice repeatedly how often the Psalmists fail to show
' what Christianity is ' in some of their moods, as e.g. in their hatred
of their enemies, their belief that virtue is rewarded with temporal
prosperity, their slight hold on hope of a life after death, and their
inability to sever the spirit of religion from its national form. But,
these excepted, all that Luther says is true. The Psalter, as a whole,
is the noblest expression of personal religion which the world's literature
contains.

xii INTRODUCTION
The data it supplies for a critical fixing of the dates of authorship
are scanty, and for the most part doubtful. Even where a datum
seems to be given it is not always possible to be sure whether the
section containing it is an original part of the Psalm or a later addition
(the last two vv. of Ps. 51 afford a ready example). The hints given in
a Psalm may be quite consistent, or indeed only consistent, with a
Maccabean date, and yet they may be additions to an earher song, or
modifications of its phraseology made to make it suit some later
purpose, (Of this the Messianic insertion in Ps. 72 is an illus
tration.) The most conspicuous example, however, of the working over of
the Psalms by a later hand is found in "the Elohistic Psalms." The
following table is instructive :
In Book I, Elohim as a name for God occurs 15 times;
Jhvh 272 times.
In Book II, Elohim as a name for God occurs 164 times;
Jhvh 30 times.
In Book ni (73 — 83), Elohim as a name for God occurs
36 times; Jhvh 13 times.
The Supplement (84—89) wavers, for Elohim occurs 7 times
and Jhvh 31 times.
In Book IV, Elohim as a name for God does not occur ;
Jhvh occurs 103 times.
In Book V, Elohim as a name for God occurs 7 times ;
Jhvh 236 times.
In other words, in Books i, iv and v, Jhvh is the nsual name for
God, and in Books n and in, Elohim. This contrast in itself would be
striking, but it becomes still more so when we find that in these two
latter Books the original Jhvh has been struck out by a later editor
and Elohim substituted. For this procedure many reasons have been
suggested, but not one that is conclusive, A comparison of the doubles,
Pss. 14 and 53, and a glance at Ps, 45S 48^^ and 50' will show, how
ever, clearly enough that revision has taken place, and will also convince
us that at the time present needs were of more avail than reverence for
the letter.
It has been thought better to say in the commentary all that need
be said about specific Psalter problems. Of these the most important
are the interpretation of the "I" Psalms, the Psalmists' behef or non-
behef in immortality, and the so-called imprecations of such Psalms as

INTRODUCTION xiii
69 and 108. But as to the first, it may be said that the view taken in
this commentary is, that when a Psalmist says he lies sick on his bed,
he means what he says, and is not speaking in the name of his nation
of their evil condition in the midst of the neighbouring peoples. This
does not hinder the community from adopting his language later on,
and adapting it to their needs. In other words, a distinction has been
drawn between the Psalm as originally composed, and the Psalm as
forming part of the Temple or Synagogue worship.
So again the witness of the Psalms to belief in immortality is
fluctuating, and intelligible only on historical lines. Any theory of
verbal inspiration can serve only to throw it into confusion. But
speaking broadly, the Psalmists for the most part had no firm belief in
any blessed hfe after death, though now and then they trembled on the
bruik of it, and on the other hand they did rise to that sense of union
with their God, which is the one sure support and fundamental base for
such a belief, even among Christians.
The imprecations of the Psalms are no difficulty to one who believes
in a progressive revelation. What shocks the Christian sense was fit
and proper in the mouth of Judas Maccabaeus. Whether, as Prof.
Cheyne has suggested, the Prayer Book should be amended so as to
relieve Churchmen of the obligation to recite such imprecations, is a
question which does not seem to have caused any serious difficulty at
present to the consciences of Churchmen generally, and in any case
does not come within the scope of this Introduction,

3. The Date of the Psalms.
With one or two insignificant exceptions we are without objective
evidence of the date of origin of the separate Psalms in the Psalter. We
know indeed that at the time of the writing of the New Testament the
Book of Psalms was in existence ; and it is highly probable that it was
formed out of the smaller collections, but, if so, the origin of these latter
is shrouded in obscurity, which is hardly relieved by the superscriptions,
or the contents of the divisions which have come down to us. The fact
that in the "Elohistic Psalms" (42—83) the original name for God,
Jhvh, has been replaced by Elohim shows that some sufficient time had
elapsed between their composition and their revision to allow of a
change of religions mood, and shows also that the change was made at
a time when verbal inspiration had not become a dogma, i.e. at some

xiv INTRODUCTION
time before the Psalms were regarded as canonical. The super
scriptions of the Psalms are by common consent worthless as docu
ments of date of origin. We have one verse (79^) quoted in 1 Mace. 7'^,
and another (146^ referred to in 1 Mace. 2*^'- Ps. 74 may be dated
with confidence in B.C. 167, and a fair number of others may be safely
referred to the Maccabean period. For the rest, we must confess that
so far as external evidence goes they might be referred to any age from
the time of David onwards.
There does not seem, however, to be any historical ground for the
tradition which makes David to be both a composer of sacred poems,
and also a player on the harp. The latter may be allowed, but in aU
probability the former is an illegitimate expansion of what tradition
said of David's musical capacity. In Amos 6^ extemporisers at feasts
are! accused of being emulous to rival David's skill, but the remark is
probably a gloss, and in any case refers to secular music, not to sacred.
There is in fact the same reason for referring sacred poetry to David as
its father, as there is for ascribing ' wisdom ' to Solomon, or legislation
to Moses, or circumcision to Abraham, and that reason was not so
much historical as ideal. It is true that the choice of these men as
epon)Tnous heroes was not purely arbitrary. In each case sufficient
ground existed for placing the hero at the head of a line of develop
ment ; but in none are we justified in speaking of independent
originality, still less of anything but an impetus which moved later
generations. The Book of Jubilees affords an exceUent illustration of the
tendency which marked post-exilic Judaism in general, and showed
itself in the ascription of the Psalter to David. In that book (written
between b.c. 135 and B.C. 105) we are given a midrash on the history of
Israel from the Creation onwards, similar to the midrash known to us
as the two Books of Chronicles, only that this latter rewrites the
history from the point of view of the Priests' Code. In the Book of
Jubilees the law is carried back not to Moses, but to the Creation.
Adam himself offers the first daily sacrifice. The law of " an eye for
an eye " is first manifested in Cain. The feast of weeks began with Noah,
as did the feast of the new moon, Abram instituted tithes, and ordered
many details of the sacrificial ritual. The Day of Atonement was
taken back to the death of Joseph. The Patriarchs became priests and
exponents of the moral and religious ideals of the Maccabean period.
The whole history, indeed, is treated with a freedom which declares
plainly how little conception the author had of the meaning of 'history'

INTRODUCTION xv
as it is understood to-day. By analogy we are able to argue that what
operated in the Book of Jubilees, in the Book of Chronicles, to some
extent in Ps. 78, operated no less strongly in the choice of David as the
founder of sacred Israelitish poetry, of Solomon as the first of the
Wise Men, and of Moses as the first of legislators. In the case of all
three enough of fact existed to make the canonisation plausible, but
not enough to justify the large place assigned to them as themselves
the authors of what after generations slowly produced.
But though external evidence is wanting, the internal evidence is
strong enough to warrant the exclusion of all our existing Psalms from
the pre-exilic period. Though it is true that some Psalms are of a
timeless character, in that they express feelings which are peculiar
to no age; yet, on the other hand, it is also true that the Psalter as a
whole does reflect post-exiHc piety, and does not reflect that of the
age of the Monarchy. Amos tells us that sacrifices were not offered in
the wilderness ; lets us see that the cult of Bethel was a Jhvh cult,
and indicates plainly that the Jhvh of his day, as represented by His
official representatives, differed from the deities of the land only in
being the God of Israel. Jhvh was not to Amaziah and his colleagues
the God of Heaven and Earth; He was not the God Whose chief
characteristic was moral righteousness. By His altar the Mass^b^h
still stood, and cromlechs were objects of veneration. The cult of
ancestors; the cutting of the flesh; the use of the Ash^r^h; the
veneration of sacred objects, such as trees and stones ; polydemonism,
united to a tribal devotion to their own God, Jhvh — these are the
characteristic marks of pre-exilic religion. They are just as character
istically wanting to post-exilic religion, and where they occur at all, it
is either as a survival, or a literary instrument only. Or to put the
same view in another way : Before the Exile Jhvh was chiefly
worshipped after the manner of the Canaanites; after the Exile His
worship became more and more closely identified with obedience to the
Law. The Psalter, in whole and in detail, is imbued with the spirit of
post-exilic piety. The theology is that of the Scribes, not that of
polydemonism, or even of monolatry. To transfer it, or any part of it,
to pre-exilic times is to throw the history of the rise and growth of
monotheism in Israel into as hopeless confusion as is caused when the
ritual of Ezekiel, and the second Temple, is assigned to Moses and the
Tabemacle in the Wilderness. "Jahwe is for the original Jahwism
the God of the people of Israel ; not more, because by His side stood
the gods of the heathen ; not less, because He too looks after the public

xvi INTRODUCTION
affairs of the people at home. He is the God of the outer and of the
inner history of the people of Israel ; but only after He had revealed
Himself as the God of Justice and Bighteousness in the deepest sense
does He become recognised as the highest, and finally as the one and
only God." (Marti, Geschichte der Israelitischen Religion, p. 65.) The
rise of written prophecy, and the Exile, cut Israel's religious history
into two separate segments, and even though the customs and habits of
the earlier reappear every now and then in the later, yet the two are
so distinct in outward form and inner spirit, that the perverse action of a
traditional bias alone can account for the failure to distinguish them.
A few points may be briefly described so as to show this distinction.
1. The Messiah is not mentioned in the Prophets, and, therefore,
in no writer before Deutero-Isaiah. Neither Amos nor Hosea speaks of
him ; in Deut, 28 and Lev. 26 — two collections of promises and threats
— is no reference to him ; Ezekiel outlines the ftiture, but he finds no
place for Messiah, as do Pss. 2, 72, 110, &c. Before the days of
Deutero-Isaiah a deliverer indeed is often looked for, and often
promised, but He is none other than Jhvh Himself.
2. The Presence of Jhvh was a fact to the rehgion of pre-
exilic days in proportion as it approximated to the Nature-religion of
Canaan. Jhvh was indeed one, though worshipped on every high hiU
and under every green tree, at Bethel as at Jerusalem, just as "Our
Lady" is but one though she has many dwelling-places. But He dwelt
in every sacred spot, and was found wherever sacrifice was duly offered.
The religious concept of Jhvh before the rise of the Prophets was of
an animistic character. The Prophets first spiritualised Jhvh ; then •
asserted His moral majesty ; till finally He became a transcendent
God. Whose temple was in Heaven, Whose servants were on Earth
(Ps. 115 is the classic example of this dichotomy). The fact that Jhvh
is sought and found by the Psalmists on Zion is no proof that they
belonged to pre-exilic days. The Israelites set up Zion as their
religious and political centre, after the pattern of unity they had
seen in Babylon. Jhvh was no longer localised in the old sense, but
yet He was not wholly cut off from His people. The older current of
religion had rolled by, but its backwash was felt. Jhvh's tran
scendence was toned down by the formula of a covenant. He would
reveal himself in the place He had chosen to set His name in — as the
Priests and Levites and devout laity loved to think. Gradually, how
ever, even this reverence for the Temple as the chief blessing of the
Covenant gave way to the higher and higher majesty claimed for the

INTRODUCTION xvii
Law. Both these later stages are revealed in the Psalter, — the former
in such Psalms as 15 and 24, and the latter in 19 b and 119.
3. The Conception of Sm differs in the later period from that
held in the earlier. In this a manifold taboo provides the material of
sin ; in that it is disobedience to the sacred Law. Sin in the one case
was determined by "sympathetic magic"; in the other, by the moral
demands of a Moral Person. Even where the Psalmists feel that sin is
punished by material suffering ; when they express their doubts, or fears,
or ignorance about death, and the other side, they invariably speak as
men who have been taught that the moral is the axis ai-ound which all
their rehgious interests revolve.
4. Public Worship as delineated in the Psalter is certainly not
that of the pre-exilic period. It makes little of sacrifice; it delights in
the sioging, the processions, the public prayers, the music ; it emphasises
in short those very points which passed over into the synagogue, and,
to the same degree that it does that, it stands away from the normal
type of worship which is afforded by the union of Jhvh and Canaanitish
cult in pre-exflic times.
In short, whether we take the spirit of the Psalter as a whole, or
analyse it, and study its separate self-manifestations, we are forced to
the conclusion that it belongs to the days after the Exile, when exile,
and travel, and comparative rehgion, and closer acquaintance with a
wider culture had done their work. But for the Exile we might not
have had a Jewish Psalter. We should not have had one to which
Jewish piety would have cared to put the name of David, nor one
which would have been taken as its Hymn-Book by a Christian
Church — if indeed we could have had such a thing as a Christian
Church at all.

DIACRITICAL MARKS.
[ ] Denotes a passage which should be added to the text.
[[ I Denotes a passage which should be omitted from the text.
h H Denotes a translation which notably differs from A.V.
'~ "' Denotes that the text or its translation is doubtful.

AUTHORITIES.
Baethgen, Die Psalmen, in Hand-Kommentar zum Alten Testament
(Gottingen, 1897).
Baldensperger, W., Die Messianisch^Apokaiyptischen Hoffnungen des
Judentums (1903).
BoussBT, W., Die Religion des Judenthums (1903).
Cheyne, ,600^0/ Psalms (London, 1888) ; Origin of the Psalter dLonAcm, 1891).
Cobb, W. P., Origines Judaicae (1895).
Delitzsch, Franz, Biblical Commentary on the Psalms, 3 vols, (Edinburgh,
1871).
Driver and Briggs, Hebrew and English Lexicon (Oxford, 1898, &c.).
Duhm, Die Psalmen, in Kurzer Hand-Commentar zum Alten Testament
(Tubingen, 1900).
Ewald, Commentary on the Psalms (London, 1881).
GESENrus-KAUTzscH, Hebraische Orammatik (1902).
Grimm, K, J., Euphemistic Liturgical Appendixes in the Old Testament
(Leipzig, 1901),
Hengstenberg, Commentary on the Psalms, 3 vols, (Edinburgh, 1846).
Hitzig, Ferdinand, Die Psalmen Uebersetzt und Angdegt (1863).
Jennings and Lowe, The Psalms with Introductions and Critical Notes,
2 vols. (London, 1877).
Kautzsch, E., Die Psalmen uhersetzt (1893).
Kirkpatrick, The Book of Psalms with Introduction and Notes (Cambridge,
1902),
Marti, Karl, Geschichte der Israelitischen Religion (4th edition).
Montefiorb, The Book of Psalms (London, 1901).
Olshausen, Justus, Die Psalmen ErMart (1853).
Perowne, The Book of Psalms, 2 vols. (London, 1878).
RosBNMiJLLBR, Scholia in Veius Testamentum (Lipsiae, 1781).
SoHiJRER, Bmil, History of the Jewish People (Eng. Trans.), 1897.
Wellhausen, The Book of Psalms, in the Polychrome Bible (London, 1898).
ABBREVIATIONS.
A.V. = Authorised Version. N.T. =New Testament.
Ace. = According. O.T. =01d Testament.
Heb. = Hebrew, P.B.V. = Prayer Book Version.
LXX. = Septuagint. Ps.; Pss. = Psahn; Psalms.
M.T. = Massoretic Text. R.V. = Revised Version.

BOOK I.
PSALMS 1—41.
PSALM L
1 Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the
ungodly :
That standeth not in the way of sinners :
That sitteth not in the seat of the scornful.
2 Whose delight is in the '"fear"' of Jhvh :
Who in his law doth meditate day and night.
3 For he shaU be like a tree planted by the water-brooks
That bringeth forth its fruit in its season :
Its leaf withereth not :
So whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
4 The ungodly are not so :
But are like the chaff which the wind scattereth.
5 Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the Judgment :
Nor shaU sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
6 For Jhvh knoweth the Way of the righteous :
But the Way of the ungodly shall perish.
It matters little whether this Ps. was once the first part of the
second, or was composed by the last compiler of the Psalter as a
preface to the whole, or was merely selected by him for that purpose.
Its subject is general, not particular. That God has appointed salva
tion to the righteous, perdition to the wicked, this is the great Truth
with which the sacred bards grapple, amid all the painful experiences
of life which apparently indicate the reverse. Like the Decalogue and
the Negative Confession of Ch. 125 of the Egyptian Book of the Dead
c. 1

2 PSALMS [I.
it puts the emphasis of blessedness on what a man has not done. In
this it resembles Hillel's answer to the man who wished to become a
proselyte, provided that the Jewish religion could be taught him in so
short a time as he could stand on one foot: "Whatever is not pleasant
to thee do not unto thy fellow-man." On that Rabbi Ismael said :
" The orders of the Pentateuch contain either prohibitions or per
missions. The first are of importance; the latter are not; but the
words of the doctors are always so." So here the blessedness promised
is to the man who does not adopt a lax ethical system, does not order
his life by a " principled licentiousness," and does not openly take the
side of those who scoff at religion.
The negative, however, passes at once into the positive. The good
man's delight is in the law of God : — in the outer law of custom,
tradition or scripture, of Church or Bible, if he is on the plane of
Judaism ; in the inner law of heart and conscience, if a Christian.
The two planes may be combined, as by Baalshem, who said that the
Law being the word of God, God is more easily discovered and absorbed
in this Revelation than in any other. Such an enthusiast draws his
inspiration from the hidden waters of divine wisdom, and his works
and words are, therefore, evergreen. Moreover as his is the Kingdom,
earthly goods are given him according to his need — his hfe is pros
perous— Mt. 6'*''
On the other hand the ungodly, by losing touch with Reality,
become light and worthless as chaff, and are being daily .tested and
rejected as often as the Son of Man in the person of one of His followers
crosses their path.
Exclusion from the congregation in the Judaist sense is an act of
discipline inforo externa ; in the Christian the sinner is self-excluded
because self-judged.
The opening word of the Psalter, ashrgi=0 tlie blessednesses, is
related to y^shar, upright, and contains, therefore, a popular judg
ment that good luck follows on uprightness (cf. 41^). But uprightness
here is synonymous with the fear of Jhvh (read with Lagarde in v. 2
yir'ath for Tarah ; cf. 19^ 34"; Is. 11^), that is with legal rectitude,
the Torah being at once the law-book, book of devotion, and moral
hand-book of the pious Israelite.
Hence the ungodly, sinners, scornful are those who do not observe
the Law, not as we should say to-day the irreligious, indifferent or
worldly-minded classes, but an organised, definite body with counsels
of their own, which stood opposed to the party that represented zeal
for the Law of Jhvh, Ps. 1 in short sets before us the Psalter as a
song-book of strict Judaism which loathed and detested aU ethnicising
tendencies— which enshrined itself in the Scribes and Pharisees, and
lived in bitter conflict with Sadducean laxity.
The judgment in v. 5 is the Messianic judgment, which was to
sever the sinners from the righteous. Hence when John Baptist came
to herald that judgment it was natural that he should use the imagerv
of V. 4 (Lk. 3 "). * '

II. 1-12] PSALMS 3
PSALM II.
1 Why do the heathen rage ?
Why do the peoples imagine vanity ?
2 Why do the kings of the earth set themselves :
Why do the rulers conspire,
Against Jhvh, and against his Anointed, saying,
3 "Let us break their bands asunder,
And cast away their cords from us"?
4 He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh :
Jhvh shall have them in derision.
5 Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath :
He shall vex them in his anger.
6 '""As for me, I have been set as King"'
Upon '"his"' holy hill of Zion.
7 I will declare the decree :
Jhvh hath said unto me, 'Thou a/rt my Son :
This day have I begotten thee.
8 Ask of me, and I shall give thee the nations for thine
inheritance,
Even the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.
9 Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron :
Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel.'"
10 Be wise now, therefore, 0 kings :
Be instructed, 0 judges of the earth.
11 Serve Jhvh with fear :
Worship him with trembling.
12 pC^iss the Son]] lest he be angry, and ye perish from the
Way:
For shortly will his wrath be kindled.

Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.
That this Ps. has a Messianic subject is agreed by all. But no
agreement exists as to the character of the Messiah depicted in it,
whether he is the "ideal" Messiah of Jewish eschatology, or an actual
reigning monarch in whom was seen the fulfilment, or the promise
1—2

4 PSALMS [II.
of fulfilment, of the national hope. But, as it seems to us, v. 3 _ is
decisive for the latter, for it is impossible to believe that the Psalmist
could think of the arrival of the Messianic age, the estabhshment of
Jhvh's Kingdom, and a subsequent rebellion of the world-powers.
It is moreover contrary to all the psychology of religion to treat
any Ps, as a fancy picture based on no facts of experience. If the
age of the Maccabean struggle be rejected, some similar age must stiU
stand for this Ps. In any case it has close affinities with a strain of
Messianic hope which recurs often in the late Judaic eschatology. In
the Jewish Sibyllines it is said that God will send from the East a
King, who will put an end to all war upon earth, killing some and ful
filling His promises to others. When He appears, the heathen kings
will assemble to attack the Temple (iii. 652-794). In the Book of
Enoch (xc. 16 ff.) the Syrians, pictured as eagles, vultures, ravens and
kites, assemble against the Messianic hero. Then God Himself took
the staff of wrath in His hand and smote the earth till it was rent
asunder. In the Pharisaist Psalms of Solomon (xvii. 26) this Ps. is
reproduced in its spirit and one verse quoted : " He shall thrust out
the sinners from the inheritance, utterly destroy the proud spirit of
the sinners, and as potters' vessels with a rod of iron shall he break
in pieces all their confidence." Cf. Dan. 2"; Judith 16".
After comparing these and similar passages it is difficult to resist
the conviction that Ps. 2 belongs also to the same relatively late strain
of thought and hope, and that its terms are such as might fitly be used
in an accession-hymn of Aristobulus I, or Alexander Jannseus.
That it does not, moreover, refer to David, or to Solomon, is
evident from the question about the rebellion of the peoples. The
Aramaic colouring of its phraseology seems to put Jehoshaphat,
Uzziah and Hezekiah out of our reckoning ; and finaUy, the absence of
any heading may point also to a late date. What the historical posi
tion assumed in the Ps. is, is clear enough in outline. A king has
just ascended the throne ; his power is not shadowy, but all the same
is not unquestioned, for other nations and their princes are assuming
the offensive. But they are forgetting a factor, which to the Psalmist
is aU-important, and that is the presence of Jhvh on the side of the
anointed king. Moreover, they do not seem aware of the appointed
"day of Jhvh," of which the prophets were full. When that day
comes (= then of v. 5), and it will come soon (v. 12), it will be a day of
wrath, when Jhvh's representative shall break his enemies in pieces as
a man breaks clay pottery. Therefore, is the Psalmist's practical con
clusion, it will be well for the Edomites, or Phihstines, or Moabites, or
whoever the restless peoples may be, to forestall that day by making
their submission at once. If not, it may be too late when the king
sets out on his way. The children of Gibeon once were saved because
they submitted in time. Ai which resisted was destroyed. So would
history repeat itself
Yet the Psalm is not Messianic in the full Christian sense, but
strictly speaking in that Judaic cschatological sense which marked a

II.] PSALMS 5
step on the road towards the conception given by our Lord. It centres
round the prophetic "day of Jehovah" (v. 5 then). When His wrath
blazes forth on that day those who trust in Him will find deliverance ;
others will perish from the way, — "the way is the politic of that
King." If then the Ps. is not a "fancy picture floating in the air," but is
based on an urgent political danger, and reflects the cschatological
hopes called out by a present distress, it is not difficult to see how it
becomes by a necessary analogy the picture also of Christian Messianic
hope. That too feels the attacks of the world-powers; looks for the
return in spiritual majesty of Jesus, its Messiah ; and is confident that
happiness awaits those who have trustful faith, and misery those who
choose the lower good, and so make it their evil.
In V. 6 the LXX text has been followed. In v. 7 son is not a term
of metaphysic, or of mere honour, but of social rank. All men are
"servants of Jhvh"; much more those, who like kings, or priests, are
called to a position of authority and of larger responsibilities, Israel
was Jhvh's son (Hos, 11'), but all nations might become so, and sooner
or later were to become sons.
This truth that Jhvh is the Father of those who serve Him, and
that men become His sons by the acceptance of service, meets us of
course on a lower plane than it stands on for the Christian. To the
Psalmist his king was Jhvh's son in a peculiar and limited sense, but
the Christian belongs to a community of which not the head alone but
every member is a son, because he is at once a king and a priest in his
own right. Yet the value of the Jewish conception is that it is the
historical antecedent to the Christian teaching that not kings only but
all men have God as their Father,
In V. 12 the much debated kiss, the Son, whether the text of it is
correct or not, must be regarded as a marginal gloss, which has crept
in, and broken up the connection of the thought. For the subject of
the next, lest he be angry, is certainly Jhvh, as it is of the preceding
clauses in v. 11. The whole of m. 10-12 indeed have forgotten the
king who was the subject of m. 1-10. Like ,^sop the writer is now
done with his story, and is stating its moral ; and that moral is that
since "the day of Jhvh" is a certain fact (whether introduced by
Him personally, or through His Messiah is indifferent), the best pre
paration for it is a present submission to one who is His son, i.e. His
vicegerent. Submission to Him will have a supernatural character, for
it will not mean the submission of one earthly king to another earthly
king, but of an earthly king to the heavenly,
12 c. The same feeling which shrank from concluding Lamenta
tions with the thought of Jhvh's wrath, prompted here the addition
of this clause. (Grimm, Euphemistic Liturgical Appendices to the
O.T, p. 13,)

5 PSALMS [III- 1-8
PSALM III.
A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son,
1 Jhvh, See the increase of mine enemies !
See how many assail me 1
2 How many are there who are saying of me.
In Jhvh is no help for him. Selah.
3 But thou, Jhvh, art my shield :
Thou art my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.
4 I ever cry aloud unto Jhvh :
Ever doth he hear me out of his holy hill. Selah.
5 I lay me down : I sleep :
I awake : for Jhvh keeps me.
6 I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people,
That have set themselves against me round about.
7 [[Arise, 0 Jhvh ; save me, 0 my God :]]
For thou dost smite all mine enemies upon the cheek bone ;
thou dost break the teeth of the ungodly.

8 Salvation unto Jhvh :
Thy blessing be upon thy people. Selah.
" His holy hill " is not to be taken in a general sense, but is said of
Mount Zion. This points to a post-exiHc date. The writer is a person
of importance, a king or a priest, or at any rate the leader of a party.
He was in danger not from aliens, but from myriads of the people,
and tells us of his habit of finding, as religious people always do find,
his help in God. Heaviness might endure for a night, but joy came in
the morning.
With the exception oi 1 b the whole Ps. is redolent of the pure
spirit of Christianity. It tells of persecution and persecutors (for
this reason it was used by the Church in the commemoration of
martyrs) ; of the habit of religion to endure as seeing Him who is
invisible ; of firm confidence in the presence of overwhelming power ;
and of faith in the power of God to give salvation.
The emphasised contrast in many (v. 1), thou (v. 3), and I (v. 5)
should be noted.
/ cry aloud (v. 4), cf note on 142'.
It is best to take perfect tenses in 5 (sustaineth), and in 7 (smitest)
as not narrative but descriptive of the writer's constant experience.
7 a should be omitted, as obnoxious to the metre, and to the
following fo?:

IV. 1-8] PSALMS 7
The concluding prayer " upon Thy people be Thy blessing " reminds
us of " Pather, forgive them," and is a euphemistic liturgical appendix.
See note on 2'".
The Hebrew notion of salvation is that oi freedom, and enlargement,
the having the feet set in a large room, so that one may go in and out
at will, and find pasture.
The enigmatical music-mark Selah occurs here for the first time in
the Psalter. It occurs in all 73 times and three times in Habakkuk.
It is to be taken as denoting a pause in the music, and therefore, in the
sense, and not as a direction =fortissimo.

PSALM IV.
To the chief Musician on the strings, A Psalm of David.
1 Hear me when I call, 0 God of my righteousness :
¦"Set me free from my distress : "'
Have mercy upon me : hear my prayer.
2 0 ye sons of men, how long will ye dishonour my glory ?
!How long will ye love what is vain, and seek what is false?
Selah.
3 '"Now learn that Jhvh hath made wonderful his kindness
to me:"'
Know that whensoever I call Jhvh will hear me.
4 Be ye angry ; sin not :
Rebel not ; be stiU. Selah.
5 Offer the sacrifices of righteousness.
And put your trust in Jhvh.
6 Many are they that say, "Who will shew us good?"
Jhvh, lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us.
7 Thou hast put gladness in my heart,
More than is theirs when their corn and their wine are
increased.
8 I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep :
For it is thou, Jhvh, that keepest me safe.
All commentators are agreed in referring Ps, 4 to the same author
as Ps. 3. Hence as the former contains indications that a high-priest
is the author, it confirms the suspicion of a priestly origin that Ps. 3
suggested. The spiritual beauty of this Ps. is dimmed where the
attempt is made to make the heading govern the content. That
heading apart the Ps. gives clearly enough its own milieu. The people

8 PSALMS [IV.
were suffering from a bad harvest, or a succession of bad harvests, and
for this they held the high-priest responsible. Prom them he appeals
(v. 1) to God, in a verse which might serve in a liturgical composition
as an antiphon. He next turns round on his calumniators with the
indignant enquiry :—" How long will ye insult my high office, a,nd put
earthly goods (corn and wine) before religious, so resting on vanity and
lies ? That you are in error is clearly shown by the fact that Jhvh
distinguishes me with His favour as He did Moses and Samuel, the
heroes of answered prayer (Jer. 15'). He hears me when I caU on Him.
You may be angry (so LXX) but do not sin by giving your anger
words; be roused in your hearts, if you like, but keep silence. Do
what is right before God, and trust in Him. This course of action
is better than reproaches against me."
Then to the despondent who aSk : "When shall we be better off?
Who will show us any good ? " the poet replies, " God will " ; and
then he appeals to Jhvh Himself to justify his confidence, in the high-
priestly benediction. Next he reasserts his own inner joy by declaring
that in spite of ah he is far more happy than his revilers were when
they enjoyed good harvests. He has the peace which the world can
neither give nor take away ; he can lay him down in security even
alone, for he is never less alone than when alone.
The chdsid oi v. 3 (godly-man) is the first occurrence in the
Psalter of a word which is characteristic. It occurs in it 25 times in
all, and elsewhere in O.T. 5 times only. If it is to be interpreted by
the analogy of its cognate chesed, which occurs 127 times in the
Psalter, and means nearly always " God's lovingkindness to man," then
it must mean " one to whom God shows lovingkindness." It is God,
therefore, who establishes the relationship, not man ; that is, the
word moves properly in the realm of religion, not of ethic. It is in
a derivative sense when it is used to describe the lovingkindness
shown by man to man, as a reflection of the original which came from
God to man. From being religious it becomes moral. But it is never
used of man's love to God in the Psalter. (See Kirkpatrick in loco ;
Cheyne, Origin ofthe Psalter, p. 370; W. Robertson Smith, Prophets
of Israel, pp. 160, 408 ; G. A. Smith, Book of the Twelve Prophets,
I. 243, &c., and Oxf. Heb. Lex. s.v.)
The Chasldim in later use were those who loved Jhvh because He
first loved Israel, They were on the side of the Maccabees in their
resistance to the Seleucidse, and their name eventually came to denote
men who were narrow in their piety, legalistic in their ethic and
militant in their propaganda. Ps. 149 illustrates this degeneracy.
3. Read with Oxf. Heb. Lex. and many commentators chesed ll
for ch^sld Id, kindness to me for his beloved one. Cf 17', 31^'.
4 a. Render as above with LXX. 4 b. In your heart is a variant of
upon your bed (R.V.) and both are glosses which destroy the metre.
Duhm suggests m'rH for imrfi, rebel for commune. Cf. 5'°. Others give
up as hopeless the attempt to make sense.
5. The sacrifices of righteousness - those prescribed by the Law.

V. 1-12] PSALMS 9
PSALM V.
To the chief Musician upon Nehiloth, A Psalm of David.
1 Give ear to my words, 0 Jhvh :
Consider my whispered (prayer).
2 Hearken unto the voice of my cry, my King, and my God :
For unto thee do I pray.
3 Jhvh, thou shalt hear my voice in the morning :
In the morning will I set in order my prayer unto thee, and
will look up.
4 For thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wicked
ness:
Evil shall not dwell with thee.
5 Fools shall not stand in thy sight :
The wicked thou hatest.
6 Liars thou shalt destroy :
Deceivers Jhvh loathes.
7 But as for me, I will enter thy house trusting in thy
wonderfully great goodness :
I wiU worship toward thy holy temple, filled with thy fear.
8 Lead me, Jhvh, in thy righteousness because of mine
enemies :
Make thy Way plain before my face.
9 For there is no faithfulness in their mouth :
Their inward part is very wickedness:
Their throat is an open sepulchre:
They flatter with their tongue.
10 Destroy thou them, 0 God :
Let them fall by their own counsels:
Cast them out through their abounding transgressions:
For they have rebelled against thee.
11 But let all those that put their trust in thee rejoice:
Let them ever shout for joy, because thou defendest them:
Let them also that love thy name be joyful in thee.
12 Bless the righteous :
Let thy favour, Jhvh, be his shield.
-A "Guest-psalm," as also a persecution Ps., written either by a
priest, or at any rate by a pious frequenter of the Temple, who certainly

10 PSALMS [V.
found the Temple-worship a joy and not a wearisome duty. Where
Ps. 23 looks upon the godly man as privileged to be a dweller in
Jhvh's house, here he is described as a guest: — "The ungodly is
no guest of Thine." The priestly colouring of the Ps. comes out again
in verse 3 where the reference to the daily sacrifice is clear. As the
priest laid the wood in order, and prepared the sacrifice generally, and
then looked, as did Elijah, for fire from heaven, or some other sign of
acceptance, so does the persecuted Psalmist prepare his offering of
prayer, and then look up for the Divine reply. How different the
spirit of the Persian and pagan poet :
As then the tulip for its morning sup
Of heavenly vintage from the soil looks up,
Do you devoutly do the like, till Heaven
To earth invert you, like an empty cup.
The Psalmist identifies his enemies — those who lie in wait for
him — -with the enemies of Jhvh, the boasters, the workers of iniquity,
the liars and men of blood. In their mouth are lies, in their heart
deceit. Their tongue is smoothed to flattery, so as to conceal the
yawning opening to the abyss of corruption within. Cicero gives us
the same image of the throat being the channel by which evil leads its
victims to hell : Eripiie nos ex faucibus eorum quorum crudeliias, &c.
(Crass, apud Cicer. de Orat. i, 52, 225).
In the Talmud it is said : "Upon three things the world stands :
upon truth, upon judgment, upon peace. He who breaks his word his
sin is as great as if he worshipped idols. Such a one belongs to one
of the four classes who are not admitted into the presence of the
Shechinah ; these are the scoffers, the hypocrites, the liars, and the
slanderers." The Psalmist, on the other hand, holds fast to the righteousness of
Jhvh, i.e. to His covenant-faithfulness. It was due to Himself — this
the Psalmist assumes as beyond questioning — that He should vindicate
His own. "History, to Israel, was God's supreme tribunal. It was
the faith of the people, expressed over and over again in the Old Testa
ment, that the godly man is vindicated or justified by his prosperity :
the way of the ungodly shall perish." (G. A. Smith, Book of Isaiah,
II. 218.) So on the other hand must the godly be careful to observe his side
of the covenant. He must keep the law, and to keep it he must know
it, and to know it he needs Jhvh's word to be a lamp to his feet and a
light to his path. So he asks that God's way may be made level
or straight before his face, so that he may fail in no point of obedience,
and therefore give no occasion to those that lie in wait for him.
The last verse should perhaps follow the reading of the LXX:
"Thoucrownedst us, 0 Lord, with the arm of Thy favour" — Jhvh's
favour is a visible sign of the moral worth of the godly.
The whole Ps. breathes of a party-strife centring round the posses
sion of the Temple, and presupposes a time when the Temple was the

VI. 1-10] PSALMS 11
religious centre of the people, i.e. gives the Deuteronomic legislation as
its superior limit.
It should be noted that w. 4-6 and 9, 10 form two similar
strophes, and suggest, therefore, the probability that the Ps. has been
adapted for liturgical purposes by the addition of these parts for
a second choir, unless, indeed, we are to suppose that the whole Ps. was
composed originally for use in the Temple. But the general usage of
the Psalter is in favour of the former alternative.
In 1 6 haglgl, rendered by A.V. meditation, denotes a soft utterance
as opposed to a loud cry. The verb from which it is derived is applied
to the muffled growl of the lion when eating his prey (Is. 31'') ; to the
soft lament of the dove (Is. 38'S 59") ; to the mutterings of wizards
(Is. 8'°). A kindred word higgS,y6n occurs in 9'" as a musical direction,
and in 92^ (with soft music on the lyre). The noun, hagigl, occurs again
only in 39" ; the verb in 1^, 2', rendered muse, meditate, imagine.

PSALM VI.
To the chief Musician on the strings to Sheminith, A Psalm of David,
1 0 Jhvh, rebuke me not in thine anger :
Chasten me not in thy hot displeasure.
2 Have mercy upon me, Jhvh ; for I am weak :
Heal me, Jhvh, for my strength is broken.
3 I am sore vexed :
Jhvh, how long?
4 Return, Jhvh, deliver my soul :
Save me of thy lovingkindness.
5 For none remembereth thee in death :
None praiseth thee in the grave.
6 I am weary with my groaning :
Every night make I my bed to swim:
I water my couch with my tears.
7 Mine eye is consumed for grief:
It waxeth old because of all mine enemies.
8 Hence, ye wicked :
Jhvh hath heard my pitiful cry.
9 Jhvh hath heard my supplication :
Jhvh will answer my prayer.
10 AU mine enemies shall be ashamed and sore vexed:
They shall be overthrown and be put to shame suddenly.

12 PSALMS [VI.
The first of the Penitential Pss, : the other six being Pss. 32, 38, 51,
102, 130, and 143. AU are appointed for use on Ash Wednesday. The
Psalmist is, like Job, visited with a serious illness, which is complicated
by mental and spiritual anxiety, and by the reproaches of his enemies.
It is a shallow criticism which speaks slightingly of O.T. religion on
the ground that it regarded pain as a punishment for sin. Did not
Jesus Christ take that view in the injunction : " Sin no more, lest a
worse thing come unto thee" (John 5") ? The Jewish view was funda
mentally correct. All suffering has for its formal cause somewhere a
neglect or violation of the laws of Nature, i.e. a want of regard for the
Will of God. Nature calls for wholesome food, fresh air, reasonable
recreation, work, self-control, and when she calls in vain her voice is
heard through the consequent suffering. Man seeks gain in the mine,
on the ocean, at the foot of the volcano. The esylosion, the storm,
the eruption punish him for imprudence. "There is no vengeance in
the cosmic process," says Mr Herbert Spencer. Neither is there any
softness ; its mills grind exceeding small, and spare none.
The mistake made, however, by the writer of this Ps. was not of
the heart but of the head, not of the essence of religion but of its
accident. Suffering, in general, does not come to us directly from the
hand of God, but as a consequence of our place in the order of Nature.
It is the inevitable consequence of sin, but cannot be always referred to
some one particular sin, nor is it to be attributed to a special interpo
sition of God in this or that case, but is the working out of the
general laws which the wisdom of God has laid down for the education
of man, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good.
This truth was seen by the Rabbi who once in a dream asked the
divine Shechinah how long he would have still to endure his sufferings,
and received for reply : " My son, will it please you that I destroy the
world for your sake ? "
The reference in verse 5 to She61 is one of the many passages
which we shall meet with which show that Shedl was regarded as
independent of Jhvh and outside the sphere of His rule. (Cf. 31^^
88 '* ; Is, 38 'I) This view prevailed so long as Jhvh was thought of
as the God of Israel only — as a tribal God — and not as the one true
God, the Maker of heaven and earth. It marks the monolatrous stage
as distinct from the monotheistic. It is of course obvious that the
two might easily coexist in the same Church as do the Catholic and
Protestant conceptions of Christianity to-day. (See R. H. Charles,
Eschatology, pp, 35 ff.) The Psalmist's appeal here is not so much to
the self-interest of Jhvh, as to His lovingkindness. It is not so much
Jhvh as himself who would suffer by his going down to She61. The
Psalmist would be deprived of his greatest joy, the singing of the
praises of his God. (Pss. 39, 49, 73 are the trilogy of the Psalter
which confess a behef in happiness after death.)
_ What taught the Jew his sense of immortality was the discovery,
voiced by Jeremiah, that the individual — and not the nation only —
could enter into communion with God. He learned from this dis-

vn. 1-6] PSALMS 13
covery a higher self-valuation. The proclamation of God as man's
Father, and man as God's child, emphasised this lesson, and from
henceforth the conviction of our deathlessness has rested on the con
sciousness of kinship with God. For it is the argument of faith : I
cannot be God's child in any adequate sense if my sonship is terminated
by death. But I am conscious in my deepest being of being His child,
and, therefore, it follows that the child of such a Father cannot die.
This same deep religious faith it is which speaks out in the trium
phant close of the Ps. before us. The .situation is not yet altered ;
the sickness stUl remains ; the enemy is still rejoicing. But from the
darkness the cry of faith breaks forth : " Jhvh hath heard my suppli
cation ; Jhvh will receive my prayer. His hand is heavy upon me ;
yet is He the AU-Merciful. His reasons are good, no doubt; but I
hold fast to my trust in Him. I cannot understand ; I feel He will
heal me in His own time."
7a = 31'.
10. The meaning of the verse is that the enemies shall be abashed
when they see the Psalmist once more in good health. They shall be
tuirned back is only the Hebrew way of saying " They shall find the
tables turned"; for rejoicing they will have shame.

PSALM VIL
Shiggaion of David, which he sang unto Jhvh, concerning the words of Cush
the Benjamite.
1 0 Jhvh my God, in thee do I put my trust:
Save me from my persecutors: deliver me:
2 Lest he tear me like a lion :
Lest he rend me in pieces, while there is none to deliver.
3 Jhvh my God, if I have done this ;
If there be iniquity in my hands;
4 If I have rewarded evil unto him that was at peace with me;
'"If I have oppressed him"' that without cause was mine
enemy : —
5 Then let the enemy pursue me, and take me :
Yea, let him tread down my Life upon the earth, and lay
my Glory in the dust. Selah.
6 Arise, 0 Jhvh, in thine anger :
Lift up thyself against the rage of mine enemies:
Awake for me:
Command my judgment.

14 PSALMS [VII. 7-17
7 Let the congregation of the people compass thee about :
For their sakes set up thyself on high.
8 Judge the people, Jhvh :
Judge me, 0 Jhvh, [[according to my righteousness, and
according to mine integrity that is in mej.
9 Oh let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end;
but establish the just:
For the righteous God trieth the hearts and reins.
10 My defence is of God:
It is he that saveth the upright in heart.
1 1 God is a righteous judge :
God is daily angry.
12 He will not turn: he will whet his sword:
He will bend his bow, and make it ready.
13 He will also prepare for him the instruments of death:
He will ordain his arrows against the persecutors.
14 Behold, the wicked travaileth with iniquity:
He hath conceived mischief, and brought forth falsehood.
15 He hath made a pit, and digged it,
And is fallen into the ditch which he made.
16 His mischief shall return upon his own head:
His violence shall come down upon his own pate.

17 / will praise Jhvh according to his righteousness:
And will sing praise to the na/rrte of Jhvh most high.
A document of strife between two leaders of the post-exilic com
munity, artificial in its composition, clothing its complaint in proverbial
sayings ; perhaps itself one of the means by which the poet sought to
excite sympathy for his cause, and so equivalent to one of the uses of
the modern newspaper (Duhm), The first part {vv. 1-10), according
to Kirkpatrick, is of particular application, and the second of general.
The poet first states his case, and then moralises on it. The Psalmist's
protestation of innocence is no self-righteous boast, but a defence of
his integrity against his enemy. The office of the witness-box is not
to be confused with that of the confessional. As against his foe the
Psalmist appeals to the just Judge. He prays to Him to fix His
Court, to assemble the peoples, to take His seat, to open the assize,
and to declare the innocence of the slandered poet.
11-17. Then follows a general description of God's constant
attitude towards sin, and the consequent fate that dogs the steps of

VIII. 1-2] PSALMS 15
the wicked. Godis a righteous Judge and is indignant at sin every
day (v. 11). He is ever ready, as a man of war, to slay the unrepen
tant, but as for the wicked, though they bring forth their wickedness
to the full birth, or, to vary the metaphor, though they dig a pit for
the righteous, yet under the righteous government of God their own
evil makes an end of them. Truth is mighty and shall prevail.
The prayer that the wickedness of the wicked may come to an end
by their condemnation (or that it may itself end them) is one of those
prayers for vengeance which meet us often in the Psalter. It is a
prayer not directed against the individuals as such, but against the
wickedness that is in them. This Ps. is the key to all Pss. which
contain prayers against one's enemies. To this remark of Hengstenberg
we must add that the Jewish mind loves the concrete, and even when
it is dealing with the abstract it prefers to personify it. God walks in
the garden ; converses with Abraham ; speaks on the Mount ; tempts
David ; His angel is the pestilence ; He dwells between the Cherubim
and rides upon the clouds of Heaven. Wickedness in later Judaism is
concentrated in a personal Satan ; and the opponents of the godly are
so identified with the evil cause they have espoused, that the Psalmists
cannot discriminate, as Augustine did, between man as man and man
as a sinner. To destroy the sin is only possible by destroying the
sinner. Only by distinguishing — Deus odit peccatorem amat hominem
— can the Jewish imprecation become a Christian " Woe 1 " But how
pure at heart and sound in head must he be who calls down the woe.
One alone perhaps could do that and be safe. None other may bend
the bow of Ulysses.
3 and 4 form the protasis of an oath, of which the apodosis is
omitted : If I have done... then may Jhvh do so to me and more also.
5 then is added to intensify the imprecation.
5 c. glory = soul, as in 16", 30'^ 57°, 108^ ; Gen. 49'. When the
soul came first to be so described is not known.
6-10, which have certainly a different ring from the verses whicn
precede and follow them, are treated by Duhm as a separate Ps, This
makes two Pss. — A, consisting of w. 1-5 with 11-17, and B, consisting
of 6-10. 12, 13 are introduced by im-16, which marks " an emphatic
affirmative." 17 is a euphemistic liturgical appendix. Cf. 2'

1120

PSALM VIIL
To the chief Musician to the Gittith, A Psalm of David.
1 0 Jhvh our Lord,
How excellent is thy name in all the earth I
¦"Let me sing of"' thy glory in the heavens,
2 With the mouth of babes and sucklings :

16 PSALMS [VIII. 2-9
Because of thine enemies, thou hast established a '"fortress,"'
That thou mightest still the enemy and the Avenger.
3 When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers,
The moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained;
4 (I ask) "AVhat is man, that thou art mindful of him ?
And the son of man, that thou visitest him?"
5 For thou hast made him a little lower than the Elohim :
Thou hast crowned him with glory and honour.
6 Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy
hands;
Thou hast put all things under his feet:
7 All sheep and oxen ;
Yea, and the beasts of the field;
8 The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatso
ever passeth through the paths of the seas.
9 0 Jhvh our Lord,
How excellent is thy name in all the earth!
A simple and unpretentious Ps. but breathing the spirit of humble
confidence in presence of the majesty of creation. Like Kant, the
Psalmist is awed into adoring stillness by the sight of the greatness
of the works of God. He turns the story of Genesis 1 into verse,
using it to exalt the dignity of man before Nature. It is important
for the interpretation to notice this dependence on Genesis, for other
wise what is said in the clauses in w. 1 and 2 who Ivast set thy ghry
above the heavens, &c. (R. V.), which has baffled the ingenuity of
multitudes of commentators, would remain still an irrelevant and
jejune observation.
Looking out on the starry sky the Psalmist lauds the name of
Jhvh : " The name in the language of the ancient world, generaUy,
and of the Hebrews in particular, is the image and expression of the
being, the echo of its manifestation. God, as existing secretly in
Himself, is nameless. But a manifestation and a name are inseparable
from each other." The contemplation of the glory of this manifestation
in the Heavens (= ths Name) is so humbling that the Psalmist goes on
to say : With the mouth of children and them that still lisp, let me
sing of Thy glory in the Heavens : Thou hast estabhshed a fortress on
account of Thy enemies ; to hold down the foe and the rebel. This
correction of the Hebrew text (which all commentators admit in some
way to be necessary) keeps the Ps. within the limits of Gen. 1, of the
mythology of which it is an evident correction. The monsters of the
deep, TiamS,t (in Job 7'^ which is later than this Ps., the sea is
spoken of as a rebellious power) : " the tumultuous primitive abyss,

vni.J PSALMS 17
which God watched and confined, and still watches and enchains, lest
it overwhelm the world. The tannin in the same verse are those vast
creatures with which the early waters of creation teemed " (cf. Job 38 '~'^
Ps. 104°, Jer. 5^, and the " whale " in the Book of Jonah). Against the
Titanic rebellious ocean and its monsters Jhvh has set the firmament
as a fortress.
Then from the thought of God's greatness in Nature the Psalmist
turns to the httleness of man — that humbling and perplexing thought
to which modern astronomy (and also the revelations of the microscope)
has given an almost painful emphasis. The power of God, stretching
through the infinite space ; His wisdom seen in the uniformity of the
operation of His laws ; the immensity of the Universe over which He
reigns, all threaten to crush us into insignificance, until we recollect
that matter exists for the sake of spirit, and that the whole field of
man's experience offers no example of the reversal of this order. We
recognise our own spiritual transcendence of matter, even while we are
immanent in it, and we turn away, therefore, from the thought of the
material greatness of Nature to the inevitable reflection that after all
Nature exists for Spirit, i.e. for God. Hence the devout soul, like the
Psalmist, flies from Nature's appalling greatness to God's lovingkindness.
He is A vase of earth, a trembling clod.
Constrained to hold the breath of God.
I fear Nature no longer, even though "red in tooth and claw with
ravin," but take refuge under His protecting Fatherhood in Jesus
Christ. In all the maddening maze of things
And tossed by storm and flood.
To one fiixed state my spirit clings —
I know that God is good.
Man was made a little lower than Elohim — again a reference to Gen, 1
— those Elohim who formed the heavenly guild as the Jew thought.
If with Hengstenberg we say that " The Elohim expresses the abstract
idea of Godhead," the difference is small, for in any case the Psalmist
is concemed only to express man's favoured place over Nature given
him by God. The former interpretation is to be preferred here and in
Gen. 1^ (in spite of the fact that b'ngi Elohim is the usual phrase for
angels, not Elohim), in view of the Jewish feeling of the vastnessof
the gulf which separated the Creator from the creature. The Elohim
became " angels" formed as men ; stately (Jos. 5'^, princely (Gen. 16
and 18), worthy (1 Sam. 28), fair (Gen. 19). In their bodily image,
with their strength and beauty, was man formed, and so was endowed
with a fitness to represent God in this lower world, and to have power
over all lower animals.
The dignity of man as crowned with a purposeful being, as an heir
of immortality, and as capable of seeing and choosing that good which
is the end of his creation, all this is foreign to the primary teaching of

18 PSALMS [IX. 1-11
this Psalm. It deals with the former only of Kant's two awe-inspiring
objects, the starry heavens, and not with the majesty of the moral law.
This latter will meet us again in the latter half of Ps. 19 and in the
whole of Ps. 119. It hes at the root of St Paul's reference to this Ps.
in 1 Cor. 15% just as the further truth that man's true strength is
made perfect through weakness sleeps in our Lord's use of the title
Son of Man, as contained in v. 4.
Thy wisdom plays with us as with a child.
Who, playing, learns his Father loves him well.

PSALMS IX AND X.
Psalm ix.
To the chief Musician to Muth-labben, A Psalm of David.
ml will praise thee, 0 Jhvh, with my whole heart :
I will shew forth all thy marvellous works.
2 I will be glad and rejoice in thee: I will sing praise to
thy name, 0 thou most High.
3 '2 Mine enemies shall be overthrown :
They shall fall and perish at thy presence.
4 For thou dost maintain my right and my cause :
Thou sittest on a throne of right.
5 y Thou shalt rebuke the nations :
Thou shalt destroy the wicked:
Thou shalt put out their name for ever and ever.
6 n The enemy shall come to an end, and perish :
I- Their cities shall be overthrown:-!
Their very memory be forgotten.
7 1 But Jhvh is King for ever :
His throne is set for judgment.
8 He shall judge the world in righteousness :
He shall minister judgment to the peoples in uprightness.
9 1 Jhvh also is a refuge for the oppressed,
A stronghold in times of trouble.
10 And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee:
For thou, Jhvh, never forsakest them that seek thee.
11 T Sing praises to Jhvh, the Inhabiter of Zion:
Tell his doings to the people.

IX. 12-x. 7] PSALMS 19
12 The Blood-inquisitor remembereth them:
He forgetteth not the cry of the poor.
13 n Have mercy upon me, 0 Jhvh :
Look at my distress from my haters:
Lift me up from the gates of death:
14 That I may shew forth all thy praise
In the gates of the daughter of Zion:
And may rejoice in thy salvation.
15 t3 The nations are sunk down in their own pit : in their own
net is their foot taken.
16 Jhvh shall be known by the judgment which he executeth :
The wicked shall be snared in the work of his own hands.
Higgaion. Selah.
17 * The wicked shall be cast into Sheol :
All the nations that forget God.
18 But the needy shall not alway be forgotten :
The expectation of the poor shall not perish for ever.
19 p Arise, Jhvh; let not man prevaU:
Let the nations be judged in thy sight.
20 Put them in fear, Jhvh :
Let the nations know themselves to be but men. Selah.
Psalm x.
1 7 Why standest thou afar off, Jhvh ? why hidest thou
thyself in times of trouble ?
2 The wicked is haughtily pursuing the poor :
He is snaring them in his gins.
3 For the wicked boasteth of his heart's desire :
'"The covetous is despising Jhvh.""
4 The wicked (thinks) in his arrogance: — "He will not ask":
All he thinks is: — "There is no God."
5 His ways are always headstrong:
Thy judgments are far above out of his sight :
As for aU his enemies, he puffeth at them.
6 He saith to himself, "I shall not be moved :
/ shall never be in adversity."
7 His mouth is full of cursing and deceit and oppression :
Under his tongue are mischief and vanity. 2—2

20 PSALMS [X. 8-18
8 He sitteth in the lurking places of the villages :
He murders the innocent in corners:
His eyes are privily set against the poor.
9 He lieth in wait secretly as a lion in his den :
He lieth in wait to catch the poor: Pie catcheth the
poor :]]
He draweth him into his net.
10 He croucheth : he lies low :
The poor fall by his strong ones.
11 He saith to himself: — "God hath forgotten:
He hideth his face; he will never see it."
12 p Arise, Jhvh; 0 God, hft up thine hand: forget not
the poor.
13 Wherefore doth the wicked contemn God?
Why doth he say to himself: — "He will not ask"?
14 But thou hast seen; thou hast seen mischief and spite;
requite it with thy hand:
The poor committeth himself unto thee:
Thou art the helper of the fatherless.
15 EJ' Break thou the arm of the wicked [and the evil maw;]]
Seek out his wickedness till thou find none.
16 Jhvh is King for ever and ever: the nations shall perish
out of his land.
17 ri Jhvh, hear the desire of the meek:
Turn thy heart to them:
Cause thine ear to hear:
18 Judge the fatherless and the oppressed:
Let the man of the earth be no more a terror.

The first of the nine (or eight) alphabetical (or acrostic) Pss., the
others being Nos. 25, 34, 37, 111, 112, 119, 145.
Jennings and Lowe "repudiate entirely the theory that the two
compositions are one Ps." Perowne also favours the division.
Hengstenberg supposes that "according to the design of the author
the two Pss. form one whole, divided into two parts," and compares
for a similar relation Pss. 1 and 2 and Pss. 42 and 43. But in spite
of the difficulties in the way of regarding 9 and 10 as one Ps. the
reasons for joining them are greater. For example ; the LXX must
have had some reason for maldng them one ; 10 has no superscription,
and the two together make up a complete alphabetical Ps. — broken it

IX.-X.] PSALMS 21
is true (as in Nahum 1^"'°), but yet clear enough in outhne. "The
traces of the alphabetical arrangement of the verses (or rather of the
stanzas) may still be followed from Ps. 9 into Ps. 10. But the order
of the letters and the form of the Ps. as a whole have been disturbed.
This happened, in the first place, by accident (? by design, Cheyne),
and, secondly, through the attempts that were made to restore the
original. The unity of the Ps. has been thus made unrecognisable.
In the text which we now possess very few traces of it can be found.
For the triumph of Ps. 9 lamentation is substituted in Ps. 10 without
any explanation " (Wellhausen), In a more cautious moment Jennings
and Lowe admit that the connection of Pss, 9 and 10 is one of the most
curious phenomena in the Psalter, and one of which the full explanation
is probably hopelessly lost. The sole difficulty in amalgamating the
two Pss. arises from the difference of subjects. In the first it is the
heathen — the enemies of Israel ; in the second it is an internal wrong
doer. But this very difficulty should have made critics question that
which causes it, viz. the ascription of the joint composition to David.
Indeed Jennings and Lowe admit that Ps. 10'° — the heathen are
perished out of his land — is incongruous in a Ps. of the time of David.
It is surely more than incongruous ; it negatives the Davidic date, and
puts on the reader the task of finding an historical locus for the Ps.
Ewald refers it to the fall of Nineveh (b,c. 607) ; and certainly the
spirit of Nahum is closely akin to that which we find here. Cheyne
prefers the Persian period, but postulates editorial redaction, Charles
{Eschatology, p, 95) is content with pointing out that with Habakkuk
and Nahum begins the custom of setting the relative righteousness of
Judah over against the glaring wickedness of tbe Gentiles. The latter,
therefore, appear as the godless and the former as the righteous.
Ps. 9 + 10 would then be an exemplification of this value-judgment.
But a still more suitable historical framework has been found by
Duhm, who suggests that the points of contrast between this Ps. (9 and
10) and Pss. 56-59 and their cognate Pss. mark it out as a reflection
of the confusion that arose out of the conflict between Alexander
Jannseus and the Pharisees. During that turbulent ruler's long reign
of 26 or 27 years he "was almost constantly involved in foreign or in
civil wars, which for the most part were provoked by his own wilful
ness." Gadara, Raphia, Anthedon and Gaza — all cities of the heathen
— fell before him, and later on, Pella, Dium, Gerasa, Gaulana, Seleucia
and Gamala. The campaigns against these heathen cities would
not be distasteful necessarily to a patriotic Pharisee. Indeed, some
where about the middle ofthe reign of Alexander (c. B.C. 88), when he
was driven to the mountains by Demetrius, his reverses awakened the
national spirit, and 60,000 Jews went over to Alexander. A writer
who shared the feeling which prompted this defection might well
rejoice at the successes of their leader, who after all was one of their
own nation, and (being a man in whom religion and patriotism were
one) could well ascribe to Jhvh the devastations inflicted by Alexander
on the heathen :

22 PSALMS [IX.-X.
IX. 5, 6. Thou didst threaten the heathen : Thou destroyedst
the wicked ;
Thou didst blot out their name for ever and ever ;
Clean gone are the foes ;
The cities which Thou hast destroyed are ruins for ever ;
Perished is the memory of them.
With 5 cf Psalms of Solomon 2^^
Where pohticians saw mihtary skill the Psalmist saw the hand of
Jhvh, It was He who gave sentence on the peoples in righteousness
(v. 8), It was He who delivered His people from the gateways of
death {v. 13), It was to Him as Judge that the triumphant appeal
was directed.
17. " If the Psalmists could theorise on the state of the non-
Jewish world, they would probably say that it was composed of two
classes — those who were ' forgetful of God,' and those who were
' waiting for His law.' "
19, 20. Arise, 0 Jhvh, let not man be triumphant.
Let the heathen from Thee receive judgment !
Over them place a master, 0 Jhvh,
That the heathen may learn they are mortals.
It is an additional indication of the Maccabean date of this Ps.
that the judicial functions ascribed in it to the Judge are identical
with those ascribed to the leaders in the narrative of the Book of
Judges. In both the Judges (=the sh6ph§tim) were not so much
administrators as " champions both against the enemy and against the
unfaithful of their own people." In the Ps. Jhvh, the causa causans,
emerges from behind the Maccabean prince and Himself is the cham
pion of His people.
Even the verse which declares that " the heathen are sunk in the
pit they have made" is not without its foundation in the chequered
career of Alexander Jannseus — the Julius II of the Asmonseans.
Ptolemy of ^gypt routed and massacred the Jewish army at Asophon
on the Jordan by a stratagem, and by a stratagem of diplomacy he was
afterwards forced to leave the Jews alone. In the net which he spread
his own feet were caught, for Jhvh did not forget the cry of the godly.
(For the history ofthe period, see Schlirer, Geschichte, Div. I. Vol. i, § 10.)
But Alexander was not merely the conqueror of the heathen. When
he was not engaged in war abroad he was oppressing the party of the
Chasldim, the godly, the poor and needy, at home. What Josephus
says of his doings dovetails in precisely with the obsecrations of Ps. 10.
For six years he was fighting his own countrymen with mercenary
troops, and on one occasion, when victorious, he crucified 800 of his
prisoners and slew their wives and children before their eyes. The
indignant Psalmist compares him to a lion : he lurks in the thicket,
he stoops for prey and crouches, and the helpless are crushed by his
teeth. But what enhanced his cruelty was his godlessness. "It could
be with deep resentment only that pious Jews could look on and see a

IX.-X.] PSALMS 23
wild warrior hke Alexander Jannaaus discharging the duties of high-
priest in the holy place." On one occasion they pelted him with
citrons as he stood by the altar to offer the sacrifice during the Feast
of Tabernacles, crying out that he was the son of a prisoner of war, and
therefore unfit to act as priest. He rephed by massacring 600 of his
detractors. The Psalmist finds in Alexander's atrocities proof of his
contempt of God. He puffed at his opposers — i.e. at the godly;
his ways were firmly estabhshed {v. 5 a) ; he thought to himself that
he could not be shaken, that he would always remain free from mis
fortune {v. 6); his atheism was of a practical kind, for he thought
again to himself {v. 11) : God forgets it — ^He hides His face — He
never sees it! (cf Zech. 11° and Psalms of Solomon 2'). And so
from successful villainy the Psalmist appeals to Jhvh :
X. 12, 13. Arise, 0 Jhvh, hft up Thy hand, 0 God,
Forget not the godly.
Why do the wicked dare to blaspheme
And think to themselves that Thou dost not punish ?
Cf Psalms of Solomon : " He deceiveth with his words, saying, 'There
is none that seeth and judgeth' " (4'").
It is stiU with an appeal to Jhvh that the Psalmist concludes his
impassioned prayer for justice for the oppressed and for the orphans,
that so never more might man from the earth defy Jhvh by his
oppressions. The same hitter indignation at successful oppression meets us in
Ps. 4 of the Psalms of Solomon, which Wellhausen refers to the time
of Alexander Jannseus, and Ryle and James to that of Alexandra,
when Aristobulus was trying to renew Alexander's policy. There the
Sadducean enemy is denounced in similar terms :
He never ceaseth to scatter and bereave, and he maketh desolate
for the sake of his wicked desire ;
He deceiveth with his words, saying, There is none that seeth and
judgeth {vv. 13, 14).
Another point of contact between our Ps. and the Psalms of Solomon
occurs in 10' compared with Pss. S. V, "Their sins were in secret; and
I knew it not." The allusion, say Ryle and James, is to the immor
alities which the Jewish aristocracy practised in defiance of the Law.
A close comparison, however, of our Ps. and that of the Psalms of
Solomon would rather suggest the dependence of the latter on the
former, as it certainly enables us to feel why one was included in the
Canon and not the other. What inspiration consists in may also be
realised by anybody who can taste the distinct flavour of each.
Whatever may be our conclusion as to the exact situation in history
which gave birth to this Ps., it is clear that it is the cry of the rehgious
in every age who see might contemptuous of right, law denied to the
poor, capital treading on the neck of labour, a strong people crushing
a weaker, and irreligion seated in high places.

24 PSALMS [XI. 1-7
PSALM XI.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.
1 In Jhvh put I my trust:
How say ye to my soul, "Flee as a bird to your mountain"?
2 For, lo, the wicked bend the bow, they make ready their
arrow upon the string,
To shoot privily at the upright in heart.
3 If the foundations be destroyed,
What can the righteous do?
4 Jhvh is in his holy temple :
Jhvh's throne is in heaven :
His eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men.
5 Jhvh proveth the righteous :
But the wicked and the violent his soul hateth.
6 Upon the wicked he shall rain snares :
Fire and brimstone, and a wrath-wind shall be the portion
of their cup.
7 For Jhvh is righteous ; he loveth righteousness :
The upright shall see his face.
This Ps. reminds us strongly of Pss. 3 and 4, and may be from the
same author. In any case, all three emerge from similar perplexities,
and solve them by the same faith in Jhvh. The speaker here is some
leader of a party whose supporters give him advice which he holds to
be cowardly. If on general grounds we were to hold that the headings
of the Pss. which refer them to David were trustworthy, then it would
not be difficult to find circumstances in his life suitable to this Ps.
He was an outcast hiding in the mountains, and hunted like a partridge.
But we might find situations of the same kind in the Maccabean times,
e.g. when Mattathias and his sons fled into the mountains (1 Mace. 2^).
The fact is that throughout Jewish history the mountains were ever
the refuge of the persecuted.
The danger here is imminent. The opposite side is even now ready
to strike ; the pillars of the State, whether its leaders, or the foundation
principles of law and order, are broken up ; the godly have wrought
nothing; they can do nothing; Jhvh is their sole hope. Of Him
faith says that in spite of storms below He sitteth in His heavenly
Temple calm above the waterfloods. But He is not heedless of man's
doings. He proves the righteous and the unrighteous (so LXX),
approving the former aud reproving the latter. The violent man He
hates "with all the energy of His perfectly and essentially holy

xn. 1-6] PSALMS 25
nature." This hatred from His very soul explains why He is to treat
the Psalmist's enemies as He had treated the men of Sodom. The
simoom, which is to be in their cup, Hengstenberg prefers to render as
a " wrath-wind " — Jhvh's wrath shall they drink.
7. The Psalmist's refuge that Jhvh is righteous is best explained
in the sense of faithful and true, as often in the Second Isaiah ; and
then the Righteousness which He loves will be the righteous acts (as in
Judges 5") by which He comes to the help of His own, and so proves
Himself "a just God and a Saviour" (Is. 45^').
7 b. "Jhvh is hiding His face, and seems indifferent to the rights of
His godly ones. But eventually He will interfere and do them justice.
The deeds which He will then perform in the world will be the mani
festation of His countenance. The phraseology appears to be derived
from the arrangements at an Eastern court, where it is difficult to
reach the King's presence and obtain a hearing for a request, but
where, a hearing once obtained, the suit is generally won " (Well
hausen). To the Christian it is not the form here which is the important
factor. The substance is what he will seek, and that he finds in the
assurance of the Psalmist's faith that somehow and somewhen he will
see God, but he gives to this substantial faith an cschatological form.
New bottles for new wine.

PSALM XII.
For the chief Musician to the Sheminith, A Psalm of David.
1 Help, Jhvh; for the godly ceaseth:
The faithful fail from among the children of men.
2 They speak vanity every one with his neighbour :
With flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak.
3 Jhvh shall cut off all flattering lips,
The tongue that speaketh proudly,
4 Who have said, "With our tongue will we prevail :
Our lips are our own : who is lord over us?"
[Arise, 0 Jhvh, help me, 0 my God.]
5 For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the
needy : —
"Now will I arise," saith Jhvh:
"I will set him in safety l-who longeth after me-l."
6 The words of Jhvh are pure words :
As silver tried pn a fumace of earth,]]
Purified seven times.

26 PSALMS [XII. 7-8
7 ""Thou shalt keep them, Jhvh :
Thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.
8 The wicked walk on every side,
When the vilest men are exalted."'
It is the poet's business to put into language that is "simple,
sensuous, passionate " the feelings of man ; it is the prophet's to speak
with the authority of God and declare to man what His will is. In
this Ps. the two are united. The falsehood of the age was felt acutely
by the pious — the "poor and needy" — so acutely that nothing could
make it tolerable but a direct interposition of Jhvh Himself This
interposition is promised in verse 5. Delitzsch indeed says that the
whole Ps. is a ring and verse 5 its jewel.
In verse 1 we meet for the first time with that conjunction of mercy
and truth which meets us again so often in the Bible — cf Pss. 25'°,
26^ 57^ 61', 85'°, 89'^ Proverbs 3^ 20^; Hos. 4^; or of mercy
and judgment, Ps. 101'. We have light and truth, Ps. 43' ; and grace
and truth in John !'*•" ; and lovingkindness and truth in Ps. 40'°.
This double strain in the interpretation of the " Name" runs through
out the whole Bible, and finds its highest expression in the doctrine of
God as Father, = Him who is (1) loving and (2) a moral Governor.
The Psalmist was living in an age of lies, flattery and deceit. His
complaint finds its echo to-day in the lament that diplomacy is but
another name for the art of graceful jugghng with words; that
conventional phrases want sincerity {e.g. the superscription and sub
scription of letters, the phrase " Not at home " ; what are called white
lies, and social hypocrisies in general) ; that few dare to say out what
they think, and that vice is gilded with glozing words which hide its
ugliness. So Elijah felt that all was unreal in his day, and that he was
the sole surviving representative of the truth of Jhvh.
In Church and State to-day it may be not improper to point out
that verse 4 has its analogue. There are those who are strong with
their tongue and trust to their eloquence, their conversational powers,
and their savoir faire to carry them to victory, heedless of the spiritual
laws which alone make a nation, or religious community, pleasing to
God. Duhm suggests that a stichos has dropped out after verse 4, and
that it was probably the "Arise, 0 Jhvh ! help me, 0 my God" of
Ps. 3 '. If this be so, then 5 a belongs to the restored clause, and
Jhvh's reply begins at "Now will I arise," which is a quotation from
Is, 33'°, The clause 5 b should almost certainly be "I will place him in
safety who longs for me." (So Wellhausen.) Most commentators who
give the meaning of longing to the verb (Perowne, Hengstenberg,
Ewald, Delitzsch, &c.) refer it to salvation as its object. He who longs
for Jhvh him will Jhvh save is clearly the only sense which is worthy
and appropriate. So Olshausen.
Verse 6 is proof of the power of familiar words of the Bible received

XIII. 1-3] PSALMS 27
traditionaUy as coming from God. The Psalmist had quoted one such
saying (in v. 5) and finds in it strength and consolation, as multitudes
of the pious have done in similar sayings, and then he cries exultingly
that "the sayings of Jhvh are pure sayings, genuine silver for the
land, purified by fire, seven times refined." This translation is that of
Deissmann (in his "Bible Studies," p. 262), who from Egyptian papyri
finds a word (rendered trying or trial in Jas. 1" and 1 Pet. 1'), which
clearly meant genuine ; by following it backwards in time he assigns it
here a meaning, which clears away what commentators had found
previously an insoluble difficulty. Nevertheless a gloss must be sus
pected as well as a misunderstanding.
Verse 7 is called by Dehtzsch the Psalmist's Amen to Jhvh's
promise of help.
Wellhausen transposes vv. 7 and 8, but without assigning any
reason. Perowne, who retains the usual order, remarks that "this
return to gloom and doubt is without parallel at the conclusion of a
Ps." The LXX makes no sense, Duhm says that how the clause 8a
got there, and what it means he does not know. All we can say is
that the text as it stands affirms that Jhvh will keep His promise and
protect the godly from the generation (=the whole genus) ofthe wicked,
and that when men of lax morals are put in high places the godless
flaunt their vices publicly and without restraint. But the two clauses
have no logical connection ; and if they are to stand, their basis must
be sought in events which pressed on the Psalmist to such an extent
that his feelings could not be contained in any framework of thouglit,
but dropped from the pen staccato fashion.
The Midrash on Ps. 81^ has an interesting note to the effect that
the harp ofthe sanctuary is described as of seven strings (Ps, 119'"*) =
the age of this world ; in the days of the Messiah as of eight strings
(according to the Inscription of Pss. 6 and 8, "To the Sheminith");
and in the world to come as of ten strings (according to Ps. 92').
Hengstenberg says, however, that Al-Hashsh'mlnlth cannot possibly
denote an instrument of eight strings, Olshausen and Ewald hold
that it indicates a musical mode ; Delitzsch follows Gesenius in
explaining it of the bass = to be sung in the octave.
PSALM XIII.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David,
1 How long, Jhvh, wilt thou forget me, for ever?
How long wilt thou hide thy face from me?
2 How long shall I take counsel in my soul.
Having sorrow in my heart 1-by day and nightH ?
How long shall mine enemy be exalted over me?
3 Look ! Hearken ! Jhvh, my God :
Lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death ;

28 PSALMS [XIII. 4-6
4 Lest mine enemy say, "I have prevailed against him":
Lest my foes rejoice when I am moved.
5 But I have trusted in thy mercy :
My heart sliall rejoice in thy salvation.
6 / tvill sing unto Jhvh,
Because he hath dealt bountifully with me.
The flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh
in this beautiful little Ps. Luther says finely : " Here hope itself
despairs and despair hopes, and there only lives the unutterable
groaning with which the Holy Spirit intercedes in us." The four times
repeated "How long?" shows the intensity of the Psalmist's grief and
perplexity. He was forgotten, and for so long that it seemed for ever;
God's face was hidden ; he could find no way out of his troubles ; and
to crown all, he had no answer to the taunts of his enemy. "Day
after day and night after night he has lain down helpless in Doubting
Castle, till at last he plucks at the Key of Promise." Have we here a
recourse to Scripture as in the previous Ps, 1 Does the Psalmist refer
to Is, 57 '" : ^ J will not be content for ever, neither will I be always wroth" 1
The agony of the sufferer appears again in the short and sharp
ejaculations of verse 3, "Look ! hearken I " wliich are the reply of the
spirit within to the suggestions of the lower self that God had
forgotten and hidden His face. His prayer is for life, and life more
abundantly, else must he go down to the gloomy land of ghosts where
is no praise, and no activity. Finally the spiritual part of the writer
prevails, and he affirms his trust in the fatherly love (chSsSd) of God
and his confidence that he will yet rejoice in being delivered by Him.
His confidence is all the more touching in that he apparently lacks the
support of a belief in immortality.
The counsels (= devices, plans, schemes) of verse 2 and their
futility are well placed by St Paul in Phil, 4' where he says that the
peace of God ( = the inward peace which comes to him who trusts), the
peace which surpasses every human device or thought for ensuring
calmness of heart, shall act as sentinel; mounting guard over the
believer. On this Professor Vincent aptly quotes Tennyson :
Love was and is my King and Lord,
And will be, though as yet I keep
Within his court on earth, and sleep
Encompassed by his faithful guard.
And hear at times a sentinel
Who moves about from place to place,
And whispers to the worlds of space.
In the deep night that all is well.
In Memoriam, Stanza 126,
But Duhm (following Dyserinck and others) reads griefs for counsels
(atzzarbSth for etzoth) so as to preserve the parallelism,
5, 6 form a euphemistic liturgical appendix; cf 2'^°.

XIV. 1-7] PSALMS 29
PSALM XIV.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.
1 The fool hath said in his heart, "There is no God."
They are corrupt, they have done abominable works:
There is none that doeth good.
2 Jhvh looked down from heaven upon the children of men,
To see if there were any that did understand,
That did seek after God.
3 They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy :
There is none that doeth good, no, not one.
4 Have aU the workers of iniquity no knowledge ?
'"They eat the bread of Jhvh:
On Jhvh they do not call."'
5 There were they in great fear :
For God is in the generation of the righteous.
6 '"Ye shall be put to shame for your attacks on the poor, '
Because Jhvh is his refuge.

7 0 that the salvation of Israel tvere come out of Zion !
0 that Jhvh woidd bring back the captivity of his people I
Then should Jacob rejoice, and Israel be glad.
Commentators are more in conflict on this Ps. than usual.
Wellhausen, for example, says that it is the heathen who are spoken
of, but Jennings and Lowe refer it to the "godlessness of the oppressive
faction." Nibh^l, tlie fool, according to Perowne is rather a practical
than a theoretical atheist, but Duhm says that it is not merely
practical atheism that is intended. The opening word sh4m of v. 5
means here (as in Jud. 5" and elsewhere) then rather than there;
Hengstenberg affirms, however, that it always denotes in Hebrew the
place, never, as in Arabic, the time. In v. 4 Jhvh Himself speaks,
according to Kirkpatrick and Wellhausen, but Duhm says it is not
hkely that Jhvh is the speaker, and Hengstenberg supports him. Where
experts differ common sense must be judge.
Two main principles are to be borne in mind here as throughout :
(1) The first is that of Matthew Arnold that " to understand that
the language of the Bible is fiuid, passing and literary, not rigid, fixed
and scientific, is the first step towards a right understanding of the
Bible " {Literature and Dogma, Preface). The fact is that the Bible

30 PSALMS [XIV.
writers wrote not as theologians drawing up a Summa, but as men of
religion, and, therefore, their language was approximative and poetical
merely, not scientific, concrete not abstract. This will save us from
following St Paul in treating, as he does in Romans S'^-'S isolated
passages of the Old Testament about the spread of moral _ corruption
as proofs of mankind being a massa perditionis. Moral indignation
takes no account of exceptions, but allows its feelings to override aU
calculations of nicely balanced less or more. The Psalmist is not to be
held responsible, therefore, for any rigid doctrine about the total
depravity of human nature which the exigencies of controversy, or
the ingenuity of the mere theologian may deduce from his impassioned
words. (2) The Hebrew temperament, at least as revealed in the 0. T,, is
intensely and exclusively practical, and that because it is religious.
It takes httle interest in the merely intellectual problems of religion ;
it is not tbe antinomies of reason which affect it principally. So far
from the 0. T. writers speculating about the One and the Many, or
discussing the legitimacy of ascribing Personality to God, or taking
part in the duel between Reason and Faith, they seldom show that
they are even aware of such problems. Their difficulties are very real,
but they belong to the moral order. They cannot find Jhvh, or they
mourn the adverse decision of history against them, or they dread the
land of shadows, or they resent their oppression by the heathen, or the
success of their rivals within the theocracy ; but they very seldom are
oppressed, as we are oppressed, by the difficulties started by reason
and insoluble by it. This fact will, for example, incline the balance of
weight to the determination of n^bh^l in the Ps. before us as the
practical atheist.
So too in V. 2 the understanding that is desiderated is not prudence
but wisdom. The understanding man is not he who knows the truth
but he who does it, "he who through experience and doctrine has
acquired the proper insight into our dependence on God."
But the denunciation of the n8,bhi,l has a historic as well as a moral
interest, if we bear in mind that analogy warrants us in seeing the
Sadducean party under that term of opprobrium. That the Sadducean
spirit existed long before the historical Sadducean party is of course
natural, but we shall not be far wrong in saying that the beginning of
Sadduceeism as an active and organised party may be fixed at a date
soon after the conquests of Alexander the Great, or about B.C. 300.
Both Pharisee and Sadducee, apparently, were affected by Persian
thought, but the former used it to bring out and to enhance the
rehgion of his fathers, while the latter, as a man of the world, treated
it as opposed to right reason, holding that as reason knew nothing of
immortality, angels, demons, or fate, therefore it was folly to trouble
about them. Hence the Sadducee figures consistently in history as a
rationalist, a conservative, a politician, and a secularist. The strife of
Pharisee and Sadducee was the perennial strife between the Church
and the world, or faith and sight, the spiritual and the material.

XIV.] PSALMS 31
Hence Mr Cowley's suggestion that Sadducee is derived from a Persian
word ZanMikah, infidel or heretic, is very tempting. Encyc. Bibl. 4''™-
The Sadducees ace. to Josephus " were able to persuade none but the
rich, and had not the populace obsequious to them." It is worth
noting that the Greek name Epicurus was used to denote a heretic or
unbeliever, whether Jewish or foreign. Study the Law, said R. La'zar,
that thou mayest make answer to Epicurus. The student of the Law
was the Pharisee ; his opponent was a Sadducee, a Samaritan, an
Epicurean, an infidel, heretic, in short a n^bhS,!.
How is 4 J to be understood ? Is it that they who eat bread should
call on the name of Jhvh 1 Is it that they are so absorbed in their
food that they forget the Giver ? Or is it that they have robbed the
poor of his bread and so robbed Jhvh ? None of these seem so likely
as the briUiant suggestion of Duhm that the full clause should run :
" Have the evil-doers no knowledge who eat up my people ? They eat
the bread (of Jhvh) and on Jhvh they do not call." He adds that
" to eat anybody's bread " means to be supported by him and to stand
in his service. This suits all Israelites, but particularly the priests
who in a special sense eat Jhvh's bread ; apparently then our passage
contains a thrust at the priestly aristocracy, because those who " eat
up my people " cannot be common evil-doers, and for them the reproach
of ignorance is most severe. Baethgen, however, by a slight change of
the text, renders the verse : They eat up my people whom war has
already consumed.
7. The last verse is a liturgical addition, and of post-exilic date.
There is httle gxound for Kirkpatrick's view that the Ps. could hardly
have ended abruptly with v. 6. "Ye have frustrated the counsels of
the poor, but know that Jhvh is his refuge," is just the sort of confident
close which meets us repeatedly. (See Grimm, Euphemistic Liturgical
Appendixes in the 0. T, p. 17.)
" To tum the captivity " (Shiib Sh'bAth) is not necessarily a cry of
the E.xile, but is a phrase = restore the fortunes. It is used in this
tropical sense in Job 42'°, Ezek. 16^^ Ps. 85' to describe the restoration
to any one of a previous possession, or prosperous condition, of which
Jhvh had deprived the owner. It is quite true, as Olshausen points
out, that sh'blth in Num. 21^^ has the primary meaning of captivity,
but this does not affect the expression shtb sh'biith of this verse in
which two cognate words are used in a quasi-technical sense. Nor is
Deut. 30' a case in point, as Hengstenberg seems to think, except
that there v'shob eth-sh'bfith is certainly used in the tropical sense,
for it speaks of the Israelites being not imprisoned but scattered
abroad. We must distinguish then between {a) the primary sense of
captivity given by the Exile, and {b) the derivative sense of misery in
general of which the Exile was a leading case. This gives us shUb
sh'Mth as a post-exihc expression for adversity.
Cf. Amos 9 '^ where both meanings are contained.

32 PSALMS [XV. 1-5
PSALM XV.
A Psalm of David.
1 Jhvh, who shall abide in thy tabernacle ?
Who shall dwell in thy holy hill ?
2 He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness :
Who speaketh the truth in his heart :
3 Who takes no slander on his tongue :
Who doeth no evil to his friend :
Who taketh up no reproach against his kinsman :
4 In whose eyes the apostate is contemned :
Who honoureth them that fear Jhvh :
Who sweareth to his own hurt, and stands to his oath :
5 Who putteth not out his money to usury :
Who taketh no reward against the innocent ; —
He that doeth these things shall never be moved.
A Guest Ps, to be compared with Ps. 24 and Is. 33"'; (and with
the whole of the Epistle of St James), with both of which it has close
ethical affinities. The unquestioned references to the Mosaic code of
Leviticus, and the assumption of there being but one sanctuary of
Jhvh, as well as the reflective character of its moral teaching, are fatal
to its Davidic date.
A favourite post-exilic mode of stating the relation of the pious
Jew to Jhvh was that of a guest, a dweller, or one having a Burgerrecht
(cf 5*'''). So in Eph. 2'° we have "fellow-citizens" and "members of
the household" of God. The title "guest of Allah" is given by the
Arabs to one who resides in Mecca beside the Caaba.
The description of the Temple as a tent is poetic only, similar to
our description of a Christian Church as a temple.
The answer to the enquiry : " Who can be Jhvh's Guest or
Chesed?" is couched, not in the terms of tribal relationship which
would be proper to David's time, but in those of legalism which suit
the circumstances of the post-exilic period. This developed after
wards into the conception of a spiritual temple as in John 4^'. Cf
Browning's :
Why, Where's the need of temple, when the walls
O' the world are that ? What use of swells and falls
Prom Levites' choir, priests' cries, and trumpet calls ?
2. The Guest was one who walked uprightly (Kirkpatrick's "integer
vitse scelerisque purus" is apt in Horace's sense) ; one who like Zacharias
and his wife " walked in all the commandments and ordinances of the

xv.J PSALMS 33
Lord blameless" (Luke 1')'; one who kept Jhvh's judgments before
him and did not put away His statutes from him (Ps. 18"^) ; one
whose righteousness was that of Ps. 119, of the Scribes and Pharisees,
legal, obedient and whole-hearted, the best that was known, and,
therefore, acceptable to Jhvh.
For the power of righteousness see R. Eleasar : " Ten hard things
were created in the world. Rock is hard, but iron cuts it : fire fuses
iron : water quenches fire : clouds bear water : wind scatters clouds :
the body bears the wind : fear shatters the body : wine dispels fear :
sleep dissipates wine: and death is harder than all of them, but
RIGHTEOUSNESS dehvers from death."
As the Law directs in numerous precepts, so does he speak the
truth and that not "in his heart," but "with his heart," i.e. cordially,
gladly. He takes no slander on his tongue (Dr Kay's exceUent
rendering), and so keeps the 9th Commandment of the Decalogue.
3. His morahty again is particularistic. It is his kinsman, a member
of the same nation, to whom he is careful to do no evil (the Heb. has
a play on the words, the words for evil and neighbour being almost
indistinguishable, and often confused). The second word rendered in
A. V. neighbour is less strong and denotes " the common bodily and
spiritual derivation through which men have become brethren." Both
words are found together again in Ex. 32^". Delitzsch quotes the line
audacter calumniare, semper aliquid hceret, to describe the effects of
taking up a reproach against a neighbour. The difference between the
Pharisaic and the Christian conception of neighbour is illustrated by
the saying that " the neighbour of a cheber is a cheber {i.e. the neigh
bour of a Pharisee is a Pharisee), of a priest a priest, and of an Israelite
an Israelite," The answer of Christ in Lk. 10^ arose from and was in
contrast to the teaching of the schools of His day.
4 a. The reprobate (R. V.) or vile person (A. V.) is one who does
not keep the law, who is, therefore, no fit companion for the righteous
who do, and so by easy stages sinks into one of the "people of the
land" that later Pharisaism is said to have regarded as accursed. It
was, and is, easy for the Pharisaic spirit to come to persuade itself that
the vile person who does not keep the law does not keep it because he
does not know it — the knowledge that is thought of being more
HeUenic, or intellectual, than Hebrew or moral.
4 b. On the other hand he that feared Jhvh was to be honoured.
The scribe, or one who honoured Jhvh by studying His law day and
night, was deserving of aU the veneration that the layman (as we
should say) could give him. " Let thine esteem for thy friend border
upon thy respect for thy teacher, and respect for thy teacher on
reverence for God." "Respect for a teacher should exceed respect
for a father, for both father and son owe respect to a teacher." " If a
1 The O.T. halach walk reappears with its moral connotation in the N.T.
diiatrTpe(l)a or TrfpOTareu = me gero, vitam instituo; cf, for example, Eph. 4^,
1 Cor. 7", &c.
a. 3

34 PSALMS [XVI. 1-3
man's father and his teacher are carrying burdens, he must first help
his teacher and afterwards his father. If his father and his teacher
are in captivity, he must first ransom his teacher and afterwards^ his
father." Such were some of the maxims which show how the pious
Jew was to honour them that feared Jhvh. See Schiirer, History,
Div. II. Vol. I. § 25.
4 c. The Law as to vows is referred to in v. 4 c — " he that sweareth
to his own hurt and changeth not." In Lev. 5* we have : " If a soul
swear, pronouncing with his lips to do evil or to do good, &c.," and in
Lev. 27", in the case of a man who has vowed a beast unto Jhvh he
is forbidden to change it. So ¦«. 5 & refers to Lev. 25'°, " Take thou no
usury of thy brother," where usury denotes what it denotes with us,
exorbitant interest charged on money lent to one whose poverty com
pels him to borrow. This is based on Deut. 23", where, however,
usury is allowed in the case of a heathen.
5 b. The acceptance of bribes to blind the judge's eyes withal is
condemned in Deut. 16'": "Thou shalt not wrest judgment: thou
shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift." The impartiality of
Jhvh is attributed, on the other hand, to His kindness in Ps. 62'^:
" To Thee, 0 Lord, is goodness : To every one Thou renderest according
to his deeds."
Josephus {De Bell. Jud. ii. 8, 7) has an interesting account of the
oath imposed by the Essenes on their novitiates. Each before being
admitted to the common meal has to pledge himself " first that he will
reverence the divine Being ; and secondly, that he wih abide injustice
to men, and will injure nobody, either of his own accord or by command,
but will always detest the iniquitous, and strive on the side of the
righteous ; that he will ever show fidelity to all, and most of ah to
those who are in power, for to no one comes rule without the Deity;
and that if he should become a ruler himself, he will never carry
insolence into his authority, or outshine those placed under him by
dress or any superior adornment ; that he will always love truth and
press forward to convict those that tell lies ; that he will keep his
hands free from peculation and his soul pure of unholy gain."
This oath with its tone of universal morality may be said to stand
half-way between our Ps. 15 and the teaching of the Sermon on the
Mount. But what a world has to be traversed before the last is
reached I
PSALM XVI.
Michtam of David.
1 Preserve me, 0 God : for in thee do I put my trust.
2 I have said unto Jhvh, Thou art my Lord :
I have no good beside thee.
3 ^To the pious in the land he noiv says,
"In their princes is all my delight."J

XVI. 4-11] PSALMS 35
4 Their sorrows shall be multiplied that exchange Jhvh for
another god :
Their drink offerings of blood will I not offer :
I will not take their names upon my lips.
5 Jhvh is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup :
¦"Thy Thummim are my lot. '
6 The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places :
Yea, I have a goodly heritage.
7 I will bless Jhvh for giving me counsel :
My reins also instruct me in the night seasons.
8 I have set Jhvh always before me :
Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
9 Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth :
My flesh also dwells securely.
10 For thou wilt not leave me to Sheol :
Thou wilt not suffer thy saint to see corruption.
11 Thou wilt shew me the Way of life :
In thy presence is fulness of joy :
In thy right hand there a/re pleasures for evermore.
This Ps. raises problems which it 'does not solve. Its text is
corrupt, its date uncertain, and it has been used apologetically in the
N. T. in a way which, though in substance justifiable, yet is in form
opposed to any reasonable canon of interpretation. The Psalmist must
be supposed to speak first for himself, and not for his people. It is
true that Cheyne affirms that "the speaker is the personified associa
tion of pious Israelites, which, however small, feels itself the bearer of
Jhvh's banner," This view is in accordance with the dictuni laid
down that "we can venture to say that it is the consciousness of the
Church, or of some leading members of the Church, which finds a
voice in every part of the Psalter." This theory of Prof Cheyne's is
not without its attraction as a practical restatement of the mystical
view in terms required by criticism. The most succinct form of the
mystic view is Augustine's : " Scarce is it possible in the Pss. to find
any voices but those of Christ and the Church, or of Christ only, or of
the Church only" (on Ps, 590- In spite, however, of all that is urged
in behalf of this idealising tendency of the Psalmists it is impossible
to accept any theory which makes them mere mouthpieces of the
Church-nation. What they felt and wrote they felt and wrote indeed
as Jews, but they had first experienced it as men. Perhaps the more
adequate statement would be that the Psalter, being the Hymn Book
of the Jewish Church after the Exile, comes to us not directly frora its
several authors, but fragrant with the aspirations, fears, hopes, joys
3—2

36 PSALMS [XVI.
and sorrows of the Church-nation which adopted them. In this
respect it resembles the Synoptic narratives. These do not come to
us as they might have met a contemporary of Jesus Christ, but they
bear the impress of the history of the first two generations which
followed His Ascension. He who would understand them as they
stand must feel the heart-throbs of the earhest Christian communities.
So it is with the Psalter. Every Ps. had its historical hcu^, but it is
charged with more than its author put into it. It survived because,
under its particularistic form, pious people felt a more general truth
which belonged to the Church-nation as a whole.
The point thus raised by Prof. Cheyne is so important for the
proper understanding of the Psalter that it may be well to illustrate
it a little further.
In every one of us there may be said to lodge two souls. There is
that which seeks its own particular good, and that which refuses to
separate between its own good and that of others. The end to both
is the same, viz, self-realisation, but in the one case the self is dwarfed,
or as Hobbes put it, "sohtary, poor, nasty, brutish, short"; in the
other the self is that larger and more generous ego which has taken to
its heart the good of all as its own good. The individual self has
been transformed into a social self. "A being who, like man, is a
little higher than the animals, 'a little lower than the angels,' can only
realise his own life, in so far as he realises the life of the society of
which he is a member. To maintain himself in isolated independence,
to refuse to be compromised by social relations, is the surest way to
fail to realise the good he seeks. To seek life is in this sense to lose
it. On the other hand, a man finds salvation in the duties of family,
profession, city, country. To lose his life in these is to find it. For
the social fabric of which he finds himself a part is only the fabric of
his own life 'writ large'" (Muirhead, Elements of Ethics, p. 160).
In the same sense we may say that the Psalmist writes not merely
from the view-point of his narrow, individualistic self, but from that of
his larger self, as having made his own good consciously the good of
his people. He speaks indeed as the representative of the Church-
nation, but only because he has first identified his own proper good
with that of the society of which he is a member. Its spirit lives in
him, and his "social-self" is its compendium and voice.
With this preface we may now proceed to the Ps. before us. It is
from first to last the jubilant expression of the joy and serenity which
the chasldim experience in the favour of Jhvh. It presupposes also a
knowledge of the Law and glad acceptance of it. "I have said unto
Jhvh, 'Thou art my Lord; I have no good beside Thee,'" is a confession
based on the First Commandment of the Decalogue.
3 a. It is better on the whole to take that crux of commentators,
3 a, as a gloss which has crept into the text = To the holy in the land
he now says, " In their princes is all my delight." If {v. 5) The Lord
Himself is the portion of my inheritance may be referred, as seems
almost certain, to the law of the Levites which gave them Jhvh for

XVI.] PSALMS 37
their inheritance (Deut. 10"), then the princes here may weU be the
priests, God's representatives of whom the Psalmist himself was
perhaps one. Helki = my portion, suggests that the priest's name may
have been Hilkiah = Jhvh is my portion.
4. As for idolaters— Samaritans, says Cheyne— the Psalmist will
have no connection with them ; he wiU not even mention the idols'
names :— names were charged with magical power for good or evil, e. g.
to name Jhvh was to be blessed by Him, and to name Chemosh was to
come in some way under his power ; nor will he share their drink-
offerings of blood. Most commentators treat the predicate of bhod as
metaphysical, but there seems no reason for rejecting its literal meaning.
Libations of blood were common enough.
5 a says with Ps. 23' that Jhvh " is for His people a cup which is
never empty." The Hebrew for maintainest is in any case ambiguous.
Delitzsch translates it : Thou ensurest for me a spacious habitation as
my lot. Hitzig's suggestion is tempting ¦ Thy Thummim are my lot,
a_ remark which would be very appropriate in one who was perhaps
himself a priest. It is no vahd objection that the Thummim are never
mentioned without the Urim, for if we reject this conjecture then the
word itself occurs nowhere else, and might as well be rejected for the
same reason.
6. The lines are fallen, &c., is a manifest reference to Jos. 17'.
Israel, as a whole, had had Palestine marked out as its portion by the
measuring line, but a far sweeter portion was assigned the Levites ;
truly the hnes had marked out for them a goodly heritage, even Jhvh
and His religion.
7. The thought of his favoured position, especially as the writer
lies awake at night and meditates on the Law, the Temple and Jhvh's
nearness to him, and His bountiful goodness, sweUs his heart with
joyful pride and confidence. He has a champion at his right hand,
even Jhvh ; who can move him ? His heart is glad ; his ghry (= his
soul ; cf. my darling in Ps. 22^° and my honour in Ps. 7°) rejoices ; his
whole living organism (= his^esA) rests in security (not in hope). The
good is present not future, and in this world not the next.
8, Cf. 109^', 121=.
10, 11. The last two verses have no eschatological reference.
They declare merely in their proper meaning that the Psalmist's confi
dence in Jhvh, like that of the Pss. of Solomon (3'), is such that he
issure his soul will not be allowed to go to She61; as Jhvh's chi,sld he
wiU not go to the grave. Some imminent danger is doubtless before
his mind, and from it, he declares, Jhvh will surely deliver him.
What is more, Jhvh will show him the path which leads to life. {Path
of life and path of ghry both refer to the Messianic age, when, as
another Psalmist says, ghry will abide in our land!) In Jhvh's presence
is perfect joy; in His right hand (not at His right hand) is a super
abundance of good things ready to be bestowed on Jhvh's favourites.
But though this be the primary meaning, the question still remains
whether a deeper meaning can be legitimately read from the words

38 PSALMS [XVII. 1-3
used. We may hold that there is, and yet not admit that the methods
of interpretation adopted in Acts 2"^-^ and 13^"'' are vahd, outside
the reach of Rabbinical rules. The truth is indeed that the antithesis
is not between life here and life hereafter, but between life with and
life without God. But it is not the whole truth. It is also true that
one who has been aUowed to experience such close intimacy with the
Living One cannot die. His God is the God of the living. The
fulness of this truth is reached when God is revealed as the Father,
and claims men as His sons. On that revelation rests our hope of
immortality. This truth is admirably set forth in the following
extract from C. G, Montefiore's Bible for Home Reading, in loco : —
" Though Israel or the pious community may be the speaker in a number
of seemingly ' individuaUstic ' Pss,, yet the Psalmist himself feels the thoughts
which he puts into the mouth of Israel. Only because he has reaUsed them
in his own soul, does he embody them in written words. They are the expres
sion and outcome of his own experience; Israel speaks through him 
But if he says of Israel, ' Thou wilt not suffer Thy loving one to see the pit,'
he cannot feel his words to be true for himself as well as for Israel. As an
individual he will see 'the pit' {i.e. the nether world), for he, like all men, is
mortal. The best explanation will therefore be to assume that the Psalmist
speaks both for himself and for all other pious Israelites, who together make
up the true Israel  It would not, I think, be inaccurate to say that the
Psalmist was, as it were, trembling on the verge of a fuller faith. If the Ps.
was written in the late Persian, or early Greek period, various conceptions of
a life after death in one form or another, were making their appearance in
Judsea, May we not suppose that at a moment when the Psalmist is filled
with a sense of close communion with God, he forgets and ignores the
approaching death, and conceives of his life with God as enduring for ever
more ? The Psalmist's joy in God was in truth one of the pathways whereby
men climbed up to the conception of immortality. And it was the purest of
all the pathways — if I may use so mingled a metaphor. Por a behef in
immortality is not the mere postulate of God's righteousness ; it is not the
supposed necessary reward of human merit; but it is the result and the
corollary of communion with God, It is the conviction that the spirit which
has found its source and home in God has also found a bond and a union
which even death is powerless to sever."

PSALM XVII.
A Prayer of David,
1 Hear the right, Jhvh, attend unto my cry,
Give ear unto my prayer, that goeth not out of feigned lips.
2 Let my sentence come forth from thy presence ; let thine
eyes behold the right.
3 Thou hast proved mine heart ; thou hast visited me in the
night ;
Thou hast tried me ; thou findest nothing ;
I am purposed that my mouth shall not transgress.

xvii. 4-15] PSALMS 39
4 [[Concerning the works of men]] : — By the word of thy lips
I have kept the ways of '"the godly "".
5 I have kept my steps in thy Way :
My feet slip not.
6 To thee do I call : hear me, O God :
Incline thine ear unto me : hear my speech.
7 '"Shew favour marvellously by thine own right hand,
0 Saviour of thy trusting ones
From those that pursue them.^
8 Keep me as the apple of the eye,
Hide me under the shadow of thy wings,
9 From the wicked that oppress me,
From my deadly enemies, who compass me about :
10 Men who are inclosed in their own fat :
Who with their mouth speak proudly:
11 Who have now compassed us in our steps :
And have set their eyes to bow us down to the earth :
12 Who are like a lion that is greedy of his prey,
Like a young lion lurking in secret places.
13 Arise, Jhvh,
Face him, cast him down :
Deliver my soul from the wicked, ^which is thy sword]]:
14 P'rom men which are thy hand, Jhvh|,
From men of the world, which have their portion in this
Ufe:
Whose beUy thou fiUest with thy hid treasure:
Who are full of children,
And leave the rest of their substamce to their babes.
15 As for me, I shall behold thy face in righteousness :
I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness.
This is not an easy Ps, to decipher. To begin with, its text is, by
common consent, corrupt. Wellhausen leaves vv. 11 and 14 mutilated
and makes no attempt to conjecture the original. Cheyne in The
Expositor for October, 1901, reconstructs the text in so drastic a spirit
that the Ps. of the R. V. becomes hardly recognisable. Duhm has, as
we shall see, some bold conjectures, which Cheyne rejects, though they
make admirable sense and have an inherent probabihty. The diver
gence between commentators as to the meaning of detailed passages is
wider even than usual, Jennings and Lowe and Cheyne, for instance,
declaring m-e rotwndo that "abar " never means transgress, while Duhm

40 PSALMS [XVII.
refers to the Psalmist's use in Ps. 73' as an example of such an evil
sense. It is obvious, therefore, that any possible rendering of the Psalmist's
original meaning must be open to question, and that all we can hope
for is an approximation to what he wrote.
The Psalmist is clearly a representative of the party of Jhvh. He
is experiencing the usual fortune of those who " set themselves up to
be better than their neighbours," and like all religious men he flies for
support and vindication to his God. According to Duhm his Ps. "is a
valuable document of the earnest, world- eschewing, purely legal and
self-conscious piety of the first generations of the Pharisees ; but, at
the same time, of the offence they were to the ruling party; it is
weighty too for the history of religion for the opposition it reveals
between the ' separated ones ' and the ' men of the world.' " For this
view the righteousness of v. 1 to which Jhvh is intreated to give heed,
is legal righteousness, as are the right, or straight things of v. 2. The
conservative commentators, such as Delitzsch and Hengstenberg, find
great difficulty in harmonising these declarations of personal righteous
ness with the N. T. view that none is righteous before God. " In the
exposition of this Ps. and of some others, the left eye must be fixed
on David, that the right may be intent on Christ." Here, as in many
other cases, the difficulty vanishes at the touch of the Ithuriel spear of
Evolution. This suspected self-righteousness is, if anything, emphasised in
vv. 3-5. The Psalmist lays bare his heart to God ; even in the quiet
ness of night, when man's true self lies before his own consciousness,
he shrinks not from God's scrutiny. He claims freedom from sin just
because his conception of sin was not that of the N. T. There is no
evil purpose in him; it passes not out into act; before God's doings
he keeps reverential silence; he keeps anxious watch over his lips; his
feet have ever walked in the way of the Cha,sid {i.e. in its later sense of
the "separated one") ; they have not swerved from the paths of Jhvh.
This is Duhm's rendering of these difficult verses, and gives a
consistent sense, if it be permissible — which is not at aU certain — to
correct p^rltz {tyrant) into pfi.riish {Pharisee), and so to assign as
a date to the Ps. the end of the second century B.C. Cheyne, who
rejects Duhm's rendering, substitutes liar for destroyer.
Kirkpatrick remarks on verse 7 that " the balanced brevity of the
Hebrew (the whole verse contains but six words) defies translation.
The translation should most certainly be : 'Of Thy favour show note
worthy tokens. Thou that helpest by Thy right hand those who seek
refuge from their enemies ' " (so substantiaUy Wellhausen).
For the apple ofthe eye = that which is guarded jealously, cf. Zech.
2^ Deut. 32'°, Prov. V : and for the varied metaphor of a bird covering
her young, Ps. 36', Deut. 32". The verse here is clearly borrowed
from the two verses of Deuteronomy referred to.
The enemies of the Psalmist are described in terms which are
identical with those used of their opponents by the Pharisees. They
are ungodly or impious ; they have closed their heart against every

XVII.] PSALMS 41
good thought and feeling ; they speak haughtily ; they watch for an
opportunity to cast the righteous down to the ground ; like a lion are
they_ eager for the prey ; they are men of the world, who ask for
nothing better than earthly prosperity, children to perpetuate their
name (a boon which Orientals in general desired), plenty of corn and
wine, and enough over to hand on to their children.
The Psalmist's own aspiration is of another kind. As for himself,
he says, with emphasis on the context, that he finds his delight in
God. To behold God's face means ordinarily to visit His Temple, and
there is no reason for assigning it any other meaning here. Others
may be satisfied with sensual pleasures, but I, gays the Psalmist, will
go away in stricter righteousness, that is, the righteousness demanded
by the Law, to visit Jhvh in His Temple, and will be satisfied with
His hkeness — e.g. with such a representation of the Invisible Dweller in
the Temple as is given in Is. 6, or in the thought of Him as Lord over
the world, or as Giver of the Law — that is the "likeness" of Him
which His chdsid carries with him, which I shall be satisfied with when
I awake in the morning to visit His Temple.
Wellhausen's rendering of the word b'hikltz, on awaking, deserves
consideration, as = when Thou awakest in answer to my petition :
"Arise, 0 Jhvh, come forth to meet him." Then when I shaU see
this vindication of my righteousness I shall be satisfied with the
tokens Thou shalt show.
It is impossible to maintain that this last verse is an explicit
confession of belief in resurrection after death. Such a confession
would be an anachronism in the days of David, and could be defended
only if the Ps. is assigned to a much later date. But, as Kirkpatrick
remarks, any reference to the awaking out of the sleep of death is
excluded by the context. " The Psalmist does not anticipate death,
but prays to be delivered from it. The contrast present to his mind
is not between 'this world' and 'another world,' the 'present life' and
the 'future life,' but between the false life and the true life in this
present world, between 'the flesh' and 'the Spirit,' between the
'natural man' with his sensuous desires, and the 'spiritual man'
with his 'Godward desires.'"
At the same time it is true, as we saw in the previous Ps., that the
close communion which the Psalmist had in spirit with Jhvh contains
implicitly the full Christian hope of immortality. "Historically, it
has been just in proportion as the doctrine of the Divine sovereignty
has verged towards that of Fatherhood, that the sense of the worth of
the individual, apart from the community, and of his permanence —
that is, his immortality — has dawned on man. That man is dear to
God, and that once dear to Him he is eternally dear, is a truth which
is only brought home and sustained fully by the Fatherhood of God,
and, where this is not fully reahsed, by the supremacy of fatherliness
in the conception of God. The evidence of _ immortality wiU never
stand mainly in the nature of man, but ever in what is known of the
nature of God." (Lidgett, The Fatherhood of God, p. 313.)

42 PSALMS [XVIII. 1-12

PSALM XVIIL
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David, the servant of Jhvh, who
spake unto Jhvh the words of this song in the day that Jhvh delivered him
from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul : And he said,
1 I love thee, Jhvh, my strength.
2 Jhvh is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer :
My God, my rock ; in whom I put my trust :
My buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high
tower.
3 " Laudable is Jhvh,'' is my cry ; who is worthy to be
praised :
Therefore am I secure from mine enemies.
4 The I- waves H of death compassed me.
And the floods of impiety made me afraid.
5 The cords of Sheol compassed me about :
The snares of death laid hold of me.
6 In my distress I called upon Jhvh,
And cried unto my God :
He heard my voice out of his temple :
My cry before him came into his ears.
7 Then the earth shook and trembled :
The foundations also of the hheavens-l moved :
They were shaken, because he was wroth.
8 There went up a smoke out of his nostrils :
Fire out of his mouth devoured :
Coals were kindled by it.
9 He bowed the heavens also, and came down :
Darkness was under his feet.
10 And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly :
Yea, he flew upon the wings of the wind.
11 He made darkness his secret place ; his pavilion round
about him :
He covered himself with darkness of waters,
Thick clouds of the skies without brightness.
12 Before him his thick clouds passed :
Hail stones and coals of fire.

XVIII. 13-27] PSALMS 43
13 Jhvh also thundered in the heavens :
The Highest gave his voice :
Hail stones and coals of fire.
14 He sent out his arrows, and scattered them :
He shot out lightnings, and discomflted them.
15 Then the channels of waters were seen.
And the foundations of the world were discovered
At thy rebuke, 0 Jhvh,
At the blast of the breath of thy nostrils.
16 He sent from above, he took me :
He drew me out of many waters.
17 He delivered me from my strong enemy.
And from them which hated me : for they were too
strong for me.
18 They came upon me in the day of my calamity :
But Jhvh was my stay.
19 He brought me forth also into a large place :
He delivered me, because he delighted in me.
20 Jhvh rewarded me according to my righteousness :
According to the cleanness of my hands hath he recom
pensed me.
21 For I have kept the Ways of Jhvh,
And have not wickedly departed from my God.
22 For aU his judgments were before me.
And I did not put away his statutes from me.
23 I was also upright before him.
And I kept myself from mine iniquity.
24 Therefore hath Jhvh recompensed me according to my
righteousness,
According to the cleanness of my hands in his eyesight.
25 With the merciful thou wilt shew thyself merciful :
With an upright man thou wilt shew thyself upright :
26 With the pure thou wilt shew thyself pure :
And with the froward thou wilt shew thyself froward.
27 For thou wilt save the afflicted people :
But wilt bring down high looks.

44 PSALMS [xvni. 28-43
28 For thou, Jhvh, art my light :
My God will enlighten my darkness.
29 For by thee I run upon a troop :
And by my God I leap over a wall.
30 As for God, his way is perfect,
And all his Ways are judgment :
The word of Jhvh is tried :
He is a buckler to all those that trust in him.
31 For who is God save Jhvh ?
Or who is a rock save our God?
32 The God that girdeth me with strength,
And maketh my way perfect.
33 He maketh my feet like hinds' feet,
And setteth me upon my high places.
34 He teacheth my hands to war,
So that [[a bow ofJ brass is broken by mine arms.
35 Thou hast also given me the shield of thy salvation :
And thy right hand hath holden me up,
[[And thy gentleness hath made me great.]]
36 Thou hast enlarged my steps under me,
That my feet did not slip.
37 I will pursue mine enemies, and overtake them :
I will not turn again till they are consumed.
38 I will wound them that they are not able to rise :
They shall fall under my feet.
39 For thou hast girded me with strength unto the battle :
Thou hast subdued under me those that rose up against me.
40 Thou hast also given me the backs of mine enemies :
That I might destroy them that hate me.
41 They cried, but there was none to save them:
Even unto Jhvh, but he answered them not.
42 Then did I beat them small as the dust hof the earth-) :
I did h trample them down -I as the dirt in the streets.
43 Thou hast delivered me from the strivings of the people :
(48 c) Thou hast delivered me from the violent man :
Thou hast made me the head of the nations :
A people whom I have not known shall serve me.

XVIII. 44-50] PSALMS 45
44 As soon as they hear of me, they shall obey me :
The strangers shall submit themselves unto me.
45 The strangers shall fade away,
And come trembling out of their close places.
46 Jhvh liveth ; blessed be my rock :
Exalted be the God of my salvation :
47 The God that avengeth me.
And subdueth peoples under me.
48 He delivereth me from mine enemies :
Yea, thou liftest me up above those that rise up against me :

49 Therefore tvill I give thanks unto thee, Jhvh, a/mong the
nations :
I tmll sing praises unto thy name.
50 Great deliverance giveth he to his king; amd sheweth
mercy to his anointed,
][To David and his seed for ever!^
A Ps. popular enough to appear in two coUections. Its appearance
in 2 Sam. 22 is due to interpolation, for the story of the numbering of
Israel (2 Sam. 24) follows quite naturally on the story of the incident
of the sons of Rizpah, and of the burial of the bones of Saul and
Jonathan, related in 2 Sam, 2P~'^. But between these two was
first of ah interpolated a catalogue of David's heroes, and this inter
polation in its tum was cut into by the insertion of the two Pss.
of which the variant of Ps. 18 was one. (See International Critical
Commentary, Samuel, p. xxvii.)
Ps. 18 has been considered as the one Ps. which biblical criticism
has left to David, and the older commentators ascribe it to him without
hesitation. But WeUhausen gives excellent reasons against its Davidic
authorship. "The decisive argument against it is furnished by the
total absence of definite historical allusion."
When a heathen king like Shalmaneser II recorded his exploits, as
on the black obelisk now in the British Museum, he speaks distinctly
of historical doings. Thus he says: "In the first year of my reign I
crossed the Euphrates in full flood. To the Western Sea I marched.
I washed my weapons in the sea ; presented offerings to my gods ;
ascended the Mt. Amanus ; felled cedar and cypress timber ; ascended
the LaUar; my royal image there set up,"
In the poem transcribed by Pentaur, in which Ramses II describes
his danger at Qodshfl from the "perverse" Khiti, the historical
colouring is clear, "No other prince," he says, "was with me, no
general officers, no one in command of the archers or chariots. My

46 PSALMS [XVIII.
foot-soldiers deserted me, my charioteers fled before the foe, and not
one of them stood firm beside me to fight against them." Then he
invokes his father Amon, and the god replies : "Face to face with thee,
face to face with thee, Ramses Miamun, I am with thee ! It is I,
thy father ! My hand is with thee and I am worth more to thee than
hundreds of thousands."
On the Moabite Stone Mesha is no less explicit :
" I am Mesha, son of Chemosh, King of Moab, the Dibonite;
"My father reigned over Moab 30 years, and I reigned after my
father ;
"And I made this high-place for Chemosh at Khorkah,
" A high-place of salvation, for he saved me from all the kings, and
made me look on all mine enemies."
Or if we compare the Song of Deborah, and David's lament over
Saul and Jonathan, we find the same minuteness of detail which
betrays the mind of one conversant at first hand with the events which
he is celebrating.
This absence of living characterisation forbids us to ascribe the Ps.
either with the old commentators to David, or to Alexander Jannseus
with Duhm, The Ps, is rather a Messianic lyric uttered by the royal
nation of which the Davidic dynasty is the appointed leader, or else by
the Messianic King himself But even so, as we have seen before, a
lyric must have some contact with earth, and thus the truth probably
is that the doings of David or of Alexander Jannseus, or better still of
Simon Maccabseus, have been selected by some Psalmist who had no
personal acquaintance with either, and used as the materials from
which to construct a Ps. of praise to Jhvh. " We have heard with our
ears, 0 God, our fathers have told us what work Thou didst in their
days, in the times of old," seems to state his position. He then takes
the traditional stories of war, deliverance and victory, and weaves them
into a confession of faith and an anthem of praise.
It is to be noted too that he speaks as one of the afflicted people,
as a doer of the law, keeping Jhvh's statutes and ordinances, walking
in righteousness, and, therefore, as living at a time when "the poor
and needy" was almost a technical term, when the law was the principal
mediator of religion, and, moreover, when foreign peoples had been
subdued, and mountain warfare had been familiar. All which suits
very well the age of Simon Maccabseus, and does not suit the days of
David. Beyond tbis we caimot go.
The Ps, falls into five parts : —
1. An ascription of praise (1-3); vv. 1 and 3 are perhaps the
addition of a Levite singer, as v. 49 also seems to be.
2. A lyrical description of Jhvh as Deliverer (4-19).
3. The Psalmist's righteousness as a reason for his deliverance
(20-30). 4. An Io Psean before Jhvh (31-45).
5. Doxology (46-50).

XVIIL] PSALMS 47
1. _ The names of Jhvh in v. 2 are all drawn from military art.
The cliff, the cavern, the difficult crag had saved ; shield and sword
and spear had not failed, but better than all was Jhvh. So Ramses II :
"Amon is more to me than a million soldiers, than a hundred thousand
charioteers, than a myriad of brothers, or young sons joined all together,
for the number of men is as nothing — Amon is greater than all of
them." (Cf. 119".) Verses 4 and 5, too, have their close parallel in
the same Egyptian poem : " Here am I in the midst of people so
numerous that it cannot be known who are the nations joined together
against me, and I am alone amongst them, none other is with me."
Amon too heard the cry of his servant, and his descent made the
Khiti recoil with terror. Between the two there is that remarkable
similarity which the Oriental mind stamps on all its religious creations,
and, it may be added, there is a no less remarkable ethical difference
between the Jew's conception and that of his neighbours.
2. It is impossible to regard the second division as a literal
description of a literal deliverance by means of a thunderstorm. It
has every mark of being an idealised picture of a storm regarded as a
manifestation of Jhvh's wrath, and couched in the language of an
earlier day, before Israel had been taught that Jhvh was more than a
God of the storm and tempest. The mind of the poet — and every
religious mind is also poetic — saw Jhvh's presence in the wind which
drove back the Red Sea, and in the thunder of Sinai and lightning
cloud which encircled its summit, and in the earthquake which made
the little hiUs to hop. It was the prophet of a later age who found
Him in the still small voice.
The Cherub on which Jhvh rode takes us back to the primitive
conception of the Hebrews, before their religion had developed its
distinguishing characteristics. At the root of the name Jhvh is the
thought of breath, or wind — the two have a cognate meaning in most
languages — and in more than one passage Jhvh appears as riding on
the swift storm-cloud, as making winds His messengers and His
ministers the lightning-fires. The Cherub then, whatever its form,
came down from heaven to earth, and so was symbohsed in a form
which was of the earth earthy. We shall not be far wrong, perhaps, if
we conceive of the cherubim of Eden as like the winged figures guarding
the tree which Babylonian seals have made us familiar with, and also
assign the same form to the cherubim carved on the wahs of the
Temple, and to the two figures which guarded the way into the Holy
of Holies. The Rabbinical guess at the etymology of cherub that it = K'rahi,
like a child, is responsible for the absurd conception of innocent, child
like gentleness which artists have loved to assign to the attendants on
the Most High. (On the whole subject, see Cobb, Origines Judaicce,
pp. 244-248.)
3. The force and inherent truth of the assertion of uprightness
contained in the third section are lost by those commentators who
insist on reading a Christian standard into it backwards. The Psalmist

48 PSALMS [xvin.
is speaking from the view-point of one who found his delight in the law
of Jhvh. That law he declares he had kept; having kept it he had
not made iniquity his own. He is sure too that Jhvh is true and just.
Therefore He wiU show Himself mindful of His covenant; to His
Chasid He wih show Himself as a Chdsid, but the proud He will treat
as they deserve. Scorn shall be met by scorn, pride by more than
equal unyieldingness. The revelation given by Jesus Christ that God
remains the Father of aU, even if His children have not yet bebome such
by filial recognition of Him, was not yet given to the Psalmist. _ Man
had to assimilate the truth of Jhvh's sovereignty and retributive justice
before he was fit to receive Him as his Father. The Psalmist's piety,
therefore, is that which is exhausted in the observance of the Law
with all lowliness, and does not rest on the higher ground of the sense
of imperfection and sin within. So the Psalms of Solomon (1 ") say :
"Suddenly the alarm of war was heard before me. I said: 'He mil
hear me, for I am full of righteousness.' "
4. This section contains more definite notes of actuality than the
rest of the Ps., and may be considered as the nucleus of fact round
which has clustered the poetic emotion of the Psalmist. Battle had
been joined — apparently with domestic {v. 43) and foreign {v. 44) foes —
and the enemy had been routed and massacred. Like the worshippers
of Baal of T3rre, they had cried to their god, but there was none to
hear. Beaten they had been forced to sue for terms and to submit.
Without any attempt at dogmatising, it may be at least suggested
whether the year b.c. 142, when "the yoke of the Gentiles was taken
away from Israel," does not supply the suitable historical background
for the Ps. before us. Jonathan had had a career troubled, but on the
whole prosperous, when he was murdered in B.C. 143. His brother
Simon, who succeeded him as leader, entered into the labours of
Jonathan and reaped their fruit. He secured from the Syrian king
recognition of the political independence of the Jews. The Jews, " in
order to give expression to this fact, now adopted a mode of reckoning
of their own, beginning with the Seleucid year 170, or B.C. 143-142.
Documents and treatises were dated according to the year of Simon as
high-priest and prince of the Jews." An event so important as to
start a new era, and to produce Ps, 110, may weU have produced also
the one before us,
5. The phrase of «. 46 translated Jhvh liveth is really similar to the
court salutation "Long live the King," and is a reverent greeting
given to Jhvh by the Psalmist. " The really secular impression which
the phrase 'Long live Jhvh' makes on the mind is in perfect harmony
with the naive self-seeking of the speaker, who is eager for the subju
gation of the foreigners and the satisfaction of his revenge, and treats
religion as a means for gaining for himself the Mightiest of all allies."
Duhm. The same critic transfers v. 48 c to the end of v. 43 a, as
above. This alteration {a) fiUs up a lacuna in ¦;;. 43, and {b) contrasts
more symmetricahy the foreign and the domestic foe.
Verse 49 is clearly a hturgical insertion, for the only attitude of

XIX. 1-6] PSALMS 49
the Psalmist to the heathen is that of the conqueror to the conquered,
while in this verse the Levite appears among them as a singer.
Similarly, in v. 50 c, "to David and to his seed for evermore" is clearly
an epexegetical addition to His anointed. If the suggestion given
above is well founded, then it is Simon who is Jhvh's anointed, because
His King. As the leader of Jhvh's Chasidlm, it is fitting that Jhvh
should show him chesed.
3 a is a battle-cry.
4 a. Correct the text from 2 Sam. as required by the parallelism.
Ih. As 2 Sam. The mountains are meant in either case.
11 b. Brightness belongs here and not to 12 a (R.V.).
20-23 presuppose Deuteronomy by such technical expressions as
keep, statutes, judgments, way, perfect.
28. As 2 Sam.
30 a = Deut. 32*, and the stiche inserted above is taken from this
latter passage to satisfy the metre ; 30 c, d = Prov. 30°.
35 c is of dubious meaning, besides being in aU probability a gloss.
The (LXX) Thy hearing {i.e. of my prayer), or Thy discipline, or Thy
meekness are all unsuitable. WeUhausen conjectures Thine aid hath
made me mighty, Duhm Thy shield protecteth me.
41 b shows that the enemies were not heathen.
42 a, b should certainly be corrected by 2 Sam.

PSALM XIX.

For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.
1 The heavens declare the glory of God :
And the firmament sheweth his handywork.
2 Day unto day uttereth speech,
And night unto night sheweth knowledge.
3 There is no speech nor language :
Their voice is not heard.
4 Their '"voice'' is gone out through all the earth.
And their words to the end of the world.
*******
In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun,
5 Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
And rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race.
6 His going forth is from the end of the heaven.
And his circuit unto the ends of it :
And there is nothing hid from the heat thereof.
c. 4

50 PSALMS [XIX. 7-14
B.
In Praise op the Law.
7 The law of Jhvh is perfect,
Converting the soul :
The testimony of Jhvh is sure,
Making wise the simple.
8 The precepts of Jhvh are right,
Rejoicing the heart :
The commandment of Jhvh is pure,
Enlightening the eyes.
9 The fear of Jhvh is clean,
Enduring for ever :
The judgments of Jhvh are true
And righteous altogether.
10 More to be desired are they than gold.
Yea, than much fine gold :
Sweeter also than honey
And the honeycomb.
11 Moreover by them is thy servant warned :
In keeping of them there is great reward.
12 Who can understand his errors ? from secret faults
Cleanse thou me.
13 Keep back thy servant also from the presumptuous :
Let them not have dominion over me :
Then shall I be upright, and innocent
From the great transgression.
14 Let the words of my mouth be acceptable,
And the whispered prayer of my heart,
In thy sight, Jhvh,
My Rock, and my Redeemer.
Few commentators on this Ps. can resist the temptation of quoting
Kant's: "The starry sky above me and the moral law in me are two
things which fill the soul with ever new and increasing admiration and
reverence." Yet the Ps. and the philosopher's remark are not on all
fours. The Law eulogised in the Ps. is not the moral law within, but
the Mosaic law without the soul. With that alteration, however, the
Psalmist would have borrowed Kant's confession gladly.

XIX.] PSALMS 51
Have we two Pss. here or one ? One, say the older commentators ;
two, say most of the later. Why should not a poet have chosen
deliberately to alter his metre and language to mark the contrast
between the revelation of Jhvh in Nature and in the Torah ? ask the
former. Is it not more likely, reply the latter, that some one, either
displeased at the original ending of the Ps. affixed the present, or that
the original was lost, and so a new ending found ? Such questions, on
both sides, are not determined, and are not determinable merely by
literary criteria, but receive their answer from the theological, or
philosophical preconceptions of the questioner. One who has come to
accept the view of O.T. history which evolution offers will probably
give an answer which differs from that given by a man who believes in
the verbal inspiration of the Bible.
A. If what we have now is really one Ps. it is at aU events a Ps.
with two motifs. The first adores Jhvh in Nature ; the second praises
His Law given to Israel. Just as Ps, 8, as we saw, presupposed Gen. 1,
so does this. It was El — so is Jhvh named in the first half — who
created the heavens and the earth, made the firmament, and set great
lights and made the stars also. They all declare His glory. They
declare it unceasingly : each day receives the song of praise from the
day before it, and each night from its forerunner. (Wellhausen, how
ever, would prefer to render v. 2 " the blue vault tells it by day, the
starry heavens teach it by night." He also relegates v. 3 to the foot
of the page as " an extremely prosaic intimation that the voice of v. 2
is not to be taken literally.") The P.B.V, of v. 4 gives sound for line,
and Jennings and Lowe give strain, but the Hebrew kS,v is always a
measuring line, and gives here a perfectly good meaning, (On the other
hand, the paraUelism of the verse favours voice, and so far supports the
substitution of kdli,m, their voice, for kivvi.m, their line.) The sphere
of operation of this mute voice, its appointed limit, is, in modern
language, the Infinite. Where there is Reason " in Reason's ear they
ah rejoice." After 4 6 we must suppose that something has been omitted,
perhaps dehberately. Egyptian religion told of a journey of the sun
during the night through the underworld and of his re-appearance in
the morning. But the Hebrew religion learned to dissociate itself from
the nature-religion of its neighbours. To them Rfi,, or Horus, or Osiris
might be an anthropomorphic god, sailing in his bark across the sky,
or on the under-sky. To the Jew Nature was but the instrument of
Jhvh, and He a terrible God, holy, not to be found by searching. One
hiding Himself. If the original writer of this Ps. used the imagery of
nature-rehgion to describe the sun as journeying in the realms of the
underworld, and went on to say that in them had Jhvh set a tabernacle
for the rising sun, then it is quite intelligible that a later editor, recol
lecting how the cult of the dead was associated with Osiris worship,
felt compeUed to excise the passage as offensive. His action would be
on a par with that which has passed the plane in general over the
mythological in the O.T. The same consideration would account for
4—2

52 PSALMS [XIX.
the suppression of the whole of the latter half of the Ps. in favour of
a passage of greater actuality. In any case the description of the sun
as a strong man, a bridegroom, and a runner gives a picture of vigour
and joy in life which would not be disowned by Homer.
B. This is written in the Qina-Strophe, in which dirges were
expressed, the characteristic of which is that a long line is followed
by a short. Cf Ps. 101.
7-14. In this section it is not the El-Shaddai of Nature, but Jhvh,
the covenant-God, that is hymned, for and in His Law. His Torah is
perfect for "all His work is perfect" (Deut. 32*). Not only is it free
from all flaw ; it is also final. It is a joy and not a burden — it refreshes
the soul. Montefiore says : "Let none of my readers believe a word of
it, if they read in non- Jewish books that the Law was a burden and a
bondage. That is historically false. Outsiders can only discern the
fetters and the chain ; but to the immense majority of those who wore
them they were transfigured into the robe of glory and the crown
of joy." The testimony, 'ad6th, is a common name for the Decalogue,
especially in its character of a code which testified to the requirements
of Jhvh, and so gave sure Imowledge of His Will, and also made the
simple folk wise.
8. The precepts, pikkudim, affirm of the Torah in its detailed
charges that they are straightforward, meaning what they say, and give
joy to the conscience which has learned to track them out — the joy of
healthy casuistry.
The commandment, mitzvdh, of Jhvh, as expressing His purpose
and desire, is pure as sunlight, and enlightens the inner eye (Mt. 6"').
9. The fear of Jhvh is not here a name for inward awe, but it is
one more name for the Law itself, regarded as the "revealed way in
which Jhvh is to be feared, in short it is the religion of Jhvh." Cf
Ps. 34" : " I will teach you the fear of Jhvh." He is to be feared by
keeping the Sabbaths, by observing the laws of cleanness, and by the
Levitical sacrifices. This code of honour is clean, free from heathen
abominations ; and it shares Jhvh's unchangeableness.
The judgments of Jhvh, mishpdtim, the case-law, the decisions of
the judges, the deductions of the Scribes, being based on the eternally
true Torah, are themselves just and true. God's word is Truth
(John 17").
10, 11 are illustrated by the Siphri : "A man must not say: 'I
will study the Law that I may attain the title of Rabbi, or that I may
become rich by it, or that I may be rewarded for it in the world
to come.' He must study for love's sake." So Rabbi Zadok : " Make
not the Law a crown to glory in it ; nor an ox to live by it."
12, 13 move uneasily in the circle of legal piety. For known sins
of inadvertence there was the trespass offering of course, but for sins
which the sinner was not conscious of, the Law had no remedy. They
were left to Jhvh's uncovenanted mercies. Moreover the pious were

XX. 1-9] PSALMS 53
in danger of falling into the ways of the proud (the presumptuous ones),
i.e. of "sitting in the seat of the scornful," of sinning, therefore, with
" a high hand," and so would they fall into the unpardonable sin of
deliberate law-breaking. For that the Law provided nothing but
death. " The soul that sinneth shall be cut off from my people " was
aU it had to say (Num. 15"°' ^'). As of sins of inadvertence and of
ignorance the Psalmist prays, " Forgive us our debts," so of the great
sm he says, "Lead us not" into temptation,"
The explanation just given is preferable to that of Wellhausen who
makes the Proud = the heathen and the Servant = Israel. He also
treats verse 14 as a liturgical addition, as in Ps. V.
The word acceptable in it is that commonly applied to sacrifices,
and would be natural to a Levite who had learned that prayer was an
unembodied sacrifice. Forheg'ydn, whispered prayer, ci. 1^ and 5'.
PSALM XX.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.
1 Jhvh answer thee in the day of trouble :
The name of the God of Jacob defend thee ;
2 Send thee help from the sanctuary,
And strengthen thee out of Zion ;
3 Remember all thy oflFerings,
And accept thy burnt sacrifice ; Selah.
4 Grant thee according to thine own heart,
And falfil all thy counsel.
5 We wiU rejoice in thy salvation,
And magnify the name of our God :
The Lord fulfil all thy petitions.
6 Now know I that Jhvh saveth his anointed :
He wiU answer him from his holy heaven
With the saving strength of his right hand.
7 Some hare strong-! in chariots, and some in horses :
But we hare strong in -I the name of Jhvh our God.
8 They are brought down and fallen :
We are risen, and stand upright.
9 Jhvh, save the king :
Answer us when we call.
The subject-connection between Pss. 20 and 21 is very close. In
both it is a King who is the object. The intercession of the first is
completed by the thanksgiving of the second. In both there is the
same view of sacrifice. The King himself is the sacrificer, and to him

54 PSALMS [XXI. 1-2
in both the same affectionate loyalty is shown. The latter part only_ of
Ps. 21, with its fiery denunciation of the nation's foe, is in discord with
the joyful trust of the remainder of the two Pss.
Ps. 20 has two divisions and a concluding prayer. The first five verses
were sung by the Levites, and form an invocation on the King's behalf.
Jhvh indeed dweUs in Heaven, but He is present in His Temple ; the
King is His anointed, the sacrifice is of His own appointment, the
presence-bread speaks of Him as there — He sitteth between the Cheru
bim. Well may the Levites then look for an answer out of Zion ;
well may they pray that the memorial of meal-offering shall turn
Jhvh's mind towards the King, and that the whole burnt-sacrifice
shaU win him Jhvh's favour. Their prayer finds its highest point in
verse 5 : Let us shout for joy in Thy salvation :
Let us magnify the name of our God
(where the LXX reading for the word rendered magnify — nigd^l for
nigd61 — is obviously more suitable). After verse 5 a pause must be
assumed, while the worshippers anxiously await the answer of Jhvh to
the sacrifice which is being offered, in a spirit analogous to that of the
heathen priest whose duty it was to see and report whether the omens
were favourable. Then a solo-voice breaks out with exultation. Jhvh
has accepted the sacrifice, and it is certain, therefore, that He will be
with His anointed representative, when he goes out to war for his
people. He will answer with "mighty acts of salvation of His right
hand" {v. 6). The world-powers may employ the mailed-fist: the
pious Jew has a mightier force — the saving presence of Jhvh. (Read
for naz'klr, remember, nag'blr, are strong, after LXX.) Therefore, he
concludes : God save the King;
Answer when we call.
In the University of Pennsylvania is a glass axe dedicated to Bel
of Nippur in the fourteenth century B.C., on which is inscribed a votive
Ps., part of which is as follows :
That he may hear his prayer;
Hearken unto his desire ;
Accept his prayer ;
Preserve his life ;
Make long his days.
PSALM XXL
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David,
1 The king joys in thy strength, Jhvh :
And in thy salvation how greatly he rejoices !
2 Thou hast given him his heart's desire :
Thou hast not withholden the request of his lips.

XXI. 3-13] PSALMS 55
3 For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness :
Thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head.
4 He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him,
Length of days for ever and ever.
5 His glory is great in thy salvation :
Honour and majesty hast thou laid upon him.
6 For thou hast made him most blessed for ever :
Thou hast made him exceeding glad with thy countenance.
7 For the king trusteth in Jhvh,
And through the mercy of the most High he shall not be
moved-
8 Thine hand shall find out all thine enemies :
Thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee.
9 Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of
thine anger :
Jhvh shall swallow them up in his wrath,
And the fire shall devour them.
10 Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the land,
And their seed from among the children of men.
11 For they intended evil against thee :
They imagined a mischievous device, which they are not
able to perform.
12 Therefore shalt thou make them turn their back :
Thou shalt make ready with thy strings against the face
of them.
13 Be thou exalted, Jhvh, in thine own strength :
So tmll we sing and praise thy power.
This Ps. is structuraUy identical with the preceding, consisting as
it does of two divisions and a concluding prayer. A solo-voice sings
the first seven verses, the choir praises Jhvh's might in verses 8-12,
and in verse 13 is a refrain summing up the whole. This Ps. is one
appointed for Ascension Day, and is regarded, therefore, by the Church
as Messianic, which in a true sense it is, as indeed is every Ps, But
the great things spoken here of the King by no means imply that " the
Ps. may have been written by David in the Holy Spirit with reference
to the Messiah, his Son." A direct reference to Messiah must not be
inferred merely because life, length of days, salvation, glory, honour
and majesty are ascribed to the King spoken of here. For similar
ascriptions appear in heathen poetry. Cheyne quotes an Assyrian Ps.
which runs : " Distant days, everlasting years, a strong weapon, a long

56 PSALMS [XXI.
life, many days of honour, supremacy among the Kings, grant to the
King, the Lord, who made this offering to his gods." The prayer in
both Pss. springs from the same loyal and rehgious spirit. Every
rehgious Oriental of the time believed that his King was the represen
tative of his God, and the Jews were no exceptions. This accounts for
much of the glow of the language addressed to the monarch. He was
closer to the Divinity than the ordinary mortal, and shared in the
Divine prerogatives. Hence the language used of the King was not
inappropriate for the King of Kings in His Messiah. It might be too
hyperbolical for the Oriental monarch as he reaUy was, but the believer
in the Messiah finds it all too short for his King.
But more than this must be said. The form of expression was
admirably adapted for Christian phraseology. Was there not then
some substantive reality behind the form? Was not the Jewish
monarch himself a type and forerunner of the Messiah ? He was ; but
only in proportion as he stands before us realising in his own person
the eternal righteousness of Jhvh. In so far as his character and
doings are a shadow cast before by the King who would show forth
perfectly the kindness and truth of Jhvh, so far, and no further, may
he be regarded as a type of the Messiah, and so far, and no further,
may a Ps. sung of him be said to be Messianic.
With this explanation it is easy to see that the Psalmist might
himself see no further than to the King of his own day, and yet that
he might pray for him such great things as overtopped the reality :
the kingly dignity (= the crown of pure gold), length of days forever and
ever (cf Let the king live for ever), glory, honour and majesty — ah
Divine attributes — all point to an ideal which neither the King before
us, nor any other Jewish king realised. They are a sign-post then of
the future ; they find their true fulfilment in the enduring Kingship of
Jesus the Christ.
Most commentators take the second part as addressed to the King.
Jennings and Lowe are almost alone in taking it as addressed to Jhvh,
But as it is Jhvh who most commonly in the Psalter is described as
the destroyer of Israel's enemies, there does not seem any good reason
for departing here from the general usage. Jhvh is to utterly destroy
every enemy, and their children; to put them to flight, to "aim at
their faces with His bowstring," and to consume them as fuel in the
furnace. There is nothing in these two Pss. to determine their date, or the
occasion of their use. References to David's history can be found
easily enough, but so can others to the days of the Asmonseans. The
fact that the King appears to be a priest also points to a date not later
than Solomon, or not earher than Simon Maccabaeus. On the whole
the latter seems preferable. Duhm points to the fact that 10 refers
clearly to domestic foes, and 11 in all probability to the caUing in of
foreign foes, and sees in this conjunction a striking parallel to the
struggle of Alexander Jannseus with the Pharisees who called in
Demetrius III, were finally beaten and driven into exile. See Schiirer
Div. I. § 10.

XXII. 1-14] PSALMS 57
PSALM XXII.

For the chief Musician to Aijeleth-Shahar, A Psalm of David.
1 My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ?
Why so far from helping me.
From the words of my roaring ?
2 0 my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou answerest not :
And in the night season, and am not silent.
3 But thou art holy,
0 thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel.
4 Our fathers trusted in thee :
They trusted, and thou didst deliver them.
5 They cried unto thee, and were delivered :
They trusted in thee, and were not confounded.
6 But I am a worm, and no man :
A reproach of men, and despised of the people.
7 All they that see me laugh me to scorn :
They shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying,
8 " Throw thyself on Jhvh ; let him deliver thee :
Let him deUver thee, seeing he delighted in thee."
9 But thou art he that took me out of the womb :
Thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother's
breasts.
10 I was cast upon thee from the womb :
Thou art my God from my mother's belly.
11 Be not far from me ; for trouble is near :
For there is none to help.
12 Many bulls have compassed me :
Strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round.
16 a For dogs have compassed me :
16 b The assembly of the wicked have inclosed me :
13 They gaped upon me tmth their mouths,
As a ravening and a roaring lion.
14 I am poured out like water,
And all my bones are out of joint :

58 PSALMS [XXII. 14-28
My heart is Uke wax :
It is melted in the midst of my bowels.
15 My strength is dried up like a potsherd :
And my tongue cleaveth to my jaws :
16 c They have h fettered-) my hands and my feet.
And brought me into the dust of death.
171 may tell all my bones :
They look and stare upon me.
18 They part my garments among them,
And cast lots upon my vesture.
19 But be not thou far from me, Jhvh :
0 my strength, haste thee to help me.
20 Deliver my soul from the sword :
My darling from the power of the dog.
21 Save me from the lion's mouth :
From the horns of the unicorns answer me.

B.
22 I will declare thy name unto my brethren :
In the midst of the congregation will I praise thee.
23 Ye that fear Jhvh, praise him :
All ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him :
Fear him, all ye the seed of Israel.
24 For he hath not despised nor abhorred the aflMction of the
afflicted :
Neither hath he hid his face from him :
But when he cried unto him, he heard.
25 From him cometh my praise in the great congregation :
I will pay my vows before them that fear him.
26 The meek shall eat and be satisfied :
They shall praise Jhvh that seek him :
Their heart shall live for ever.
27 All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn unto
Jhvh :
All the kindreds of the nations shall worship before him.
28 For the kingdom is Jhvh's :
He is the governor over the nations.

XXII. 2.9-31]

PSALMS

59

29 All they that be fat upon earth shall eat and worship :
All they that go down to the dust shall bow before him :
Whosoever cannot keep alive his own soul.
30 A seed shall serve him :
It shall be told of Jhvh to the next generation.
31 They shaU come, and shaU declare his righteousness
Unto a people that shall be born, that he hath done 

The importance of this Ps. may warrant a little fuller treatment
than has been given those which have preceded it. In the first place
it has more numerous points of contact with other 0. T. scriptures
than most Pss. This may be seen best by setting side by side the Ps.
and its parallels. I use the translation which on the whole seems to
give the best sense, when the Heb. and its versions, and also the
numerous emendations of critics have been duly weighed.

1 My God, my God, why hast
Thou foi-saken me ?
Thou remainest far from my
help
And from the cause of which
I complain.
2 I call by day ; Thou answerest
not;
I caU by night ; I find no rest.
3 Yet Thou art the Holy One ;
Thou art throned on Israel's
songs of praise.
4 On Thee, our fathers trusted ;
They trusted and Thou didst
deliver them.
5 They called to Thee and were
delivered ;
On Thee did they trust and
were not put to shame.
6 No man am I, but a worm :
Scorned of men, despised by
the people.
7 All who see me jeer at me ;
They make mouths at me ;
They toss their heads : —
8 " Lay thy cares on Jhvh ;
Let Jhvh help thee ;
Let Him deliver thee, for He
delights in thee."

But Thou hast said : The Lord hath
forsaken me ; Is. 49'-*.
If I had called and He had answered
me, yet would I not believe that He had
hearkened unto my voice: Job 9^^. Cf.
Ps, IQi,
When I cry and shout He shutteth out
my prayer : Lam. 3*.
Jhvh is in His holy Temple: Ps. 11*.
The Lord of Hosts that art throned on
the Cherubim : 2 Sam. 6''; 2 Kings \^^; Is.
37'". Ps, 44'.

Ps. 107".
Fear not ; for thou shalt not be ashamed ;
neither be thou confounded ; for thou shalt
not be put to shame : Is, 54*.
Fear not, thou worm, Jacob : Is, 41'*.
Him whom man despiseth, whom the
nation abhorreth : Is. 49'. Despised and
rejected of men : Is. 53^.
I was a derision to all my people ; and
their song all the day : Lam. 3".
The daughter of Jerusalem shakes her
head at thee : Is. 37^^ Ps. 109^.
Commit thy works unto Jhvh and thy
thoughts shall be established : Prov. 16^ ;
Ps. 37^
Jhvh taketh pleasure in them that fear
Him : Ps. 147". Cf Ps. 37*.

60

PSALMS

[xxii.

9 Yet Thou art He who didst
take me from my mother's
womb ;
Under Thy care did I lie upon
her breast ;
10 On Thee was I thrown from
my mother's womb ;
From birth onward hast Thou
been my father ;
11 Be Thou, Jhvh, not far from
me;
Trouble is nigh and none to
help.
12 Many bulls encompass me ;
bulls of Bashan beset me
round.
16 Dogs encompass me ; a crew
of villains encircle me.
13 A ravening and roaring lion
gapes upon me;
14 Like water spilled am I ;
My bones are disjointed.
My heart is become like wax ;
It is melted in the midst of
my bowels,
15 My throat is dried up as a
potsherd ;
And my tongue cleaveth to
my jaws ;
16 c They have fettered my hands
and my feet ;
15c And fixed me in the dust of
death.
17 1 number all my bones ;
They stare on me ; they feast
their eyes on me ;
18 They part my garments among
them;
They castthe lotfor my vesture.
19 But be not Thou far off, Jhvh ;
0, ray Strength, haste Thee to
help me.
20 Deliver my life from the
sword ;
My sole-beloved from the
power of dogs.
21 Save me from the jaws of the
lion ;
Help me from the horns of
the wild-oxen,
22 I will proclaim Thy Name to
my brethren ;
In the midst of the assembly
will I praise Thee,
23 Oh, ye that fear Jhvh, praise
Him;

vv. 9 and 10 are quoted loosely in Ps.
716'", All the remnant of the house of
Israel which are bome by Me from the
belly, which are carried from the womb :
Is, 463. Of Is, 491. 16.

Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan...
which oppress the poor, which crush the
needy : Am, 4', Cf Ez, 3421, 39".

Cf Ps. 1712.
A broken spirit drieth the bones : Prov.
For God maketh my heart soft: Job
231". My flesh and my skin hath He made
old ; He hath broken my bones : Lam, 3*.

So Job 29i».
Cf Ps, 105".
Ps, ID?!"'",

Jhvh hath anointed me to preach good
tidings unto the pious : Is. 61', And He
said. Go, and tell this people, &c, : Is, 6'.
Ps, 40", 35i«.
Ps, 1351''''"', n\\

XXII.]

PSALMS

61

Ye children of Jacob, honour
Him;
Ye children of Israel, stand in
awe of Him.
24 The affliction of the aflBicted
He has not despised or
loathed ;
He has not hidden His face
from me;
When I cried he heard.
25 From Him springs my praise
in the great assembly ;
In the presence of them that
fear Him will I pay my
vows.
26 The pious shall eat and be
satisfied :
They who seek Him shall
praise Him :
May your hearts revive for
ever !
27 The ends of the earth shall
celebrate Jhvh ;
The kindred -peoples shall
worship Him.
28 For Jhvh's is the Kingdom ;
And He is Governor over the
peoples.
29 Him only all the proud of the
earth shall worship.
Before Him shall bend they
that have been made to
descend into the dust (i.e.
those in whose soul is no
life).
30 The seed (of Jacob) shall serve
Him;
One generation shall proclaim
to the next the doings of
Jhvh,
31 It shall declare His righteous
ness to people yet unborn :
For He hath done 

Ps. \i\ 53"; 1 Chr. 16^3, Ye seed of
Israel, His servant, ye children of Jacob,
His chosen.
Sing unto Jhvh ; praise ye Jhvh ; for
He hath delivered the soul of the poor
from the hand of the evil-doers : Jer. 20^1
He delivereth the afflicted in his affliction :
Job 36«.
Ps. 6933,

Deut, 12^.1. ¦a.-a.^ pg ggx

The Levite... and the stranger. . .shall
come and shall eat and be satisfied : Deut.

Your heart shall live that seek Jhvh :
Ps, 6932. Cf 1 Sam. 253^.
The Egyptians shall know Jhvh in that
day : Is. \^^.
In that day shall Israel be the third
with Egypt and with Assyria: Is. 19*';
Ps. 87*.
The Kingdom shall be Jhvh's : Ob. 21.
Jhvh shall be King over all the earth :
in that day shall there be one Jhvh, and
His Name one : Zech. 14".
Ps. 49^, Kings shall see and arise,
princes also shall worship : Is. 49'.
He raiseth the poor out of the dust :
1 Sam. 2'. Let the poor and needy praise
Thy Name : Ps, 74^1. I have taken upon
me to speak unto Jhvh, which am but
dust and ashes: Gen, IS'^; Is. 27".
They are the seed which Jhvh hath
blessed: Is. 61", 65".
Bx. 1220.2'.

Ps. 78".

A.
This Ps. "could never have existed but for that mine of poetry and
religion — the Book of Isaiah in its expanded form, ...The Servant of
Jehovah, as he [the author] at least understands the phrase, is cer
tainly not a guild or company of prophets, but the whole congregation
of faithful Jews in Jud8ea.,..Ps. xxii. presents us with a perfectly new
phase of Jewish rehgious thought. Before the Exile, men forsook

62 PSALMS [XXII.
their God when He proved unable or unwilhng to protect them. But
the congregation of faithful Israelites which was founded by Ezra was
able to trust its Father and its God even in the dark."
3. We should have expected "the Righteous One." But "the
Holy One," i.e. "the Separated One"— He that is far removed above
aU that is cruel and oppressive — is appealed to because the neglect of
His Servant is incompatible with His Perfection.
" The semi-mythic view of the cherubim pervades the Old Testa
ment; and wherever we find this phrase, it clearly describes Jehovah,
not as the God of Israel, but as the master of the forces ofthe Universe!'
In this verse Jhvh is not thought of as riding on the storm-cloud, or
on its earthly surrogate, the temple-cherubim, but on the " praises of
Israel," a bold and evangelical image.
14 and 18. FoUowing Wellhausen I have placed 16 a, b after 12
instead of after 15, and with Duhm I have transferred 16 c from after
16 b to its position above. In 16 c the A. V. deserts the Massoretic
Text and rightly, as its reading Ka'M, " like a lion," gives no sense.
But its substitute Ka'§.r<l in the sense "they pierced" does not give
much better. It is by no means certain that the verb has this meaning
at all, and the Oxf. Heb. Lex. says of the word, " meaning doubtful,
perhaps bore." Aiiother and a much better translation lies ready to
the hand. The triliteral kflr which is its root is "to be or make round."
Hence it gives us the word for "a pot or furnace for smelting metals,
but always in metaphor or simile of human sufferings in punishment
or discipline." But the root idea of what is round need not be
restricted to one set of round things, used for discipline. It can be
easily used for prison-gyves as going round the hands and feet. And
the reading of some ancient versions (Aq. Symm. Jer.) confirms
this meaning by their rendering, "they bound" (Jer. vinxerunt).
Probably fixerunt would not have been used at ah, but for the belief
that our Lord's sufferings were foretold here in detail. It was known
that His hands were pierced : therefore, seemingly it was argued, His
feet were also. But there is no authority for this latter belief in the
N. T., and, apart from this verse, none anywhere else either. It is far
more natural, and it suits the context better to understand "they
fettered" of the torment inflicted on the unhappy Psalmist by his
jailers — the dogs perhaps of v. 16 as distinguished from the opposing
leaders, the bulls and lions of vv. 12 and 21.
This is strengthened by what follows (17, 18). His limbs are
stretched and racked by the fetters he bears, so that his very bones
seem disjointed. His jailers take pleasure in staring at a man whose
approaching execution crowns him with a halo of morbid curiosity.
They are so sure of his fate that they begin at once to appropriate his
clothes. Everything within and without assures him that he has beeii
brought indeed to the dust of death.
20. My only-one = my hfe, not so much because I am alone (cf.
Luther: "He wishes to say. My soul is alone and forsaken by every
body ; there is no one who enquires after it, or cares for it, or comforts

XXII.] PSALMS 63
it"). But the similar term "my glory" in Pss. 7° and 16° points to the
true meaning being that of "only-beloved" {unicam meam Vulg., Trjv
jxovoyairj /xov LXX, <^t'A.ov K^p Homer, and Tifi.Lora.T7i \j/v)(i} Plato), But
the closest parallel is not Judg. 11'*, Gen. 22^ or Prov. 4", but
Cant. 6°: — "My dove, my undefiled is but one," i.e. she alone I love of
aU the women of the harem.
21. The unicorn of A. V. {unicornis Vulg., monoceros LXX) was
a fabulous animal, believed in perhaps through pictures of "profile
delineations of straight-horned antelopes." Haupt says that the R. V.
wild-oxen is not perhaps the best translation of re'em, since in Arabic
that name is given to the Oryx Leucoryx, a powerful antelope. But
the whole context of the Ps. makes wild-oxen preferable,
B.
22. The word for assembly in v. 22 and in v. 25 is k^hS.1, not
§dhah. The latter is by far the commoner word of the two in Ex. Lev.
Num. and Josh., but it is wholly absent from Deut. In the later
books fidhah goes almost out of use. K8-hS,l is hardly more common
in the Pss. and Prophets. After the return from the Exile it did duty
for the two words and combined their meanings. (Hort, The Christian
Ecclesia, pp. 6 and 7.) The R. V. renders it by assembly predomi
nantly. 25. From Him springs my praise. An objective praise, says
Calvin i "David canendi argumentum ex Deo petit"; but subjective
according to Cheyne : " Thou art the Alpha (and Omega) of my song "
= Jhvh "is not only the object but the source of his praise."
26, The word translated above pious is the familiar 'antivlm, the
meek, those who are humble or have been humbled, so as to have room
in their hearts for Jhvh, and none for self The reference is to the
social-religious meal, or the thank-offering (Sh'Mmlm) for deliverance
from trouble. Jennings and Lowe suggest tbe latter. For the former
in connection with the tithe see Driver's Deut., pp. 168-171.
29, The contrasted classes are not the quick and the dead, but
the rich and the poor. The man in whose soul there is no life is " he
who has been degraded and down-trodden in the social system of the
world, and brought down even to the dust of death," The poor have
the good news proclaimed to them.

This Ps. consists of two distinct parts, A, 1-21, and B, 22-31
(^Duhm says the latter has nothing in the least to do with the former),
u indeed the two parts are not distinct Pss. The references adduced
above show that Ps. 22 has most in common with the later writings,
with the Second Isaiah, Job, other Pss., and with Deuteronomy, We
may, if we choose, suppose, therefore, that B was added to A for
liturgical purposes by a writer of the school which, like the author of
Jonah, of Is. 19 and of Ps. 87, had come to look for "the mountain of

64 PSALMS [XXII.
Jhvh's house to be estabhshed in the top of the mountains." What
is stiU more interesting and important is that it was precisely this
school from which the N. T. writers drew chiefly their inspiration, and
their religious terms, and that our Lord used their writings more than
any other part of the 0. T. What the literature of the Reformation
was to us up to 1833 that was the hterature of the Exile to the meek
and quiet in Judsea up to b.o. 5.
But the two halves A and B can be taken together very weU for
our present purpose. They raise three questions :
(i) Is the author speaking in a personal, ideal, national or pre
dictive capacity ?
('ii) How far and in what sense is the whole Messianic ? and
(iii) What are we to understand from it is the nature of
Inspiration ?
The answers to the two last questions depend on the view we take
of the writer's capacity.
(i) The true view-point from which to regard the first question
has been stated already in the notes on Ps. 16. The personal, the ideal
and the national are perhaps never separated in the Psalter. If the
personal were not the solid framework of the picture the ideal would
be but a wiU o' the wisp. If the ideal be removed, the picture of the
Psalmist is but one out of myriads of pictures in history caUing for
our sympathy, but not compelling our attention. If the national be
absent, the personal element is narrow, selfish and unlovely. So far,
therefore, as the first three elements go we may agree with Kirkpatrick
that they are all there. But he adds, "the Ps. goes further. It is
prophetic. These sufferings were so ordered by the Providence of
God, as to be typical of the sufferings of Christ ; the record of them
was so shaped by the Spirit of God, as to foreshadow, even in detail,
many of the circumstances of the Crucifixion." I am quite unable to
accept this view. It is not want of reverence which withholds assent,
but the compelling abundance of it. To put the matter bluntly. To
regard God as planning the details of the Passion of His Son centuries
beforehand, and inspiring men to write them down is to take a low and
unworthy view of His action. It introduces also a psychological
miracle which is as vain as it is unthinkable. Is there a single case
in the whole Bible where God has revealed indubitably a matter of
historical fact — as distinct from an eternal principle — and so invaded
that domain of autonomy in our nature which by our creation He con
ceded ? Is it not the fact that the rehgion of the Bible is a religion
of faith and not of belief, in its essence and inmost self? If religion
depends in the last resource for its assurance on historical testimony
then it is not a matter of spiritual insight and feeling, i.e. of faith, but
of outward authority, of belief and argument. Kirkpatrick's prin
ciple — which is certainly that of the Reformers and their continuators —
leads logically to Rome. But it has no warrant in Holy Scripture.
But it may be said. This very Ps. has so many startling details
that design is obvious. Let us see what these details are.

XXH.] PSALMS 65
(a) " Our Lord quoted v. 1 on the Cross." Yes, because He had
been nurtured on the Pss., and the world's distress found once more,
not for the first time, agonised expression.
(6) " 'I am a worm and no man' is clearly based on Is. 53, and
that_ great chapter is confessedly a prophecy of Calvary." No doubt,
but it is the eternal principle of life through death which is the subject
in aU three, not details of fact. There are some details in Is. 53 which
were not found in the death of our Lord.
(c) "Does not Lk. (23^') use the very word used by the LXX to
express the ' deridere naribus suspensis ' " ? But would it have been
used if Lk. had not had the LXX before him ? A similar remark is
to be made of the head-wagging of v. 7 and Mt. 27"'.
{d) "They pierced my hands and my feet" has been dealt with
above. So too has the clause about the division of the clothes. The
truth reaUy is, no doubt, that John 19^* in describing what took place
borrowed the language of our Ps. The paraUel clause in Mt. 27 '^ is
an interpolation. It was inevitable, with the current views of inspira
tion, that the writers of the Gospel Story should see parallels in the
O.T. and that they should faU into O.T. language in describing the
Passion. It ought not to be inevitable that we should share their
theological mistakes. To do so is the surest way to miss their mar
veUous faith, and their life in Christ.
(ii) In what sense then is the Ps. Messianic ? In the same sense
as Is. 53. Israel was slowly educated to be Jhvh's Servant. A distinct
stage in its education was reached when an inspired Seer declared that
the purpose of Jhvh for Israel was at length cleared from ambiguity.
That purpose was not that, in its Messiah, it should subdue mighty
kings, and break them in pieces like a potter's vessel, but that it
should overcome the world by suffering. That was Israel's mission,
and it has been carrying it out ever since, consciously or unconsciously.
The pious man, therefore, both here and in Is. 53, who in his person
represented the power of suffering, who rested on Jhvh, and sought to
win for Him all the ends of the earth, was on the spiritual plane on
which was planted the Cross of the Servant of Jhvh. To him who
has once become familiar with this majestic possession of the Redeemers
of man, details of historical happenings become impertinent, when
separated from the eternal principle they embody, and from which they
derive aU their vahdity and aU their life.
(iii) In what sense is the Ps. inspired? In the sense that the
Bible as a whole is. It is the record of an inspired people, and when
we get them at their best we find inspiration at its highest. The
inspiration of the Bible can never, it is true, be dissevered from the
historical materials in which it is enshrined, but it itself is not locked
up in them. It breathes through them. In a word, it is of a religious
and not of an archaeological, or historical, or scientific, or theological
nature. It is spirit and not form ; life and not matter. (Cf Driver,
Introduction, p. xvi. ; Sanday, Oracles, pp. 72-75 ; Cobb, Origines
' " " ^, p. xi.)

66 PSALMS [XXIII. 1-6
PSALM XXIII.
A Psalm of David.
1 Jhvh is my shepherd ; I shall not want.
2 He maketh me to lie down in green pastures :
He leadeth me beside the still waters.
3 He restoreth my soul :
He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's
sake.
4 Yea, though I walk through the gloomy valley,
I will fear no evil : for thou art with me :
Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
5 Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine
enemies :
Thou anointest my head with oil ; my cup runneth over.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall foUow me all the days of
my life :
And I will dwell in the house of Jhvh for ever.
A Ps. which deserves its honour of being the first to be taught us
in our childhood, so sweetly does it breathe the air of unreflecting
peace, joy and confidence. The only discordant note in it is the
reference to the enemies, and this but serves to make the foUowing
concord the softer.
The image of God as Israel's Shepherd is one rare in the early
writings (Gen. 48^^), but became highly popular in the post-exilic
writings (Pss, 74S 77'", 78^' ™, 79", 80^; Is. 40"; Mic. 7"). The
imagery of the first four verses foUows closely the pastoral life of the
East. It is the shepherd's task to find cool pasturage under the blazing
sun (cf Cant, 1': "Tell me, 0 thou whom my soul loveth, where thou
feedest, where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon ") ; to find waters
of refreshment ; to revive the fainting sheep ; to lead them in straight
paths, because he himself is " straight " ; to go before them through the
dark and gloomy wMy (see note on 107"), and to beat off any wild
beast which may lurk there.
Then the image changes suddenly. Jhvh is no longer the guiding
and protecting shepherd. He is the bountiful host. He spreads the
table ; the foes look on, but receive no invitation ; the festal unguents
are provided to do the guest honour ; his cup is filled to overflowing.
His enemies may meditate pursuit, but the Psahnist is sure that only
Jhvh's goodness and lovingkindness wiU seek to overtake him (see note
to 85"), and he looks forward to such a peaceful hfe that he wUl be

XXIV. 1-7] PSALMS 67
privileged to share in Jhvh's Temple-service as long as he lives. The
first two verses have Is. 49"' " in view: "They shall not hunger nor
thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun smite them; for he that hath
mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shaU he
guide them. And I will make all my mountains a way, and my high
ways shall be exalted."
Ecclus. 18" furnishes also a striking paraUel: " The mercy of man
is towards his neighbour, but the mercy of the Lord is upon all flesh ;
He reproveth and nurtureth and teacheth, and bringeth again, as a
shepherd his flock."
WeUhausen points out that " the title ' shepherds ' in the 0. T. is
regularly employed in the transferred sense of shepherds of the peoples
= Kings." Hence it is as Israel's King that Jhvh is here hymned.
The Ps. too, in that case, has not the individual as its primary object,
but the nation, and so supplies an apt illustration of the view that the
" 1 " of the Psalmist is not to be taken in any but a national sense.
But see note to Ps. 16.
4. Tzalmfith is not a composite noun (= Tzal-miveth) but an
abstract noun with fem. pi. ending, as in Amos 5' and (against
Noldeke) Is. 9", signifying gloom.

PSALM XXIV.
A Psalm of David.
1 The earth is Jhvh's, and the fulness thereof :
The world, and they that dwell therein.
2 For he hath founded it upon the seas.
And established it upon the floods.

3 Who shall ascend into the hill of Jhvh ?
Who shall stand in his holy place?
4 He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart :
Who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity :
[[Who hath not sworn deceitfuUy.|
5 He shaU receive the blessing from Jhvh,
And righteousness from the God of his salvation.
6 This is the generation of them that seek him,
That seek the face l-of the God of Jacob.-) Selah.

7 Vers. Lift up your heads, 0 ye gates :
And be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors :
And the King of glory shaU come in.
5—2

68 PSALMS [XXIV. 8-10
8 Resp. Who is this King of glory?
Jhvh strong and mighty,
Jhvh mighty in battle.
9 Lift up your heads, 0 ye gates :
Lift them up, ye everlasting doors :
And the King of glory shaU come in.
10 Resp. Who is this King of glory?
Vers. Jhvh of hosts,
He is the King of glory. Selah.
This is apparently, says Duhm, a liturgical Ps. composed out of
three wholly distinct Pss. or fragments of Pss. But see what was said
above on Pss. 19, 22, 23. In any case somebody has made them to be
one Ps., and it is to be supposed that he saw no incongruity in the
patchwork. The first section describes Jhvh's greatness as Creator. It would
be interesting but futile to speculate as to the time when the Jews
first rose to the height on which they identify their tribal God with
the Maker of aU things. The step they then took was large and
fraught with momentous world-issues. The Gnostic denial of the
identity of the Creator with the God of Jesus Christ was a distinct
step backwards. The world to this Psalmist was in three divisions ('as
in Ex. 20*), the heaven above, the earth floating like a disc on the
waters beneath it, and the waters themselves out of which it came.
This so mighty God is yet Israel's God and dwells on Mount Zion.
Who then may dare to approach Him in worship?
The answer to that question is the criterion of the evolutionary
position of the religion which puts it. Here it is clearly a high one.
Not mere ritual cleanness, but a pure heart is required. So too is
devotion to the highest which is opposed to " vanity," i.e. immorality,
sensuality, vulgarity, and earthliness. So too we may take the clause
" he that sweareth not deceitfully " as an addition byway of illustration
drawn from a particular kind of " vanity " in fashion at the time. The
men who have these quahfications are they who seek the presence of
the God of Jacob, and they reap their reward by receiving the blessing
of righteousness from Him.
In the third part of the Ps, we are given what was clearly the
objective of it. Jhvh's greatness had been used to intensify His
hoUness, and His holiness now enhances the joy of approach to Him.
It is commonly assumed that this section refers to the entry of the Ark
into the Tabernacle. But this, it may be confidently said, is a mistake.
The "primeval doors" which are apostrophised speak too clearly of
some centuries at least of existence. "The expression 6Mm proves
that the Templeis already centuries old, and that the Ps., therefore,
is from the age immediately preceding the Exile (in which there was'

XXIV.] PSALMS 69
however, no occasion for a triumph-song of this sort), or else that it
sprang out of the last centuries before Christ " (Duhm). Hengstenberg
and Dehtzsch, however, get over the difiiculty (caused by their assump
tion of a Davidic authorship of the Ps.) by referring the expression
to the "gates of the citadel of Zion." "These might weU be called
ancient, for Jerusalem, with its strong Mount Zion, was aheady in the
time of Abraham a city of the Canaanites." But what ground is there
for giving the first place in the Psalmist's mind to the secular gates,
and the second to the sacred ?

4. It is impossible to miss the reference here to the Decalogue.
The hands are the instruments of action, and, hence, clean hands
= freedom from acts of sin, e.g. those forbidden by the 6th, 7th, and
Sth Commandments. The pure heart (if it refers to the 10th) is an
anticipation of St Paul's clear insight which saw the whole Law in
"thou shalt not lust" (Rom. 7'). To lift up the soul to vanity is
almost a quotation from Ex. 20', and, therefore, refers to perjury, a
very common offence in Eastern countries, and especially hateful to
the Jewish prophets. (4 c is a gloss on 4 5.) That the man who keeps
the moral law is he who shaU draw down Jhvh's blessing is a testimony
to the moral insight of the Psalmist. To deduce from this with Duhm
a side-blow at the efiicacy of the priefstly benediction is wanton.
5. Righteousness here seems used in the sense of iXeri/jLoa-vvr] (the
word by which the LXX here and in 8 or 9 other passages render
Tz'dlklh), the word which gives us the later equation : righteousness
= ahns; cf Dan. 4"; Ps. 112=; Toh 2", 12', 14"; and Mt. 6^
6. The spiritual insight of vv. 4 and 5 has been appealed to to
give as the true translation of this verse :
This is the generation of them that seek Him ;
Those that seek Thy face (are) Jacob.
Cf Rom. 9*' '. This is the well-known prophetic doctrine of the
remnant. But the LXX can hardly be departed from here. There is
a play on words in d6r (= generation) and d6rshi,v (= that seek Him).
The second seek (bikash) ace. to Oxf. Heb. Lex. aUudes to the practice
of " resorting to holy places."
7. The King of Glory. Jhvh is the glorious King (= He whose
manifested excellences call for all the adoration that man can give;
"He is more than thou bestowest").
Who is the King of Glory?
Jhvh, the Mighty, the Hero,
Jhvh, the Hero in battle.
10. Here the reply is varied and the King of Glory is described as
Jhvh Sab3,6th — a title which first occurs in Amos. What are the hosts
that are referred to ? A hasty answer would say the God of Israel's
battles, and would cf. 1 Sam. 17*: "I come to thee in the name of

70 PSALMS [xxv. 1-8
the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel." But against this
as the primary meaning of the term fall the considerations {a) that
Jhvh was Israel's God before Israel had armies; {b) that He was a God
of the storm-cloud before He tabernacled in Israel, and as such had
more to do with the heavenly forces than with earthly hosts ; (c) that
Jhvh Sabi,6th is preeminently the prophetic title of God, and that the
prophets were not so much concerned with Jhvh's power, using the
armies of the world-peoples for the instruments of His chastisements,
as with His unique majesty and holiness. Moreover, {d!) it is agreed
that J' S' is J.'s "most significant and sublimest title." Hence it
must be based on the highest of aU powers supposed to be His, i.e. not
earthly hosts, but heavenly. These latter would be perhaps in earlier
times the sun, moon and stars, and in later angels who formed His
court. It would then be in a secondary sense that He was also Lord
of the earthly hosts as well. See Driver's article s.v. in Hastings'
Dictionary of the Bible.

PSALM XXV.
A Psalm of David,
1 X Unto thee, Jhvh, do I lift up my soul.
5 c On thee do I wait all the day.
2 2 10 my God,]] I trust in thee :
Let me not be ashamed :
Let not mine enemies triumph over me.
3 J Yea, let none that wait on thee be ashamed :
Let them be ashamed which ^transgress"" without cause.
4 1 Shew me thy Ways, Jhvh :
Teach me thy paths.
5 n Lead me in thy truth, and teach me :
For thou art the God of my salvation.
6 T Remember, Jhvh, thy tender mercies and thy loving
kindnesses :
For they have been ever of old.
7 n Remember not the sins of my youth, fnor my trans
gressions :
According to thy mercy remember thou me]]
For thy goodness' sake, Jhvh.
8 £3 Good and upright is JhvH :
Therefore will he teach sinners in the way.

xxv. 9-22] PSALMS 71
9 1 The meek wiU he guide in judgment :
The meek wiU he teach his Way.
10 3 All the paths of Jhvh are mercy and truth
Unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies.
11 7 For thy name's sake, Jhvh,
Pardon mine iniquity ; for it is great.
12 lb What man is he that feareth Jhvh ?
Him shall he teach in the Way that he shaU choose.
13 J His soul shaU dweU at ease :
His seed shaU inherit the land.
14 D The secret of Jhvh is with them that fear him :
And he will shew them his covenant.
15 y Mine eyes are ever toward Jhvh :
For he shaU pluck my feet out of the net.
16 fi Turn thee unto me, and have mercy upon me :
For I am desolate and afflicted.
17 X The troubles of my heart hremove thou -I :
0 bring thou me out of my distresses.
18 *1 Look upon mine affliction and my pain :
And forgive aU my sins.
19 'n Consider mine enemies ; for they are many :
And they hate me with cruel hatred.
20 jy 0 keep my soul, and deliver me :
Let me not be ashamed ; for I put my trust in thee.
21 n Let integrity and uprightness preserve me :
For I wait on thee.

22 Redeem Israel, 0 God, out of all his troubles.

Ps. 24 answers the question, "Who may ascend the hill of Jhvh?"
and Ps. 25 the question, " Who is he that feareth Jhvh ? " The
answer is given in the form of an alphabetic Ps. of a general character,
devoid of direct historical background, but bearing a strong family
likeness to the Wisdom literature. It has also points of connection
with Ps. 34, and may be from the same author. In both, it is curious
to note, the 1 verse is omitted, and a supernumerary verse is added at the
end. Outside the Psr. the alphabetic device meets us in Lam, 1-4,
and in Prov. 31""*'. It is not easy to find any single note in a Ps. of
thia character, any "climax or logical sequence." The thought which

72 PSALMS [XXV.
seems to dominate it is that Jhvh is with those who fear Him, and
that He is against those who hate His foUowers, It contains allusive
references to Ex. 33 and 34, to Job, and to Isaiah, which serve only to
illustrate its " mosaic of aphorisms and petitions," and in the light
of verse 14 may be assigned, without much rashness, to the age of the
Chasldim or of the Pharisees.
1. Each verse of the Ps. consists of two hnes of which each line
has three "beats." But the second hne of verse 1 is wanting, and
verse 5 has a superfluous hne. Hence it is suggested that verse 1
should read thus :
Unto Thee, 0 Jhvh, do I lift up my soul;
On Thee do I wait evermore.
2 will begin with its proper letter if " 0 my God " be removed.
3 is an afiirmation :
Yea, none that wait for Thee shall be ashamed ;
Ashamed shall they be who deal treacherously.
4. " The ways " of Jhvh are the course of life demanded by His
Law. That Law is not clear, and wants study, and also that inspiration
which another Psalmist found in the quiet of night (16'). This same
prayer is found in Ps. 27", and was also the prayer of Moses (Ex. 33")
which is apparently quoted here.
5. Lead me in Thy truth is not the prayer of one who desires to
explore the unknown — a thought alien to the Psalter — but a prayer for
guidance by One whose character is faithfulness : " Guide me, because
Thy guidance is to be trusted " is the prayer.
5 c of A.V. is transferred as above to verse 1.
The 1 verse is here omitted as in Ps. 34, perhaps because (beyond
the conjunction and a word for hooks in Ex, 26^^ and lis — a doubtful
word meaning guilty in Pr, 21° — and a few proper nouns) there are no
words in Hebrew beginning with this letter. The Psalmist may have
had a literary objection to beginning a verse with and, similar to that
felt by stylists of to-day.
6. The " hvingkindnesses" here are particular cases of that chesed
which we have seen is Jhvh's standing feeling towards Israel. The
same word occurs again in verses 7 and 10,
7, Following Duhm we omit "nor my transgressions according to
Thy mercy remember them not," as the interpolated pious ejaculation of
a scribe. This saves the metre, and we get :
The sins of my youth remember not
Because of Thy goodness, Jhvh.
The sins of youth are indiscretions ; those of later years are rebeUions.
For God's goodness c£ Ex, 33".
8. For the Way see Ps. 32" and Is. 49": "I wiU make aU my
mountains a way." This verse and verse 12 show that the term had
become technical for the right way in which Jhvh's followers should
walk. The fact that the expression had become technical may serve to

XXV.] PSALMS 73
iUustrate John 14^= " Not the Rabbis, but I am your guide in the way
you should go"; and also Acts 19^' ^, where the Christian community
is the continuator of Christ's functions, and is called itself " the way,"
and for the same reason.
9. The meek -those only who are humble and docUe. Low is
the door into the treasure-chamber of wisdom. He who would enter
must stoop.
10. Mercy and truth (chesed and emeth): quoted from Ex. 34'
(quoted also in Joel 2'° and Jonah 4*) ; see note on 12'. The meaning
is that the paths in which Jhvh's servants walk {Oxf. Heb. Lex. takes
it of Jhvh's mode of action, and so makes an unnecessary solecism) are
under the governance of One who out of His lovingkindness has made
a covenant with Israel, and is true and faithful to it in every case
where Israel is true and faithful to it, inaugurated as it was in circum
cision, ratified at Sinai, continually pledged by the Shechin§,h and the
two Tables present in the Temple, So Kirkpatrick. The " testimonies "
are the Ten Commandments as in 19'.
12. The question "Wliat man" is, as in Ps. 34"^, Is. 44", a
rhetorical way of saying " Whosoever." " The way He shall choose,"
according to Duhm = the right line of conduct in cases such as it is the
province of casuistry to solve. It is better to foUow 119^°' '", and
interpret it of Jhvh's way as chosen by the pious. He fears Jhvh ;
he has chosen the way marked out for him ; Jhvh shaU teach him
what more is required.
13. Two rewards were dear to the Jew, prosperity and a continued
hfe in his chUdren. The land which his posterity shall possess is the
Holy Land in the Messianic time, from which the godless shaU have
been removed. This is described in Is. 57'°, 60^', 65^ The same
promise is made in Ps. 37" and Mt. 5\
14. Jhvh's " secret," which He communicates to those who fear
Him, is His counsel to give them the land, and with it lordship over
the earth. Is the ' ' mystery " a parallel case to this, and deduced by
that same interpretative method which became known in Rabbinical
times as the s6d (the word here used for " secret ") ?
17. A.V. is here impossible. Kirkpatrick makes it : "The strait-
nesses of my hea/rt enlarge thou," where the Hebrew is read as hS,rchi,b.
Duhm, however, says that to enlarge straitnesses is of questionable
meaning, and suggests h£lrch§,k, remove thou them, which seems better.
18, 19. These in the M.T. both begin with the same letter. Kirk
patrick would prefix kflm, arise, to 18, and so give it its right letter.
Duhm again prefers to transpose the two verses and prefix k^dS,m,
prevent (a word found also in 17'" and 18'°).
" Forgive all my sins " ; because they are the ground on which
Jhvh aUows the author to be plagued by his foes.
22 is a subscription which hke the similar subscription in 34°'
begins with the word p3,dah, whence Lagarde has suggested that the
author's name was Pedael. If there is anything in this conjecture it
would concern, not the author, but a copyist.

74 PSALMS [XXVI. 1-12
PSALM XXVL
A Psalm oi David.
1 Judge me, Jhvh ; for I have walked in mine integrity :
I have trusted also in Jhvh ; I shaU not slide.
2 Examine me, Jhvh, and prove me :
Try my reins and my heart.
3 For thy lovingkindness is before mine eyes :
And I have walked in thy truth.
4 I have not sat with vain persons,
Neither wiU I go in with dissemblers.
5 I have hated the congi-egation of evil doers :
And will not sit with the wicked.
6 I will wash mine hands in innocency :
So wiU I compass thine altar, Jhvh,
7 That I may make heard the voice of thanksgiving,
And teU of all thy wondrous works.
8 Jhvh, I love the habitation of thy house,
And the place where thine honour dweUeth.
9 Gather not my soul with sinners,
Nor my life with bloody men :
10 In whose hands is mischief.
Whose right hand is ftdl of bribes.
11 But as for me, I will walk in mine integrity:
Redeem me, and be merciful unto me.
12 My foot standeth in an even place :
In the congregations will I bless Jhvh.
This and the previous Ps. have much in common, though the one
contains self-accusation and the other self-justification. But these two
things are not incompatible. In Ps. 25 the writer puts himself in
relation to Jhvh absolutely — solus cum solo— hut in Ps. 26 he brings
himself and his foes side by side before the bar of the just Judge, and
protests that as compared with them he is just and innocent. There is
no reason why a humble Christian should not do the same, and yet
retain his humility. This relativity is marked in v. 1 by the emphasis
laid on the " /" :
Do me right, Jhvh, for / have walked in my integrity ;
I have trusted in Jhvh without wavering.
His trust in Jhvh is contrasted with the trust in lies of the false
persons of v. 4. The words rendered "examine" and "try" are

XXVI.] PSALMS 75
borrowed from the art of the metal-refiner. The middle word of the
three rendered "prove" (n&s§,h,— reappears in Massah) is used of an
attempt to see whether a person will act in a particular way, and
is used of God tempting Abraham. (Driver, Deut. 6'".) The reason of
the Psalmist's confidence is that he has striven to keep Jhvh and His
two revealed attributes before his eyes ; He has remembered Jhvh's
kindness in entering into covenant with the people he belonged to,
and His faithfulness in keeping the covenant. (See note on 12'.)
Moreover, because of the very earnestness of his devotion to Jhvh the
kind and faithful, he hates the liars, conspirators, and hypocrites, who
take no heed of Jhvh. He feels as did the author of Ps. 1\
It is to be presumed that the washing of the hands in v. 6 takes its
origin from Deut. 21"' ', according to which a village-community, where
a murder has been committed by some person unknown, are to break
the neck of an unyoked heifer over running water in a wsldy, and wash
their hands, in token that their village has nothing to do with the
crime. This is clearly a more primitive custom than that enjoined on
the priests in Ex. 30'°"". Our Psalmist treats the congregation of evil
doers as on the same plane as the unknown murderer of Deuteronomy
and declares that when he stands in the circle of worshippers round
Jhvh's altar he will have first washed his hands clean of aU guilt
of contact with his and Jhvh's foes. A pious Pharisee might have
said this of the apostate HeUenising priests of the later Asmonsean
rule. Cf 73",
Duhm would transpose vv. 8 and 7. The Psalmist will be found at
the altar because he loves Jhvh's dwelling-place as passionately as he
hates the congregation of the evil-doers. (Cf Apoc. 2°.) It was the
place of the tabernacle of Jhvh's glory (Ps. 78" ) ; it was where he
would offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and tell of the marveUous
acts (Ps. 9') of Jhvh in judgment and redemption. The same word is
used in Ex. 3'" of Jhvh's marvellous doings in Egypt.
The equal liabiUty of saint and sinner to pain and death stared the
pious in the face then as now. Ewald suggests that some national
calamity overhung the land, perhaps a pestilence, and that it was this
which drew forth the petition that a distinction of loyalty might be
met with a distinction of fate : — Take not away my life with ihe sinners.
These are powerful men, who murder, are full of crimes and take
bribes, whether as legislators or judges. One of the chasldim in a
more humble position might well resent the being swept into the net of
destiny with the unscrupulous Asmonsean princes. As against them
again the "7" stands out prominent. As for me, Z"wiU walk in mine
integrity ; if in spite of that the national calamity sweeps over him he
is sure Jhvh will answer his prayer, will redeem him and be gracious
to him. 12 is the epilogue. After being hemmed in by precipices and
rough places he now emerges into the open, stands on level ground,
free from ambush or sudden attack or fall, and can in Jhvh's congre
gations bless Jhvh for his redemption.

76 PSALMS [XXVII. 1-11
PSALM XXVII.
A.
A Psalm oi David.
1 Jhvh is my light and my salvation ; whom shall I fear ?
Jhvh is the strength of my Ufe ; of whom shaU I be
afraid ?
2 When the wicked come upon me to eat up my flesh :
Mine enemies and foes stumble and faU.
3 Though an host should encamp against me.
My heart shall not fear : though war should rise against me,
Then tmll I be confident.
4 One thin,g have I desired of Jhvh ; that wiU I seek after :
That I may dweU in the house of Jhvh aU the days of
my life.
To behold the beauty of Jhvh, and to enquire in his temple.
5 For in the time of trouble he shaU hide me in his paviUon :
In the secret of his tabernacle shaR he hide me :
He shaU set me up upon a rock.
6 And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies
round about me :
I wiU offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy :
I will sing, yea, I wUl sing praises unto Jhvh.
B.
7 Hear, Jhvh, when I cry with my voice :
Have mercy also upon me, and answer me.
8 hWhen thou dost say to my heart, "Seek ye my face,"
Thy face, Jhvh, do I seek.-]
9 Hide not thy face far from me :
Put not thy servant away in anger :
Thou hast been my help :
Leave me not, neither forsake me, 0 God of my salvation.
10 My father and my mother have forsaken me.
But Jhvh taketh me up.
11 Teach me thy way, Jhvh,
And lead me in a plain path.
Because of mine enemies.

XXVII. 12-14] PSALMS 11
12 Deliver me not over unto the wiU of mine enemies :
For false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as
breathe out cruelty.
13 Unless I had believed to see the goodness of Jhvh
In the land of the living 

14 Wait on Jhvh:
Be of good courage, and strengthen thine heart :
Wait, I say, on Jhvh.
Two distinct Pss. are here joined, and Pss. too which had not the
same author. Not only are the tone and subject of A {w. 1—6)
dissimilar from those of B {vv. 7-14), but the author of the first half
is a leader, and that of the second a private person.
Duhm attributes A to Simon Maccabaeus or John Hyrcanus, and
says that B " for its childlike faith in Jhvh's care and favour bears the
noblest traits of the post-exilic religion."

It is not easy to say whether A is to be interpreted of literal
warfare, or of a campaign of calumny. Cheyne (p. 121) quotes 27"
and 35'' as evidences of a " common practice of avaricious and powerful
men to accuse innocent persons of some crime, such as theft, with the
view of obtaining double restitution." C£ Job 19''^: — "Why do ye
persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh ? " shows that
"to eat up my flesh" is a phrase which may describe calumny.
Cheyne (p, 219) also suggests that the ardent longing of v. 4 may
express the feeling of the proselytes of post-exilic times towards Jeru
salem. "Their chief desire was  to settle at Jerusalem and to
frequent the temple." This might be said with more truth to represent
the mind of the Jews of the Dispersion, who had for their mother-city
the feeling that non-Italian Roman Catholics have for Rome.
If, however, we are to follow Duhm and take A to be the utterance
of a priest, then v. 5 may very possibly refer to his feeling of security
in the possession of the Temple, where Jhvh was, and of the rock, or
holy mountain of Zion. B.
B is the moving cry of an afilicted ch&sld, whose only hope and
trust — and he gives them whole-heartedly — are in Jhvh. He manages,
too, to put into a single pithy sentence "the sum of aU revelation" :
When Thou dost say to my heart,
"Seek ye my face,"
Thy face, Jhvh, do I seek.

78 PSALMS [XXVIII. 1-5
Kautzsch, however, renders the verse : " From thee, saith my heart,
[goeth forth the word] : 'Seek my face' : Thy face, Lord, wiU I seek."
10 alludes to Is. 49'^ " : " But Zion said, 'Jhvh hath forsaken me,
and my Lord hath forgotten me.' Can a woman forget her sucking
chUd, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb ?
Yea, they may forget, yet wiU I not forget thee." This confirms the
view of Wellhausen that it is not an individual but Israel which
speaks in this Ps. He also says that 10 a "is not to be taken literally,
but = all who may be naturally expected to help. Israel is very fre
quently caUed an orphan (Pss. 68^ 94°)." It is better to say that the
writer nationalises his own experiences.
Nor is there any doubt that B moves in the circle of love of the
law : "Instruct me in Thy Torah" of v. 11 is witness enough for that.
Equally certain is it that he looks for continued life on earth as his
blessing from Jhvh {v. 13). This verse may be completed (as in R.V.)
from 1 19 ''^ or Is, 7'= "/ should have perished but for my belief to feast
my eyes on Jhvh's goodness in the land of the living," i.e. on earth in
contrast to Sheol. But since 14 is to be taken as a later addition by
another writer, who wished to avoid the ill-omened close he found in
his text, we must assume that the apodosis has been omitted (Grimm,
Euphemistic Litwrgical Appendixes, p. 11).

PSALM XXVIIL
A Psalm of Darid.
1 Unto thee wUl I cry, Jhvh :
My rock, be not silent to me :
Lest, if thou be silent to me, I become like them that go
down into the pit.
2 Hear the voice of my supplications, when I cry unto thee :
When I lift up my hands toward thy holy shrine.
3 Draw me not away with the wicked.
And with the workers of iniquity,
Which speak peace to their neighbours,
But mischief is in their hearts.
4 Give them according to their deeds, and according to the
wickedness of their deeds :
Give them after the work of their hands :
Render to them their desert.
5 Because they regard not the works of Jhvh,
Nor the operation of his hands.
He shaU destroy them, and not build them up.

XXVIII. 6-9] PSALMS 79
6 Blessed be Jhvh,

'¦I

Because he hath heard the voice of my supplications.
7 Jhvh is my strength and my shield :
My heart trusted in him, and I am helped :
Therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth :
And with my song will I praise him.
8 Jhvh is a strength hto his people,-!
And he is the saving strength of his anointed.
9 Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance :
Feed them also, and lift them up for ever.
Another Ps. which has no literary unity, though it may have a
liturgical. It is full, too, of passages which appear elsewhere. Thus
16=Ps. 143'; Ic recurs in Psalms of Solomon 5'; 2a=31^^; 5a = Jer.
45^; 7 seems a reminiscence of 16' and 1 Sam. 2'. This mosaic of
famihar passages is quite in accordance with the assumption that a
priest or Levite, whose lips kept knowledge, and gave forth the law he
had just studied, composed this Ps. as a hymn for the Temple-service.
Every modern hymn is redolent of Holy Scripture. Why should not
our ancient hymns be similarly influenced ? The same consideration
will account for the curious fact that in v. 5 the prayer is broken by a
sort of parenthetical reflection, in which the third person takes the
place of the second. Jhvh is called in v. 1 "a rock" (as in 18',
Deut. 32*, &c.) because of His strength, faithfulness and unchange
ableness. Tzftr, rock, is but emeth (faithfulness) in a concrete image.
The pit of V. 1 {= b6r, the same root as b'gr, well) is the name for the
land of death and is paraUel to " Sheol!' to " the land of forgetfulness,"
and to "death" (88=, Ez. 31'*' '^ &c.).
Oracle [A.V.] in «. 2 is a corrupt following of LXX and Jerome,
who supposed that d'bir, the word used, was derived from dibber, to
speak, instead of from dabar, to be behind. It denotes the sanctuary
as the innermost chamber of Jhvh's palace.
4. We have to avoid an error on each side when dealing with the
imprecations of the Psalmists. One is that of Hengstenberg, who
does not think that the Psalmist requires any apology, inasmuch as he
" prays that God wiU do nothing more than what He necessarily must
do according to His own being. He practises the^MS talionis according
to His own righteousness. Justice reverberates ; the unrighteous
blow, which I aim at another, recoils according to the moral government
of the world back upon myself" On the other hand are those who
with Prof Cheyne would extrude the imprecatory Pss. from Christian
worship, on the ground of their inconsistency with the spirit of Christ.
In medio tutissimus ibis. We shaU do better with Kirkpatrick to give
due weight to the principle of evolution, and to admit, therefore, that
some of these imprecations are below the Christian standard, and

80 PSALMS [XXIX. 1-9
necessarily so. We ought not, however, to forget that of the two
principles which Israel learned of J 'svu— kindness and faithfulness
(chesed and emeth)— Ohristianity, if it has emphasised the former has
not abrogated the latter. The Father is love indeed, but He is holy
love, who will by no means clear the guilty, and must maintain the
perfections of His being, and, therefore, present Himself in sternness
to those whose lives outrage His holiness. This truth cannot be
safely overlooked in any age, and least of all in one which has learned
softness. The verse recurs virtually in Psalms of Solomon 2 ".
_ 8, By a very slight change (I'ammd for lfi,m6) the LXX reading
gives us instead of "Jhvh is their strength," the far better sense:
"Jhvh is a strength to His people." "His anointed" is according to
most interpreters the king, or the priest. WeUhausen, however, holds
that the anointed here " is not David but the people. In the history
of the Theocracy the community succeeded to the place formerly
occupied by the kings. When the Theocracy ceased to be a monarchy
and became a republic, the sovereignty passed to the people." So
Cheyne, Jewish Religious Life after the Exile, p. 109,
Verse 9 gives a versicle and respond to the Morning and Evening
Prayer of the Church of England, and a verse to the Te Deum,

PSALM XXIX.
A Psalm of David.
1 Give unto Jhvh, 0 ye I- sons of Elohim,-!
Give unto Jhvh glory and strength.
2 Give unto Jhvh the glory due unto his name :
Worship Jhvh in the beauty of holiness.
3 The voice of Jhvh is upon the waters :
The God of glory thundereth :
Jhvh is upon many waters.
4 The voice of Jhvh is powerful :
The voice of Jhvh is full of majesty.
5 The voice of Jhvh breaketh the cedars :
Jhvh breaketh the cedars of Lebanon.
6 He maketh them also to skip like a calf :
Lebanon and Sirion like a young wild-ox.
7 The voice of Jhvh divideth the lightning-fires.
8 The voice of Jhvh shaketh the wilderness :
Jhvh shaketh the wilderness of Kadesh.
9 The voice of Jhvh maketh the Hoaks to tremble,-!
And layeth bare the forests :

XXIX. 9-n] PSALMS 81
[All the ends of the earth fear him,]
And in his temple doth every one say : "Glory. '^'
10 Jhvh sitteth upon the flood :
Jhvh sitteth King for ever.

11 Jhvh tmll give strength unto his people:
Jhvh tmll bless his people toith peace.
A Ps. which opens with Gloria in Excelsis ends with Pax in terris,
and is in form and construction and poetic skill without a superior in
the Psalter. It consists of a description of the rise, progress, and
dying away of a thunderstorm, preluded by an invitation to the
heavenly guUd to praise Jhvh, and concluded by an epilogue which
leaves Jhvh in static majesty.
According to tradition this Ps. is a festival Ps, for Pentecost, a
feast on which the Jews commemorated the giving of the Law. The
connection, of course, is through the thunderings and lightnings and
voices of Ex. 19'^ Jennings and Lowe point out that the phrase "the
voice of Jhvh" occurs seven times in this Ps,, that the name Jhvh also
occurs seven times in Ps. 19 B, and that seven thunders occur in
Rev. 10'.
1. The sons of the mighty — the b'n6 6hm are the "sows of God" —
the b'ng h^el6him of Gen. 6^ and Job 1", half-mythical beings, still
betraying their animistic origin, not unconnected with the spirits who
ruled the sun, moon, and stars, and with those who presided over the
nations, but yet brought by reflection and historical teaching under the
general formula of Jhvh's attendants :
 Thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o'er land and ocean without rest :
They also serve who only stand and wait,
Duhm distinguishes them from the angels, but the distinction is
more formal than material. Their song is the heavenly Hallelujah of
which that of Job 38' is a particular case. The LXX has led astray
the Vulg, and P.B.V. into translating b'ng ^lim by " sons of rams."
2, The glory of Jhvh's Name is the glory of His self-revelation in
Nature, since His Name always = Jhvh as manifested, Cf "Hallowed
be Thy Name!' "The beauty of holiness" should be as in 96'
(=1 Chr. 16''), 2 Chr. 20" (and perhaps Ps. 110'), in holy garments,
perhaps priestly, certainly ceremonial.
3 introduces the seven-fold repeated "Voice of Jhvh," reverberating
as if they were seven thunder-claps. The "voice" is over the waters
which are above the firmament ; it is with power ; it is with majesty ;
it breaks earth's noble.st growths, the taU cedar- trees; it terrifies the
strongest of Nature's marvels, the everlasting hills ; it cleaves the
flames (= forked lightning ; Duhm, however, corrects the text so as to
give : "Jhvh's thunder shatters the stone, shatters the rock with its

82 PSALMS [XXX. 1-5
flames of fire"); it shakes the wilderness; it makes the oaks to
tremble (the rendering "maketh the hinds to calve" is inappropriate as
an anti-climax, and derives no support from the consideration which
Kay aUeges, that it is a physiological fact); and strips the forests.
FinaUy, the storm dies away, rumbhng in the distant south-east where
is the wilderness of Kades.
9, Duhm for the second time holds that the metre requires an
addition, and he, therefore, reads :
All the ends of the earth fear Him ;
While in His palace all things say "Glory,"
the palace, of course, being that of Heaven. C£ Is. 6^
10. It is true that the word for flood, mabbiil, is used elsewhere
only of the Flood of Noah's story, but that is no conclusive reason for
so interpreting it here. If the word "deluge" were used only of the
same catastrophe in a modern work on the Bible and the Monuments
it would not follow that the author never speaks of a deluge of rain
when it pours. Besides there is no reason for dragging in a reference
to Noah's flood by the head and shoulders, when a heavy rain is not
unknown as an accompaniment of such a thunderstorm as is the subject
of this Psalm.
The Targum paraphrase, however, is : " The Lord at the time of
the Flood sat on the throne of judgment to take vengeance on men,
and sat on the throne of mercy to save Noah and to reign over his
children for ever." If a reference to Jhvh sitting in His judgment to
bring on a storm was seen by the scribes in 10, we can understand why
they added 11 as " a euphemistic liturgical appendix."
11. The Ps. concludes with an assurance that as Jhvh Himself is
strong over all the mightiest forces of Nature, so shaU His people be
strong, and being strong shall be at peace.

PSALM XXX.
A Psalm : Song at the dedication of the house of Darid.
1 I will extol thee, Jhvh ; for thou hast lifted me up :
Thou hast not made my foes to rejoice over me.
2 Jhvh my God,
I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me.
3 Jhvh, thou hast brought up my soul from Sheol :
Thou hast kept me ahve, that I should not go down to
the pit.
4 Sing unto Jhvh, O ye saints of his,
And give thanks to his holy name.
5 For his anger endureth but a moment:
In his favour is life :

XXX. 5-12] PSALMS 83
Weeping may endure for a night.
But joy cometh in the morning.
6 And in my prosperity I said,
"I shall never be moved."
7 Jhvh, by thy favour thou ^art a strong mountain"':
Thou didst hide thy face ; I was troubled.
8 I cried to thee, Jhvh :
And unto Jhvh I made suppUcation.
9 What profit is there in my blood, when I go down to the
pit?
ShaU the dust praise thee? shaU it declare thy truth?
10 Hear, Jhvh, and have mercy upon me :
Jhvh, be thou my helper.
11 Thou hast tumed for me my mourning into dancing :
Thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness :
12 To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not
be sUent.
0 Jhvh my God, I wUl give thanks unto thee for ever.
The superscription, A Psalm (A Song for the Dedication of the
House) of David, shows pretty clearly that an aheady existing Ps.
which was thought to be David's was taken and used at some dedica
tion festival. Most commentators pitch on the reconsecration of the
Temple in B.C. 165 by Judas Maccabaeus, after its desecration by
Antiochus Epiphanes ; and since this event was still commemorated in
our Lord's time (John 10"^) they are probably right. The Ps. itself,
therefore, iUustrates the transition of the "I" of the Psalter from the
individual to the community. The latter adopted, made its own, what
the former had before said, because the experience of the one was that
of the other also.
This Ps. is the simple, chUdlike expression of trust in Jhvh.
"ChUdlike souls," hke that of its author, "in whom misfortune leaves
behind no deeper impression than is found here, can bring to religion
no new thoughts and strength, but they belong, with their thankfulness
and their joy in the heavenly benefactor, to the most delightful
phenomena of the history of religion ; like the fiowers of the field, they
serve perhaps no useful purpose directly, but yet we should not like to
do without them." Duhm.
A comparison, too, of the Psalmist's judgment on misfortune with
that of the Book of Job is inevitable. The problem of that dramatic
poem is the age-long problem of evil, and Job's friends solve it as
does our Psalmist, He who is unfortunate is so because he has sinned,
for sin is punished by temporal suffering. The Psalmist's place is,
6—2

84 PSALMS [xxx.
therefore, if not chronologically earlier than that of the author of Job,
at any rate earlier in evolution. He has been prosperous, and pros
perity, as Deut. S""'" warns, had demoralised him (cf. also Deut. 32").
Then, according to Ps. 119" ("It is good for me that I have been
afilicted that I might learn Thy statutes"), the lesson came ; Jhvh hid
His face, and then the Psalmist cried to Him. His cry was heard, and
he was delivered, and the end was that he gave thanks to Jhvh, his
God, for ever.
The Ps. has close affinities with Jer. 38'°"", and with Hezekiah's
prayer (Is. 38 "'-^°), and perhaps was composed by one to whom those
passages were familiar. But even if he alludes to them he does not
quote. His deliverance, according to Duhm, Hengstenberg, Delitzsch,
Perowne, and others, was from sickness of some sort, but Jennings and
Lowe see no reference to sickness in the Ps. (not even in the " healed "
of V. 2), but a clear allusion to a violent death in the phrase " in my
blood " of V. 9. The Psalmist's attitude towards death is that of the
average man of the O.T. It is life here which is life indeed ; that in
Shedl is not extinction, but is on the other hand so shadowy and
joyless that, compared with life on earth, it is death. Yet the Psalmist's
language, like that of many other Psalmists, being so instinct with a
deathless hope, was fitted by its very force to be the language of a
higher and a later faith ; e.g. when he said, " I will give thanks unto
Thee, for ever," his meaning was exhausted by life on earth, but his
words are self-fitted to the Christian's faith. The earlier hope has
become the later faith.
1. Thou hast lifted me up = Thou hast drawn me up out of the
pit as men draw a bucket from a well.
2. Tliou didst heal. Raph^ is usually the healing as of a physician,
but not necessarily. This verse may be compared with 107'°' ^•. "They
cry unto Jhvh  He sent His word and healed them," and with
Deut. 32^°, in both of which places r8,phS, is used.
4. Ye saints = chasldim = those who enjoyed Jhvh's favours = the
men of good-pleasure of Lk 2 '*,
The remembrance of His holiness [A.V.] = either (1) Jhvh-s Name,
as that by which He is known, and, therefore, remembered (Wellhausen
— followed by R.V. — translates tbe phrase plumply : " Give thanks to
His holy Name") ; or (2) " the memorial which Jhvh Himself founds
by His doings, and which is celebrated in the Temple- worship." In
support of (1) are quoted Ex. 3'°; Pss, 97'^ ^22^ 135"=; fs. 26^
Hos. 12^ If (2) be adopted, then the writer uses sacrificial language
= Jhvh has shown Himself once more a God of Truth, and, therefore, of
hohness ; offer Him then a sacrifice of thanksgiving, not of a beast's life,
but of" the calves of your lips," and so commemorate His holiness,
5 in its full form is still more beautiful than A.V. :
For His anger is but for a moment;
In His favour is life for length of days.
Sorrow is a wanderer who may stay a night, but in the morning he

XXXI. 1-10] PSALMS 85
gives place to a better guest in the inn of life. Jennings and Lowe
quote the Persian couplet:
The end of gloomy night is morn iu fulgent dress.
And of unhappiness the end is happiness.
a Alles Ding wahrt seine Zeit,
Gottes Lieb' in Bwigkeit.
7 a according to the Targum is " Thou hadst made me stand on
strong mountains," which Duhm says would be " a very uncomfortable
position," and proposes instead (by a little emendation of the M.T.) :
"Jhvh, in Thy favour Thou standest as a mountain of refuge."
12. My glory = my soul, as in 7^ 57«; cf 16', 22'", 30'^ 108'.

PSALM XXXL
A.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.
1 In thee, Jhvh, do I put my trust ; let me never be ashamed :
Deliver me in thy righteousness.
2 Bow down thine ear to me ; deliver me speedily :
Be thou my strong rock, for an house of defence to save me.
3 For thou art my rock and my fortress :
Therefore for thy name's sake lead me, and guide me.
4 PuU me out of the net that they have laid privily for me :
For thou art my strength.
5 Into thine hand I commit my spirit : thou hast redeemed me,
Jhvh, God of truth.
6 i-Thou hatest-l them that regard lying vanities :
But I trust in Jhvh.
7 I wUl be glad and rejoice in thy mercy :
For thou hast considered my trouble :
Thou hast known my soul in adversities :
8 And hast not shut me up into the hand of the enemy :
Thou hast set my feet in a large room.
B.
9 Have mercy upon me, Jhvh, for I am in trouble :
Mine eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly.
10 For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing :
My strength faileth because of mine [-affliction:-!

86 PSALMS [XXXI. 10-22
My bones are consumed because of mine enemies.
11 I was a reproach through all mine enemies:
hTo my neighbours a horror :H
hTo my acquaintances a fearsome thing:-!
They that did see me without fled from me.
12 I am forgotten has a dead manH out of mind :
I am like a broken vessel.
13 For I have heard the slander of many :
Fear on every side :
While they took counsel together against me :
They devised to take away my life.
C.
14 But I trusted in thee, Jhvh :
I said. Thou art my God.
15 My times are in thy hand :
Deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them
that persecute me.
16 Make thy face to shine upon thy servant :
Save me for thy mercies' sake.
17 Let me not be ashamed, Jhvh; for I have called upon thee:
Let the wicked be ashamed, and let them be silent in Sheol.
18 Let the lying lips be put to silence ; which speak grievous
things against the righteous :
Proudly and contemptuously.
\Q Oh how great is thy goodness, which thou hast laid up for
them that fear thee :
Which thou hast wrought for them that trust in thee
before the sons of men I
20 Thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from
the h plots H of man :
Thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavUion from the strife
of tongues.
21 Blessed be Jhvh :
For he hath shewed me his marveUous kindness in a strong
city.
22 For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine
eyes :

XXXI. 22-24] PSALMS 87
Nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications
when I cried unto thee.
23 0 love Jhvh, all ye his saints :
Jhvh keepeth faithfulness,
And plentifuUy rewardeth the proud doer.

24 Be of good courage, and strengthen you/r heart.
All ye that hope in Jhvh.
It is very difficult to say whether this is to be regarded as one Ps.
or as a composite. If the former then the writer could not have
written it all at one time, and if it be composite, we can hardly say
that even so unity of mood has been attained. It is best to treat it as
a whole of three distinct parts, and to admit further the probability
that in the separate parts additions may be suspected. The first part
A, and the third C, are clearly distinct from B, which has close
resemblances with Jer. A and C also have points of contact with
Ps. 28 and the Ps. of Jonah. Kirkpatrick therefore conjectures that
B is a later addition to A and C. Duhm goes further and treats the
Ps. as wanting in unity, as a mosaic, a "Sammlung von Citaten."
The following table will justify his judgment :
vv. 1-3 = Ps. 71'-'
3 6 = Ps. 23'.
6a = Jonah 2^
10 a = Jer. 20'^
12 6 = . Ter. 22^,48''; Hos. 81
13 = Jer. 20'°-
17 = Jer, 17 'I
22 a = Jonah 2^ Lam. 3'^ Ps. 116".
22 6 = Ps. 28='' ^ Cf Jonah 2^
If we knew more we should find, in aU probability, that our Ps.
has grown by gradual additions made by men to whom the Law and
the Prophets were known by heart, and that the original nucleus was
from the pen of one also who thought in words supplied by his Bible.
One thing may be said to be certain, viz., that the Ps. moves within
the circle of Judaism, and that the Psalmist's enemies, therefore, are
to be looked for within its ranks, and not among the heathen. It
would be too rash to conclude that Jeremiah was the author or subject.
But what Wellhausen says is no doubt correct: "Jeremiah is the model
followed by the congregation of the pious in later days ; one might
almost call him the nucleus out of which the congregation developed.
The Israel that had gone before was summed up in him ; the new
Israel grew out of him. He exercised a larger influence than any one
else in framing the pietism of post-exilic times."
1 a = the closing verse of the Te Deum.

88 PSALMS [XXXI.
2b,c, 3 a remind us ofthe towers and fortresses of Maccabean times.
3 b. "For Thy Name's sake " = " in Thy righteousness " (1 c) =
practically "for ihe sake of Thy renown" as in Josh. 9'; 1 Kings 8^;
Is. 63 'I What Jhvh is and has done gives the Psalmist a warrant to
something which He is to do for him,
5 a compared with Lk, 23^* gives the difference between 0. T. and
N. T. piety. So in 5 6 redemption is in the one deliverance from
temporal distress, in the other from spiritual.
6. "I have hated" should be Thou hatest, so LXX; them that
regard = sh6merim. Sh6mr6nl was an Aramaic name for the Samaritans.
Can there be a condemnation of the perverse ways of these "heretics"?
8 b. "A large space " betrays the mind of a people accustomed
to have to conceal themselves in holes and corners. Cf 4', 18'°, 26'^
10 would be better :
My life is passing in sorrow.
My years in groaning;
My strength is failing because of my affliction;
My bones are dry because of mine enemies.
In the third stichos in my affliction should be substituted for because
of my sin, with the LXX (baani for baavoni).
11 b should be emended :
Through my adversaries I became an ignominy,
To my neighbours a horror.
To my acquaintances a fearsome thing.
The second clause is arrived at by reading mdrS. for m'6d, after
Deut. \V\
11 c says that he was a leper.
12 a. "As a dead man" is perhaps an interpolation ; a broken
vessel = YOB periens.
15 indicates the deep and narrow gulf between the religion of
Israel and that of its neighbours. What "Fortune" or "Fate" (Is. 65")
was to the latter, Jhvh was to the former. Astrology did not enter
into Israel's religion, for the stars and the course of history, individual
and national, were in the hand of Jhvh. This truth lies at the root of
all later eschatological dreams.
16 is an echo of the priestly blessing of Num. &^^' '^^, and blends
two of its clauses into one. Cf. 4".
20. " The pious are protected from evil tongues as though they
lived in the deepest retirement." Behind the waU of Jhvh's tent they
are safe.
21. "In a strong city" if hteral (Wellhausen takes it to=in
time of distress) gives a historical datum, but not one that is definite :
in some siege the Psalmist had been delivered by Jhvh.
23 6. " The faithful" [A.V.] should be faithfulness, and the
clause = Jhvh keeps faith, Cf Psalms of Solomon 4"'^.
24 is a euphemistic liturgical appendix. See Grimm, p. 12.

XXXII. 1-1 1] PSALMS 89
PSALM XXXII.
A Psalm, of David, Maschil.
1 Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is
covered.
2 Blessed is the man unto whom Jhvh imputeth not iniquity.
And in whose spirit there is no guile.
3 When I kept sUence, my bones waxed old
Through my roaring aU the day long.
4 For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me :
My moisture is turned as the drought of summer. Selah.
5 I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have
I not hid.
I said, I wUI confess my transgressions unto Jhvh ; and
thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.
6 For this let every one that is godly pray unto thee in a
time l-of trouble:-!
Surely in the floods of great waters they shaU not come
nigh unto him.
7 Thou art my hiding place ; thou shalt preserve me from
trouble :
Thou shalt compass me about with songs of deliverance.
Selah.
8 I wiU instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou
shalt go :
'"I wUl guide thee with mine eye.^
9 Be ye not as the horse, or as the mule, which have no
understanding :
Whose raouth must be held in with bit and bridle,
I- That they mayH come near unto thee.
10 Many sorrows shall be to the wicked :
But he that trusteth in Jhvh, mercy shaU compass him
about. 
11 J?e glad in Jhvh, and rejoice, ye righteous:
And shout for joy, all ye that are upright in heart.
The second of the 7 Penitential Pss. and the favourite of
St Augustine, who had it written on the wall to comfort him as he

90 PSALMS [xxxn.
lay a-dying. Its key-note is in his words : Intelligentia prima est ut
te noris peccatorem. It is astonishing how commentators read into
their texts their own preconceptions; e.g. Duhm says: "That the
author stands at the view-point of the Law is shown by the predicates
chasidlm and tzaddikim, which he applies to those who share his
feelings. His representations of suffering, of sin, of good-fortune are
sub- Christian, and the Church, by her choice of this Ps. for one of her
Penitential Pss., only testifies to the dogmatic and legal character of
her conceptions of the world of religion." On the other hand Jennings
and Lowe are as strongly of opinion that the Ps. is essentially Christian.
" The work of conscience depends little upon dogmas. The history of
the disciplined spirit, even in the absence of the quickening impulse
of religious systems, constantly repeats itself" The truth really is
that when a later age takes over the expressions of an earlier it does
not fill them with the same content. Duo si faciunt idem non est idem
is a truth which embraces the half-truths of both the above authorities.
The same divergence of view meets us when we come to consider
the formal cause of the Ps. Thus Delitzsch refers it to one grievous
sin, David's adultery with Bathsheba. " For a whole year after his
adultery David was like one under sentence of condemnation. In the
midst of this fearful anguish of soul he composed Ps. 51, whereas
Ps. 32 was composed after his deliverance from this state of mind."
Duhm on the other hand declares that "it is wholly mistaken to
assume that the poet had committed a great sin, and become a trans
gressor ; he is a pious man, and speaks as a teacher to the pious {v. 6),
and his misdeed was the sin of a pious man, who has not been
sufficiently careful over himself, and was too sure of his own righteous
ness. It is a gross misunderstanding of the simple mode of thought
here, to interpret the 'roaring' of v. 3 [as Kirkpatrick does] of the
torment of conscience and the blotting out of the guilt, as if it referred
to the peace which the transgressor experiences after he has made
confession. That blotting out is not recognised by the poet in any
acquired peace of conscience (to which no word of the text points),
but he sees it in the removal of his affliction — ^probably a painful
illness, which according to v. 4 is of a feverish character." It must
be confessed that the Ps. as a whole is more in favour of the second
hypothesis just given.
1. Three words are used to describe the offence : peshi,, rebellion,
deliberate defiance; ch§,ta4h, a missing of the mark; and i,v6n, guilt.
Three words too are used of the removal of the offence : nfi,sah, to lift
up and bear away ; kiss8,h, to cover up, so that it cannot be seen ; and
lo-chi,sab, not to reckon, and so to cancel. AU six expressions of course
are metaphorical, and do not lend themselves, therefore, to theological
argument. 2 c is omitted by some as the gloss of a scribe = Ps. 66 '^
3. The Psalmist hints that he had refused at first to admit to
himself that his sickness was due to his own sin — he was disposed to
side with Job as against Job's friends — but his refusal to confess made

XXXIII. 1-4] PSALMS 91
matters worse, and at last he was forced to confess himself to have
sinned. Then he became better, finaUy recovered, and so was assured
that, his punishment being removed, his guilt also was taken away:
" So Thou forgavest the guilt of my divergence from the path of
righteousness — of my chi,ta§,h."
6, The Psalmist then turns to instruct his disciples. With
Ps. 66'* he says: " Come, hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare
what He hath done for my soul."
6 a, "The time of finding" must certainly be corrected into "the
time of trouble " (mats6k for matz6r).
66 = Is. 28^ _
7 b. The linguistic peculiarities of this stichos are not without
importance in their bearing on the character of the Ps. as a whole. It
displays one play on words (if not two).
From trouble Thou shalt preserve me:
With songs of deliverance Thou shalt compass me
= in Heb, mitztzar Thitztz'ri,nl r^nl, &c., where the word-play is
obvious. Hitzig and others would delete rinl as a dittography, but
without sufficient reason. A Ps. in which the author can pause to
find aUiterations of this kind can hardly be regarded as other than an
artificial composition, or at any rate one which is more reflective than
spontaneous. 8. Who speaks ? Jhvh, say WeUhausen, Jennings and Lowe,
Ewald, and Kirkpatrick ; but the Psalmist, say Delitzsch, Hengstenberg,
Duhm, and Perowne, Cheyne is doubtful, and regrets the insertion
of vv. 8-10. The general meaning, in spite of textual difficulties
(WeUhausen omits 9 c as unintelligible), is fairly plain. Brute beasts
must be brought to man by main force ; the pious, on the contrary,
should find the guidance of their teacher's eye quite enough. The
consciousness of want and assurance of God's lovingkindness should
be sufficient persuasion. Cf. note on 103^. So Kautzsch.
10, Ctr. 34'°.
11, A conventional ending similar to that of Ps. 31.
PSALM XXXIII.
1 Rejoice in Jhvh, 0 ye righteous :
Praise is comely for the upright.
2 Praise Jhvh with harp :
Sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten
strings.
3 Sing unto him a new song :
Play skilfuUy with a loud noise.
4 For the word of Jhvh is right :
And all his works faithfulness.

92 PSALMS [XXXIII. 5-22
5 He loveth righteousness and judgment :
The earth is full of the goodness of Jhvh.
6 By the word of Jhvh were the heavens made :
And all the host of them by the breath of his mouth,
7 He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap :
He layeth up the depth in storehouses.
8 Let all the earth fear Jhvh :
Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of
him.
9 For he spake, and it was done :
He commanded, and it stood fast.
10 Jhvh bringeth the counsel of the nations to nought :
He maketh the devices of the peoples of none effect.
11 The counsel of Jhvh standeth for ever,
The thoughts of his heart to all generations.
12 Blessed is the nation whose God is Jhvh :
The people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.
13 Jhvh looketh from heaven :
He beholdeth aU the sons of men.
14 From the place of his habitation he looketh
Upon aU the inhabitants of the earth :
15 It is he that fashioneth their hearts aUke :
And considereth aU their works.
16 There is no king saved by the multitude of an host :
A mighty man is not delivered by much strength.
17 An horse is a vain thing for safety :
Neither shall he deliver any by his great strength.
18 Behold, the eye of Jhvh is upon them that fear him,
Upon them that hope in his mercy :
19 To deliver their soul from death,
And to keep them alive in famine.
20 Our soul waiteth for Jhvh :
He is our help and our shield.
21 For our heart shall rejoice in him.
Because we have trusted in his holy name.
22 Let thy mercy, Jhvh, be upon us.
According as we hope in thee.

xxxni.] PSALMS 93
A Ps. which resembles 1, 2 and 10 of this Book in having no title,
and may, therefore, be a later addition to Book i. Its character bears
out its late date. Even Jennings and Lowe declare that "the style,
spirit, and phraseology of the Ps. all go to prove indisputably that it
is one of late origin." They add that it "contains hardly one original
verse." Duhm describes it : " An inoffensive and insignificant collec
tion of all sorts of passages out of the earlier and later Scriptures,
and out of the belief of the later Jews amongst whom the reference to
the Jewish eschatological hope {w. 10 ff.) had a peculiar interest."
This judgment is too severe. The Ps. is a mosaic indeed, but it has a
beauty of its own and a sequence of thought. It is (1) a trumpet-call
to praise Jhvh, (2) because of His moral goodness. His creative power.
His wisdom, His goodness to Israel, and (3) with Him is contrasted
material power, and (4) the Ps. concludes with a confession of
confidence. Nothing in the Ps. gives any clue to the occasion which produced
it. The aUusions to the counsels of the heathen, to warfare and famine
are aU of a quite general character.
1 = Pss. 97'" (where however the verb is different) and 147'.
2 = 92'. In the O.T. two stringed instruments only are men
tioned as in use among the Hebrews, the kinn6r, harp, and nibel,
psaltery, the strings of which varied in number, and it was the kinn6r
which the captives hung on the willows in Babylon (Ps. 137^), and as
compared with the ngbel the kinnSr was the more primitive instru
ment. Jubal was its historical inventor (Gen. 4"'). The name n§bel
is derived from a root to swell, which gave its name to the skin-bottle,
the lyre or psaltery and the bottle having the same shape. It is not
certain that music formed part of the worship of the Temple in the
earlier days. " In the Pentateuch sacred singers and musicians are not
mentioned at all ; in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah (b.o. 430) they
play a great role, rivalling the Levites, and gradually coming to be
regarded as their equals, and at last their superiors."
3. A new song = " one which comes from a new impulse of grati
tude in the heart," Delitzsch ; "one which springs freely from a thankful
and rejoicing heart; one which seeks to put an old theme in a new
hght," Perowne. "This new song comes from Is. 42'"; unfortunately
the Psahnist himself does not obey his own exhortation ; what he sings
is by no means new." Duhm. The phrase is common in the later Pss.,
e.g. 96', 98', 144', 149'.
4. Right is originaUy straight (cf. a right line in geometry). The
word for truth gives us also the O.T. word for faith = confidence. Man
trusts because God is true, and he who is true is also strong,
5. Righteousness is the disposition of which judgment is the act.
Verse 56= 119°*.
6. A verse pointing clearly to a developed theology of creation.
Cf Gen. 1*; Ps. 148*; Job 26". With these passages should be com
pared the words of Chokmih in Prov. 8, and its praise in Wisdom 7,
and especiaUy 9' : "Who hast made aU things with Thy word." These

94 PSALMS [XXXIV. 1-3
passages were the forerunners of the Christian doctrine of the Logos
and Pneuma of God.
7. This verse is an indirect confirmation of the interpretation
given above of 8".
7 a. As an heap = Heb. kan-ngd ; the LXX however read kan-n6d,
like a bottle, which Wellhausen follows. In 136' the winds are brought
from Jhvh's treasuries and in Job 38"" the snow and hail. The word
6tsar6th is used in all three passages. In the Similitudes of Enoch,
c. 40, this same imagery is borrowed and elaborated. But T'h6m is
the Chaos of Gen. 1' — the Assyrian Tiamit. As Merodach tamed
Tiim&t, so did Jhvh Chaos. Chaos, which was often personified as a
dragon, leviathan, or other monster, "the Old Serpent that is caUed
the Devil and Satan (Rev. 12'), is descended literally from the T'h6m
of Gen, ll" See Gunkel's Schopfung und Chaos and W. Bousset, The
Anti-Christ Legend.
9 = Gen. 1'; Ps. 148^ and cf 119°' and Is, 48""-
11 = Is. W; 46'°; Prov. 19"'.
12= Deut. 33^; Ps. 144'^
13 = 14'; cf 94°.
15= He who alone fashioneth, i.e. Is He not, therefore. One who
is likely to know? R. Li'ezer used to say: "Let not thine imagination
assure thee that the grave is an asylum ; for perforce thou wast framed ;
and perforce thou wast born ; and perforce thou livest ; and perforce
thou diest; and perforce thou art about to give account and reckoning
before the King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed is He"; cf Prov. 15'-".
18 = 147".
19 = 37'° and Job 5=».
20J = 115°''°-".
22 6 = 119".
The religion of the chasidlm was essentially a religion of hope.
Hence the abundance of words which describe their waiting, expecting,
hoping attitude. B^tach, confido ; H4sfi,h, confagio in tutelam ; Ylcheb,
exspecto, spero; Kiwah, spero, all meet in the N.T. i\vit,u>. It is the
third of these which occurs here.

PSALM XXXIV.
A Psalm of David, when he changed his behaviour before Abimelech ;
who drove him away, and he departed.
1 X I wiU bless Jhvh at aU times :
His praise shall continually be in my mouth.
2 i My soul shaU make her boast in Jhvh :
Let the humble hear thereof, and be glad.
3 J 0 magnify Jhvh with me.
And let us exalt his name together.

XXXIV. 4-21] PSALMS 95
4 T I sought Jhvh, and he heard me,
And delivered me from all my fears.
5 n Look unto him, and be Ughtened :
And !-your faces shaU never beH ashamed.
6 T This poor man cried, and Jhvh heard him.
And saved him out of all his troubles.
7 n The angel of Jhvh encampeth round about them that
fear him,
And delivereth them.
8 to 0 taste and see that Jhvh is good :
Blessed is the man that trusteth in him.
9 "< 0 fear Jhvh, ye his saints :
For there is no want to them that fear him.
10 3 hThe ungodlyH do lack, and suffer hunger :
But they that seek Jhvh shall not want any good thing.
11 7 Come, ye children, hearken unto me :
I will teach you the fear of Jhvh.
12 J3 What man is he that desireth Ufe :
That loveth many days, that he may see good?
13 3 Keep thy tongue from evil,
And thy Ups from speaking guile.
14 D Depart from evil, and do good :
Seek peace, and pursue it.
16 3 The face of Jhvh is against them that do evil.
To cut off the remembrance of them from the earth.
15 y The eyes of Jhvh are upon the righteous.
And his ears are open unto their cry.
17 X The righteous cry, and Jhvh heareth.
And deUvereth them out of all their troubles.
18 p Jhvh is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart :
And saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.
19 '^ Many are the afflictions of the righteous :
But Jhvh deUvereth him out of them all.
20 ^ He keepeth aU his bones :
Not one of them is broken.
21 n EvU shall slay the wicked :
And they that hate the righteous shall be desolate.

96 PSALMS [XXXIV. 22
22 Jhvh redeemeth the soul of his servants :
And none of them that trust in him shall be desolate.
The fourth Alphabetical Ps., and one with strong resemblances to
Ps. 25. The sixth or ^ verse is wanting in both, and the 22nd in each
is a subscription. It is clearly the composition of one who moved in
the atmosphere of post-exilic piety; one too who is a teacher, as is the
author of 32, and caUs his pupils round him to learn the ways of
Jhvh. Specially noticeable is its insistence on humility, and lowliness
of spirit as the qualities which win the favour of Jhvh. A comparison
of the attitude of this Ps. with that of the Book of Proverbs, and of
Deutero-Isaiah, leaves no doubt where the religious affinities of the
author are.
2. Better : Let the humble {pious, Wellhausen) hear, i.e. the
Psalmist invites those who belonged to his own group of the pious to
join him in acknowledging Jhvh's greatness. Notice the word-play in '
yish'm'ft, they shall hear, and yish'mfi,ch^, they shall rejoice.
5. Better as an imp. ; Look unto Him and ye shall be radiant with
joy. The verb nihar, to be enlightened, has for its radical meaning to
flow forth = (a) to flow forth as water ; {b) to flow forth as light =
Lichtstrahl. It occurs again Is. 60*, where A.V. gives wrongly the
former meaning, and R.V. margin rightly the latter. In the former
meaning we have n8,har used of the rivers of Eden (Gen. 2'°) ; of the
Nile (Is. 19'); of the Euphrates (Gen. 15'°), &c. Oxf. Heb. Lex., how
ever, makes two distinct roots, regarding the one as a loan-word for
river, and the second as connected with the Arabian word for day.
In 5 b, chS,phgr is properly to be made to blush for shame, and ace.
to Delitzsch comes from a root to cover, hide or veil.
6. This poor man cried = Here is one who is pious, WeUhausen.
The Psalmist backs up his exhortation by reference to his own personal
experience; cf Ps, 66'°.
7. The angel of Jhvh = mal'ak Jhvh. Mal'ak = messenger (cf
mal'akl, my messenger, as the supposed name of the author of the last
O.T. prophet).
The angel of Jhvh in 0,T, = either (a) one of the angels of Jhvh,
or {b) Jhvh Himself in self-manifestation. Sometimes He speaks of
Himself in one way and sometimes in the other. The explanation is
to be sought probably in the historical evolution of Israel's rehgion.
In its earlier and more naive days Jhvh was thought to have manifested
Himself in human form — or in the form of one of the heavenly guild,
the Elohim, in whose form man was made. But with the growth of a
more vivid sense of Jhvh's transcendence. He was more and more
exalted above His creation, and His manifestations, therefore, were no
longer made directly through a Theophany, but through one of His
attendants deputed for the purpose. It is in the latter sense, as
captain of Jhvh's host (Josh, 5'*), that the title is used here, the sense
which agrees best with the date we assign to the Ps. The word for

XXXIV.] PSALMS 97
encampeth — ch6neh — meets us also in Machanaim (Gen. 32^) = the two
camps. "If a man performs one precept," says the Talmud, "the Holy
One, blessed is He, gives him one angel to guard him (Ps, 34') ; if he
performs two precepts He gives him two angels to guard him (Ps, 91");
if he performs many precepts He gives him the half of His host " (Ps.
91' cpd. with Ps. 78*).
8. " Nisi gustaveris non videbis." St Bernard,
9. His saints, ked6sh^v, = those who like the Psalmist belonged
to the class of those who submitted patiently to affliction, the anlylm.
In 16* they are further defined as those dwelling in Palestine (but see
note). 10. Young lions (A.V.) = c'plrim; the LXX read k'b4dlm = #Ae
rich; Duhm k6ph'rim, liars, unbelievers, apostates. He adds that the
A.V. rendering is absurd. Jennings and Lowe, on the other hand, say
that the LXX "absurdly misrender" the word. Hengstenberg retains
lions, but says "we are to understand powerful and violent men."
Kirkpatrick, again, says "young lions is best understood literally."
Quot homines tot sententise. The general sense in any case is clear,
11. The fear of Jhvh = Religion. Morality, Wellhausen. In 19'
it is clearly the law of Jhvh, c£ 1^. The phrase is characteristic of
Proverbs, e.g. 8", 9'°; c£ the beautiful phrase in Is. 11^: "He shaU
draw his breath in the fear of Jhvh."
12. Life is to be taken here, as usually in the Pss., for continued
and prosperous hfe on earth ; the paraUel, loveth days, is evidence for
this. For the interrogative form of the exhortation see note on 25'^.
13. The sins and dangers of the tongue are a matter of frequent
emphasis in the later books of the O.T,, e.g. Prov, 13°, Ps. 39'.
14 a = 37^; cf Job !'•«; Is. l"-"; Prov. 16".
14 b. Peace = sh§16m. This signifies properly not the joy of recon
cUiation with God, but security and prosperity in general. Ace.
to Grimm {s.v. (.Iprivq) shi,16m is " securitas, incolumitas, salus et
fehcitas." So the salutation sh^l6m \kch, peace be to thee = dimittere
aliquem cum bonis votis. The Messianic peace of Lk. 1'° and 2'*, and
still more the Christian peace of Rom. 10'^ &c,, are later developments
of the shS,l6m which the Psalmist here emphasises,
15 and 16 are to be transposed, except for the two opening words
of each. 16. The face of Jhvh = here His presence in anger. In later days
periphrases were used for the name of God, as e.g. "the Name," "the
Place," "Heaven" {e.g. "the kingdom of Heaven"), "the angels which
are in Heaven," "the Father in Heaven," "the Holy One," "Blessed
is He," "the Power," "the Merciful One." See Dalman, Words of
Jesus, §§ 6 and 7.
16 b. The remembrance = the memorial = their name.
18, A broken heart and contrite spirit describes those in whom
affliction has broken the pride of self-will, and crushed that self-
confidence which, like Nebuchadnezzar, exalts its head against high

98 PSALMS [xxxv. 1-11
heaven. The phrase broken in heart occurs in Is. 61', and with contrite
in Ps. 51"; contrite and humble in Is. 57".
20. This was exemplified to the Fourth Evangelist^ in Jesus
Christ, 19*^, where however the Ps. is quoted in a sense which is the
precise opposite of the original.
22 is a liturgical verse added by way of avoiding any evil omen
which the preceding verse might threaten. (Grimm, Euphemistic
Liturgical Appendixes, p. 11.)
PSALM XXXV.
A Psalm of David.
1 Plead my cause, Jhvh, with them that Strive with me :
Fight against them that fight against me.
2 Take hold of shield and buckler.
And stand up for mine help.
3 Draw out also the spear, and '"stop the way~^ against them
that persecute me :
Say unto my soul : " I am thy salvation."
4 [[Let them be confounded and put to shame that seek after
my soul :
Let them be turned back and brought to confusion that
devise my hurt.]]
6 Let them be as chaff before the wind :
And let the angel of Jhvh chase th&m.
6 Let their way be dark and slippery:
And let the angel of Jhvh pursue them.
7 For without cause have they hid for me their net \in a pit| :
Without cause they have digged a pit for my soul.
8 [[Let destruction come upon him at unawaresj ;
And let his net that he hath hid catch himself:
Into that very destruction let him fall.
9 And my soul shall be joyful in Jhvh :
It shaU rejoice in his salvation.
10 AU my bones shall say, Jhvh, who is like unto thee,
Which deliverest the poor from him that is too strong for
him.
Yea, the poor and the needy from him that spoileth him?
11 False witnesses rise up :
They lay to my charge things that I know not.

xxxv. 12-25] PSALMS 99
12 They reward me evil for good
To the spoiling of my soul.
13 But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing wOfS
sackcloth :
I humbled my soul with fasting ;
And my prayer returned into mine own bosom.
14 I behaved myself as though it had been my friend or
brother :
I bowed down heavily, as one that mourneth /or his mother.
15 But in mine adversity they rejoiced, and gathered themselves
together :
[The abjectsj gathered themselves together against me, and
I knew it not :
They abuse me unceasingly with profanity :
16 They are ever mocking me :
They gnash upon me with their teeth.
17 Lord, how long wilt thou look on ?
Rescue my soul from their destructions,
My darling from the lions.
18 P wiU give thee thanks in the great congregation :
I wUl praise thee among much people.]]
19 Let not them that are mine enemies wrongfuUy rejoice
over me :
Let them not wink with the eye that hate me without a
cause.
20 For they speak not peace :
But they devise deceitful matters against them, that are
quiet in the land.
21 Yea, they opened their mouth wide against me,
And said, Aha, aha, our eye hath seen it.
22 This thou hast seen, Jhvh : keep not silence :
Lord, be not far from me.
23 Stir up thyself, and awake to my judgment,
Even unto my cause, my God and my Lord.
24 Judge me, Jhvh my God, according to thy righteousness :
And let them not rejoice over me.
25 Let them not say in their hearts. Ah, so would we have it :
Let them not say, We have swaUowed him up. 7—2

100 PSALMS [xxxv. 26-28
26 Let them be ashamed and brought to confusion together
that rejoice at mine hurt :
Let them be clothed with shame and dishonour that magnify
themselves against me.
27 Let them shout for joy, and be glad, that favour my
righteous cause :
Yea, let them say continuaUy, Let Jhvh be magnified,
Which hath pleasure in the prosperity of his servant.
28 And my tongue shaU speak of thy righteousness
And of thy praise aU the day long.
It is only a blind following of the title which can refuse to see in
this Ps. evidences of a late date. Even if it belonged in its original
form to the collection which was traced back to David's initiation, yet,
as it stands, it bears marks of a late post-exilic date. The mention of
the battle-axe, of the quiet in the land, the insertions from other Pss.
and the presupposition throughout of injustice through the abuse of
legal forms, rather than through open warfare, taken together point to
a more highly developed social system than was to be found before the
Exile. 1. Plead, i.e. defend me before the judge.
2. The judicial contest is iUustrated by martial terms, and also
by anthropomorphic conceptions. The buckler was twice the size of
the shield (1 Kings 10'"'").
3. Read Draw out ihe spear and the sagaris against my pursuers
{pursue is also used in 23"). By a change of the vowel-points (now
generally made) s'g6r, stop, becomes selgir, the Scythian double-edged
battle-axe. It is possible that the Jews learned to know this weapon
early from the Hittites ; it is more probable that (as in the case of
the musical instruments of Dan. 3^' '¦"''"', where cithara, psalterion and
symphonica are clearly Greek loan-words) they became familiar with
it through the opening out of the national life to the world-history
of the time which began at the Exile. This was to the Jewish State-
Church what the Roman Church became to the English through the
Norman Conquest,
3 b. Thy salvation am I is used of temporal rescue.
4 is interpolated from 40'^
5, 6, Kirkpatrick suggests that 5 b and 6 b should change places,
and Cheyne does the same. But there seems to be no necessity for
this. The enemy are thought of as being driven like chaff before the
wind with the angel of Jhvh thrusting sore at them that they may faU
(118"); the verb rendered here chase, di,chi,h, occurs also in 118" and
62^ and in each case means to push down; in 6 b the image is changed,
and the enemy are flying along the slippery limestone paths of the
dark valleys, and again the angel of Jhvh is in pursuit (r^daph, pursue,
as in u 3 and 23").

xxxv.] PSALMS 101
7. Transfer pit from 7 a to 7b: —
Without a cause have they spread for me their net ;
A pit, cast without a cause, have they covered over for my life.
Without a cause = with no just provocation on my part.
Schachath, a pit = a pit in which to catch wild beasts.
8 a. Omit as a citation from Is. 47".
10 shows the Psahn to come from the same school as the preceding :
34'^>". 11. False witnesses = literally witnesses of violence, i.e. who
promote violence and wrong : cf Ex. 23'; Deut. 19'°. In 18*^ we have
man of violence; in 25'°, a hatred (born) of violence; and 27'", false
witnesses breathing out violence. Probably we are to understand not
witnesses in Court, but violent and arrogant calumniators.
12. To the bereavement of my soul. The word for bereavement
does not seem ever to travel far from its primitive meaning of child
lessness. Duhm therefore suggests n'k61 for sh'k6l = laying wait for.
13. My prayer returned, &c. No two commentators agree as to
what this means. It means, says Kirkpatrick, that as curses come
home to roost so do prayers. According to Duhm it says that instead
of praying with upturned eyes, he prayed as a mourner downcast, his
head sunk on his breast. Wellhausen treats the clause as senseless.
Jennings and Lowe prefer to render it "May my prayers return," &c. =
May I too receive the blessings I ask for others. Probably Wellhausen
(with whom is Kautzsch) is the wisest of these authorities.
14. / bowed down heavily = squalidus, in morning garb, unwashed
and unanointed. Cf 2 Sam. 12"°. R. Shimeon ben Eleazar said :
" Conciliate not thy friend in the hour of his passion ; and console him
not in the hour when his dead is laid out before him ; and ' interrogate '
him not in the hour of his vow ; and strive not to see him in the hour
of his disgrace."
15. Abjects, n'klm, is a disputed word. Cheyne, foUowing Ols
hausen, reads n'k^rim, aliens (so in 18^' ^). Kirkpatrick rejects this as
ahen to the context. Duhm prefers n'k^lim as in v. 12 = They heaped
together against me malicious accusations.
16. The Hebrew word for profanity belongs to 15 c and not 16 a
(BickeU). This is the word which is rendered (perhaps wrongly)
hypocrite in the Synoptics.
18. Omit as an insertion from 22""' "', interrupting the progress of
the complaint.
19. That hate me without a cause, a verse "fulfilled" in John 15"°.
20. The quiet in the land, rig'M-eretz, can be explained only from
Is. 28°~". The prophet there quotes the taunt of the priest and his
rival-prophets that he talks to them as to children line upon line, &c.
WeU then, he replies, Jhvh shall teach you in the same way through
the Assjrrians and will repeat His former lesson that in quietness and
confidence you shall be saved (cf Is. 30'* and Hab. 2"). "What is
meant is stillness and trust in Jhvh, i.e. cessation from the game

102 PSALMS [XXXVI. 1-6
of politics, the giving up of warlike aspirations, and of political
infiuences. That would be a quickening and refreshing experience for
the citizen wearied with the expenses of war-preparations and war-
service. Not an aUiance with Egypt, but withdrawal on Jhvh and
retum to Him and to His wUl would make the people strong and at
rest." Marti, Hand-Kommentar, in loco. FoUowing this clue, the
quiet in the land here are those who are not ambitious politicians or
wielders of public power, but those who, as men of piety, are content
to rest on Jhvh, and to make their protest on behalf of pure reUgion
and undefiled.
24. Judge «ie = Do me justice, and so vindicate Thine own
covenant-faithfulness. 26 a. Let them be ashamed, &c. The first three words and the
last word of this clause are also in 40'*.
27 a. That rejoice in my righteousness. Man's righteousness in
the later O.T. literature is twofold, (a) moral, {b) legal. He is
inwardly innocent, or outwardly declared so. Moreover, the adversity
of a man's foes, or his own prosperity, was the surest sign of the
judgment pronounced by Jhvh. Hence, in this verse the Psalmist
declares that the natural consequence of the confusion of his enemies
will be his own acquittal and the rejoicing of his friends at it. If the
inner righteousness is here referred to at all, it is only as a latent
assumption that where the form is, there the spirit must be also.
Christianity reverses the procedure, and demands first the spirit, sure
that the fitting form must sooner or later come to it.
27 6 is taken from 40'°.
28 is taken from 71".

PSALM XXXVI.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of Darid the servant of Jhvh.
1 hThus saith the oracle of the ungodly : "There is no God" :
In the heart of the wicked is no terror before God.H
2 For he flattereth himself in his own eyes,
That his iniquity shall not be found to be hateful.
3 The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit :
He hath left off to be wise, and to do good.
4 He deviseth mischief upon his bed :
He setteth himself in a way that is not good ; he abhorreth
not evil.

5 Thy lovingkindness, Jhvh, is in the heavens :
Thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds.
6 Thy righteousness is like the great mountains :

XXXVI. 6-12] PSALMS 103
Thy judgments are a great deep :
Jhvh, thou preservest man and beast.
7 How exceUent is thy lovingkindness, 0 God !
The children of men put their trust under the shadow of
thy wings.
8 They shaU be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy
house :
And thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy
pleasures.
9 For with thee is the fountain of life :
In thy light shaU we see light.
10 0 continue thy lovingkindness unto them that know thee :
And thy righteousness to the upright in heart.
11 Let not the foot of pride come against me,
And let not the hand of the vricked remove me.

12 There are the workers of iniquity fallen:
They are cast down, and shall not be able to rise.
The exegete has to be on his guard always against the temptation
to demand in a Ps. a logical sequence of thought. West is West and
East is East. The latter allows changes of feeling to be expressed
without much regard to continuity of thought. Bearing this in mind
we shall not be too ready to divide a Ps, into separate Pss. merely
because joy and sorrow, love and hatred pass abruptly one into the
other. Whether the portions so separated were from different authors
or not does not exhaust the problem. They were placed as a single Ps. by
somebody (and he an Eastern), who saw apparently nothing contrary to
established usage in weaving them into one. The Ps. before us has
certainly strong oppositions, and is, therefore, divided into two by
Duhm {w. 1-4 ; and 5-11, with 12 as a foreign visitor). It is not,
however, improbable that the very loathing felt by the Psalmist for
the godlessness of the ungodly suggested by contrast the delight that
the godly had in Jhvh his God.
1. As this Ps. has clear affinities with 14, it is not arbitrary
to supply with BickeU There is no God at the beginning, so that the
verse runs :
Thus saith the oracle of the ungodly, " There is no God" :
In the heart of the wicked is no terror before God.
The word n'um is the word always used of an oracular pronouncement ; of
Balaam, Num. 24"' *• "• '"; of David, 2 Sam. 23'; of Agur, Prov. 30';
here it is used of personified transgression ; in all other places of God.
The name of the speaker follows invariably in the genitive. The word

104 PSALMS [XXXVI.
occurs in all prophets except Hab. and Jon,, and in the Psalter in 110
and here only. My heart, hbbl, should be his heart, libb6. Fear of
God is not the word used in 19°, 34", Is, 11° (= yir'ath), but, pachad,
a fear, terror = "womit Gott schreckt."
2. He flattereth himself, as the word is used in Hamlet, "Lay not
the flattering unction to your soul " (Act 3, Scene 4). _ He says to
himself smooth things, viz. that even if there be a God his sin wiU not
be found out, and so will not come to judgment. This is too common
an observation of the power of self-deception not to be the true
rendering here of what is expressed with some ambiguity. It is quite
clear in Deut, 29'°.
3, The wisdom here (= sdkal, to be wise) is practical wisdom, not
the chokmdh of the Wisdom literature.
4, In his bed. " Nocte cum maxime scilicet vacet animus tempus
est, ut ad se homo redeat et meliora cogitet, si etiam toto die male
vixisset." Rosenmiiller, He setteth himself; the verb is used of the
kings of the earth in 2^
In these passages and in 1' the verbs of bodily posture (to walk, to
sit, to stand) denote a settled mode of life.
The way that is not good is that of Is. 65", the road which leads
away from Him who is good — "good and upright is Jhvh" (25°).
5. Mercy and faithfulness, Jhvh's two attributes (=His Name),
fill the world — how then can the sinner escape their power ?
6. The mountain of God: ci. the cedars of God, 80'° ; the garden of
Jhvh {= a most fertile garden), Gen. 13'° ; a prince of God (= a mighty
prince). Gen. 23°. The emphasis is on the greatness of the mountains,
which are as great as Jhvh's righteousness. The thought is an attenu
ated relic of that which once prompted men to worship on every high
hill and under every large and green tree.
Thy judgments support the moral and social order, as the ocean
was thought to bear up the earth, 24" ; cf Rom, 11'°.
Man and beast. Perhaps a reference to their salvation through the
ark. Duhm denies it, and Wellhausen says it "points to a special
occasion, probably to a siege, when animals shared the sufferings of the
people." Jennings and Lowe quote from the Talmud : " Hast thou
ever seen a beast or a bird that followed a trade ? and yet they are fed
without toil."
7. Excellent = precious. The children of men = the pious Israelites
— the chasidim correlated to the chesed (lovingkindness) of Jhvh.
8. The fatness of Thy house introduces another reference to the
chasldim as Jhvh's guests (5', 15', 23", 27*). None but people accus
tomed to droughts could have found the image of water as a precious
boon so fit. The_ river of Thy pleasures takes us back to JGden {of thy
pleasures = ad^-ngicha), the place of pleasure ; Ez. 47"*^- sees streams
of hfe-giving waters issue from the sanctuary : Zech, 14° also pictures
living waters going out from Jerusalem ; the same image is used in
John 4'° ; in Is, 33"' " the glorious Jhvh shall be a place of broad
rivers " ; 46* connects the joys of Zion with a river ; also 87' and Is, 8°.

XXXVII. 1-8] PSALMS 105
The Talmud's comment is : " Whosoever starves himself for the sake
of the words of the Law in this world, the Holy One, blessed is He, will
satiate him in the world to come."
9. Tlie well of life. The five words of this verse are a summary
of O.T. piety. It was life, prosperous life on earth which the Psalmists
looked for, and that from Jhvh. He was their light = their salvation
(27'), and that from godless men. The Christian application of these
words is inevitable and proper, but it is an expansion of the Psalmist's
meaning. 10. Thy chesed has as its echo man's knowledge, i.e. a practical,
effective current of the whole of man's being setting towards the chesed
of Jhvh, and so becoming like what it gazes on. So Jhvh's righteous
ness produces in His servant uprightness of heart. The worshipper
becomes what he worships,
11. The wicked. It is not likely that by the wicked without
further qualification the heathen are meant. It is once again the
opposition between the two parties, which were ranged against one
another since B.C. 150 as Pharisees and Sadducees, but existed from
about B.C. 450.
12 = perhaps 14'.

PSALM XXXVII.
A Psalm of Darid,
1 N Fret not thyself because of evUdoers,
Neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity.
2 For they shaU soon be cut down like the grass,
And wither as the green herb.
3 1 Trust in Jhvh, and do good :
DweU in the land, and h exercise faithfulness.-!
4 DeUght thyself also in Jhvh :
And he shaU give thee the desires of thine heart.
5 J Commit thy way unto Jhvh :
Trust also in him ; and he shall bring it to pass.
6 And he shaU bring forth thy righteousness as the light.
And thy judgment as the noonday.
7 T Rest in Jhvh, and wait patiently for him :
Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way.
Because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass,
(14 6) To cast down the poor and needy.
8 n Cease from anger, and forsake wrath :
Fret not thyself in any wise to do evU.

106 PSALMS [XXXVII. 9-25
9 For evildoers shaU be cut off :
But those that wait upon Jhvh, they shaU inherit the land.
10 1 For yet a little while, and the wicked shaU not be :
Yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place, and he shall
not be.
11 But the meek shaU inherit the land :
And shall deUght themselves in the abundance of peace.
12 T The wicked plotteth against the just,
And gnasheth upon him with his teeth.
13 Jhvh shaU laugh at him :
For he seeth that his day is coming.
14 n The wicked have drawn out the sword, and have bent
their bow,
To slay such as be of an upright walk.
15 Their sword shaU enter into their own heart.
And their bows shall be broken.
16 D A little that a righteous man hath is better
Than the riches of many wicked.
17 For the arms of the wicked shaU be broken :
But Jhvh upholdeth the righteous.
18 * Jhvh knoweth the days of the upright :
And their inheritance shaU be for ever.
19 They shall not be ashamed in the evil time :
And in the days of famine they shall be satisfied.
20 D But the wicked shaU perish
(25 c) And his seed be beggars of bread :
The enemies of Jhvh shall be as the I- splendour of the
meadows :-!
They shall consume ; into smoke shall they consume away.
21 7 The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again :
But the righteous sheweth mercy, and giveth.
22 For such as be blessed of him shaU inherit the land :
And they that be cursed of him shaU be cut off.
23 D The steps of a good man are ordered by Jhvh :
And he delighteth in his way.
24 Though he fall, he shaU not be utterly cast down :
For Jhvh upholdeth him tmth his hand.
25 J I have been young, and now am old :

XXXVII. 25-40] PSALMS 107
Yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken.
26 He is ever merciful, and lendeth :
And his seed is blessed.
27 D Depart from evil, and do good :
And dwell for evermore.
28 For Jhvh loveth judgment,
And forsaketh not his saints :
y (-The wicked shaU be cast out for ever :-!
The seed of the wicked shall be cut off.
29 The righteous shall inherit the land.
And dwell therein for ever.
30 S The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom,
And his tongue talketh of judgment.
31 The law of his God is in his heart :
None of his steps shaU slide.
32 S The wicked watcheth the righteous,
And seeketh to slay him.
33 Jhvh wiU not leave him in his hand,
Nor condemn him when he is judged.
34 p Wait on Jhvh, and keep his way,
And he shaU exalt thee to inherit the land':
(40 6) I- He shall deUver thee from the wicked:-]
When the wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it.
35 "1 1 have seen the wicked in great power,
And spreading himself like a h cedar of Lebanon :-|
36 One passed by, and, lo, he was not :
Yea, I sought him, but he could not be found.
37 ^ Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright :
For the end of that man is peace.
38 But the transgressors shaU be destroyed together :
The end of the wicked is to be cut off.
39 T\ But the salvation of the righteous is of Jhvh :
He is their strength in the time of trouble.
40 Jhvh helpeth them, and delivereth them :
He saveth them, because they trust in him.
For warmth of content and inner connection this is one of the best
of the alphabetic Pss, — Ewald. Each letter has a strophe of four lines,
and each line two members. But vv. 7, 20, and 34 have each a line

108 PSALMS [XXXVII.
short, and 14, 25, and 40 a line too many. It is supposed that the
Ps. was written in parallel columns, and that a Une was placed acci
dentally in the wrong column three times. In two cases a similar
carelessness may be seen in the text. In the Ayin verse and in the
Tav a letter has been wrongly prefixed, and so the proper initial letter
displaced. The Ps. is another of those which belong to the Wisdom literature,
and might quite as fitly have found a place in the Book of Proverbs.
Its subject is that which for centuries perplexed the Jewish mind,_and
is still insoluble by reason — the problem of evil. It meets us again in
Ps. 73, in Is, 53, and, in its most subUme presentation, in the Book of
Job. The Psalmist here is content with the more superficial view that
Jhvh attaches temporal prosperity to His service, and misfortune to
ungodliness. But he has reached a point far beyond the crude view of
the friends of Job, He admits the possibility of the godly being in evil
case temporally, and even dying unhappy, but he is sure that his
children will reap what he has sown. He may fall but he shall not be
utterly cast down. The seed of the wicked shall be cut off, but the
seed of the righteous (so the parallelism requires) shall inherit the
land. When ? At the establishment of the Messianic Kingdom.
He looks forward, if vaguely, to a day when Jhvh shall come forward
as Judge, root out the wicked, and give the land to the pious — an
expression which contains all that is essential to the developed form of
the Messianic hope. What is more, he expresses his hope so con
fidently, so simply, that we shall not be wrong if we say that he was a
pious layman of what we should call the middle-classes, with not too
much zeal for theology, and unspoiled by priest or scribe. He tells us
himself that he was old. His hope reflects that piety which, after
a few scattered expressions in the canonical O.T., gave birth to a
collection of apocalypses from the beginning of the second century
onwards. Duhm puts him as late as B.C. 100.
1 = Prov. 24'°.
2 = Is. 40"'', Pss. 90"-', 103".
3. Trust (b't&ch) = se reposer sur quelquJu/n. 3 6 is Imp. Abide
in Jhvh's land (= Canaan) : from the same religious feeling which still
prompts "Zionist movements." Verily thou shalt be fed [A.V.] should
be exercise faithfulness — iibe Treue.
5. Commit, lit. Roll thy way, as in 22° — Roll it on Jhvh. Prov.
16° gives the same advice.
7. Insert from v. 14 thus :
Because of the man who doeth crooked things
To cast down- the poor and needy.
8 6. The result of fretting is that you wiU (a) sin with your
tongue, or if) merely harm yourself The {a) is preferable.
9. The waiters on Jhvh = another name for the meek, the humble,
the poor and needy, the chasidlm. In each case their virtue consists
in their relating themselves to Jhvh. Their reward wiU be that in

XXXVII.] PSALMS 109
" the day of Jhvh " they shall inherit Canaan, and see the ungodly
rooted out.
Meanwhile "they contentedly awaited, in the discharge of their
religious duties, the coming of the King," and acted on R. Shemaiah's
advice : " Love work ; and hate lordship ; and make not thyself known
to the government."
11 a = Mt. 5° where however the land has grown to the earth. " To
inherit the land is equivalent to having part in the Messianic King
dom." Schiirer, II. n. 172.
11 b. Abundance of peace. The r6b, abimdance, merely intensifies
the completeness of the peace promised. It shall be "perfect peace"
in the sense of there being none to make them afraid. See note
on 34'*, and cf 72', 119'"', and Is. 32"' '". This last passage explains
the nature of peace as understood by the Psalmist.
13. Cf. 2*. The taunt of anthropomorphism had little meaning for
the Hebrews.
14. Omit To cast down ihe poor and need/y, as transferred to v. 7,
15 = Mt. 26°". Force meets with force, meekness with meekness,
according to Mt. 7^.
16. One eats, another says Grace.
18. Jhvh knoweth. Cf. 1°. But Jhvh's knowledge "compre
hends blessing as its necessary consequence" — Hengstenberg: "cum
affectu et effectu," Neither 0,T. nor N.T. knows anything of reUgion
as merely, or even primarily, an intellectual habit.
20. Complete the verse by transferring a line from v. 25, thus :
But the wicked shall perish.
And his seed shall be beggars of bread.
20 c. The fat of lambs is the A.V. rendering of the splendour of
the meadows = " the flower fadeth " of Is. 40'. _
20 d does not borrow and repeat the subject of v. 20 c. There is
a word-play here (kik^r kMm).
21. The fates of the two classes are contrasted. The righteous is
prosperous and has enough to lend ; so he carries out the pious duty
enjoined in Deut. 15'"'°. But the ungodly is reduced to borrowing,
and what he borrows he is too poor to pay back.
22 = Gen. 12°.
23 b. It is the ch§,sld who delights in Jhvh's way, as in 1".
26. The house that does not open to the poor shaU open to the
physician. A Jewish saying is that " hospitality is the most important
part of divine worship."
28. Jhvh loveth judgment. Judgment = righteousness in mani
festation. Again, the Hebrew's saving love of the concrete.
28 c. They are preserved for ever [A.V.]. The proper initial
letter is obtained by deleting the obtrusive V of the M.T., or by
foUowing the LXX who read a shghtly different text which gives us
instead : The wicked shall be cast out for ever. There is no doubt that
the latter course is the correct one.

110 PSALMS [XXXVIII. 1-12
34. Complete the verse from v. 40, thus :
Wait on Jhvh and keep His way,
And He shall exalt thee to inherit the land :
He shall deliver thee from the wicked :
When the wicked are cut off thou shalt see it.
35. Like a green bay-tree of A.V. should be like a cedar of
Lebanon (k'ez'rach I'bandn for k'ecrez raa'n9.n), with the LXX.
36. He passed away [A.Y .]. Better I passed by.
37 b. Peace = felicitas, securitas, as above.
39. Remove the obtrusive initial letter, and transfer He shall
deliver them from the wicked to v. 34 as above.

PSALM XXXVIII.
A Psalm of Darid, to bring to remembrance.
1 Jhvh, rebuke me not in thy wrath :
Neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure.
2 For thine arrows stick fast in me.
And thy hand presseth me sore.
3 There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger :
Neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin.
4 For mine iniquities are gone over mine head :
As an heavy burden they are too heavy for me.
5 My wounds stink and are corrupt
Because of my foolishness.
6 I am troubled ; I am bowed down greatly :
I go mourning aU the day long.
7 For my loins are fiUed with a loathsome disease :
And there is no soundness in my flesh.
8 I am feeble and sore broken :
I- 1 cry more loudly than the lion roars.-!
9 Lord, all my desire is before thee :
And my groaning is not hid from thee.
10 My heart panteth, my strength faUeth me :
As for the light of mine eyes, it also is gone from me.
11 My lovers and my friends stand aloof [  ] :
And my kinsmen stand afar off.
12 They also that seek after my Ufe lay snares for me :
[[And they that seek my hurt speak mischievous things]]
And imagine deceits all the day long.

XXXVIII. 13-22] PSALMS 111
13 But I am as a deaf man, that heareth not :
And as a dumb man that openeth not his mouth.
14 I am as a man that heareth not,
And in whose mouth are no reproofs.
15 For in thee, Jhvh, do I hope :
Thou wilt answer, Jhvh, my God.
16 For I said, " Hear me, lest otherwise they should rejoice
over me
When my foot sUppeth, and should magnify themselves
against me."
17 For I am ready to halt,
And my sorrow is continuaUy before me.
18 For I wUl declare mine iniquity :
I wiU be sorry for my sin.
19 But l-they that make war upon me without a cause-! are
strong :
And they that hate me wrongfuUy are multiplied.
20 They also that render evil for good
Are mine adversaries because I foUow the thing that good is.
[They have throvm away my darling one as an abominable
corpse.]
21 Forsake me not, Jhvh :
0 my God, be not far from me.
22 Make haste to help me,
Jhvh my salvation.
The third Penitential Psalm of the Church, Are we to understand
the speaker as Israel personified, with Baethgen, or as a late and
artificial writer, who had made use of citations from many sources,
especially Ps. 69, as Duhm maintains ? It borrows its opening verse
from Ps, 6. The words of Is. 1" might stand for the original out of
which the description of sickness here has been elaborated, and lesser
points of contact with other O.T. writings may be pointed out. Yet
the Ps. as a whole is no servile copy of older passages. Nor ought we
to conclude hastily, when we find an older phrase repeated in a later
writing, that the second writer copied from the first. This would be to
leave too little room for the influence of intimate acquaintance with
earlier hterature. It is natural for us to faU into the use of phrases
of the Bible, or Shakespeare, or Tennyson, merely because they have
become part of our minds. We think in them. So with the Psalmists.
If we are to foUow the M.T., then the writer of Ps. 38 was either

112 PSALMS [XXXVIII.
a leper, or one who assumed the r61e of leper for hterary purposes.
What he says favours the former. The likeness between his descrip
tion of himself and that of the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53 is too
close to be a mere coincidence. In the latter "the English translators
have masked the leprous figure that stands out so clearly in the original
Hebrew" (G. A. Smith, in loco); the same word, nega, is used in
Is. 53°, Ps. 38" and in the Levitical regulations of leprosy, e.g. 13", and
in these two former passages no doubt can be felt that the word is not
used in the wider sense of any " stroke, regarded as sent by a divine
chastisement." But the LXX suggest very forcibly that nega is cor
rupted from ni,gash, to draw near, which gives us an O.T. parallel
to Lk, 10°'. His friends keep a safe distance.
The religious interest of the Ps. lies, however, not so much in the
diagnosis of the disease as in the judgment passed on it by the
sufferer. Like Job's friends, he himself, his friends and neighbours,
and also his enemies regard him as suffering because he had sinned.
It was this judgment which lent all its sting to the suffering. It was
Jhvh's arrows which pierced his heart. It was to Jhvh, therefore, that
he cried for salvation.
The above seems to explain the natural genesis of the Ps., and
does no violence certainly to the text.
The inscription "A Psalm of David, Remembrance," or more
exactly "A Psalm of David for the Azkara" (where this last word = the
avd.iJ,vq<TL<; or portion of the minchah, or meat offering, which, mixed
with oil, was cast into the sacrificial flame), shows by its composite
character how the primary sense acquired a secondary. On the sup
position that an individual leper had poured out his suffering soul in
song, then the inscription informs us that the community adopted his
song for liturgical purposes. This being done, the substitution in
thought of Israel for the original sufferer was both necessary and
proper. When the Magnificat is sung nowadays it is not Mary who
sings, but the Church of her Son.
5. Foolishness as in 69" is a synonym for sin.
8. Read with WeUhausen, Baethgen, Duhm, and Kautzsch :
I am whoUy benumbed and sore bruised ;
I cry more loudly than the lion roars.
12. For the isolation of the leper, cf Job 19'°*, Ps. 31'^ Lam. 1',
Jer. 30'*. " Premature sickness and the miscarriage of justice — these
to Orientals are the two outstanding misfortunes of the individual's
life. Take the Psalter, set aside its complaints of the horrors of war
and of invasion, and you wiU find almost aU the rest of its sighs rising
either from sickness or from the sense of injustice," (G. A. Smith,
Isaiah, ll. 361,) Cf also Ps, 69°,
Duhm would delete 11 b " as introducing a pentastich into a
Psalm which is tetrastichic throughout," Baethgen would rather
delete 12 6. In any case the picture of men gloating over the
sufferings of a fallen foe with Schadenfreude (a word which Trench

XXXIX. 1-6] PSALMS 113
rightly remarks has no equivalent in EngUsh — happily enough) is one
which may remind us that its absence from our life to-day is proof that
Christianity has effected something.
13. As in Is. 53 the sufferer is silent because he waits for his
acquittal from Jhvh. In v. 18 he tells us that confession is the means
to forgiveness, and hints that the sign of forgiveness is recovery from
his sickness. Cf. Is. 38.
19, For mine enemies are lively [A.V.]. Read with Houbigant,
They that make war upon me without a cause. So Ewald, Wellhausen,
Baethgen, Duhm, Kautzsch.
21 and 22 contain "a clearly confessed change of mood." In
some MSS of the LXX they are preceded by a clause which runs :
" They have thrown away my darling one as an abominable corpse,"
a phrase which is certainly not borrowed from the O.T., and suits
admirably the position of one suffering from leprosy. If the words are
to stand (as Baethgen thinks they should), they complete the tetrastich,
and are a close paraUel to Forscike me not, Jhvh.

PSALM XXXIX.
For the chief Musician, for Jeduthun, A Psalm of David.
1 I said, I wUl take heed to my ways.
That I sin not with my tongue :
I wUl keep my mouth with a bridle,
While the wicked is before me.
2 I was dumb with silence, I held my peace, even from good :
And my sorrow was stirred.
3 My heart was hot within me,
WhUe I was musing the fire bumed :
Then spake I with my tongue : —
4 "Jhvh, make me to know mine end,
And the measure of my days, what it is :
Let me know how frail I am.
5 Behold, thou hast made my days as an handbreadth :
And mine age is as nothuig before thee :
Verily every man at his best state is altogether vanity.
Selah.
6 Surely every man walketh in a vain show :
Purely they are disquieted in vain :|
He heapeth up riches, and knoweth not who shaU gather
them." 8

114 PSALMS [XXXIX. 7-13
7 And now, Lord, what wait I for ?
My hope is in thee.
8 Deliver me from all my transgressions :
Make me not the reproach of the foolish.
9 I was dumb, I opened not my mouth :
Because thou didst it.
10 Remove thy stroke away from me :
I am consumed by the blow of thine hand.
11 When thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity,
Thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth :
Surely every man is vanity. Selah.
12 Hear my prayer, Jhvh, and give ear unto my cry :
Hold not thy peace at my tears :
For I am a stranger with thee,
A sojourner, as aU my fathers were.
13 O spare me, that I may recover strength,
Before I go hence, and be no more.
" Ps. 39 is incontestably the finest of all the elegies in the Psalter."
Ewald. It should be compared.with Pss. 4 and 62. The depth of its
feeling is shown by the thrice-repeated ak of vv. 5 and 6 (= verily or
surely). The writer is in trouble, as was the author of Ps. 38, but his
thoughts take a different direction. There it was the plain proof of
Jhvh's displeasure which weighed most heavily, and gave occasion to the
enemy to blaspheme. Here it is the problem how to reconcile the
suffering of the pious (when contrasted with the prosperity of the
wicked) with the righteousness of Jhvh. Baethgen says correctly
enough that "the singer says nothing of the good-fortune of the
ungodly, but complains only of the suffering of the pious." But this
good-fortune it is which supplies the missing link in the sequence of
thought. He found such difficulty in accepting the inequality that he
felt it wiser to attempt no apologia in the presence of the godless. But
he was forced to speak by the very urgency of his inner debating, and
when he did he gave the following as the solution he had come to : —
The matter was not to be disposed of by reference to this life only, but
by a contrast between man's nothingness and Jhvh's Eternity. Between
man lucky and man unlucky the difference was infinitesimal, as com
pared with that between Jhvh and both. One was as a hundred pence ;
the other a thousand talents. Therefore, the solution of life's riddle
must be from the Eternal Himself " My hope is in Thee."
We have, therefore, in this Ps. the first shimmering appearance, not
of belief, but of a feeling that life's great injustices require a wider
sphere for their compensations. The Psalmist does not say so ex
plicitly. But his sense of the utter insignificance of this earthly hfe,

XXXIX.] PSALMS 115
joined to his experimental knowledge of Jhvh's greatness and good
ness, supply the historical locus from which sprang the later belief in
personal subsistence through death. This belief, as held to-day, may
be held more tenaciously than it was by the Psahnist, but it rests on
a ground not essentially different from that which he sees here afar
off. Those who are Jhvh's sons cannot perish, or He would cease
to be their Father.
The emphasis laid here'and elsewhere {e.g. in Pss. 6, 28, 38) on the
derision of the godless as an important factor in the suffering of the
righteous is "very instructive for the psychology and history of
religion." It may be said to be connected with the view of the time
that hfe is bounded by the cradle and the grave. The man who holds
that view would desire to be superior to the taunts of his foes. Jhvh
rules the world ; that he knows. He knows also, therefore, that to be
pleasing to Jhvh is the pre-requisite of happiness. Piety and peace
are partners. If pain or poverty come, the godless will say that it is
deserved, and that the piety was a sham. Those, on the other hand,
who beUeve in a fuUer life after this can afford to disregard the taunts
of men, for they look for a verdict of acquittal from the Judge who
knows. Piety and peace being no longer regarded as inseparable the
loss of the latter does not throw doubt on the former.
The Ps. is later than Job, for its last verse is reminiscent of
Job 7", 14°, IO""' ^ — especiaUy the last — while the view of man's tran-
sitoriness taken in the Ps. generaUy, is succinctly summed up in
Job 14". On the other hand, v. 12 is quoted in 1 Chr. 29'* (not vice
versa as Duhm holds). Whatever its precise date, it is certainly true
that "under the pressure and mockery of the heathen in exilic and
post-exilic times, every pious Israelite could pray as did the singer of
this Ps." Baethgen. It would be better (as in Ps. 38) to say that the
meditation of the individual was adopted afterwards as the prayer of
the community. This explanation is supported by the double super
scription =(1) A song taken from the song-book known as David's,
(2) A direction (of uncertain meaning) given to the leader Jeduthun.
2, Even from good = a, contraction of the phrase which occurs in
Gen. 31^, either good or bad. I kept silence from all. The opposite
occurs in 12°. After v. 3 a long pause is to be understood, before the
speech of v. 4. This and lyo. 5, 6 give the Psalmist's conclusion = God
is in Heaven, he is on earth ; how then can they contend on equal
terms ? He decides, therefore, to silence his doubts and rest on Jhvh.
His God wiU not fail his hope, and wiU not suffer him to be the butt
of fools. 9 says that when he turned his eyes on his stroke, and thought of
the taunts of the godless, he was dumb, he had nothing to say, for he
was perplexed at Jhvh's doing. The solution was found in v. 7: "My
hope is in Thee."
11. Duhm sees here an allusion to the beauty in which man was
created and its loss (Gen. 3), but this is fanciful. All the Psalmist
says is that man's most desirable things (ch^mad) he at the mercy of
8—2

116 PSALMS [XL. 1-7
fortune — i.e. of the will of Jhvh. (Ch^mad is used of the Servant
of Jhvh in Is. 53 ^ of the Torah in Ps. 19'°, of Jhvh's hiU in
Ps. 68'°.)
12. A stranger, g^r (in opposition to ez'rach, a native-born, free
tribesman, lit. one springing from the soil — so of a hill in its native
soil, Ps. 37°' — but see note there), is one who on his travels stops for
a time in a foreign country, and enjoys the protection of the laws of
hospitality, A sojourner, t6sh^b, is a settler admitted to such rights
of citizenship as may be accorded him by the people to which he has
joined himself The Psalmist says that Jhvh is the Lord of the land,
and he is His guest ; Jhvh is its King, and he is His subject.
Duhm expunges vv. 8, 10, 12, 13 as " parasites,"
13, R. Jacob said: "This world is like a vestibule before the
world to come ; prepare thyself at the vestibule, that thou mayest be
admitted into the hall."
PSALM XL.
A.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.
1 I waited patiently for Jhvh :
And he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.
2 He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the
miry clay,
And set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.
3 And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise
unto our God :
Many shall see it, and fear,
And shaU trust in Jhvh.
4 Blessed is that man that maketh Jhvh his trust,
And respecteth not the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies.
5 Many, Jhvh my God, are thy wonderful works which thou
hast done,
And thy thoughts which are to us- ward :
'"They cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee:"'
If I would declare and speak of them.
They are more than can be numbered.
6 Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire :
[[Mine ears hast thou opened :]]
Burnt offering and sin offering hast thou not required.
7 '"Then said I, Lo, I come:"'
[In the volume of the book it is written of me,]

XL. 8-17] PSALMS 117
8 I deUght to do thy wiU, 0 my God :
[[Yea, thy law is within my heart.|
9 I have preached righteousness in the great congregation :
Lo, I have not refrained my lips,
Jhvh, thou knowest.
10 I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart :
I have declared thy faithfuhiess and thy salvation :
I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth from
the great congregation.
11 Withhold not thou thy tender mercies from me, Jhvh :
Let thy lovingkindness and thy truth continuaUy preserve me.
12 For innumerable evils have compassed me about :
Mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am
not able to look up :
They are more than the hairs of mine head : therefore
my heart faileth me. B.
13 Be pleased, Jhvh, to deliver me :
Make haste to help me, Jhvh.
14 Let them be ashamed and confounded together
That seek after my soul to destroy it :
Let them be driven backward and put to shame
That wish me evil.
15 Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame
That say unto me, "Aha, aha."
16 Let aU those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee :
Let such as love thy salvation say continually,
"Jhvh be magnified."
17 But I am poor and needy :
Yet Jhvh thinketh upon me :
Thou art my help and my deliverer :
Make no tarrying, 0 my God.
Two Psalms are here brought together for some unknown reason.
Verses 1-11 are a song of thanksgiving ; v. 12 is probably a verse taken
from some book of lamentations to serve as a bridge for the following
verses when added ; aud w. 13-17 are proved to have an independent

118 PSALMS [XL.
value from their occurrence (with a few unimportant variations) as
Ps. 70.
Ps. 40 A is for the most part a lyrical paraphrase of Jer. 7^' ^,
and springs evidently from the school of the prophets. It does not
depreciate the services of the Temple — the references to "the great
congregation" in vv. 9 and 10 are probably to the Temple-worship.
(There is no ground for dating the institution of synagogues before the
Maccabean age, and "great congregation" is no description of the
numbers who assembled in the schools of the priests and^ of the
scribes — which were of exilic origin — see W, Bousset, Die Religion des
Judenthums, pp, 149, 150,) But the sacrifices which are here placed
below obedience are those offered for private purposes, for vows or
sins or trespasses. Like Is. (1"~'*) and Amos, he depreciates cere
monial worship, not absolutely, but relatively to that which consists
in the surrender of the will. "This latter supplies the highest mode of
proclaiming the wonders of Jhvh. The Ps., therefore, belongs to that
transition period in exilic or post-exilic religion, of which Deuteronomy
was the preparation, Jeremiah the greatest Old Testament preacher,
and Jesus Christ the goal.
2. Most take this verse as figurative, some, like Baethgen, because
they regard the Ps. as the voice of the community, and others, like
Duhm, because they think " rock '' to be indubitably not meant
literally. But the Ps. as a whole gains in vividness if we suppose Jeremiah
to be the author, or, if not Jeremiah, then one so like him as to be
indistinguishable from him. In the former case v. 2 finds its historical
background in Jer. 38°'". A waterless cistern, miry at the bottom,
was no unusual prison. Cf Ps. 69^'°''^
3. A new song. Cf 33°. Apparently from Is. 41° and 42'°-
4. The man, geber, a word chosen designedly to describe man
as tempted to trust in his own strength. It is used sarcasticaUy
in 52'. The proud = the violent and arrogant ; such as turn aside to lies
would be better rendered lying apostates, apostates from Jhvh, and
liars because they deny Him who is Truth.
Baethgen, however, inclines to take the violent to be the heathen
peoples, and the liars to be (Babylonian) idol-priests, which would suit
the circumstances of Jeremiah.
5, Wonderful works = God's thoughts reahsed ; His thoughts in
5 h are in process of being realised, 5 c would be better, " Nothing can
be compared unto Thee."
6. Sacrifice and ofiering = zebach, slain-animal sacrifice ; minchah,
that of the fruits of the earth. These are the materials of sacrifice.
Burnt offering_ and sin offering give the purpose = complete self-dedica
tion or reconciliation. 6 6 is a gloss. Cf Prov. 21°.
7 and 8 are difficult to construe, though their general sense is
clear. Duhm solves their problem in his characteristic way. For then
said I, he writes Tliou hast opened my eours (az'naim kar'tha for

XLI. 1-7] PSALMS 119
azamar'thi), and he then renders the rest of the verses 7 b and 8 : "Sin
offering hast Thou not demanded ; — see, I have read it in a roll of
a book copied for me." He then explains the last clause to be a
marginal note of a copyist who agreed with the statement, but thought
it required some apology before the bar of the public opinion of his
day. We have certainly a similar toning down of a prophetic "heresy"
at the close of Ps. 51. The quotation of this Ps, in Heb, 10 follows
the LXX but does not affect the general sense. Whether an ear is
opened to listen, or a body to carry out what is ordered, the result is
the same. WiUingness to hear and do God's will, that is better than
sacrifice. If a conjecture were to be hazarded as to the roll of a book
referred to, it would be natural to think of Mic. 6°, "Thy law is
within my heart" cannot, in any case, be wholly unrelated to Jer. 31°°,
But it is clear that 6-8 have been farced.
9. / have declared Thy righteousness, i.e. in delivering Israel from
Babylon. As so often in the Psalter Jhvh's truth, faithfulness and
righteousness were seen in the salvation He brought to His people.
10. Lovingkindness and truth = the sum of Jhvh's perfection ; the
two Angels sent out by Him for the protection of His saints.
12 belongs neither to Ps. 40 nor to 70, but is a verse introduced as
a bridge by the man who added vv. 13-17 to m. 1-11.
Ps. 40 B. See notes to Ps. 70.

PSALM XLI.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of Darid,
1 Blessed is he that considereth the poor [and needy] :
Jhvh wUl deUver him in time of trouble.
2 Jhvh wiU preserve him, and keep him alive ; and he shaU
be blessed upon the earth :
And wiU not deliver him unto the wiU of his enemies.
3 Jhvh wUl strengthen him upon the bed of languishing :
I- He wUl turn his sickness into health.-!
4 I said, Jhvh, be merciful unto me :
Heal my soul ; for I have sinned against thee.
5 Mine enemies speak evil of me,
"When shaU he die, and his name perish?"
6 And if he come to see me, he speaketh vanity :
His heart gathereth iniquity to itself:
When he goeth abroad, he teUeth it.
1 AU that hate me whisper together
Against me : against me do they devise my hurt.

120 PSALMS [XLL 8-13
8 An evil disease, say they, cleaveth fast unto him :
And now that he lieth he shaU rise up no more.
9 Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom 1 trusted, which
did eat of my bread,
Hath lifted up his heel against me.
10 But thou, Jhvh, be merciful unto me, and raise me up.
That I may requite them.
11 By this I know that thou favourest me.
Because mine enemy doth not triumph over me.
12 And as for me, thou upholdest me in mine integrity,
And settest me before thy face for ever.

13 Blessed he Jhvh God of Israel from everlasting, and to everlasting.
Amen, and Amen.
A Ps, embodying the complaint of a sick man, his trust in Jhvh,
and his desire for vengeance on his foes. The speaker, according to
Baethgen and Cheyne, is suffering IsraeL The details, however, of the
description {e.g. 'va. 3 b, 6 a, and 9) point unmistakeably to an indivi
dual as the original author. " The poem of an embittered sick man,
and a most dreary testimony of the unsatisfactory state of things
within Judaism. The picture which the author unconsciously outlines
enables us to understand why he was so roughly treated by his foes ;
good for friend and foe alike that he does not possess the power of a
Herod." Duhm. This judgment is too harsh, as that of Kirkpatrick
and others is too lenient.
1. Blessed is as in Ps. 1 ' happy = felix. In the Doxology at the
end of the Ps. blessed = iauVistus, i.e. treated benignly. So in Jer. 17'.
The former is secular happiness, the latter religious.
The poor and needy. The latter must be supplied with the LXX,
so as to complete the metre.
2 b. Better He shall be called happy in the land, i.e. in the land of
Canaan, 3 b. Lit. Thou wilt change or turn his lying down = Thou wilt
turn his sickness into health. The paraUel in Ps. 30" (where the
same verb is used) is conclusive as to the meaning here.
4-8 show that the general propositions of the vv. 1-3 are based on
a particular case — that of the Psalmist himself He was smitten with
serious sickness. According to the current opinion his illness was
proof of transgression preceding. His enemies readily avail themselves
of the taunt prepared for them. Evidently the conduct of Job's friends
was not unique. Those in that age (as indeed in any) who belong to
the "hard Church" think they do God service when they add their
own condemnation to that of events.

XLH. 1-5] PSALMS 121
6 a. Vanity = falsehood, or hypocritical sympathy. If he come
would be better If one come.
8. An evil ^^¦sease = literally a thing of Belial = both the disease
and its formal cause.
9. The tooth of ingratitude bites most rudely of all. The foe was
one bound to the Psalmist by ties of hospitality. The same complaint
is laid against Edom in Obad. 7 and in similar language.
10 b. Duhm's sole comment on this is : " If this verse did not
stand in the Old Testament many a reader would shake his head at it
instead of enjoying it as he now does by means of an allegorical inter
pretation." The excuse for 137° is not available here.
12 a. Integrity does not exclude transgression and consequent
punishment. But the Psalmist claims, as against his foes, a relative
goodness before Jhvh.
12 b. To be set before Jhvh's face = to be accepted to His favour.
Far ever (l'61^m) is a poetic hyperbole. It denotes indefinitely pro
longed existence, before or after. In 77 ° it = years of ancient times.
In Deut. 15 " we have "a slave for ever" = for his life-time. A common
salutation was " May the King live for ever," an obvious hyperbole.
In Pss. 115'° and 121° the phrase = as long as one lives. Matthew
Arnold's caution should be never forgotten, that the Bible is a book
of religion, and, therefore, uses poetical language not scientific. To
build up any argument on the Hebrew for ever is as futile as the
question what Homer proves. It is not true that the lex cantandi is
the lex credendi.
BOOK II.
PSALMS 42—72.
PSALMS XLII AND XLIIL
Psalm xlil
For the chief Musician, Maschil, of the sons of Korah.
1 As the hart panteth after the water brooks,
So panteth my soul after thee, 0 God.
2 My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God :
Wlien shaU I come and appear before God?
3 My tears have been my meat day and night,
WhUe they continuaUy say unto me, Where is thy God?
4 When I remember these things, I pour out my soul in me :
'"For I had gone with the multitude, I went with them to
the house of God,
With the voice of joy and praise, with a multitude that
kept holyday. '

122 PSALMS [XLIL 5-XLin. 5
5 Why art thou cast dot/on, 0 m,y soul?
And why art thou disquieted in me ?
h Wait-\ thou on God : for I shall yet praise him
Who is the help of my countenance, and my God.
6 0 my God, my soul is cast down within me :
For I remember thee from the land of Jordan,
And of the Hermonites, from the '"hill Mizar. '
7 Deep caUeth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts :
All thy waves and thy billows are gone over me.
8 ^Yet Jhvh will command his lovingkindness in the daytime,
And in the night his song shall be with me,
And my prayer unto the God of my life.]]
9 I will say unto God my rock, Why hast thou forgotten me ?
Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy ?
10 As '"with a sword"' in my bones, mine enemies reproach me :
While they say daily unto me, Where is thy God?
11 Why art thou cast down, 0 my soul?
And why art thau disquieted tmthin me?
\-Wait-\ thou on God: for I shall yet praise him.
Who is the health of my cowntenance, and my God.
Psalm xliii.
1 Judge me, 0 God, and plead my cause against an ungodly
nation :
0 deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man.
2 For thou art the God of my strength : why dost thou cast
me off?
Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy ?
3 0 send out thy light and thy truth : let them lead me :
Let them bring me unto thy holy hUl,
And to thy tabernacles.
4 Then let me go unto the altar of God,
Unto God my exceeding joy :
Yea, upon the harp let me praise thee, 0 Jhvh my God.
5 Why art thou cast dot/on, 0 my soid?
And why art thou disquieted tmthin me?
Wait thou on God : for I shall yet praise him.
Who is the health of my countenance, and my God.

XLIL] PSALMS 123
These two Psalms are clearly one which by some accident has been
split up. The author of this "real poem " had been driven from home
by the machinations and violence of a rival of his own nation. He was
perhaps a high-priest, certainly not more remote from the Temple
than a Levite, and he laments in language of true poetry his banish
ment from the Temple. Hitzig, Chejnie, and Duhm find the occasion
of its composition in the conquest of Jerusalem by Scopas, an .ffitolian
mercenary captain under Ptolemy Epiphanes (referred to in Dan. 11'").
The writer then might be the high-priest Onias III, and the man of
deceit and mahgnity would be Simon, with his tool Jason. Baethgen,
however, prefers the days of Jehoiachin, But, as is the case generally,
no certainty as to date is possible — nor is the beauty of the Psalm
affected by our ignorance of the time and place of its composition.
XLII. 1, The hart. Better the hind. The female is the more
suitable image of the soul (nephesh is itself a feminine word). The
streams are thought of as dried up ; the hind is distressed and pants
for the running stream.
2 a. The living God = El cheli, a title used only here and Josh. 3 '°,
Ps. 84^ Hos, 1'°, In Deut, 5^^°, &c,, it is the plural Elohim chS,yylm
which is found. Duhm, however, by a slight change (chaiyl for ch§,i)
reads as in 8 c " the God of my life,"
2 b. Appear before God = see the face of God. " To see the face"
is the usual phrase to describe admission to the presence of a superior :
Gen. 43°; Ex, 10^°. The mood used here is "chosen to avoid the
obnoxious assertion that God can be seen. But ' the face of God ' is
but an expression for the Temple, in which God dwells." See Is. 1 '°.
3. The Psalmist's greatest grief was his inability to meet the
taunts of his foes : " Where is now thy God ? " He is not out of
Jhvh's present power, as David thought he was when driven from
Palestine (1 Sam. 26'°). Cf Ovid : " Cura dolorque animi lacrymseque
alimenta fuere " {Metamorph. 10™).
4. A sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.
The Psalmist caUs to mind the happy part he was in the habit of
leading. The text here is uncertain. Perhaps the best rendering is :
I led the procession of the notables to the House of God, with the voice
of joy and praise, with the multitude of them that danced.
5 a. Our Lord used words reminiscent of this verse in Gethsemane
(Mt. 26°°) and again in John 12".
5 b. Better Wait thou on God, as in 38'°, &e. The refrain is to be
corrected to agree with v. 11 and 43°, on the authority of the LXX.
Qb. Baethgen renders this : "I will think of Thee, far as I am
from Canaan and the little hill" of Zion, But Duhm retorts that
Hermon is not part of Canaan, and that none but an exegete would
have seen Zion in Mizar (= the little hill). Yet "the land of Hermon-
heights and of Jordan " is not an inexact phrase for Palestine, and the
Psalmist's thoughts were more concerned with the land he had been
driven from than with that where he had taken refuge. So Wellhausen.
7. Is it the sea {e.g. the Mediterranean), or the waters that be

124 PSALMS [XLIV. 1
above the firmament, that are the deep? Clearly the latter, says
Duhm. If we think of the Psalmist as by the sea-side, or an inland
lake, in the heavy winter rains, when the windows of heaven seem
opened, and the waves come rushing in, one on the heels of the other,
we have an exact image of the troubles which threaten to overwhelm
him. The storms of trouble allowed by God had gone over his head.
This is a better rendering than is obtained by referring to cataracts,
mountain-torrents, and deep ravines.
76 is found also in Jonah's Psalm (2°).
8 is struck out by Wellhausen and others as "inserted by pure
chance," and because it " completely breaks the connection."
9. Why hast Thou forgotten me ? = Jon, 2^
10, "As the boring of a worm in my bones." Wellhausen. _ " It
is as if my bones were crushed," Baethgen, "As death raging in my
bones," Duhm, The general sense is the same.
XLIII, 1. Ungodly nation = g6l l6-chlsid = a people not pious.
661, nation, is used usually of non-Hebrew peoples ; the definite
reference to Israel and (or) Judah is comparatively rare ; seldom in
exilic and post-exilic prophets. Yet it is used in Ps, 106°, Is. 1* and
10°. The predicate " non-pious " of this verse, however, stamps g6i as
referring to Israelites : Chesed was what was the hall-mark of Israel's
religion. The heathen had nothing to do with it, and hence there was
no need to deny it to them. The Psalmist, therefore, says of those
who had driven him into exile that they were false Israelites, void of
Israel's characteristic piety. Their leader was an intriguer (treacherous)
and a man who had no scruples about using violence.
3 a. Light and Truth. A more common conjunction is mercy and
truth (25'°, 57°, 85'°, 86'°, 89'^ 98° ; Prov, 3°).
Does the exiled high-priest pray for the restoration to him of the
Urim and Thummim which the man of deceit had appropriated ? In
27' it is Jhvh's "light and salvation" which the poet looks to. In
23^ it is Jhvh Himself who leads. Perhaps the Urim and Thummim
suggest here the two guides the Psalmist feels most in need of
3 b. Thy Tabernacles is either an amplificative plural, or it indi
cates that the Psalmist had had to do with all the rooms which the
priests used in the worship of God.
4 is best taken as a prayer : Let me go io Thine altar ; let me
praise Thee on the harp.
0 God, my God [A.V.] — Jhvh my God of the " Jehovistic Psalms."
PSALM XLIV.
For the chief Musician : of the sons of Korah. Maschil.
1 We have heard with our ears, 0 God, our fathers have
told us,
'What work thou didst in their days, in the times of old.

XLIV. 2-17] PSALMS 125
2 Thou didst drive out the nations with thy hand, and didst
plant them in :
Thou didst afflict the peoples, and I- spread them abroad.-!
3 For they got not the land in possession by their own sword,
Neither did their own arm save them :
But thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy
countenance.
Because thou hadst a favour unto them.
4 Thou art my King, 0 God :
Command deliverances for Jacob.
5 Through thee wUl we push down our enemies :
Through thy name wiU we tread them under that rise up
against us.
6 For I wiU not trust in my bow,
Neither shaU my sword save me.
7 But thou hast saved us from our enemies.
And hast put them to shame that hate us.
8 In God we boast all the day long.
And praise thy name for ever. Selah.
9 But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame :
And goest not forth with our armies.
10 Thou makest us to tum back from the enemy :
And they which hate us spoil for themselves.
11 Thou hast given us Uke sheep appointed for meat :
And hast scattered us among the nations.
12 Thou seUest thy people for nought.
And dost not increase thy wealth by their price.
13 Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours,
A scorn and a derision to them that are round about us.
14 Thou makest us a byword among the nations,
A shaking of the head among the peoples.
15 My confasion is continuaUy before me.
And the shame of my face hath covered me,
16 For the voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth :
By reason of the enemy and avenger.
17 AU this is come upon us ; yet have we not forgotten thee.
Neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant.

126 PSALMS [XLIV. 18-26
18 Our heart is not turned back.
Neither have our steps declined from thy Way :
19 Though thou hast sore broken us in the place of bjackals,-!
And covered us with the shadow of death.
20 If we have forgotten the name of our God,
Or stretched out our hands to a strange god :
21 Shall not God search this out?
For he knoweth the secrets of the heart.
22 Yea, for thy sake are we kiUed aU the day long :
We are counted as sheep for the slaughter.
23 Awake, why sleepest thou. Lord ?
Arise, cast us not off for ever.
24 Wherefore hidest thou thy face.
And forgettest our affliction and our oppression?
25 For our soul is bowed down to the dust :
Our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
26 Arise for ou/r help, and redeem us for thy mercies' sake.
Here, too, every commentator has his own opinion of the date of
this Ps. Hengstenberg and Delitzsch, as usual, prefer David — though
Calvin observes that " if anything is clear, it is that the Ps. was
written by any one rather than by David." Ewald had first thought
of the Persian period, but later preferred the days of Zerubbabel.
Rosenmiiller, who rejects the possibility of any Psalms being of the
Maccabean period, ascribes our Ps. to the days of Nebuchadnezzar.
Kirkpatrick says vaguely that it belongs to "the days of the Monarchy."
Jennings and Lowe incline to Hitzig's suggestion that the occasion of
the Ps. was the defeat of Joseph and Azarias by Gorgias (1 Mac. 5°° '''¦)•
So Perowne thinks it most suitable to those troublous times, and Duhm
to the time after the fall of Judas Maccabseus, i.e. about b,c. 160.
The most striking note of the Ps. is the absence of what is so
common in other Psalms, viz, the confession that personal wrong-doing
has been the cause of the present distress. On the contrary, the
Psalmist says emphatically that their troubles had come upon them in
spite of the fact that he and his fellows had not declined from the way
of Jhvh, We need not, with Duhm, speak indeed of " the haughty
spirit and fanaticism of those Jewish Puritans," but we may say that
no time in Jewish history, so far as it is known to us, exhibits the
spirit of this Ps. so clearly as the age of the Maccabean struggle. With
this Ps. should be compared Pss. 74 and 79.
1 and 2. The Psalmist says that he had heard of Joshua's capture
of Canaan by oral tradition. The fathers had taught it to their
children as prescribed in Deut, 6°', Ex. 13°. The them who are the

XLV. 1-2] PSALMS 127
objects of the verbs plantedst and spread abroad (not cast out) are of
course the Jewish fathers.
3. The light of Thy countenance is an allusion to the Aaronic
benediction of Num, 6. The phrase denotes the joy and prosperity
(of which light is a symbol) which come from the favour of Jhvh ; just
as darkness and gloom of v. 19 are the symbol of the misery which
comes from absence of Jhvh's grace.
5. Push down as oxen with the horns ; tread under as with their
hoofs. 6 = 1 Mac. 3'°-=^-
9-18. Contrast between the ideal and the actual. Victory was
the sure proof of the presence of Jhvh of Hosts, as the Ark was once
thought to be. The Chasidim were put to fiight, kiUed like sheep, and
sold as slaves. "The merchants of the country  came into the
camp to buy the children of Israel for slaves," 1 Mac. 3*'. What was
worse, the Psalmist seems to feel, was that Jhvh sold His people
without obtaining for them any reasonable price. Hardest of all to
bear were the taunts of his foes, the heathen nations round about, the
Edomites, Moabites, and Ammonites.
19. The place of dragons (A.V.) = the haunt of jackals. The
shadow of death = the place of gloom as in 23'*, and is a name for
the wilderness into which the fugitive Maccabeans were driven.
22. Quoted in Rom, 8°° as proof that in all ages God's Church
has been persecuted,
23. At the time of the Maccabees the Levites were wont to
ascend the pulpit and cry : " Why sleepest Thou, Jhvh ? " John
Hyrcanus put an end to this custom by asking : " Doth God sleep ?
Doth not the Scripture say : The Keeper of Israel slumbers not nor
sleeps ? "
25. The position of mourners. Rosenmiiller, however, thinks of
soldiers struck to the ground, and kept there by the foot of the victor.
This is less probable.
26. An addition by a later hand, according to Duhm.

PSALM XLV.
For the chief Musician : to Shoshannim : of the sons of Korah : Maschil :
A Song of loves,
1 My heart bubbles with a good matter :
I speak the things which I have made touching the king :
My tongue is the pen of a ready writer.
Address to the Bridegroom.
2 Thou art fairer than the chUdren of men :
Grace is poured into thy lips :
Therefore God hath blessed thee for ever.

128 PSALMS [XLV. 3-17
3 Gird thee with thy sword upon thy thigh, 0 most mighty :
Gird thee with thy glory and thy majesty.
4 And in thy majesty ride prosperously
Because of truth ([and meekness]| and righteousness :
And thy right hand shall teach thee terrible things.
5 Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the king's enemies :
The peoples faU under thee.
6 Thy throne, 0 God, is for ever and ever :
The sceptre of thy kingdom is a sceptre of righteousness.
7 Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness :
Therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee
With the oil of gladness above thy feUows.
8 AU thy garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia.
Out of ivory palaces do the stringed instruments make thee
glad.
9 Kings' daughters are among thy honourable women :
Upon thy right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir.
Address to the Bride.
10 Hearken, 0 daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear :
Forget also thine own people, and thy father's house :
11 So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty :
For he is thy Lord ; and worship thou him.
12 And the daughter of Tyre shall be there with a gift :
Even the rich among the people shall intreat thy favour.
13 The king's daughter is aU glorious within the palace :
Her clothing is of gold inwrought.
14 She shall be brought unto the king in embroidered raiment :
The virgins her companions that follow her
Shall be brought unto thee.
15 With gladness and rejoicing shaU they be brought :
They shall enter into the king's palace.
Address to the King.
16 Instead of thy fathers shall be thy children.
Whom thou mayest make princes in all the earth.
17 They shaU make thy name to be remembered in aU genera
tions :
Therefore shaU the peoples praise thee for ever and ever.

XLV.] PSALMS 129
It is not unnatural to compare this Jewish epithalamium with the
famous Pervigihum Veneris, and that, as much on account of its
differences as of its resemblances. Who the King is for whom the
Court-poet writes is uncertain. He is no Ptolemy, and no Persian
king (if V. 7 is to be followed), for Jhvh is his God. He is not
Solomon, for v. 6 implies that he was of a royal dynasty, and that his
fathers had been kings before him. Jennings and Lowe (following
DeUtzsch) think that the marriage of Joram and Athaliah was the
occasion of the Ps. But the term for queen (sh§g§,l) in v. 9, as of
Chaldean origin, points to a later date, and v. 16 seems to imply that
the King's father was dead, while Joram was married during the life
time of his father, Jehoshaphat. Duhm suggests Aristobulus I. The
multitude of conjectures serves but to emphasise our ignorance.
From what foUows it will be seen that the Ps. in its original sense
is so purely a marriage-song that we almost expect the Io Hymen of
the classical writer. It may excite surprise, therefore, that such a
song should have found entrance into a collection of sacred poems.
The answer is that, like the Song of Solomon, the bridge was con
structed by the later system of mystical interpretation. The bride
and bridegroom became the Israelitish Church and Jhvh, and later
the Christian Church and Christ. And that is the sense in which it is
stiU used among us. Where a canon of sacred scriptures has been
formed, mysticism is not only legitimate but necessary, if religious
thought is not to become stagnant. Its mode of interpretation is the
instrument by which it is made possible for those of more civilised
ages to adopt and use the ruder language of their fathers. Nor can
any vahd objection be made to the use of mystical interpretation, so
long as its secondary sense is not allowed to oust the primary. Forget
fulness of this last elementary truth makes the devotional Commentary
on the Psalms of Neale and Littledale a piece of embroidery on a
shadow. 1. Render :
My heart bubbles forth ; good is the theme ;
A song do I sing; a poem for a king;
My tongue is a pen ; it is a rapid writer.
2. In Cant. 5'° it is the bride that is "white and ruddy, the
chiefest among ten thousand." Here it is the bridegroom. His hps
are full of grace, i.e. he is courteous and affable. Eccl. 10'^;
Prov. 22 ". This courtesy is a sign, not a reason, of Jhvh's blessing.
3, 4 are not exhortations to any immediate action, but poetic
exhortations to adopt the power and emblem of royalty. "Gird on
thy sword, thy glory, thy majesty; mount thy chariot, and ride
forward to defend the truth, and to hear the right; shoot thine
arrows in the heart of thy foes— peoples shaU be subdued unto thee."
The image of the kings of Egypt in their chariots wiU at once occur to
every reader. t^- ¦ •
6, The vocative 0 God (Elohim) does not predicate Divinity
0. 9

130 PSALMS [XLVL 1-3
necessarily. In 1 Sam. 28'° Samuel's spirit is called Elohim; in
Ex. 2'S 22^, Ps, 82°, rulers or judges; in Ex. 7' Moses is an Elohim to
Pharaoh. In v. 7 the Psalmist is careful to set Elohim the King over
against Elohim the God — " 0 Elohim, thy God hath anointed thee."
If this were not a Jewish Ps. we might think of the ascription of
Deity to the Pharaohs and servants of Nebo and Marduk. Majesty,
God-given, is what Elohim means here. Throne and sceptre are related
to righteousness and judgment. The latter member is the former in
action, 7, The oil of gladness. Not the consecrating oil, but that of the
wedding-feast, symbolising joy. Thy felhws = the children of the
bride-chamber, the bridegroom's companions, not as Jennings and
Lowe, "all other contemporary kings."
8-9 describe the procession from the bride's quarters to those of
the bridegroom— the culminating act of the marriage drama. The
bridegroom is myrrh and aloes — so sweet-smelling are his robes ; from
the ivory inlaid rooms where the bride is are heard stringed instru
ments (= minni with Duhm and Jennings and Lowe) ; the two
processions unite, when that of the bridegroom sees that of the bride ;
the bride places herself at the bridegroom's right hand ; her attendants
are princesses,
10. Then the poet addresses the bride, bidding her forget her
father's house, and be buxom to her new lord, and do him reverence.
He sends her a gift from the merchandise of Tyre (the daughter of
Tyre is Tyre itself ; cf. daughter of Babylon and daughter of Zion) ;
the leaders of the nation also seek her favour (literally "stroke her face")
with all sorts of costly gifts. The poet then describes the vision of
beauty which the Queen presents, as with the virgins, her bridal atten
dants, she is led to the King's apartments.
16, 17 are addressed to the King. He is to live in his children
which are to be born, and not in the past of his family. By a slight
change we read : They (not I) shall make thy name to be remembered,
and through them wiU thy memory be perpetuated. " For ever and
ever" is the common poetic hyperbole for a period of indefinite
duration.

PSALM XLVI.
For the chief Musician : of the sons of Korah : to Alamoth : a Song.
1 God is our refuge and strength,
A very present help in trouble.
2 Therefore wiU not we fear, though the earth be removed.
And though the mountains be carried into the midst of
the sea :
3 Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled.

XLVI. 3-11] PSALMS 131
Though the mountains shake with the sweUing thereof
Selah.
Jhvh of hosts is tvith us :
The God of Jacob is our refuge.
4 hThe streams of Jhvh rejoice the City of God:-!
The hoUest of the tabernacles of the Most High.
5 God is in the midst of her ; she shaU not be moved :
God shall help her, and that right early.
6 The nations rage: the kingdoms I- quake:-!
He utters his voice : the earth melts.
7 Jhvh of hosts is tmth us :
The God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah.
8 Come, behold the works of Jhvh,
What desolations he hath made in the earth.
9 He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth :
He breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder :
He burneth the chariot in the fire.
10 Be stUI, and know that I am God :
I wiU be exalted among the nations,
I wUI be exalted in the earth.
11 Jhvh of hosts is with us:
The God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah.
Psalms 46, 47, 48 have strong likenesses, and may be safely attri
buted to the same originating cause, Delitzsch and others find it
in Jehoshaphat's victory over the Moabites, Edomites, and others
(2 Chron. 20). Kirkpatrick (and Jennings and Lowe also) ascribes it
to the miraculous deliverance of Jerusalem from the army of Sen
nacherib "with a probability which approaches certainty." Rosen-
miiUer, foUowing Aben-Ezra, says that the future wars of Gog and
Magog described in Ez. 38 and 39 were in the Psalmist's mind.
Baethgen is wise enough to express no opinion, and Duhm refers to the
end of the third century B.C. after the wars of Alexander the Great and
his immediate successors, and before the time of Antiochus Epiphanes.
The only thing certain, amid such variety of opinion, is that a great
deUverance due to Jhvh is hymned. The German equivalent is well
known in Luther's "Ein feste Berg ist unser Gott,"
1, Refuge for defence, strength for attack.
2. The hostile motions of the enemies are compared to convulsions
of nature. Two explanations of 26 are possible : (a) that the moun
tains are shaken in the midst of the subterranean sea, in the midst of
which they stand; or ifi) that they are transferred into the visible
9—2

132 PSALMS [XLVII. 1-5
ocean. The former is, no doubt, more prosaic ; the latter might
be the original of Mt, 21^'- On the whole {b) is to be preferred.
3. After this verse the refrain which occurs in vv. 7 and 11 must
be supplied. It has dropped out by some accident. Then the verse
will run :
Though the waters roar,,,Though the mountains shake.., Jhvh of
hosts is with us ; a stronghold is the God of Jacob.
4 a. There is a river [A.V.]. Duhm thinks that river was left in
some copy by mistake, and would read : The stream of Jhvh makes glad
the City of God — the Civitas Dei, Jerusalem possessed no stream of
sufficient importance to have water-courses or irrigation canals. Hence
the phrase is used in a secondary sense (as well as "light" in 36°), and
the meaning is that though all is terror without, within is joy and
peace, 4 b. The Authorised Version makes the dwelling-place, &c,, to be
in apposition to the City of God, The LXX renders : The Most High
has made holy his dwelling-place. But our text means that .Jerusalem
is that one of His dwelling-places which the Most High has chosen to
make holy above others, e.g. Gibeon and Shiloh — a very good meaning.
5c, Right early. LiteraUy at the coming of the morning, i.e. after
so small an interval as is given between evening and morning. The
same phrase occurs in Is. 33^, Ex. 14^', Judg. 19^°, and of the evening
Gen. 24°°, Deut. 23"-
6. The sharp clauses remind us of 45' and Ex. 15°' '°:
The nations rage ; the kingdoms quake :
He speaks with His voice ; the earth melts.
Sb Duhm strikes out as prosaic, ill-sounding, superfluous and
destructive of the sequence of thought.
10. The earth = i\ot the land of Palestine, but the whole earth.
To the Psalmist Jerusalem is the City of God, but He reigns from it
over all nations.
PSALM XLVIL
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of the sons of Korah.
1 0 clap your hands, all ye peoples :
Shout unto God with the voice of triumph.
2 For Jhvh Most High is terrible :
He is a great King over all the earth.
3 He subdued the peoples under us,
And the nations under our feet.
4 He chose our inheritance for us.
The exceUency of Jacob whom he loved. Sdah.
5 God is gone up with a shout,
Jhvh with the sound of a trumpet.

XLVII. 6-9] PSALMS 133
6 Sing praises to God, sing praises :
Sing praises unto our King, sing praises.
7 For God is the King of all the earth :
Sing ye praises '"with understanding.''
8 God reigneth over the nations :
God sitteth upon the throne of his holiness.
9 The princes of the peoples are gathered together,
j-WithH the people of the God of Abraham :
For the shields of the earth belong unto God :
He is greatly exalted.
A Ps, which has not only close relation with 46 and 48, but also
with 93-100, as well as Is, 40-66. Hence it is referred by many
commentators to a date after the return from Exile and the rebuilding
of the Temple. Verse 5 has suggested to the Christian Church the
use of the Ps. for Ascension Day, and to the Jewish for New Year's
Day. What seems clear is that it was written for liturgical use on a
feast-day. 1. Clap your hands. So was a king welcomed — e.g. Joash in
2 Kings 11'°.
All ye peoples. PI. It is the heathen who are summoned to salute
Jhvh as King.
Shout unto God. Balaam speaks ofthe shout with which a victorious
king was received. Num. 23°'.
2. Render : Jhvh, Most High, the terrible,
Is a great King over all the earth.
Most High = Ely6n is used sometimes to qualify El, or Jhvh. But
when it stands alone it is a proper name. Philo Byblius says that
among the Phoenicians Eliom was in use as a name for God. "This is
the simplest explanation of the fact that in the single early passage
where Ely6n occurs (Num. 24 '") it is put in the mouth of a foreigner,
whilst the employment of the word as an Israelite name for God
belongs almost exclusively to post-exilic usage " (E. Kautzsch in Ency.
Bib., VoL III. col. 3327). The term became more commonly used in
post-exihc times, when the conception of Jhvh as the Creator of Heaven
and Earth came to the front.
3. He shall subdue the people under us [A.V.]. Duhm regards this
expectation as due to Jewish vanity, and proposes: He subdues the
peoples under Him, &c. But the tenses should be read as aorists,
and be referred to the conquest of Canaan :
3 He subdued the peoples under us :
And the nations under our feet;
4 He chose out our inheritance :
The pride of Jacob whom He loved.

134 PSALMS [XLVIII. 1-7
3 a = 18"'. 4a. The inheritance = Canaan (Ex. 15 ", &c.).
46 = the land on which Jacob prided himself; Jhvh's love for
Jacob was the cause of the choice, not Jacob's merits. So Jhvh's
chesed is always the basis of the covenant.
5. Jhvh is gone up = a. term of the language of the Temple-
service ; Jhvh called down to accept the sacrifice is said to return to
His place after it is offered. No doubt the form of the expression is
borrowed from the old expression for the Ark of the Covenant ascending
Zion in triumph.
With the sound of trumpet, a phrase which suggests that the Ps.
was composed for New Year's Day, " the memorial of the blowing of
trumpets" (Lev. 23^).
6, Sing praises = zimrii, a word from which mizmdr, a psalm, is
derived. 7. With understanding. Better as R.V. margin in a skilful
Ps. = in a Maschil — a word of which nobody knows the meaning. It is
found in the superscriptions of 83 Psalms.
9, The text as it stands contains the astonishing statement that
the princes of the people are gathered together to be the people of the
God of Abraham — a statement which finds a parallel in Is. 19 and
Ps. 87, but the LXX rendering suggests that instead of am (people),
im {with) should be read. The princes of... along with the people ofthe
God of Abraham — so the promise in Gen. 12 is fulfiUed.
The shields of the earth = its protectors = its kings. Jhvh is His
people's shield (89 '°, Hos. 4'°).

PSALM XLVIIL
A Song : A Psalm of the sons of Korah.
1 Great is Jhvh, and greatly to be praised
In the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness.
2 Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth.
Is mount Zion, oti the sides of the north.
The city of the great King.
3 God is known in her palaces for a refuge.
4 For, lo, the kings were assembled.
They passed by together.
5 They saw it : they marveUed :
They were troubled ; they hasted away.
6 Fear took hold upon them there :
Pain, as of a woman in travaiL
7 Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish
With an east wind.

XLVIIL 8-14] PSALMS 135
8 As we have heard, so have we seen
In the city of Jhvh of hosts, in the city of our God :
God wiU estabUsh it for ever. Selah.
9 We have thought of thy lovingkindness, 0 God,
In the midst of thy temple.
10 According to thy name, 0 God,
So is thy praise unto the ends of the earth :
Thy right hand is full of righteousness.
11 Let mount Zion rejoice,
Let the daughters of Judah be glad,
Because of thy judgments.
12 Walk about Zion, and go round about her :
TeU the towers thereof
13 Mark ye weU her bulwarks.
Consider her palaces :
That ye may teU it to the generation foUowing.
14 For this God is our God for ever and ever :
He will be our guide [[unto death.]]
Nearly aU commentators regard this Ps. as centred round such
a national deliverance as was wrought when the Assyrians rose in the
morning aU dead corpses. But a closer reading shows that what the
Ps. is concemed with is the beauty and glory of Zion. No inhabitant
of it was stirred to sing its praises thus, but a pilgrim from a distant
land whose pent-up meditations were crystallised by a visit, and then
transfigured by the after-glow of memory. His description of Zion as
beautiful rather than high may be taken to show him familiar with the
Greek love of beauty.
2. On the sides of the north. This has been interpreted (1) as
indicating that the pilgrim came from the south, e.g. Egypt ; (2) that
Zion was on the north side of the hiUs on which Jerusalem was built ;
(3) that the Psalmist had iu his mind the familiar mythology of the
West-Asian peoples, and of the Indians, which placed the abode of the
gods on a mountain in the extreme north, and that he boldly said
of Zion that she was aU that they had fabled of their northern Olympus
and more. She is the north-side City, the Aralu of the Babylonians,
the City of a King greater than the great King himself "This last
seems the best interpretation, and one which fits in best with the
general character of the Ps.
3-8. These verses are consistent with the thought of a recent
deliverance, but do not necessitate it. The Psalmist sings (among
other praises of Zion) of her strength which enables her to defy her
foes. Kings assemble; they look at her steeps and walls ; they marvel;

136 PSALMS [XLIX. 1-6
they are affrighted; they melt away; they can do nothing, for Jhvh has
made His City so strong for Himself Verse 7 is a compressed simile.
As the East Wind breaks in pieces the great men of war, so does Jhvh
scatter Zion's enemies. All this had the Jew of the Dispersion heard
about Zion in his exile, but now he has seen her for himself, and can
bear the testimony of an eye-witness to her beauty and strength.
9. His mind goes back to the happy moments when he took his
part in the Temple-service, and in quiet meditated there of Jhvh's
chesed for His people. He noticed, too, there pilgrims from all lands,
and rejoiced to think that Jhvh's name and glory were th'is carried to
the ends of the earth. The Psalmist could but see in this widespread
knowledge of Jhvh a further sign of His faithfulness to His covenant,
and he declares with gratitude that Jhvh's right hand is full of His
righteousness — a cornucopia from which He showers His blessings
wherever the Jew is to be found.
11-13. Zion may well rejoice as Jhvh's head-centre ; the towns
and villages of Judsea around her be glad, for their security was
due to Jhvh's judgments which were continually separating between
them and all other powers and places. The pilgrim is then exhorted to
mark weU every part of this happy city, that he may tell it aU to his
children and his children's children.
14. Even unto death = al-miith, which is probably a corruption for
ali,m&th = a musical direction (= for Elamite tunes, or for soprano
voices), which belongs to the superscription of the following Ps.

PSALM XLIX.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of the sons of Korah.
1 Hear this all ye peoples :
Give ear, all ye inhabitants of the world :
2 Both low and high.
Rich and poor, together.
3 My mouth shall speak wisdom :
And the meditation of my heart shall be of understanding.
4 I will incline mine ear to a parable :
I wUl open my dark saying upon the harp.
[Man in honour abideth not;
But is like the beasts that perish.]
5 Wherefore should I fear in the days of evil,
hWhen the unrighteous Mammon compasseth me about.-!
6 They that trust in their wealth,
And boast themselves in the multitude of their riches : —

XLIX. 7-20] PSALMS 137
7 None can by any means redeem his I- soul,-!
Nor give to God his ransom :
8 [[(For the redemption of their soul is precious,
And it ceaseth for ever :)]]
9 That he should still live for ever ;
l-Shall he notH see corruption,
10 Seeing that wise men die,
Likewise the fool and the brutish person perish, and leave
their wealth to others?
11 Graves are their houses for ever :
[She61] their dweUing places to aU generations :
They who call their lands after their own names :
[Their memory perishes with them.]
12 But man in honour abideth not :
He is like the beasts that perish.
13 I- This is the fate of those who trust in themselves :
This the end of those who take pleasure in their repute :
14 Like a flock of sheep do they go down to She&l :
Death feedeth on them (with the upright they descend) :
Soon must their form be destroyed : soon must Sheol be
their home.-!
15 But God wiU redeem my soul from the power of SheSl :
For he shaU receive me. Selah.
16 Be not thou afraid when one is made rich,
When the glory of his house is increased ;
17 For when he dieth he shall carry nothing away :
His glory shall not descend after him.
18 Though while he lives he blesses his soul :
And though men praise hhim while he does well to himself:-!
19 Yet he shaU go to the generation of his fathers :
Where they never see light.
20 Mam, in honomr abideth not :
But is like the beasts that perish.
The " riddle " of this Ps. is that of Ps. 73 and the Book of Job :
Why do bad men prosper and the pious suffer ? Ps. 37 dealt with the
same problem, but was able to deny the premisses. The pious did not
suffer in the long-run. Here it is admitted that they do, and a deeper

138 PSALMS [XLIX.
insight gives a more lasting solution. The Psalmist, however, still
does not get beyond a superficial view — superficial, that is, at the bar
of logic. What he says is that all men die, it is true, rich and poor,
good and evil alike, but he hints (he does not work out his hint) that
in some undefined way Jhvh redeems his soul from the power of She61
and receives him. This finger-post pointing to the right road the
Psalmist himself, however, takes no further notice of The time was
not yet ripe. It is also to be observed that the Psalmist's teaching
about future retribution is stated to be a sort of mystery (?of the
Schools), which everybody is not capable of understanding, unless it
be explained by an initiate. This indicates the influence of a new
element of thought (? Persian), which, however, had not yet made
itself at home, or been assimilated by Jewish thinkers. The Ps.
before us may be called the Old Testament parable about Dives and
Lazarus. 1. All ye peoples. The Psalmist is going to treat of a matter not
of national but of universal human interest, and he, therefore, invites
them all to listen.
3. Wisdom and understanding are both plural to denote the depth
and complexity of the subject.
4. A parable... a dark sai/mg' = a m^shi,l and a chidi,h = a simile
and a metaphor, or a parable and a riddle. Unfortunately the Ps.
omits to say, according to our present text, what the m§,sh41 is. We
must suppose, therefore, that it is the refrain, and that it has dropped
out by some accident. We supply, therefore, that of w. 12 and 20 :
"Man in honour abideth not, but is like the beasts that perish." That
sounds like a paradox from a collection of popular proverbs which the
Psalmist chooses as his theme, and proceeds to expound in an esoteric
sense, in a poem intended to be sung to the harp.
" With ten names," says the Talmud, "is the Holy Spirit named in
Scripture. They are — Parable, AUegory, Enigma, Speech, Sentence,
Light, Law, Command, Vision, Prophecy."
5. When the iniquity [A.V.]. It is not his own iniquity which he
is here concerned with, nor is he talking of any attacks of his foes (so
Baethgen) ; and, therefore, since the text must be corrected, Duhm's is
to be preferred: While the unrighteous Mammon. The Psalmist is
dealing solely with the problem set by the prosperity of the wicked.
7. His brother [A.V,]. Again an extraneous idea. By a slight
change in the Hebrew (ak for ach) we regain the sense. A sort of were-
gild was legal among the Jews. If a man's ox gored another man to
death, the law exacted a life for a life, but allowed the owner to redeem
himself by a money payment. Alluding to this the Psalmist says of
therich men : They may trust in their wealth and pride themselves on
their possessions, but they do not own enough to buy back their lives
from God, or the power of the grave, so as to secure a continuance of
life here. Whether wise or foolish, one thing happens to them aU.
They die and surrender their wealth.
8. This verse is probably a marginal reflection.

XLIX.] PSALMS 139
11 must be amended. Inward thought (kirbam) [A.V.] should
be graves (k'barim). So LXX and we get:
The grave is their house for ever ;
(She61) their dwelling-place from generation to generation ;
They who caU the lands after their own names — their
memory is perished with them.
Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople — where are their eponyms ?
Man, however rich or high, abideth not, but dies like the beasts.
13, 14, Better :
This is the fate of those who trust in themselves ;
This the end of those who take pleasure in their repute;
Like a flock of sheep do they go down to She6l ;
Death feedeth on them ; (with the upright they descend) ;
Soon must their form be destroyed; soon must Shedl be
their home.
I have followed Klostermann and Duhm in the clause "with the
upright do they descend," which seems unquestionably right, but must
be regarded as a parenthetic aside,
15. Jhvh will redeem my soul. This is the Psalmist's solution,
and it is strange that Kirkpatrick should hold that it does not reach
beyond this present life. What riches cannot do here or hereafter, the
Psahnist declares, with the true power of religious faith, Jhvh can
and will do. All go down to She6l, but the righteous only are redeemed
from it. Hence the question set in the beginning : " Why should
I fear when unrighteous Mammon prospers ? " is answered : Why
indeed, seeing that no rich man can redeem his soul from She61 with
any wealth he may have, while it is certain that Jhvh will redeem the
righteous ? Here we reach the doctrine, not only of persistence after
death, but of delivery by Jhvh from the hold of death. The significant
point in the Psalmist's conclusion is not so much the conclusion itself
as the road by which he reached it. Not by logical, or historical
proof, not by ghost- worship, or re-appearance of the dead to the living,
was he convinced of man's immortality, but by an intuition which told
him of the faithfulness of his God to the lovingkindness He had shown
him through life. He who cared for him so much during his life
would not desert him in or after death. Once our Father, always our
Father. That was the last word of Judaism. It was also the first
word of Christianity.
15 b. The verb lakach {receive) occurs again in 73^, and is used of
such a reception by God as fell to Elijah and Enoch, In the Toldoth
Jesu this verse is put into the mouth of Jesus when arraigned by His
enemies before Queen Helena. " When now the elders of Israel came
before the Queen, and Judas Iscariot with them, came Jesus and began
to speak against them, and they against Him. After much discussion
Jesus saw Himself in great straits, and began to say : ' Of me pro
phesied my forefather David, saying, He shall receive Me, Selah. Now
is He calling me, and I wiU ascend to heaven.' "

140 PSALMS [L. 1-15
PSALM L.
A Psalm of Asaph.
The Theopha/ny.
1 The mighty God, Jhvh, hath spoken :
The earth l-hath trembledH from the rising of the sun unto
the going down thereof
2 Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty,
God hath shined.
3 [[Let our God come, and not keep silence :][
A fire devours before him.
And it is very tempestuous round about him.
4 He calls to the heavens from above.
And to the earth, that he may judge his people.
5 " Gather my saints together unto me :
Those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice."
6 And the heavens shaU declare his righteousness :
For God is judge himself. Selah.
The Instruction.
1 Hear, 0 my people, and I will speak :
0 Israel, and I wiU testify against thee :
I am Jhvh thy God.
8 I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices :
Thy burnt offerings are continually before me.
9 I will take no bullock out of thy house ;
No he-goats out of thy folds.
10 For every beast of the forest is mine.
The cattle upon a thousand hiUs.
Ill know all the fowls of the mountains :
And the wild beasts of the field are mine.
12 If I were hungry, I would not tell thee :
For the world is mine, and the fulness thereof
13 WUl I eat the flesh of buUs,
Or drink the blood of goats ?
14 Offer unto God thanksgiving :
And pay thy vows unto the Most High :
15 And call upon me in the day of trouble :
I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.

L. 16-23] PSALMS 141
The Moral.
16 [[But unto the wicked God saith,]]
What hast thou to do to declare my statutes ;
That thou shouldest take my covenant in thy mouth?
17 Seeing thou hatest instruction.
And castest my words behind thee.
18 When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him :
Thou hast been partaker with adulterers.
19 Thou givest thy mouth to evil,
And thy tongue frameth deceit.
20 Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother :
Thou slanderest thine own mother's son.
21 These things hast thou done, and I kept silence :
Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such am one as
thyself :
But I wUl reprove thee, and set them in order before
thine eyes.
22 Now consider this, ye that forget God,
Lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.
23 Whoso offereth praise glorifteth me :
And to him that ordereth his conversation aright
WiU I shew the salvation of God.
If we could be sure of the date of this Ps, it would be a valuable
document for the history of the education of the Jewish people. Un
fortunately every possible date is suggested from that of Delitzsch, who
says bluntly "Psalm 50 is an original psalm of Asaph," to that of
Baethgen, who puts it between 622 and 586. On the other hand the
general meaning of the Psalm is perfectly clear. The Psalmist takes
up his parable for the Ten Commandments as superior to the Temple
sacrifices, and he does this without going to the length of condemnation
which we find in Amos, Isaiah and Jeremiah. "These ought ye to
have done," he seems to say, "and not leave the others undone." His
Psalm consists of three parts, viz. an introduction, the instruction, and
the moral. The first is an imitation of Deut. 33^ the second is in the
style and tone of the Wise Men, while the following part of the Psalm
is more of a Prophet's utterance.
It must be confessed that the Theophany of the first six verses
is too solemn for the sermon which follows. A great poet would have
felt that not a sermon but a judgment was alone the fitting conclusion

142 PSALMS [L-
to a Theophany to which Heaven and Earth were summoned as wit
nesses. Moreover, vv. 16-21 are the true objective point of the Ps. —
vv. 7-15 being their obverse, as w. 1-6 are the title to both.
1. Called[A.Y.]. Wellhausen reads vathir^ for vayikra,yHr.ffSj7eafe
and the earth trembles for Jhvh speaks and calls. Three divine Names
are here placed side by side— El, Elohim, Jhvh {fortis, deus, dominus).
Their number serves to emphasise the majesty of God. The trembling
of the Earth from East to West is the natural effect of Jhvh's voice.
2. Not from Sinai this time, but from Zion, the perfection of
beauty (so in Lam. 2'°), has Jhvh appeared in His glory.
3 a. Let our God come and not keep silence is the parenthetical
wish of a pious scribe interjaculated after the style of a revivalist
"Praise the Lord."
5. Gather My saints, not so called because they were ethicaUy so,
but because they were chasidim = the objects of Jhvh's chesed oi which
the Exodus Covenant (Ex. 24') was the historical pledge.
7. Jhvh is described as opening the assize. For / am God, even
ihy God we must clearly read with Ex. 20, / am Jhvh thy God — the
opening words of the Decalogue.
8. They a/re continually before Me; i.e. the daily sacrifices are
offered ; therefore, the Psalmist has no fault to find on this head.
10. The cattle on a thousand hills; better "the thousands of cattle
on the mountains."
12. The earth is Mine. A frequently recurring thought, e.g.
Ps. 24', Ex. 19°, Deut, 10'^ 1 Cor. 10^.
13, Yet we read of the bread of Jhvh (Lev. 3"), and the shew
bread was certainly thought of originally as meant for Jhvh's con
sumption. The Talmud has an interesting passage : " ' Has God pleasure in
the meat and blood of sacrifices ? ' asks the prophet. No ; He has not
so much ordained as permitted them. It is for yourselves, He says,
not for Me that you offer. Like a king who sees his son carousing
daily with aU manner of evil companions : ' You shall henceforth eat
and drink entirely at your will at my own table,' he says. They
offered sacrifices to demons and devils, for they loved sacrificing, and
could not do without it. And the Lord said : ' Bring your offerings to
Me ; you shall then at least offer to the true God.' "
14. Thanksgiving. Not the material thank-offering (as contrasted
with the burnt-offering) but the thankful heart is meant ; so not the
material of the vow but inward truthfulness is Jhvh's tribute. Cf.
Pss, 15 and 24.
16. Unto the wicked saith God. This is the explanatory note of
the same editor perhaps who inserted 3 a. He did not see that what
had gone before was not in contrast with vv. 16-21 but was another way
of saying that not sacrifices but moral goodness was what Jhvh looked
for. If sacrifices were of little esteem, so was learning in the Law.
What good is it, he asks indignantly, to be always tracing the boundary
lines set by the Law, when you are overstepping them daily ?

LL 1-10] PSALMS 143
17. Instruction = discipline in the school of wisdom. The term
mtsar occurs in the Psalter here only, but is a technical term of
Proverbs. 18-20. It is the 7th, 8th, and 9th Commandments which are
singled out as those most commonly broken. It is remarkable how
often the Psalms denounce calumny and perjury. So the Talmud
says : "Let the honour of thy neighbour be to thee like thine own.
Rather be thrown into a fiery furnace than bring any one to public
shame.'' 21-23 = the epilogue. 23 a sums up the first half of the Ps, and
23 b the second. The salvation of God should be my salvation if Jhvh
is still the speaker.
PSALM LI.
For the chief Musician, A Psalm of Darid : when Nathan the prophet came
unto him, after he had gone in to Bath-sheba,
1 Have mercy upon me, 0 God, according to thy loving
kindness :
According unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out
my transgressions.
2 Wash me throughly from mine iniquity,
And cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I acknowledge my transgressions :
And my sin is ever before me.
4 Against thee, thee only, have I sinned.
And done this evil in thy sight :
That thou mightest be justified when thou speakest,
And be clear when thou judgest.
5 Behold, I was shapen in iniquity :
And in sin did my mother conceive me.
6 Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts :
And in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shaU be clean :
Wash me, and I shaU be whiter than snow.
8 hSatisfy me with-! joy and gladness :
That the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.
9 Hide thy face from my sins,
And blot out aU mine iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, 0 God :
And renew a j-fixedH spirit within me.

144 PSALMS [LL 11-19
11 Cast me not away from thy presence :
And take not thy holy spirit from me.
12 Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation :
And uphold me with I- a wiUing H spirit.
13 Then will I teach transgressors thy ways :
And sinners shaU be converted unto thee.
14 Deliver me from '"bloodguUtiness,"' 0 God, thou God of my
salvation :
And my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.
15 0 Lord, open thou my Ups :
And my mouth shall shew forth thy praise.
16 For thou desirest not sacrifice ; else would I give it :
Thou delightest not in burnt offering.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit :
A broken and a contrite heart, 0 God, thou wUt not despise.

18 Do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion :
Build thou the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteous
ness, tmth burnt offering and whole burnt offering:
Then shall they offer bullocks u/pon thine altar.
The historical interpretation of this Ps, has wavered between the
inscription which attributes it to David, and the view of Theodore of
Mopsuestia who says that it was " spoken with reference to the people
in Babylon, which confesses its sins, and prays forgiveness and the
cessation of its exile." Two things may be affirmed with confidence :
(1) That the Ps, is not of the age of David ; and (2) that the theory
which makes " I " = the community is a piece of exegesis proposed at a
time when the origin of the Ps. was obscure. The difficulty of dating
the Ps, is added to by the doubt whether the two last verses formed
part of the original Ps. If they did then the Ps. cannot be David's.
If they did not, then the Ps. must have been written at a time when
Jerusalem had been destroyed once at least. No decisive proof can be
drawn against the Davidic authorship from v. 4, nor any for it from
V. 14. All that we are justified in saying is that the one piece of firm
ground supplied by the Ps. itself for its date is its dependence on the
language of Is. 40-66. It is later than the ExUe, but how much later
cannot be determined.
1. Have mercy = chan^ni = " be gracious " rather than " be merci
ful." The meaning of " mercy " is a special case of that of " favour."
To the sinner God's favour takes the form of mercy. In Ps. 77° " Hath

LL] PSALMS 145
God forgotten to be gracious ? " the word is used absolutely. In the
verse before us the Psalmist implies that it is Jhvh's nature to show
favour. According to Thy lovingkindness = Th'y chesed. This is the founda
tion of Israel's confidence. Jhvh is kind ; therefore He chose Israel ;
He is true ; therefore He wiU not abandon His people. Hence it and
every member of it can appeal to His chesed with assurance, just as
Christians can appeal to God as their Father.
Thy tender mercies = rachamSichi,. Better compassions. Rechem =
a womb, and so the meaning of the word here rendered compassions is
that yearning, pitying and guardian love which a mother is wont to
have for the child of her womb. RosenmiiUer. This verse is reminis
cent of Is. 63'.
Blot out = m'chSh. The same word is used of wiping a dish clean
from all stain in 2 Kings 21'°. In Ps. 69^ it is used of blotting out
names from a book. So in Num. 5^, and Ex. 32°"- °° The Psalmist
uses a figurative term to express his prayer that his transgressions may
be made to be as if they were not.
My transgressions = p'shS,S,i. Of the three words used in the Pss.
for moral iU (p'shaSth, S,v6n, and chatto6th) the last denotes sins of
imprudence such as youth falls into ; the second iniquity or guilt
= moral evil in general ; and the first is deliberate sin such as may be
described as rebelhon against Jhvh. All three occur here in tyo. 1 and
2. Cf 106°.
2. Wash me, kibbes, is to wash clothes = TrXvi/etv. Cleanse me,
rSrchatz, is to wash persons = Xovuv. In Num. 19° both words are
so used. The meaning here and in 76 is : Cleanse me as one cleanses
a stained garment ; purify me as one purifies a defiled person. The
lustral washings of the Mosaic Law represent the ch6n, the sin-
extirpating grace of Jhvh.
3. For I acknowledge. Literally For I know (4di,). The for
gives the ground for the preceding prayer. I know (the / is emphatic
and seems to imply that others do not know), and though knowledge
and confession of sin are uo efficient cause of forgiveness yet tbey are
its indispensable pre-requisite. Cf 2 Sam. 12'° ; Ps. 32° ; Prov. 28'°
3 & is an echo of Is. 59'"-
4. The verse is parenthetical. Duhm indeed would transpose vv. 4
and 5. In any case the reason assigned for Jhvh's being free from all
charge of injustice when He speaks in judgment is the Psalmist's con
fession. The sense is : I know and acknowledge that I have sinned ;
hence whatever Thy sentence determines and pronounces against me,
does me no wrong ; just and true is Thy judgment, nor can any fault
be found with it. Rosenmiiller. To see (Cheyne) Jhvh's participation
in the sin by predestination, or by His providence (Hengstenberg) is to
theologise and so miss the simple, human sense of the passage.
R. Akiba said that the four types of sufferers were to be seen in
four children of a king chastised by him ; the first son maintains
stubborn silence, the second simply rebels, the third supplicates for
c. 10

146 PSALMS [LL
mercy, and the fourth (the best of sons) says, " Father, proceed with
thy chastisement," as David said, " Wash me throughly, &c."
5. Render : In iniquity was I born, and in sin did my mother
conceive me. Is this a palliation of his wrong-doing or an emphasising
of it? Cheyne on the one hand says that it is a fourth plea for
pardon ; Kirkpatrick points on the other to the fact that it is but the
introduction to v. 6, and its contrast. In either case the Psalmist
holds the monastic view that the act of generation is impure. He says
nothing, on the other hand, about original sin, or the total depravity
of human nature. All he says is that his parents sinned in bringing
him into the world.
The Talmud of a later day said, on the contrary, that there were
three partners in the making of a man, the Holy One (who contributes
the breath of life) and the father and the mother.
6. Truth; not the inteUectual virtue — which is alien to the
Hebrew genius as displayed in the O.T. — but the true and sincere love
of virtue and piety, or (Cheyne) a stable, truthful character, one rooted
in the fear of God, and moulded by His indweUing law.
In the inward parts. The deep corruption which clings to his
physical origin acts as a foil to Jhvh's requirements. He demands
unbending loyalty to conscience (= truth in the inward parts), and
Himself teaches that inner wisdom which makes him who learns it to
depart from evil and do good. Baethgen, however, renders : " Because
Thou delightest in steadfastness of heart, therefore teach me wisdom
within." 7, Purge me with hyssop. Again the Psalmist alludes to the cere
monial purifications of the Law, The leper was sprinkled with hyssop
(Lev. i4^.8.«.5i), and the person defiled by a corpse (Num. igeff-.'sf-).
So would Jhvh's favour cleanse him. Cf. Is. I'l
8 a. Render with Peshito : Satisfy me with joy and gladness (see
90'^), Remove the curse of the leprosy of sin, and joy comes.
8 b can only mean that the Psalmist has suffered from an iUness,
and that this iUness it is, therefore, which has convinced him of his
sin. The same sequence of illness and conviction of sin meets us in
Pss, 32 and 38,
9. Hide Thy face. UsuaUy Jhvh is said to hide His face in
displeasure, e.g. in 13', 44". Here the phrase is a synonym for forget
fulness of sin = a cessation of punishment, i.e. a removal of the sickness
of the sufferer. The word for bht out is the same as in v. 1.
10. Create in me a clean heart. From his punishment the
Psalmist now turns to his cure. His sickness was of spiritual origin ;
it was, therefore, to his spirit that the remedy must be applied. He
uses a symbol which he borrows from Ez, 11'°, 36^, and a verb which
is specially consecrated to Jhvh's action in making things out of
nothing. A clean heart is one which is like the pure gold that the
refiner has burned clean of all dross.
A right spirit. Better a firm spirit, one which does not waver
when trial comes but stands steadfast. The same word, nak6n, is used

LL] PSALMS 147
in 78", "steadfast to His covenant," and 112', "his heart is fixed."
The petition then is for a heart that is fixed in its aUegiance to Jhvh.
11. Cast me not away. Jhvh's presence is of course understood
variously at different stages of religious education. Perhaps man has
no option but to localise it. When David said that he was driven out
to serve other gods (1 Sam. 26") Palestine was where he thought of
Jhvh as being. But it was the Temple where Jhvh was speciaUy
present, and the Psalmist's harp delights to sing of the joy of appearing
before the presence of God. The best interpretation here is that which
refers Jhvh's presence to His Temple. Let me not die, but live, says
the Psalmist, and once more find Thee present in Thy house, else shall
I be free among the dead and cut off from before Thine eyes (Ps. 31°°).
Take not Thy Holy Spirit. This term "Holy Spirit" occurs else
where in the O.T. only in Is. 63'°' ", where it is the equivalent of " the
Angel of His Presence " who saved Israel. Moses was but the visible
instrument; but behind him was the angel of Jhvh or His Spirit.
The epithet holy comes from the domain of worship, and the meaning
of 11 b (especiaUy when taken in connection with the technical meaning
of presence in 11 a) is : As Thy Spirit once led our fathers to the
Holy Land, so let It now lead me to the blessings and delights of
worship in the place which Thou hast chosen to put Thy Name there.
So Duhm. Cf. 143'°, note.
12 a. Restore v/nto me the joy of Thy salvation = the joy which
comes from restored health, and, therefore, from the assurance of
forgiveness. 12 b. Free spirit. Rather willing spirit. With Delitzsch, Ols
hausen, Kirkpatrick, Duhm, and others as against Jennings and
Lowe, not Jhvh's Spirit but the Psalmist's human spirit. Perowne
remarks rightly enough that it is the human spirit as influenced by
the Divine which is the subject here. N'dlbah (same root as Nadab,
Aaron's son) is connected with the word used of free-will offerings.
The Psalmist asks for a wiUing spirit that he may make his offerings
as aforetime. 13 a. Deliverance is but the prelude to further service. The ways
of Jhvh which he vows to teach are either (1) that according to which
He sends punishment for rebellious acts (p'shg,im) — Duhm ; or
(2) Jhvh's cult and religion — Rosenmiiller. The latter is supported
by 13 b, sinners shall be converted unto Thee, where sinners describes
those guilty of sins of imprudence.
14. Deliver me from bloodguUtiness. This last word is in Hebrew
dAmim = blood (plural). The word is used ordinarily of death by
violence, but once at least (Ps. 30°) it is used in the general sense of
death, and frequently is synonymous with nephesh, the life. It very
rarely stands for bloodguUtiness (Ez. 18'°, Hos. 12'*, 1 Sam. 25"'' °°
are not to the point), or for mortal sin. The Psalmist has nowhere
hinted that he was in danger of a violent death, and apart from the
iuscription there is no reason for supposing his sin to have been
murder. Moreover, n§,tzal, deliver, is very rarely used except in the
10—2

148 PSALMS [LII. 1-5
sense of physical deUverance. If it is used here in a figurative sense,
then the Ps. is clearly stamped as late in its date. The only passage
in which the figurative sense occurs is 39°. Olshausen quotes also 79°
and 119"°, but the first is not to the point, and the second is doubtful.
14 b. Thy righteousness = Thy faithfulness in keeping Thy promises
to deliver Thy servants in time of need.
15. Thou shalf open, &c. 15 a is conditional. " If Thou shalt
open my Ups, then I wUl show, &c." As the Ps. moves in the circle of
common worship, the sense is, that if he be restored to health, and so
given a chance once more to join in the Temple-worship, then he vows
to sing Jhvh's praises.
16. Thou desirest no sacrifice must be understood as Is. 1'° ;
1 Sam, 15°°; Ps. 50°-"; Mt. 9'°-
" The calves of the lips " are better than those of the field ; hence
Jhvh is more pleased with the former. If the writer of v. 19 did not
understand a comparison here and not a negation, it is impossible
to acquit him of contradiction in set terms.
17 is an echo of Is. 57'°. In both passages the hall-mark of
genuine piety is described — by which Jhvh's chasldim may be dis
tinguished from the godless within, and the heathen without the
chosen people.
18, 19 have nothing to do with the preceding. The question is
not of a contrast or of a contradiction but of a distinct author. Duhm.
The rest of the Ps. concerns the writer personaUy. These two last
verses concern Jerusalem. Its waUs lie low ; the appointed sacrifices
cannot be offered ; if Jhvh will cause the walls to be rebuilt He shall
be worshipped with the ancient sacrifices. It is a comparatively poor
conclusion to a noble Ps,
PSALM LIL
For the chief Musician ; Maschil of David : when Doeg the Edomite came and
told Saul, and said unto him, David is come to the house of Abimelech.
1 Why boastest thou thyself in mischief, 0 mighty man,
I- Against the godly-! continually?
2 Thy tongue deviseth mischiefs :
Like a sharp razor, working deceitfully.
3 Thou lovest evil more than good :
Lying rather than to speak righteousness. Selah.
4 Thou lovest all devouring words,
•"0 thou deceitful tongue."'
5 God shall likewise destroy thee for ever.
He shall take thee away, and pluck thee out of thy dweUing
place,
[[And root thee out of the land of the Uving.]] Selah.

LII. 6-9] PSALMS 149
6 The righteous also shall see, [[and fear,]]
And shaU laugh at him :
7 " Lo, this is the man that made not God his strength :
But trusted in the abundance of his riches,
[[,4««i strengthened himself in his wickedness.]|"
8 But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God :
I trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever.

9 / tviU praise thee for ever, because thou hast done it :
And I tvUl proclaim thy name {for it is good) before
thy saints.
"The decision of Onias II (and III) to go over to Antiochus III
was premature. His grand-nephew, the Tobiad Joseph,,, cast in his lot
unreservedly with the Ptolemies,,, and received from Ptolemy IV the
official positions which until that time had been held by Onias.,. This
occurrence had an important bearing upon the position of the high-
priests of the Jews in Jerusalem. Until now the spiritual head of the
community had been at the same time its representative in its political
relations with the foreign over-lord ; now the care of these ' foreign
affairs' was dissociated from the priestly office and committed to a
secular person — the Tobiads were Benjamites. The change meant
a substantial diminution of the high-priest's power, and gave rise to
many disputes within the community, Joseph having asserted and
maintained his new position as fuUy as he could against the high-
priest" {!Erw. Bibl., Vol m. col. 3505). We cannot say that Ps. 52
has this dispute as its subject. All we can say is that " one thinks
naturaUy of the rivalry between Onias III and the Tobiads." Duhm.
The Psalmist, whoever he may be, is a man of position among the
chasldim and he inveighs against a rival, also of high position, exposes
his lying and deceit, and threatens him with overthrow. Verses 1-5
describe the evil-doer and 6-9 his fall, and the consequent joy of the
chasidlm. 1. Thou tyrant (A.V.). Better thou hero (haggib6r), i.e. of lies
and intrigue — an ironical address.
The goodness of God (A.V.) = chesed El, WeUhausen and others
read al chasid = against those who are loyal. Baethgen, however,
retains the reading of A.V. as being supported by v. 8, and points out
that so la summarises the first haU of the Ps., and \b the second.
But the strict parallelism of the Ps. favours WeUhausen.
4 6. Deceitful tongue, whether used as an object to hate or as
a vocative, seems harsh. Duhm proposes (laasoth for I'shon) exercising

5 a. Destroy thee. As a high tower is torn down and left in ruins
for ever.

150 PSALMS [LHL 1-6
5 b. Pluck thee. As with a pair of tongs.
5 c. Root thee out. As a cedar of Libanus is uprooted by a storm.
The clause is probably a gloss on 5 b.
6. Shall see and fear. A play of words if the text is correct.
7 c. Wickedness. Better perhaps render with Targum and Syriac
in his wealth, which preserves the parallelism with lb. But "Zc is
probably a gloss on 7 6.
8 a. A green olive tree. According to Kirkpatrick a conflation of
metaphors. The chesed (1) prospers and grows ; (2) he is also Jhvh's
guest. But olive-trees may have grown in the Temple-court. In any
case Kirkpatrick gives the sense.
9 is a liturgical addition. 9 b should be : I wiU proclaim that Thy
name is good before Thy chasidlm.

PSALM LIIL
For the chief Musician : to Mahalath : Maschil of Darid,
1 The fool hath said in his heart, " There is no God."
Corrupt are they, and have done abominable iniquity :
There is none that doeth good.
2 God looked down from heaven upon the children of men,
To see if there were any that did understand, that did
seek God.
3 Every one of them is gone back : they are altogether
become filthy :
There is none that doeth good, no, not one.
4 Have the workers of iniquity no knowledge ?
Who eat up my people :
hThey eat Jhvh's bread : and on Jhvh they do not call.H
5 There were they in great fear, ^where no fear was :][
'"For God hath scattered the bones of him that encampeth
against thee :"•
^Thou hast put them to shame, because God hath despised
them."'

6 Oh that the salvation of Israel tvere come out of Zion!
When God bringeth back the captivity of his people,
Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad.
This Ps, is Ps. 14 in a second edition. The ni,bh§,l, who is its
subject, is described in Is, 32°, " The nftbhai speaks villainy ; his heart
works iniquity ; he practises profaneness ; he utters error against

LIV. 1-7] PSALMS 151
Jhvh ; makes empty the soul of the hungry and causes to fail the
drink of the thirsty." He is a compound of impietas and improbitas,
and the latter is the result of the former.
We have already commented on this Ps, under Ps. 14 and all that
is necessary here is to note the divergence between 14'* and 53°. The
difference is due to carelessness. The Ps. was dictated, and the
aspirates heard amiss ; it was also corrupt and so copied wrongly. It
is sufficient to put the two texts over against one another to see that
in 5 a a marginal note has crept in ; that 5 6 is a scribal variant of
14"; and that 5 c has suffered in the same way in the course of
transcription from 14°.
It will be noticed too that Ehhim takes the place of Jhvh, for the
divine Name, as it does generally throughout Book n.

PSALM LIV.
For the chief Musician : on Neginoth : Maschil of Darid, when the Ziphims
came and said to Saul, Doth not David hide himself with us ?
1 Save me, 0 God, by thy name.
And judge me by thy strength.
2 Hear my prayer, 0 God :
Give ear to the words of my mouth.
3 For bthe proudH are risen up against me,
And oppressors seek after my soul :
They have not set God before them. Selah.
4 Behold, God is mine helper :
The Lord is with them that uphold my soul.
5 He shall reward evil unto mine enemies :
Cut them off in thy truth.
6 I will sacrifice ha freewiU offeringH unto thee :
I will praise thy name, 0 Jhvh ; for it is good.
7 For he hath deUvered me out of all trouble :
And mine eye hath seen his desire upon mine enemies.
A Ps. directed against proud and oppressive men of his own nation
(perhaps Sadducees). The title is a late addition borrowed from
1 Sam. 23'°, and of no value. As is usual with the Psalmists the
writer appeals from the haughty on earth to the God who judges
righteously, and helps those that are true of heart,
1. By Thy Nams = hy Thy power as manifested in many a
wonderful act.
By Thy strength = as Thou hast the wiU, so put forth Thy might.

152 PSALMS [LV. 1-10
3 a. Strangers, R,V. (zMm), Render, the proud (zgdlm). This
has some MS authority and is read in Ps, 86'^ It is required by the
parallelism in 3 b.
4 b. That uphold my soul: a paraphrase for The Lord is my
Upholder. Lord here = Adonai.
6 a, Freely sacrifice of A.V. is rightly rendered bring Thee a free
will offering. Num. 15°.
6 h. Thy Name, Jhvh, is good. Jhvh was probably left here in
place of Elohim by a scrihe's error.
7 b. Seen his desire. "The defeat of evil and the triumph of good
presented themselves to the saints of the 0,T. in this concrete form,
which has a ring of personal vindictiveness about it, yet, fairly con
sidered, is in its real motive and character elevated far above a mere
thirst for revenge." Kirkpatrick, But it is better to say that the
sentiment was good Judaism, and is bad Christianity.

PSALM LV.
For the chief Musician : on Neginoth : Maschil of David,
1 Give ear to my prayer, 0 God :
And hide not thyself from my supplication.
2 Attend unto me, and answer me :
I l-am distracted-! in my complaint, and make a noise :
3 Because of the voice of the enemy.
Because of the oppression of the wicked :
For they cast iniquity upon me.
And in wrath they pursue me.
4 My heart is sore pained within me :
And the terrors of death are faUen upon me.
5 Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me,
And horror hath overwhelmed me.
6 And I said, Oh that I had wings like a dove 1
Then would I fly away, and be at rest.
7 Lo, then would I wander far off :
I would dwell in the wilderness. Selah.
8 I would hasten my escape
From the windy storm and tempest.
9 Destroy, 0 Lord, and divide their tongues :
For I have seen violence and strife in the city.
10 Day and night they go about it upon the waUs thereof :
Mischief also and imquity are in the midst of it.

LV. 11-23] PSALMS 153
11 Wickedness is in the midst thereof:
Deceit and guile depart not from her streets.
12 For it was not an enemy tJiat reproached me :
Then I could have borne it:
It was not a hater that did magnify himself against me :
Then I would have hid myself from him :
13 But it was thou, a man mine equal,
My partner, and my friend.
14 We took sweet counsel together.
And walked unto the house of God with the company.
20 He hath put forth his hands against such as be at peace
with him :
He hath broken his covenant.
21 The words of his mouth were smoother than butter.
But war was in his heart :
His words were softer than oil.
Yet were they drawn swords.
15 Let death seize upon them :
Let them go down alive into hell :
For wickedness is in their dweUings, and among them.
16 As for me, I wUl caU upon God :
And Jhvh shaU save me.
17 Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and cry aloud :
And he shaU hear my voice.
18 He hath delivered my soul in peace from the battle that
was against me :
For there were many with me.
19 God shaU hear, and afflict them
(God that abideth of old). Sdah.
'"Because they have no changes,"'
Therefore they fear not God.
22 Cast thy burden upon Jhvh, and he shaU sustain thee :
He shaU never suffer the righteous to be moved.
23 But thou, 0 God, shalt bring them down into the pit of
destruction :
Bloody and deceitful men shall not live out half their days :
But I will trust in thee.

154 PSALMS [LV.
That the Ps. cannot be David's is clear from v. 13 " mine equal "
and the reference in v. 14 to the Temple. Jeremiah is thought of by
some, and his times suit what the Ps. says very weU. Olshausen and
others refer to 1 Mac. 7'°~'°, and see in the writer one of the Chasidim
who went to Bacchides and Alcimus, his assessor, to seek peace because,
as they said, " One that is a priest of the seed of Aaron is come with
this army and he will do us no wrong." He sware to procure the
harm neither of them nor of their friends. " Whereupon they believed
him : howbeit he took of them threescore men, and slew them in one
day, according to the words which one wrote" — then Ps. 79^' ° are
quoted. All we can say is that this occasion suits the Ps. very well,
but it does not follow that we have sufficient ground for dating the Ps.
by it with any certainty. Internal strife was too common in Jerusalem
to justify us in particularising from a general description.
The Ps. lacks uniformity of tone. In the first section despair, in
the second indignation, and in the third trust prevails.
1-5 open with a passionate prayer for a hearing from Jhvh,
because the Psalmist is distracted (like a Bedouin) and restless under
the insults of the wicked, who roll iniquity on him as men roU stones
on an enemy in the valley below.
6-8. He is in such despair that he would like to have the swift
flight of the dove which he watches on the wing, for then would he fly
and settle in the clefts of the rock (Cant. 2 '") in some solitary place in
the wilderness. The stormy wind and tempest = the strife and bitter
faction of the city.
9-11, The violence and strife, treachery and bloodshed are de
scribed as in Vergil's lines :
crudelis ubique
Luctus, ubique Pavor et plurima Mortis imago.
{^n. II, 368.)
12-14. A description of his rival and foe. He was an equal,
perhaps a feUow-priest, once his associate in public affairs, and familiar
friend in private, a fellow- worshipper in the Temple throng — his " Et
tu Brute" expresses the most unkindest cut of all. That an enemy
should bring disaster upon him was, in a way, natural, but that his fall
should be due to a friend, who had shared his counsels — and perhaps
because he had shared them — was agony to think of No wonder, then,
that he prays that Korah's fate may be that of his false friend and
his allies.
16-18. A calmer mood follows, but does not last long. Jhvh
would nght him, put him in safety from the many who were striving
with him {i.e. against him).
19 c. Because they have no changes is quite unintelligible. We can
only read with Duhm because they have no morals, and see a reference
to the rejection of their country's laws by the opponents of the Psalmist,
who was probably one of the Chasidlm.
20-21. It is hard to resist the belief that these two verses have
been displaced, and should come after v. 14.

LVL 1-1 1] PSALMS 155
22. Burden stands for a word of uncertain meaning. " Committe
deo id quod tibi dedit sive imposuit," i.e. sortem tuam.
23, The pit of destruction = the pit which is the grave.
The Talmud says: "In whomsoever are three things, he is a
disciple of Abraham ; and three (other) things, a disciple of Bileam.
A good eye, and a lowly soul, and a humble spirit (belong to) the
disciple of Abraham ; an evil eye, and a swelling soul, and a haughty
spirit to the disciple of Bileam. And what difference is between the
disciples of Abraham and of Bileam ? The disciples of Bileam go down
into the pit, &c."

PSALM LVL
For the chief Musician : to Jonath-elem-rechokim, Michtam of David : when
the Philistines took him in Gath.
1 Be merciful unto me, 0 God : for man would swaUow me up
'"He fighting daily oppresseth me.
2 Mine enenues would daily swaUow me up :"¦
For they be many that fight hviolently-l against me.
3 What time I am afraid,
I wiU trust in thee.
4 '"In God I wUI praise his word,
In God I have put my trust ; I will not fear
What flesh can do unto me."'
5 Every day they '"wrest my words :
AU their thoughts are against me for evil.
6 They gather themselves together, they hide themselves,
They mark my steps.
When they wait for my soul."'
7 '"ShaU they escape by iniquity ?
In thine anger cast down the people, 0 God."'
8 Thou tellest 'my wanderings :">
Put thou my tears into thy bottle :
[[Qy. : Not in thy book.l
9 When I cry unto thee, then shaU mine enemies turn back :
This I know ; for God is for me.
10 '"In God wiU I praise his word :
In Jhvh will I praise his word.
11 In God have I put my trust: I will not be afraid
What man can do unto" me.""

156 PSALMS [LVL 12-13
12 Thy vows are upon me, 0 God :
I will render praises unto thee.
13 For thou hast delivered my soul from death :
[[Not my feet from falling]]
That I may walk before God
In the light of the living.
The variations in the titles of this Ps. form an excellent com
mentary on the hypothesis which finds so much favour with Baethgen
and Cheyne and others, that the Psalms were originally of a national
character rather than personal. The title in the Hebrew is unin
telligible; the LXX renders it "for the people far removed from the
sanctuary " (a suggestion probably from v. 8), and the Targum has
it : " Concerning the congregation of Israel, which is compared to a
silent dove, at the time when they were far from their cities, and
turned again and praised the Lord of the World." All that these
variants show is that at a later date the Ps, was regarded as national ;
it is still open to us to take the natural sense of the Ps. as its original,
ie. to make an individual its subject. As to its date nothing can be
said with certainty. It has close connection with the four foUowing
Psalms, and for this reason Duhm assigns it to the end of the second
century B.C. Its text is open to great suspicion. As in so many other
Psalms, the writer says that he is in great danger from his foes, but in
it all his trust is in Jhvh.
1, Be merciful, as in bV = be gracious (ch4ni,ni). Some repeti
tion has probably crept in here illegitimately, for daily, swalhw, and
fight occur twice for no apparent reason. Probably the first two verses
should run thus :
1 Be gracious unto me, Jhvh :
Mortal man would swaUow me up.
2 My enemies pursue me eagerly :
Many are they who fight against me.
0 Thou Most High of A.V. {= proudly of R.V.) is not Ely6n, but
Mar6m, and is probably an adverb = arrogantly, unless with Duhm
we divide it into mar, bitter, and y6m, day, and take mar with 26 and
y6m with 3 a.
3 and 4 recur again in 10 and 11, and seem to have been inserted
here by a copyist who desired a refrain.
5. They wrest my words. Better :
They injure my cause :
Against me are all their thoughts :
6 For evil do they assemble :
They hide (? a net for my steps — see 57"):
They lie in wait for my soul.

LVIL 1-3] PSALMS 167
7. Render with Hupfeld (after 58') :
Weigh unto them according to their iniquity :
In Thy anger cast down the haughty, 0 Jhvh.
The liaughty for the peoples (azzim for ammlm) is a correction
suggested by 59°.
8. A play on the words n6di {wanderings) and b'n6dech^ {in Thy
bottle). But to count my n6d is unnatural. (It was the land of Nod
to which Cain was banished.) Duhm's suggestion, therefore, to read
n'duddim from Job 7* deserves consideration : Thou countest my
tossings = my sleepless hours.
8 c is a copyist's gloss : a marginal note = " Qy. book."
10, 11. The text of this and their double in 3 and 4 is suspicious.
We should read in both cases perhaps :
Daily, Jhvh, do I cry to Thee;
Jhvh shall maintain my cause;
On Jhvh do I trust ;
I fear not for myself;
What can flesh do unto me ?
13 a. Not my feet from falling ? would seem to be another
marginal note by a copyist, who perhaps found this reading in another
MS, and queried the alternative reading, Thou hast delivered my soul
from death. Duhm would prefer the suggested reading. But the
former makes quite good sense, and agrees better with the final clause.
13 b. The light qf the living = life here on earth. The purpose of
the Psalmist's deliverance is that he may take his proper place in the
Temple and there continue to perform the duties of his office.

PSALM LVII.
A.
For the chief Musician : to Al-taschith, Michtam of Darid : when he fled
from Saul in the cave.
1 Be merciful unto me, 0 God, be merciful unto me :
For my soul trusteth in thee :
Yea, in the shadow of thy wings wiU I make my refuge.
Until these calamities be overpast.
2 I will cry unto God Most High :
Unto God that performeth all things for me.
3 He shall send from heaven, and save me
''From the reproach of him that would swallow me up.""
Selah.
|[God shall send forth his mercy and truth.|

158 PSALMS [LVIL 4-11
4 '"My soul is among lions :
And I lie even among them that are set on fire,^
Even the sons of men, whose teeth are spears and arrows,
And their tongue a sharp sword.
5 [[Be thou exalted, 0 God, above the heavens :
Let thy glory be above all the earth.]|
6 They have prepared a net for my steps :
hTheir own soul is caught :-!
They have digged a pit before me,
Into the midst whereof they are fallen themselves. Selah.
B.
7 My heart is ready, 0 God, my heart is ready :
I will sing and give praise.
8 Thou art my glory ; awake, psaltery and harp :
/ myself will awake early.
9 I will praise thee, 0 Lord, among the peoples :
I will sing unto thee among the nations.
10 For thy mercy is great unto the heavens,
And thy truth unto the clouds.
11 Be thou exalted, 0 God, above the heavens :
Let thy glory be above aU the earth.
As vv. 7-11 occur again with slight variations as Ps. 108 '~°, and as
vv. 1-6 have no lyrical or logical connection with them, it is better
with Duhm to regard this as two separate Psalms which have somehow
become connected. This is no rare thing — cf. Pss. 19 and 22. The
first Ps. then is one of the many which complain of persecution and
express unwavering confidence in Jhvh. Where the " Sadducees " are
the foes the lion is frequently their symbol.

1. Be merciful. Better : Be gracious, as in 51 ' and 56 '.
Under the shadow of Thy wings do I take refuge. So 36'.
Calamities = ha,YY6th, rendered mischiefs in 62° and wickedness in
55". In Is. 26"" the word is different.
2. God Most High = Elohim Bly6n, which = an original Jhvh
Elyon. This union of Name occurs again only in 78^^ and = covenant-
goodness + world-wide power.
3 a. He shall send. No object expressed, as in 18'^
From the reproach, &c. Kirkpatrick renders : He that would crush
me hath reproached. Baethgen suspects the clause as not original.

LVIL] PSALMS 159
Jennings and Lowe are content to draw attention to " the abruptness
of mental transition, and uncouthness of diction." Duhm renders 3 b :
He shall thrust out those who lie in wait for my soul to devour it, and
omits 3 c as an interpolation from 43^. The displacement of Selah
(after v. 2 according to LXX) shows that the text has somehow gone
wrong. 4. / lie among lions. WeUhausen gives up any attempt to make
sense of the text as it stands. Kirkpatrick renders : / will lie down
to rest among fiery foes — an expression of complete confidence.
Baethgen : My soul lies among lions, who breathe out flames.
Jennings and Lowe :
As for my soul — among lions I am prostrate:
Devouring fiames are the sons of men.
Duhm, who has already taken naphshi (= my soul) with 3 b, reads by
one of his ingenious emendations :
Amongst lions must I lie
Who are ravenous for men.
There may be a reference to Dan. 6. In that case the story of Daniel
is older than the date of its incorporation in our canonical book.
5. An insertion which destroys the sequence of thought.
6 b. My soul is bowed down (R.V.) is clearly wrong in view of the
parallelism in 6 c. Render :
They have prepared a net for my feet;
Their own soul is caught;
They have digged a pit for me:
They are themselves fallen into it.
6 6 is corrected from 10', cf 35^ B.
7. My heart is ready. N§.k6n (from kUn, to be firm) means either
to be established, certain, steadfast, or to be prepared, arranged, set in
order. The Prayer Book Version gives fixed here, and ready in 108 '.
But the context again requires the latter. The Psalmist says he
is ready to sing Jhvh's praises ; he will sing with his voice and praise
with his harp.
8. My glory = my soul in 7', 16°, 30'^. Theodore of Mopsuestia,
however, understands it of the song which (compared to the instru
ments next mentioned) is his fairest tribute of praise. But a com
parison of this verse with 108' shows a corruption ofthe text. Attih,
Thou, has become aph, even, in the latter, tath in the former.
8 b. I will awake right early. Better / will awaken the dawn.
Kirkpatrick quotes Milton, L' Allegro, 1. 63 :
Oft listening how the hounds and horn
Cheerly rouse the slumbering morn.
The Ps. is, therefore, a morning song.

160 PSALMS [LVIIL 1-11
9 seems to suggest that the Ps. was composed in the Diaspora.
Cf.Dan. 6"'>".
10 = 36'-
11. Be Thou exalted =']!ho\i art exalted as a matter of fact,
therefore, manifest Thy preeminent power that all on earth may see it
as it is in Heaven.
PSALM LVIIL
For the chief Musician : to Al-taschith : Michtam of David.
1 Do ye indeed speak righteousness, I- ye gods ?-!
Do ye judge uprightly, 0 ye sons of men ?
2 Yea, in heart ye work wickedness :
Ye weigh out the violence of your hands in the earth.
3 The wicked are estranged from the womb :
They go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies.
4 Their poison is like the poison of a serpent :
They are like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear :
5 Which will not hearken to the voice of charmers,
Charming never so wisely.
6 Break their teeth, 0 God, in their mouth :
Break out the great teeth of the young lions, Jhvh.
7 Let them melt away as waters which run continually :
''When he bendeth his bow to shoot his arrows, let them
be as cut in pieces. '
8 As a snail which melteth, let every one of them, pass away :
Like the untimely birth of a woman, that they may not see
the sun.
9 Before your pots can feel the thorns,
He shaU take them away as with a whirlwind, both living,
and '"in his wrath."'
10 The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance :
He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked.
11 So that a man shaU say, "Verily there is a reward for the
righteous :
Verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth."
A Ps. of bitter denunciation of some high-placed wrong-doers —
heathen rulers (Baethgen), or Sadducees (Duhm). The latter goes so
far as to fix for its date on the struggle between John Hyrcanus and
his foUowers, on the one side, and the Chasldim, on the other. On the

LIX. 1-3] PSALMS 161
death of John the latter attained power and literaUy washed their feet
in the blood of the ungodly. Baethgen, however, thinks the expression
to be too fierce for anybody to be its subject save a heathen.
1. 0 congregation (A.V.) is as untenable as the R.V. rendering
in silence. Flem is put for ^lim or Elohim, 0 Gods ; ci. 82". The only
question is whether the judges are so caUed because they represent the
authority of God, or whether they are so styled sarcasticaUy in allusion
to the flatteries and Oriental subservience of which we have an indica
tion in 2 Sam. 14".
2 a. Yea = Nay. 2 6. Ye weigh out violence, when you are in
authority for the purpose of weighing out righteousness.
3-5. The princes, or judges, belong to the class of men who are
vicious from their birth. The righteous may appeal or exhort, but all
in vain, they are as deaf as an adder. " If an adder had crept into a
room, and refused to be allured by any form of song of the charmer,
then the conjurer would excuse himself with the excuse that the snake
was dumb."
6-9 give us a succession of 'lively images which describe the
fierce hatred of the Psalmist for his unscrupulous foes. He prays that
their teeth may be broken ; that they may be like the torrents which
run apace for a time and then dry up and are no more ; that they may
be as grass which withers (7 b is uninteUigible) ; like a snail which
seems to consume itself in its trail (or to be dried up in its sheU, see
Tristram, Nat. Histy. of Bible, p. 296); like a still-born child which
never sees the sun ; like a fire of thorns extinguished by a whirlwind
before the meat in the vessel is cooked (9 a, b is perhaps a proverb like
the German : " Es wird nicht so heiss gegessen wie gekocht ").
10-11 "belong to the spirit of the Old Testament and not of the
New Testament, and by it they must be judged. They belong to the
age in which the martyr's dying prayer was not ' Lord, lay not this sin
to their charge' (Acts 7™), but, 'Jehovah, look upon it and require it'
(2 Chr. 24^). It is impossible that such language should be repeated
in its old and hteral sense by any follower of Him who has bidden us
to love our enemies and pray for them that persecute us." But ought
we then to use the language at all ?

PSALM LIX.
For the chief Musician : Al-taschith : Michtam of Darid : when Saul sent,
and they watched the house to kill him.
1 Deliver me from mine enemies, 0 my God :
Defend me from them that rise up against me.
2 DeUver me from the workers of iniquity.
And save me from bloody men.
3 For, lo, they lay in wait for my soul :
The mighty are gathered against me :
c. 11

162 PSALMS [LIX. 3-17
Not for my transgression, not for my sin, Jhvh.
4 They run and prepare themselves without my fault :
Awake to help me, and behold.
5 Thou therefore, Jhvh [[God] of hosts, the God of Israel,
Awake to visit all the heathen :
Be not merciful to any wicked transgressors. Selah.
6 They return at evening : they make a noise like a dog,
And go round about the city.
7 Behold, they belch out with their mouth :
Swords are in their lips :
For who, say they, doth hear?
8 But thou, Jhvh, shalt laugh at them :
Thou shalt have all the proud in derision.
9 hUnto thee, 0 my strength, will I sing:-!
For Jhvh is my defence, [the God of my mercy].
10 The God of my mercy shall prevent me :
God shall let me see m/y desire upon mine enemies.
11 Slay them not, lest my people forget :
Scatter them by thy power ; and bring them down,
0 Lord our shield.
12 For the sin of their mouth and the words of their Ups,
Let them even be taken in their pride :
And for cursing and lyuig which they speak.
13 Consume them, in wrath, consume them, that they may not be:
And let them know that God ruleth in Jacob
Unto the ends of the earth. Selah.
14 And at evening let them return ; and let them make a noise
like a dog.
And go round about the city.
15 Let them wander up and down for meat.
And grudge if they be not satisfied.
16 But I will sing of thy power :
Yea, I will sing aloud of thy mercy in the morning :
For thou hast been my defence
And refuge in the day of my trouble.
17 Unto thee, 0 my strength, will I sing :
For Jhvh is my defence, the God of my mercy.

LIX.] PSALMS 163
It is not wholly gratuitous (for the better understanding of this
Ps.) to point out that 66-69 come, if not from the same hand, at any
rate from the same circumstances. Several facts in them point to a
late rather than an early date. Internal strife, oppression, unrest,
treachery, and robbery mark this small group of Psalms, and justify
Duhm's reference to the party struggles of the late Maccabean period.
Ps. 69 is constructed with art. It has two main divisions (1-9
and 10-17) in which the closing verse is the same. Each half is
again subdivided, and the subdivision marked by a Selah (5 and 13).
Then 6 and 14 begin with the same theme.
1 is UteraUy Set me up on high = Be my mishgab or high tower,
as in 9^ 18^ 20'.
2-4. The three legal terms transgression, sin, iniquity are used
here as in 51'' "¦ Run and prepare are military terms.
5. The original reading was Jhvh Tz'bi,6th, Elohai Is'rael. Elohim
was then inserted between the two first terms. It would be the Qere,
and Jhvh the Kethib. The first title says that God has the power to
help, having hosts at His command ; the second that as Israel's God
He is pledged to do so.
6-7 describe the evil-doers. They are robber-bands who like
city dogs wait for the enemy, and then go about in troops in search of
prey. Their snarls are blasphemies in that they say, " Who hears the
cry of the righteous?" "Far less than with us was it the Israelites'
custom to employ dogs in man's immediate service, nor is it the
custom to-day in Palestine. They lie about sleeping and dreaming
during the day, or slinking lazily around. At the approach of evening,
however, the hungry pack runs howling and barking through the city
in greedy search of food. They have to satisfy their hunger with
whatever is thrown from the houses into the streets, and especially
with the carcases of larger or smaller beasts; hence the Arabian
saying: 'More greedy than a dog for carrion.'" Cf. Ex. 22^'.
8 = 2*. Read gMm proud for g61m heathen.
9 = 17, and should certainly be rendered in both cases as in the
text, and not with R. V. :
On Thee, 0 my strength, will I wait.
For Jhvh is my high tower, the God of my lovingkindness.
11 and 13 are in logical contradiction, which may be accounted for
by vehemence of feeling. 13 should perhaps run :
Let men know unto the ends of the earth that Jhvh ruleth in
Jacob.
Cf 1 Sam. 17«
14-17. The two sides are again contrasted, the robber-bands and
the pious Chasidlm. 14 = Though thJey return at evening, &c, , . .yet as
for me I will sing of Thy power.
17. See 9. 11—2

164 PSALMS [LX. 1-12
PSALM LX.
A.
For the chief Musician : to Shushan-eduth : Michtam of David : to teach :
when he strove with Aram-naharaim and with Aram-zobah, when Joab re
turned, and smote of Edom in the valley of salt twelve thousand.
1 0 God, thou hast cast us off, thou hast scattered us.
Thou hast been displeased ; 0 turn thyself to us again.
2 Thou hast made the earth to tremble ; thou hast broken it :
Heal the breaches thereof; for it shaketh.
3 Thou hast shewed thy people hard things :
Thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.
4 Thou hast given a banner to them that fear thee,
•"That it may be displayed because of the truth."' Selah.
B.
5 That thy beloved may be delivered :
Save with thy right hand, and answer me.
6 God hath spoken in his hoUness : — " I wiU be victorious,
I will divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth.
7 Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine :
Ephraim also is the strength of mine head :
Judah is my lawgiver :
8 Moab is my washpot :
Over Edom will I cast out my shoe :
(-Over Philistia will I shout." H
9 Who will bring me into l-Mazor ?-!
Who will lead me into Edom?
10 Is it not thou, 0 God? I- Why hast thouH cast us off?
I- Why goest thou not forth, 0 God,H with our armies?
11 Give us help from trouble:
For vain is the help of man.
12 Through God we shall do valiantly :
For he it is that shaU tread down our enemies.
A complaint of some disaster which had overtaken the people in
spite of Jhvh's promise to lead His own to victory. The first part of
the Ps., vv. 1-5, is a mournful appeal to Jhvh; then in w. 6-8 is
a quasi-oracular saying of Jhvh's, a condensed statement of what His

LX.] PSALMS 165
purposes for Israel were as shown in history; and finally 9-12 a
prayer for divine help based on that oracular saying.
As to the date; it seems from v. 8 that the Northern Kingdom no
longer existed, and yet that the Jews had an army. This gives us the
days of Josiah (when no conflict with Edom is known of) or of the
Maccabees. Duhm assigns it to the date when John Hyrcanus was
besieged by Antiochus Sidetes in Jerusalem, and Baethgen, more
cautiously, concludes "that a certain date for the Ps, is not possible
of attainment." The latter part ofthe Ps. re-appears in 108 ^''^ which
may or may not tell against the Maccabean date. The same fact may
point to the union of two distinct Pss., viz. vv. 1—4 and 5-12.
1-3. The consternation of the people is described. It has been
deserted by Jhvh, and so the enemy has broken through (it is the
same word as in Baal-Perazim, 2 Sam. 5™). Kirkpatrick prefers to
think of a breach in a wall. The dismay is compared to that caused
by an earthquake, or to the intoxication of a poisoned cup causing
laughter and scorn to the beholder. The Jews were very sensitive to
the taunts of their neighbours.
4 can best be understood in irony : Thou hast given Thy servants
a banner not for victory but that they may betake themselves to flight
from before the bow (so read with LXX). Cf Jer. 4". " Thou gavest
us indeed a banner, when we took the field for the true religion, but
what a banner ! Far from being a raUying point for God's warriors, it
seemed as if only intended to scatter us in flight." Ewald. So most
modems. 5. Render: In order that Thy beloved ones may be delivered help
cmd hear. The opening is abrupt, and it is probable that it has been
confused by the running together of two Pss.
6-8. The oracle which had served as a banner, and had given an
unwarranted confidence, is recited. The usual word for an oracle
(n'um), however, is not used. God had sworn by His holiness for
delivered an oracle in His Temple) and said, " 1 will be victorious (so
De Lagarde) ; Sichem on the West and Succoth on the East of Jordan
shall be divided among my people (both places at which Jacob rested) ;
Gilead and Manasses on the one side, and, on the other, Ephraim as
the head-defence (= helmet with most commentators ; but Baethgen
thinks of horns as a symbol of offensive warfare. Num. 23^^) and Judah
as the ruler (Gen. 49'°). Ephraim (= strength) and Judah (= skill)
shall be mine. Moab shaU be as a common vessel for feet-washing;
on Edom's neck will I set my foot (Baethgen), or take seisin of her land
by casting over it my shoe (Rosenmiiller); over Philistia will I triumph."
9. The strong city, A proper name is required, and, therefore,
Mazor should be left untranslated. The name occurs in 2 Chron. 8°.
10. Render: Is it not Thou, 0 Ehhim'? Why hast Thou then
cast us off, &c. L8.m§,h, why, seems to have dropped out through its
similarity to the preceding word Elohim.
11 b half implies that the help of aUies had been sought and to no
purpose.

166 PSALMS [LXI.

1-8

PSALM LXL
For the chief Musician : upon Neginah : of David.
1 Hear my cry, 0 God :
Attend unto my prayer.
2 From the end of the earth wUl I cry unto thee, when my
heart is overwhelmed :
Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
3 For thou hast been a shelter for me :
A strong tower from the enemy.
4 I- Let me-l abide in thy tabernacle for ever :
I- Let me-! trust in the covert of thy wings. Selah.
5 For thou, 0 God, dost hear my vows :
Thou dost maintain the heritage of those that fear thy name.
********
6 Prolong thou the king's life :
May his years be for many generations.
7 May he dwell before God for ever :
May lovingkindness and truth preserve him.
8 So wiU I sing praise unto thy name for ever,
That I may daily perform my vows.
A Ps. of David according to Kirkpatrick and Jennings and Lowe.
But it is obviously a third person who prays for the king; a king it
is, however, and therefore he lived (Baethgen) before b.c. 586, and
would probably be Zedekiah, and his Psalmist would be an exile in
Babylon with Jeconiah, But WeUhausen points out that the Ps,
speaks, v. 3, of recent salvation, and prefers, therefore, as does Duhm,
a date of the Maccabean kings. Non nostrum inter vos tantas
componere lites (Verg. Eel. 3, 108).
2 a. From tlie end of the earth. This may refer either to Palestine
or to the world. The whole tenor of the Ps, favours the former. If
the latter be preferred then this verse shows a later conception than
1 Sam, 26". Jhvh's power extends over the whole earth.
2 b. Lit. The rock that is too high for me, i.e. the rock that is too
high for my unaided strength.
3 b. A strong tower - migd61-6z. Its use is exemplified in
Judg, 9".
4 a. Tabernacle : ^chal is here used figuratively. When we speak
of a church as God's temple we also retain an old word with a new
meaning, and no longer think of a piece of ground cut off with primitive
rites for worship under the open sky.
The verse is a prayer : Let me abide, &c. Let me take refuge &c.

LXiL 1-8] PSALMS 167
5. The verbs are perfecta confidentice according to Baethgen,
which Kirlqiatrick denies. But the for gives the ground of the
previous prayer, which is better understood as an abiding habit of
Jhvh than an act which has passed and gone. The R. V. gives : For
Thou, 0 Jhvh, hast heard my vows; Thou hast given me the possession
of those who fear Thy name, i.e. Thou dost defend Thy people's right
to Palestine. 6-8 is a prayer for the king, which follows 1-5 very abruptly.
Unless two Psalms have been united as in 19, 22 and 57 we can only
say with Duhm that it was part of the ritual of thank-offerings that
the offerer should add a prayer for the king to those which he offered
on his own account. We must certainly render :
Prolong the king's life;
May his years endure from generation to generation;
May he dwell before Jhvh for ever;
May lovingkindness and truth guard him.
(Even Kirkpatrick questions the rendering of man as appoint, and
rightly.) 8. The Targum says : " So wiU I pay my vows in the day of the
redemption of Israel, even in the day when King Messiah is anointed
to reign." This is of course a piece of mystical interpretation.
PSALM LXIL
For the chief Musician : to Jeduthun : A Psalm of Darid.
1 My soul waiteth upon God alone :
From him cometh my salvation.
2 He only is my rock and my salvation :
He is my defence ; I shaU not be greatly moved.
3 How long will ye imagine mischief against a man ?
Ye shaU be slain all of you :
As a bowing waU, and a tottering fence.
4 They only consult to cast him, down from his excellency :
They delight in lies :
They bless with their mouth, but they curse inwardly. Selah.
5 My soul, wait thou only upon God :
For my expectation is from him.
6 He only is my rock and my salvation :
He is my defence ; I shall not be moved.
7 In God is my salvation and my glory :
The rock of my strength, and my refuge, is in God.
8 Trust in him at all '"times ; ye people,""

168 PSALMS [LXIL 8-12
Pour out your heart before him :
God is a refuge for us. Selah.
9 Surely men of low degree are vanity, and men of high
degree are a lie :
In the balance l-they go up : H
They are altogether lighter than vanity.
10 Trust not in oppression.
And become not vain in robbery :
If riches increase, set not your heart upon them.
11 God hath spoken once :
Twice have I heard this ; that power belongeth unto God.
12 Also unto thee, 0 Lord, belongeth mercy :
For thou renderest to every man according to his work.
LXiiL lie So the mouth of them that speak lies shall be
stopped.
The general form of this Ps,, the character of its content, e.g. the
aUusion to vanity, the leading position of its author, all suggest that it
and Ps. 4 are from the same hand. The Psalmist has enemies who
think him falling and would fain hasten the process ; but he trusts in
Jhvh and appraises the wicked at their true worth. His words have
some points of contact with the Wisdom literature. 1 Mace. 7 has
been suggested as a chapter supplying the historical framework — a
suggestion which can neither be accepted nor rejected, but noted only.
1. Ak, surely, only, truly, occurs 6 times in this Ps. Only gives
the best sense.
Verses 1 and 2 occur again with variations in verses 5 and 6.
They may be a refrain or an accidental repetition. In either case the
variations are textual errors.
3 6, c, 4 a. These lines may be rendered as in the text, or with
Kirkpatrick and Baethgen: "How long will ye set on a man, and batter
him all of you as a wall, &c. ?" But as Duhm points out this violent
mode of attack hardly agrees with 4 d.
6. My high tower (or rock) = mishgab = stronghold as in 59 "¦ ", &c.
8, Trust in Him at all times, 0 people. Am, 0 people, occurs
nowhere else as a vocative. Baethgen would read 0 congregation of
the peoph, and Duhm more probably (from 31"): Trust in Him in
all your chances, for "your times are in His hand."
9, 10. The Psalmist touches the Evangelical note — not that of
Pss, 49 and 73, where rich transgressors are a stumbling-block to faith.
Such men are of vanity; in the balances they kick the beam. If his
fellows, hints the Psalmist, believe in the glitter of the unrighteous
mammon, they will run a risk of becoming of vanity themselves.
11, 12. 'Two things has Jhvh declared, viz. His power and His

Lxm. 1-11] PSALMS 169
grace = potest, vult. Therefore, He both can and He wiU render to
every wicked man what he deserves. Cf Prov. 24'°. Bousset points
out that in later Judaism the old conception of God's righteousness,
shown in love to Israel, gives way to that which is retributive. His
mercy here is impartiality; He does not torture like an Eastern despot,
but dispenses justice inexorably.
So the mouth of them that speak lies shall be stopped. The verse
which ends Ps. 62 wants a member, that which ends Ps. 63 has a
member too many. Moreover, the latter is out of place where it is and
is in place in 62'^- Therefore, it is to be transposed with Duhm. For
the sense, cf Prov. 6 ". R. Levi said : " The Holy One, blessed is He,
saith : ' If thou hast witnessed false witness against thy neighbour, I
impute it unto thee as if thou hadst witnessed against Me that I
created not heaven and earth.'"
PSALM LXIIL
A Psahn of Darid, when he was in the wUdemess of Judah.
1 Jhvh, thou art my God ; early wiU I seek thee :
My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee
In a dry and thirety land, where no water is :
2 As once I saw thee in the sanctuary.
Beholding thy power and thy glory.
3 Because thy lovingkindness is better than life :
My Ups shaU praise thee.
4 Thus wiU I bless thee whUe I Uve :
I wUl lift up my hands in thy name.
5 My soul shaU be satisfied as tvith marrow and fatness :
And my mouth shaU praise thee with joyful Ups :
6 [[When]] I remember thee upon my bed,
I meditate on thee in the night watches.
7 Because thou hast been my help,
In the shadow of thy wings wiU I rejoice.
8 My soul foUoweth hard aftep thee :
Thy right hand upholdeth me.
9 But those that seek my soul, [[to destroy it^
ShaU go into the lower parts of the earth.
10 They shaU fall by the sword :
They shaU be a portion for '"foxes."'
11 But the king shaU rejoice in God:
Every one that sweareth by him shaU glory :
|[But the mouth of them that speak Ues shaU be stopped.]

170 PSALMS [LXIIL
"If the reference of this Ps. to David is abandoned it is idle
to speculate as to the author and his circumstances." Kirkpatrick.
Nevertheless it must be pointed out that David was not a king when
he was in the wilderness of Judah, nor was the sanctuary of v. 2 in
existence in his time. That the Ps. was written by one who was m
close relationship with the king, and that the Temple-services were
being carried on in all their splendour, and that the Psalmist, a,s is
usual with the Psalmists, was opposed by deadly foes, are the only data
which his work supplies. But his subject is timeless, and his mood
that of a deep religious feeling which never fails.
1. 0 God, Thou art my God. Read : Jhvh, my God art Thou.
Early = earnestly. But early (LXX) was a word which determined
the use of this Ps. in the early Church as a morning song.
lb, c, dis a, compressed parable, and not a statement of literal fact.
As the hart, or the weary traveller longs for the oasis and its well, so
does the heart of man for God. Cf (and contrast) :
Would but the Desert of the Fountain yield
One Glimpse — if dimly, yet indeed, revealed.
To which the fainting Traveller might spring.
As springs the trampled herbage of the field,
2. Transpose the two clauses of R. V. and render :
As once I saw Thee in the sanctuary.
Beholding Thy power and glory.
I saw = the earnest gaze of contemplation. "Contemplor te animi
mei oculis quasi coram in sacrario." Rosenmiiller. " Thy power and
ghry" contains a reference to the ark of Jhvh's strength (132 ^ 150'),
the ark "of the glory of Jhvh," The Psalmist had enjoyed the inner
vision in the Temple, and the memory of it haunts him in his evil
days. 3, 4. Wellhausen and Duhm transpose these two verses:
Thus do I praise Thee all my life long,
I lift up my hands to call on Thy Name;
For Thy lovingkindness (chesed) is better than life;
My lips are praising Thee.
6. When. Duhm deletes this as making no sense, and WeUhausen
renders : On my couch I think of Thee,
On Thee I meditate in the hours of night.
8 a says that the Psalmist holds fast to Jhvh, and 8 b that Jhvh
responds with His succour.
9. To destroy = Vshokh, which Wellhausen omits and Duhm
treats as a gloss (I'Sheol) on the lower parts of the earth.
10. Foxes. Better jackals. The persecutors of the Psalmist shall
fall on the field of battle and their dead bodies shall be meat for the
beasts of the field.

LXIV. 1-10] PSALMS 171
11. The casual mention of the king shows that the Psalmist's
cause is that of the Government and is also the cause of Jhvh. To
swear by Jhvh is to confess His lordship. If lie is to be retained
then the liars whose mouth is to be stopped are the worshippers of
false gods, that is, of a lie. But see 62 '^

PSALM LXIV.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of Darid.
1 Hear my voice, 0 God, in my prayer :
Preserve my life from fear of the enemy.
2 Hide me from the secret counsel of the wicked :
From the noisy crowd of the workers of iniquity :
3 Who whet their tongue Uke a sword.
Who aim their arrows : who speak bitter words :
4 That they may shoot in secret at the perfect :
Suddenly do they shoot at him, and fear not.
5 They encourage themselves in an evil matter :
They commune of laying snares privily :
They say, "Who shaU see them?"
6 '"They search out iniquities ; they accompUsh a diUgent
search :
Both the inward th^yught of every one of them, and the
heart, is deep.""
7 But God shall shoot at them
With an arrow : suddenly shall they be wounded.
8 '"So they shall make their own tongue to faU upon them
selves :
AU that see them shaU flee away. '
9 And aU men shaU fear,
And shaU declare the work of God :
For they shall wisely consider of his doing.
10 The righteous shall be glad in Jhvh, [and shaU trust in
him:]
And aU the upright in heart shaU glory.
A Ps. like many others which tell of the intestine factions which
were common in post-exihc times. The Psalmist's cause is that of
Jhvh, and it is assailed by intriguers and backbiters. But in vain is

172 PSALMS [LXV. 1-6
their net spread. When they least expect it Jhvh will interpose to
overthrow them, and so aU men shall admire the triumph of righteous
ness. The Ps. falls into two divisions, 1-6 and 7-10, and its text
seems to be corrupt in several passages.
1. The fear of the enemy = the terror which the enemy inspires,
2. For secret counsel and noisy crowd cf. Ps. 2'" ^.
3 b. Render They bend their arrows; {they speak) bitter wmds.
On the former clause Duhm remarks that it shows ignorance of war or
of Hebrew ! It is the darts of calumny which are feared.
6. The precise meaning is lost, and no two commentators are
agreed in restoring it. The general meaning is obvious, however.
The enemy plots secretly and cleverly, as well as in impious forgetful
ness of God.
7 introduces the punishment of impiety.
8. The text is again corrupt.
9, 10. Render (striking out and shall trust in him, ci. the ending
ofPs. 63): All men fear and proclaim the deed of Jhvh :
They acknowledge His work:
The righteous rejoices in Jhvh :
The upright make their boast in Him.

PSALM LXV.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm : Song of Darid.
1 Praise l-beseemethH thee, 0 God, in Sion :
And unto thee shall the vow be performed.
2 0 thou that hearest prayer,
Unto thee shall all flesh come.
3 Iniquities prevail against me :
As for our transgressions, purge thou them away.
4 Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to
approach unto thee.
That he may dwell in thy courts :
We shall be satisfied with the goodness of thy house, even
of thy holy temple.
5 By terrible things in righteousness wilt thou answer us,
0 God of our salvation :
Who art the confidence of all the ends of the earth,
And of them that are afar off upon the sea :
6 Which by his strength setteth fast the mountains :
Being girded with power :

LXV. 7-13] PSALMS 173
7 Which stiUeth the noise of the seas, phe noise of their
waves,]]
And the tumult of the peoples.
8 They also that dwell in the uttermost parts are afraid at
thy tokens :
Thou makest the outgoings of the morning and evening to
rejoice.
9 Thou visitest the earth, and waterest it :
Thou greatly enrichest it.
•"With the river of God"'
Thou preparest their corn.
And this is the way in which thou preparest it : —
10 Thou waterest the ridges thereof abundantly :
Thou settlest the furrows thereof:
Thou makest it soft with showers :
Thou blessest the springing thereof
11 Thou crownest the year with thy goodness :
And thy paths drop fatness.
12 They drop upon the pastures of the wilderness :
And the little hiUs rejoice on every side.
13 The pastures are clothed with flocks :
The vaUeys also are covered over with corn :
They shout for joy, they also sing.
A Ps. sung at a Jewish Harvest Festival as vv. 9-13 clearly show.
This, the Ps. proper, is introduced by a double confession, one {w. 1-4)
of the blessings of communion with God which flow from public worship
in the Temple; and the other {vv. 5-8) of His power as seen in the
course and government of the world. The inscription to the Ps. is of
even less value than usual, and even Perowne, Kirkpatrick and
Delitzsch give it up and with Ewald refer it to the time of Sennacherib's
overthrow. Baethgen is content to say that the universalistic touches
in vv. 2, 5 and 8 show its date to be in any case after that of Deutero-
Isaiah. Duhm can only say that the Ps. gives a picture of the pious
Israelites' attitude towards the power of Jhvh and gives no data for
fixing any date. Hengstenberg as usual ties himself to the inscription.
Wellhausen says merely that " the Ps. appears to have been composed
for a festival."
1. Waiteth = dummlyS.h ; beseemeth = d6miy^h. The latter, which
the LXX foUow, is undoubtedly the true vocalisation. The verse
shows how piety was interlocked with public worship, and what a large

174 PSALMS [i^xv.
place the offering of sacrifices by individuals in fulfilment of vows
occupied. 2 a. Thou that hearest prayer. " The singer does not mean that
one comes to God in order that He may hear prayer, but because He
has heard it." Baethgen.
2 6 is universalistic according to most with Mai. 1", but Duhm
makes all flesh = ^ Israelites with Is. 66^, and in v. 5 interprets all
the ends of the earth as " Jews and Proselytes," and adds that it is as
certain that in both places " the poet can mean Jews only, as that he
assumes a certain connection of all men with Elohim, and believes in a
dumb groping of the heathen after the true God."
4. Blessed is the man whom Thou choosest is said (1) of the priests
(Num. 16°) and (2) of any worshipper who was allowed to take his part
in the Temple-worship. That worship was sacramental and carried
with it forgiveness of sins {v. 3) because it was a mark of Jhvh's
favour, and conferred the privileges enjoyed by a guest.
6 = whenever Israel prays, Jhvh answers him by His terrible doings
in Nature, and that in righteousness = in discharge of His covenant
with Israel, to which He is constantly true.
7 b. The noise of their waves is apparently an interpolated gloss
on the noise of the seas.
The tumult of the peoples. The sea is so famihar to the Jewish
mind as a symbol of world-powers that the two sides of the parable
are blended here. Cf Is. 17'"; Rev. 17'' '^ The familiar character of
this symbolism has been used even to explain the genesis of Mk. 4^*-"
and parallels and of Mk. 6^^"°^ and parallel.
8 a. Tokens, e.g. comets, storms, earthquakes, eclipses, &c.
Sb = East and West rejoice together. Cf Job 38'. " Even Night
has its own dweUing from which it comes forth at evening to cover the
world." Duhm.
9 c. The river of God = the heavenly stream which shed itself as
rain on the earth. So the Egyptians fabled of a heavenly NUe which
had its earthly counterpart in that which fertilised Egypt.
9 c and 10 should be read thus :
With the river of God 
Thou preparest their com.
And the following is the way in which Thou preparest it:
Thou dost saturate its furrows, &c.
In this way vv. 9 and 10 describe the gracious influence of rain. With
Thou blessest the increase begins a description of the growth of the seed
after the winter rain, the joy of the earth wherever Jhvh's footsteps
tread, the rich crown of golden grain or of meadow-green, and the
consequent happiness of the flocks and herds.
For the image " Jhvh's paths drop fatness " cf Wordsworth's Ode
to Duty : Flowers laugh before thee on their beds.
And fragrance in thy footing treads.

LXVI. 1-14] PSALMS 176
PSALM LXVI.
A.
For the chief Musician : A Song : A Psalm.
1 Make a joyful noise unto God, aU ye lands :
2 Sing forth the honour of his name :
Make his praise glorious.
3 Say unto God, How terrible art thou in thy works !
Through the greatness of thy power shall thine enemies
submit themselves unto thee.
4 All the earth shall worship thee,
And shaU sing unto thee :
They shaU sing to thy name. Selah.
5 Come and see the works of God :
He is terrible in his doing toward the children of men.
6 He turned the sea into dry Icmd :
They went through the flood on foot :
There did we rejoice in him.
7 He ruleth by his power for ever :
His eyes behold the nations :
Let not the rebeUious exalt themselves. Selah.
8 0 bless our God, ye peoples :
Make the voice of his praise to be heard :
9 Which holdeth our soul in life,
And suffereth not our feet to be moved.
10 For thou, 0 God, hast proved us :
Thou hast tried us, as silver is tried.
11 Thou broughtest us into the net:
Thou laidst aflUction upon our loins.
12 Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads :
We went through fire and through water :
But thou broughtest us out into a place l-of liberty.-)
B.
13 I wUl go into thy house with burnt offerings :
I wiU pay thee my vows,
14 Which my lips have uttered,
And my mouth hath spoken, when I was in trouble.

176 PSALMS [LXVL 15-

¦20

15 I will offer unto thee burnt sacrifices of fatlings,
With the incense of rams :
I will offer bullocks with goats. Selah.
16 Come and hear, all ye that fear God :
And I wiU declare what he hath done for my soul.
17 I cried unto him with my mouth,
And he was extolled with my tongue.
18 If I regard iniquity in my heart.
The Lord wiU not hear me:
19 But verily God hath heard me :
He hath attended to the voice of my prayer.
20 Blessed be God,
Which hath not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy
from me.
Verses 1—12 are spoken by " we " ; the remainder by " I." In spite
of what Baethgen says v. 12 is a quite satisfactory ending, and v. 13
gives no too abrupt beginning. Kirkpatrick's plea is ingenious,
according to which the whole Ps, is put in the mouth of the com
munity represented by its leader {e.g. Hezekiah), who drops the plural
in the second half and speaks for himself But the difference of tone
and sense between the two halves forces the conclusion that we have two
independent Psalms here which were run together by the fact perhaps
that the song-books of the Temple had no superscriptions originaUy. As
to their date, Kirkpatrick and Perowne suggest Sennacherib's invasion,
Baethgen a moment soon after the return from the Exile, and Duhm
refers (A) to the days of John Hyrcanus or Alexander Jannseus, and
merely notes (B) as a pure liturgical composition with affinities to
Ps. 22, A.
The sections of the Ps, are marked by a Selah.
1-4 are an lo Psean. The nations are caUed on to hail Jhvh as
victor, and to come cringing to Him, as captives are represented as
doing on Assyrian incised stones. Cf. Pss. 18", 81'^ In verse 4 we
have perhaps words put into the mouths of the captives.
5-7 (cf 46^ describe Jhvh's great doings for His people, especially
at the Red Sea and at the Jordan {the flood = the river). Therefore,
as what was true then is true for ever, let not His opponents exalt
themselves. These, according to Duhm, are the enemies of the
Asmonseans. 8-12 are a thanksgiving for recent dehvery. The people had
been tested in the fire of trouble, but their life had been preserved.
Jhvh Himself had brought them into temptation, but He had deUvered

LxviL 1-7] PSALMS 177
them from its evil. Mortal men — note the irony — had driven horses
and chariots over their prostrate bodies ; but Jhvh had brought them
out into a place of liberty (not of wealth). Cf. 18", 119*°.
B.
13-15 read like a formula for use at any kind of sacrificial
offering. It is scarcely credible that all the animals here mentioned
would be offered. Probably the formula was intended for general use,
and on a particular occasion all would be omitted from it which was
unsuitable. 16-20 = a statement of personal gratitude for deliverance, for
Jhvh's answer to prayer, of which sincerity is named as a pre-condition.
The positive and negative statement of one and the same fact in
vv. 19, 20 reminds us of John 1'°.

PSALM LXVIL
For the chief Musician : on Neginoth : A Psalm : A Song.
1 God be merciful unto us, and bless us :
And cause his face to shine upon us ; Selah.
2 That thy way may be known upon earth,
Thy saving health among all nations.
3 Let the peoples praise thee, 0 God :
Let aU the peoples praise thee.
4 0 let the nations be glad and sing for joy :
For thou shalt judge the people righteously,
And govern the nations upon earth. Selah.
5 Let the peoples praise thee, 0 God :
Let all the peoples praise thee.
6 The earth hath yielded her increase :
God, even our own God, hhath blessedH us.
7 God shaU bless us :
And all the ends of the earth shall fear him.
This Ps. rests on the promise of Lev. 26'*"', and is an expansion of
the priestly blessing of Num. 6^"^. It appears from v. 6 to be
motived by a plentiful harvest, and it draws the conclusion (by the
laws of religious logic) that the sight of Israel's happiness is a sure
means of drawing the peoples of the earth to worship Jhvh, the giver
of that good-fortune. To try to date the Ps. is futile — Kirkpatrick
thinks of Hezekiah's age, Jennings and Lowe of the post-exilic period,
and Baethgen says that its Messianic ring (=66*) relates it to Deutero-
Isaiah. C. 12

178 PSALMS [Lxviii. 1-8
1. Be merciful = Be gracious, as in 51'. Bless is used in the Ps.
three times to correspond to the three-fold form of the blessing in
Num. 6.
2. Thy way = Thy salvation, as the paraUelism shows Jhvh s way
with His people is one of saving power.
3. Peopks— it is the worid-peoples who shaU praise Jhvh when
they see what His way is like,
4, Judge = not punish, but rule, or, as the paraUel clause has it,
govern. 5, 'Read peoples here also, and not people, as A.V, has it.
6. Render The earth hath yielded her increase, and Jhvh our God
hath blessed us. PSALM LXVIII.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of David : A Song.
The Prelude.
1 Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered :
Let them also that hate him flee before him.
2 As smoke is driven away, so drive them away :
As wax melteth before the fire.
So let the wicked perish at the presence of God.
3 But let the righteous be glad ; let them rejoice before God :
Yea, let them exceedingly rejoice.
4 Sing unto God, sing praises to his name :
I- Cast up a highway for him that rideth through the steppes : -I
hExult in-l Jah,
And rejoice before him.
5 A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows.
Is God in his holy habitation.
6 God setteth the solitary in famUies :
He bringeth out those which are bound with chains :
But the rebellious dwell in a dry land.
The War.
1 0 God, when thou wentest forth before thy people,
When thou didst march through the wUderness ; Selah :
8 The earth shook.
The heavens also dropped at the presence of God:
Yonder Sinai itself at the presence of God, the God of
Israel.

LXVIII, 9-23] PSALMS 179
9 Thou, 0 God, didst send a plentiful rain,
Whereby thou didst confirm thine inheritance, when it was
weary.
10 Thy congregation hath dwelt therein :
Thou, 0 God, hast prepared of thy goodness for the hpeople.H
11 The Lord gives the word :
Great is the company of the women that publish it.
12 Kings of armies flee apace :
She that tarrieth at home divideth the spoil.
13 '"Though ye have lien among the pots,''
As the wings of a dove covered with silver,
And her feathers with yeUow gold.
14 When the Almighty scattered kings in it,
It was white as snow in Salmon.
15 The hUl of God is the hiU of Bashan :
An high hUl is the hUl of Bashan.
16 Why l-look ye enviously,-] ye high hiUs?
On the hiU which God desireth to dweU in :
Which Jhvh wUl dwell in for ever.
17 The chariots of God are ten thousand times ten thousand.
[[The Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place!^
18 Thou hast triumphed gloriously ; thou hast led in pro
cession thy captives :
Thou hast received tribute-gifts among men :
The rebels also shall dwell with Jhvh, the God.
19 Blessed be the Lord, who daily l-beareth our burden,-!
The God of our salvation. Selah.
20 Our God is the God of salvation :
And unto Jhvh, our God, belong the issues from death.
21 But God shall wound the head of his enemies :
The hairy scalp of such an one as goeth on still in his
trespasses.
22 The Lord said, " I wiU bring again from Bashan,
I wiU bring my people again from the depths of the sea :
23 That thy foot may be dipped in the blood of thine
enemies,
And the tongue of thy dogs in the same."
12—2

180 PSALMS [LXVIIL 24-35
24 They have seen thy goings, 0 God :
Even the goings of my God, my King, in the sanctuary.
25 The singers went before,
After them the minstrels :
In the midst of the damsels playing with timbrels.
26 Bless ye God in the congregations :
•"The Lord, from the fountain of Israel."'
27 There is Uttle Benjamin with their ruler.
The princes of Judah and their council,
The princes of Zebulun, and the princes of Naphtali.
The Triumph.
28 Command, Jhvh, thy strength hfrom thy temple : -)
[[Strengthen, 0 God, that which thou hast wrought for us.|
29 l-To Jerusalem shaU kings bring presents unto thee.-)
30 Rebuke hthe wild-beast of the reeds,-!
The multitude of the bulls, with the calves of the peoples,
•"Submitting himself with pieces of silver : ¦¦
•" Scatter thou the people that delight in war."'
31 Princes shall come out of Egypt :
Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God.
The Epilogue.
32 Sing unto God, ye kingdoms of the earth :
0 sing praises unto the Lord :
33 Cast up a highway to him that rideth upon the heavens of
heavens, which are of old :
Who doth send out his voice, a mighty voice.
34 Ascribe ye strength unto God :
His exceUency is over Israel,
And his strength is in the clouds.
35 0 God, thou art terrible out of thy holy places :
The God of Israel giveth strength and power unto his people.
Blessed be God.
A noble Ps. of corrupt text and uncertain date. It has been
assigned to any period from Joshua to Alexander Jannseus. It is,
moreover, composed very largely of citations from earher books. " It
is as if the poet has felt his inabihty to produce so lofty a song

LXVIIL] PSALMS 181
altogether out of his own resources, for the best and strongest passages
in it are an anthology from earlier songs, some of which we still find
elsewhere in the Old Testament, while others it must be presumed
were once in existence elsewhere. The whole is more a skilful combina
tion from old sources than a new work. Moreover, since many older
passages are given in bare outline, the explanation is often very diffi
cult" (Ewald). Deutero-Isaiah was known to the writer, and the
Temple-services were observed. Hence the Ps. was not composed
before the second Temple was built. Reuss, accordingly, fixes on the
period of the struggle between the Ptolemies and the Seleucidse (220-
170 B.C.); Duhm that of Alexander Janneeus; Olshausen that of
Jonathan or Simon, and Baethgen gives these dates his general
approval. A war in Bashan, a victory, rebels at home, a subdued
Samaria, and a united "Judsea and Galilee are fixed points supplied
by the Ps. itself It has three main divisions — a Prelude, a War,
a Triumph. 1 = Num. IO'*, the watchword of Israel's march under Moses.
2. Smoke is an emblem of discomfiture and wax of impotence.
3. The wicked are the heathen and the righteous are Israel.
4 b. A.V. has Extol him that rideth upon the heavens. S6l(i, cast
up, is used again in Is. 57'*, 62'°; cf also Is. 40'-
4 c. R.V. has His Name is Jah, but render : In Jhvh rejoice and
be glad before Him (read shimchvl, rejoice, for sh'm6. His Name)
who is the Father of the fatherless, &c. Unless the shortened form
Jah is a copyist's error (Duhm), the writer is following Ex, 15',
5, 6. Jhvh is to be praised not merely because He was mighty
towards the heathen, and pitiless towards the domestic foes, but
merciful towards the widow and the fatherless, and the redeemer of
those in exile or captivity. There seems a reference here to the work
of Judas Maccabaeus described in 1 Mace. 5.
7, 8 are from Deborah's song.
9, 10. The rain which came as a storm in the wilderness became
a gracious shower in Canaan (Jhvh's inheritance), in which Israel
dwelt. In 10 b it would be better with Duhm to read \Mxn for the
peoph for (R.V.) leinl/or the poor.
11, The Lord gives the word. The word = the promise of victory
(Wellhausen) ; or the command to open the battle (Kirkpatrick) ; or
the triumph-song which follows (Baethgen). If we follow the last,
which on the whole seems best, then 12-14 give the Miriam-like song
of victory. The women are introduced as celebrating the defeat of the
foe with songs and dances, and in a song too (12-18) which is clearly
reminiscent of the Song of Deborah.
12-14. Though the general sense of these verses is fairly clear, it
is impossible to press any particular meaning, and 13 a is unintelligible.
But Judg. 5'" is clearly referred to. Duhm corrects the text and
reads : " Dove-wings covered with silver and feathers of them with
yellow-gold, and precious stones as snow on Salmon." He explains the
wings and feathers as the richly adomed helm-crests of the conquered

182 PSALMS [LXVIIL
Emirs. Wellhausen, on the other hand, takes the dove as an emblem
of Israel, and refers the gold and silver to the spoil which Israel takes
from the kings whom the Almighty made to " stumble in the night of
death," But Shaddai, the Almighty, occurs only once again in the
Psalter (91'), and it is more probable that there is a reference to
Judges 5'^ "the high places of the field." All that is clear is that
the women's song, like Deborah's, celebrates the wealth of the spoil
taken. 15-17. If a war has been waged against Bashan it was natural for
the poet to set Hermon with its three majestic peaks, Bashan's
northernmost boundary-stone, against Israel's httle Zion, httle in size,
but great in Jhvh's favour.
Render :
A mountain of God is the mountain of_ Bashan,
A high-peaked mountain is the mountain of Bashan.
Why look ye enviously, ye high-peaked mountains
On the mountain which Jhvh hath desired for His abode,
In which he will abide for ev&r ?
The chariots of Jhvh are ten thousand times ten thxrusand
(cf 2 Kings 6").
The clause "Adonai has transferred them from Sinai to His holy
place" is rightly treated by Duhm as a Rabbinical gloss on Deut. 33'
and 1 Kings 19".
18, The rendering of A.V. and R.V. should be compared with
that of our text :
Thou hast triumphed gloriously ; Thou liast led {in procession)
Thy captives;
Thou hast received tributary gifts among men;
Tlie rebels also shall dwell with Jhvh Elohim.
The last clause is rendered by Duhm, by a slight emendation of the
text. The rebels also shall be unable to remain, which gives a more
tolerable sense.
21. The hairy scalp ; not a derisive, but descriptive clause. The
flowing hair was a sign of strength, as in tbe cases of Absalom and
Samson, and was often so worn in performance of a vow. This verse
refers to Judg. 5" : For that flowing locks were worn in Israel.
22-23, The object is the person referred to in v. 23. The two
verses form an oracle of Jhvh : Jhvh said : "I will bring him from
Bashan, from the dangers which threatened to engulph him, and he
shall take bloody vengeance on his enemies on his return home."
24-28. The triumphal procession now shifts from Bashan to
Zion. These verses may be regarded as a general description of a
ritual procession. Singers, flutists, harpists, and dancers join with
maidens who clash their timbrels. Israel is represented by Zebulun
and Naphtali ; the Southern Kingdom by Judah and Benjamin. The
union of North and South "was first possible at the time of John

LXVIIL] PSALMS 183
Hyrcanus and Aristobulus I ; for at the time of Judas Maccabeus the
number of Jews in Galilee was so small that Simon had to transport
them to Judsea, in order to deliver them."
Verse 26 is either the song sung in procession (in which case cf
Is. 48' and 51'), or the text should be corrected: In the congrega
tions tlie Leaders of the people of Israel praise Jhvh.
28 a should be read with LXX : Command, Jhvh, Thy strength,
and 28 b should be omitted as a gloss on 28 a. The sense is :
Put forth Thy strength, Jhvh, from Thy temple ;
To Jerusalem shall kings bring presents unto Thee.
30 a. The company of the spearmen of A.V. should be The wild
beast of the reeds. " The wild beast of the reeds is certainly not the
crocodile as representing Egypt, for Egypt is spoken of in v. 31 as
quite friendly, and not rebuked, but invited to come " (Duhm). But,
according to Baethgen and others, the crocodile or hippopotamus is
meant, and reference is made to Ez. 29" and Job 40^', But Duhm's
reason seems conclusive, and we must, therefore, point to the wild
boars of the Jordan vaUey (80") as representing the heathen inhabitants
of Gadara, who gave Alexander Jannseus so much trouble.
30 b. Heathen kings = the buUs, and their followers are the calves.
Leaders and foUowers.
30 c, d are admittedly corrupt in the text.
Duhm gives : Let Thyself down among them that hve Thy threshold;
Give joyful news to the people who take delight in visiting Thy Temple.
Baethgen omits a as unintelligible.
But Wellhausen's conjecture fits the context better :
Tramph Thou down ihe hvers of lies ;
Scatter Thou the peoples who delight in war.
Nestle's conjectural emendation is worthy of more consideration
than Duhm gives it. Verses 29-31 refer, he says, to gifts of homage
from foreign peoples, and, therefore, he would read 30 c as referring to
Pathros with its gifts of silver.
32-36 are a conventional ending in the form of a universalistic
appeal to praise Jhvh. 32 and 33 a resemble so closely v. 4 that the
Selah at the end of 32 (R.V.) should probably be s6lti as in 4 b, which
then gives us : 0 sing to Adonai ; cast up (a highway)
For him that rideth, &c.
The Heavens of old = Wordsworth's " most ancient heavens " in the
Ode to Duty; cf Deut. 33''.
For the Nature-power ascribed here to Jhvh, cf Ps. 29, Deut. 33'"',
Ex. 15".

184 PSALMS [LXix. 1-13
PSALM LXIX.
For the chief Musician : to Shoshannim : of Darid,
1 Save me, 0 God :
For the waters are come in unto my soul.
2 I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing :
I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me.
3 I am weary of my crying : my throat is dried :
Mine eyes fail while I wait for my God.
4 They that hate me without a cause are more than the hairs
of mine head :
^They that would destroy me, being mine enemies wrongfuUy,
are mighty : ^
Then I restored that which I took not away.
5 0 God, thou knowest my foolishness :
And my sins are not hid from thee.
6 Let not them that wait on thee, 0 Lord God of hosts, be
ashamed for my sake :
Let not those that seek thee be confounded for my sake, 0
God of Israel.
7 Because for thy sake I have borne reproach :
Shame hath covered my face.
8 I am become a stranger unto my brethren,
And an alien unto my mother's children.
9 For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up :
And the reproaches of them that reproached thee are faUen
upon me.
10 When I wept, and chastened my soul with fasting.
That was to my reproach :
11 When I made sackcloth my garment:
I became a proverb to them.
12 They that sit in the gate l-talk of-! me :
And I am the song of the drunkards.
13 But as for me, my prayer is unto thee, Jhvh, in an
acceptable time :
0 God, in the multitude of thy mercy
Answer me, in the truth of thy salvation.

LXIX. 14-29] PSALMS 185
14 Deliver me out of the mire, and let me not sink :
Let me be deUvered from them that hate me, and out of the
deep waters.
15 Let not the waterflood overflow me.
Neither let the deep swaUow me up,
And let not the pit shut her mouth upon me.
16 Answer me, Jhvh ; for thy lovingkindness is good :
Tum unto me according to the multitude of thy tender
mercies.
17 And hide not thy face from thy servant :
For I am in trouble : answer me speedily.
18 Draw nigh unto my soul, and redeem it :
Deliver me because of nune enemies.
19 Thou hast known my reproach, and my shame, and my
dishonour :
Mine adversaries are all before thee.
20 Reproach hath broken my heart ; and I am full of heaviness :
And I looked for some to take pity, but there was none :
And for comforters, but I found none.
21 They gave me also gaU for my meat :
And in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
22 Let their table become a snare before them :
And let their well-being be a trap.
23 Let their eyes be darkened, that they see not :
And make their loins continually to shake.
24 Pour out thine indignation upon them,
And let thy wrathful anger take hold of them.
25 Let their habitation be desolate :
And let none dwell in their tents.
26 For they persecute him whom thou hast smitten :
And they talk of the grief of those whom thou hast wounded.
27 Add iniquity unto iniquity :
And let them not come into thy righteousness.
28 Let them be blotted out of the book of the living.
And not be written with the righteous.
29 But I wm poor and sorrowful :
Let thy salvation, 0 God, set me up on high.

186 PSALMS [LXIX. 30-36
30 I will praise the name of God with a song,
And will magnify him with thanksgiving.
31 This also shall please Jhvh better than an ox
Or bullock that hath horns and hoofs.

32 The pious poor see this, and are glad :
Let your heart live, ye seekers after God.
33 For Jhvh heareth the poor,
And despiseth not his prisoners.
34 Let the heaven and earth praise him.
The seas, and every thing that moveth therein.
35 For God wUl save Zion, and wiU build the cities of
Judah :
That they may dwell there, and have it in possession.
36 The seed also of his servants shall inherit it :
And they that love his name shall dwell therein.
A prayer of a pious man for the help of his God against the violence,
and even still more against the ridicule of his foes — the godless. As
in Ps. 56, the writer may be one of the chasidim, who were deceived
and maltreated by Alcimus, His words suggest that he had been
charged with carelessness (he calls it folly himself) in the administra
tion of the Temple revenues, and made to pay back what he had never
squandered. His position was weU known, and he was of sufficient
public importance to become a jest for gossip and a butt for tavern
song. The words of the Ps. are frequently quoted in the New Testament,
and those which describe the dejection of the writer have been frequently
quoted as a prediction of the Passion of Christ. Yet " the Ps. is not
prediction but description " (Kirkpatrick). Prophecy is not concerned
with concrete facts, but with eternal principles, or with facts only
as expression of those principles. Verse 21 was probably in the mind of
the writer of Mt. 27**; John 19^ probably refers to this Ps. John 15*'
and 2" quote it. So do Acts 1==°, Rom, ll''' '° and 15'.
1. The Psalmist is like a man drowning, or like one sinking in
a morass. 2, The floods = Shibb61eth — the word of contention in Judges 12*.
4 b. Ewald and Baethgen follow the Syriac in reading here : More
numerous than my bones are they who hit me causelessly.
4 c-9, A judicial process of malversation is implied, but the shame
of it is less to the Psalmist than the fear that he may injure his cause.
What he had done — folly or not — had been done for the good of Jhvh's
house, out of the zeal he bore towards it. On the other hand, the

LXX. 1-4] PSALMS 187
reproaches against Jhvh were felt by the Psalmist as reproaches directed
against himself
12. The gate, where men gossipped as well as transacted justice.
13-18 do but repeat the nervous cry of the beginning of the Ps.
The repetition emphasises the anguish.
19-21. Invective and isolation have told on the mind. The
Psalmist was "Athanasius contra mundum" as he felt. Gall and
vinegar are used figuratively to describe the cruel scorn offered to one
who looked for sympathy. Verse 21 has somehow influenced Mt. 27'*,
as Ps. 22'^ has crept into Mt. 27 '^ XoXt; gall is used by the LXX
to describe poison or wormwood.
22-28 are awful imprecations proper to the Jewish spirit, but
repeated often enough in Christian history wherever Rome and Pro
testantism have met in deadly conflict, as they meet stiU, e.g. in
Belfast, and in Rhenish Prussia.
29-31, An echo of the evangelical piety of Ps. 51. A " sacrifice
of praise and thanksgiving" is better than that of an animal of the
required age and " cleanness,"
32-36. Duhm treats these verses as forming a separate Ps., as
22 B and 66 B, and dates it after the death of Alcimus, and the treaty
struck between Bacchides and Jonathan, one consequence of which
was the freeing of those Chasidim who had been imprisoned,
1 Mace, 9 'I
When the an^vim see that their cause is favoured by Jhvh they
rejoice, and their heart is strengthened.
Peace is established, Zion at peace, Judah is rebuilt, and the ruin
of war succeeded by rest and prosperity. In joy, such as filled Germany
in 1866 and 1871, but more pure, the Psalmist caUs on all the earth to
join him in praising Jhvh,

PSALM LXX.
For the chief Musician : of Darid : to bring to remembrance.
1 Make haste, 0 God, to deliver me :
Make haste to help me, Jhvh.
2 Let them be ashamed and confounded
That seek after my soul :
Let them be turned backward, and put to confusion.
That desire my hurt.
3 Let them be turned back for a reward of their shame
That say. Aha, aha.
4 Let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee :
And let such as love thy salvation say continually,
"Let God be magnified."

188 PSALMS [LXX. 5-LXXL 8
5 But I am poor and needy :
Make haste unto me, 0 God :
Thou art my help and my deliverer :
Jhvh, make no tarrying.
A second version of 40""" with a few verbal changes, such as the
substitution, as is the rule in Book ii., of Elohim for Jhvh, _ The
existence of two editions of a Ps, is valuable as affording evidence
of carelessness in the transcription of the text, and as giving authority,
therefore, for that emendation of the text on which critics have been
engaged for a long time.
In 40" the first word is omitted in 70' ; in 40'* together occurs, but
not in 70" ; to destroy it of the same verse is omitted in 70'' ; let them be
desolate of 40'^ appears in 70' as let them be turned back ; in 40" the
verb for thinketh is corrupted in 70^ into make haste.
These variations, which may be put down to accident, together
with others which are dehberate {e.g. the substitution of Elohim for
Jhvh), serve to show that the text possessed no sacrosanct character
until a very late date.

PSALM LXXL
1 In thee, Jhvh, do I put my trust :
Let me never be put to confusion.
2 Deliver me in thy righteousness, and cause me to escape :
Incline thine ear unto me, and save me.
3 Be thou my strong habitation, whereunto I may continually
resort :
t-For a house of defence-! to save me :
For thou a/rt my rock and my fortress.
4 Deliver me, 0 my God, out of the hand of the wicked,
Out of the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man.
5 For thou art my hope, 0 Lord God :
Thou art my trust from my youth.
6 By thee have I been holden up from the womb :
I-Thou hast been my protector from-l my mother's bowels :
I- On thee do I waitH continually.
7 I am as a wonder unto many :
But thou art my strong refuge.
8 Let my mouth be filled uoith thy praise
And tmth thy honour all the day.

LXXL 9-22] PSALMS 189
9 Cast me not off in the time of old age :
Forsake me not when my strength faileth.
10 For mine enemies speak against me :
And they that lay wait for my soul take counsel together,
11 Saying, "God hath forsaken him:
Pursue and take him ; for there is none to deliver him."
12 0 God, be not far from me :
0 my God, make haste for my help.
13 Let them be confounded and consumed that are adversaries
to my soul :
Let them be covered tmth reproach and dishonour that seek
my hurt.
14 But I wiU hope continuaUy,
And wUI yet praise thee more and more.
15 My mouth shaU shew forth thy righteousness
And thy salvation aU the day :
For I know not the H scriptures.-!
16 I wiU go in the strength of the Lord God :
I wUl make mention of thy righteousness, even of thine
only.
17 0 God, thou hast taught me from my youth :
And hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works.
18 Now also when I am old and greyheaded, 0 God, forsake
me not :
Until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation :
Thy power to every one that is to come.
19 Thy righteousness also, 0 God, is very high.
Who hast done great things :
0 God, who is like unto thee !
20 Thou, which hast shewed me great and sore troubles,
Shalt quicken me again.
And shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth.
21 Thou shalt increase my greatness,
And comfort me on every side.
22 I will also praise thee with the psaltery,
Even thy truth, 0 my God :
Unto thee wiU I sing with the harp, 0 thou Holy One of
Israel.

190 PSALMS [LXXL 23-24
23 My lips shaU greatly rejoice when I sing unto thee :
And my soul, which thou hast redeemed.
24 My tongue also shaU talk of thy righteousness aU the day
long :
For they are confounded, [[for they are brought unto shame,
that seek my hurt.]]
A cento Ps., and yet one of native originality. The Psalmist is
not Israel (against Baethgen, Kirkpatrick, and WeU^iausen), but an
individual who recounts his plaints, execrations, and joys in language
which had grown to be part of his natural self-expression. Jennings
and Lowe speak of the poorness of his style. The text is not free
from suspicion, but it indicates that the writer is not a learned scribe,
but one who trusted to his own inner light — a Quaker of his time, and,
therefore, a "monster," a laughing-stock, or scorn to the many.
Jeremiah, as in many other cases, has been suggested as the author,
but the suggestion is that, and no more,
1-3 are taken from 31'"'. 3 b, by an obvious small change of the
consonants, should be as in SVfor a house of defence to save me.
4-8 = an appeal for deliverance : 5 and 6 relate back to 22^' '"-
Thou art He that took me (R.V.) — better Thou hast been my protector.
My praise shall be continually of Thee (R.V,) should be On Thee do I
wait continually, as in 39'- 1 a = Deut. 28^".
9-11. Old age is his enemies' opportunity.
12-13. A cento from 35 =^ 40" = 70'
15-18. In 15 c read. For I do not know the Scriptures. In 40' is
a reference to a Scripture, cf 139'^ Baethgen says that Jerome's
literatwras "hardly gives a tolerable sense," to which Duhm retorts
that "it gives at least something translateable." Undoubtedly the
A.V. gives a " tolerable " sense, but leaves the for unexplained. The
writer says, it seems, therefore, that he is not a learned scribe, and
hence can but go in the strength of Jhvh, as the early Christian
prophets went in the power of the Spirit who taught them what to
say. Trusting in that prophetic spirit he testifies to the public of
Jhvh's righteousness and salvation, as indeed he says he had done
from his youth upwards, through the direct inspiration of Jhvh. He
begs, accordingly, that this inspiration may not desert him now he
is old, but may enable him to testify still to the generation which
is succeeding his own. The Psalmist may thus be not unfairly described
as a Wesley, or, better still, as a George Fox, declaring that God's word
required no Oxford learning to set it out.
20. The written text has showed us, the spoken me. The pre
ference which Kirkpatrick and Baethgen give to us is perverse. The
depths of the earth = a figurative expression for the danger of death.
21. Thou shalt increase my greatness is so peculiar an expression
that WeUhausen leaves it untranslated, Baethgen declares it very

LXXIL 1-13] PSALMS 191
striking in the mouth of an individual, while R. V., Kirkpatrick, and
Duhm turn it into a prayer. But the word for my greatness (g'duUathi)
is always used of Jhvh and not of man. The text is responsible for
the difficulty.
22. Holy One of Israel. In the Psalter here and in 78*' and 89'^
only, but often in Isaiah.

PSALM LXXIL
A Psalm for Solomon.
1 Give the king thy judgments, 0 God,
And thy righteousness unto the king's son.
2 He shaU judge thy people with righteousness.
And thy poor with judgment.
3 The mountains shall bring peace to the people.
And the Uttle hills, by righteousness.
4 He shaU judge the poor of the people,
He shaU save the children of the needy,
And shaU break in pieces the oppressor.
5 They shall fear thee as long as the sun endureth,
And the moon, throughout aU generations.
6 He shaU come down like rain upon the mown grass :
As showers that water the earth.
7 In his days shaU the righteous flourish :
And abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.
8 He shall have dominion also from sea to sea.
And from the river unto the ends of the earth.
9 '"They that dwell in the wilderness"' shall bow before
him:
And his enemies shall lick the dust.
10 The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shaU bring presents :
The kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts.
11 Yea, all kings shall fall down before him :
AU nations shall serve him.
12 For he shaU deliver the needy when he crieth :
The poor that hath no helper.
13 He shall spare the poor and needy.
And shaU save the souls of the needy.

192 PSALMS [LXXIL 14-20
14 He shaU redeem their soul from deceit and violence :
And precious shall their blood be in his sight.
15 [[And he shall live, and to him shaU be given of the gold
of Sheba :|
Prayer also shall be made for him continually :
All day long shall he be praised.
16 There shaU be abundance of corn in the earth upon the top
of the mountains :
The fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon :
And they of the city shall flourish Uke grass of the earth.
17 Blessed shaU he be for ever :
His name shall be continued as long as the sun :
And men shall be blessed in him :
All nations shaU call him blessed.

18 Blessed be Jhvh the God, the God of Israel,
Who only doeth wondrous things.
19 And blessed be his glorious name for ever :
And let the whole earth be filled with his glory :
Amen, and Amen.

20 The ""prayers'" of Darid the son of Jesse are ended.
A Ps, in three sections, 1-7 describe the just rule of an ordinary
king and its consequent prosperity ; 8-11 is an insertion of a later
date, which seeks to express and heighten the then Messianic interpre
tation of the Ps. ; and 12-17 return to the theme of the first section,
and restate it in different terms. It is not probable that any but an
Israelitish king is the subject here any more than in Ps. 45, though
Hitzig, Reuss, Olshausen, and Cheyne have interpreted it as the
grateful cry of the Diaspora in Eg3rpt in response to the beneficence
of Ptolemy Philadelphus, The date of the Ps, is shown to be post-
exilic by the number of its references to late literature. It is not
quoted at all in the N.T.
1-2. "The judgment is God's," Deut. 1". The king's son = the
king himself of the preceding clause = one who is no usurper, but
member of a genuine dynasty. The poor = not the poor among the
people, but the people itself of 2 a. Rosenmiiller, Kirkpatrick, and
others prefer, however, " miseri inter populum tuum," But cf. Karl
Marti's remark on Is. 14'^ : " AnnivM amm6 points to a later date,
and = not ' the poorest of His people,' as if another part of His depen
dents found no protection, but amm6 forms the apposition of the
subordinate noun = ' the poor who are His people,' His dependents

LXXIL] PSALMS 193
who are caUed precisely 'the poor, needy, oppressed.' Anl is first used
for this conception after the Exile ; Isaiah and even Jeremiah (5*) use
inl, ebySn, and dol in the hteral sense." Cf Is. 29"; Zeph. 3'^ If
this interpretation be correct this Ps. is of post-exilic date.
3 = The land flourishes because of the protection afforded by law
(Wellhausen). Through righteousness mountains and hills (= the whole
land) is at peace.
4. The children of the needy in clause b = the poor of the people in
clause a. Cf the sons ofthe strangers in 18* and Eccles. 10".
5. The king it is who is to be feared, not Jhvh (against Kirk
patrick). Duhm begins the Messianic insertion with this verse, instead of
with v. 8 (as Giesebrecht followed by Baethgen and others).
6. Duhm describes the coming down of this verse as of a Messianic
ring, as Jhvh's word "comes down" in Is. 55"'. But this is far-fetched.
The verse is a compressed parable. As the rain  so shaU the king
give prosperity,
8-11. Cf Zech. 9'" (? circa B.C. 160). From sea to sea = Ex. 23".
The River is the Euphrates. " Extension, not limit, is the idea con
veyed" (Kirkpatrick). They that dwell in the wilderness = the wild
Bedouins. But the word used means always desert-beasts (tzivvlm).
Olshausen and Duhm read, therefore, tzelrim, oppressors. Ci. Is. 49^^}
Mic. 7 ". Tarshish = Phoenician Tartessus in Spain ; isles = the coast-
lands of Phoenician settlements along the Mediterranean ; Sheba is
Arabia Felix, and Seba Ethiopia,
12-13. The emphasis laid on poor = S.ni, dol or eby6n, points to a
technical use of the terms. Cf 2 and 4 above.
14b = 116'=, 2 Kings 1", 1 Sam. 26^
15 a is the manifest insertion of a marginal note.
15 b says that the pious shall always pray for their king and daily
sing his praises. The Prayer Book Version to him is an error.
16. The general sense is clear : Plenty of corn in the fields,' plenty
of inhabitants in the towns. No rural exodus, and no slums 1
17. Render with the LXX : " Blessed be he for ever."
His name shall be continued (Yinnon), which the Talmud ren
dered " His Name is Yinnon " — one of the eight mystical names of the
Messiah, from which we may infer that the sense of Yinnon had beer
lost. 17 c says that men shall use his name in blessing-formulae ;
e.g. " May God be gracious to you as to King  "
18-19 = the doxology to Book ii. 19 b is taken from Num.
20. Prayers = T'phiUoth. The LXX read Psalms = T'hUloth,

c. 13

194 PSALMS [Lxxm. 1-14

BOOK III.
PSALMS 73—89.
PSALM LXXIII.
A Psalm of Asaph.
1 Truly God is good to hthe upright,-!
Jhvh, to such as are of a pure heart.
2 But as for me, my feet were almost gone :
My steps had well nigh sUpped.
3 For I was envious at the foolish,
When I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
4 For l-they are free from pains :
Healthy and well-fed is their body.H
5 They are not in trouble as other men :
Neither are they plagued like other men.
6 Therefore pride compasseth them about as a chain
Violence covereth them as a garment.
7 Their eyes stand out with fatness :
They have more than heart could wish.
8 I- They scoff and talk of wickedness :
They talk of oppression loftily. H
9 They set their mouth in the heavens.
And their tongue walketh through the earth.
10 Therefore the people l-run after them :
And find no fault in them.-|
11 And they say, "How doth God know?"
And "Is there knowledge in the Most High?"
12 Behold, these are the ungodly.
Who prosper in the world, and increase in riches.
13 Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain,
And washed my hands in innocency.
14 For every day have I been plagued.
And chastened every morning.

Lxxm. 15-28] PSALMS 195
15 ""If I were to say, "I will speak thus":
Behold, I should offend against the generation of thy
children."'
16 When I thought to know this,
It was too painful for me :
17 Until I went into the holy mysteries of God :
And understood their end.
18 Surely thou dost set them in sUppery places :
Thou I- lettest them faU into errors. H
19 How are they brought into desolation, as in a moment !
They are utterly consumed with terrors.
20 As a dream when one awaketh do they become :
h Whose image is despised on awaking. -i
21 Thus my heart was grieved.
And I was pricked in my reins.
22 So fooUsh was I, and ignorant :
I was as a beast before thee.
23 Nevertheless I am hone favoured by thee:H
Thou hast holden me by my right hand.
24 Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel.
And afterward receive me to glory.
25 Whom have I in heaven but thee ?
And there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee.
26 My flesh and my heart faileth :
But God is the strength of my heart, and my portion
for ever.
27 [[For, lo, they that are far from thee shall perish :
Thou hast destroyed all them that go a whoring from thee.
28 But it is good for me to draw near to God :
I have put my trust in the Lord God, that I may declare all
thy works.]]
This Ps. belongs, with 37, 49 and the Book of Job, to a group of
writings which are concemed with the problem of life after death. The
description of it by Jennings and Lowe faUs, if anything, short of its
merits. " This Psalm for the sublimity of its poetry, the depth of its
thought, and the intensity of the struggle which it portrays, may be
regarded as one of the most interesting in the whole Psalter. The
spiritual life, illumined by only a partial revelation, is here presented
13—2

196 PSALMS [LXXIII.
to us in its inner conflicts. The various phases of the struggle, the
misgivings expressed only to be repressed, the perplexity, the final
reassurance and self-reproof, are portrayed with almost dramatic reality."
The writer is "a Hebrew Pascal."
But there is even more in this Ps. than this. In Ps. 49 '°_ another
singer, had touched— but only touched — the one truth on which rests
man's hope of a better life after this. "God will redeem my soul
from the power of the grave, for He shall receive me." Sense fails,
and reason gropes in the dark when the heart asks, "ShaU I live
through death ? " Where both are dumb, faith speaks with certain
voice : God is Spirit ; I am spirit too, because I am His child. He
cannot die, nor can His child. I shaU Uve again. Resurgam. That
is the certainty of Ps. 73, but expressed more confidently than in 49.
The earthly Ufe may fail {v. 26), but God is the strength of the
perishing. One that is able to claim Him as his strength has in that
very fact the pledge of immortality. To believe that God could inspire
the hope, and could not ftilfil it, would be the worst atheism, the
contradiction of Faith, for faith means "holding fast to unseen good
ness," and that goodness which gave an instinct and withheld its object
would be no goodness, but a deceit.
The Ps. faUs into three divisions :
1-14 state the problem set by the prevalence of prosperous
wickedness. 15-22. The reaction in the singer's mind when he thought on a
complementary group of facts.
23-26. The solution of faith.
27-28. These last two verses are irrelevant and inconsequent
additions. 1. L'yis'r^^l To Israel, and LayyS,shir tl To the upright God, are
almost the same in Hebrew letters. If we adopt the latter we secure a
precise parallel without doing any violence to the text. The Psalmist
states his faith by anticipation, before he commits himself to the gloom
of triumphant evil, and that faith is that moral uprightness and purity
of heart are pleasing to Jhvh, who will, therefore, somehow bring
their possessor victorious out of the dark and desperate fight. The
mention of Israel would have no pertinence in this connection (Duhm).
4. There is no question of a euthanasia here, but of prosperity
during life. By separating I'mbtham = in their death into Mm6 thS,m
and then taking thftm, healthy, with the next clause, we get an exceUent
and certain meaning. UlUm, their strength (R.V.), is of uncertain
meaning. Duhm makes it belly, but most others body.
8, Again we must divide the words between the clauses differently.
Osek, oppression, belongs to 8 b. See R, V.
9. The idea is not that they have spoken against high heaven
(against Baethgen), but that they talk with the conceit of the self-
satisfied man as if they knew everything in heaven and earth, and
needed not that anybody should teach them. The purse-proud are
ordinarily satisfied with themselves all round.

LXXIII.] PSALMS 197
10 in R.V. conveys no meaning. The rendering in the text is
obtained by a very slight orthographical correction. The meaning is
that of the line of Phaedrus (ii. 3, 7) quoted by Hitzig, " Successus
improborum plures aUicit."
11, Ely6n, the Most High, was a favourite name for God in pro
phetic circles, and emerges at a time when Jhvh's transcendency was
asserted against the gods of the nations. "As for our God He is in
heaven" (US'). The proof that Jhvh is not a God that knows is
adduced by the prosperity of the wicked : " Look at them," is the
thought, "how they succeed. How then can God know what is going
on here below ? " This leads to the further thought :
13-14. Since wickedness is no barrier to happiness, of what avail
to live religiously, to keep the heart pure, and to foster a tender sensi
tiveness which lays a man open to aU the pains of life 1 Selfishness
dulls the feelings ; piety brings with it the capacity for being plagued
every day and chastened every morning. But why cultivate this higher
life if Jhvh does not know ?
For all the day hng of R.V. read ev&ry day on account of both sense
and balance of clauses.
15. The text is corrupt, and no two commentators agree as to its
emendation. The simplest is Baethgen's, who omits the im, if, as a
dittography from the preceding verse, and secures a positive instead
of a conditional statement. In this case the sense is : "So did 1 say,
so did I speak, and in so speaking I sinned against my feUows." It is
the thought of the duty he owes to his brethren who are the upright
and pure-hearted of v. 1 which prevents the singer from adopting the
cjmical philosophy of the worldling. This practical basis for a moral
view of history is precisely that which modem thought prefers to lay
down. Luxury, impurity, and arrogance are sins because they are
breaches of the law which says "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as
thyself." 17. Mik'd'shgl-el = R.V. Sanctuary of God. But the plural is
against this rendering (cf. 84'), and even if sanctuary were the correct
interpretation, yet it would be an inner revelation given there which
was the centre of the thought, not the sanctuary itself But does the
Psalmist expect the solution in the future? or has he received it
already ? The older commentators, and also Hitzig and Duhm, take the
former, and most modems the latter. Hitzig refers to Wisdom (2") and
sees in the mystery "the secret purpose which God pursued in the
prosperity of the sinner." Duhm emphasises the fact that it was " the
mysteries of God" which the singer entered into, as distinct from those
of any heathen deity {e.g. those referred to in Is. 66°, 66"). He has
in favour of his theory the fact that the Psalmist proceeds to set out
Death as holding the key of the dark chamber, and that Apocalyptic
writers (of whom the writer of Daniel was not surely the first) were
occupied with the mysteries of the new £eon, " In distinction from
the Messianism of the Prophets, Apocalyptic means not a continuation
but a catastrophe, not a conclusion but an antithesis, not a strengthened

198 PSALMS [LXXiv. 1
earth-Ufe, but a judgment on the past, and a new start; it is not
a finah which takes up the earher refrain, but a new song sung by a
higher choir" (Baldensperger, Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu, 1903, p. 174).
It was a "mystery" of this sort which gave the Psalmist the clue
to his riddle. He is clearly no legalist, still no Sadducee ; his stand
point is not that of the sceptical author of Eeclesiastes, but that of the
numerically insignificant group which found its food in Apocalyptic
visions — out of which, according to His education, Christ came.
17 &. CfDeut. 32=^
18. "The immortal gods are wont to allow sometimes greater
prosperity and longer impunity to those whom they wish to punish for
their sins, in order that the change of fortune may make them feel
their punishment the more," Caesar, De Bell. Gall. I. 14. Cf. Ps. 92'.
18 b. L'nashshii6th = R,V. destruction. Baethgen ruins. With
Ewald, derive the word from n§,sh^, to deceive. It is self-deception —
that of the N.T. Pharisees — which is probably meant. They are on
the "broad way," but are self-deceived as to its end.
20. R.V. So, 0 Lord, when Thou awakest, &c,, gives no good
sense. For Adonai, 0 Lord, read yih'yfl, they become, and take this
word with 20 a. The godless life is but a dream from which man
awakes in eternity to shame and everlasting contempt (Dan. 12°).
22. B'h^m6th = a rhinoceros. The Psalmist was as a beast who
stands gazing at the beauties of nature and sees them not.
23-26. The singer now turns to his own unshaken personal faith.
He is a chasid (this must surely be the true reading in place of th^mid
in 23 a), and therefore safe under Jhvh's care, held by His hand.
During fife he is guided ; after this life he will be glorified. This is
plainly the meaning ; the antithesis is so marked that those who take
Mb6d adverbially are clearly wrong. It is an adverbial accusative
(Duhm), or an accusative of direction, or of the goal after a verb of
motion (Baethgen). The stories of Enoch and Elijah were not to be
repeated, perhaps, but yet they stood as opening out unknown poten
tialities. (The same verb likach is used in 24 b, as in 49".)
The earthly life {v. 26) might fail, but when it does it wiU leave
God and the soul in close embrace. That was the Psalmist's hope ; no
greater is the Christian's.
27, 28 are barnacles. 27 is a verse from, perhaps, Hosea or
Jeremiah. 28 is atomistic. That the LXX has yet another clause
shows both that the text has been exposed to chance, and that it was
not always regarded as sacrosanct,
PSALM LXXIV.
Maschil of Asaph.
1 0 God, why hast thou cast us off for ever ?
Why doth thine anger smoke against the sheep of thy
pasture ?

LXXIV. 2-18] PSALMS 199
2 Remember thy congregation, which thou hast purchased
of old:
{[The rod of thine inheritance, which thou hast redeemed ;]]
This mount Zion, wherein thou hast dwelt.
3 Lift up thy feet unto the perpetual desolations :
Even aU that the enemy hath done wickedly in the
sanctuary.
4 Thine enemies roar in the midst of thy congregations :
They set up their ensigns for signs.
5 ^A man was famous according as he had lifted up axes upon
the thick trees.]]
6 But now the carved work thereof
They break down with axes and hammers.
7 They have cast fire into thy sanctuary.
They have defiled by casting dotvn the dwelling place of thy
name to the ground.
8 Theiy said in their hearts. Let us destroy them together :
They have burned up all the synagogues of God in the land.
9 We see not our signs :
There is no more any prophet : •
[[Neither is there among us any that knoweth how long.]]
10 0 God, how long shall the adversary reproach ?
ShaU the enemy blaspheme thy name for ever?
11 Why withdrawest thou thy hand, even thy right hand?
Pluck it out of thy bosom.
12 Thou, Jhvh, art our King of old.
Working salvation in the midst of the earth.
13 Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength :
Thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters.
14 [[Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest
him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness.]]
15 Thou didst cleave the fountain and the flood :
Thou driedst up mighty rivers.
16 The day is thine, the night also is thine :
Thou hast prepared the light and the sun.
17 Thou hast set aU the borders of the earth :
Thou hast made summer and winter.
18 Remember this, that the enemy hath reproached, Jhvh,

200 PSALMS [LXXIV. 18-23
And that a fooUsh people hath blasphemed thy name.
19 0 deliver not the soul of thy turtledove hto the wild-beast :H
Forget not the congregation of thy poor for ever.
20 hLook on the arrogant for they are full :
The caves of the earth are abodes of violence.-!
21 0 let not the oppressed return ashamed :
Let the poor and needy praise thy name.
22 Arise, 0 God, plead thine own cause :
Remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee daily.
23 Forget not the voice of thine enemies :
The tumult of those that rise up against thee increaseth
continually.
Since Hitzig published his Die Psalmen 40 years ago a general
agreement has been arrived at that this Ps, is a product of the times
of Antiochus Epiphanes, or to be more precise, describes the situation
in Judaea of circa b.c, 168-165, It is true that Hitzig lays consider
able stress on the clause 9 b, There is no more any prophet, as being
decisive against the only competing date (that of B.C. 588, the date of
the Chaldaean catastrophe), while Duhm deletes it as a mere gloss.
But the nature of the desecration of the Temple described in vv. 4-8,
and the allusion to synagogues (not to be explained away as prophet-
schools, or as Rabbinical schools), together with the fact that the
description of the adversary and his doings exactly fits in with the
Syrian date, leave no room for reasonable doubt as to the accuracy of
the Maccabean date. It is not too much to say that this Ps. has the
value of a historical document which may be used to confirm the story
in 1 Mace. 4, 2 Mace, 8, and not merely to illustrate it.
The one singular point of the Ps, is the ground of the Psalmist's
complaint to Jhvh. Where we should have expected — especially from
a chisld — an appeal to the chesed and the truth of Jhvh, we have an
appeal to His creative power. Yet the singularity is quite easy to
understand. By the time of the Maccabees Jhvh's mercy and truth
were taken for granted, but their keenness had been blunted by the
emphasis now laid on Jhvh's transcendence. He was God of gods and
Lord of lords ; He was too holy to mix with mortal men. If He
stooped to earth at all it was through some intermediary, angel, or
theophanic agent. Especially was the Law becoming the one medium
in orthodox circles — and the sufficient veil — between Jhvh and His
people. His transcendency had made Him an awful being, and awe
was suggestive of power rather than of tenderness. This attitude of
the Psalmist is refiected in his song, and hence the Ps, becomes a
historic witness for one side at least of the piety of the time
1 b. Jhvh-s fiock. Cf 79", 96', 100'.
2b. After redeemed Duhm inserts from Ex, 6" with outstretched

LXXIV.] PSALMS 201
arm. He then begins the next clause with {See) the tribe of thine
inheritance. But it seems more natural to put the metre straight by
omitting 2 6 as another of the many glosses which have crept into the
Psalter. Edh4h, congregation = a-wayioyri (LXX) and ckkXt/o-io, (Acts 20"°).
See Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, pp. 13-15.
3 = an invitation to come and walk round the ruins to see what
cause the "congregation" of Israel has to pray for His help. The
adjective perpetual is hyperbolic.
4-8. The devastation is described in detail. The axe was at
work on the doors as if men were cutting down trees in a wood ; the
ornaments were smashed, just as "images" were in a.d. 1536-1539 ;
some part of the Temple was set on fire — perhaps the woodwork which
had been cut down with axes and biUs ; the sanctuary was wholly
(= to the ground) defiled, not only by the entrance of the unhallowed
feet of the heathen, but also by the setting up of their ensigns. These
may have been their own idols, or altars (" the abomination of desola
tion," Dan. 8"). Duhm suspects vv. 5 and 6 to be an early insertion
on account of their prosaic character.
9. Duhm, foUowing BickeU, extrudes 9 6 on the ground that in
the Maccabean troubles men were clearly not of the opinion that the
age of the Prophets was over. But what 1 Mace. 4**, 14*' say is not
that the age was over but that just then there were no prophets, which
is precisely what this verse says. But 9 c has much more the air of a
gloss, and as the verse is overcrowded it would seem better to omit the
last clause. Besides a gloss foUows, as a rule, not precedes what it
professes to explain. The how long ? of the gloss is reminiscent of the
similar question in Dan. 8" Indeed the Ps, and that chapter in
Daniel have many points in common. The signs of Israel which were
no more to be seen were the Law, the sacrifices, the Sabbath, Circum
cision, &c.
11, Cf. Lam. 2'.
12. The LXX justify the our King, and Thou Jah for Elohim is
probably the correct reading. In the midst of the earth. Cf Ex. 8".
13-17. An appeal to Jhvh's power as shown in the wonders of
creation — not in the deliverance from Egypt. The sea that was divided
was the primaeval sea (Gen. 1") ; the dragons were the monsters of the
deep, tamed by Jhvh s power (14 is, according to Hitzig, an inter
polation, and 14 b is in its present form without any certain meaning.
Cf. 8' ; Is. 51" ; Job 7'^ 9", 26"). In 15_ again the reference is not to the
drying up of the Jordan as an event in history, but to the power of
Jhvh in nature, as in 104'°. In 16 we have the work of the fourth day
of Creation and in 17 the promise to Noah in Gen. 8^. The borders of
the earth are the boundaries which the sea cannot transgress, Job 38*.
18-23 take up the prayer; since Jhvh's power is so great, and
since His enemies blaspheme, let Him arise and deliver His poor and
needy people.
18. Olshausen and Baethgen render : Think on what has just been

202 PSALMS [Lxxv. 1-7
said; The enemy reproaches, &c. Duhm (also Hitzig) says that
Remember this has no connection with what foUows, and emends the
text from z'k6r z6th think of this to b'kol z6th in spite of this. In 18 b
a foolish people suggests irresistibly the play on the name of Antiochus
Epiphanes (= Antiochus Epimanes).
19. Turtledove. The dove was a symbol of Israel often in the
Talmud, but the history of the evolution of the symbol has not
survived. But cf 84'. In Daniel the world-kingdoms are symbolised
by beasts ; that of the saints by one in human form. The variation
here which gives a dove for one like unto a son of man in no way
negatives a connection of the two passages.
20. By a very slight change of b'ri6th the fat ones for b'rith the
ccmenant, by taking they are full in 20 a instead of 20 b, the verse
acquires a sense and connection which it lacks in the R.V. The hiding-
places are probably those to which the chasldim had fled. The word
abodes is not to be taken prosaically. 1 Mace. 1^' ; Is. 42'^
22. N4bh&l, foolish man = Antiochus Epimanes.
23 6 = the rioting in the Temple and Jerusalem,

PSALM LXXV.
For the chief Musician : Al-taschith : A Psalm of Asaph : A Song.
1 Unto thee, 0 God, do we give thanks,
We give thanks hand call upon thy name :H
We tell of thy wondrous works.
Jhvh speaks.
2 h" Though I set a time of delay -I
I will judge uprightly.
3 Though the earth and all the inhabitants thereof are dis
solved :
I hold up the pillars of it. Sdah.
4 I say unto the fools, ' Deal not foolishly ' :
And to the wicked, ' Lift not up the horn :
5 Lift not up your horn against Him on high :
Speak not h against the Rock.-!
6 For neither from the east, nor from the west,
Nor from the hills  '"
The Psalmist speaks.
1 God is judge :
He putteth down one, and setteth up another.

LXXV. 8-10] PSALMS 203
8 For in the hand of Jhvh there is a cup, and the wine is
red:
It is fuU of mixture ; and he poureth out from this to that :
The di-egs thereof, all the wicked of the earth shall wring
them out, and drink th£,m.
9 But I will hrejoiceH for ever :
I wiU sing praises to the God of Jacob.
10 All the horns of the wicked also will hheH cut off:
But the horns of the righteous shall be exalted.
According to Hitzig 1 Mace, 2*'* is a historic paraUel to vv. 4
and 5, and 1 Mace, S""- gives the historic occasion which gave this Ps.
birth. Moreover he selects Judas Maccabaeus as the author, and holds
it for certain that it is a song of victory, and that it was given its
present place with Ps. 76 as an antithesis to Ps. 74. Duhm, on the
other hand, regards it as a Ps. of somewhat artificial feeling, and
stilted style, in which the author tries to calm the impatience of those
who were growing tired of waiting for an eschatological change for the
better. He is correct in his depreciation of the style : the abrupt way
in which Jhvh is introduced as speaker in v. 2 is faulty from the
hterary point of view, and the connection of thought, though to be
discovered, is obscure. The text has suffered more than that of most
Pss., but can be emended with some confidence.
1 b. For Thy name is near = v'kar6b sh'mechi ; read instead
v'ki,ri,nft bish'mechi, we call upon Thy name. Similarly (in 1 c) by a
n4n losing its place Men tell should be emended into We tell.
2-3 are words put without any warning into the mouth of Jhvh.
The sense is clear enough where the whole context is borne in mind.
It is that of Hab. 2' (cf Ps. 102" ; Dan, 8"), The judgment "is yet for
an appointed time, but at the end it shaU speak and not lie : though
it tarry wait for it ; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."
Though the earth be convulsed, yet Jhvh sitteth above the storm.
Pss. 46'' ', 29'° The kl in 2 a introduces a concessive clause and
governs 3 also. The Selah at the close of v. 3 suggests the closing of
the words of Jhvh. So Baethgen, Most commentators however make
them run to the end of v. 6,
4, As Johnson said once to Boswell, "Let us be serious, for here
comes a fool."
The horn. Cf Deut. 33". The image is taken from nature. As
a wild bull of Basan when he throws his head aloft in conscious
strength or ferocity so is the arrogant man. To lift up the horn (= "to
lift up the head" in 83^, Job 10'°) occurs here for the first time in the
Psalter and again in 89"- ^, 92'°, 148'*. Cf 1 Mace. 2*« ; Job 16'".
5. In 5 6 the with a stiff neck of R.V. is rendered by the LXX
against God, and since they translate tzflr, rock, as a divine title by
God as a rule, they must have read batztzHr instead of b'tzavvar.

204 PSALMS [Lxxvi. 1-8
Usage is in favour of this reading. But in that case the paraUelism^ of
Hebrew poetry requires a similar idea in 5 a and therefore Iamm4r6m
(R.V, on higK) must be given as above,
6 is a sentence containing the protasis, bub not the apodosis. The
Targum saw here an enumeration of the four quarters of the heaven ;
hence midbar (= the desert of the south) and harlm (=the hiUs, i.e. of
the north) are to be regarded as definitions of place put side by side
without grammatical connection. The R.V,, lifting up, for h§,rim is a
desperate expedient to fill a hiatus.
7 = the delayed judgment promised in 2. The wicked are put
down ; those true to Jhvh are lifted up.
8 seems to contain two distinct ideas, viz. the cup of fate, and the
cup of judgment, or rather, the ancient cup of fate has received an
ethical use. It is a cup which foams, and is mixed with roots of all
sorts, and Jhvh pours it out to this nation and to that in their turn
(mizzeh lizeh, following LXX ; cf Jer, 25"- '^). But for "the wicked of
the earth" (almost a technical term in opposition to "the meek ofthe
earth," 76" ; c£ 101') the dregs alone are reserved. Hitzig sees in
sh'm4rey4h (dregs) a play on the word Samaria, 1 Kings 16^"*.
9. For / will declare of R. V. = aggld read 3.gll, / will rejoice.
10, If the first person of R,V. is retained then we may perhaps
assent to Duhm's picture of Judas Maccabaeus brandishing his sword
as he threatens to do what his history records that he did. Rosen-
muUer and Ewald, however, regard Israel coUectively as the speaker.
Olshausen thinks that God is. The simplest course is to correct the
first person into the third.
PSALM LXXVI.
For the chief Musician : on Neginoth : A Psalm of Asaph : A Song.
1 In Judah is God known :
His name is great in Israel.
2 At Salem also is his tabernacle.
And his dwelling place in Zion.
3 There brake he the arrows of the bow.
The shield, and the sword, and the battle. Selah.
4 hFearful art thou [[and excellent]] from the eternal hills.-!
5 The stouthearted are spoiled, they have slept their sleep :
And none of the men of might have found their hands.
6 At thy rebuke, 0 God of Jacob,
Both the chariot and horse are cast into a dead sleep.
7 Thou, even thou, art to be feared :
And who may stand in thy sight '"when once thou art angry ?"'
8 Thou didst cause judgment to be heard from heaven :

LXXVI. 8-12] PSALMS 205
The earth feared, and was still,
9 When God arose to judgment,
To save aU the meek of the earth. Selah.
10 All the nations of men shall praise thee :
The remainder of them shall feast thee.
11 Vow, and pay unto Jhvh your God :
Let aU that be round about him bring presents unto Him
that is on higL
12 He shaU cut off the spirit of princes :
He is terrible to the kings of the earth.
Jhvh has manifested Himself in Judah, routed the foe, ended the
war, crippled the enemy. How terrible is He, and how politic it would
be for the surrounding nations to pay Him homage through gifts to
His people !
The Ps. is akin to 46 and 48, was written somewhere about B.C. 168,
and celebrates one of the Maccabean victories, before defeat had intro
duced any doubt of the ultimate issue into the hearts of the chasidlm.
In tone, and here and there in phraseology, it resembles apocalyptic
literature. Hitzig refers 75 to the overthrow of Apollonius, and this
to the defeat of Seron (1 Mace. 3'°*). In favour of this identification
is the fact that the suddenness of the attack deprived Seron's army of
its superiority (5), and that the battle was fought on the hills whence
Seron was driven into the plains.
1. Is known, n6d^ = 48'. The doubt as to Jhvh's personal pres
ence in their midst, which the developed doctrine of His transcendency
had suggested, had been dissipated by the recent victory. See Intro
duction to 74.
2 = in spite of the occupation of Jerusalem by the Syrians, Seron's
defeat had proved that Jhvh still dwelt in it. Not only had Salem
and Zion become His abode in ancient days, they were so still.
3, 4. Hitzig transposes these verses, so as to get a better sense for
sh4mmdh, there, in v. 4. Duhm reads shi,m hish'blth for sh^mm^h
shibbar, a slight change which makes the verb fit better its triple
object. Shdm either (a) means that Jerusalem was where the fight
took place, or else {b) it must be rendered as = mishshi,m, from those.
(a) would, of course, exclude Seron's defeat.
The arrows of the bow. Jerome renders " volatilia arcus " (cf. 91").
Rish'phgi, arrows, is literally ^awes, and is the name of the Phoenician
sun-god = Phoehos ApoUo, Arrows and lightning are interchangeable
as figures of speech.
4. N§,6r = glorious (R.V.) must be emended by n6ri,, fearful. The
word occurs again in 8 and 13 and in Ex. 15". The excellent (R.V.)
= addir is a gloss on n6rS,, which the differences among the older inter
preters show to have been a stumbling-block.

206 PSALMS [Lxxvn. 1-2
From the eternal hills. The R.V. mountains of prey is justified by
the Hebrew text. But Hitzig is doubtiess right in regarding tereph
{prey) as a gloss for ad {eternal) — especially as the LXX read the latter
word, and it has also the double meaning of prey and eternal Cf
Hab. 3'; Gen. 49=='. ^ ¦, ¦ ,.
5 fits exactly the condition in which Seron's army found itself
when taken by surprise, and unable to use their arms. Hitzig quotes
Sallustius, Jugurtha, c. 99 : " Neque fugere, neque arma capere, neque
omnino facere aut providere quicquam poterant."
6. Chariot and horse, by metonymy for their riders. Qy. "Were
chariots in use in the Syrian Wars?
7 6. The M.T, can be supported by analogy with Ruth 2' and
Jer. 44", but Gratz, Noldeke, and Duhm read mi6z for mSoz =for the
strength of thy anger.
8. The transcendency of Jhvh asserts itself against the indweUing
in Jerusalem of 1-3.
9 b. Cf 75'°.
10 a has in R.V. an improbable sense and 10 b no sense. The
thought seen in 10a that "he laughs best who laughs last" is of
course, as Ewald holds, simple enough, but what is meant by Jhvh
being "girded with the residue of wrath" ? The LXX put us on the
right track, 'ihej TeB,d shall feast thee. Who? Surely the surrounding
peoples of 11, But umm6th, nations, is then a natural correction of
chamath, wrath, which satisfies tbe context as no other explanation
yet suggested does. So elated were the Maccabeans that they were not
content with liberty of prophesying and worshipping ; they looked to
political supremacy even over the surrounding nations. When that
expectation was the leading aim of the Asmonaean rulers — and it
became so even in the days of Judas — the religious movement had
become of the earth earthy.
11 b. For lammorg,, him that ought to be feared (R.V,), I propose
ffoUowing 75'") to read lamm^rdm, him that is on high. In 56^ A,V,
(but not R.V.) translates Mfi,r&m 0 Thou most High. (Duhm would
read I'nSri, — see note on 4 above.)
The whole Ps. is noteworthy for its eschatological colouring (as
indeed are 73 and 75), and forms a link between the prophetic teaching
of a Kingdom of God to be set up on earth, and the apocal5rptic of a
Kingdom of the other world, to be introduced by a decisive world-
judgment.
PSALM LXXVII.
For the chief Musician : to Jeduthun : A Psalm of Asaph.
1 I cry unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice,
that he may give ear unto me.
2 In the day of my trouble I seek the Lord :
My hhand is stretched out-l in the night, and hslacks-l not:

LXXVIL 2-18] PSALMS 207
My soul refuses to be comforted.
3 I remember God, and am troubled :
I complain, and my spirit is overwhelmed. Selah.
4 Thou boldest mine eyes waking :
I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
5 I consider the days of old :
The years of ancient times I caU to remembrance.
6 ([My song in the night :]]
I commune with mine own heart :
And my spirit makes diligent search.
7 WiU the Lord cast off for ever ?
And wUl he be favourable no more?
8 Is his mercy clean gone for ever ?
Doth his promise fail for evermore?
9 Hath God forgotten to be gracious ?
Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.
10 And I said. This is my infirmity :
hThat the right hand of the Most High has changed.-!
11 ''I wiU remember the works of Jhvh :
Surely I will remember thy wonders of old.
12 I wiU meditate also of aU thy work,
And talk of thy doings."'
13 Thy way, 0 God, hwas in hoUnessH :
Who is so great a God as our God?
14 Thou art God : thou doest wonders :
Thou hast declared thy strength among the peoples.
15 Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people.
The sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.

16 The waters saw thee, 0 God,
The waters saw thee ; they were afraid :
The depths also were troubled.
17 The clouds poured out water :
The skies sent out a sound :
Thine arrows also went abroad,
18 The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven :
The Ughtnings lightened the world :

208 PSALMS [LXXVIL 18-20
The earth trembled and shook.
19 Thy way is in the sea,
And thy path in the great waters.
And thy footsteps are not known.

20 Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses
and Aaron.
There is no apparent reason for the conclusion of Baethgen (he
speaks of it as a recognised fact), Hitzig and others that the "I " of
this Ps. is the people of Israel. Olshausen is more cautious in his
remark that it has "a thoroughly national attitude." As in similar
cases I take it to be first an individual utterance, that is to say, of one
who spoke for himself — but for bis larger self, that which embraced his
people as a living part of his own personality. Afterwards when the
authorities were drawing up a Hymn Book they adopted such privately
composed hymns as seemed to them capable of a corporate application,
just as we do nowadays. But even a modern hymn writer when he puts
his own feelings into verse feels always that they are valuable only in so
far as they are typical, that is, so far as he himself has a representative
character. The difference between this standpoint and that of Baethgen
is more important than it seems. Mutatis mutandis it lies at the root
of the divergence between the Roman and the Protestant systems. In
the Ps. before us, at any rate, is no single expression which compels us
to put the corporate authorship in the first place.
The singer is in dire straits, and finds his only consolation in the
thought of the great deeds of Jhvh in the past. These two contrasted
thoughts fill vv. 1-15 and 20. Verses 16-19 are an interpolation, for
which Hab, 3*' '"' "¦ " provided the material. Perhaps they occupy the
place of a conclusion which has somehow been lost.
Pss. 75 and 76 go together as songs of victory — the only songs
of the kind in Book iii. 74 and 77 also go together as songs of
affliction. 1. The cohortative verb shows that the singer is not saying what
he has done, as A.V. says, but what he wiU do, or, better stiU, what his
custom is and will be.
2. In the day, and in the night are excised by Duhm as overloading
the verse and as heing favourite additions by later hands. But the
text in 2 and 3 is very difficult, and its correction must be a matter of
pure conjecture, Duhm's proposal is to correct these two verses by the
aid of 11 and 12, on the supposition that 2 and 3 stood on the same
level in one column as 11 and 12 in another, and that they have
become mixed. But his emendations want in certainty what they have
in interest. Perhaps the best resource is to follow Olshausen in trans
ferring V. 5 to follow V. 9. But this stiU leaves the main difficulty
unsolved.

LXXVIL] PSALMS 209
5. / call to remembrance = ez'k^r^h certainly belongs to 5 6 as in
the text. The years of ancient times do I call to remernbrance. Then
"my song in the night," which, as it stands in R.V., hardly seems to
have any meaning, must be omitted as extra sensum,
7-9 state the question into which 6 6 says diligent search was
made = WiU Jhvh do again what He did in days of yore? He was
gracious and merciful then; "wiU He be so again? We seem to be
admitted into the searchings of heart of a man who would fain cling to
the old truth of Jhvh's presence in the midst of His people, but is
crushed by the new doctrine of His transcendency. The sting of his
doubt lies in the suspicion that Jhvh's sympathy, once so nearly and
clearly shown, has been taken away because He has had enduring
cause to " shut it up." We perhaps, as students of history, may
rather conclude that the new doctrine had sapped the old, but had not
yet so fuUy established itself as to have supplied such an answer as
Messianism soon learned to give.
10. Having considered the case the Psalmist says inuch what
Hamlet did in the words : "The time is out of joint." Whatever the
cause, it is my misfortune that the right hand of the Most High is no
longer manifested as it used to be.
11, 12. See note on 2 and 3 above.
13. R.V. in the sanctuary for bakk6desh does not fit the context.
It is Jhvh's wonderful doings in the past that is the general thought
in these verses. " The presence of Jhvh made the time in the wilder
ness a continuous act of worship."
13 b should surely be rendered :
What god is great as Jhvh is?
14 a. It is stiU Jhvh's power, not as in earher (and later) times
His kindness, which is the stay of the sufferer. The clause suggests
EUjah's chaUenge "If Jhvh be God, follow Him," 1 Kings 18"', and
the Mussulman's There is no God but God.
With Wellhausen omit the article before God (h§,el) and read Thou
art God.
15. Jacob and Joseph = Israel and Judah = the whole nation. So
m Obad. 18. But cf note, 81".
16-19 are admittedly foreign to the rest of the Ps. They read as
a fragment of a hymn of Jhvh's power in Nature, inserted here as an
elaboration of 14 a. That the storm was regarded in early days as
Jhvh in His manifestation is shown by many passages, e.g. Ps. 29, and
the wonders attending the giving of the Law on Sinai, If any historical
occasion is referred to here its record has been lost. But it is perhaps
a poetic setting of Jhvh's traditional Self-revelation in the thunder
storm — a compressed Ps. 29.
20 follows on 15 immediately, but is a very abrupt ending. We
should expect a final appeal based on the recital of Jhvh's wonders.
Its absence gives cause for suspicion that the text has suffered by
curtailment, as weU as in other ways.
c. 14

210 PSALMS [LXXVIIL 1-13
PSALM LXXVIIL
Maschil of Asaph,
1 Give ear, 0 my people, to my law :
Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
2 I will open my mouth in a parable :
I will utter dark sayings of old :
3 Which we have heard and known.
And our fathers have told us.
4 We will not hide them from their children,
Shewing to the generation to come the praises of Jhvh,
and his strength and his wonderful works that he hath
done.
5 For he established a testimony in Jacob,
And appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our
fathers,
That they should make them known to their children :
6 That the generation to come might know th£m, even the
children which should be born :
Who should arise and declare them to their children :
7 That they might set their hope in God,
And not forget the works of God,
But keep his commandments :
8 And might not be as their fathers,
A stubborn and rebellious generation :
A generation that set not their heart aright.
And whose spirit was not stedfast with God.
9 The children of Ephraim hwere a treacherous bow: -I
They turned back in the day of battle.
10 They kept not the covenant of God,
And refused to walk in his law :
11 And forgat his works,
And his wonders that he had shewed them.
12 MarveUous things did he in the sight of their fathers,
In the land of Egypt, in the fleld of Zoan.
13 He divided the sea, and caused them to pass through :
And he made the waters to stand as an heap.

LXXVIIL 14-30] PSALMS 211
14 In the daytime also he led them with a cloud.
And aU the night with a Ught of fire.
15 He clave rocks in the wilderness,
And gave them h water as rivers in the desert.-!
16 He brought streams also out of the rock,
And caused waters to run down like rivers.
17 But they sinned yet more against him :
They provoked the Most High in the wilderness.
18 And they tempted God in their heart :
They asked meat for their lust.
19 Yea, they spake against God :
They said, "Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?
20 Behold, he smote the rock, that the waters gushed out.
And the streams overflowed :
Can he give bread also ?
Can he provide flesh for his people?"
21 Therefore [Jhvh heard this, and was wroth : so]]
A flre was kindled against Jacob,
And anger also came up against Israel :
22 Because they believed not in God,
And trusted not in his salvation :
23 Then he commanded the clouds from above :
He opened the doors of heaven :
24 He rained down manna upon them to eat :
He gave them of the corn of heaven.
25 Man did eat food hof the mighty ones :-l
He sent them meat to the full.
26 He caused an east wind to blow in the heaven :
By his power he brought in the south wind.
27 He rained flesh also upon them as dust,
And feathered fowls like as the sand of the sea :
28 And he let it faU in the midst of their camp,
Round about their habitations.
29 So they did eat, and were well filled :
For he gave them their own desire :
30 [[They were not estranged from their lust.]]
But while their meat was yet in their mouths, 14—2

212 PSALMS [LXXVIIL 31-46
31 The wrath of God came upon them,
And slew the fattest of them,
And smote down the chosen men of Israel.
32 For aU this they sinned still,
And beUeved not for his wondrous works.
33 Therefore their days did he consume in vanity,
And their years in trouble.
34 When he slew them, then they sought him :
And they returned and enquired early after God.
35 And they remembered that God was their rock,
And the high God their redeemer.
36 Nevertheless they did flatter him with their mouth,
And they lied unto him with their tongues.
37 For their heart was not right with him.
Neither were they faithful to his covenant.
38 But he, being full of compassion, forgave their iniquity, and
destroyed them not :
Yea, many a time turned he his anger away,
And did not stir up all his wrath.
39 For he remembered that they were hut flesh :
A wind that passeth away, and cometh not again.
40 How oft did they provoke him in the wUderness,
And grieve him in the desert !
41 Yea, they turned back and tempted God,
And '"limited"' the Holy One of Israel.
42 They remembered not his hand,
Nor the day when he delivered them from the enemy.
43 How he had wrought his signs in Egypt,
His wonders in the fleld of Zoan :
44 And had turned their rivers into blood :
And their floods, that they could not drink.
45 He sent divers sorts of flies among them, which devoured
them :
And frogs, which destroyed them.
46 He gave also their increase unto the caterpiUer,
And their labour unto the locust.

LXXVIIL 47-63] PSALMS 213
47 He destroyed their vines with hail.
And their sycomore trees with '"frost."'
48 He gave up their cattle also to the hail.
And their flocks to hot thunderbolts.
49 [He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger.
Wrath, and indignation, and trouble,
By sending evil angels among them.
50 He made a way to his anger :
He spared not their soul from death.
But gave their life over to the pestilence :]
51 And smote aU the firstborn in Egypt :
The chief of their strength in the tabernacles of Ham :
52 But he made his own people to go forth like sheep,
And guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
53 And he led them on safely, so that they feared not :
But the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
54 And he brought them to the border of his sanctuary,
Even to this mountain, which his right hand had purchased.
55 He cast out the heathen also before them,
And divided them an inheritance by line.
And made the tribes of Israel to dweU in their tents.
56 Yet they [[tempted andj provoked the most high God,
And kept not his testimonies :
57 But tumed back, and dealt unfaithfully like their fathers :
They were tumed aside Uke a deceitful bow.
58 For they provoked him to anger with their high places,
And moved him to jealousy with their graven images.
59 When God heard this, he was wroth.
And greatly abhorred Israel :
60 So that he forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh,
The tent which he placed among men :
61 And delivered his strength into captivity,
And his glory into the enemy's hand.
62 He gave his people over also unto the sword :
And was wroth with his inheritance.
63 Fire consumed their young men :
Their maidens were not given to marriage.

214 PSALMS [LXXVIIL 64-72
64 Their priests fell by the sword :
And their widows made no lamentation.
65 Then the Lord awaked as one out of sleep,
Like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine.
66 And he smote his enemies in the hinder parts :
He put them to a perpetual reproach.
67 Moreover he refused the tabernacle of Joseph,
And chose not the tribe of Ephraim :
68 But chose the tribe of Judah,
Mount Zion which he loved.
69 And he built his sanctuary like high places.
Like the earth which he hath estabUshed for ever.
70 He chose David also his servant,
And took him from the sheepfolds :
71 From following the ewes great with young he brought him
To feed Jacob his people, and Israel his inheritance.
72 So he fed them according to the integrity of his heart :
And guided them by the skilfulness of his hands.
Ps, 78 is closely related to Pss. 106-107, It comes from an age
when the Law was cherished as Israel's most priceless treasure by the
circle to which the Psalmist belonged, and yet was neglected by a large
number of those to whom it was given. But who were these latter ?
It is easy to reply that they are " the people of the land," the masses
who had no time to study the sacred law, and perhaps, like the majority
of people in all ages, were willing to take the chance of things coming
out right for them somehow, sooner or later. But how then are we to
explain w. 9 and 67? What was the parable, what were the dark
sayings that the writer promises in his opening words ? There was
nothing of the nature of an enigma in the general proposition that old
Israel had been a rebellious and stiff-necked generation. The fact was
writ large in the canon of Holy Scripture. If this is all that the Ps.
has to say then we must treat the introduction as bombast, and vv. 9
and 67 as written currente calamo.
But such treatment would miss the point of the mi,shlll which the
singer indites. The contrary view of the introduction and vv. 9 and
67 gives the Ps, its value and most of its interest. Ephraim, i.e. the
Northem Kingdom, had always been a thorn in Judah's side. It had
revolted under Jeroboam ; set up a rival kingdom and a rival cult.
The Samaritan heresy was as objectionable to later piety as Jeroboam's
schismatic worship at Dan and Bethel had been to earlier. But it was
a new doctrine that Ephraim's perversity had been innate from the

LXXVIIL] PSALMS 215
Exodus onwards, that its later aberrations were but the outcome of a
congenital self-wiU. That is the m§,shi,l of the Psalmist. Such a
doctrine could not but be pleasing to orthodox circles in Judaea. The
history of the past was very often an unpleasing one. If it could be
shown that it was the Ephraimite strain in the nation's blood which
was the root of its former backslidings, the schismatics and heretics
would be suitably judged, and yet the history would be as valuable as
ever for warning. The children of Zion were to see by Ephraim's bad
example how dangerous was neglect of the Law of Moses, The line of
argument is similar to that of Roman Catholics when they warn their
children against disobedience to the Church by pointing to the divisions
amongst Protestants as the awful consequence of private judgment in
religion, Ps. 78 is interesting from another point of view. It is not merely
a transcript from ancient history. It is also a haggadistic version of it.
The Jewish hagg^di,h was a narrative which freely used the Law and
the Prophets for ethical and religious purposes. It did not profess to
be history in the modern sense of that word, but to be doctrinal
teaching using history without special regard to its actuality. The
Book of Jubilees, for example, builds on Genesis, but adds, omits and
alters, as was required by its purpose. The importance of this branch of
Jewish hterature for N,T. exegesis has not been generally recognised
as it deserves. Ps, 78 may be regarded as, for example, an early
forerunner of St Paul's haggadistic treatment of the rock in the
wilderness, of Sarah and Hagar, and of Abraham's faith. Ps, 78 does
not stick to the account in Exodus when it describes the 10 plagues ;
it exaggerates the history in vv. 15, 47 and gives touches in 25 and
46 which show that the fancy of the writer was at the service of his
faith. As the notes wiU show there are numerous " atomistic " citations in
the Ps. which show that its author was familiar with our O.T. as a whole.
1. Cf 49*; Deut. 32'. MS.shai parable, and chldah riddle, are
paraUel terms. The former denotes any kind of gnomic utterance
longer or shorter, and the latter states a thesis in veiled language
which the reader's ingenuity has to solve. According to Jiilicher, the
former is the parent of our Lord's parables, and the latter of the
aUegories in the Gospels. Hibbi^, utter, denotes a volume of poetic
fervour and recalls Horace's
Pervet immensusque ruit profundo
Pindarus ore. Carmin. ii. 9.
3 = 44'. The whole verse (which is itself an adjectival clause to
chld6th in 2) states the object to the verb hide.
4. The writer says their children, not our children, because he
desires to emphasise the course of tradition, and not his duty to his
own chUdren. Job 15".
5, 6 are a restatement of 3, 4. The testimony, ^d&th = the De
calogue, and the lom, T6r^h = the whole system of legal ordinances.

216 PSALMS [LXXVIIL
Cf Deut. 4"''°; Ex. 12='. Baethgen would take the clause even the
children which should be born with 6 b. This gives a less frigid sense.
8-11 is the first of five minor episodes in the Ps. which are con
trasted with those which sing in a major key of Jhvh's strength and
wondrous works.
86 = Deut. 32"; 8c implies after their heart aright the words
towards Jhvh. 1 Sam. 7'; v. 37 below.
9. Hupfeld, Hitzig, and Baethgen omit this as a gloss suggested
by V. 57, because the Ephraimites are not in question, but Israel as a
whole. But see Introduction. Olshausen says that the allusion is
figurative, and is explained in the next verse. But if we retain the
R,V. reading it is not clear why the weapon of the Ephraimites is
specified. But in fact 57 is a doublet and apparently should be read
in 9. Ephraim is again so described in Hos. 7'^. Is not the Book
of Judges (with the exception of the story of Othniel) one long com
mentary on Ephraim's perverseness ?
11 is the summary introduction to
12-16, 23-29, 43-55, 65-72, which sections describe Jhvh's
doings from the Exodus onwards. Two verses are assigned to the
miraculous supply of water, corresponding to the two accounts of it in
Ex. 17 and Num. 20 respectively.
In 15 b Gratz reads arg,bah for rabb8,h, the desert for abundantly.
17-22= the people's rebeUion in the wilderness. BickeU and
Duhm suspect v. 19 as an interpolation, but without sufficient reason ;
cf Num, 25'. But the phrase prepare a table had a religious appUca
tion (Ps. 23^), and hence there is some ground for Duhm's suspicion
that the Psalmist is thinking of a rival cult, such as the Samaritans
had set up on Mount Gerizim. /
21 a is too long for one stichos, too short for two. Moreover, the
verse has three members instead of two. I omit it as an insertion
from 59. Hitzig omits the whole verse.
23-29, The miraculous feeding in the wilderness was a favourite
subject for Haggadi,h as is shown by 106*°, John 6", 1 Cor. 10*. The
story of Ex. 16* receives a new colouring by the rationalising explana
tion that what Jhvh gave was the heavenly ambrosia on which the
angels = the mighty ones (abblrim) lived. The gift of quails could be
more readily explained by secondary causes, just as the passage
through the Red Sea has been, and did not, therefore, lend itself so
easily to elaboration. Yet even here, though the winds have been
given as the instrument, in u 27 the phrase rained is used of the
quails as of the manna. The connecting formula is supplied by the
Book of Enoch which sees rain, hail, snow and winds as all stored up in
heaven. If the wind was set loose from heaven (so LXX) then the
quails might be said to be rained from heaven,
30-3'7. The third time that the waywardness of the b'ngl
Ephraim is emphasised,
30 a must be excised, and 31 a will then form the second clause of
30, so preserving the balance. 34 a = Num. 21". Duhm says that 37
is an addition. But both 36 and 37 are clearly connected, and both

LXXVIIL] PSALMS 217
introduce the alien thought of a more prosaic scribe. If 36 and 37
are original then they supply a reason against the compassion spoken
of in 38.
38-39, Another interlude of Divine compassion. The thought of
39 is that of Ps. 90, Job 4"*, Is. 40«-^
40-42. The fourth lamentation ; 40 = Is. 63". 41 refers to the
period of the Judges, when the lessons of the wilderness were forgotten.
43-55 take up in more detail the Egyptian wonders touched on in
V. 12. The Psalmist has little regard for chronological proprieties, but
goes back from the wilderness and the Judges to Egypt, and takes the
plagues in an order of his own. The caterpillar of 46 is not named
in Ex. 10. Frost {v. 47) is a doubtful word, and analogy suggests
lightning. 49 and 50 are also an interpolation, both breaking up the
context, and contradicting it. It is not God's anger against the
Egyptians which is the subject of the section, but His signs, as being
phenomena which ought to have converted the Israelites, seeing that
immediately afterwards God "led them forth like sheep." We can,
therefore, regard 49 and 50 as the tasteless additions of a scribe.
51-55. The Exodus and the settlement in Canaan are now
adduced as further instances of Jhvh's "wondrous works." 54 is
borrowed from Ex. 15", and Zion (as Olshausen rightly sees) is the
mountain, not mountain-land in general (with Duhm and Hitzig).
Ewald thinks of ShUoh, but the context in both cases leaves no doubt
that, in spite of the anachronism, Zion is referred to.
To dwell in their tents (55 c)=to possess the land in peace (Gen. 9^).
56-64 go back to the main proposition of 9 which it has been the
object of 9-42 to iUustrate. The high places and graven images of 58
supply incidental proof that the "treacherous bow" of Ephraim is the
object of the Psalmist's censure. These were the special offence of
the Northem Kingdom in the eyes of the later orthodox writers.
Baethgen, however, in 59 sees all the tribes under the term Israel,
because the punishment did not faU on Ephraim alone, and because
(though Shiloh was in Ephraim's land) it was tho general sanctuary of
all the tribes. This latter statement hardly requires refutation, and
62, to which Baethgen refers, does not support his former assertion.
The story of 1 Sam. 1-6 is clearly used by the Psalmist as a final proof
of Ephraim's demerits. The ark fell into the Philistines' hands, and
Hophni and Phinehas were slain (the want of lamentation by the widow
= 1 Sam. 4^). The fire of 63 is figurative (Olshausen).
65-72. Pinal solution of the "dark saying." History had at last
completed its tale. Ephraim had been tried and found wanting.
Jhvh's enemies were smitten but Ephraim was rejected, Zion chosen
and the dynasty of David established. Jeroboam's sin " with which he
made Israel to sin" the Psalmist, like the author of the Book of Kings,
says was the root of Israel's troubles and was perpetuated by the Samari
tans. But its consequence was to cause Ephraim to go under, and to
endow Zion with the permanency of the mountains. " Salvation is of
the Jews," is the summary of the whole Ps.

218 PSALMS [lxxix. i-13
PSALM LXXIX.
A Psalm of Asaph,
1 0 God, the heathen are come into thine inheritance :
Thy holy temple have they defiled :
They have laid Jerusalem on heaps.
2 The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat
unto the fowls of the heaven.
The flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth.
3 Their blood have they shed like water round about Jeru
salem :
And there was none to bury them.
4 We are become a reproach to our neighbours,
A scorn and derision to them that are round about us.
5 How long, Jhvh ? wilt thou be angry for ever ?
Shall thy jealousy burn like fire ?
6 Pour out thy wi'ath upon the heathen that know thee not.
And upon the kingdoms that call not upon thy name.
7 For they have devoured Jacob,
And laid waste his dwelUng place.
8 0 remember not against us former iniquities :
Let thy tender mercies speedily prevent us :
For we are brought very low.
9 Help us, 0 God of our salvation, for the glory of thy name :
And deliver us, and purge away our sins, for thy name's sake.
10 Wherefore should the heathen say.
Where is their God?
Let there be known among the heathen in our sight
The revenging of the blood of thy servants which is shed.
11 Let the sighing of the prisoner come before thee:
According to the greatness of thy power preserve thou those
that are appointed to die :
12 And render unto our neighbours sevenfold into their bosom
Their reproach, wherewith they have reproached thee, 0
Lord.
13 So we thy people and sheep of thy pasture
Will give thee thanks for ever :
We will shew forth thy praise to all generations.

LXXIX.] PSALMS 219
Of the two dates which have been assigned to this Ps., viz. that
when Jernsalem was destroyed by the Chaldeans, and that of the
troubles of the Maccabean age, the latter alone agrees with the data
suppUed by the Ps, Of this it is true that the blood of the chasidlm
was shed round about Jerusalem, and not of that ; besides the Ps.
contains no word which speaks of any kind of war, but only of
slaughter of the helpless. Moreover, v. 3 is cited in 1 Mace. 7" (if
not as canonical Scripture, yet at all events as an authority), as
referring directly to the Maccabean period. The only difficulty, in
fact, in dating the Ps, comes from this very citation. 1 Mace, was
not written before the days of John Hjrrcanus, and most commentators
are agreed in referring the slaughter mentioned here to the ferocity
of the high-priest Alcimus. We must conclude, therefore, that the
author of 1 Mace, thought a late, or what was practically a contem
porary document, of sufficient importance to be quoted. Probably,
the explanation is that the author was known to him as being
officiaUy a guarantee that his words would carry weight. All the
characteristic features of the picture painted in the Ps., the desolation
of the Temple City, the bloodshedding, and the reproaches levelled
against Jhvh are repeated in 2 Mace. 8^"""*.
1-3. The g6im, lieathen, have laid waste Jerusalem, slain the
chasidlm, and left them unburied. Cf 1 Mace. 1".
4. It is Jhvh against whom the persecution is really directed.
His people are put to shame because of Him, and not vice versa. At
the time of the Chaldean War it was Jhvh "who pronounced the
evil " on Jerusalem (Jer. 40^). In the Maccabean outbreak the worship
of Jhvh was the direct point of attack. Verse 4 = Ps, 44" ; and v. 5 =
89*". In these and similar quotaitions we must aUow for the influence
of the oral teaching in the school of the scribes, for the common
practice of learning the lesson by heart, and, therefore, for the possi
bility of what seems to us a quotation being part of the mental stock
in trade of large circles of Judaism.
6-7 = Jer, 10^ The image occurs in Ps. 14*.
8, Rish6nlm may = (a) our earlier sins, or (b) the sins of those
earlier, viz. our forefathers. Verse 9 favours (a). But cf 44"~'* and
Jer, 11".
9-11. For Thy Name's sake in v. 9 is the ground of the appeal in
V. 10. Jhvh's Self-revelation to the Jews was of His own doing, and
who touches that touches Jhvh's honour. Yet the Syrians were
taunting the chasidlm, " Where is now your God?" This taunt occurs
again in 115^ ; cf 42' ; Mt. 27*^*- It appears that the time of Alcimus
was like that of the French Revolution ; many were killed, and many
others thrown into prison to await a decision which depended only on
the convenience of the ruling power. But Baethgen refers i,slr, the
prisoner, to the people as a whole.
12. Por the folded cloak into which gifts were put see Is. 66°' ' ;
Jer. 32" ; Lk. 6'=.
13 is a euphemistic liturgical appendix. Cf 2'^°.

220 PSALMS [lxxx. 1-14
PSALM LXXX.
For the chief Musician : to Shoshannim-Eduth : A Psalm of Asaph.
1 Give ear, 0 Shepherd of Israel,
Thou that leadest Joseph like a flock, give ear :
Thou that art enthroned upon the cherubim, hgive ear. -I
2 Shine forth before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh :
Stir up thy strength, and come and save us.
3 Turn us again, Jhvh [of Hosts] :
Cause thy face to shine ; and we shaU be saved.
4 Jhvh of hosts.
How long wilt thou be angry against the prayer of thy
people ?
5 Thou hast fed hus-l with the bread of tears :
And given us tears to drink in great measure.
6 Thou makest us a strife unto our neighbours :
And our enemies laugh among themselves.
7 Turn us again, Jhvh of hosts :
Cause thy face to shine ; and we shall be saved.
8 Thou didst bring a vine out of Egypt :
Thou didst cast out the nations and planted it in.
9 Thou preparedst room before it :
It took deep root, and it fiUed the land.
10 The hiUs were covered with the shadow of it.
And the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars.
11 She sent out her boughs unto the sea.
And her branches unto the river.
{Tu/rn us again, Jhvh of Hosts :
Cause thy face to shine, and we shall be saved!]
12 Why hast thou then broken down her hedges,
So that aU they which pass by the way do pluck her?
13 The boar out of the wood doth waste it.
And the wild beast of the field doth devour it.
[Turn us again, Jhvh of Hosts :
Cause thy face to shine, and we shall be saved.]
14 Look down from heaven, and behold, and visit this vine :

lxxx. 15-19] PSALMS 221
15 [[And the vineyard]]
Which thy right hand hath planted,
'"The branch that thou madest strong for thyself"'
16 It is burned with flre, it is cut down :
[[They perish at the rebuke of thy countenance.]]
17 Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand,
Upon the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself
18 So wUl not we go back from thee :
Quicken us, and we wiU caU upon thy name.
19 Turn us again, O Jhvh ][GodJ of hosts:
Cause thy face to shine ; and we shall be saved.
Ancient and modem commentators agree that this Ps. belongs to
the age of Antiochus Epiphanes, that he is the wild boar out of the
Syrian^ woods, and that the devastation of the people of Israel is his
handiwork. The LXX superscription, " Over the Assyrian," points in
the same direction. Baethgen, however, thinks this late date impos
sible because Ps. 89 *"- *' borrow v. 12 of this Ps. He forgets apparently
that a Ps. need not be old for another Ps. to borrow from it. See note
to Ps. 79*.
The Ps., as a whole, is a prayer for the reuniting of the twelve
tribes into one strong and homogeneous whole, and for their march to
victory under Jhvh's leadership, as they did in the distant days when
Joshua conquered Canaan.
1, 2. The verbs in these verses are better arranged as above, and
not as in R.V. The one give ear is best understood in the three
clauses of i;. 1. Israel and Joseph = the united twelve tribes ; cf 77'^,
81 ^ The Cherubim here are not the heavenly (Hitzig). It is true
that the earthly cherubim were the type of the heavenly, and were no
longer in existence, but the singer has the earlier state of things in his
mind, and reminds Jhvh of the times when the ark led the people
(1 Sam. 4* ; 2 Sam. 6? ; Num. 10'').
Why Benjamin is numbered in v. 2 and Judah omitted has puzzled
commentators. Duhm excises Benjamin as overloading the verse ;
Hitzig makes the three mentioned to be representatives of Gilead,
GaUlee, and Judaea, without giving any satisfactory reason for Benjamin
being chosen as the representative of the last. Baethgen thinks that
the singer was of the tribe of Judah, and meant the three tribes named
to stand for the Northern Kingdom as a whole : Olshausen would
supply Judah in the text. The true explanation surely is that the
author has still the early history in his mind, and is thinking of
Num. 2"~^, where the same three tribes are ranked together on the
west side of the camp, under " the standard of the camp of Ephraim."
3. Turn us again, i.e. not, bring us back from our exile, or from
our dispersion (see v. 6), but, restore us to our former state of prosperity.

222 PSALMS [LXXX.
Restore is used as in Dan. 9'^- Hitzig thinks of their being far from
Jhvh, and regards the petition as meaning that they desire to find
Him and His help again. He refers to 22"- ", 85^ See note to 14'.
The verse is alluded to in Psalms of Solomon 5'.
Cause thy face to shine = Num. 6"°.
The repeated assertion that the titie, 0 God, is strengthened into
0 God of Hosts in 7, and to Jhvh, God of Hosts in 19 (but cf 14), is
probably a fancy. The scribe has omitted the full form m 3, and has
accidentally kept the original Jhvh in 19. In any case, God of Hosts
is as impossible as 0 God, my God in 43 ^
5 b. In large measure = shMlsh = the third part of an ephah ;
here used as an adverbial accusative. Cf Is. 40"- For tears as meat,
see Ps. 42'-
6. Strife = mMon ; according to Baethgen an apple of discord,
i.e. between Syria and Egypt, but according to Hitzig an object of
attack. 8-11, The vine of Jhvh's planting. Cf Gen. 49'^ Hos. 10';
Jer. 2" ; Is. 3'*, 5'"'. Ceda/is of God in 10 6 = which God hath planted
(Hitzig), Num. 24'; cf Pss. 36" (= mountains of God), 37" (LXX).
For the whole section, cf Ezek, 17. (Some commentators give the
fanciful interpretation of the vine clasping the cedars of Lebanon.)
The image is a bold one, and, therefore, fitting, Jhvh's vine equals
His cedars for size and splendour.
11, The Mediterranean and the Euphrates were the ideal boundaries
of Israel. Deut, 11^.
After 11 insert the refrain which has dropped out accidentally, as
in Pss. 46 and 49.
12, 13. Vineyards were walled round ; Num. 22^; Is. 5° Theodore
of Mopsuestia suggested that by the wild boar was meant Antiochus
Epiphanes. The parallelism, however, is in favour of a collective
noun, and in that case we may safely refer the image to the Syrians in
general. 14-19. Duhm suspects that the final strophes of Pss. 79 and 80
have become mixed up, and certainly both have their difficulties. I
propose to complete the refrain in v. 14, to omit and the stock, to query
15 5 as a doubtful doublet to 17 b, and to omit 16 b as clearly out
of place. 17 seems to play upon Benjamin (Gen, 35'^) and Judah. If so, we
must for ish y'minechd read ben y'minechd, and see in the reference
to Judah a confirmation of Baethgen's hint that the singer belongs to
that tribe. It is tempting, but precarious, to see in the phrase son of
man a veiled reference to the Messiah. In the Blessing of Moses,
Deut. 33', Levi is called Z'sra's favoured one; in Ps, 110' a similarly
favoured one is placed at the right hand, and in 84° is called the
Anointed. Perhaps tbe verse contains a reference to a leader at the
time, whom we can no longer identify.

LXXXI. 1-14] PSALMS 223
PSALM LXXXI.
A.
For the chief Musician : to Gittith : of Asaph,
1 Sing aloud unto God our strength :
Make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.
2 Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel,
The pleasant harp with the psaltery.
3 Blow up the trumpet in the new moon,
hAt the fuU moon-l on our solemn feast day.
4 For this is a statute for Israel :
A law of the God of Jacob.
5 This he ordained '"in Joseph"' for a testimony,
'"When he went out through the land of Egypt:"'
B.
""I heard a language that I understood nof
6 " I removed his shoulder from the burden :
His hands were deUvered from the pots.
7 Thou caUedst in trouble, and I delivered thee :
I answered thee in the secret place of thunder :
P proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.'^
8 Hear, 0 my people, and I wiU testify unto thee :
0 Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me :
9 There shaU no strange god be in thee :
Neither shalt thou worship any strange god.
10 I am Jhvh thy God,
Which brought thee out of the land of Egypt :
Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.
11 But my people would not hearken to my voice :
And Israel would none of me.
12 So I gave them up unto their own hearts' lust :
They walked in their own counsels."
13 "Oh that my people would hearken unto me,
That Israel would walk in my ways !
14 I would soon subdue their enemies,
And turn my hand against their adversaries."

224 PSALMS [LXXXL 15-16
15 hHis haters -1 should submit themselves unto him :
hAnd his terror-) would endure for ever.
16 He would feed them also with the finest of the wheat :
And with honey out of the rock would he satisfy them.
That two independent fragments are here joined is asserted by
Olshausen and Duhm, and denied by Baethgen, but is obvious to any
reader who will fix in his mind the two parts of which our present Ps.
is composed. 1-5 are an invitation to celebrate the Peast of Taber
nacles, and 6-16 are a summons to serve Jhvh as the one and only
God. No inner connection exists between the two, and the probability
is that B was tacked on to A through the mention of the Exodus in
V. 5, and again in -y. 6. A.
The only doubt as to the object of this song is whether it was
meant for the Passover or the Feast of Tabernacles. The Targum says
that the new moon of v. 3 is that of Tisri (October), which month
began the civil year. The addition of the full moon in 3 6 also suits
this Feast better. The rams' horns were blown for the first day of that
Feast, at the new moon, and again on the 15th, at the fuU moon.
But according to Num. 10'° the trumpets were to be blown on days of
gladness, on solemn days, as weU as at the beginning of months ; and
according to Josephus {Bell. Jud. iv. 9, 12) the babbath was inaugurated
with the trumpet. Hitzig, for these reasons, prefers to think of the
Passover. Others refer to the Feast of Tabernacles {the Feast,
2 Chron. 6') ; cf Deut. 16'*. But the reference in v. 5 to the Feast
being instituted at the time of the Exodus is decisive for the
Passover. B.
The principal point in B is the warning against idolatry ('». 9).
Baethgen's remark that this song must be referred to the last days of
the monarchy, because no temptation to idolatry existed after the
Exile, overlooks the state of things in Judaea in the years preceding the
outbreak under Antiochus Epiphanes. A systematic attempt was made
by their Syrian masters to Hellenise the Jews. Culture was to super
sede Jhvh's religion, and serve the purpose of breaking down Jewish
separatism, and so make that troublesome nation fit for peaceful incor
poration into the Syrian empire. The scheme was politically wise, but
to the pious Jew it spelt idolatry. It is against the seducing allure
ments of this scheme that B was written. Culture and broad-minded
ness could offer many worldly advantages, and the Psalmist meets the
temptation by declaring that Jhvh could give all that heart could
wish, and would give it if Israel remained true to Him, and rejected
Hellenistic blandishments. Baethgen's remark that 14 and 15 do not
fit in with this date, again forgets that with prospects of worldly good
were mixed threats and force, whenever these were more effectual.

LXXXL] PSALMS 225
The author of B was well versed in his Scriptures and his poem is
steeped in their spirit; he uses, however, its phrases "atomistically."
1-5 b. In V. 1 the whole community is summoned to rejoice at the
Feast; in v. 2 the Levites (Ezra 3'°; 2 Chron. 6"^0 ; and in v. 3 the
priests (Num, 10'°; 2 Chron, 7^^), The statute for Israel in 4 refers
to the Feast, not to the trumpet-blowing.
Joseph and Israel are collocated in 77'^ 80'.
5 c. This is a fragment ; the exact beginning has apparently been
lost in fitting in the two poems into one another. Duhm, however,
has an interesting emendation of the text of 5, which gives the
following :
A testimony gave Jhvh to .lacob ;
In Joseph laid He it down ;
When he (= Jacob-Joseph) was drawn to Egypt
And heard a speech which he knew not.
But decisive against this is the fact that we have no record of any such
command being given when Jacob went to Egypt. Had we out of
Egypt instead of over to Egypt the correction would be irresistible.
Cheyne {Ency. Bibl. 2^^^) thinks that the mention of Joseph in
77'°, 80', side by side with Jacob or Israel is probably due to a corrup
tion ofthe text, and certainly so in 81°- In the latter he reads b'yad
Mdsheh, by the hand of Moses, for biyh6s^ph, in Joseph. But tempting
as this emendation may be, we seem barred from it by the fact that 5 b
is an almost verbatim quotation from Gen. 41*°, where it is Joseph (not
Elohim) who goes out over the land of Egypt. If, however, we give
weight to the fact that no such statute was given in Joseph (and was
given to Moses) we must then assume that the Psalmist quotes loosely,
and ascribes to Elohim (so Delitzsch, Hengstenberg, and others) what
Gen. 41*° said of Joseph. Then Cheyne's suggestion makes excellent
sense. 6-7. The gracious deeds of Jhvh should be a safeguard against
ingratitude. The secret place of the thunder = the storm-cloud which at
once concealed and revealed Jhvh (18"- "). After-ages found it natural
to refer to Jhvh Ely6n in terms drawn from the early days when He
was to His worshippers a storm-God.
7 c is out of place here, overfills the verse and is probably a
Haggadistic addition. In Ex. 17 it is the people who tried Jhvh.
Duhm would be inclined to transfer the clause to a place before 10 c.
It is simpler to omit it,
8-12 opens with the famous sh'mel of Deut. 6* (quoted by Jesus
Christ) and continues with 5°' ' of the same book. The promise in
10 c has an obvious application to the promises made by the Syrian
power to those who would accept its world-view as against Jhvh's.
11 and 12 in the same way seem to say that as Israel was in
bygone days so is he still. Priest and people are accepting Hellenistic
ways of thought and life, and Jhvh has, therefore, left them to their
devices. c, 15

226 PSALMS [LXXXli. 1-8
13-16, on the other hand, declare that prosperity would be the
result of faithfulness to Jewish national and religious traditions.
Israel would no longer be a people poor in power and resources, at
the mercy of the world-powers. Jhvh had left them, and, therefore,
they were impotent. With Him on their side they would be strong
against Syria, and every other nation ; from Him they would receive
all the good things ofthe earth promised in Deut. 6'.
In 15 a omit of ihe Lord of R.V., and in 15 b read chittim terror
for ittah time, which only confuses the meaning.
16 = Deut. 32"' '*
PSALM LXXXIL
A Psalm of Asaph.
1 God standeth in the congregation of the mighty :
He judgeth among the gods : —
2 " How long wiU ye judge unjustly.
And accept the persons of the wicked? Selah.
3 Defend the poor and fatherless :
Do justice to the afflicted and needy.
4 Deliver the poor and needy :
Rid them out of the hand of the wicked."
5 They know not, neither will they understand :
They walk on in darkness :
Therefore all the foundations of the earth are out of course.
6 hAs for me, I confess that-l ye are gods :
And aU of you sons of the Most High :
7 But ye shaU die like men, and fall like one of the hdemons.-!

8 Arise, 0 God, judge the earth :
For thou \-rulest-i all the nations.
The interpretation of this Ps, depends on the view we take of the
subject. "The gods" are by most commentators understood of the
heathen kings, or their officers, or both. This affords a close parallel
to Wisd, 6'~°. In that case no better date for the Ps. can be assigned
than that suggested by Hitzig, viz. B.o. 204, when Antiochus the Great
was approaching Palestine as the first step in his campaign against
Ptolemy V Epiphanes, the object of which was to partition the
Egyptian kingdom.
An older view, adopted by Hupfeld, Cheyne, and Bleek, is that the
"gods" are the guardian angels of the several kingdoms, and Dan. 10-12
is referred to in support of this theory. But the expression of v. 7,

LXXXIL] PSALMS 227
"Ye shall die like men," is aUeged as negativing this. How, it is
asked, can death be attributed to the angels ? This objection is based
on a prosaic habit of mind. Death, like all other words of human
speech, has at once a scientific and a rhetorical content, one original
and one derived. The Book of Enoch frequently refers to a judgment
on the angels, which is as death to them. For example: "And after
this, in the tenth week, in the seventh part, there will be the great
eternal judgment, in which He will execute vengeance amongst the
angels" (91'°). "Whosoever shall be condemned and from thence
forward be destroyed with them," &c. (10'*). The judgment passed
on the "Watchers," on those who defiled themselves with women, was
to be cast into everlasting fire when the great world-judgment took
place. Moreover, we must recollect that the angels who presided over
the nations were the ancient "gods of the nations" (Deut. 4", 29^°),
and as these came to be regarded as perished, and therefore mortal, so
no attribute of deathlessness necessarily attached itself to their suc
cessors. Jhvh alone was immortal. All other beings depended for
their life on His will. If they refused to perform what His will enjoined
on them, why should death itself be thought an impossible decree ? If
7 a is thought to be fatal to the suggestion that tutelary angels of the
nations are meant, 7 6 is equally fatal to any theory which makes them
to be human beings. What sense would there be in saying to the
judge of a Seleucid king that he would die "like one ofthe princes" —
like " any of the mortal princes," as Wellhausen renders it ? If it be
rephed that the kings of the earth at the time claimed to be gods, and
that, therefore, the reminder of their mortality was not out of place,
it may be asked. What then is the meaning of the parallel clause "Ye
shaU die like men " ? Similarity puts the object outside the category
of identity. (See, however, the note below.) In view of the large
place which angelology occupied in the period to which this Ps. belongs,
and in view of the expression in the Ps. itself, it seems best to reject
the view of Baethgen, Olshausen, and others, which sees in the Ps.
heathen rulers only, and to adopt the older view that it is patron
angels which are described. Duhm is singular in seeing in the gods
Sadducean priest-princes, and in w. 3, 4 not the Jewish people, but
the oppressed chasidlm. It must be confessed that each of the views
mentioned can appeal for support to express terms in the Ps., but, on
the whole, v. 1 must be decisive. It is certainly a heavenly court
which is summoned, and the members therefore must be heavenly.
1, 2. Jhvh assembles His celestial court as in Job 1°, 2'. There
appear before Him the Elohim (more generally the b'n§i Elohim), who
here include the patron angels of the nations (Cheyne points out that
the Peshito in both Unes of v. 1 gives mall,kgi angels). The patron
angels of Dan. 10-12 are called on to render an account of their doings.
What the nations do is done at their instigation. In the Book of
Enoch it is said (56°) : "And in those days will the angels retum and
hurl themselves upon the East, upon the Parthians and Medes to stir
up the kings and provoke in them a spirit of unrest, and rouse them
15—2

228 PSALMS [LXXXIL
from their thrones, that they may break forth from their resting-places
as hons and as hungry wolves among their flocks." So here Jhvh says
to the angels : " How long wiU ye judge unjustly ? " Judging among
the Hebrews had a wider meaning. It meant the securing a man jn his
right by any means, whether by a legal decision or by the exercise of
governmental power in general. To judge unjustly, therefore, would
include oppression of aU sorts, as well as partial decisions in court.
3-4. The terms used here, dol poor, kai, afflicted, eby6n, needy,
may (a) either denote the pious poor among the Jews as they frequently
do, or (6) the nation as a whole in the face of powerful oppressors. The
root idea in both cases is the same. The pious poor are those who are
trampled on for Jhvh's sake.
5. The author now speaks, not Jhvh, In spite of Jhvh's express
directions, he says, they go on in their evil courses.^ They neither see
that what they do is evil, nor have they sufficient insight and under
standing to follow out its consequences. They are bUnd — or, as he
puts it, they walk in darkness — and therefore (l^k^n is to be supplied, as
having dropped out from its similarity to the three last consonants
of the previous word — the Targum gives it) is the whole foundation of
society shaken.
6, 7. The first of these verses sounds like a quotation, but if so
it is not from our O.T. Nor does there seem any reason why the
Psalmist should emphasise the /= " as for me I said," unless we render
the clause As for me I say, i.e. in opposition to the view taken by the
men of no insight just mentioned. But why should the Psalmist say
this — even sarcastically, as Olshausen understands him ? For that it
is the Psalmist and not Jhvh who speaks is obvious. The only meaning
which makes tolerable sense of the words as they stand is that of the
text, As for me I admit, &c  but, &c.
7. On the supposition that it is the patron angels which are
meant here, the meaning is quite clear. " Of superior strain though
ye be, yet since you have instigated your nations to defy the will of
the Most High and to oppress His people, you shall die like mortal
men, like one of the princes under your jurisdiction." Hitzig points
out that to men it might be said : " Ye shall fall like any other of the
princes" (after Judg. 16"). Duhm points out that it is not of the nature
of a prince, as such, to fall, and that, therefore, the image is improper.
For sh4rim princes, he reads sh^dim demons — a word derived apparently
from the heathen deities. This suits our theory better than Duhm's,
for if "the gods" were Sadducean priest-princes, the comparison of
their fate to that of the evil angels who kept not their first estate is
somewhat forced, while on our theory it is the one which springs at
once to the mind.
8. A final appeal to Jhvh to show that the Psalmist's warning is
just. For mAm^ = thinchal, Wellhausen reads thimsh61 Thou rulest,
which suits the context better. The Thou is emphatic = It is Thou
who rulest ; not the patron angels, or the heathen kings. But 8 is no
original part of the Ps., but a euphemistic liturgical appendix. Cf 2'".

LXXXIIL 1-15] PSALMS 229
PSALM LXXXIIL
A Song : A Psalm of Asaph.
1 Keep not thou silence, 0 God :
Hold not thy peace, and be not still, 0 God.
2 For, lo, thine enemies make a tumult :
And they that hate thee have lifted up the head.
3 They take crafty counsel against thy people,
And consult against thy hidden ones.
4 They say : — " Come, and let us cut them off from being a
nation :
That the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance."
5 For they have consulted together with one consent :
Against thee they are confederate : —
6 The tabernacles of Edom, and the IshmaeUtes :
Of Moab, and the Hagarenes :
7 Gebal, and Ammon, and Amalek :
The Philistines with the inhabitants of Tyre :
8 Syria also is joined with them :
They have holpen the children of Lot. Selah.
9 Do unto them [as unto Midian]] as to Sisera :
As to Jabin at the river Kishon :
10 WTio perished at '"Endor"' :
They became as dung for the earth.
11 Make them Uke Oreb, and like Zeeb :
Yea, as Zebah, and as Zalmunna :
12 All their princes who said. Let us take to ourselves in
possession
The houses of God.

14 As the fire burneth the forests.
And as the flame setteth the mountains on fire ;
15 So pursue them with thy tempest.
And make them afraid with thy storm.
13 0 my God, make them like a wheel :
As the stubble before the wind.

230 PSALMS [LXXXIIL 16-18
16 FiU their faces with shame :
That they may seek thy name, Jhvh.
17 Let them be confounded and troubled for ever :
Yea, let them be put to shame, and perish :
18 That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JHVH,
Art the most high over all the earth.
In 1 Mace. 6 we read of a general attack made on the Jews by
"the nations round about," when they heard "that the altar was
built, and the sanctuary renewed as before," i.e. in the year B.C. 164.
"Wherefore they thought to destroy (UteraUy, 'they took counsel,' as
in Ps. 83°) the generation of Jacob that was among them." Among
these nations "round about" are specified the "children of Esau in
Idumsea," "the children of Ammon," "the heathen that were at
Galaad," "they of Ptolemais, and of Tyrus and Sidon and all Galilee
of the Gentiles," " the Arabians," and " the children of Esau in the
south." The situation in general is that of our Ps. as no other
recorded situation is, and a general agreement exists that the Ps. and
1 Mace. 5 describe the same thing from different sides.
The two accounts agree also in representing the ground of offence
to be religious. The Jews could have been at no time a serious menace
to their neighbours, seeing that all alike were overshadowed by the
two great powers of Syria and Egypt, while behind them all was the
dread power of Rome. The fact that it was the restoration of the
Jewish religion, which brought about a general agreement on the part
of the nations round about, shows that they all took the part of the
more powerful Syrians, whose chief complaint against the Jews was on
the score of their religion. Syria is mentioned as an important ally,
but one not taking a leading part, probably because its hands were too
fully occupied in Persia.
2 = 2', 46'.
3. Thy hidden ones = tz'phftneychS, from tz§,phan, to treasure, to
shelter. It is the same word which we get in the name Zephaniah. In
Ez. 7^^ Jerusalem is called Jhvh's treasured place, and in Ps. 31^° Jhvh
treasures up those that fear Him.
4-5, The "taeterrima gens" was to be wiped out as a standing
reproach to the Hellenism which ruled everywhere round about except
in Judaea. A religion which claims exclusive authority must be always
odious to eclecticism. It is an old example of the never-ceasing
conflict between religion and culture,
R. Shimeon said : " There are three crowns : the Crown of Torah,
and the Crown of Priesthood, and the Crown of Royalty, but the crown
of a good name is above them all three."
6-7. For Edom, cf 1 Mace. 5'. The Ishmaelites were Bedouin
Arabs, 1 Mace. 5'°- Moab is not mentioned in this last-named
chapter, though one at least of its towns is in v. 26, viz. Bosor = the

LXXXIIL] PSALMS 231
Bezer of Deut. 4*° ; the Hag'tim occur in 1 Chron. 6'°' "~^ as nomads ;
Gebal = the Arabic Jibal, the northern part of Mount Seir. The name
means mountain country. Ammon is named in 1 Mace. 5° ; Amalek is
passed over. Dehtzsch and Olshausen remark that he had no longer
any existence on account of 1 Chron. 4*'. But when Deuteronomy
was written Amalek was still in existence (25'^). Philistia and Tsrre ;
cf 1 Mace. 5'°' "- The peoples named are also named in the late addi
tions to Amos 1 and 2.
8. By Asshur is meant Syria, because Assyria had long ago
disappeared from the historical map ; in Ezra 6"^ Persia is called
Asshur ; the name Sjrria was derived from that of Assyria ; Josephus
calls the Seleucid dynasty that of the Assyrian kings ; and Cicero con
versely calls Sardanapalus " Rex Syriae." Also Ps. 80 has in the LXX
superscription Assyrian for Syrian. They occupy a merely auxiliary
position here because of the occurrences at the time of the death of
Antiochus IV, and the intestine troubles caused by it in Syria itself, to
which must be added the weakening effect of the Persian war. The
children of Lot appear to have taken the leading part in the con
federacy. 9-12 show the late origin of the Ps. It quotes events from
the Book of the Judges, as we might the defeat of the Spanish
Armada, or the battle of Crecy. Endor is not mentioned in
Judges, but Gratz would read for b'iin-d6r b'6in-h^r6d — trans
posing the two similar letters d and r. This gives us Harod,
by whose well Jerubbaal pitched (Judg. 7'). In 1 Sam. 28'"^° the
witch of Endor should be the witch of En-harod — at the well of
trembling. In Ps. 83" Cheyne would read for Endor, without
survivors. In vv. 9, 10, 11 occur several difficulties: Midian is mentioned
in 9 a and (after a statement about Jabin and Sisera) is reintroduced
in 10a. In 11 are two disconnected accusatives, "a thing against all
rule " and only to be explained by saying that them anticipates their
nobles. In lib all their princes h^ongs to I'Za. One suggested course
(not rejected by Wellhausen) is to transfer 10 a to become Qb. A far
simpler course, which removes all difficulties, is to omit Midian in 9 a
and the second accusative in lib. Then all runs smoothly as in
the text.
12 6 = all the places in Palestine where pious Jews were to be
found. Where they were there was a habitation of Jhvh.
13 should apparentfy precede 16. Galgal = a wheel, R.V. whirling
dust. In 14 b the mountains are thought of as wooded,
16-18, To seek Jhvh's name is to seek Him, to acknowledge His
sovereignty, and to beg for His favour. The hope here expressed that
the nations round about will do this implies that they were still blas
pheming the Name, So v. 18 implies that other gods, such as Zeus
Olympics, had been set up as rivals to Jhvh.

232 PSALMS [lxxxiv. 1-12
PSALM LXXXIV.
For the chief Musician : to Gittith : A Psalm of the sons of Korah,
A.
1 How amiable are thy tabernacles,
Jhvh of hosts I
2 My soul did long, yea, faint for the courts of Jhvh :
My heart and my flesh cried out for the living God.
3 Yea, '"the sparrow"" hath found an house.
And '"the swallow"" a nest for herself, where she may lay her
young.
Even thine altars, Jhvh [[of hosts]].
My King, and my God.
4 Blessed are they that dwell in thy house :
They will be still praising thee. Selah.
5 Blessed are the men whose strength is in thee :
In whose heart are the pilgrim-ways.
6 Who passing through the Valley of Desolation make it a
fleld of fountains,
Which the rain fiUeth with blessing.
7 They go from strength to strength :
hThey see the God of gods, Jhvh, in Sion.H
10 For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand.
I had rather lie on the threshold of the house of my God,
than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. Selah.
B.
8 0 Jhvh God of hosts, hear my prayer :
Give ear, 0 God of Jacob.
9 Behold, 0 God, our shield.
And look upon the face of thine anointed.
11 For Jhvh is a htower-l and a shield :
Jhvh will give grace and glory :
No good thing will he withhold from them that walk
uprightly.
12 Jhvh of hosts,
Blessed is the man that trusteth in thee.

LXXXIV.] PSALMS 233
In Ps. 42 we have a poem expressing an unsatisfied longing for the
Temple and its services. In this we have the joyful cry of a pilgrim
from the Diaspora, who has been able to visit Mother-Zion. Its glad
some tone justifies Montefiore's contention that the pious Jew fourid
the Law and its yoke no burden, but a cherished possession. The
Psalmist's enthusiasm finds its paraUel in the eagerness of the Cmsaders
to see Jerusalem, and rescue it from the infidel ; in the pilgrimages to
Rome, or to sacred spots, such as Canterbury, or Walsingham, in the
Middle Age; to Lourdes or Turin in modern times. Beneath the
earth-bound form in all these cases may lurk— iu the Ps, before us,
there is clearly to be traced — a core of that longing after the ideal —
after God — which is a permanent factor in all true religion. Hence
the most enlightened Christian finds no difficulty in adapting the
words of the Ps. to his own longings. The hour has come when neither
in Jerusalem, nor in Rome, nor in Mecca shaU men worship the Father,
but wherever there is a human heart with a thirst for the living God.
The earthly Temple at Jerusalem has vanished from before the soul's
eye, and the Kingdom of God has taken its place. The Christian's
desire, therefore, is to see that Kingdom in aU its glory, and it is well
with him if his longing can be satisfied with no words which fall short
of the whole-hearted self-surrender of this Ps. It sings the old
song of : The desire of the moth for the star.
Of the night for the morrow.
The devotion to something afar
Prom the sphere of our sorrow.
Its date cannot be fixed with precision, since the only hints of time
are found in the implication that the Temple was intact and its services
unimpeded, that no war existed to hinder a pilgrimage, and that the
Diaspora was a familiar fact. Some confusion, however, has been
caused by the obvious interpolation of w. 8, 9, 11, and 12. The
first two were queried by Olshausen, and all four by Duhm. They were
probably inserted by way of adapting the Ps. to ritual purposes. Their
relegation to an appendix leaves the general meaning clear.

1. The plural tabernacles may refer to the many chambers under
the one roof of the Temple, or may be a plural of majesty.
2. The perfects are best taken as describing the Psalmist's feelings
before starting on his pilgrimage.
3. Sparrow = any small bird, and swallow is perhaps wild dove.
It is not meant literally that these birds nested in the Temple, which
would have made it unclean, but by a figure the Psalmist describes
himself and his companions as having found what was their true home.
4. The Psalmist is thus led to contrast the happiness of those
Jews who lived in Jerusalem, and could visit the Temple continually,
with that of himself whose visits must be rare.

234 PSALMS [Lxxxv. 1-2
5-7. Yet his case, and that of other Jews of the Diaspora, was
not so hopeless. They had their inner happiness ; they felt strong in
Jhvh, their longing to go on pilgrimage was itself a treasure — far
surpassing any which the secular- minded Jew might have in his
prosperity at Alexandria, or Ephesus, or Rome. Moreover, if the
stay-at-home Jew urged the difficulties of the way the Psalmist could
still declare that the joy that was set before the pilgrim turned any
Valley of Baca — of balsam trees, of drought and desolation — into a
fruitful field blessed by the early rains, whereby he went on with ever-
increasing strength, till at last he was rewarded by the sight of Jhvh's
face in Zion. Baethgen translates "from strength to .strength" by
"from wall to wall," and understands it of the nightly encampment
under the protection of a city wall. Either rendering makes excellent
sense. " They see the God of gods " is a rendering supported by the
LXX. The text was altered so as to soften down the anthropomorphism
in days when the transcendency of God had been sharply emphasised,
i.e. in the days which were not far distant from those of the authors of
apocalyptic works, like Daniel, and the Similitudes of Enoch.
10. Doorkeeper was an honourable post, like that of the Papal
Guards. The LXX and Jerome give a rendering, abjectus esse, "to lie
on the threshold as a beggar." Better this, says piety, than the
comforts of the mansions of the rich in the heathen city.
B,
9 a. Shield is accusative after behold, not a vocative. The person
called a shield, i.e. a king, is the same as Thine anointed of the next
clause. It is a Maccabean prince that is referred to,
11. Sun, shemesh, is a title nowhere else given to God, and is
probably a variant reading for shemshih, a batthment — a word which
occurs in Is, 54'".
Tower amd shield are not so strangely assorted a pair as sun and
shield. Hitzig, however, sees the connecting link for the latter in
their roundness and brightness, and refers to Vergil, Aen. in. 637.
But see Cant, 4*.
Grace and g'forj' = naturaUy not in the N.T. sense, but Jhvh's
favour (chin) will be the cause of honour and prosperity (cMb6d)
followingon a time of ignominy and adversity. It must be confessed.
that tbe interpolator of these four last verses has caught the spirit of
the Ps.
PSALM LXXXV.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of the sons of Korah.
1 Jhvh, thou hast been favourable unto thy land :
Thou hast brought back the captivity of Jacob.
2 Thou hast forgiven the iniquity of thy people :
Thou hast covered all their sin. Selah.

LXXXV. 3-13] PSALMS 235
3 Thou hast taken away all thy torath:
Thou hast turned thyself from the fierceness of tMne
anger.
4 Turn us, 0 God of our salvation.
And cause thine anger toward us to cease.
5 Wilt thou be angry with us for ever ?
Wilt thou draw out thine anger to all generations?
6 hThou wUt, 0 God,-) revive us again :
That thy people may rejoice in thee.
7 Shew us thy mercy, Jhvh,
And grant us thy salvation.
8 I tvill hear what Jhvh the God tmll speak :
For he udU speak peace unto his people, \mid to his
saints :
But let them not turn again to folly !^
9 Surely his salvation is nigh them that fear him :
That glory may dwell in our land.
10 Mercy and truth are met together :
Righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
11 Truth springeth out of the earth :
Righteousness looketh down from heaven.
12 Yea, Jhvh shall give that which is good:
And our land shall yield her increase.
13 Righteousness shall go before him :
And [-peace shall follow -i his steps.
A liturgical composition in three parts. In vv. 1-3 a choir sings
of Jhvh's gracious dealings in the past ; in 4-7 another choir responds
with a consequent prayer for the return of the former halcyon days.
In 8-9 a single voice takes up the prophetic strain, and declares that
Jhvh has already heard the prayer. A choir continues the news of
joy in 10, 11, and the last two verses, sung full, extend the expected
blessing into the future. This seems the obvious division of the Ps,,
and even if any doubt remains whether we can assign the solo and
chorus parts so precisely, none exists that the first seven verses are
marked off from the last six. Olshausen assigns the former to the
congregation and the latter to the priests.
The time at which the Ps. was composed is not clearly indicated.
The people were in some distress, but not in the throes of an agony.

236 PSALMS [lxxxv.
They had experienced Jhvh's goodness in the past, though it had not
gone so far as to remove all cause of anxiety. But the anxiety was
not serious enough to forbid the hope of an early blessing to the full.
We may think of the days when Antiochus the Great made peace
(Hitzig) or of the days of Simon (Duhm), and the beginning of the
Syrian persecutions (Olshausen), or leave it open as Baethgen does. In
any case the date of so beautiful a Ps. is a matter of minor importance.
The Ps. speaks of human fears and hopes which are peculiar to no
time. 1-3. Ewald takes the six perfects of these verses in a pluperfect
sense. Olshausen would regard them as foreign to the main body of
the Ps. but for this device, and thinks of the Exile as the time of
blessing referred to. Hitzig refers it to some recently experienced
mercy, such as the cessation of drought or of war. Verses 10, 11 seem to
support this last. Truth and peace are good things, but do not flourish
where war is.
For shab'tha sh'bHth, turn the captivity, see note on 14'. In 4
shUbinil, turn us (the same verb), is rendered by Hitzig turn round to
MS = LXX conversus es. Cf Ezek. 14°, 18'°' '" It is an inner transi
tion which is meant. Duhm reaches the same conclusion by another
road. He would treat the verb as a contracted form of shiib sh'bHth
but for 1 b, and prefers rather to emend it into shftb nS, = turn Thyself,
we pray Thee.
A-1. A prayer for better times based on 1-3. In 4 & the LXX
(reading h4s6r for hS,phir — Ez. 16*^) give us and turn Thine anger
from us, a better paraUel to 4 a. In 6 a they read hS, el, 0 God, for
hS,l6, and not, as in the text above. For 7 cf 90'*.
8-9. The Psalmist speaks as a prophet, Hab. 2'. He, 'too, stands
upon his watch to see what he shaU answer from Jhvh to the cry of
His people.
8 c is rendered by the LXX and to those who turn their heart to
Him. But the heaping up of "people," "saints," and "converted" is
suspicious. Moreover, the whole clause overloads the verse, and the
M.'T, gives no clear meaning. For all these reasons it seems best to
omit it as a gloss,
9, Salvation is nigh = Is. 56', 51°- It is the old poetic and
prophetic cry, which re-appears again in the words of Him whose
earthly Ufe was nurtured on the Pss,, Deutero-Isaiah, Jeremiah, and
Deuteronomy — " The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand," Glory abso
lutely is Jhvh's presence (Is. 24^), Men remembered the days when
the Shechinah was the glory of the temple of Solomon.
10-11 are a prophetic realisation of the divine promise uttered in
8, 9. For mercy and truth see note on 12', 25'°. For 10 6 cf Is, 32",
" The work of righteousness shaU be peace," i.e. prosperity. 11 repeats
a pair of terms from 10, viz. truth and righteousness. But, as in 10,
mercy, truth, righteousness, and peace are all divine effluences, so in 11
we are not to think of man's truth on earth springing up to meet God's
righteousness coming down from heaven. In Is. 45 S which seems to

LXXXVL 1-5] PSALMS 237
have been before our Psalmist, it is God's gifts on both sides which
meet. He opens the heaven; He opens the earth too. Truth and
righteousness are both alike from Him.
12-13, A bad harvest is to be forgotten by the gracious gift
of the early and the latter rain (Deut. 28'^) = that which is good. This
causes the land to give her increase.
13 a. Righteousness is a word of fluctuating meaning. In general
it stands for that which is right, natural, legal, personal, religious. A
man is righteous in the modem sense, i.e. he lives according to virtue,
or he is shown by the course of events to be in the right — prosperity
being, it is assumed, a proof of God's approbation. Jhvh is righteous
either because He " declares things that are right," i.e. He gives predic
tions that are true to fact ; He has ' ' practical sense as well as good
faith," or it is His truthfulness in maintaining His covenant with Israel,
or, lastly, it is very often made objective and identified with some
manifestation of God's saving power. In this latter sense it is a
homonym for salvation {e.g. Is. 51°, "My righteousness is near. My
salvation is gone forth"), Cf G. A, Smith's Book of Isaiah, ch. xiv,
13b. Righteousness and peace are the yeomen of the guard of
Jhvh, One goes before Him ; the other foUows Him. Baethgen, who
foUows the M.T., refers to Is, 58^ as supporting it. As a matter of
fact it makes the case for emendation certain by pointing to the true
meaning : "Righteousness shall go before thee ; the glory of the Lord
shall be thy rereward," But the M,T. does not express that meaning
here. Read, therefore, with Wellhausen and others, shM6m, peace
(welfare), for yishim, and yird6ph, shall follow, for I'derek, in 'the way.
Then 13 b is precisely = to Ps. 23°.
Righteousness, peace, mercy, and glory are the angels of Jacob's
vision which ascended and descended on the Son of Man.

PSALM LXXXVL
A Prayer of David,
1 Bow down thine ear, Jhvh, answer me :
For I am poor and needy.
2 Preserve my soul ; for I am pious :
[[0 thou my God]] save thy servant that trusteth in thee.
3 Be merciful unto me, 0 Lord :
For I cry unto thee all the day.
4 Rejoice the soul of thy servant :
For unto thee, 0 Lord, do I lift up my soul.
5 For thou. Lord, art good, and ready to forgive :
And plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon
thee.

238 PSALMS [lxxxvi. 6-17
6 Give ear, Jhvh, unto my prayer :
And attend to the voice of my suppUcatlons.
7 In the day of my trouble I wiU call upon thee :
For thou wilt answer me.
8 Among the gods there is none like unto thee, 0 Lord :
Neither are there any works like unto thy works.
9 All nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship
before thee, 0 Lord :
And shall glorify thy name.
10 For thou art great, and doest wondrous things :
Thou art God alone.
11 Teach me thy way, Jhvh ; I will walk in thy truth :
Unite my heart to fear thy name.
12 1 wiU praise thee, 0 Lord my God, with all my heart :
And I will glorify thy name for evermore.
13 For great is thy mercy toward me :
And thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest pit.
14 0 God, the proud are risen against me.
And the assemblies of violent men have sought after my
soul:
And have not set thee before them.
15 But thou, 0 Lord, art a God full of compassion, and gracious,
Longsuffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth.
16 0 tum unto me, and have mercy upon me :
Give thy strength unto thy servant,
And save the son of thine handmaid.
17 Shew me a token for good :
That they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed :
Because thou, Jhvh, hast holpen me, and comforted me.
Little need be said of this Ps. It is a mosaic of pieces taken from
other writings, and is " colourless, Ufeless and void of all originality,"
Prayer, praise, hope, and lamentation jostle each other, and no con
tinuous strain of thought is to be found. It belongs to the Maccabean
period and may serve to illustrate the religious outlook of the average
member of the body of the Chasldim.
1 = 17°, 40"; 2 = 25°°— omit the appeal, which comes in an
impossible place between Thy servant and which trusteth in Thee.
Duhm would transfer it to 3, where it is not wanted. Pious = chisld.
46 = 25'; 5 is a reminiscence of Ex. 33", Jonah 4=*; 6=5'';

LxxxviL 1-7] PSALMS 239
7=17°; 8a = Ex. 15"; 86 = Deut. 3^; 9a = 22^; 10 6 shows that
the Psalmist did not postulate the real existence of other gods in 8 a ;
11 a = 27 " ; 11 6 = 26' ; 11 c is reminiscent of Jer. 32'°. It is a prayer
for whole-hearted devotion to Jhvh and His law, in contrast to the
double-minded (seS.phlm) of 119'" and of Jas. 1'. At all times
Israelites existed who could not be induced to choose once and for
all between Jhvh and the Baalim (1 Ks, 18^'), It is "a unity of
religious consciousness " which the Psalmist prays for.
13 = 56"; the hwest pit='Deut. 32^, 14 = 64'— but this latter
has zalrim, strangers, and v. 14 has z^dlm, haughty ones. The difference
is probably a scribal error, and zldim has the greater fitness in both
cases. But see Is. 25°, 13" ; 2 Kings 19^ ; Jer. 18'*.
15 = more closely Ex. 34° and Jonah 4^ than does 5. 16 = 116'° ;
son of thy handmaid need not be explained in detail as a description
of one who was a son of Jhvh's handmaid Israel, but is a simple
parallel to servant; so in Gen. 27^° (49^) brethren = mother's sons.
17. A token, signum, not a miracle, say the commentators, but what
else could the wished-for sign be but a miracle in the eyes of a writer
of circa b.c 200 ?

PSALM LXXXVIL
A Psahn of the sons of Korah : A Song,
********
1 His foundation is in the holy mountains.
2 Jhvh loveth the gates of Zion
More than all the dweUings of Jacob.
3 Glorious things are spoken of thee,
0 city of God.
4 " I will make mention of Rahab and Babylon '"to them"" that
know me :
Behold PhiUstia, and Tyre, with Ethiopia :
This man was born there."
5 And hto Mother-Zion do I say -I : —
"This and that man was born in her":
And the highest himself shall establish her.
6 [[Jhvh shaU count, when he writeth up the people, that
this man was bom there.][ Selah.
1 As weU the singers as the dancers shall shout : —
'""AU my fountains are in thee.""'

240 PSALMS [LXXXVIL
A Ps. Uke a Chinese puzzle, where the general outlines are fa,irly
obvious but the details difficult to fit in. The beginning is certainly
defective, the ending seems also to be a fragment. Like Ps. 84, this
Ps. too reveals the love of the Diaspora for Jerusalem, the joy of all
her scattered children (48°). Wherever the Jew found himself, whether
in Alexandria, Babylon, Phcenicia, or Arabia, he still looked to Jeru
salem as his Fatherland. He lived an exile ; in Zion he was at home.
He shared the feeling of the Christian writer who dated his book " in
the 59th year of his Exile," i.e. on earth. At the same time the
Psalmist shows none of the desire of the modern "Zionist" to retum
to Palestine. He was content to know that he was a member of the
community whose religious centre was the Temple in Jerusalem,
Hitzig thinks that Pss, 81, 84, and 87 are severally related to the
three great feasts, but no good ground exists for the suggestion.
Ps. 87 in any case is of late date, probably late Maccabean. It is
closely related to Is. 19^"°°, which is itself a late addition to Isaiah's
prophecies. 1. The abrupt opening is contrary to usage. The person referred
to in His is certainly Jhvh, but no Psalmist introduces Jhvh with a
mere suffia. We must either suppose that the name of Jhvh has
dropped out, or else that the first clause (at least) has disappeared.
Ewald would read the verse :
Jhvh's is Sion for ever :
The city of His founding is on the holy hills.
Olshausen suggests :
How lovely is God's city :
He has founded it on the holy hiUs.
Baethgen, however, saves the metre by reading :
His foundation on the holy hills does Jhvh love :
The gates of Zion more than, &c., &c.
As la has to be supplied somehow, either rendering is possible and
neither certain.
16. His foundation. It does not seem that Zion was held speciaUy
sacred in earlier Jewish history. Jerusalem as the City where David
dwelt (Is. 29') was their holy place. It was in later days that Zion
became sacred, and the narratives of Melchizedek and of Abraham's
sacrifice on Mount Moriah were motived by the veneration felt by
their compilers for Zion. Jhvh's foundation was no new act.
2 6. The dwellings of Jacob are not merely all other places in
Palestine where Jews lived (against Baethgen) but all the places where
were found Jews of the Diaspora.
4, 5. It is not quite clear whether v. 4 means to say that Rahab,
&c., are paraded as tributaries of Zion ; or that proselytes in each of
the places mentioned are among them that know Jhvh ; or that in

Lxxxvra. 1-9] PSALMS . 241
each are to be found Jews. The last is most likely. In that case
render : I mil make mention of Rahab and Babylon
Because of them that know me (there).
Israel (not Jhvh) is represented as counting up the citizens of Zion,
and as numbering among them many in the great cities of the world.
Of each Jew in foreign cities it is said that his citizenship is in Zion.
It was a point of honour among the Jews of the Diaspora to maintain
their independent life, to the despair, or fury very often of the govern
ing, and also of the middle classes. Abundant evidence of this is
given in Schiirer, With this fact in view, Ps, 87 rings as a patriotic
song. In V. 5 read (after LXX) gm 6mar for v^Hmar, And to Zion do I say
"Mother" ; cf Is. 49^'.
6. To be omitted as a theological variant of 5.
7 6 is probably a popular refrain adapted by the Psalmist.
PSALM LXXXVIII.
A Song or Psalm for the sons of Korah, to the chief Musician upon
Mahalath Leanuoth, Maschil of Heman the Ezrahite.
1 hJHVH, my God, I cry to thee by day :
By night I caU to thee for help.-|
2 Let my prayer come before thee :
IncUne thine ear unto my cry :
3 For my soul is full of troubles :
And my life draweth nigh unto the grave.
4 I am counted with them that go down into the pit :
I am [[as]] a man that hath no strength :
5 '"Free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave,""
Whom thou rememberest no more :
And they are cut off from thy hand.
6 Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit.
In darkness, in the deeps.
7 Thy wrath Ueth hard upon me.
And thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves. Selah.
8 Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far from me :
Thou hast made me an abomination unto them :
/ am shut up, and I cannot come forth.
9 Mine eye mourneth by reason of affliction :
Jhvh, I have called daily upon thee,
I have stretched out my hands unto thee.
c. 16

242 PSALMS [LXXXVIII. 10-18
10 Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead ?
Shall the dead arise and praise thee? Selah.
11 Shall thy lovingkindness be declared in the Grave?
Or thy faithfulness in Destruction?
12 Shall thy wonders be known in the Dark?
And thy righteousness in the Land of Forgetfulness ?
13 But unto thee have I cried, Jhvh :
And in the morning shall my prayer prevent thee.
14 Jhvh, why castest thou off my soul ?
Why hidest thou thy face from me ?
15 1 ami aflUcted and ready to die from my youth up :
While I suffer thy terrors I am hdumb.-!
16 Thy flerce wrath goeth over me :
Thy terrors have cut me off.
17 They came round about me all day like water :
They compassed me about together.
18 Lover hast thou put far from me :
Darkness alone is mine acquaintance.
Not Ps. 77, as the old expositors answer the question, "Quaenam
ode omnium tristissima ? " but this Ps. 88 is the darkest and gloomiest
of all the plaintive Pss. (Delitzsch). Yet it evokes a certain interest
through the fact that it nowhere speaks of sins, and also a certain
sympathy for the author, because no enemies are brought forward for
his curse (Duhm). " The conclusion is, for a Ps, of supplication and
complaining, broken off short in an unusual manner and makes us
suspect a mutilation" (Olshausen). It is only in this way that the
blackness of the Ps. can be in any way relieved.
Who is the speaker? Baethgen says the people of Israel, and
points for confirmation to the fact that the speaker is aheady dead
{v. 5, a verse of doubtful meaning), and among the shades {v. 6 — which
is not what the verse says), and quotes the Targum which paraphrases
V. 6 : " Thou hast brought me into Exile which is like the lowest
deep," Olshausen refers it to the days of the heaviest oppression
of Israel by the Syrian kings, Jennings and Lowe, holding the
traditional date of Job and Proverbs (with which books this Ps. has
many points of contact), refer it to the days of Solomon. Hitzig,
equating it to Ps, 86, and noting linguistic affinities in w. 4, 12, 24
with the Book of Wisdom, refers it (as well as Ps. 89) to the date of
that book.
If the subject is an individual, what was the character of his
sufferings ? Leprosy {v. 8), and that congenital {v. 15), say Jennings
and Lowe. Delitzsch goes so far as to say that the sufferer here was

LXXXVIII.] PSALMS 243
Heman, the Ezrachite, who described his own sufferings in the person
of Job— a loose and wild guess. Or his illness is but a figure of speech
for national sufferings (Baethgen). All we can say with certainty
is that the author (if he were an individual) was a man whose life had
been spent in perils from his youth, and was now in prison — in a bdr
(or more or less dry pit, often used for holding prisoners), and that he
felt his plight to be so desperate that he was no better than a dead
man. The notes of personal suffering are too sharp to allow us to
treat Israel as the subject, with Baethgen and Olshausen, This need
not imply that suffering Israel did not afterwards adopt the Psalmist's
lamentation as its own.
The Ps, faUs into two main divisions : 1-9 = a prayer for help,
based on his misery ; 10-18 = a still more urgent reminder that help
may come too late because of his terrible plight. It lacks originality
of expression as the many aUusions in it to other writings show.
1, By an easy scribal error y'shfl^thl of my salvation has been
substituted in M.T. for shiw§,'tl / cry, to the spoiling of the parallelism.
The LXX partly support the rendering given above.
36 = 107"; 4a = 143'; in 46 the k' = as seems out of place.
The man is helpless. Baethgen, however, sees in the comparison a
proof that Israel is the speaker.
5 a. The general sense is clear, though the grammatical details
are obscure. The verse is modelled on Lam, 3°- '- No belief in
another life appears.
6 = Lam. 3°°. The three places named are used figuratively. The
deeps are those of the sea ; Ex. 15°. In Job 26° the home ofthe dead
is under the seas. Cf Jonah 2°.
8, 9a = Job 19"*; Ps, 31". The ostracised condition of the
sufferer might proceed as well from party-hatred as from leprosy.
ReUgious strife was as fertile a cause of separation then as now. Like
John Baptist, the Psalmist was shut up in prison and his heart was
faihng him.
10-12 are a piercing cry for help before it is too late, before the
Psalmist goes to the land where men forget and are forgotten — a
pathetic word which is Uke Vergil's " sunt lacrymse rerum." So in
Pss. 6°, 30°. The practical disbelief of the Psalmists in any existence
after death that deserved the name of life served but to intensify their
clinging to Jhvh while life lasted. " The idea of resurrection is not
unknown to the singer, but he denies its reality" (Baethgen). We
should rather say that the singer implies that the idea was not seriously
held by anybody.
116. Thy faithfulness in Abaddon. This last word as a name
for the underworld occurs in Job 26°, 28^". In Rev. 9" the name
is personified. 13-14 show that even if Delitzsch's suggestion that Heman, Job,
and the Psalmist are aU one is but a guess, yet the attitude of the
Psalmist is that of Job. He does not admit, with the author of Ps. 32,
that suffering is a proof of sin.
16—2

244 PSALMS [Lxxxix. 1-1 1
15 6. Por 1 am distracted read with Olshausen / am dumb —
%figl,h for ^piinah.
18. Hupfeld suspected that darkness was the subject, and most
commentators with him refer to Job 17" as normative for 18 6. In
that case we must with Duhm translate as in the text. He also reads
for vArea (= and friend) v'rak — a difference of guttural only. In any
case the singer ends his song on a note of despair.

PSALM LXXXIX.
Maschil of Ethan the Ezrahite.
1 I will sing of the mercies of Jhvh for ever :
I will make known thy faithfulness to aU generations.
2 For thy mercy is built up for ever in the heavens :
Thy faithfulness his established in them through thy word.-]
3 hThou didst say -I : — " I have made a covenant with my
chosen,
I have sworn unto David my servant :
4 ' Thy seed will I establish for ever, and build up thy throne
to all generations.'"
5 The heavens shall praise [[thy wonders,| Jhvh :
Thy faithfulness the congregation of the saints.
6 For who in the heaven can be compared unto Jhvh ?
Who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto
Jhvh ? —
7 A God hvery terrible-j in the assembly of the saints,
h Great is he and fearful above-) all them that are about
him.
8 Jhvh God of hosts.
Who is a merciful One like unto thee, 0 JAH ?
Thy faithfulness is round about thee.
9 Thou rulest the raging of the sea :
When the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them.
10 Thou hast broken Rahab in pieces, as one that is slain :
Thou hast scattered thine enemies with thy strong arm.
11 The heavens are thine, the earth also is thine :
The world and the fulness thereof, — thou hast founded
them.

LXXXIX. 12-29] PSALMS 245
12 The north and the south — thou hast created them :
Tabor and Hermon rejoice in thy name.
13 Thou hast a mighty arm :
Strong is thy hand, and high is thy right hand.
14 Justice and judgment are the foundation of thy throne :
Mercy and truth go before thy face.
15 Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound:
That walk, Jhvh, in the light of thy countenance :
16 Who in thy name rejoice all the day:
Who in thy righteousness are exalted.
11 For thou art the glory of their strength:
And in thy favour our horn shall be exalted.
18 For our shield is Jhvh's:
Ou/r King is the Holy One of Israel's.
19 hOnce upon a time -I thou spakest in vision to thy holy one :
Thou saidst : " I have hset a crownH upon one that is mighty :
I have exalted ha youth-l out of the people.
20 I have found David my servant :
With my holy oil have I anointed him :
21 With whom my hand shall be established :
Mine arm also shall strengthen him.
22 The enemy shall not exact upon him :
Nor the son of wickedness afflict him.
23 And I will beat down his foes before his face,
And plague them that hate him.
24 But my faithfulness and my mercy shall be with him :
And in my name shall his hom be exalted.
25 I wiU set his hand also on the sea,
And his right hand on the rivers.
26 He shaU cry unto me : — ' Thou art my father,
My God, and the rock of my salvation.'
27 Also I will make him my flrstborn,
hThe highest of-) the kings of the earth.
28 My mercy will I keep for him for evermore,
And my covenant shall stand fast with him.
29 His seed also will I make to endure for ever.
And his throne as the days of heaven.

246 PSALMS [LXXXIX. 30-47
30 If his children forsake my law,
And walk not in my judgments :
31 If they break my statutes,
And keep not my commandments :
32 Then will I visit their transgression with the rod,
And their iniquity with stripes.
33 Nevertheless my lovingkindness vrill I not utterly take from
him.
Nor suffer my faithfulness to fail.
34 My covenant will I not break.
Nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips.
35 hOne thingH have I sworn by my holiness :
That I will not lie unto David,
36 That his seed shall endure for ever,
And that his throne shall be as the sun before me.
37 That it shall be established for ever as the moon,
^And so long as the sun continueth in the Heavens.""' Selah.
38 But now thou hast cast off and abhorred.
Thou hast been wroth with thine anointed.
39 Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant :
Thou hast profaned his crown to the ground.
40 Thou hast broken down all his hedges :
Thou hast brought his strong holds to ruin.
41 All that pass by the way spoil him :
He is a reproach to his neighbours.
42 Thou hast set up the right hand of his adversaries :
Thou hast made all his enemies to rejoice.
43 hThou turnest back his sword from his enemies, H
And hast not made him to stand in the battle.
44 Thou hast htorn his sceptre from his hands, H
And cast his throne down to the ground.
45 The days of his youth hast thou shortened :
Thou hast covered him with shame. Selah.
46 How long, Jhvh, wilt thou hide thyself for ever ?
How long shall thy wrath burn like fire?
47 Remember, Lord, how short is life :
For what vanity thou hast made all men I

LXXXIX. 48-52] PSALMS 247
48 What man is there that shall Uve and not see death ?
That shall deUver his soul from the hand of the grave?
Selah.
49 Lord, where are thy former lovingkindnesses,
Which thou swarest unto David in thy truth?
50 Remember, Lord, the reproach of thy servant :
How hhe bears the fury of the peoples :H
51 Wherewith thine enemies reproached thee, Jhvh :
Wherewith they reproach the footsteps of thine Anointed.

52 Blessed be the Lord for evermore.
Amen, and Amen,
Had the O.T. been always in the hands of impartial historians
instead of theologians, long ago would the proof have been brought
forward that the Psalms of David run very close upon the Psalms
of Solomon (Duhm). Duhm also thinks that " the Anointed " of this
Ps. is one of the Hasmonsean kings, viz. Alexander Jannseus, who was
overcome and driven into the mountains (circa B.c, 88) by Demetrius
Euchaerus. In this case the claim of the dynasty to be the lineal heir
of the Davidic monarchy is to be noted. On the other hand, Baethgen,
who assigns the Ps, to the second half of the fifth century b,c. (on the
insufficient ground of its dependence on Ps. 80), maintains that the
royal house exists no longer {vv. 41, 42, 51), but that it is not
the people simply which is "the Anointed"; "the close connection
of the people and ' the Anointed ' shows that the latter is a necessary
member of the community."
Hitzig holds that the Ps. comes from the Maccabean age, and that
"the Anointed" is the Jewish people. David's descendants had been
merged in the mass of the people, and so their privileges fell to the
people as a whole, for "all Israelites are kings' sons." Olshausen
says, in turn, that this is a clear contradiction to the plainly expressed
wish for the restoration of the house of David to the throne of
Judah, Where doctors differ common sense must be allowed to judge.
Alexander Jannaeus was not a king who was acceptable to the ruling
piety of his day. Moreover, Deutero-Isaiah shows clearly a gradual
refining of the nation's hopes. Israel was Jhvh's servant ; first Israel
as a whole, then the pious remnant of it, and, apparently, in Ch. 63 one
representative individual. It is noteworthy in this connection that
"the Anointed" in this Ps. is also twice called "Jhvh's servant" (39,
50), and that the evils which are deplored better suit an individual
(38, 39, 43) — 40 and 41 cannot be built upon as they are borrowed
from Ps. 80, unless indeed we take them as determinative, and say,
that as that Ps. had the people as its subject, so must this also have.

248 PSALMS [LXXXIX.
On the whole it seems best to say that Ps. 89 comes from a time when
the idea of Israel as a whole being Jhvh's "anointed" and His
" servant " was in the air, but was not yet sufficiently distinct to save
it from being expressed in other than personal terms. What has just
been said, however, refers more particularly to the latter part of the
Ps. {vv. 19-51). The earlier part {vv. 5-18) may be from the same
age, and perhaps from the same author, but implies a very different
state of affairs. So different are these verses in tone, subject, and
metre, that the suspicion is natural that two distinct compositions
have heen joined together, and that afterwards vv. 1-4 were prefixed
as a general introduction, or else that w. 5-18 are an interpolation.
The fact that the Psalmist builds on the sure mercies of David in the
Introduction, then drops all reference to them in vv. 5-18, resumes
them in v. 19, and then continues with them as his subject, is all in
favour of the theory of interpolation.
1, 2. The " I have said " in v. 2 makes no sense, and the LXX,
therefore, are to be followed who give the second person. Moreover,
the two words for with thy mouth and thou didst say which follow on
one another in the text seem to be misplaced, and to belong properly
to the end oi v. 2 and the beginning of «, 3 respectively. This slight
emendation gives an excellent sense and a better metre. The familiar
coUocation of mercy and truth should be noted. Cf 25'°.
3, 4 go back (as does Is. 55'' *) to 2 Sam. 7".
5 6, The assembly (k'hai) which praises Jhvh's faithfulness is that
of the angels. (So also in v. 7.) Cf Job 5', 16'°; Ps. 29'- 1 I suspect
that pil'akH Thy doings should be ch'sedkl, Thy mercy, on account of
the parallelism,
7 6, The text is to be emended after the LXX — rab great for
rabbS/h very.
8. Chasln, an Aramaic word meaning strong, occurs here only.
The text should again be emended by the substitution of chasid, a
merciful one (cf 5 6 above), even though applied to Jhvh, and not to
his client.
9, 10. Jhvh's power was shown in the Creation. Hence RS,hab
here is not Egypt, but the primaeval monster of the deep, the dragon,
the world serpent of old folk-lore, the Ti£lmS,t of Babylon, So in
Job 26"' " ; Is. 51" ; Pss. 8^ 74"- '*.
As one that is slain is as Duhm remarks a not very fortunate
expression. It may perhaps be connected with the boring of Leviathan's
jaw in Job 41 ^-
11, 12 = a variation of 74'^' ". T^b§l the world is the fruitful,
habitable part of the earth (Is. 14"; Ps. 33'), Why Tabor and Hermon
are selected is not quite clear, unless they emphasise the north and the
south of the parallel clause by drawing attention to the fact that even
" the mountains of God " are His humble servants. The reason, how
ever, may be that the writer was a Galilean,
l3, 14, Verse 13 sums up the praises of Jhvh's power. Verse 14 says
that fortunately for Israel that power is in the service of His mercy and

LXXXIX.] PSALMS 249
truth. These latter are as heralds going before the heavenly King.
Righteousness and judgment are regarded as the powers in the form of
beasts which support the royal throne. Cf. 43', 97".
15-18 sound like a doxology. From the majesty of Jhvh the
Psalmist turns to the blessedness of Israel. They are hearers of the
joyful sound = that of the festal trumpets (Josephus, Jewish Wars, iv,
9, 12 ; Neh, 9'*; Is. 58", &c.). Those who respond to the summons
walk in the light of Jhvh-s countenance = enjoy the high privilege of
sharing in the Temple-services. In Jhvh's name (= His Self-revelation)
do they rejoice, and having His righteousness (= His faithfulness to
His covenant) as their support, they stand four-square to the attacks of
their enemies.
Our shield = om King. Cf. 47', 84".
19-37 are a free rendering of 2 Sam. 78-16^ David being substituted
for Solomon. 19. Oz is hardly rendered strongly enough by tlien. The saint is
Nathan, and his night- vision is recorded in 2 Sam. 1*. Gibb6r, ihe
mighty man, is used proleptically of the greatness which David received
(2 Sam. 7'). Ezer, help, is a scribe's error for n§zer, crown (Ps. 21° and
V, 39). The ground for preferring youth to elect one lies in 2 Sam, 7 '
21 a = 78". Jhvh's hand will be his constant protection.
22 = 2 Sam. 7"",
24. Cf vv. 1, 2, 5, 8 above ; 28 6 and 33, 34, 49 below.
25. The ideal boundaries of Israel's dominion. The rivers in
plural, if the text is correct, must denote the Euphrates, Tigris, and
their canal-system.
26, 27. A free rendering of " I will be his father and he shall be
my son," paraUeled by the equally free use of 2 Sam. 7'* in Heb. 1°
The three passages iUustrate very well the changing application of the
title " Son of God." David, his successors, the people, the remnant of
the people, the typical Israelite, each in turn enjoys the title. Cf
Ex. i^.
28 6. Covenant is the concrete expression of Jhvh's faithfulness.
Cf. V. 33.
29 = Deut, IP'.
32. Measure for measure; Cranmer's " 0 this unworthy hand " ;
"Pestilence cometh into the world for capital crimes mentioned in
the Law ; noisome beasts come into the world for vain swearing and for
profanation of the Name ; captivity comes iuto the world for strange
worship and for incest," Leprosy was God's stroke for immorality,
slander, and perjury,
34. The same antithesis as 24, &c.
35. Once [A.V,] = once for all &s Heb, 7% or achath may be 07ie
thing, = 36,
37 6 has puzzled all commentators. Hitzig makes it a sort of
soliloquy of the Psalmist's. Baethgen suspects the text, but adds that
the "witness" is God, which He is not, but the contracting party.
Olshausen supposes that a word has dropped out. Duhm proposes

250 PSALMS [LXXXIX.
"And so long as the Heaven lasts shall his throne endure," which, no
doubt, gives the sense. I propose to read v'or for v'^d and to trans
late : And so hng as the light (= the Sun) endureth in heaven. This
satisfies the parallelism and does the least possible violence to the
existing text.
38-51 give the actual situation and the reason for the recital
of Jhvh's promise to David. That promise seems to be forgotten by
Jhvh, else why Israel's present distress ? Oddly enough, the Psalmist
does not explain the distress as the result of sin, though the warnings
contained in 30-32 might suggest this, but falls back on the short
ness of life as a reasonable ground for praying for a change of Jhvh's
attitude. 38 a. The Hebrew words for Thou and ivm are very similar, and
the latter seems to be called for in antithesis to the once upon a time of
V. 19, while no reason exists for emphasising Thou. Baethgen, how
ever, sees no necessity for this, and Hitzig that antithesis is between
the past and present attitude of the same God.
40, 41 are borrowed from 80'^
43. TzHr is given in R.V. the impossible meaning of edge. But
its root meaning is hardness, rock. Jennings and Lowe derive it from
a root tzar = compress it, "a flint being called ts6r, because the particles
of which they are composed are closely compact or pressed together " !
Read with Duhm mitztzar after 44'". Olshausen would prefer to read
tzflr as a vocative and address to God, but in that case we must go a
step further and read our rock, or 0 Jhvh, our rock. For tzftr as an
appellation of Jhvh, see 18' and Deut. 32^' ".
44. Por mittfi,hi,ro, his brightness, read with Baethgen matteh
miyyiido, the sceptre from his liand — an improvement in meaning and
metre, and suiting better the paraUel clause.
45. Deprived him of the elasticity of youth through sorrow and
trouble, as in Ps. 102^- Hitzig, however, refers it to Zedekiah's
premature death in Babylon, and Baethgen, as usual, to the Jewish
people. 47. Read Ad&nS,i, Lord, for 4nl, /,
48 is a useful parallel to the troublesome passage 49'"'.
50 6. The text is corrupt, Baethgen would read k'limmath,
the scorn, for kol, all. Duhm's solution is the omission of the word for
in my bosom, and the reading of kol-rlb maammim, all the wrath of the
peoples. This seems simpler and better,
51a, An object is wanted for the verb. Probably ak, Tliee, has
dropped put before the following guttural, through the faulty ear of
the scribe to whom the passage was dictated,
51 6. _ The Anointed is thought of as turning away so that they
shout their reproaches after him, (Hitzig.)
52 is the Doxology which closes Book iii. of the Psal|er.

xo. 1-10] PSALMS 251

BOOK IV.
PSALMS 90—106.
PSALM XC.
A Prayer of Moses the man of God,
1 Jhvh, thou hast been [[our dwelling place]] in all generations.
From everlasting to everlasting,
0 God, art thou :
2 Before the mountains were brought forth.
Or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world.
3 Thou turnest man to destruction :
And sayest, " Return, ye children of men."
4 For a thousand years in thy sight
Are but as yesterday when it is past,
[[And as a watch in the night.]]
5 '"Thou carriest them away as with a flood :
They are as a sleep :"'
Pn the morning]] they are like grass which groweth up.
6 In the moming it flourisheth, and groweth up :
In the evening it is cut down, and withereth.
7 For we are consumed by thine anger,
And by thy wrath are we troubled.
8 Thou hast set our miquities before thee.
Our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.
9 For all our days are passed away in thy wrath :
We spend our years '"as a tale that is told?
10 The days of our years are threescore years and ten :
[[And ft by reason of strength they be fourscore years,]]
Yet is their strength labour and sorrow :
|[For it is soon cut off, and we fly away.]]

252 PSALMS [xc. 11-17
11 Who knoweth the power of thine anger?
([Even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath.]]
12 So teach us to number our days,
That we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.
13 Return, Jhvh, how long ?
And let it repent thee concerning thy servants.
14 0 satisfy us soon with thy mercy :
That we may rejoice [[and be gladj all our days.
15 Make us glad according to the days wherein thou hast
afflicted us.
And the years wherein we have seen evil.
16 Let thy work appear unto thy servants.
And thy glory unto their children.
17 And let the beauty of Jhvh our God be upon us :
And establish thou the work of our hands upon us :
Yea, the work of our hands establish thou it.
This Ps. appears at the first glance to be of general human interest,
and not to concern Israel in special ; and yet w. 13 ff, show plainly
enough that Israel, afflicted, and seeking help and deliverance, is the
person who speaks. (Baethgen,) It seems better with Duhm to say
that vv. 13 ff, are an addition by another hand, seeing that the subject
changes from human mortality in general to a temporary trouble.
That Moses is not the author is certain. Verse 3 contains a clear
reference to Gen. 3", and v. 2 shows a familiarity with the Story of
Creation in Gen. 1, The case against the Mosaic authorship is still
stronger if the reading in R,V. in v. 1 be retained, or if vv. 13 ff. are
regarded as originally part of the Ps. Possibly it was the very
references to the story in Genesis which caused the assumption that
Moses was the author. But the latter part of the Ps. shows that
Israel had long been suffering, and the earlier part is more akin to the
reflection ofthe Wisdom literature than to the "naive sensationalism"
of an earlier period. Any more definite date cannot be fixed.
Verses 1-12 fall into three divisions: 1-6 describe mortaUty; 7-10
refer it to sin as its cause ; and 11, 12 lament man's thoughtlessness.
1-2. Omit our dwelling-place as destroying the point of the
entire section. It is Jhvh's eternity as contrasted with man's
fugaciousness which is being described, not Jhvh's care for Israel,
Besides 1 a is overladen. 2 6 also should be transferred to follow 1 a.
So Duhm following BickeU.
The substantive verbs " Thou hast been," " Thou art," are a

xc] PSALMS 253
reminiscence of Ex. 3'*. The earth and the world, eretz v'tgb§l = the
earth as a whole, and its inhabitable part. See note on 89".
3 6 = Return to the dust whence you came.
4 emphasises the transitoriness of man's life by a contrast of it with
the Ufe of Him who sits unmoved while thousands of years fly by.
A thousand years are but a drop in the stream of time. The thought
is familiar enough to the modern man who feels crushed by the infinite
depths of space and time discovered by science.
And fear not lest existence closing your
Account and mine should know the like no more ;
The Eternal Saki from that Bowl has poured
Millions of Bubbles like us, and will pour.
So the Talmud : " Life is a passing shadow, says the Scripture. Is it the
shadow of a tower, of a tree ? A shadow that prevails for a while ?
No, it is the shadow of a bird in his flight — away flies the bird, and
there is neither bird nor shadow."
4 c sounds like the gloss of a scribe, and in any case weakens the
sense. 5 6. The meaning is doubtful, but the R. V. is the least probable.
The verb z'ramthim, thou carriest them away, is rendered in 77"
poured out. Hitzig retains this latter meaning (against Olshausen and
Baethgen), as does Duhm. The latter supplies a second shfinih so as
to get the meaning year in, year out, and omits the first in the
morning, because it is meaningless. Render:
Thou sowest them year by year;
They are as grass which groweth up.
If shep is to be retained then it is the sleep of death. This would
give an equally good sense :
Thou sowest them ; they sleep = they are bom ; they die, &c.
The Pagan world sought for the Eternal in the external {e.g. in
sculpture); Christianity from a.d, 300 to a.d, 1900 in the internal.
The age which has throned Evolution as King of Thought sees the
Eternal in an endless Becoming; — man is immortal not because he
does not die but because he is ever dying.
7-10 assign sin as the cause if not of death, yet of the shortness
of life = an undesigned coincidence with Gen. 3^. St Paul echoes the
older philosophy of death when he says that "death passed upon all
men for that all have sinned " (Rom. 5'^). The difference between the
older and the later view is that this regards sin and death as almost
automatically interlocked by a necessary law, while that makes Jhvh's
anger an almost arbitrary reason for not allowing men to live. The
difficulty which both throw in the way of modem religious thought is
overcome by leaving unmolested the conclusion of science that physical
death antedated sin, and by interpreting the death, which follows sin,
of spiritual separation from God. In doing this we are merely obeying

254 PSALMS [XCI. 1-4
the law which rules wherever men adopt ancient forms of behef They
are bound in self-defence to put their own content into the ancient
form — else must the new wine find for itself a more suitable bottle.
9 6. The meaning of k'md-hegeh is doubtful. It is variously
rendered as one that sighs, as a sound that passes by, while the LXX
seem to compare man's life to the web of a spider.
10. Omit 6 and d as the glosses of an unimaginative man.
12. With this verse ends the Psalmist's poem on human mortality.
The conclusion of the whole matter is that of the appendix to Eccl.
in 12". 13-17 appear to be a liturgical supplement with a definite
historical allusion, now in-ecoverable.
13 = Ex. 32'^; in 14 6 one of the two verbs is probably interpolated.
There is nothing to show what the wcn-k is that is referred to in 16, 17,
though Hitzig suggests that it is agricultural. 17 c is probably a short
chorus. The Talmud has an interesting conclusion which is drawn from 15.
Israel was in Egypt 400 years ; this verse equates Israel's gladness with
its afflictions, and as that gladness was to be enjoyed under King
Messiah, therefore, the Messianic Kingdom which was to follow the
ending of the present course of things, and to precede a higher and
heavenly happiness, was to last just 400 years. Following a similar
line of argument, as one day with the Lord was as a thousand years.
Rev. 20*"" conclude that the Messianic Age should last 1000 years.
According to the Zend-Avesta the world was to last 12,000 years.
Brahmanism was much bolder in its speculations about the world-
periods. If a cubic rock, it said, of a face of 16 miles were brushed
once a century with gossamer, then when the rock was reduced to an
atom there would have passed the fourth part of one period.
PSALM XCI.
First Voice.
1 [Blessed is] he that dwelleth in the secret place of the
Most High,
That abideth under the shadow of the Almighty.
2 He will say of Jhvh, " He is my refuge and my fortress :
My God ; in him will I trust."
Second Voice.
3 Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler,
And from the hpit of corruption.-!
4 He shall cover thee with his feathers :
Under his wings shalt thou trust :

XCI. 5-16] PSALMS 255
5 Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night :
Nor for the arrow that flieth by day :
6 For the pestilence that walketh in darkness :
For the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
7 A thousand shaU faU at thy side,
Ten thousand at thy right hand ; but it shall not come nigh
thee.
His truth is a shield and buckler.
8 Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold
And see the reward of the wicked.
First Voice.
9 hFor thou, Jhvh, art my refuge : H
Second Voice.
hThou hast made the most high thy habitation.-]
10 There shaU no evil befall thee :
No plague shall come nigh thy dwelling.
11 For he shall give his angels charge over thee,
To keep thee in aU thy ways.
12 They shall bear thee up in their hands,
Lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.
13 Thou shalt tread upon the hserpent-l and adder :
The young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under
feet. Third Voice (?A priest's).
14 " Because he hath set his love upon me,
Therefore will I deliver him :
I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.
15 He shaU call upon me, and I will answer him :
I will be with him in trouble :
I wiU deUver him, and honour him.
16 With long life will I satisfy him,
And shew him my salvation."
But for V. 8 (cf 23") we might call this a N.T. Ps. — and even for
that many paraUels offer themselves in Christian writings. In point of
date also the Ps. is not far removed from the beginning of the Christian
era. Its general drift is as simple as it is beautiful. It is related to

256 PSALMS [XCL
Ps. 90 as Christianity is related to Paganism. It breathes the sure
trust in God and the subUme optimism of Jesus of Nazareth, and was,
we may venture to say, one of His favourite Pss., if we may judge
from the use made of it in the story of the Temptation.
But though the general drift of the Ps. is plain enough, the change
to the second person in verse 3, to the first in 9 a, to the second again
in 9 6, and to the first once more in 14 is perplexing. Olshausen
solves the difficulty by referring it to a corruption of the text, while
admitting that the Ps. was written for use in public worship.^ Hitzig
treats the verbs which cause the difficulty as of an indefinite third
person, and, therefore, capable of being rendered by either the first or
the second. So Wellhausen. Duhm corrects the text. But a less
drastic and more simple explanation lies ready to our hand in a
suggestion of J. D. Michaelis. Holding it, with Olshausen, for a
liturgical composition he assigns vv. 1-2 to one voice, 3-8 to another,
9 a to the first again, 9 6-13 to the second, and 14-16 to Jhvh.
This satisfies all the requirements, and saves us from the necessity of
emending the text.
There is no improbability in Wellhausen's suggestion that this Ps.
may have served as a talisman, and so be in this respect without a
parallel in the collection, but it is a moral impossibility that the
author meant it to serve that purpose. Its religion is too pure for
that. It is worth noting that the Ps. has many points of contact with
Deuteronomy and that both that book and this Ps. are quoted in the
narrative of our Lord's Temptation; e.g. verse 8= Deut. 32'", 4 =
Deut. 32", 13 = Deut. 32". Also separate expressions, e.g. chMz,
keteb, eleph and zoch^l (see below).
Lastly, it may be noticed that the view here taken, viz, that the
Ps, is in antiphonal form, is supported by the Targum, which makes
it to be a dialogue between David and Solomon, and by Hengstenberg,
who regards it as a catechetical lecture, the Psalmist employing at one
time the thou in the character of teacher and at another the / in the
character of scholar,
1. The view of the Ps. taken in the Introduction renders it
necessary to follow Hitzig (but conversely) and understand the im
personal ySshgb as / that dwell. Then the third person of shall abide
remains as in Job 12*, It is possible that ash'rSi, blessed is the man
(as 1'), has dropped out at the beginning of the Ps, Shall abide is a
verb having as its root meaning to spend tlie night. B'zgl under the
shadow occurs in the proper name Bezaleel, under the shadow of God.
Under the shadow of my roof occurs in Gen. 19'- The idea here, then,
clearly is that the man is blessed who is Jhvh's guest — an " undesigned
coincidence" with the often-recurring thought ofthe "Guest-psalms."
Most High - ely6n, &nd Almighty = Shaddai, are terms of transcend
ence — and fit the late period when Jhvh's nearness was fading before
His awful greatness.
3. _i^or = thy trust is well-founded. The fowler. Man's soul is
as a bird, and death is the fowler who takes it (11', 124'), This

XCL] PSALMS 257
supplies the true meaning of 3 6, For middeber, frmn the pestihnce,
read mibb6r, from the pit. (a) It is not likely that pestilence should
occur both in 3 and 6, and (6) the paraUelism requires a reference to
death. Even Hengstenberg sees the force of (a) and renders, therefore,
the pestihnce of wickedness, which does not satisfy (6).
4. With His feathers = Deut. 32". His truth is a shield and
buckler, which forms 4 c in R.V., has been transferred with BickeU to
the end of 7.
5 a. The terror by night = assassination, according to Duhm, who
quotes Cant, 3'. But the arrow that flieth by day in 5 6 is sunstroke,
and therefore 5 a can only refer to epilepsy or lunacy, as caused by
the moon. The verse is a document from the days when a cultured
animism was the popular creed and which saw, as India sees to-day,
the work of a demon in every startling illness. In Babylon Sin, the
Moon-god, ruled " fire and water," i.e. caused fever and cold — of which
belief Mt. 17'" is a distant echo, Ps, 121' repeats the meaning of this
verse. (See a note by Gunkel in Die Christliche Welt, 1903, No. 34,
sp. 811.) 6. Pestihnce and destruction again as demons. 1 Chron. 21
knows of an angel of pestilence. North India has a demon of cholera
in Hardiha L^la, a small-pox goddess in SitaM, and Kisi Balba is a
demon of cattle-disease in Bengal.
7 is a conditional sentence. Though a thousand fall... it shall not
come nigh thee, for His truth is thy shield.
8. The only verse of the Ps. which hints at a historical back
ground. The sense is : Though the demon of pestilence rage, your
only concern will be the sight of his doings in the death of the wicked.
You wUl see, but not be touched.
9 a. This moves the first voice to exclaim, and to say why he
wiU not suffer. In 9 6 the second voice resumes its words of sure
confidence. 10 a = Prov. 13"", 24'". _
10 6. Tent (lit.). "An instance of the way in which the patriarchal
life became stereotyped, so to speak, in the language " (Perowne).
11 = Ex. 23^°. Over against the demons of disease are the good
angels of Jhvh. It is a mistake to suppose that Jewish religion was
ever a finished piece of logical precision. It was not a constant — any
more than any true religion ever is — but was a growing power where it
Uved. This is why we find in it such a contradiction as a simultaneous
belief in the supremacy of Jhvh and the existence of evil angels. The
Pss. themselves witness to the perplexity caused by the sight of
irreconcileables. But in spite of its confusion Judaism held fast to
its trust in Jhvh. Its loyalty in this was the pre-condition of
Christianity. 12 6 = Prov. 3 2',
13. lAon and adder [A.V,] are not a pair to go together.
Serpents and scorpions occur m Luke 10", and the LXX rendering here
is asp and basilisk. Besides one does not tread on a Uon unawares.
c. 17

258 PSALMS [XCII. 1-13
Hence read zokgl, serpent, for shachal, lion, and note too that zochal^i
occurs in Deut, 32 ^^ See Introduction above. Tannin = dragon.
14-16. Jhvh speaks and says that chesed on man's part begets
chesed on His — Liebe Gegenliebe erzeugt. To know Jhvh's self-
manifestation (=His Name) is man's most liberal education; it sets
him on high.
15 = 50'" and 16 = 60^.

PSALM XCH.
A Psalm : A Song for the sabbath day.
1 It is a good thing to give thanks unto Jhvh :
To sing praises unto thy name, 0 Most High :
2 To shew forth thy loringkindness in the moming,
And thy faithfulness every night,
3 Upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery :
Upon the harp with a solemn sound.
4 For thou, Jhvh, hast made me glad through thy work :
I wiU triumph in the works of thy hands.
5 Jhvh, how great are thy works !
Thy thoughts are very deep.
6 A brutish man knoweth not :
A fool understandeth not : —
7 When the wicked spring as the grass.
And when all the workers of iniquity do flourish :
It is that they shall be destroyed for ever :
8 But thou, Jhvh, art on high for evermore.
9 For, lo, thine enemies, Jhvh,
For, lo, thine enemies shall perish :
All the workers of iniquity shaU be scattered.
10 But my horn is exalted like the horn of a wild ox :
I am anointed with fresh oU.
11 Mine eye hath seen my desire on mine enemies :
Mine ears have heard my desire of the wicked that rise
up against me.
12 The righteous shall flourish Uke the palm tree :
He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
13 hThey shaU be planted in the house of Jhvh :-|
They shaU flourish in the courts of our God.

XCII. 14-15] PSALMS 259
14 They shall still bring forth fruit in old age :
They shall be green and flourishing :

15 To shew that Jhvh is upright:
He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him,.
The theme of this Ps. is that of 37, 49, 73, but does not reach
their level. EspeciaUy are the two latter more alive to the wider and
deeper issues of the problem of evil. Pss.- 37 and 92 are content to
say that Jhvh shall give those that are true to Him their heart's
desire here, whUe 49 and 73 catch a glimpse of the land that is very
far off. In 92 the Psalmist, however, agrees with 73 that it is the
fool (or the beast) only who does not understand Jhvh's thoughts. In
49 and 92, moreover, we have a similarity of treatment. A solemn
introduction, a sort of invocation of the heavenly muse, in the one, in
the other a joyful demand to give praise to Jhvh, serves to heighten
the reader's sense of the importance attached by the writer to the
problem which he is about to hymn.
There is no reason to doubt that the Ps. is to be classed with its
neighbours as a product of the Maccabean age. The enemies are
within Israel, are probably of the Sadducean party. The position
described in 1 Mace. 7^ would suit this Ps. very well. Internecine
strife, strong religious fervour contending against secularism, and the
prospect of ultimate victory resound in the Ps, and were present in
B.C. 162 in Jerusalem. But as 94 seems to be from the same author,
the times of Alexander Jannaeus (b,c. 104-78) seem preferable.
1-3. The older conception of Jhvh as a God of mercy and truth
(cf Ps. 89) here struggles with the newer thought of His transcendency
as Ely6n, the Most High. The division in v. 2 is rhetorical only.
Mercy and truth are to be sung night and morning. For 3 a see note
to Ps. 12 ad finem.
4-5. A definite work is pointed to in 4 a, e.g. the slaughter of
Antiochus and Lysias by Demetrius, or a deliverance from Syria as a
whole. The thought of the particular work leads to the wider con
sideration of Jhvh's works in general, and this to the thought which
lay behind them. Man still starts from the thought of a special
Providence ordering the individual's goings, then assumes this for
other people, and finaUy adores the unsearchable judgments of God.
In the Ps. God's works are those performed by the hands of the
chasidlm, e.g. Judas slew all the friends of Demetrius, and drove
Alcimus, and all the wicked and ungodly men of Israel, out of their
own land (1 Mace. 7').
6 = 73^. The writer of this Ps. was certainly familiar with 49 and
73. The word baar, brutish, occurs in connection with k'sU, fool, in
49'°- K'sil is joined mth b'h6m6th, beast, in 73 ^^ and is a word
peculiar to the Ps. and Wisdom literature. Coming from a root which
17—2

260 PSALMS [xciii. 1-3
means to be fat, it is an earlier instance of the popular belief that fat
people are generaUy stupid.
7 states the riddle which the fools do not understand. They see the
prosperity of the wicked, i.e. here the Sadducean party, but they do
not see God's purpose in raising them so high that their fall may be the
deeper. 8-9. 8 = Is. 57'"; Ps. 10". This truth that Jhvh is in heaven
whence He can see, and, seeing, can judge all men is the Psalmist's
solution. Evil may triumph for a time, but it cannot escape the eye
of the Heavenly Ruler, and, if He does not yet interpose, it is only
because His thoughts are very deep. The thought is Augustine's —
Deus patiens quia ceternus.
10-11. See note on horn, 75^. Wild ox r'§m (A.V. unicorn,
cf 22^", 29'). In Assyrian the Hebrew word has the meaning of wild
ox, but in Arabic it is the name of the leucoryx, " a powerful antelope
that can cope with lions and tigers, and whose large sharp-pointed
horns (more than three feet long) are a formidable weapon " (Haupt).
The horn is an emblem of defensive power and at the same time of
stately grace; and the fresh, green oil an emblem of the pleasant
feeling and enthusiasm, joyous in the prospect of victory, by which the
Church is then pervaded (Delitzsch). This latter passage explains
the reasons which have induced the Catholic Church to adopt oil as
the symbol of the Holy Spirit.
12-14. The writer now generalises. The righteous = those true
to the theocracy, shall fiourish with a duration denied to the godless,
i.e. Paganised Jew. Like a cedar in Lebanon occurs again in 37'",
where see note. The tree in the house of Jhvh is referred to in 52*.
Cf 2 Mace. 14*. In Zech. 1 ' the myrtle trees of the heavenly palace
were a counterpart of those of the earthly. But the text requires the
emendation given it above. In 14 the prosperity of the godly is still
described in terms drawn from the olive tree.
15 reads like a gloss of a pious scribe.
Ps. 92, as the superscription reminds us, was appointed for use
on Saturday. Sunday's Ps. was 24; Monday's 48; Tuesday's 82;
Thursday's 81; Friday's 93.PSALM XCIII.
1 Jhvh reigneth, he is clothed with majesty :
Jhvh is clothed with strength; he hath girded himself:
The world also is stablished, that it cannot be moved.
2 Thy throne is established of old :
Thou art from everlasting to everlasting.
3 Though the floods lift up, Jhvh,
Though the floods lift up their voice :
Though the floods lift up their waves :

XCIII. 4-5] PSALMS 261
4 Yet Jhvh on high is mighty
Above the noise of many waters,
Above the mighty waves of the sea.
5 Thy testimonies are very sure :
Holiness becometh thine house,
Jhvh, for ever.
This Ps. contains nothing to compel us to refer it to an uproar of
the nations against Jhvh, and Duhm, therefore, prefers the interpreta
tion of the LXX, who placed over it the superscription : For the day
before the Sabbath when the earth was filled with inhabitants. He
holds, therefore, that all modern exegetes are wrong in giving the Ps.
a figurative meaning. Certainly it is open to him to emphasise the
sequence of thought as being (a) Jhvh's kingly power is shown in
creation, in His saying with Job (38"), and Canute, "Thus far shalt
thou go and no further" ; (6) in the addition of a reference to the law
as a second proof of Jhvh's kingship (cf Ps. 19); and (c) in the
implicit prayer of 5 6, c that Jhvh's kingship may be shown m main
taining the integrity of His Temple.
On the other hand the Ps. is one of a group of so-caUed "accession-
psalms," which consists of 47, 93, 96 to 100, in all of which Jhvh's
kingship is celebrated. In all of the others it is plain that Jhvh's
kingship over the heathen is meant, whatever may be the symbolism
chosen to set it forth. Analogy, therefore, would bid us make no
exception of Ps. 93 but refer its imagery also to the raging of the
heathens. In this case all aUusion to Jhvh's power in creation and in
holding back the forces of the waters, or of their dragon-spirits, serves
the purpose only of emphasising His lordship over the heathen nations.
The two sets of ideas stand side by side in Ps. 46. Also 96'°, it seems,
must be regarded as giving the clue to the interpretation of this group
of Pss,_ This enables us to fix the date of their composition as one when
Israel was exulting in the sense of Jhvh's newly manifested power.
The recovery of their Temple and the overthrow of the attempts to
wipe out the worship of Jhvh in B.C. 165 afford, therefore, a suitable
background for the Pss. whose motto is " Jhvh reigneth."
Wilfred Monod distinguishes between the " Kingdom of the Psalms "
and the "Kingdom of the Prophets." The former, he says, is regarded
as exercised over Nature now, and the latter is to be manifested over a
transformed Nature in the Messianic future. L'Esperance Chretienne,
ll. 45. 1. How beautiful are the feet of him,,, that saith unto Zion, "Thy
God reigneth" (Is, 52'), The Psalmist impUes that Jhvh's power had
been in abeyance ; now He has become King ; He shows Himself in all
His majesty, which rises aloft above everything; He has put this on
like a garment (Delitzsch).

262 PSALMS [XCIV. 1-7
Ic and 2 are to be interpreted as 76' q.v. BickeU inserts in 2 6
the completing phrase which might easily have been omitted by a
scribe. 3 is a concessive clause. Though the floods be lifted up, etc...
yet Jhvh is high above them all. The idea occurs again in 89*"",
where too Jhvh's power in nature is but a guarantee (or a paraUel) of
His supremacy over the nations of the world. But n'har6th, rivers,
points to the figurative character of the passage. Is the poet drawing
on his own experience (like the author of 42') and using " the echo of
Niagara " to body forth the thunder-threats of heathen tyrants ? The
Nile = Egypt (Jer. 46'"''); the Tigris, arrow-swift = Assyria (Is. 8');
the Euphrates = Babylon (Is. 27'). So here the j«oo& = heathen-
powers in general.
4. Rev. 1'" is another instance of the N.T. appUcation to Jesus
Christ of attributes of Jhvh in the O.T, Oceans thunder may be
terrific, but Jhvh's is mighty above them all. Ps. 29*; Ex. 19".
5. The power of Jhvh in nature is proof that the attacks of
Antiochus Epiphanes, or any other foe of Israel, on the law wliich
Jhvh gave to Israel must end in failure. The Sd6th of Jhvh are as
firmly established as the earth which cannot be moved {v. 1). Holy
was the Law; holy too the Temple. K6desh, holiness, is used here as
in 1 Sam. 6™ to denote separateness from heathen defilement. Judas
had cast out "the abomination that defileth," the altar erected in the
Temple to Zeus Olympios. The Temple was now ceremonially clean.
Such cleanness it was fitting should be for ever ; for was it not Jhvh's,
and had not Jhvh shown His supreme power and glory in nature and
history alike? PSALM XCIV.
1 Jhvh, thou God, to whom vengeance belongeth :
God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself
2 Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth :
Render their reward to the proud.
3 Jhvh, how long shall the wicked.
How long shall the wicked triumph?
4 They utter, they speak haughtUy :
All the workers of iniquity boast themselves.
5 They break in pieces thy people, Jhvh,
And afflict thine heritage.
6 They slay the widow and the stranger :
They murder the fatherless.
7 And they say, " Jhvh shall not see.
Neither shall the God of Jacob take notice."

XCIV. 8-23] PSALMS 263
8 When will ye understand, ye brutish among the people :
When will ye be wise, ye fools?
9 He that planted the ear, shall he not hear ?
He that formed the eye, shall he not see?
10 He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct ?
He that teacheth man knowledge, doth not he know?
11 Jhvh knoweth the thoughts of man,
[[That they are vanity.]]
12 Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, Jhvh,
And teachest him out of thy law :
13 That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity,
UntU the pit be digged for the wicked.
14 For Jhvh will not cast off his people :
Nor forsake his inheritance.
15 But judgment shaU return unto the righteous :
All the upright in heart shaU follow it.
16 Who will rise up for me against the evildoers ?
Who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity ?
17 Unless Jhvh had been my help.
My soul had quickly dwelt in silence.
18 Whenever I said, " My foot slippeth " :
Thy mercy, Jhvh, held me up.
19 In the multitude of my thoughts within me
Thy comforts delight my soul.
20 ShaU the throne of iniquity have feUowship with thee,
Which frameth mischief according to law ?
21 They gather themselves together against the soul of the
righteous,
And condemn the innocent blood.
22 But Jhvh is my defence :
My God is the rock of my refuge.
23 He shall bring upon them their own iniquity,
He shall cut them off in their own wickedness :

Jhvh ou/r God shall cut them off.

264 PSALMS [XCIV.
Not a Ps. (as Hitzig seeks to prove) directed against heathen
oppressors such as Bacchides and his ally Alcimus, but against tyrants
at home, who bore themselves haughtily, oppressed the widow and the
stranger — surely internal iniquity this — disbelieved in Jhvh's activity,
occupied a throne of wickedness, and did wrong by process of law. No
time suits these details better than the days after Alexander Jann^us
had taken Bethome, carried its people to Jerusalem, crucified them and
slain their wives and children before their face, and so paralysed his
opponents with terror that they fied to the number of 8000, and during
his lifetime kept away from the land of Judsea. Schiirer, I. L 10.
Alexander was but carrying out ruthlessly the poUcy of John Hyrcanus
in subordinating his religious interests to his political. This caused a,
breach with the Pharisaic party, and dependence on the aristocratic
party of the Sadducees. It is one of the oppressed adherents of the
Pharisees — probably a leader (19 a) — who complains here of the
violence and tjrranny of the dominant Sadducean class.
The Ps. consists of an introduction of three verses and five sections
of four verses each. It depends {v. 12) on Job (5"), and {vv. 2-4, 16)
on Ps. 73 (6-9, 25). According to the LXX superscription it was
written for use on Wednesdays in the Temple, as the preceding Ps.
was for use on Fridays. Ps. 92 also bears a superscription "for the
Sabbath-day." 1-3 is an echo of Deut. 32", and is re-echoed in Rom. 12"; gfilm,
the proud, is a standing description ofthe Sadducean party, and should
be read probably for g61m in 9", 59". Other Pss. containing a polemic
against the Sadducees are 2, 18, 20, 66-69, 68, 72, 82, 89, 99, 110,
140, &c.
4-7. A description of Sadducean arrogance. Yithamm'rfi from
§.mar, to say, from root which = prominent. The Hithpael occurs here
only, and was formed by the writer, Hengstenberg thinks, from the
four Hithpaels in 18^"' ^, and denotes "zealous, vehement, impassioned
speaking." Delitzsch, on the other hand, points to ^mir as meaning
(Is. 17°) "an uppermost branch," and to speaking even as being a self-
exaltation— effari = effere. It would be simpler to say that one of the
meanings of i,mar, viz, io command, lies at the root of this Hithpael,
and then we have a human trait. He who is in a position of authority
is apt to become haughty and overbearing. The Arabic Emir is
probably one who commands, and hence those referred to in our verse
are those who ut Emiri se gerunt (Schultens). The Hithpael may
have a reciprocal meaning here as in 65" = they vie with each other in
being arrogant — certatim se tollunt.
The wicked described in these verses are not the heathen— verse 6
negatives that (cf 14") — but arrogant and powerful Jews. They rob
and murder and take no heed of the piety of their opponents. It is
not necessary to understand verse 7 literally. To a Pharisee one who
scoffed at legalism would naturaUy seem a contemner of Jhvh.
8-11. A warning addressed to the weak-kneed of the writer's
own party. There are always some who have too little faith to hold

XCIV.] PSALMS 265
fast to goodness when selfishness prospers, and to them the Psalmist
turns with a philosophic reflection, a reductio ad absurdum. Quoting
himself perhaps (92') he asks whether the mind which produces man's
mind can be thought of as wanting intelligence. The argument has
the peculiarity of proceeding from Jhvh's chastisement of the nations
to His chastisement of His own people. If we are correct in supposing
that Ps. 92 is from the same author, then he uses the famous instance
of the chastisement of the Syrians in proof that kindred, but domestic
foes wdl also in due time be punished.
11 must certainly be expunged as a feeble gloss, probably because
of an accidental hiatus in the text, which can probably be supplied as
above. 12-15. An assurance to the adherents of his own party that
though Jhvh's judgment tarry yet it will surely come. This is but
an instance of Matthew Arnold's definition of faith as holding fast
to unseen goodness. See note on 75^. The thought is that of
2 Mace. 6'*-'^ and of Heb. 6*, 12""^ God chastises the wicked when
He breaks them. He chastises the godly to purify them. This is
taught plainly "out of His law," and is the subject of the greater part
of the Deuteronomic law.
In V. 13 from the days of adversity = {mth Ps. 141'°) during the
days of adversity. So long as the Sadducean t3n:anny lasts Jhvh shall
give His own people rest — not inner rest — but outward protection.
They shall be safe under His pinions (91") until the tyranny be over
past, and the secularistic power of the Sadducean nobles be overthrown.
In V. 15 the Peshito reads ad-tzaddlk, to the righteous, for ad-
tzedek, to righteousness, which renders the sense more precisely. It is
assumed that the Psahnist's party is the party with God's right on its
side. Though now depressed and spoiled, yet its opponents will some
day perish. When that happens the right of judgment, i.e. of ruling
in general, wiU be transferred to the righteous, and what is more, the
upright in heart (cf 73') wiU then be in no doubt as to their duty.
Their feet were almost gone when they saw the prosperity of the
wicked, but when the righteous rule the temptation to doubt will no
longer exist. They wiU follow the party which is at once righteous
and in power,
16-19. A glimpse into the Psalmist's spiritual struggles. As a
leader {v. 19) he had felt more deeply than others the darts of doubt
and despair. He and his party felt alone, and yet they were not alone.
They could stiU say, as in 73^", " Whom have I in heaven but Thee ? "
It was Jhvh Himself who would rise up against the Sadducean evil
doers on behalf of the champions of His law.
18 describes by its imperfect tense what had repeatedly happened.
Whenever he was tempted to say " I am undone, my foot has slipped
on the edge of the precipice," then the chesed of Jhvh was as a good
angel saving him from faUing ; or whenever {v. 19) his mind was full
of "mazy thoughts," plans of campaign, devices to outwit his foes,
fightings without and fears within, all the anxiety which responsibility

266 PSALMS [xcv. 1-4
and leadership bring with them. Multa cura summo imperio inest.
The thoughts are not so much trains of abstract reasoning as anxieties.
Cf Ps. 139^'.
20-23. A final denunciation and a contrast. There is a double
play in v. 20, (1) on the word chaber, a name by which the Pharisees
described themselves (= neighbour or companion) ;_ and (2) on the
throne of wickedness which Alexander occupied ; being the throne at
once of high priest and king it should have been a throne of glory.
How, asks the Psalmist, can Alexander presume to claim feUowship
with Jhvh seeing that he defiles Jhvh's glorious throne ? The title
throne of glory occurs in 1 Sam. 2'; Jer. 14", 17". The kingdom of
Israel was a theocracy (Josephus coined the word), and Jhvh's throne
was in Jerusalem. "The ruler there was but His representative, and
occupied, therefore, a throne which was a " throne of glory." This
sense was common enough in the days of our Psalmist, for that term
connected it with the restoration of the Shechinah, the glory of the
first Temple. This was to be given again in the last days, the days
when Jhvh should arise to judge the earth. Cf Ps, 86% Is. 4"- ', 24"',
60"' ^°. But meanwhile the " throne of glory " was prostituted to a
throne of wickedness. What gave additional sting to the oppression
of " the throne of wickedness " was that it was carried on under the
forms of law, according to what was decreed. Like Judge Jeffreys
Alexander Jannseus carried on his judicial atrocities by warrant of the
power conferred on him, Simon Maccabaeus had been given the
authority of priest and king "for ever," i.e. with power of hereditary
transmission. His successor was but executing the office entrusted to
him by statute. The al§i-chok, according to statute, of this Ps. = al-
dibrath, according to the order, of 110"- In both cases the reference is
to the Maccabean royal priesthood which was first formaUy conferred
on Simon. In the last two verses Duhm substitutes passive verbs for indicative.
But it is sufficient to read a future tense with A.V.
23 c is the sigh of a pious scribe.

PSALM XCV.
A.
1 0 come, let us sing unto Jhvh :
Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before his presence vrith thanksgiving :
Let us make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.
3 For Jhvh is a great God :
A great King above all gods.
4 In his hand a/re the deep places of the earth :
The heights of the hiUs are his also.

xcv, 5-11] PSALMS 267
5 The sea is his, and he made it :
His hands formed it ; His is the dry land.
6 O come, let us worship and bow down :
Let us kneel before Jhvh our maker.
7 For he is our God :
We are the people of his pasture, ""and the sheep of his
hand.'' B.
To day if ye would hear his voice : —
8 "Harden not your heart, as at Meribah,
As in the day of Massah in the wilderness :
9 When your fathers tempted me,
Proved me, and saw my work.
10 Forty years long was I grieved with the generation :
I said, ' It ^s a people that do err in their heart :
Who have not known my ways.'
11 Unto whom I sware in my wrath
That they should not enter into my rest."

{conclusion missing)
Wellhausen sums up in a pithy form what we must see is the fact
as to the composition of Ps. 96. "An exhortation, spoken by God,
begins abruptly in the last hne of v. 7. There is no link between the
two halves of the Ps. Probably there is no real connection between
them ; for the exhortation, vv. 8-11, accords ill with the exultation of
vv. 1-7. Two fragments seem to have been united. The end, as
weU as the beginning of the second fragment, is lost, v. 11 not being a
conclusion. Yet vv. 1-7 a may perhaps form a whole." With this
division agree Cheyne and Duhm. Ewald says that " precisely where
the language leads to the Ancient History, it is suddenly broken,
because its fulness is too great." But a more prosaic explanation is
probably to be applied as in 77, 81', 114. Ewald, however, misses a
verse member in 7 c. That the text has not been preserved in its
purity may be guessed also from the fact that the LXX inserts after
V. 3, 94'"". Duhm, too, would treat v. 3 as an interpolation from 96"
or 97°. This does not seem, however, necessary.
There is nothing in either half of the Ps. to say when it was
composed, AU that is certain is that it is the first member of a group
of Pss. (95-100) which were obviously intended for liturgical use.
Hitzig, who treats the Ps. as a unit, refers it to the early part of the

268 PSALMS [xcvi. 1-6
year B,c. 161, soon after Nicanor had lost 500 men in a skirmish. But
this is highly precarious.
1-7 contain an invitation to praise the covenant-God, Jhvh, on
the ground of His omnipotence. The writer is not affirming in v. 3
any belief in the real existence of other gods — Jer. 2", 10'"" forbid
that — but for rhetorical purposes speaks of them at their pretended
worth. Had he been writing theology he would have said "Jhvh
alone is God," In 4 the deep places of the earth seems required by
the paraUeUsm; Baethgen, however, would read from Is. 8° the far
places. So too the word for heights is of uncertain meaning, but the
LXX renders t6aph6th as our text. In Job 22^" it is rendered
phntifulness, in Num. 23^, 24' strength. Delitzsch derives it from
the root y^ph, io be high. Read 5 6 as a relative sentence paraUel
to 5 a,
With 3 cf Psalms of Solomon 2", which says of Pompey :_ "He
said : ' I will be lord of earth and sea ' ; and perceived not that it is God
who is great, powerful in the greatness of His strength."
Go^ is to be adored for three reasons: He is exalted above aU
gods as King {v. 3) ; above all things as Creator {vv. 4, 5) ; and above
His people as their Shepherd {v. 7).
"7 C-I2. Duhm begins the second section thus :
Sheep of my hand are ye to-day;
Oh! that you would listen to my voice.
This makes an excellent beginning, but it is quite uncertain whether
the writer would have recognised it as his own. The warning is based,
as in Ps. 78 and elsewhere, on the past history of the people, and ends
with an abruptness which plainly points to the loss of the original
ending.
PSALM XCVI.
1 0 sing unto Jhvh a new song :
Sing unto Jhvh, all the earth.
2 Sing unto Jhvh, bless his name :
Shew forth his salvation from day to day.
3 Declare his glory among the nations.
His wonders among all peoples.
4 For Jhvh is great, and greatly to be praised :
He is to be feared above aU gods.
5 For all the gods of the nations are idols :
But Jhvh made the heavens.
6 Honour and majesty are before him :
Strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.

XOVL 7-13] PSALMS 269
7 Give unto Jhvh, 0 ye kindreds of the peoples,
Give unto Jhvh glory and strength.
8 Give unto Jhvh the glory due umto his name :
Bring an offering, and come into his courts.
9 O worship Jhvh in the beauty of holiness :
Fear before him, aU the earth.
10 Say among the nations that Jhvh reigneth :
[[The world also shall be estabUshed that it shall not be
moved :]]
He shall judge the peoples righteously.
11 Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad:
Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof.
12 Let the field be joyful, and aU that is therein :
Then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice
13 Before Jhvh : for he cometh,
For he cometh to judge the earth :
He shaU judge the world with righteousness.
And the peoples with his truth.
The text of this Ps. occurs in a slightly different form in
1 Chron. 16^"". But there la and 2a are omitted; 10a is placed
after 11 a ; 10 c is omitted, as are also 13 c, d. Moreover, in the same
song of David are placed Pss. 105'"'" and 106'' "'• "*. And throughout
there occur differences in the choice of words. That the version in
1 Chronicles is the later nobody but Hitzig doubts. But how are
we to account for the differences? Either the Chronicler wrote
down from memory, or he had a text before him which differed from
ours, or he took hberties with the text to suit his own purposes. On
the whole, and looking at the Midrashic character of his work, the
last hypothesis seems the most likely. But in any case the difference
is instructive. It shows quite plainly that at the time when 1 Chronicles
was composed there were men who had no superstitious veneration for
the text as such. It was to them an instrument of piety, and being
an instrument they felt themselves at liberty to shape it as their
purpose demanded. Reuss regards the whole Ps. of David as a later
interpolation in 1 Chronicles. It is not impossible, however, that
Hitzig has so much right on his side as is contained in an admission
that our Ps. has been touched up by the insertion of 1 a and 2 a and
13 c, d. But the substitution in v. 6 of gladness and place for beauty
and sanctuary, aud of before him for into his courts in v. 8 is evidence
of tendency, unless indeed we are to regard the difference as du^ to
defective memory. In any case the use of place for sanctuary reminds
us of the growing disinclination to think of Jhvh under an image of

270 PSALMS [xcvL
a concrete kind, which led ultimately to His being Himself described
as "the Place." "Heaven" was first used as an "evasive or pre
cautionary " mode of address, and then when this had become a divine
name the place became its substitute. (See note in Sayings of the
Jewish Fathers, p. 39, second ed., and Dalman's Words of Jesus,
p. 231.) Ps. 96 consists of three strophes, the first of which calls on Israel
to bless Jhvh, the second the nations, and the third nature in general.
Its eschatological character is strongly marked. The day of Jhvh is
approaching when He Himself shall take the power and reign and
judge the earth. There is no hint that He would do this through His
Messiah. But the whole Ps. is strongly coloured with the naive behef
that the Temple-worship was the appointed means of keeping alive the
idea of the all-embracing Kingdom of God, present and future. No
doubt the writer felt that the coming of the heathen with offerings to
the Temple would mean a great deal more, acceptance of the law, and
of the high place of Israel in the divine economy.
1-6 = Bless Jhvh, 0 House of Israel (135 '°).
All the earth in 16 = Israel, for in 3 a Jhvh's glory is to be
proclaimed among the nations. AU three verses are moulded on
Is. 12"'" 4 a is borrowed from 48'; cf 95'. The gods of 4 6 are
not merely impotent as against the Creator, they are non-existent.
Passages such as this and Pss. 115, 135 are of high importance for the
history of religion. They show us Monotheism in the making, A
tribal God, side by side with other tribal gods, is believed in so
tenaciously that He first becomes superior to them all, then dethrones
them, and finally reduces them to nothingness. Meanwhile the God
of the Jews bas become identified with the Creator of the Heavens, as
weU as being Lord of the whole earth.
In V. 6 honour and majesty go before Jhvh as heralds, or a body
guard. The influence of Persian reUgion may be suspected here ;
strength and beauty are as the two pillars of His sanctuary, Jachin
and Boaz.
7-10 = 0, praise Jhvh, aU ye nations (117'). Verses 7-9 a
are taken from 29'- ^ 8 6 being inserted, while kindreds of the peoples
(cf 22"; Amos 3^) takes the place of sons of the mighty. The author
of Ps. 96 treats the author of Ps. 29 with the same freedom with which
he is in his turn treated by the Chronicler. The text of the Pss. was
clearly in a fluid condition before the Canon was finally closed.
The beauty of holiness in 9 = the pure and clean garments which
were fitting for the court of the divine king. "As the priests were to
minister only in 'holy attire' (Ex. 28^) so must the nations be now
clothed with holiness" (Kay),
To 10 a from the time of Justin Martyr was added from the pen of
a Christian scribe in the Latin version the famous a ligno — !Dominus
regnavit^ a ligna—s,o often quoted as a prophecy of Jesus Christ's
world-wide dominion.
10 6 breaks the sense and is inserted from 93'°.

XCVII. 1-6] PSALMS 271
10 c = the judgment of the nations. It is worth noticing that in
Mt. 25'^ it is "all nations who are gathered before the Son of Man for
judgment." The ideas of the N.T. are to be illustrated historically
from the O.T,, and not from extraneous sources such as Buddhism.
11-13 = Make a joyful noise unto Jhvh, all the earth (98").
Man and Nature are bound up together. The whole creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together, waiting for the Messianic
deliverance (Rom. 8"^). When that deliverance came Nature would
rejoice with man— a favourite thought of the Second Isaiah (44^", 49",
56'^). It was Jhvh Himself who would come to judgment. Judgment
was no fearful thing to Hebrew piety, when it set itself over against
the heathen. Israel would be on Jhvh's side; its throne we might
almost say would be an assessor of His, and it was the nations who
would be judged ; the poor and needy, the chasldim would be righted.
The Kingdom of God would be established on earth, and its two pillars
would be righteousness and faithfulness.
R, Akiba used to say: Everything is given on pledge; and the
net is cast over all the living. The office is open; and the broker
gives credit; and the ledger is open; and the hand writes; and
whosoever will borrow comes and borrows; and the bailiffs go round
continually every day, and exact from a man whether he wills or not ;
and they have whereon to lean ; and the judgment is a judgment of
truth. And everything is prepared for the banquet.
The Moring Finger writes ; and having writ.
Moves on : nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
Omar Khayyam, Stanza 71.

PSALM XCVII.
1 Jhvh reigneth ; let the earth rejoice :
Let the multitude of isles be glad thereof.
2 Clouds and darkness are round about him :
Righteousness and judgment are the foundation of his
throne.
3 A fire goeth before him,
hAnd blazes round about his steps.H
4 His lightnings lighten the world :
The earth sees, and trembles.
5 The hills melt like wax at the presence of Jhvh,
At the presence of the Lord of the whole earth.
6 The heavens declare his righteousness.
And aU the peoples see his glory.

272 PSALMS [XCVII. 7-12
8 Zion heard, and was glad :
The daughters of Judah rejoiced
Because of thy judgments, Jhvh.
7 Confounded are aU they that serve graven images :
That boast themselves of idols :
All the gods worship him.
9 For thou, Jhvh, art high above all the earth :
Thou art exalted far above all gods.
10 hJHVH loveth them that hate evil-l :
He preserveth the souls of his saints :
He delivereth them out of the hand of the wicked.
11 Light hath arisen for the righteous :
Gladness for the upright in heart.
12 Rejoice in Jhvh, ye righteous :
Give thanks to his holy name.
The Psalmist describes, in the traditional language of a theophany
through a thunderstorm, an appearance of Jhvh to judgment. An
historical event is pointed to, not so much by the perfects of 4 and 5
as by 6 6-8, Because it is one in which Zion took no active part
{v. 8), and caused the general overthrow of the heathen gods, Wellhausen
thinks of the conquest of the East by Alexander the Great. Hitzig
refers to Judas's victory over Nicanor at Adasa B.C. 161 (1 Mace. 7"*) ;
Hengstenberg and Kirkpatrick to the faU of Babylon, when Bel and
Nebo reigned ; Ewald to the time immediately following the retum
from tbe captivity — a highly improbable date. All that is clear is
that some event of wide-reaching importance had taken place, unless
we are to charge the author with exaggeration, in which the power of
the idols had been shown to be nought. Either Alexander's conquest
or the fall of Babylon in B,c. 539-8 would suit the general context of
our Ps. But the fact that it is embedded in a group of Maccabean
Pss. and that it is a mosaic of passages from earlier Pss. and especiaUy
from Deutero-Isaiah gives the preference to the date adopted by
Hitzig. Duhm's view of the Ps. is peculiar. He takes it to be merely the
expression of the feelings which a storm evoked in the Jew ; it shows
Jhvh's kingly power compelling the world to submission and adoration,
but filling the Jew with joy and assurance. Accordingly he excuses
7 a, 6 as " a foolish interpolation." But he does not explain why the
Psalmist should speak of Zion's joy at hearing of the thunderstorm,
for what he says is no explanation. " The judgments," he says, " are
the proclamations of the world-government of Jhvh, for which the
storm affords a symbol, and often the introduction as well." Nor does

XCVII.] PSALMS 273
the third section of the Ps. hang on to the rest in any connected way
if 1-9 are merely the description of a thunderstorm.
1-6. The Psalmist seems to have taken the description of the
thunderstorm as the backbone of this section and fitted it with a head
in V. 1 and a tail in v. 6. The revelation of Jhvh in Nature is a
symbol of His higher revelation when He inaugurates the Messianic
age. He rules in Nature now ; He will reign over human nature then.
Is it merely an airy hypothesis that when Judas and his 3000 men
defeated Nicanor and the Syrian host, they may have been helped by
a convenient thunderstorm as Samuel was when fighting against the
Philistines (1 Sam. 7'°; cf Ps. 18'")? The Psalm would then
acquire an actuality and a unity which otherwise do not lie on the
surface. But if we regard the storm as a symbol inherited from the
days when Jhvh was the Storm-God, then the Psalmist's train of
thought is: Jhvh, whose dweUing is the thick darkness, and His
voice the thunder, has defeated the Syrian idolater and oppressor.
He has spoken from the heavens through Judas's prowess, and all
the peoples have seen His (and our) glory.
It is a favourite thought of Isaiah's that the "isles" shaU pay
homage to Jhvh. By the term is meant far countries, especially
coast-lands, and in particular those of Greece and Italy. Egyptian
records also use ishs with the same latitude of meaning. Cf 96'°;
Is. 42'°"'^, 51°. In m. 2, 3 the nature-wonders of Sinai have supplied
the Psalmist's imagery. But the references to Jhvh's manifestations
in the storm are too numerous in the O.T. for us to regard that as
being an isolated case in Jewish religion. The storm-cloud was Jhvh's
pavilion in what we might call the natural religion of the Jews.
2 a is a paraphrase of 18", and 2 6 is borrowed from 89'"". 4 is
from 77'^. 5 is from Mic. 1"; cf Ps. 68^ Hab. 3°. _
In 3 6 Wellhausen reads tz'adS,iv, steps, for tzar^iv, foes.
7-9. If 7 and 8 be transposed, as by Hupfeld and Cheyne, we
leam what Zion heard, viz. Jhvh's glory; and the contrast between
the nothingness of idols in v. 7 and the transcendent might of Jhvh
in 9 is sharpened. Jhvh's glory was seen in the defeat of the Syrian,
and the news was received in Jerusalem, not with the noisy demon
stration of the "mafficker," but with the sober joy of religion. Zion
saw in its victory, not its own power, but Jhvh's judgment on the
Syrian idolater. He had declared war on Jhvh. The death of
Nicanor and his host was Jhvh's reply.
7 c is best taken as an assertion of a fact. The Psalmist does not
mean that he believes in the existence of heathen gods, but he uses
popular language to assign them (if they do exist) to their proper
place as suppliants of Jhvh. The LXX, feeling this difficulty, trans
lated elohim here not by gods but by angels.
9a = 83"; 9 6 = 47'' ^
10-12, a hortatory strophe, which was perhaps not added till
later on (Delitzsch). But the exhortation in 10 a breaks up the
connection between 9 and 10 6. It is better, therefore, to read with
c. 18

274 PSALMS [XCVIII. 1-9
Wellhausen (by a slight change in the vowel-points) as in the text
above. Not aU Jews hated Syrian idolatry and Greek culture. Those
who did were Jhvh's chasldim, and were delivered from the hands of
the wicked (enemy).
Zirua, sown, in v. 11 was read by LXX z§,rach, hath arisen; the
same phrase occurs in 112". Hitzig, who defends the M.T., regards
light as being in atomic form, and strewn on the path of the righteous.
Vergil says of the dawn : Et jam prima novo spargebat lumine terras
{^n. 4"'"). Nevertheless the authority of LXX, of 112" and 104^^
must prevail Light is here = salvation, 27', 36°.
12 a = 32"" and 12 6 = 30"^ His holy Name = literaUy, a remem
brance of His holiness.

PSALM XCVIII.
A Psalm,
1 0 sing unto Jhvh a new song :
For he hath done marvellous things :
His right hand, and his holy arm, hath gotten him the
victory.
2 Jhvh hath made known his salvation :
His righteousness hath he openly shewed in the sight of
the nations.
3 He hath remembered his mercy [to the house of Jacob],
His truth toward the house of Israel :
AU the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our
God.
4 Make a joyful noise unto Jhvh, all the earth :
Make a loud noise, rejoice, and sing praises.
5 Sing unto Jhvh with the harp :
With the harp, and the voice of a psalm.
6 With trumpets and sound of cornet
Make a joyful noise before King Jhvh.
7 Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof :
The world, and they that dwell therein.
8 Let the floods clap their hands :
Let the hills be joyful together
9 Before Jhvh ; for he cometh to judge the earth :
With righteousness shaU he judge the world,
And the peoples with equity.

XCIX. 1-4] PSALMS 275
Another liturgical composition formed from earlier writings used
atomistically. The beginning and the end are taken from Ps. 96.
Almost aU that lies between is taken from the second part of Isaiah.
This book of consolation for the exiles is become as it were a Catalian
spring for the religious lyric (Delitzsch). The same historical occasion
which gave birth to the previous Ps. may very well have produced this
Ps. as well. In 1 Mace. 7"° (repeated in 2 Mace. 15") the victory over
" the ungodly Nicanor " was to be celebrated by a yearly feast on the
thirteenth of Adar, "the day before Mardocheus' day." That such a
feast was observed on the fourteenth is as certain as its origin and
object are uncertain. It was a feast of rejoicings and feastings, and of
permitted excess ; gifts were given to the poor ; it was, in fact, of the
mixed religious and secular character of our Christmas, or the Con
tinental New Year. As we have composed Christmas carols for our
great Feast, so analogy would lead us to expect that Jewish hymn-
writers would for theirs, and it is no improbable conjecture that Ps. 98
is one of them.
la. A new song. See note on 33'- lc = Is. 59", 63". The Jew
had no morbid fear of anthropomorphism.
2. Salvation and righteousness are homonyms. See note on 86"".
3. Insert as above from LXX. 3c = Is, 52'°. For the conjunction
of kindness and truth see note on 26'° and Ps. 89 pa!3sim.
46 = Is. 62°.
5, 6 refer to the shout of triumph and welcome with which the
people were wont to greet their king. Num. 23^; 1 Sam. 4";
2 Sam. 6'"
So V. 8 has its analogue in 2 Kings 11'^, when Jehoiada brought
Joash forth to be recognised as king. In Is. 56'^ it is the trees of the
field which clap their hands.
9 = 96". Every particular judgment, or act of authority of Jhvh,
is an anticipation of the final world-judgment, which, whether per
formed by Jhvh in person, or through His Messiah, forms the critical
point in all later apocalyptic writings. If Jhvh smote Nicanor in
B.O. 161 it was a proof to faith that He would smite all the ungodly
in His own good time. PSALM XCIX.
1 Jhvh reigneth ; let the peoples tremble :
He sitteth on the cherubim ; let the earth be moved.
2 Jhvh is great in Zion :
High above all the peoples.
3 Let them praise thy great and terrible name :
Holy is he.
4 The king's strength h didst thou establish in Israel :
Justice and judgment didst thou execute in Israel. H
18—2

276 PSALMS [XCIX. 5-9

5 Exalt ye Jhvh our God :
Worship at his footstool :
rr„7». „•„ 7.^

Holy is he.
6 Moses and Aaron among his priests,
Samuel among them that call upon his name :
hLet them caU on Jhvh, and he wiU answer them.H
7 He hspeaks-l unto them in the cloudy piUar :
They keep his testimonies, and the ordinance that he gave
them. [Holy is he.]
8 Thou wilt answer them, Jhvh our God :
Thou art a God that forgivest,
¦"And takest vengeance of their doings."'
9 Exalt Jhvh our God :
Worship at his holy hill :
Holy is Jhvh our God.
Bengel says that "the 99th Psalm has three parts, in which the
Lord is celebrated as He who is to come, as He who is, and as He
who was, and each part is closed with the ascription of praise: 'He
is holy.' " A closer examination of the text wiU hardly support this
logical division.
This Ps. offers as many problems as the preceding Ps. offered few.
In the first place we have to decide whether it has a unity of its own ;
whether, that is, vv. 6-8 are to be regarded as an integral part of the
Ps, or are to be suspected, with Olshausen, of being a fragment let in
and cemented with the subsequent refrain. If the latter, then the Ps.
loses all the distinction and the originality which it would otherwise
possess. But if a historical locus can be secured, and a consistent
sense be made out to fit it, then we are bound to prefer the former
alternative. To do this we have to amend the text of the R.V. in 4, and re
translate the verbs in 6-8. This latter wiU not be thought an
illegitimate liberty, when it is borne in mind that the Hebrew tenses
denote the mode rather than the time of action, and also that a much
freer use of them prevails in poetry than in prose. Moreover, in 6-8
participles are mainly used, and the participle is necessarily indefinite.
The perfect occurs twice, and the perfect may be used " for our abstract
present where this denotes (a) a condition, or attitude, already long
continued, and stiU now existing; or (6) a past, but still ever-recurring
action." If these two exercises are allowed with the results given in the text
above (which should be carefuUy compared with R.V. and the notes

XCIX.] PSALMS 277
below), we get a tolerable meaning for our Ps. It is then seen to be a
Ps. of high literary finish, consisting of four strophes with a refrain,
" Holy is He," at the close of each. It was written at a time when a
king reigned over Israel, i.e. a Maccabean king, and one, moreover,
who had not yet thrown over the Pharisees for the Sadducees, i.e.
before the decisive change in his internal policy made by John Hyrcanus
(135—105 B,c.). As Simon was the first Hasmonsean king formally
recognised as such (1 Mace. 14"') we are tied down to the two kings
Simon and his son John Hyrcanus, i.e. between 142 B.C., when Simon
succeeded Jonathan as leader, and some date in the earlier part of the
reign of John Hyrcanus. Probability is in favour of Simon being the
king of V. 4.
Moreover, Simon enjoyed the peculiar honour of being, like
Melchizedek, both priest and king. He was regarded, therefore, by
the pious as the representative of all the theocratic powers of the past.
Moses was a king, Aaron a priest, and Samuel a prophet. These
called upon Jhvh and He answered them. The days of visible
representation of Jhvh were resumed. What they did Simon could
do equaUy effectuaUy, The plenary powers of Simon are specified in
1 Mace. 14"'. "The Jews and priests were well pleased that Simon
should be their governor and high-priest for ever until there should
arise a faithful prophet," i.e. that this popular decree should remain in
force untU an authentic communication from God should make some
other enactment. The company of priests and Levites (Samuel was
sometimes regarded as a Levite) with Simon at their head made up
one united body, just as in Ps. 89^° David and the line of his
descendants form an ideal whole. Therefore when they called upon
Jhvh they might be as certain of being heard as Moses, Aaron, and
Samuel were in bygone days, for these tliree national and religious
heroes lived on in their spiritual descendants.
Thus the Ps. becomes a very important document for the religious
history of later Judaism. It shows us that the ruling tendency to
remove Jhvh to a distance because of His transcendent holiness was
crossed by the indestructible longing of the heart to find Him near.
The scribism of the orthodox and ruling party which bridged over the
gulf by means of the Law; the piety of the quiet in the land which
cherished Messianic hopes in the small circle of the devotees; both
found their analogue in Simon's time in our Psalmist, who saw in
Simon and his colleagues the visible representatives of the heavenly
King, whose presence was so awful that it made the people to tremble
and the earth to quake.
1. Yoshgb kerliblm, sessor Cherubim (Jerome), is a standing
epithet of Jhvh and connects the times of Simon with those of
David. See note on 80'.
Let the earth be moved. For the otherwise unknown th^niit, be
moved, Olshausen reads from 46' thS,mtig,
2 = 48', 76', 96', 96", 97°. The idols hath He utterly abolished,
and their worshippers now worship Him— or fear Him.

280 PSALMS [CI. 1-2
A purely liturgical composition, of the same period as the Pss.
immediately preceding it, and intended for use in the forecourts, or
the porch, of the Temple. Hitzig detects in v. 3 an implication that
the people needed encouragement by a reminder that they were Jhvh's,
and that, therefore, a time of danger was at hand. He selects as a
suitable date the year 161 b.c, when Bacchides was marching on
Jerusalem. But this is precarious. The title connotes its use in the
Temple for the thank-offering. But the Ps. was probably written for a
more general purpose, and then, on the suggestion of v. 4, adapted for
a more specific use,
2. Serve ^heie with sacrifices as in Is, 19°''^; Ex. 3'^ (which
= 5'''). All ye lands, not (as v. 3 shows) all the heathen, but the Jews,
with an eye to the Diaspora,
3 6. We are His. One of the fifteen passages where 16, not, has
been wrongly written for 16, his. The only other passage in the
Psalter is 139". 3Iade us = to be what we are, viz. His own chosen
people. The reference is not to the creation. Is. 29^, 60^'; Deut. 32'' ".
4 = 96'.
5, T6b, good, never means kind, says Hengstenberg. T6b means,
inter alia, according to Oxford Hebrew Lexicon, good, kind, benign,
Pss, 34', 100", 135'. The Hebrew language is hke theology, ifc leaves
room for a large variety of opinions.
Mercy and faithfulness. God is love ; His mercy is the generosity
of His love, and His faithfulness its constancy.
This Ps, closes the series of Deutero-Isaianic Pss. which began with
Ps, 91. There is common to all of them that "mUd subUmity, sunny
cheerfulness, unsorrowful spiritual character, and N.T. expandedness,
which we wonder at in the second part of the Book of Isaiah ; and
besides all this, they are a,lso linked together by the figure anadiplosis,
and manifold consonances and accords." They are occupied with the
destruction of enemies that have been endured long enough, and with
the deliverance of God's people (Venema). They show how the
Maccabean piety fed itself on Deutero-Isaiah, no less than did the
N,T. writers,
PSALM CL
A Psalm of David,
1 Mercy and judgment hwill I keepH
For thee, Jhvh :
[[Unto thee, Jhvh, wiU I sing.]]
2 hi will give heed to the way of the upright
When he comes before me,H
I will walk with a perfect heart
Within my house.

CI. 3-8] PSALMS 281
3 I vrill set before mine eyes
No base thing :
I hate the work of thein that turn aside :
It shall not cleave to me.
4 A hperverted-l heart shall depart from me :
I will know no wicked thing.
5 Whoso privily slandereth his neighbour.
Him will I cut off:
Whoso hath an high look and a proud heart
Him will I not suffer.
6 Mine eyes shall be upon the faithful of the land,
That they may dwell with me :
He that walketh in hthe way of the perfect-l
He shall serve me.
7 He shaU not dwell within my house
That worketh deceit:
He that telleth lies shall not tarry
In my sight.
8 I wiU early destroy
All the wicked [[of the land]] :
That I may cut off from the city of Jhvh
AU wicked doers.
This Ps. is a Speculum Regis or mirror for kings. It was a favourite
of Ernest the Pious, Duke of Saxe-Gotha, who was accustomed to send
an unfaithful minister a copy of this Ps., which gave rise to the saying,
when an official had transgressed, that he would soon receive the
Prince's Psalm. It was a favourite of Bishop Ridley. After the
death of Monica, Augustine and his friends sang this Ps. Lord Bacon
recommended it to King James when Villiers became his favourite, as
affording a good rule for the promotion of courtiers. Antonio Velasquez,
a Spanish Jesuit, wrote a folio volume of over 400 pages ou this Ps.
alone. It has been caUed also the "householders' Psahn."
The author was a person in authority, or it was composed in the
person of one. He was surrounded by revolters {v. 3), slanderers,
men haughty and arrogant, false-hearted and apostates. But he
declares that he will set before him as his canon of conduct Jhvh's
mercy and judgment. He will j'udge justly, and set his face against
aU forms of wrong. His aim will be to purify the holy land day by
day from all who defile it by their wickedness. He is one of the
chasidlm, therefore, and his enemies are those of Jhvh = the Sadducean
aristocracy, and all the lax people who tampered with Greek culture.

282 PSALMS [CL
were eclectics in religion and indifferent to legal strictness. The
circumstances of Jonathan (161-143 b.c), as described in 1 Mace. 9",
when he was dweUing in Machmas "and began to govem the people;
and he destroyed the ungodly men out of Israel," suit this Ps, very
weU. We cannot at all events put it very much later, as Duhm
suggests, for the men "high of eyes and wide of heart" cannot well
be the pious to whom a Sadducean king was opposed.
This Ps. is written in the Qina strophe of 19 B, a fact which is
somewhat obscured in the R.V. In 2c, 3a, 56, 7a, 86 I have
transposed the clauses, therefore, so as to bring out the Hebrew
rhythm better. In the first verse the law of the rhythm helps us to
correct the text of the M. T.
In the time of Theodoret some MSS of the LXX had a superscription
to this Ps., "For the fourth day of the week," which stamps it as a
Wednesday hymn for the congregation. But the whole course of the
Ps. shows clearly enough that it was not originally intended for a
liturgical end. The original "I" of the Ps. too was not Israel, as
Baethgen, following his usual course, maintains, but an individual
ruler. His song bears trace, as the note below shows, of having been
touched up for public worship.
1 and 2 in R. V. are as follows :
1 I will sing of mercy and judgment:
Unto Thee, 0 Lord, will I sing praises.
2 I will behave myself wisely in a perfect way:
Oh, when wilt Thou come unto me ?
In 1 a we may confidently replace eshm6rS,h, / will keep, by ^shlr^h, /
will sing. The latter was evidently substituted when the Ps. was
taken over for public worship. The second verb, / will sing praises,
comes at the end of the verse and is clearly superfluous, as it destroys
the requisite shortness of the second strophe. If this be omitted as
a mistaken interpolation we get the original Ps. in its own metre.
Moreover v. 2 then is seen in its true light. As it stands 2 a is a
strange and almost unintelligible saying, and 2 6 has no sort of re
lation to the context. But if we take asklMh, I will behave myself
wisely, in the sense it bears in 41', viz, consider (the verb has the same
meaning and construction in Dan. 9"), and take b'derek (R.V. in a
way) as referring to the conduct or doing of the perfect men who come
before the author as judge, we have the excellent and pertinent sense
of the text above.
I will give heed to the way of the upright — a very natural resolution
for a judge to make at his entry on his office.
(Baethgen has felt the difficulties of the verse before us, but he
solves them by transposing the verb / will sing praises from 1 6 to 2 a
/ u>ill sing and speaJc of the godly life, which has no relevancy. More
over it does not reheve the difficulty of the question thrust in by the
head and shoulders in 2 6.)
On this follows equaUy naturaUy the clause when he comes before

CII. 1-2] PSALMS 283
me, the interrogative m^thl being omitted as due to the mistake of a
scribe who thought th^b6 to be a verb in the second person — or it may
be a double dittology. This correction is supported by Hitzig, Bickell
and Duhm.
2 c. The perfect heart which the ruler will cherish in his court is
that which admits of no divided allegiance — Jhvh and not the all-
pervasive Pagan culture shall have his heart. That is why he hates
(3 6) those who tum aside = the revolters of Hos. 51 Cf 119'",
86", 40".
3-5. The writer expresses in these verses not merely his official
attitude as described in 1, 2, but his own individual feeling against
current wickedness = the base thing — d'bar bellyy^al, a thing of Belial
(the same phrase in 41' = an evil disease). He will not even look at
bribery, for example; he will hate those who go over to Hellenism, and
its lies (40") ; a twisted or perverted (same word in 2 Sam. 22 " = Ps. 18 ^' ;
Prov. 22") heart, one that is not ya.shS,r, i.e. straight, upright, true to
Jhvh, or, as we should say, conscientious, shall depart from him
(Hitzig refers the verse to the Psalmist's own purity of heart, but
wrongly); he wiU employ no spies, and encourage no informers; the
haughty and arrogant (= Sadducean aristocracy, opposed to the poor
and needy of Mt. 5') of Prov. 21", Ps. 131' shall not be tolerated.
Many rulers make such resolutions in the beginning. Very few possess
the strength to carry them out against vested interests, a territorial
aristocracy, plutocratic' pushfulness, or bureaucratic tenacity.
6—7. On the other hand, his supporters and counseUors shaU be
the true in the land (cf quiet in the land, 35^°), those who have held
fast to their faith in Jhvh, the same as the upright of 2 a, and those
who walk in the way of the perfect of 6 6. These are the chasidlm, the
followers of the Maccabean revolt, the Pharisees and those in general
who were jealous for Jhvh, the God of Hosts.
8. Baethgen says, strangely enough, that the destruction meant
here is not that of violence, but that of the daily song of praise and
pious conduct. That is hardly bome out by 1 Mace. 9"- The
Maccabees carried on an unceasing conflict with those of their feUows
who did not support their campaign.
PSALM CII.
A Prayer of the aflBicted, when he is overwhelmed, and poureth out
his complaint before Jhvh.
1 Hear my prayer, Jhvh:
Let my cry come unto thee.
2 Hide not thy face from me in the day when I am in
trouble :
Incline thine ear unto me :
In the day when I call answer me speedily.

284 PSALMS [CIL 3-15
3 For my days are consumed like smoke :
My bones are burned as an hearth.
4 My heart is smitten, and withered like grass :
I forget to eat my bread.
5 By reason of the voice of my groaning
My bones cleave to my skin and to my flesh.
6 I am like a pelican of the wilderness :
I am like an owl of the desert.
7 I watch, and am as a sparrow
Alone upon the house top.
8 Mine enemies reproach me all the day :
They that are mad against me swear by me.
9 For I have eaten ashes like bread.
And mingled my drink with weeping,
10 Because of thine indignation and thy wrath :
For thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down.
11 My days a/re Uke a shadow that declineth :
And I am withered like grass.
¦|-23 He weakened my strength in the way :
He shortened my days.
24 I said, 0 my God, take me not away in the midst of my
days :t
12 But thou, Jhvh, art for ever :
Thy remembrance unto all generations.
f [[Thy years are throughout aU generations.]]
25 Of old hast thou laid the foundation of the earth :
And the heavens are the work of thy hands.
26 They shall perish, but thou shalt endure :
Yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment :
As a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be
changed :
27 But thou art the same :
Thy years shall have no end."!-
13 Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion :
For the time to favour her, yea, the set time, is come.
14 For thy servants take pleasure in her stones.
And hthink longingly on her-| dust.
15 So the nations shaU fear the name of Jhvh,

CIL 15-28] PSALMS 285
And aU the kings of the earth his glory.
16 When Jhvh shaU build up Zion,
He shall appear in his glory :
17 He shaU regard the prayer of the destitute.
And not despise their prayer.
18 This was written for a generation to come :
hThat a people ton be created should praise Jhvh.
19 hBecause he had-i looked down from the height of his
sanctuary :
Because from heaven hhad Jhvh regarded-! the earth :
20 To hear the groaning of the prisoner :
To loose those appointed to death :
21 That men might declare the name of Jhvh in Zion,
And his praise in Jerusalem :
22 When the peoples were gathered together,
And the kingdoms, to serve Jhvh.
t t t t t t t t

28 The children of thy servants shall continue.
And their seed shall be established before thee.
The more carefuUy this Ps. is studied the more clearly wiU it
appear that as it stands it possesses no unity or progress of thought.
Cheyne's obiter dictum that "the transitions are grand" does nothing
to account for 24 foUowing on 23 or 28 on 27. The second verse in
each pair has nothing at all to do with the first, is not even related to
it by contrast. We have three separate and independent sections :
1-11, a description of the writer's evil plight ; 13-22, the deUverance
of Zion; 24 6-27, a lyric in praise of Jhvh's eternity. Besides these
three sections are a few scattered verses like wandering stars, following
no apparent law. 12 belongs in thought to section 3, 23 and 24 to
section 1, and 28 to section 2.
It is a pure assumption that the subject in 13-22 is the same as
in 1-11. The two are rather wholly independent poems, in subject,
style and tone, while 24 6-27 is also a fine little l)Tic which some
how has come to be used by way of contrast. The moan of the poor
sufferer is heightened by the thought of Jhvh's majesty. We suffer
from the changes and chances of this mortal life. He alone sits above
the waterflood of time, unmoved, unchangeable.
As to the floating vv. 23, 24, and 12, they have probably lost their
place through documentary accidents. Copyists make mistakes, one
column receives what was meant for another, papers get lost, and

286 PSALMS [OIL
besides, minds differ as rivers differ, and a scribe not infrequently
assumes the additional r61e of a corrector.
We must assign this Ps, on account of 13-22 especially to the
Maccabean times. It is fuU of allusions to Deutero-Isaiah, as well as
Job and Lamentations. It is later than 79. Hitzig selects the time
referred to in 1 Mace. 9"' "', when Jonathan and Simon fled into the
wilderness from Bacchides, circa 161 B.C.
The re-arrangement of the Ps. given above differs from that of
Duhm, whose order is: 1-11, 12-20, 24 6-29, 21, 22.
1 = 39'S 88^; 2 = 69"; 3 = 37^°; as a firebrand = the embers
smouldering on the hearth, and so gradually being_ consumed. In 4,
when grass is cut it withers ; when the heart is smitten the life-blood
dries up. The thought of 4 6 recurs in 9, and of 4 a in 11. 5 6 can
only mean that his sorrow emaciates him, so that he is but skin and
bone (Ps. 22"). Complete the verse for rhythm's sake from Job 19™.
6-7. Pelican (?) and owl are unclean birds. The Psalmist was
feeling the loneliness of failure. To this was added what the Jew
dreaded most of all, the scorn of his enemies. His very name was a
bj^ord = " May God do unto me as unto M,N."
9 is not literal but figurative.
23, In the way, i.e. the way of life. It is impossible to under
stand the Ps. as a whole (with Baethgen and others) as spoken in the
name of the whole community. 24 is too explicitly personal for that.
12, 24 6-27, The consideration of Jhvh's eternity heightens the
sense of man's limitations. Every under implies an upper; every
here a there, and man's finiteness logically presupposes an infinite.
The very feeUng of our limitations shows that we have a canon by
which to judge what is finite, i.e. that we have a sense of the infinite.
It is this capacity which gives human suffering a sharpness of agony
unknown to a lower being. A whole world of difference lies between
the suffering which is merely the response to a harmful stimulus, and
the suffering which is conscious all the time of a capacity for bliss.
Man's lament, therefore, over his mortality is the more bitter because
he hears a voice within which speaks to him of immortality, or rather,
he laments because of his sense of immortality, and only because of it.
In other words, one strong presumption of our immortality is our
possession of a sense of it. That the Psalmist could lament as he
does his own evil case in 1-11, 23, 24 is because he knows of the
ideal described in 12, 24 6-27. He feels the actual because it stands
out so hideously against the ideal.
A concrete example of this offers itself in the form of the Jewish
captives carrying their loads with a gait suggestive at once of hard
necessity and proud unyieldingness which we see depicted on the
bands of the palace-gates from Balawat, on which the campaigns of
Shalmaneser II are set forth in repousse work. Even to-day the poor
Jew may be met in Houndsditch whose every gesture is a parable of
the rebeUion of the human race against all that robs it of that ideal
which both dignifies it and disturbs its repose.

CIL] PSALMS 287
The section before us is an expansion of Is. 61' (cf 50°), a verse of
critical importance in the history of religion, and of crucial value to
day. Heaven and earth, all that is visible, that is, the material
universe, is transitory, but the good which religion offers is imperish
able. When in another passage (65") we read : " I create new heavens
and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered, nor
come into mind," we meet with a thought which was probably awakened
by 51', but reaches not to its lofty height, inasmuch as it contemplates
a change of relationships only (as in 11'-°, 29", 32""'°). "Ring in,"
he said, Ring in the valiant men and free.
The larger heart, the kindlier hand ;
Ring out the darkness of the land ;
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
The Christian world stiU awaits the "sweeter manners, purer laws"
outlined in the passage just referred to, and how should it have ears
for the still higher tmth that righteousness is the one abiding thing in
the flood of time? What 51' said had been said earlier by Isaiah
in 7°": "If ye have not faith surely ye shall not abide." This is the
earliest instance of faith being brought to the front in the history of
Israel (Gen. 16' is later). An unquestioning trust in Jhvh that His
power and wiU are enough to ensure a happy issue, a refusal to use
any means which are either a denial of that trust, or are seen to be
contrary to His wiU, these are what give a man a safe standing ground
when even a world-catastrophe falls upon him. It is Horace's
Si fractus illabatur orbis
Impavidum ferient ruinae
raised to the nth. Rehgious faith is not belief in what somebody else
has said — even were that somebody Jesus Christ Himself — but it is
that inner vision, that inner hearing which gives a certainty that
cannot be impaired by any of the changes or chances of this mortal
Ufe. The same deep truth meets us in Is. 28": "He that has faith
shall not be moved" (yimiish as in Ps. 66"). That faith is "the
foundation-stone laid in Zion, tried and precious," hidden out of sight,
but bearing the whole edifice of life.
The deep truth of Isaiah that Jhvh would know how to create a
new social order, and to turn man's chaotic unions into His own
kingdom on earth, is developed in the Apocalyptic writers into the
expectation of the destruction of the existing material universe and
the creation of a new and better world (Rev. 21'' ^; 2 Pet. 3").
Modern science, in a similar way, predicts the death of our earth
either by precipitation on the sun, or by gradual cooUng. Faith says
to this: You may be right, but man also is slowly emancipating
himself from the thraldom of matter; his true self wiU survive the
death of the earth; somewhere, somehow he wiU find a new earth,
perhaps more subtly organised, fitted to be his environment; the fires
of the sun might destroy his physical Ufe, but he himself will live on

286 PSALMS [on.
besides, minds differ as rivers differ, and a scribe not infrequently
assumes the additional r61e of a corrector.
We must assign this Ps. on account of 13-22 especiaUy to the
Maccabean times. It is fuU of allusions to Deutero-Isaiah, as well as
Job and Lamentations. It is later than 79. Hitzig selects the time
referred to in 1 Mace. 9"' *", when Jonathan and Simon fled into the
wilderness from Bacchides, circa 161 B.C.
The re-arrangement of the Ps. given above differs from that of
Duhm, whose order is: 1-11, 12-20, 24 6-29, 21, 22.
1 = 39", 88'; 2 = 69"; 3 = 37'°; as a firebrand = the embers
smouldering on the hearth, and so gradually being consumed. In 4,
when grass is cut it withers ; when the heart is smitten the life-blood
dries up. The thought of 4 6 recurs in 9, and of 4 a in 11. 5 6 can
only mean that his sorrow emaciates him, so that he is but skin and
bone (Ps. 22"). Complete the verse for rh)rthm's sake from Job 19'°.
6-7. Pelican (?) and owl are unclean birds. The Psalmist was
feeling the loneliness of failure. To this was added what the Jew
dreaded most of all, the scorn of his enemies. His very name was a
byword = " May God do unto me as unto M.N."
9 is not literal but figurative.
23. In the way, i.e. the way of life. It is impossible to under
stand the Ps. as a whole (with Baethgen and others) as spoken in the
name of the whole community. 24 is too explicitly personal for that.
12, 24 6-27. The consideration of Jhvh's eternity heightens the
sense of man's limitations. Every under implies an upper; every
here a there, and man's finiteness logicaUy presupposes an infinite.
The very feeling of our limitations shows that we have a canon by
which to judge what is finite, i.e. that we have a sense of the infinite.
It is this capacity which gives human suffering a sharpness of agony
unknown to a lower being. A whole world of difference lies between
the suffering which is merely the response to a harmful stimulus, and
the suffering which is conscious all the time of a capacity for bliss.
Man's lament, therefore, over his mortality is the more bitter because
he hears a voice within which speaks to him of immortality, or rather,
he laments because of his sense of immortality, and only because of it.
In other words, one strong presumption of our immortality is our
possession of a sense of it. That the Psalmist could lament as he
does his own evil case in 1-11, 23, 24 is because he knows of the
ideal described in 12, 24 6-27. He feels the actual because it stands
out so hideously against the ideal.
A concrete example of this offers itself in the form of the Jewish
captives carrying their loads with a gait suggestive at once of hard
necessity and proud unyieldingness which we see depicted on the
bands of the palace-gates from Balawat, on which the campaigns of
Shalmaneser II are set forth in repousse work. Even to-day the poor
Jew may be met in Houndsditch whose every gesture is a parable of
the rebeUion of the human race against aU that robs it of that ideal
which both dignifies it and disturbs its repose.

CIL] PSALMS 287
The section before us is an expansion of Is. 51' (cf 50°), a verse of
critical importance in the history of religion, and of crucial value to
day. Heaven and earth, aU that is visible, that is, the material
universe, is transitory, but the good which religion offers is imperish
able. When in another passage (65") we read : " I create new heavens
and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered, nor
come into mind," we meet with a thought which was probably awakened
by 51', but reaches not to its lofty height, inasmuch as it contemplates
a change of relationships only (as in 11'-°, 29", 32'"-'°). "Ring in,"
he said, Ring in the valiant men and free.
The larger heart, the kindlier hand ;
Ring out the darkness of the land ;
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
The Christian world stiU awaits the "sweeter manners, purer laws"
outlined in the passage just referred to, and how should it have ears
for the still higher truth that righteousness is the one abiding thing in
the flood of time? What 51' said had been said earlier by Isaiah
in 7°': " If ye have not faith surely ye shall not abide." This is the
earliest instance of faith being brought to the front in the history of
Israel (Gen. 15' is later). An unquestioning trust in Jhvh that His
power and wiU are enough to ensure a happy issue, a refusal to use
any means which are either a denial of that trust, or are seen to be
contrary to His wiU, these are what give a man a safe standing ground
when even a world-catastrophe falls upon him. It is Horace's
Si fractus iUabatur orbis
Impavidum ferient ruinse
raised to the nth. Religious faith is not belief in what somebody else
has said — even were that somebody Jesus Christ Himself — but it is
that inner vision, that inner hearing which gives a certainty that
cannot be impaired by any of the changes or chances of this mortal
hfe. The same deep truth meets us in Is. 28": "He that has faith
shall not be moved" (yftmftsh as in Ps. 55"). That faith is "the
foundation-stone laid in Zion, tried and precious," hidden out of sight,
but bearing the whole edifice of life.
The deep truth of Isaiah that Jhvh would know how to create a
new social order, and to tum man's chaotic unions into His own
kingdom on earth, is developed in the Apocalyptic writers into the
expectation of the destruction of the existing material universe and
the creation of a new and better world (Rev. 21'' '; 2 Pet. 3").
Modem science, in a similar way, predicts the death of our earth
either by precipitation on the sun, or by gradual cooUng. Paith says
to this: You may be right, but man also is slowly emancipating
hunself from the thraldom of matter; his true self wiU survive the
death of the earth; somewhere, somehow he wiU find a new earth,
perhaps more subtly organised, fitted to be his environment; the fires
of the sun might destroy his physical life, but he himself will hve on

288 PSALMS [cin. i-4
in another way. " Who has faith wiU not be moved." (See WUfred
Monod, L'Esperance Chretienne, Vol. i. ch. 1.)
The above is but a paraphrase of the Psalmist's thought in our
first and second sections. He does not mention /aM, but he impUes
it in his " grand transition " from mortal to immortal.
13-22 is a section of a purely eschatological character. Zion was,
if not precisely in ruins, at all events in a ruinous condition. But an
oracle (perhaps Is. 60) had declared that the time would come when
Zion should be the object of worship of all nations, when her brass
should be gold, her iron -silver, and her stones iron ; but this Jhvh
would "hasten in His time." Now, says the Psalmist, the set time
has surely come, because at length we have learned in the hard school
of affliction to value Zion; we take pleasure in her stones and think
hngingly (R.V. have pity — y'ch6ngn<i, Po'el from chanan [cf Prov. 14"]
— to cherish a tender feeling for anybody or anything) upon her very
dust (Neh. 4'). If then Jhvh will visit Zion as promised in Is. 60,
then, as also promised there, the nations shall come and worship.
16-17. These two verses may be taken with R.V. as stating why
the nations should praise Jhvh, viz, because He had built up Zion,
because He had appeared, &c,, or as above, as affirming the Psalmist's
own individual faith that Jhvh would certainly buUd up Zion, &c,,
according to His promise in the oracle,
18-22. The R.V., this shall be written, robs this whole section
of all intelligible meaning. The imperfect has here an aorist sense.
The meaning is that the oracle was written not for the age of its birth
but for a (not the) future generation (which verse 13 says has now
come), in order that it might praise Jhvh for looking down from
heaven to listen to the sighing of the prisoner  ; in order that the
men of that generation might declare Jhvh's name in Zion, when, as
promised in Is. 60, all the Gentiles had come to the brightness of
Zion's rising, when the kingdoms were gathered together to serve Jhvh.
28 has no apparent connection with an3rthing else contained in the
Ps., and must be regarded as only the addition of a scribe who wished
to say his Amen to the Psalmist's confession of faith.
PSALM CIII.
A Psalm of David.
1 Bless Jhvh, 0 my soul :
All that is within me, bless his holy name.
2 Bless Jhvh, 0 my soul :
Forget not all his benefits :
3 Who forgiveth all thine iniquities :
Who healeth all thy diseases :
4 Who redeemeth thy Ufe from the pit :
Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies :

CIII. 5-21] PSALMS 289
5 Who satisfieth thy hsoul-j with good things:
So that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.
6 Jhvh executeth righteousness
And judgment for aU that are oppressed.
7 ([He made known his ways unto Moses,
His acts unto the chUdren of Israel.]]
8 Jhvh is merciful and gracious,
Slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy.
9 He wiU not always chide :
Nor keep his anger for ever.
10 He hath not dealt with us after our sins :
Nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.
11 For as the heaven is high above the earth,
So great is his mercy toward them that fear him.
12 As far as the east is from the west.
So far hath he removed our transgressions from us.
13 Like as a father pitieth his chUdren,
So Jhvh pitieth them that fear him.
14 For he knoweth our frame :
He remembereth that we are dust.
15 As for man, his days are as grass :
As a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.
16 For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone :
And the place thereof shall know it no more.
17 But the mercy of Jhvh is from everlasting to everlasting
[[upon them that fear himj.
And his righteousness unto chUdren's chUdren :
18 To such as keep his covenant.
And to those that remember his commandments po do
them]].
19 Jhvh hath prepared his throne in the heavens :
His kingdom ruleth over aU.
20 Bless Jhvh, ye his angels,
Ye exceUent in strength, that do his commandments,
[[Hearkening unto the voice of his word.]]
21 Bless ye Jhvh, aU ye his hosts :
C. 19

290 PSALMS [cm. 21-22
Ye ministers of his, that do his pleasure.
22 Bless Jhvh, all his works
In all places of his dominion :
[[Bless Jhvh, 0 my soiU.]]
A late Ps., with frequent allusions to Job, Jeremiah and Deutero-
Isaiah. It contains nothing more to betray its date than a chapter in
Proverbs. Indeed the main body of it, i.e. excluding the introduction
1-5 and the epUogue 19-22, might as well find a place in the
Wisdom hterature as in the Psalter. The writer was far more in
sympathy with the wise men than with the pious circles which fed
their souls on eschatological hopes. He is content to rest on Jhvh's
tender lovingkindness. His harp has no bass-notes of anguish or
trouble. Hitzig refers to 1 Mace. 9"-", but though this period would
suit the Ps, very well, yet nothing is said to justify us in deciding on
it. The main body of the Ps. is usually divided into three parts.
One division only, however, seems natural, that after v. 13, and even
there no breach is made in the continuity of the thought.
1-5, Baethgen, who, as usual, regards the community as the
speaker, says that Israel here is regarded as a maiden in the flower of
her youthful beauty (conversely in Is, 3"), The image, however, is
foreign to the context. The Psalmist by a common Hebrew idiom
addresses himself under the word soul. " The Semitic languages have
no word for ' self If the Syriac has to render ' a kingdom divided
against itself,' it says ' a kingdom divided against its soul ' ; if it has
to render 'yourselves,' it must needs say 'your souls.'" Delitzsch
is right, therefore, in saying that "the soul, which is addressed,
represents the whole man." The kol-k'rfi,bai, all the things within
me = T)eut. 6^; the same whole-heartedness is emphasised in Ps, 86"' ".
The forget not of 2 6 = Deut, 6 ", 8 "¦ '", The gifts of 2 6 are detaUed in
3-5, The participles must be taken as representing not the habit of
mind of Jhvh, but what He has actuaUy done. He has forgiven, and
the Psalmist knows that by the fact that he has been set free from his
sicknesses (there is no reason for treating this figuratively = sufferings),
delivered from the pit of the grave (R.V. corruption), and had showered
upon him His own best graces, lovingkindness and tender love. Cf
Prov. 3°.
Ed6ch, thy mouth (R.V.); old age (Targum); body (Peshito);
cheeks (Delitzsch); desire (LXX, Olshausen); beauty (Baethgen); de
light (Duhm, who reads adin^yiki); jaw (Wellhausen); goodliness
(Kirkpatrick). The diversity is entertaining. Hengstenberg is to be
followed, who says "all translations are to be set aside as arbitrary,
and not worth mentioning, which take adi in any other sense than in
the only one which is ascertained, and which also occurs in 32°, that
viz. of ornament or beauty. That the Psalmist by his beauty denotes
his soul as his better part, is clear from the fact that the corresponding
term expressing 'my glory,' as denoting the soul," occurs in 57' (cf

cm.] PSALMS 291
7", 16°, 30"); "and from the fact that to satisfy the soul is a phrase
of constant occurrence" (Ps, 107°; Is, 58"; Ps. 63^.
The eagle was thought to cast off her feathers and to renew herself
therefore with youth. The effect of Jhvh satisfying the soul is to give
it the vigour and elasticity of youth (Mic. 1"; Is, 40").
6-13. The Psalmist here speaks for his "social self" for the
whole community which he takes up into his own person. He quotes
liberally throughout the section.
6. Jhvh's righteousnesses are the gracious acts He has done for
Israel in accordance with His covenant. His judgments teU in favour
of Israel. 7 should probably be omitted as a gloss of the same
character as those in Amos 2 '"' "- It is of the same character, too,
as the Talmudic saying that Scripture, Mishnah, and Talmud and
Haggadah, and even that which the diligent scholar was destined to
point out before his master, were aheady spoken to Moses from Sinai.
8 = Ex. 34', a favourite passage. 9 = Is. 57"; Jer. 3'' " — his anger is
rightly supplied both here and in Jer, 3°. 10 is used in the Church of
England Litany. It is the punishment of sin which the Psalmist has
in mind. ll = Ps. 36^ Them that fear Him in 13=, of course, the
Israehtes. 14-18 remind us of 90°' " for the connection between man's mortal
weakness and his sin with its punishment. But the tone here is more
generaUy human. The Psalmist appeals to Jhvh's generosity. He is
strong and eternal ; man is weak and fugacious. Nor is the appeal in
vaiu. One thing is permanent, and that, fortunately for mortal man,
is Jhvh's chesed. This it is which causes Jhvh to remember that out
of dust we came and unto dust shaU we return. How different is the
spirit of the Psalmist from that of the Persian poet :
O thou ! who Man of baser Earth didst make.
And ev'n with Paradise devise the Snake :
Por all the sin wherewith the Pace of Man
Is blackened — Man's forgiveness give — and take.
The Psalmist, however, makes one morally-grounded limitation. Jhvh's
lovingkindness is enduring, but it is effective only for those who keep
their side of the covenant. The bracketed clauses in 17 and 18 are
obvious glosses which, besides being trivial, also overload the verses.
19-22. Two glosses are found also in this section, viz. in 20 c
and 22 c; the former seems to be a corruption of 20 6, and the latter
testifies to the once close connection between Pss. 103 and 104. This
section is a doxology, to which 19 forms the introduction, and supplies
the ground. Jhvh's kingdom ruleth over all = persons and things,
and therefore aU are caUed on to praise Him. The angels are sum
moned as in Pss. 29 and 148; they are described as Jhvh's mighty
ones as in Joel 3", as ministering spirits, hearkening to Jhvh's word
(Ps. 104"; Dan. 7'°; Heb. 1'"); round them, and beneath them, are
the hosts of inferior angels, and from them the Psalmist descends to
aU Jhvh's creatures. The threefold call to bhss Jhvh reminds us of
the threefold priestly blessing in Num. 6'""".
19—2

292 PSALMS [crv. 1-15
PSALM CIV.
1 Bless Jhvh, 0 my soul.
0 Jhvh my God, thou art very great :
Thou art clothed with honour and majesty.
2 Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment :
Who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain :
3 [[Who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters :]]
Who maketh the clouds his chariot :
Who walketh upon the wings of the wind :
4 Who maketh the winds his messengers :
The lightnings his ministers :
5 Who laid the foundations of the earth.
That it should not be removed for ever.
6 Thou coveredst it with the deep as with a garment :
The waters stood above the mountains.
7 At thy rebuke they fled,
[[At the voice of thy thunder they hasted away.
8 hThe mountains rose, the vaUeys sank-!]]
Unto the place which thou hadst founded for them.
9 Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass over :
That they turn not again to cover the earth.
10 |[He sendeth the springs into the valleys :
They run among the hills.
11 They give drink to every beast of the field :
The wild asses quench their thirst.
12 By them shall the fowls of the heaven have their habitation :
They sing among the branches.]]
13 He watereth the hiUs from his chambers :
The earth is satisfled with the fruit of thy works.
14 He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle :
Herb for the service of man :
15 That he may bring forth food out of the earth :
And wine that maketh glad the heart of man :
[[Oil to make his face to shine,
And bread which strengtheneth man's heart.]]

CIV. 16-31] PSALMS 293
16 The trees of Jhvh are fuU qf sap :
The cedars of Lebanon, which he hath planted :
17 Where the birds make their nests :
As for the stork, the fir trees are her house.
18 [[The high hills are for the wild goats :
The rocks for the conies.]]
19 He appointed the moon for seasons :
The sun knoweth his going down.
20 Thou makest darkness, and it is night :
Wherein aU the beasts of the forest do creep forth.
21 [[The young lions roar after their prey,
And seek their meat from God.]]
22 The sun ariseth, they gather themselves together,
And lay them down in their dens.
23 [[Man goeth forth unto his work
And to his labour until the evening.]]
t t t t t t t
25 Yonder is the Sea, great, infinite,
Wherein are things creeping innumerable,
[[Both smaU and great beasts.
26 There go the ships :
There is that leviathan whom thou hast made to play
therein.]]
27 These wait aU upon thee :
That thou mayest give them their meat in due season.
28 That thou givest them they gather :
Thou openest thine hand, they are filled with good.
29 Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled :
Thou takest away their breath, they die,
[[And retum to their dust.]]
30 Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created :
Thou renewest the face of the earth.
f 24 Jhvh, how manifold are thy works 1
In wisdom hast thou made them all :
The earth is full of thy riches.!
31 The glory of Jhvh shall endure for ever :
Jhvh shall rejoice in his works.

294 PSALMS [CIV. 32-35
32 [[He looketh on the earth, and it trembleth :
He toucheth the hills, and they smoke.]]
33 I will sing unto Jhvh as long as I live :
I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.
34 Let my meditation to him be sweet :
Let me rejoice before Jhvh.
35 [[Let the sinners be consumed out of the earth,
And let the wicked be no more.]|
Bless thou Jhvh, 0 my soul.
Praise ye Jhvh.
Ps, 104 is a free poetic paraphrase of the Story of the Creation,
written to extol the majesty of the Creator. It does not quote
Genesis 1, but its writer was clearly familiar with that chapter. The
Ps. opens with a sort of antiphon — that which closes Ps. 103 — and
proceeds at once to recount Jhvh's wondrous deeds; and first in the
heavens and air; he next hymns (as in Pss. 8 and 74 and in Job)
Jhvh's might in quelling the monstrous powers of the deep, in rescuing
from T'h6m the dry earth with its mountains and valleys ; in bringing
forth vegetation ; in making night and day ; in providing for the night-
beasts — domesticated animals do not seem to have been thought worthy
of his notice— and for the innumerable tenants of the unharvested
ocean. He concludes with a liturgical ending of the ordinary type.
The unity of the Ps., however, has been obscured by the numerous
additions which a later hand has made. These consist, as will be seen
by a study of the verses enclosed in double brackets above, in large
part of repetitions ofthe thought in a variant form, e.g. in 7a aud 76;
of one considerable interpolation in 10-12 which breaks up the hymn
of the earth, and anticipates 13, 14 and 17 ; of elaborations of the
thought as in 15 and 21 ; and of a reference to the commerce of the
Psalmist's day, which is clearly out of place in a Hymn of Creation.
One verse (24) has been misplaced, probably by accident, and another
(35) is an alien.
1-4. The Psalmist thinks of the world as a large house of which
heaven is the upper storey, earth the ground-floor, and the ocean
the basement. He does not mention the last as the house of the
dead. He holds with Gen. 1 that there are two sets of waters, one
above, and one below the firmament. In the former Jhvh has stretched
His tent ; He dwells in Light unapproachable, and rides on the clouds
as on heavenly cherubim ; the winds are His messengers and the
Ughtnings His servants. Cf Amos 9', Ps, 18'°*
5-9. Primaeval ocean was brought into subjection by Jhvh,
chaos became cosmos, and the wide ocean received its orders to cover
the earth no more. The Psalmist does not allude to the Deluge. 7 6
is a gloss on 7 a, and 8 a should be rendered as above. The original

CIV.] PSALMS 295
Ps. contained no reference to the earth's wrinldes — the mountains and
vaUeys — but ran on : At Thy rebuke they fled
To the place, &c.
10-12. The mention of the wild animals here is clearly out of
place. The editor had still in his mind the thought of the hills and
the valleys, and was led to celebrate the brooks which were found
among them, and so the wUd animals and birds to which they gave
drink. 13-18. The waters of the earthly ocean had been subdued for
man's benefit ; those of the heavenly were also put at his service. The
clouds which gathered round the mountain-tops (= Jhvh's chambers,
3 a) emptied themselves in rain (= the fruit of Jhvh's works) ; so came
grass for the cattle and cultivated plants, especiaUy wheat for man.
(Esheb, herb, shows that the Psalmist was thinking of the second Story
of Creation, that in Gen. 2. See Gen, 2^)
The specification of oil in addition to wine in 15 is quite natural.
Duo sunt liquores corporibus humanis gratissimi intus vini, foris olei.
(Pliny, Hist. Nat. 64".) Joy makes the face to shine ; so does oil.
The trees, even the cedars of Jhvh's planting, are satisfied with rain,
and the birds of the air lodge in their branches. It does not appear
why the stork is singled out for particular mention, unless its name
ch^sidah, "the pious one," called up the thought of its being symbolical
of Israel as Jhvh's pious one. 18 should be omitted as an editorial
completion of 17.
19-23. The wonders of the night are more impressive than those
of the day, and night's wild beasts are more terrible than any which
rage by day. The refiective verse about man is foreign to the
context. 25-30. Verse 25 ends up by a reference to the creation of the
fishes, and vv. 28-30 sum up the whole, by describing the dependence
of all living creatures, birds, beasts and fishes alike, on the ever-
continued bounty of Jhvh. In language which modern science would
not contradict, the Psahnist attributes life to the continuous creative
activity of Jhvh. If water were the passive element out of which
aU things came, the breath of God (Gen, 1 ') was tbe active, and that
breath is ever being withdrawn and sent forth again. Death and life
foUow one another in unbroken sequence.
24, 31-35 point the moral of the whole. Nature is wonderful ;
Nature proclaims Jhvh as its author; therefore hymn Jhvh, When
was it that Jewish religion took the long forward step of identifying
its covenant-God with the Creator of Heaven and Earth?
35 c, d form aeuphemistic liturgical appendix as at the close of
2, 3, 7, 13, 14, 19, 27, 29, 34, &c.

296 PSALMS [ov. 1-18
PSALM CV.
1 0 give thanks unto Jhvh ; call upon his name :
Make known his deeds among the peoples.
2 Sing unto him, sing psalms unto him :
Talk ye of all his wondrous works.
3 Glory ye in his holy name :
Let the heart of them rejoice that seek Jhvh.
4 Seek Jhvh, and his strength :
Seek his face hwith all your heart.-]
5 Remember his marvellous works that he hath done :
His wonders, and the judgments of his mouth :
6 0 ye seed of Abraham his servant,
Ye children of Jacob his chosen.
7 He is Jhvh our God :
His judgments are in all the earth.
8 He hath remembered his covenant for ever.
The word which he commanded to a thousand generations.
9 Which covenant he made with Abraham,
And his oath unto Isaac :
10 And confirmed the same unto Jacob for a law.
And to Israel for an everlasting covenant :
11 [[Saying, Unto thee wUl I give the land of Canaan,
The lot of your inheritance :]]
12 When they were but a few men in number :
Yea, very few hin the land-l, and strangers in it.
13 When they went from one nation to another,
From one kingdom to another people :
14 He suffered no man to do them wrong :
Yea, he reproved kings for their sakes :
15 Saying, "Touch not mine anointed ones.
Do my prophets no harm."
16 He caUed for a famine upon the land :
He brake the whole staff of bread.
17 He sent a man before them :
Joseph was sold for a slave :
18 His feet they hurt with fetters :

cv. 18-36] PSALMS 297
He was laid in iron :
19 Until the time that his word came true :
The word of Jhvh tried him.
20 The king sent and loosed him :
Even the ruler of the peoples, and let him go free.
21 He made him lord of his house.
And ruler of aU his substance :
22 To hschool-j his princes at his pleasure :
And teach his senators wisdom.
23 Israel also came into Egypt :
Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham.
24 And he increased his people greatly :
And made them stronger than hthe Egyptians -I.
25 He turned their heart to hate his people,
To deal subtilly with his servants.
26 He sent Moses his servant :
Aaron whom he had chosen.
27 They shewed his signs among them.
Wonders in the land of Ham.
28 He sent darkness, and made it dark :
And they hdid not observe-! his word.
29 He turned their waters into blood :
He slew their fish.
30 Their '"land"' brought forth frogs in abundance,
In the chambers of hthe king himself -I.
31 He spake, and there came divers sorts of flies.
And Uce in aU their coasts.
32 He gave them haU for rain.
Flaming fire in their land.
33 He smote their vines also and their fig trees :
And brake the trees of their coasts.
34 He spake, and the locusts came,
And caterpillers, and that without number,
35 And did eat up all the herbs in their land.
And hall-1 the fruit of their ground.
36 He smote also aU the firstborn in their land,
The chief of all their strength.

298 PSALMS [cv. 37-45
37 He brought them forth also with silver and gold :
And there was not one feeble person among their tribes.
38 Egypt was glad when they departed :
For the fear of them fell upon them.
39 He spread a cloud for a covering :
And fire to give light in the night.
40 The people asked, and he brought quails.
And satisfled them with the bread of heaven.
41 He opened the rock, and the waters gushed out :
They ran in the dry places Ulic a river.
42 For he remembered his holy promise,
And Abraham his servant.
43 And he brought forth his people with joy.
And his chosen with gladness :
44 And gave them the lands of the nations :
And they inherited the labour of the peoples :
45 That they might observe his statutes.
And keep his laws.

Praise ye Jhvh.
It is natural to compare this Ps, with Ps. 78. In both the history
of Israel is treated in a poetic way, and in both with a specific purpose
in view. In Ps, 78 the writer's object was to ascribe all Israel's
troubles to the Dissenters among the twelve tribes; in this it is to
elaborate the consequences of the covenant Jhvh made with Abraham.
But for this we might suspect that the Ps. was composed for the use of
children, so simple and narrative is it in general. But the fact that it
opens and concludes with an emphasis on the importance of Abraham
as Jhvh's servant, and treats the history of Joseph, of Israel in Egypt,
and of the wandering in the wilderness as merely the unfolding of
the covenant, seems to indicate that the Psalmist wished to counteract
a tendency to neglect the privilege of being of Abraham's seed, such as
was prevalent in the days which preceded and followed the Maccabean
revolt. The Ps, as a whole is a Midrash on Is. 51'' ' In both cases
the appeal is to them that seek Jhvh to "look unto Abraham" their
father, because Jhvh "called him alone, and blessed him and increased
him." In both cases, too, the fact which each writer felt was marvellous
was the largeness of the number of people who called Abraham their
father. When Ezekiel wrote at an earlier date (33'") he had to give
the reply of Jhvh to those that inhabited the wastes of Israel, who
said: "Abraham was one and he inherited the land; but we are

cv.] PSALMS 299
many ; the land is given us for inheritance," and teU them that for
their immorality Jhvh would lay the land desolate. But in Is. 51'
Jhvh gives the opposite oracle, and promises to make Zion's wilderness
like Eden. So our Psalmist builds on Deutero-Isaiah, and says in effect
that Abraham was one ; we are many ; it is Jhvh's doing, and it is
marvellous in our eyes.
We may date the Ps. then with some confidence in the Maccabean
period, and find its text in Is. 51 '• '
The first 15 verses occur again in 1 Chron. 16, in company with
Ps. 96, and three verses of Ps. 106. That the Chronicler is the borrower
is certain, and in all probability the whole passage in his work is an
interpolation by a later hand.
1-7. -An exhortation to praise Jhvh for His marvellous works.
These are probably of recent as weU as of ancient date, and the mention
of the latter is called up by the experience of the former.
l = ls. 12". Call upon His iVame = proclaim Him as your God.
The seeking of vv. 3 and 4 = the unswerving devotion to Jhvh's will,
whether revealed in the Temple- cult or in the Law. The thimld,
evermore, is not so much a note of perseverance as of whole-heartedness,
and aims at Sadducean laxity. The judgments of v. 5 are not those
given at Sinai, but those pronounced on the Egyptians, and recently on
the Syrians. Every doing of Jhvh is also a saying. Cf. St Augustine's
Omne factum Verbi Dei verbum nobis.
7. If it is permissible to distribute Jhvh's attributes then His
chesed belongs especiaUy to Israel ; His righteous judgments to all the
earth. 8-15. Jhvh's covenant with the Patriarchs and His care of them,
8 6. Commanded, tzivvi,h = to send out an order, to issue a decree.
The word, the covenant, the oath (8 6 and 9) are all objects to
remembered. The promises to Abraham = Gen, 22"; the oath to
Isaac = Gen. 26'; the confirmation to Jacob = Gen, 28". Verse 11 is
unmetrical, and prosaic, and is therefore excised by Bickell, Duhm,
Baethgen and others. 12. The men of number = such as can be easily
counted, and is a reference to Gen. 34'°, Deut. 26'. In 12 6 we insert
in the land because both the metre and the following in it require it.
In V. 13 the way in which the words g6i, nation, and am, peoph,
alternate is instmctive : the former signifies the nation, bound together
by a common origin, language, country, and descent ; the latter the
people, bound together by unity of government (Delitzsch), In Ex. 33",
Deut. 4' am is used to lend dignity to goi — this goi is Thy am.
14 = Gen, 12", 20'' '¦ ", 26". Abimelech and Pharaoh were like dogs
in Jhvh's leash. The epithet anointed in 15 shows that the term had
lost its primary sense, and now was used in a purely technical sense.
Abraham was a prince (Gen. 23'), the equal of a king, and, therefore,
Jhvh's anointed. The Patriarchs were thought of as Prophets, because
they were the recipients of Jhvh's word (8). Abraham is called a
prophet in Gen, 20'.
16-22. A continuation of the Patriarchal story in Joseph. The

300 PSALMS [cv.
place occupied by this Patriarch, side by side with Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob is remarkable, and can be understood only by reference
to the importance of the tribes named in later history after him.
Joseph is here the hero of predestination ; his going into Egypt was
preordained with a view to the glory of Jhvh. His whole history
in Genesis stamps him as a favourite character in Israelitish story.
16, The staff of bread is that which is enough to support a man.
This is probably what hes at the base of Jesus Christ's missionary
charge in Mk, 6'. The P,B. translation of 18 has become a proverbial
saying, but Olshausen's reading of babar'zel, into iron, for bar'zel, iron,
is undoubtedly to be foUowed ; naphshd, his soul, is only a Hebrew
circumlocution for he. See note on 103'. His word came io pass
in Gen. 40'°; and then his trial was ended. Tlie ruler of peoples
in 206 has a singularly un-Biblical ring, and almost reminds one of
the tone of one of the petty rulers who figure in the Tell-el-Amama
tablets. Kin'yind, his substance, in 21 6 = riches in 104'" {creatures,
Delitzsch). 22, Por le'sor, bind, of M,T. the LXX read I'yas^r, to discipline or
instruct. 23-25. The period of Israel's sojourn in Egypt before the king
arose which knew not Josepb. The salient feature of this is the
increase of the people. Abraham's seed became more numerous than
the Egyptians (this seems the correct reading) themselves. This
leads to :
26-38 the O.T. era of miracles par excellence. 27=78"'. In
28 read with Hitzig sh^m'rii, they observed, for mfi,r1i, they rebelled.
The Egyptians are the subjects, and the LXX, feeling the contradiction
of the M.T., omitted the negative. The Psalmist does not follow the
plagues in their order as given in Exodus. His order compared with
ExOdus is 9, 1, 2, 4, 3, 7, 8, 10. The murrain (6) and the boils and
blains (6) are omitted.
In 30 a the Hebrew for land is feminine and the verb swarmed
is masculine. Duhm therefore proposes to read (Ex. 8') y'dr^m, their
Nile, for ar'tz^m, their land. In 30 6 read melek hgm, the king himself,
for mal'keyhem, their kings. We never hear of more than one king of
Egypt at the Exodus. In 34 6 the uncanonical canker worm = the
equally unauthorised caterpillar of 78"'-
In 35 6 the verb vayyokel, and they did eat, is written wrongly for
vakol, and all The Passover is passed over. The' absence oifeebh
persons in the Exodus = Is. 6": the tribes are Jhvh's as in Ps.
122". 39-41. The miracles in the wilderness. The utilitarian turn
given to the pillar of cloud and of fire is pecuUar to this Ps. "A realist
in Wonderland," says Duhm. But the Psalmist's thought throughout
is centred on the omnipotence of Jhvh, as put at the service of His
covenant with Abraham.
42-45, The joyful entrance into the Land of Promise, still
occupied by the generation to which the Psalmist belonged. Other

CVI. 1-13] • PSALMS 301
men had laboured, but the Israelites entered into their labours. But
they were not to forget Abraham's side of the covenant, and their own.
AU happened that they might keep Jhvh's statutes, and be a blessing
in the midst of the earth.

PSALM CVI.
1 Praise ye Jhvh.
0 give thanks unto Jhvh ; for he is good :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
2 Who can utter the mighty acts of Jhvh ?
Who can shew forth aU his praise?
3 Blessed are they that keep judgment,
That doeth righteousness at aU times.
4 Remember us, Jhvh, vrith the favour that thou bearest
unto thy people :
0 risit us with thy salvation :
5 That we may see the good of thy chosen,
That we may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation.
That we may glory with thine inheritance.
6 We have sinned with our fathers,
We have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly.
7 Our fathers understood not thy wonders in Egypt :
They remembered not the multitude of thy mercies :
But hrebeUed against the Most High-j at the Red sea.
8 Nevertheless he saved them for his name's sake.
That he might make his mighty power to be known.
9 He rebuked the Red sea also, and it was dried up :
So he led them through the depths, as through the
wilderness.
10 And he saved them from the hand of him that hated them.
And redeemed them from the hand of the enemy.
11 And the waters covered their enemies :
There was not one of them left.
12 Then beUeved they his words :
They sang his praise.
13 They soon forgat his works :
They waited not for his counsel :

302 PSALMS [CVL 14-31
14 But lusted exceedingly in the wilderness.
And tempted God in the desert.
15 And he gave them their request :
But sent leanness into their soul.
16 They enried Moses also in the camp.
And Aaron the saint of Jhvh.
17 The earth opened and swallowed up Dathan,
And covered the company of Abiram.
18 And a fire was kindled in their company :
The flame burned up the wicked.
19 They made a calf in Horeb,
And worshipped the molten image.
20 Thus they changed their glory
Into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass.
21 They forgat God their saviour.
Which had done great things in Egypt :
22 Wondrous works in the land of Ham,
And terrible things by the Red sea.
23 Therefore he said that he would destroy them,
Had not Moses his chosen stood before him in the breach,
To turn away his wrath, lest he should destroy them.
24 Yea, they despised the pleasant land.
They beUeved not his word :
25 But murmured in their tents.
And hearkened not unto the voice of Jhvh.
26 Therefore he lifted up his hand against them,
To overthrow them in the wilderness :
27 To overthrow their seed also among the nations.
And to scatter them in the lands.
28 They joined themselves also unto Baal-peor,
And ate the sacrifices of the dead.
29 Thus they provoked him to anger with their doings :
And the plague brake in upon them.
30 Then stood up Phinehas, and executed judgment :
And so the plague was stayed.
31 And that was counted unto him for righteousness
Unto all generations for evermore.

CVL 32-47] PSALMS 303
32 They angered him also at the waters of Meribah,
So that it went ill with Moses for their sakes :
33 Because they hrebeUed against Jhvh's spirit,-]
So that he spake unadrisedly with his lips.
34 They did not destroy the nations.
Concerning whom Jhvh commanded them :
35 But were mingled among the nations.
And learned their works.
36 And they served their idols :
Which were a snare unto them.
37 Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto
devils,
38 And shed innocent blood,
^Even the blood of their sons and of their daughters,
Whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan :]]
And the land was polluted with blood.
39 Thus were they defiled with their own works.
And went a whoring with their own doings.
40 Therefore was the wrath of Jhvh kindled against his
people,
Insomuch that he abhorred his own inheritance.
41 And he gave them into the hand of the nations :
And they that hated them ruled over them.
42 Their enemies also oppressed them,
And they were brought into subjection under their hand.
43 Many times did he deUver them :
But they hwere rebeUious against his -I counsel,
|[And were brought low for their iniquity.]]
44 Nevertheless he regarded their affliction,
He heard their cry :
45 And he remembered for them his covenant.
And repented according to the multitude of his mercies.
46 He made them also to be pitied
Of all those that carried them captives.
47 Save us, Jhvh, our God,
And gather us from among the nations,

304 PSALMS * [CVL 47-48
To give thanks unto thy holy name :
To triumph in thy praise.
48 Blessed le Jhvh God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting : and let
all the people say. Amen, Praise ye Jhvh,
According to a weU-known story Frederick the Great of Pmssia,
on asking for a plain proof of Christianity from his chaplain, received
the reply: "The Jews, your Majesty," The chaplain's judgment
must often recur to a student of the Psalter. Whatever may be the
ultimate issue of the Babel und Bibel controversy, one thing is clear
in the history of the Jews, and that is what may be called their
religious stubbomness. Through good report and evil report they
held fast to their confidence in Jhvh, They might be scattered and
peeled, but they knew that Jhvh would tum again, or rather turn
them again to Him, Were they prosperous, they gave Him the
thanks. It was this very stubbornness of faith which enabled the scribes
to stamp on their past history the note of faithlessness. That history
told of slavery in Egypt, a tedious and disastrous wandering in the
wilderness, repeated disasters in the field, subjugation and slavery
to foreign powers. How could these startling facts be reconciled with
the faith which held fast to Jhvh's chesed in maldng them His chosen
people? The answer is writ large in the Books of Kings and other
historical books, in Pss. 78 and 106 and elsewhere. The Fathers had
been stiff-necked, rebellious and self-wiUed. This gives us a one-sided,
and (to the scientific historian) untrustworthy view of the unhappy
Fathers of the Jewish people. But the books of the Bible were never
intended to be bare history. Every book in it was written for a
purpose, and that purpose was to set forth a particular view of religion.
We may, therefore, as disciples of religion, hold that the Fathers of
the Jews were not really so black as the needs of religion painted them
in later days, and yet hold that the schools of the scribes (who gave us
e. g. the latter part of Jeremiah, and not a few of the Pss.) were justified
in their philosophy of history. It was not facts that these schools
wished to set forth so much as ideas, and an idea is nearer to reality
than a fact. This truth should not be forgotten by those who complain
of two contraries being contradictory, A farmer calls trefoil grass, and
a botanist puts it with the vetches. Both are right, but each from
his own standpoint. Similarly, the student of history may suspect
that the Jewish Fathers were not the monsters of self-will that our
Psalmist paints them, and yet the disciple of reUgion may assent to
every word of his Midrash. Willst den Dichter Du verstehen,
Musst in Dichter's Lande gehen.
A writer's point of view must be ascertained first, and his work be
judged by its fitness for the end it serves. If this be so then Ps. 106

CVI.J PSALMS 305
deserves higher praise than it receives sometimes. It aims, according
to its beginning and ending, at extolling Jhvh, and what higher honour
could be given Him than a detailed proof, not so much of His "mighty
acts" as of His "mercies"? That Jhvh is "good" is higher praise
than that He is "mighty," and this praise the Psalmist secures for
Him by his Midrash on the history of the Hexateuch.
1 = Jer. 33", Pss. 107', 118', 136', 1 Chron. 16°", a favourite formula
in public worship. We cannot affirm the priority of Jer. 33", because
that verse occurs in the section which is a scribal addition of unknown
date taken fi-om the Book of Baruch, incorporated in its present form
in the Book of Jeremiah within 200 years B.C. It is best to regard the
formula here as used by the Psalmists independently of Jeremiah.
3. The keeping judgment and doing righteousness = 103'*, 106 "^
The keeping of the Law in whole and in detail is meant.
4. The LXX gives the plural here, which the context requires ;
in V. 5 the verbs being in the infinitive follow the person of v. 4.
Bickell solved the difiiculty which the singular of the M.T. offers,
by his judgment that a scribe wrote the two verses in the margin,
and another scribe incorporated them in the text. Baethgen makes
the "I" = Israel as a whole. That v. 6 is the direct counterpart of
V. 3 is in favour of BickeU' s theory.
Visit us = 8*, 80'". Here, and in 8", the paraUel to p^kad, visit, is
zSkar, remember. In 80'" it is behold. Whether the visitation is in
grace or wrath depends on the context. In 59° is an example of the
latter. 6. On the three words for sin used here see note on 51 '. Wicked
ness takes the place here of transgression there.
7-12. With V. 7 the body of the Ps. begins, which consists of
a Midrash on the early history. In 7 for al-yam, at the sea, read
elyfin, the Most High. In Egypt the people withstood Moses ; at the
Red Sea (= the reedy-sea) they were moved to praise, but soon forgot
Jhvh again.
13-24. Because they forgot, they murmured when water and
flesh ran short, and proceeded to revolt ; from that they went on to
idolatry. In V. 15 the Psalmist substitutes r^z6n, leanness, for the zfi,r§,,
disgust, of Num. 11'° He probably followed an earlier Midrash on
Numbers. (There seems no convincing reason for omitting ». 17 with BickeU,
or 18 with Duhm.)
The contemptuous way in which the Psalmist speaks of the calf
made by Aaron proceeds from an age when Jhvh's sole Majesty was a
prime article of faith. In the earlier history the caK was an image of
Jhvh.
24-33 state the fourth principal sin, ingratitude. Pleasant land
in 24 = Jer. 3'°, Zech. 7 '". Lift up His hand = to swear (Deut. 32"°).
28 a. The fifth principal sin was the worshipping of the Moabitish
Baal of Peor with the rites of Priapus. WeUhausen and others identify
c. 20

306 PSALMS [CVL
the mount of Peor with Pisgah. But the locaUty is "not certainly
identified," Peor is from a root pS,ar, io open wide, which may suggest
that the mountain was so called from a chasm over which it towered,
or that the derivative meaning of pfi,ar, to desire greedily, described the
god there worshipped, who thus gave his name to the mountain. There
is nothing improbable in this latter suggestion. Men haye in all ages
objectified their feelings, and then worshipped them. Feelings change;
worship remains constant.
28 6. The sacrifices of the (^eat^ = sacrifices offered to dead idols
(Ps. 115), in distinction from those offered to Jhvh as the living God
(Ps, 42').
31. Phinehas was credited with righteousness = the fulfilment of
a duty ; his reward was that the priesthood was conferred on his family
for everlasting (Num. 26"*),
33. His spirit = that of Jhvh = Is, 63'°.
34-43. The fifth principal sin, viz, intercourse with the peoples
they should have destroyed, and participation in their idolatry. The
particularism of later times is projected backwards, and Israel's mis
fortunes are accounted for by the failure of the fathers to keep
themselves holy — separated to Jhvh, The injunction in the Book or
Jubilees : " But thou, my son, Jacob, separate thyself from the peoples,
and eat not with them, and walk not after their doings, and be not
their acquaintance" (22'°), is in accordance with the teaching of the
Scribes, and is enforced by the Midrash here, which reads ancient
history in the light of later ideas, Cf Acts 10'* for a later witness,
and St Paul's fight with the Judaising Christians. Cf also W. Bousset,
Die Religion des Judenthums, pp. 190 ff.
34 is excised by Duhm following Bickell, as is the middle part of
38, with good reason.
39 6 = Ex, 34 '°. Disloyalty to Jhvh was frequently symbolised by
the prophets with the image of adultery.
41, 42 refer to the days of the Judges. In 43 6 read against His
counsel (as in 13) for in their counsel of R.V. 43 c (=Lev. 26^°) is
superfluous, 44-46 take the history on to the Exile and the retum from it ;
47 to the age of the Diaspora, The latter verse is the goal to which
the whole Ps. was made to lead. Israel had been refractory ; therefore
it was still scattered among the heathen : Jhvh was, as of old, merciful.
Therefore He would surely unite the nation in the Holy Land once
more. Verse 48 is the Doxology to Book iv.

cviL 1-12] PSALMS 307

BOOK V.
PSALMS 107—150.
PSALM CVII.
A.
1 " 0 give thanks unto Jhvh, for he is good :
For his mercy endu/reth for ever,"
2 So let the redeemed of Jhvh say.
Whom he hath redeemed from the hand of hadversityH ;
3 |[And gathered them out of the lands.
From the east, and from the west.
From the north, and from the south.]]
4 hWhen men wander-| in the wilderness in a solitary way :
hWhen they find -I no way to a city to dwell in :
5 When hungry and thirsty.
Their soul fainteth in them :
6 hWhen men cry -I unto Jhvh in their trouble :
He deUvereth them out of their distresses.
7 He leads them forth by the right way.
That they may go to a city of habitation : —
8 hThese men-l praise Jhvh for his goodness :
For his wonderful works to the children of men :
9 For he satisfieth the longing soul.
And fiUeth with goodness the hungry soul.
10 hWhen men-l sit in darkness and in the shadow of death :
Bound in affliction and iron :
11 [[Because they rebelled against the words of God,
And contemned the counsel of the Most High]] :
12 hWhen their heart is brought down-l with labour :
When they fall down, and there is none to help : 20—2

308 PSALMS [CVII. 13-30
13 hWhen they cry-j unto Jhvh in their trouble.
He saveth them out of their distresses.
14 He brings them out of darkness and hgloomH,
And breaks their bands in sunder : —
15 These m,en praise Jhvh for his goodness :
For his wonderful works to the children of men :
16 For he hath broken the gates of brass.
And cut the bars of iron in sunder.
17 When fools because of their transgression.
And because of their iniquities, are afl3icted :
18 When their soul abhorreth all manner of meat :
And they draw near unto the gates of death :
19 Then when they cry unto Jhvh in their trouble.
He saveth them out of their distresses.
20 He sendeth his word, and healeth them.
And delivereth them, from their destructions : —
21 These m,en praise Jhvh for his goodness :
For his wonderful works to the children of men :
22 And sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving.
And declare his works with rejoicing.
23 When men go down to the sea in ships.
And do business in great waters :
24 These who see the works of Jhvh,
And his wonders in the deep :
25 For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind,
Which lifteth up the waves thereof:
26 When they mount up to the heaven, they go down again
to the depths :
When their soul is melted because of trouble :
27 When they reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man.
And are at their wit's end :
28 Then when they cry unto Jhvh in their trouble,
He bringeth them out of their distresses.
29 He maketh the storm a calm.
So that the waves thereof are still.
30 Then are they glad because they be qmet :
So he bringeth them unto their desired haven : —

CVIL 31-43] PSALMS 309
31 These men praise Jhvh for his goodness :
For his wonderful works to the children of men :
32 They exalt him also in the congregation of the people,
And praise him in the seat of the elders.
B.
33 He tumeth rivers into a wUderness,
And watersprings into dry ground :
34 A fruitful land into barrenness,
For the wickedness of them that dwell therein.
35 He turneth the wilderness into a standing water,
And dry ground into watersprings.
36 And there he maketh the hungry to dwell.
That they may prepare a city for habitation :
37 And sow the fields, and plant vineyards.
Which may yield fruits of increase.
38 He blesseth them also, so that they are multiplied greatly :
And suffereth not their cattle to decrease.
39 Again, when men are minished and brought low
Through oppression, aflfliction, and sorrow :
40 He poureth contempt upon princes.
And causeth them to wander in the wilderness, where there
is no way.
41 Yet setteth he the poor on high from affliction.
And maketh him families like a flock.
42 The righteous shaU see it, and rejoice :
And all iniquity shall stop her mouth.

43 Whoso is wise tvill observe these things:
They shall understand the lovingkindness of Jhvh.
A Ps. which extols Jhvh for His redemption. The redemption
referred to, however, is not as is usual that from the power of the
Egyptians, or the Babylonians or Syrians, but from the ever-recurring
troubles of every-day life. The " goodness " of Jhvh is iUustrated
by four examples ; He brings the caravan safely through the desert ;
He opens the door of the prison for the captives ; He gives recovery to
the sick ; safety to the mariner. The simplicity of this representation
is obscured by the rendering of the R,V, and still more by that of
A.V. and P.B.V. The Ps. proper ends with v. 32, The remaining

310 PSALMS [CVIL
vv. 33-43 are a series of paraphrases on the earlier part of the Ps.
after the manner of the Wise Men. They add Uttle or nothing to the
thought of 1-32, and abandon the rhythmical swing of these verses.
No definite historical allusion is to be found in the Ps. Apparently,
the age was one of comparative peace, when men traded, and builded,
and sowed, and reaped, with no greater dangers than are customary to
a being who is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward.
1-3, The g'^lfii, tlie redeemed (the Hebrew word is cognate to g6gl,
the avenger of blood of Deut. 19°, &c.), are called on to sing the song of
Jer, 33", Ps, 106', &c. It is not the enemy (R.V.) that they have been
delivered from, but tzar is used abstractly as in 106"", 107"'" for
adversity. Verse 3 must be treated as a mistaken gloss on g'iU§i, It
was not that the Jews of the Diaspora had been blessed with Jhvh's
blessing on an O.T. Zionist movement, but the rest of the Ps. shows
that He had been their g661 from the ordinary distresses of life. The
South in 3 c is literally the sea (=the Mediterranean), which is a standing
designation of the West, Delitzsch says that the Psalmist must mean
the South- West ! that is, when a man says black he means grey.
Baethgen sees a reminiscence of Is, 49". Why the writer forsakes the
invariable usus loquendi it is impossible to say. In Ps. 72* we have
from sea to sea = from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf, or the
Indian Ocean, This latter would be to the south of Palestine,
4-9, The first example of Jhvh's goodness. Caravans in the
desert are subject to parching heat, want of water, and absence of
settled towns. When they are in distress Jhvh's goodness comes
to their aid. The modern man builds a railway and leaves God out of
the reckoning. Modem science and ancient religion go diverse ways.
In V. 4 follow Olshausen in reading the participle (th66i for thdd)
in accordance with 10, 17, 23. The construction in all four sections
is the same. The distress is described ; then the successful cry unto
Jhvh, and then the consequence, i.e. praise. E.g. :
they who wander = the subject.
and who cry = the action.
shall praise = the predicate.
In a desert way (R.V,) = LXX in a waterless desert = 'Ba,ethgen
a waste of a way = Olshausen (inserting a negative) a pathless desert.
But the difficulty of the verse is best met by taking dArek, way,
with 4 6.
9. Cf note to 103^ a passage iUustrated by this.
10-16, The second example of Jhvh's goodness. He gives
dehverance to the captive, 11 is to be expunged (with Duhm) as
foreign to the context, as was v. 3. Tsalmi,veth here and in 23" does
not equal shadow of death but ghom. Hupfeld remarks that compound
words are very rare in Hebrew except in proper names, and that the
pointing should probably be Tzalmilth,
17-22, The third example of Jhvh's goodness. He heals the sick,
Olshausen would read sick man iox fools, since the latter word is clearly

CVIII. 1-6] PSALMS 311
inappropriate. Sickness is regarded, as so often in the Psalter, as a
punishment for sin, but the emphasis is not on the folly of sin, but on
the misery of it.
23-32. Fourth example of Jhvh's goodness. He brings the
storm-tossed mariner home. The Jew was not a trader by sea tiU later
days, and to him, as to the Oriental generally, the sea was an object of
terror. Duhm thinks that vv. 24, 26, 27 and 30 are interesting
additions by a later hand. This is perhaps the only passage in the
Bible where sea-sickness is alluded to.
In 32 the assembly of the peoph = the ecclesia ; the seat of the elders
= the geroiisia, the body of the presbjiters, — a clearly late passage.
33-42. A miscellaneous collection of instances of Jhvh's goodness,
lacking the lyric form of 1-32, and ending with the injunction of one
of the Wise not to praise, but to study. Duhm hints that the writer
may have seen the vaUey of the Nile transformed ; WeUhausen is
reminded of the remarkable prosperity of the Syrian desert under
Nabathaean rule (b.o. 400-a.d. 100). Is not Babylon pointed out
more clearly by the reference to caravans in the desert, to trade
generaUy, and to the remarkable fertility of the plain of Babylon
through its irrigation system, before it fell on the present evil days ?
(See Friedrich Delitzsch's Im Lande des Einstigen Paradieses, Stutt
gart, 1903.)
43 is a euphemistic hturgical appendix. Cf 2"".

PSALM CVIII.
A Psalm of David : A Song.
A.
1 0 God, my heart is fixed :
I wUl sing ; I will give praise : hThou art -I my glory.
2 Awake, psaltery and harp :
I myself will awake early.
3 I will praise thee, Jhvh, among the peoples :
I will sing praises unto thee among the nations.
4 For thy mercy is great above the heavens :
And thy truth reacheth unto the clouds.
5 Be thou exalted, 0 God, above the heavens :
And thy glory above all the earth :
B.
6 That thy beloved may be delivered :
Save with thy right hand, and answer me.

312 PSALMS [cviiL 7-cix. 8
7 God hath spoken in his holiness ; " I will rejoice,
I will divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth.
8 Gilead is mine ; Manasseh is mine :
Ephraim also is the strength of mine head :
Judah is my lawgiver :
9 Moab is my washpot :
Over Edom will I cast out my shoe :
Over PhiUstia will I triumph."
10 Who will bring me into the strong city ?
Who will lead me into Edom?
11 Js it not thou, 0 God, who hast cast us off?
And is it not thou, 0 God, who wilt go forth with our
hosts ?
12 Give us help h against the enemy -1 :
For vain is the help of man.
13 Through God we shall do valiantly :
For he it is that shall tread down our enemies.
A = 67'-"; B = 60»-"(g.».).
PSALM CIX.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of Darid.
1 Hold not thy peace, 0 God of my praise :
2 For the mouth of the wicked [[and the mouth of the de
ceitful]] is opened against me :
He hath spoken against me with a lying tongue.
3 He hath compassed me about also with words of hatred :
And hattackedH me without a cause.
4 For my love he is my adversary :
'"But I give myself unto prayer."'
5 And he hath rewarded me evil for good.
And hatred for my love.
6 Set thou a wicked man over him :
And let an adversary stand at his right hand.
7 When he shall be judged, let him be condemned :
And let his plea for mercy be counted a sin.
8 Let his days be few :
Let another take his office.

CIX. 9-25] PSALMS 313
9 Let his children be fatherless.
And his wife a widow.
10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg :
Let them hbe hunted -I out of their desolate places.
11 Let the extortioner catch all that he hath :
Let strangers spoil his labour.
12 Let there be none to extend mercy unto him :
Let there be none to favour his fatherless children.
13 Let his ¦'posterity"' be cut off:
In one generation let his name be blotted out.
14 Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with Jhvh:
Let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
15 Let them be before Jhvh continually,
That he may cut off the memory of him from the earth.
16 Because that he remembered not to shew mercy.
But persecuted the poor and needy man,
hAnd him whose heart was broken unto death.-l
17 Since he loved cursing, let it come unto him :
Since he delighted not in blessing, let it be far from him.
18 Since he clothed himself with cursing like as with his garment,
Let it come into his bowels like water.
And like oil into his bones.
19 Let it be unto him as the garment whieh covereth him,
And for a girdle wherewith he is girded continually.
20 Let this be the reward of mine adversaries from Jhvh,
And of him that speaks evil against my soul.
21 But do thou for me, 0 God the Lord, for thy name's sake:
Because of the goodness of thy mercy, deliver thou me.
22 For I am poor and needy,
And my heart is wounded within me.
23 I am gone Uke the shadow when it declineth :
¦"I am tossed up and down as the locust."'
24 My knees are weak through fasting :
And my flesh faUeth hfor want of oU-|.
25 I am become also a reproach unto them :
When they look upon me they shake their heads.

314 PSALMS [CIX. 26-31
26 Help me, Jhvh my God :
0 save me according to thy mercy :
27 That they may know that this is thy hand :
That thou, Jhvh, hast done it.
28 Let them curse, but bless thou :
When they arise, let them be ashamed ; but let thy servant
rejoice.
29 Let mine adversaries be clothed with shame :
Let them cover themselves with their own confusion, as
with a mantle.
30 I will greatly praise Jhvh with my mouth :
Yea, I will praise him among the multitude.
31 For he shall stand at the right hand of the poor,
To save him from those that condemn his soul.
This Ps. raises the whole question of the lawfulness of the use
by Christians of imprecatory Pss. But the question is but one part of
a larger one. How far are people who are living on a higher religious
plane justified in adopting the words of those who occupied at an
earlier period a lower plane ? Or to put the question in another way :
Is there any lawful method by which older formulse expressing one
thing can be used in later days to express something else ? Por " it is
not the spirit of Zion but of Sinai which here speaks out of the mouth of
David ; the spirit of Elias, which according to Lk, 9"'' is not the spirit
of the New Testament," It is not enough to rest on the older conception
of prophecy, and say that "the persecution of David was a sin not only
against David, but also against the Christ in him," or shelve the
difiiculty with a Chrysostom's suggestion that the spirit of prophecy
raises the curse to a "prophecy in the form of a curse." It is not
enough to say that the Christian can use the Psalmist's curse legitimately
if he turns it not against his own personal foes but against God's (= the
devil and his angels), unless the method which does this is explicitly
recognised. The principle to be applied not merely to Ps. 109, but to
every Ps. which is clothed in Jewish modes of thought and feeling,
is this : —
The speaker must when he speaks express what he believes to
be true. If he uses old and familiar forms of speech they must be mentally
translated into his own inner beliefs.
If there is danger of others being misled by his use of older
phraseology he is bound either to explain it or to adopt less ambiguous
language. This is practically the principle of mystical interpretation, and no
Church can afford to dispense with it, if it is in the habit of using older

CIX.] PSALMS 315
formulse, whether of creed, or prayer, or praise. But when it does
employ it, it must bring into play the spirit of wisdom, because a point
may be reached when it is better to reject the old formula than to
strain it by an interpretation which is commonly regarded as forced.
It is probable that Churches would be wise in omitting the use of
Ps. 109, because of the difficulty in giving it a practical interpretation
which shall fiow by a simple transition from the old mind to the new,
from the Jewish to the Christian. It is not only in the case of the
Athanasian Creed that some liberty of prophesying is desirable.
Fortunately, the writer of Ps. 109 leaves us in no doubt about his
meaning. He has been wronged, though he be one of the poor and
needy, by some stronger man than himself apparently by process
of law, and perhaps by a colleague. Accordingly he pours out his
indignation in such a long, drawn-out curse as none but an Oriental
could use, one which both in spirit and form is wholly impossible to
a Western mind, and in any case to one who knows the Spirit of Christ,
That Christian Church, which enjoins upon its members use of it, must
credit them with a remarkable power of abstraction, if it expects them
while they are singing, to turn the concrete man of the Psalmist's
hatred into the abstract wickedness which alone the Christian may
hate. No doubt it can be done, and is done, or surely the Ps. would
long ago have disappeared from public worship ; but it is very doubtful
whether it is wise to call on the average layman to do it. He is not
given, in this country at least, to mystical interpretation, and he
is given to hating his enemies. For this latter none of us need any
encouragement. Dr King points out {Journal of Theohgical Studies, Vol. 5, No. 18)
that the Jews had " a practice of reading the Curses at Pentecost and
New Year's Day with the Decalogue," and that 69 (another imprecatory
Ps.) was read about the 29th Ab and 109 at Pentecost.
1-5. The appeal. The object of the Psalmist's curse is one definite
individual, as Delitzsch rightly asserts, though curiously enough he
yet retains the plural suffix in 2 6-5. The LXX read rS,sh§,, the
wicked, in 2 a in the singular, though they afterwards revert with
M.T. to the plural. But it is certain that the Psalmist meant the
singular, even if he wrote the plural, or if scribes did it for him, as
is more Ukely. The omitted clause in 2 a is a gloss of a common form
in the Pss. The LXX are warrant for the reading are opened. 2 6
and 3 are best understood of perjury. 4 6 is doubtful, but no satis
factory emendation can be suggested. Duhm's is too arbitrary. The
probability is that the verb has dropped out. In that case we might
read the clause as = 66'°''-
6-10. An eye for an eye. The enemy has got an unjust verdict.
May he, therefore, stand before an unjust judge himself, and have
an adversary (a Satan ; Duhm thinks of Zech. 3 '"'¦), to accuse him at
his right hand. (6 6 finds its illustration in 31.) May he meet with
a verdict of guilty, and if he then pray (7 6) for a light sentence, may
his prayer only increase the wrath against him. This is bad enough ;

316 PSALMS [ex. 1-2
but worse follows. May he die a speedy death, and vacate his office
(was he a colleague of the Psalmist ?) ; may his widow and children
be reduced to beggary, and chased from their ruined home (so 106
following LXX).
11-15. No mercy for the merciless.
The Psalmist seems to hint that his enemy had been an unjust
creditor to him, by his wish that the enemy himseU might get into the
clutches of another extortionate creditor, and be sold up with all that
he had. In 13 a acharlthS, Tendered posterity, never seems to mean anything
but future, though Oxford Hebrew Lexicon admits "an extension of
usage" here and in 37''' °^ as weU as in Am. 4', 9', Ezek. 23",
Dan, 11". In 13 b read echtd, one, ior ach^T, following. The Psalmist
could not wait for some following generation ; he wanted the extinction
of his enemy's house in one, viz. with the cutting off of the widow and
children. 16-20. Moral retribution.
The Psalmist held to the hx talionis, and could appeal to Lev. 24'°
for justification. But if Mt. 5°° repealed that law, it also made this Ps.
obsolete. The verbs in 17, 18 must be read as wishes. Duhm would
transpose 17 a and 17 6.
21-25. The cry of the needy to Jhvh.
The Psalmist means what he says about his poverty literaUy. His
harsh creditor has reduced him to beggary. Hunger has made him
thin and weak ; his heart is physically exhausted ; he has ceased the
use of oil (so 24 6). He is a byword and a scorn. What 23 6 means
it is not easy to say ; whether it is that the locusts are driven away by
the wind, scared by the sun, easily frightened away, or shaken out
of the bushes. The Psalmist would mean most likely either that his
life is as fugitive as that of the locust, here to-day and dead to-morrow,
or else that men chase him away from their company as they shake out
the locusts.
26-29. Jhvh is the fountain of justice after all. Human justice
is often unjust, but Jhvh's shall put it to shame. No other faith than
this could support a Dreyfus on an lie du Diable.
30-31. The assurance of faith.
Righteousness shall triumph finally, for Jhvh Himself is the
advocate of the righteous.

PSALM ex.
A Psalm of Darid.
1 Jhvh said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand.
Until I make thine enemies thy footstool.
2 Jhvh shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion :
Rule thou in the midst of thine enemies.

ex. 3-7] PSALMS 317
3 Thy people hvolunteer-i in the day of thy power,
•"In the beauties of holiness fi-om the womb of the morning :
Thou hast the dew of thy youth. '
4 Jhvh hath sworn, and will not repent,
^Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.""
5 The Lord at thy right hand
ShaU strike through kings in the day of his wrath.
6 He shall judge among the nations :
He shaU fill the places with the dead bodies :
^He shall wound the heads over many countries."
7 He shaU drink of the brook in the way :
Therefore shall he Uft up the head.

A Ps. with difficulties of its own, but made more obscure than is
necessary by being drawn into the Kenotic controversy. A certain
school of Christian apologists have, with singular imprudence, staked
the authority of their Lord on a supposed interpretation of His dialectic
method. They assume in the first place that His Manhood was so far
from "perfect" that He was acquainted with arch^ological facts by
intuition, they assume in the second place that an argumentum ad
hominem was unworthy of Him. For neither assumption is there any
ground. Hence the interpreter of the Ps. is bound to take the Ps.
as it stands, and explain it without any reference to Mt. 22"'' "" and
paraUels. That the Ps. does not refer to David is clear from v. 4. For the
same reason it does not refer to any of his direct descendants. Even
though David acted on occasion as a priest (2 Sam. 6'"' "• '*; cf 8'^
"David's sons were priests"), yet nowhere in the history is it suggested
that he was a priest to whom the kingly dignity was afterwards added.
We may suspect that early Israel passed through a stage in which
its prince was also a priest, but if so that is not the O.T, conception
of the relation of the two ofiices, as the history of Uzziah shows
(2 Chron. 26'°).
Delitzsch is disposed to see in Zech. 6"*- a retrospective reference
to this Ps., which he explains as Davidic. But why not assign the two
documents to the same occasion, and roundly identify Joshua the son
of Jehozadak with the priest-king of the Ps. ? The answer to this
question is complicated by the critical difiiculties of the passage in
Zechariah. Wellhausen thinks that Zech. 6" has been tampered with
deliberately, and that the words which refer to Joshua as high-priest
are a later interpolation. Others think that Joshua has been sub
stituted for Zerubbabel. In this latter case the words of the Ps. are
not applicable, for Zerubbabel was of the line of David and not a priest
by right.

318 PSALMS [ex.
We are compelled, therefore, to choose between the only two
remaining candidates, Jonathan and Simon Maccabseus. These both
were of a priestly family, and both received the kingly dignity. In
1 Mace. 9°° it is recorded of Jonathan that the people chose him as
nS,sl, prince and captain, after the death of Judas. In 1 Mace. 10'°
Alexander Balas wrote to him: — "Now this day we ordain thee to
be the high-priest of thy nation, and to be caUed the king's friend"
(and therewithal he sent him a purple robe and a crown of gold). But
it is not easy to believe that any pious patriot would regard a political
appointment by a Syrian king as equivalent to an oracle by Jhvh.
This seems to leave the way open for Simon. In 1 Mace. 14""- it
is recorded that the Jews and priests were well pleased that Simon
should be their governor and high-priest for ever until there should
arise a faithful prophet, and {v. 48) that this decree should be put
on tables of brass, and that these should be set up within the compass
of the sanctuary in a conspicuous place. (Wilbrich, Juden und Griechen,
S. 70, maintains that 1 Mace. 14''""'' is a later interpolation.)
Bickell, moreover, was the first to point out that an acrostic is
concealed in the Ps. The oracle begins with :
Shgb sit.
The 2nd v. Matteh rod,
The 3rd v. 'amm'k^ thy people.
The 4th v. Nishbi, hath swom,
and the four initial letters spell Simon's name. (Konig, however, will
admit no acrostic which does not run through the whole Ps.)
On the whole, the case for Simon has a higher probability in its
favour than can be ordinarily looked for in such ancient documents as
the Pss. are, and must be regarded as holding the field till anything
fresh against it is discovered. We assign its historical occasion, there
fore, to the year B.C. 141. The union of ruler, high-priest and warrior,
suits Simon more closely than any other known historical character.
The Ps. like 46 is generally regarded as Messianic. But as we
discovered in that Ps. clear references to a definite historical event,
a royal marriage, so here we find the Psalmist confining his view to
another definite historical event. If, by a Messianic Ps. we mean one
which has for its subject the future Anointed One, who should be
Jhvh's vice-gerent in the introduction of the final world-judgment and
the subsequent Kingdom of God, then such Pss. in the Psalter are
very rare. But if we mean by Messianic, as people generally do, a Ps.
which describes the doings of one who by his position outlines what
the " Elect One " will some day fill in, then every Ps. perhaps may be
explained as Messianic, But this latter method by explaining too
much explains nothing, and historical criticism requires that the former
be regarded as the sole legitimate meaning of the term Messianic Psalm.
In that sense Ps. 110 is not Messianic.
1. The oracle of Jhvh to my lord is the precise translation. Simon
was appointed to his ofiice of governor and high-priest for life (or with
power of hereditary transmission), " until there should arise a faithful

ex.] PSALMS 319
prophet." It is not meant by this that there was no prophet more —
(the books of Daniel and of Enoch are proofs enough for this ; Josephus
says of John Hyrcanus that he united iu his own person the three
of&ces of prophet, priest, and king ; references to the Holy Spirit of God
are not unknown, both to teach wisdom and to fit for the duty of
teacher of the Law ; see Bousset, Die Religion des Judenthums, iv. 6),
but that Simon was to be removable only by a direct command from
Jhvh Himself.
Our Psalmist claims the prophetic power referred to, and by it
he confirms the people's choice. N'um, oracle, always introduces
a saying from Jhvh uttered by a prophet in an ecstatic state
(Num. 24"' "• '"¦ '° ; 2 Sam. 23'), or of citing Jhvh's word given by
him. The word is found in aU the Prophets except Habakkuk and
Jonah. Sit thou on my right hand. This is not necessarily a Messianic
investiture. "Solomon sat on the throne of Jhvh" (1 Chron, 29'°),
i.e. as Jhvh's vice-gerent (1 Chron. 28°). The right hand of a king is
the highest place of honour, and Solomon placed Bathsheba there
(1 Kings 2'°) ; cf Mt. 19'*. What is said to Simon here is what was
said to Joseph in Egypt (Gen. 41 "°~"") ; he is placed on Jhvh's throne =
the throne of the kingdom of Israel. He is to subjugate enemies, and
put his foot on their neck (1 Kings 6° ; Josh. 10'"). Until does not fix
a terminus ad quem, but promises a fulness of prosperity.
2. In Ps. 2, in Pss. of Solomon, in the life of the tjrpical king,
David, as in that of the Servant of Jhvh, enemies follow the footsteps
of one favoured by Jhvh ; envy dogs success. Pascitur in vivis livor.
The rod = the sceptre, a sjrmbol of power. Nothing is implied here to
justify our broadening out the extent of the king's dominion till it is
co-extensive with the earth itself Simon shaU be victorious over his
enemies, but it is not said how many they shall be.
3. A SibyUine verse, and difficult to construe. Either the author
wrote with oracular obscurity, or, as Wellhausen thinks, the text is
corrapt. What he seems to mean is that Simon's army consists of
enthusiastic volunteers ; they are, like CromweU's Ironsides, men of
rehgion, fighting for religion ; they are a kingdom of priests clad in
sacred vestments. They are as fresh as the mountain-dew which comes
from the womb of the morning, and as numerous as its drops, and they
assemble at the king's summons (in the day of his arriere ban) as
silently as the dew falls,
Hadl,r§,h-k6desh (R,V, beauty of holiness) is a term which occurs
again in Pss. 29' (1 Chron. U^), 96°, and 2 Chron, 20". It is always
used in connection with the public worship of Jhvh, and is to be
explained from Ex, 28' — "Aaron's holy garments for glory and for
beauty." The reading b'harrSi-kodesh, on the holy mountains, favoured
by Jerome and others, equates the verse with 87'. Both readings are
possible, make equaUy good sense, and can claim equal support from
iUustrative passages.
4. The text of this verse, and the history of Gen. 14'*-" are highly

320 PSALMS [CXL i
uncertain. The latter is clearly a late insertion of unknown purpose
between vv. 17 and 22, which run on. This would be generally
admitted perhaps but for Heb. 7. But Bishop Westcott has pointed
out that the writer of Hebrews bases nothing on the historical character
of Melchizedek, but is concemed only with illustrating the priesthood
of Jesus by analogy. Perhaps even the name Melchizedek is not
original in the Ps., but a marginal reading afterwards incorporated
in the text. If this were so then al-dibrfi.thl (after the order of)
becomes more intelligible, and = on my account (cf Is. 43'^)= "Thy
authority is not as was Jonathan's, conferred by a heathen ruler, but is
from Me, Jhvh, thy God, declared by the mouth of my prophet, who
speaks here." In the Assumption of Moses (6') the Asmonsean priest-
kings are referred to, where it is said that " Kings wiU arise among
them, and priests of the Most High God will be appointed, who wiU
nevertheless commit wickedness, even in the very holy of holies itself,"
Cf Joseph. Ant. xv. 6'- The term Most High God points to a late
origin of Gen. 14'*"", it being characteristic of the period when Jhvh
was no longer one God among many, but plainly set forth as God over
all, Creator of Heaven and earth. This fact, however, does not hinder
us from supposing that an older Pbcenician deity may have been spoiled
of his name in the interests of Judaism.
What the Psalmist says here, if we take the text as it stands,
is that Jhvh has not merely given an oracle {v. 1) but has declared in
the most solemn and irrevocable way, viz, by an oath, that Simon shall
be priest-king for ever, i.e. he shall not be removable by any later
popular decision.
5-7 must be taken as the appendix of the Psalmist-prophet to
the oracle he has just delivered, Simon is firmly set on the throne of
glory; his supporter is Jhvh Himself (cf 109°'' °') at his right hand;
he shall be victorious over kings, Syrian, Edomite, &c., in the day
when he and his priestly army take the field ; he shall have an
eschatological value {to judge among the heathen is a Messianic pre
rogative) ; the earth shall be full of the corpses of those slain according
to his judging ; he shall wound even the head himself who rules over
a wide country (?the Syrian king or Satan, as Anti-Christ) ; he shaU
in his pursuit stop, and stoop to refresh himself, but only that he may
be the more terrible. Analogies to this Messianic picture are to he
found in PhU. 2*, Heb. 12', Rev. 6°. In a deep sense the incarnation
of every human soul, and of Jesus Christ preeminently, is a stooping
to drink of the running water of human life, that it may have life more
abundantly ; a reculer pour mieux sauter.
PSALM CXI.
1 N Praise ye Jhvh.
I wiU praise Jhvh with my whole heart,
2 In the assembly of the upright, and in the congregation.

CXL 2-10] PSALMS 321
2 J The works of Jhvh are great,
"] Worthy to be sought out '"of aU them that have pleasure
therein."'
3 n His work is honourable and glorious :
1 And his righteousness endureth for ever.
4 T He hath made his wonderful works to be remembered :
n Jhvh is gracious and full of compassion.
5 t3 He hath given ^meat"' unto them that fear him :
' He wUl ever be mindful of his covenant.
6 3 He hath shewed his people the power of his works,
7 In giring them the heritage of the nations.
7 D The works of his hands are verity and judgment :
J AU his commandments are sure.
8 D They stand fast for ever and ever :
^ They are done in truth and uprightness.
9 3 He sent redemption unto his people :
S He hath commanded his covenant for ever :
p Holy and reverend is his name.
10 1 The "fear of Jhvh" is the beginning of wisdom :
^ A good understanding have all they that do it :
n His praise endureth for ever.
An alphabetical Ps. which partly reflects the joy of the singer in
the Temple-worship (4, 5) and partly his delight in the Law of Jhvh
(76-10). It is the first of three HaUelujah Pss., but since the
HaUelujah stands outside the alphabetical form, it is not original
to the Ps.
Pss. Ill and 112 are closely related, and the latter is the converse
of the former. In 111 the singer praises the glory of Jhvh in the
circle ofthe "upright"; in 112 he describes the blessedness of these
same "upright" who are "fearers of Jhvh." The same author may
have composed both Pss., or a later poet may have moulded 112 after
the pattern of 111. In any case they come to us with the similarity
of twins. 1 b. The council of upright ones = not all Israel, but the circle of
those who were zealous for the Law. Cf note on 24°. The con
gregation is but a duplicate of the council.
2 6. That have pleasure th&rein = cheph'tz^ihem. This word may
come from the adjectival verb chftph^tz or the noun ch^phetz. The
commentators are almost all against Delitzsch and Hitzig in preferring
the former. Hitzig's strongest argument is that kol, all, is never
joined with the adjectival verb cMphgtz, but often with the noun
c. 21

322 PSALMS [CXIL 1-4
ch^phetz. His objection that the former gives a tautology is of little
weight where a Hebrew poem is concerned.
3 a. Honour and majesty =h^d-v'htd%Y, a phrase which is found in
104', 96° (=1 Chron. 16"), 46°, 21°; Job 40'°. A redundant phrase
for glorious, excellent, splendid.
4 a. To be remembered, i.e. in the Temple-services, or, to be more
precise, in the Feast of the Passover. So in 20^.
4 6, The wonderful work of dehverance showed His graciousness
and tender-kindness.
5. He gave meat. Meat = tereph = prey, torn flesh, such as lions
enjoy. It is used in late passages such as this and Prov, 31'°, Mai. 3'°
of human food. Here it is usuaUy referred to the meat of the Passover.
It may be worth while to consider the possibility (suggested by the
context) of the word being used in its more archaic sense of prey (as in
Ps. 104", Amos 3", Job 4", 38°°, or better stiU, in its metaphorical
sense of Israel's conquests, as in Gen. i9^=Thou didst give a land as
booty for Thy fearers. Then 5 6 affirms that Jhvh will not forget to
retain Israel in their land, according to His covenant, and 6 is
paraUel to 5.
7-9 are but variations of the theme of 5. Jhvh changes not;
therefore Israel is not consumed. He gave Israel Canaan ; what He
does is true (= strong and to be depended on), and right (= what must,
therefore, stand) ; His ordinances are rock-fast (in 19 ° they are upright) ;
therefore Israel need not fear that Jhvh will aUow the heathen to
deprive Israel of Canaan, which Jhvh, in His unchangeable counsels
had given to it.
10 a = Prov, 1'. The fear of Jhvh is a synonym for His law, as
in 34". A good understanding (sSkel-t6b) occurs again in Proverbs 3", 13",
and denotes that fine sagacity, or delicate spiritual tact which is the
reward of conscientiousness,
10 c. His praise must be Jhvh's (against Delitzsch).

PSALM CXIL
1 Praise ye Jhvh.
N Blessed is the man that feareth Jhvh,
i That deUghteth greatly in his commandments.
2 jl His seed shall be mighty upon earth :
1 The generation of the upright shaU be blessed.
3 n Wealth and riches shall be in his house :
1 And his righteousness endureth for ever.
4 T Unto the upright he ariseth as Ught in the darkness :
n He is gracious, and full of compassion, and righteous.

CXII. 5-10] PSALMS 323
5 13 hGood is it for theH man that sheweth favour, and lendeth:
^ That guideth his affairs with discretion.
6 D Surely he shall not be moved for ever :
7 The righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance.
7 to He shall not be afraid of evil tidings :
3 His heart is fixed, trusting in Jhvh.
8 D His heart is estabUshed, he shaU not be afraid,
y UntU he see his desire upon his enemies.
9 S He hath dispersed, he hath given to the poor :
5f His righteousness endureth for ever :
p His horn shall be exalted with honour.
10 ^ The wicked shaU see it, and be grieved :
B' He shaU gnash with his teeth, and melt away :
n The '"desire"' of the wicked shaU perish.
What is said of Jhvh in Ps. Ill is here transferred to the godly
man, so that, as Hengstenberg says, the Ps. is not a repetition of Ps. Ill
but a "sacred parody of it." Ps. Ill ended with a gnome which extols
the "fear of Jhvh." Ps. 112' opens with the same theme : " Happy is
the man who fears Jhvh." Both Pss. belong to the date when the
study of the Law was the hall-mark of orthodoxy, and both portray the
features of the man of " average piety."
16. Ch4ph6tz, delighteth, is the same word as is used in Ps. 111°',
and confirms the interpretation of it given there.
Commandments = mitzv6th, precepts = the detailed prescriptions
contained in the Law.
2. Mighty. Not (as Hengstenberg) mighty in battle (cf 24^) but
one strong and influential in general, and, therefore, held in high
esteem by his feUows; cf Ruth 2'; 1 Sam. 9'; 2 Kings 15'°.
2 6 = Is. 65''-
3 = 111°, only that the godly man is here the subject, not Jhvh.
Righteousness is used in a different sense, as so frequently in Deutero-
Isaiah. In the one case righteousness is that which Jhvh gives ; in
the other that which man receives = salvation (24^). The common
equation righteousness = ahns (Mt. 6') is too narrow here. Nor is
merit (Ez. 18°°) suitable here either. The righteousness which endureth
for ever is the temporal prosperity which the upright enjoys, regarded
as the gift of Jhvh. It will not come to an end, but will last so long
as the upright lives (cf 110"). There is nothing said or implied about
spiritual goods.
4. The light which ariseth is not Jhvh (so Delitzsch), in spite of
Mai. 4'. Nor is light the subject, as Duhm says (so A.V.), but as
Hitzig, Baethgen and others rightly see, it is the fearer of Jhvh who is
a Ught in the darkness to the upright. Just as Jhvh is "gracious,
21—2

324 PSALMS [CXIII. 1-6
compassionate and merciful," so is His fearer. Cf Mt. 5"°' "*._ The
attributes of the Father become by grace and loyalty the quaUties of
the child. Cf Is. 58'; Ps. 97". So Kautz.sch,
5 6, Duhm renders : " he will lose no cause in the courts." So
Delitzsch and Hitzig. Jennings and Lowe give the same and suggest
an alternative, " he sustains in justice his words." Olshausen is much
nearer the certain meaning, when he gives : " he does not pursue his
cause, when it is being tried, with unrighteous means, but takes his
stand on actual justice." Therefore his is the reward promised in
the next verse. With this Baethgen agrees substantially. It is not
the judgment, whether of God or of man, that is in view (this would
require the article) but the general uprightness with which the fearer of
Jhvh orders his daily doings.
6a specifies the t6b, well is it, of 5a; 66 = 111"°. Cf
Prov. 10'.
7 a. Cf Is. 26°; Jer. 49'°. The fixed heari oil b is named in
108' ; 61'° speaks of a fixed spirit.
8 6, Until, not as in 94'°, but in 110'. The until does not denote
the temporal end-point, but the goal to which one strives. Cf Bishop
Pearson on Mt, 1'° in Exposition ofthe Creed, Art. in. 2. The notion
here is that of confidence ; there is no implication that the confidence
will cease when the Psalmist sees the ruin of his enemies,
9 a = Prov. 11'"" ; 9 6 is a mere repetition of 3 6 ; 9 c = 1 Sam, 2'.
10, The wicked here are not the heathen so much as the godless
party opposed to the Chasidlm. They had looked to see their rivals
come to the ground ; but on seeing their prosperity they pine away for
very envy, as Ahab began to do when Naboth refused his vineyard.
Desire in 10 c has the support of Prov. 10'"; Hupfeld and others
prefer expectation out of Prov. 10'*. The two words are in Hebrew
very similar.
PSALM CXIII.
1 Praise ye Jhvh.
Praise, 0 ye servants of Jhvh,
Praise the name of Jhvh.
2 Blessed be the name of Jhvh
From this time forth and for evermore.
3 From the rising of the sun unto the going down of the same
Jhvh's name is to be praised.
4 Jhvh is high above all nations :
His glory above the heavens.
5 Who is like unto Jhvh our God,
Who dwelleth on high,
6 Who humbleth himself to behold
The things that are in heaven, and in the earth!

CXIII. 7-9] PSALMS 325
7 He raiseth up the poor out of the dust :
He lifteth the needy out of the dunghill :
8 That he may set him with princes.
Even with the princes of his people.
9 He maketh the barren woman to keep house :
''To be a joyful mother of children.'
Praise ye Jhvh.
The first of the group of Pss. (113-118) which go by the name
of "the Hallel." The two first were sung before the Passover meal,
and the last four after it. This custom is probably recorded in Mt. 26°°.
This "lesser HaUel" is to be distinguished from the greater Hallel of
118-137 (or 120-137).
The only doubt which this Ps. suggests is whether the poor, the
needy, the barren of vv. 7 and 9 are to be understood of individuals or
of Israel as a community. Most commentators, foUowing the lead of
Is. 54', understand Israel. There is, however, no necessity to interpret
the Ps. as having this as its primary meaning, while v. 8 and v. 9 when
rendered precisely negative it. Moreover, if with Hitzig we date the
occasion of the Ps. in b.c 160, and see a reference to Jonathan as
exalted out of the ranks of the ordinary priests to be high-priest and
prince, the Ps. is a call to praise Jhvh for His goodness in doing what
kings of the earth do not do, viz. have a chief regard for the "poor and
needy." Jewish piety in this respect may be exceUently iUustrated by
Roman state-craft. What the tribunus plebis was to be according to
the latter, that was Jhvh to the former.
The Ps. borrows from 1 Sam. 2, and affects an archaic setting in
vv. 5-9, the chireq compaginis {i), which, according to Ewald (against
Gesenius), is not the relic of an old case-ending, but a witness to the
original oneness of the Semitic and Indo-Germanic languages. This
i occurs in many proper names, e.g. Gamaliel, Hannlba'al, Melchizedek,
and in the al-dibrithi {=after tlie manner of) of 110", according to
most commentators.
1. The Hallelujah {praise ye Jhvh) is of course a liturgical prefix.
Ye servants of Jhvh is a title of Israel which plays an important
part in Deutero-Isaiah, and in the N.T. It is the name by which
Jhvh caUed His people out of Babylon, and assured them of His care
for them. Whether, or how far, a " remnant " of the nation responded
to the caU; whether, in particular, the Servant of Is. 62 "-63" is
the nation or an individual, are questions about which critics like
Duhm and Budde are still at variance. But it seems clear that the
main object in the calling of Israel to be Jhvh's Servant was His glory,
and that hints exist that the Servant had also to discharge the duty of
being Jhvh's missionary to the heathen. The individualising of the
Servant in Is. 62'°-53" is due chiefly to Christian influence; Cheyne,
however, points to wide-spread corruption of the text of 2 Isaiah, and

326 PSALMS [CXIV. 1-7
refers us to his "Jerahmeelite theory." The title occurs again in the
Pss. in 34", 69°°, 136".
3 = 50', Mai. 1" We can hardly restrict the people among whom
Jhvh's historical character (= His Name) was to be praised (laudabile)
to the Jews of the Dispersion. The thought was a favourite one in
later days that the heathen should pay homage to Jhvh in some form,
and with some degree of willingness. They would admit His supremacy,
and in doing so would admit also the prior claim of the Jews to His
favour. A truly audacious hope for "a people robbed and spoiled,"
few in numbers, and weak in worldly resources ! But it contained in it
the faith which has removed mountains.
6. Probably the best explanation of the form of expression here is
that it is an artificial chiasma, Jhvh's seat is in heaven ; He looks
down deep into the earth from thence.
7-9 are a paraphrase on the history of Hannah. If we keep the
text then the poor are not Israel, but those literally poor, or of little
account, for Israel as a whole could hardly be promised a seat with the
princes of Israel, Jonathan could, or, by a justifiable hyperbole, any
poor Israelite might. Verse 9 is a much disputed verse. It would be
quite natural to see a reference to Hannah's triumph over Peninnah,
but if so the Psalmist has expressed himself in a stilted way. What
the text says is that Jhvh establisheth the barren woman in her right
as materfamilias — and she is not put away or ashamed — and He
maketh the mother of the children to rejoice. But there seems no
reason for emphasising this latter, as a mark of Jhvh's greatness and
condescension.

PSALM CXIV.
1 When Israel went out of Egypt,
The house of Jacob from a people of strange language :
2 Judah was his sanctuary,
And Israel his dominion.
3 The sea saw it, and fled :
Jordan was driven back.
4 The mountains skipped Uke rams :
The little hills like lambs.
5 What ailed thee, 0 thou sea, that thou fleddest ?
Thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back?
6 Ye mountains, that ye skipped Uke rams :
Ye little hills, like lambs?
7 Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord,
At the presence of the God of Jacob :

CXIV. 8-cxv. 7] PSALMS 327
8 Which turned the rock into a standing water.
The flint into a fountain of waters.
A charming little lyric, of genuine poetic feeling, it is " a miniature
as majestic as it is charming." If 113 hymned Jhvh as God of all the
earth, 114 hymns Him as Israel's God, from the time of the Exodus.
The name of Jhvh is not mentioned even in v. 7, and the absence of
the name throughout may be due to the universalistic tendencies of
the age in which the Psahnist lived. The fact that the archaic
chireq compaginis is used as in 113 may point to identity of
authorship. 16. For barbarous, strange-speaking people, cf 81°.
2. Judah was the place where Jhvh was sanctified = separated
from the lower gods of the nations. It may be named because His
temple was in the kingdom of Judah, or because it was the only
kingdom left at the time of the Psalmist. In 2 6 dominion is plural in
Hebrew, because, Duhm suggests, of the dependencies which the
Asmonsean kings had added to the land they ruled over.
3-6. The poet attributes the Nature-wonders of the Exodus to
fear at the presence of Jhvh. He asks why hill and river were moved,
and answers by a mandate : " Tremble, thou earth," &c. Cf Is. 41'°;
Deut. 32".
PSALM CXV.
1 Not unto us, Jhvh, not unto us,
But unto thy name give glory,
p'or thy mercy, and for thy truth's sake.]]
2 Wherefore do the nations say,
"Where is now their God?"
3 But our God is in the heavens :
He hath done whatsoever he hath pleased.
4 Their idols are silver and gold,
The work of men's hands.
5 They have mouths, but they speak not :
Eyes have they, but they see not :
6 They have ears, but they hear not :
Noses have they, but they smeU not :
7 They have hands, but they handle not :
Feet have they, but they walk not :
[No breath is in their mouths:]
Neither speak they through their throat.

328 PSALMS [cxv. 8-18
8 They that make them are like unto them :
So is every one that trusteth in them.
9 Israel trusts in Jhvh :
He is their help amd their shield.
10 The house of Aaron trusts in Jhvh :
He is their help and their shield.
[The house of Levi trusts in Jhvh :
He is their help and their shield!]
1 1 They that fear Jhvh trust in Jhvh :
He is their help and their shield.
12 Jhvh hath been mindful of us : he will bless us :
He will bless the house of Israel :
He will bless the house of Aaron :
He wiU bless the house of Levi.
13 He will bless them that fear Jhvh,
Both small and great.
14 Jhvh shall increase you more and more.
You and your children.
15 Blessed be ye of Jhvh
Which made heaven and earth.
16 The heaven, the heavens, are Jhvh's :
But the earth hath he given to the children of men.
17 The dead praise not Jhvh,
Neither any that go down into silence.
18 But we will bless Jhvh from this time forth and for evermore.
[Praise Jhvh.]]
A triumph song of Monotheism. The heathen could not understand
a religion like that of the Jews which had no God in visible form — and,
therefore, no prcesens numen. AU the heathen gave their gods a visible
image, according to the stage of culture they had reached. Ashtoreth
had her AshlrSh ; Phoenicia's Moloch was a monstrous brazen image ;
Greece made idolatry beautiful ; and Egypt incarnated Apis in a bull.
Among all these dwelt the Jews, the only people without a visible God.
Their religious worth is not depreciated by the recollection that they
too had known a time when Jhvh materialised Himself in the storm-
cloud, or was somehow represented between the earthly Cherubim.
Israel's value to mankind lies in the fact that they progressed, while
other nations moved in a vicious circle. They learned two truths.
God was One, and God was Spirit. It is the latter of these with which
the Psalmist is here concerned.

cxv.] PSALMS 329
Olshausen, Hitzig, and Baethgen see in w. 1 and the respond in
9, 10 and 11 a reference to a campaign, in which Jhvh's honour was
engaged. But against this is the whole tenor and tone of the Ps. It
is timeless, so far as its motif is concerned. That it was composed for
ritual purposes is obvious from vv. 12-18. Thanksgiving and a buoyant
sense of spiritual superiority breathe throughout.
1 is a prayer that, since Israel trusts in an invisible God, He will
justify its trust by manifesting His power in a way not to be mistaken.
1 c is to be omitted (Olshausen) as redundant. Duhm would prefer to
retain it and prefix to it : " We will praise Thy Name, 0 Jhvh."
2=79'°- When Pompey took Jerusalem and entered the Holy of
Holies to see the God who was so jealously secluded, he found nothing
to reward his curiosity. At an earlier moment the Israelites took their
God iuto battle against the Philistines, and He was captured, but now
they knew Him to be so high and lifted up that He was beyond the
reach of the accidents of space and time.
3 6= 135°, Jonah 1'"'^, and is more nearly defined in v. 16 6. The
power of the heathen idols was but impotence. Jhvh's knew no
bounds. Modern theology is tempted sometimes, in face of life's
problems, to save God's love and wisdom at the expense of His power.
But, in any case, the power of polytheism had to be crushed by the
truth of God's unity and His transcendence, before He could be trasted
as infinite love and wisdom.
4-7 are repeated in 135. With them should be compared Deutero-
Isaiah's sarcastic description of an idol in ch. 44. They are an indict
ment of polytheism, which the scientific theologian may justly find fault
with as doing an injustice to Nature religions. None, so far as we
know — and we know a great deal — has ever identified the god and the
idol, not even the most degraded fetishism of West Africa or the Fiji
Islands. The two were inseparable but not identical. The Psalmist is
not, however, writing a treatise on comparative rehgion, but passing
a religious judgment, and that judgment is just.
After 76 is to be inserted a clause from 135"' to satisfy the metre.
8 = as the idols are dead things, so shaU they be who honour them.
9-11. Clergy and laity are, on the other hand, enumerated as
worshippers of Jhvh. The LXX give the verbs in the perfect instead
of the imperative. The addition of "the house of Levi" seems required
by the metre, is justified by 135'°, and avoids the awkward change from
the second person to the first.
"They that fear Jhvh" are probably proselytes (cf Acts 10"' ",
13'°' °°). The three verses were sung antiphonally, while 12 and 13
were sung by the full choir, and 14 and 15 sound like a priestly
blessing. 16 and 17 are omitted by Hitzig as inharmonious in consequence
of his view that the Ps. is motived by a campaign. But on the view
taken above, these verses are but a clearer restatement of v. 3. " Where
is your God?" say the heathen. "He is in Heaven," reply the Jews.
They then take the offensive. "You and your idols have no independent

330 PSALMS [CXVL l-io
power, for it is Jhvh, our God, who has full power over earth and gives
it to whom He will. He is in Heaven, and you are on earth by His
sufferance alone." With the underworld, on the other hand, religion
has nothing to do. Therefore Jhvh is to be praised while yet it is day
(John 9"). Pliny's thought sic terra hominum ut caelum Dei {H.N. ii.
63) is not quite the same.
It is possible, however, that 18 is a euphemistic liturgical appendix,
as in 2"", &c.
PSALM CXVL
1 I love Jhvh, because he hath heard
The voice of my supplications.
2 Because he hath incUned his ear unto me,
Therefore do I call upon Hhe name of Jhvh.-\
3 The cords of death compassed me,
And the pains of Sheol gat hold upon me :
I found trouble and sorrow.
4 Then called I upon the name of Jhvh:
"Jhvh, I beseech thee, deliver my soul."
5 Gracious is Jhvh, and righteous :
Yea, our God is merciful.
Therefore do I call on the name of Jhvh.
6 Jhvh preserveth the simple :
Whenever I am brought low, he helpeth me.
7 Return unto thy rest, 0 my soul :
And call on the name of Jhvh.
Jhvh hath dealt bountifully with thee.
8 Thou hast delivered my soul from death,
piine eyes from tears,]]
My feet from falling.
Therefore do I call on the name of Jhvh.
9 I will walk before Jhvh
In the land of the living.
10 I believed, therefore will I speak
And call on the name of Jhvh.
I was greatly aflUcted :

CXVL 11-19] PSALMS 331
11 I said in my haste,
"All men are liars."
Therefore I called mi the nam,e of Jhvh.
12 What shall 1 render unto Jhvh
For all his benefits toward me?
13 I will take the cup of salvation.
And call upon the name of Jhvh.
14 p wiU pay my vows unto Jhvh
Now in the presence of aU his people.]]
15 Precious in the sight of JhVh
Is the death of his saints.
16 Jhvh, truly I am thy servant :
Therefore I call on the name of Jhvh.
1 am thy servant, and the son of thine handmaid :
Thou hast loosed my bonds.
17 1 wiU offer to thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving,
And wiU call upon the name of Jhvh.
18 I wiU pay my vows unto Jhvh
In the presence of all his people,
19 In the courts of Jhvh's house,
Pn the midst of thee, 0 Jerusalem.!
[[Praise ye Jhvh.]]
Will I call on the name of Jhvh.
A Ps. the fuU beauty of which is made apparent only when the
refirain is supplied. That such a refrain existed is proved by the fact
that it is still retained in the M,T., though fragmentarily. It is found
after m. 2, 4, 13 and 17, and should presumably occur as the fourth
stichos throughout. Moreover 10 a is unintelligible (as the differences
among commentators show) without the refrain, but becomes clear with
it. So, too, 12 is an abrapt transition which the introduction of the
refrain makes smooth and easy. The introduction of the refrain, too,
explains how v. 14 (= 18) has been inserted — the scribe's eye caught
the refrain in the wrong place. That the liberty taken with the text in
restoring the refrain is not unjustified is shown by the fact that the
LXX were led to divide the Ps, into two Pss,, 1-9 and 10-19 ; that
they omit v. 14, and that 2 6 is certainly corrupt. Not all emendations
of the text of the Psalter are as certainly correct, as the restoration of
the refrain here is, but if in a case like this we reach an assured result,

332 PSALMS [cxvl
we may presume that corruptions exist in other passages, even though
we may not be able in all cases to say what form the correction should
take. A good example of this may be found in 149°'''°''. _
That Ps. 116 was a popular hymn for use at the offering of private
vows and thanksgivings may be presumed from the nature of its ex
pressions throughout. This, if correct, would account for the omission
of the refrain — of which perhaps was written only the first word, with
a mark for " &c." — and also would negative all suggestions that the
speaker was Israel itself Hitzig remarks on the want of poetic self-
control, on the abruptness and dependence of the writer on earlier
poems, and on the repetitions contained in the Ps, itself All these
objections, however, disappear when the true nature of the Ps. is once
recognised, 1, 2. The object to I hve is not expressed in M.T, Duhm would
supply the Lord, and Baethgen follows 18' (where however the verb is
not the same) in supplying thee. K6li (= my voice, R.V.) is best taken
as having the archaic ending i.
In 2 6 correct iib'yfi.mal, during my years, with Hupfeld into b'sh^m
yhvh, on the name of Jhvh. The name Jhvh was probably written in
an abbreviated form, i.e. with the initial * only, and this by an error
became attached to the word before, and so the name of Jhvh became
all the days of my life.
3-4 a. In 3 the first three words are from 18", and the next three
from 18°.
4 6-5. The idea is that Jhvh's righteousness has been shown in
His remaining true to His self-revelation as the AU-Merciful One,
inasmuch as He has been gracious and merciful to the singer.
6-7 a. The simple p'th^lm are frequently, says Calvin, "those
inconsiderate and foohsh persons who do not obey right counsel. But
here those are called simple who suffer injuries, who are easily circum
vented, whereas the children of the world are as strong in sagacity as
they are_ well furnished with expedients for protecting themselves."
The antithesis is a permanent one ; worldly men call religious men
fools; God calls them simple, i.e. open-souled, receptive of truth and
His inspirations, as are little chUdren. In 19'' it is the simple who get
wisdom from the Torah of Jhvh.
In 6 6 the verb has not an aorist but a frequentative sense : when
ever the Psalmist is in trouble Jhvh saves him. Is there a play in
y'h6shla on the name Joshua?
The word for rest never denotes inward peace but outward prosperity
— in 23' the waters of rest are waters by the side of which the flock
rests after its wandering. Here it is the place or state of ease after
trouble : Sleepe after toyle, port after stormie seas.
Ease after warre, death after life does greatly please,
Spenser, Faerie Queen, i, 9"°,
7 6-8, The /or at the beginning of 7 6 and 8 a is a repetition of
the ending of the preceding word.

CXVL] PSALMS 333
8 and 9 are taken from 56'°, but 8 6 is an interpolation and makes
a stichos too many in our Ps,
9-10 a. Land of the living is in 56'° light of the living. In either
case it is continued prosperity in earthly life which is meant.
/ believe, heemanthl, is strictly I place my confidence in, I have trust
(cf Is, 7°), The Hebrew word is derived from one which means firmness,
and the virtue to which it gives its name is, therefore, that which, con
scious of human infirmity, lays hold on One that is mightier, and trusts
in Him to do what it cannot do for itself In other words, Hebrew
religion knows only of fides quce credit ur ; it was left for the Greek in
tellect to corrupt it into fides qua creditur. The corruption had com
menced when the last of the N.T, writings saw the light, and it has lain
heavy on the Church ever since. The Psalmist was a better Christian
than the author of Jude 3'°. He says nothing of an objective creed,
but is content to afiirm his subjective trust, and to express it in the
refrain, " I wiU caU on the name of Jhvh," His fides, like that which
is reaUy Christian, is fiducia, and prayer is its self-expression. Religion
is piety. 106-11. Ch^phaz, haste, is properly alarm, and so haste to get
away. The stichos, 11 a, is taken over from 31". The word in the
sense of alarm occurs again in Deut. 20°.
KozSb, lie, is used of false prophecies, Ezek, 13'; of idols, Ps. 4',
Amos 2"; of empty human pretensions, Hos, 12', Is. 28'°, Ps. 62°; in
Prov. 23° bread is called disappointing. It is in this latter sense that
the word is used here. AU men's help ends in disappointment. God
alone is a sure defence ; therefore, call on His Name.
12-13. The former of these two verses introduces the act of
thanksgiving. The caU has not been in vain; Jhvh has heard it.
What now can His grateful servant do ? He can go to Jhvh's Temple,
and offer his zibch^i sh'Mmlm, sacrifices of peace-offerings. This word
sh'l^mtm is translated by LXX salvation, or sacrifices of salvation.
These sh'Mmlm were (1) sacrifices offered in fulfilment of a specific vow
to offer so many of such and such a kind of victim; or (2) free-will
offerings, i.e. not enjoined by the Law or by a vow; and (3) the T6dl,h
(Lev. 7"*-, 22'°'), a thank-offering. " It was a sacrifice of gratitude for
some signal manifestation of God's goodness, such as deliverance from
a great peril" Hence perhaps the phrase c««p o/'safoa^zow. The cup is
not named in the law of the T6dfi,h, and must be supposed to be a later
addition to the prescribed ceremonies, similar to that of the cups of
wine to the Passover. Libations were a universal form in pagan
sacrifices to the gods. Any reference to the Passover would seem
to be excluded here by the context.
14-16 a, 14 is 18 transcribed in error. 15 gives the benefit
received. The Psahnist's life had been spared, because the death
of His saints is too hard a thing for Jhvh's love to bear; their Ufe
is precious to Him.
The servant of Jhvh of v. 16 becomes "the slave of Jesus Christ"
in the great Jew who became the Apostle of the Gentiles.

334 PSALMS [cxvn. i-cxvin. 7
166-17. For the son of Thy handmaid see note on 86'°. The
bonds are those of poverty.
18-19. For 19 6 the refrain should be substituted, and the closing
Hallelujah should be transferred with LXX to the beginning of Ps. 117.

PSALM CXVII.
1 0 praise Jhvh, all ye nations :
Praise him, all ye peoples.
2 For his lovingkindness is great toward us :
And the truth of Jhvh endureth for ever.
l[Praise ye Jhvh.]]
A Ps. which is but a Hallelujah writ large in two verses. It is
quoted for its universalistic refrain in Rom. 15", and has the pecuUarity
that it bases its appeal to the Gentile world on Jhvh's goodness to
Israel. The Psalmist wrote, it is clear, at a time when monotheism was
Israel's assured creed, so assured that there was no need of declamation
against idols. His Ps. says in effect : There is but one God, Jhvh;
gracious has He been to us; therefore join us, all ye nations, whom
also He has made, in singing His praises.
In V. 1 peophs and nations denote the same subject. Mercy and
truth in V. 2 as in 12', where see note.
The Hallelujah belongs to Ps. 118.
PSALM CXVIII.
1 0 give thanks unto Jhvh ; for he is good :
[Chorus] Because his mercy endureth for ever.
2 Let Israel now say :
[Chorus] His mercy endureth for ever.
3 Let the house of Aaron now say :
[Chorus] His mercy endu/reth for ever.
4 Let them now that fear Jhvh say :
[Chorus] His msrcy endureth for ever.
5 I called upon Jhvh in distress :
Jhvh answered me, and set me in a large place.
6 Jhvh is on my side ; I wiU not fear :
Vniat can man do unto me?
7 Jhvh taketh my part with them that help me :
Therefore shaU I see my desire upon them that hate me.

CXVIIL 8-22] PSALMS 335
8 It is better to trust in Jhvh
[Chorus] Tha/n, to put confidence in man.
9 It is better to trust in Jhvh
[Chorus] Than to put confidence in princes.
10 Though all nations compass me about :
[Chorus] In the name of Jhvh tmll I ''destroy'^ them.
11 Though they compass me about; yea, though they compass
me about :
[Chorus] In the name of Jhvh I will ''destroy'* them.
12 Though they compass me about Uke bees :
[Chorus] In the name of Jhvh tmll I ''destroy'^ them.
hThough they rage-1 as the fire of thorns :
[Chorus] In the name of Jhvh I tvill destroy them.
13 I was sorely thrust at that I might fall :
But Jhvh helped me.
14 Jhvh is my strength and song.
And is become my salvation.
15 The voice of rejoicing and salvation is in the tabernacles
of the righteous :
[Chorus] The right hand qf Jhvh doeth valiantly.
16 The right hand of Jhvh is exalted :
[Chorus] The right 'hand of Jhvh doeth valiantly.
17 I shaU not die, but Uve,
And declare the works of Jhvh.
18 Jhvh hath chastened me sore :
But he hath not given me over unto death.
Processional.
19 Open to me the gates of righteousness :
I will go into them, and I will praise Jhvh.
20 [Levites] This gate of Jhvh,
Into which the righteous shall enter.
21 [Procession] I will praise thee : for thou hast heard me,
And art become my salvation.
22 [Levites] The stone which the builders refused
Is become the head stone of the corner.

336 PSALMS [CXVIIL 23-29
23 [Procession] This is Jhvh's doing :
It is marvellous in our eyes.
24 [Levites] This is the day which Jhvh hath made :
We will rejoice and be glad in it.
25 [Procession] Save now, we beseech thee, Jhvh :
Jhvh, we beseech thee, send now prosperity.
26 [Levites] Blessed be he that cometh in ths nmne of Jhvh:
We have blessed y<yu out of the house of Jhvh.
27 [Procession] Jhvh is God, which hath shewed us light :
'"Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the
altar. '
28 [Levites] Thou art my God, and I tmll praise thee :
Thou art my God, I tmll exalt thee.
29 [Full] 0 give thanks unto Jhvh ; for he is good :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
A processional hymn sung at a great feast, whether that be the
Feast of Tabernacles or a Nicanor-day. Solo and chorus, priests and
the marching procession sing antiphonally in praise of Jhvh's mighty
acts in giving the Maccabean armies victory over the Syrian hosts.
The martial tones of vv. 10-18 show either that war-songs have been
embodied in the Processional Hymn of later anniversaries, or that the
hymn itself goes back substantially to the very day of victory itself
On Nicanor's death "the people rejoiced greatly, and they kept that
day a day of great gladness. Moreover they ordained to keep yearly
this day, being the thirteenth of Adar" (1 Mace. 7"°-"°). There can be
no reasonable doubt that this was the occasion for the use of this Ps. ;
it is also probable that the Ps. itself grew as it got older.
The "I" of w. 10 ff, is to be explained here on liturgical rather than
theological grounds. An older war-song is taken up by a soloist, who,
therefore, uses the first person, though of course as representing the
whole body of warriors, or, better still perhaps, their leader Judas,
Perhaps the most interesting thing, however, about the Ps. is the
light it throws on the dance as part of divine worship among the Jews.
" The instinctive tendency to express overmastering feeling, to enhance
pleasure, and to seek relief from pain, forms the most deep-seated
motive of all human activity." All art is in its innermost nature a
social activity. It is not all seff-expression which is artistic, but only
that which has a social purpose, and the simplest of aU art-forms is
rhythm, or sequence in time. This has played a great part in facili
tating co-operation in work, and also in war. Whether in the form of
music or dancing, rhythm has been a means of bringing about emotional
community. In religion dancing was at one time as important as music

CXVIIL] PSALMS 337
as a means of expressing, and of stimulating in others, an exalted state
of feeling. Dancing played a greater part in Hebrew worship than the
editors of the O.T. have been wilhng to set forth. Miriam and her
maidens danced (Ex, 16°°); David danced before the Ark (2 Sam, 6'"),
to the disgust of Michal; Abel-Meholah (1 Kings 19'° = the meadow of
dancing) obtained its name from the dances of tribal or family festivals ;
in Judg. 21" dances at a vintage feast, "a feast of Jhvh," are named;
" it was customary," the Mishna says, " at the Wood-Festival on the
15th of Ab (August) and at the close of the Day of Atonement, for the
daughters oi Jerusalem to go out and dance in the vineyards, and who
ever had no wife went thither also" ; so in the worship of their neigh
bours dancing was part of their worship (1 Kings 18'°; Ex. 32'°). The
Bedouins, and Mohammedans generally, still retain dancing. The Haj,
or pilgrimage to Mecca, derives its name from the going round the
Kaaba, just as y^ch6gii in Ps. 107" = to go round and round. Nor is
Ps. 118 the only Ps. which speaks of dancing as a religious rite. It is
named in 149°, 150". Moreover, the Spring-festival, Passdver, derived
its name from the dances connected with it (pasach = to dance).
Hence, in v. 27 of Ps. 118 there is every reason for our rendering
chog in the primary meaning as dance, and not as sacrifice (R.V.).
Then we should understand the injunction sung by the priests to be
either " Join hands and approach even to the horns of the altar," or,
better stiU (after 1 Kings 20'", where §.sar bind = begin — as we say
"join battle"), "Begin the dance," &c.
1-4. An opening which partly expands 106' (where see note) and
136'— cf 1 Mace. 4'"— and partly employs the formula of 115°-", 135'°' '».
Here it supplies the hymn for the procession to the Temple. The first
half of each verse was sung as a versicle and the second as a respond.
Israel as a whole, then the priests, then the proselytes are in tum
inrited to join in Jhvh's praises.
The LXX reject for he is good at the end of 2 a, 3 a, 4 a.
5-9. The best explanation of the "I" used here is that it is not so
much the community that speaks (Baethgen), or an individual (Duhm),
as a single voice speaking for the whole congregation. A hand-to-hand
fight for liberty and life had brought home to Judas and his fellows the
uncertainty of human affairs, and the certainty which characterised
Jhvh's doings. Syria was so strong, Israel was so weak, that the
rictory of the weak over the strong could but be attributed to Divine
overruling. In any case it is the first mark of a religious spirit that it
seeks or sees God's help in preference to man's, and then awaits the
issue with calmness. Cf. 1 Mace. 3'°''°.
In 5 6 answered is used in a pregnant sense = "I called on Jhvh in
a narrow place; He gave me my answer in a large place."
66 = 56"; 76 = 54^
10-18. This whole section sounds like the songs with which the
Maccabean soldiers had marched to battle and to victory. " Chanting
the twelfth verse with voices that rose high above the din of battle, the
Protestant army mshed to victory at Coutras," What the verb ren-
c. 22

338 PSALMS [CXVIIL
dered cut them off means is doubtful. Duhm corrects it, but unneces
sarily. Hengstenberg insists that, as in its simplest form it always
means circumcise (except in 90°), so it must be rendered here, in the
sense of such forced circumcision as the Idumseans and others were sub
jected to (Joseph. Antiq. xiii, 9', 11°). Most commentators render
with Rosenmiiller, penitus succidere, to mow down as grass.
We must take the solo versicles in 10 a, 11 a, 12 a as antecedents to
the refrain sung by the chorus. Though all nations compass me about
yet will I mow them down. 12 6 is either a gloss, or else the refrain
might be supplied before it. In this latter case Duhm's emendation of
si,ar, rage {ci. "wind of raging" in 107'°), for dkak, quench, is inevitable.
The Psalmist is describing what caused his resolve to mow them doum.
Had they been extinguished already, no resolve of the sort was necessary.
Baethgen, however, is content to show how the Pual rose as a corruption
of the Kai (how brennen became verbrennen), and so to render the
verse : " They bum as fire among the thorns." This brings us to the
same goal by another road.
In 13 the second person of the R,V. must be corrected with the LXX
into the first = impulsus pellebar of Jerome. To fall in the battle meant
death. 14 a = Ex. 15', Is. 12' In 15 the righteous = the Israelites as in
33'. In V. 18 the chastening may refer to the wounds, fatigue, hunger
and general privation which the armies of the chasidim had endured.
19-29. With V. 18 the procession has reached tbe doors of the
Temple, and the first half of the Ps. is finished. Halting at the
entrance, or slowly entering, the procession and the Levitical choir
within sing verse by verse antiphonally, as in Ps. 24. The gates of
righteousness = the gate of right to Jhvh's grace (Ewald); the gate
tlirough which one goes out of piety (De Wette); the gate through
which man comes to righteousness (Baethgen) ; the gate leading to the
place where Jhvh is rightly worshipped (Duhm). Cf Ps. 4°, Deut. 33'°,
sacrifices of righteousness.
The Levitical choir reply with a Sancta Sanctis. They alone that
be righteous may enter the gates of the righteous Jhvh. Pss. 15 and
24 describe what are the qualifications required for entrance.
Verse 22 is probably a proverbial saying adopted here (as in Mt. 21 "').
That the corner-stone is either Israel or its captain is clear. Com
mentators, however, find a difficulty in supposing that the heathen cau
be dignified with the description of builders. But if the verse was
already a popular saying, this difficulty disappears, for no illustrative
saying is to be pressed too closely. If we take this verse as the con
verse of Jer, 51'° we shall perhaps best explain it. As nobody should
take of Babylon any stone to build a corner with, so Jerusalem, once in
ruins and despised by all, is become honourable among the nations.
That so small a people should attain this high honour was marveUous,
so marvellous that it was capable of but one explanation — it was
Jhvh's doing. Even so did EUzabeth and her counsellors attribute
the scattering of the Spanish Armada to the action of God.

CXVIIL] PSALMS 339
He whose self-consciousness told Him that He was the Messiah,
Israel's hope and ideal, appUed to Himself what the Psalmist had said
of the people. In the same spirit, Israel's symbol, the dove, descending
on Him at His baptism, marked Him out as the representative of Israel,
the typical Israelite in whom were summed up Israel's hopes and
Israel's destiny.
In V. 24 is no necessary reference to the Feast of Tabernacles, or
any other solemn feast of the Law, as Wellhausen and Olshausen rightly
point out. That v. 25 of the Ps. was used later at the Peast of Taber
nacles is no proof that the Peast was the occasion of the Ps. itself
" The most rational conclusion is that the occasion and object of the
festival were neither more nor less than the victory which had been
gained, and the procession of the army to the Temple to celebrate this
victory with solemn keeping" (Wellhausen). Duhm sees in v. 24 a
direct reference to Nicanor-day (1 Mace. 7"°'"°).
The rendering of v, 25 which Cheyne gives {Encyc. Bib. 2"") is:
Our Redeemer is Jhvh; He has succoured us;
Owr Redeemer is Jhvh; He has prospered us.
He rejects the common belief that the cry of the children in Mt. 21°
is taken from this verse, and favours Ps. 8' as the original of an inspired
outburst of praise on the part of childlike behevers. Verse 26 he would
excise as an interpolation, in spite of Duhm's retention of it. But the
fact that both Hosanna (= Save now) and Bhssed be he that cometh are
found both in the Ps. and the Gospel would seem presumptive evidence
that the latter has been influenced by the former, and specially so if
the song in the Gospel is an "Urlied des Christentums."
27 a. The confession of Israel's faith is " Jhvh is God " ; the proof
that that faith is weU founded is the fact that He has given light
= lovingkindness, liberty and joy, just as He gave light to the people
in the wUdemess (Ex. 13"), The priestly blessing of Num. 6'° kept
this in mind continually.
27 6 is a clause put into the mouth of the Levitical choir, but is
of disputed meaning. Whatever is precisely intended, it depends at all
events on 27a: "Because Jhvh hath given us light, therefore bind,"
&c. What is agreed is that the primary meaning of chog is festal
dance, and sacrifice only a derived sense; that abothlm is brandies
rather than cords (it = cords in Ps, 2°, Judg, 15'°, Ezek. 3'°, and
branches Ezek. 19", 20", 31°''°''"); and that the Hebrew preposition
ad, to, cannot mean what we mean when we say " bind it to the horns,"
but implies motion towards ; so that if we translate as R.V. we must
complete the sentence : "Bind the victim with cords, and bring him to
the horns of the altar " — which assumes that the phrase is pregnant, as
is answered in 5 6.
While, therefore, it is possible that the R.V. is right, it is more
probable that the clue is to be found in Lev. 23"°, with the discordant
glosses on it of Neh. 8'° and 2 Mace. 10". The beauties of palm,
myrtle and willow were to be used in Nehemiah's time for building
booths, but, according to the later author, they were to be carried in
22—2

340 PSALMS [CXIX. 1-11
procession. This was a paraUel to the pagan custom at feasts of
Bacchus, and accounts for Plutarch's belief {Symp. iv. 6, 2) that the
Jews worshipped Bacchus. So in the passage before us the simplest
explanation is that the choir invites the procession to begin the festal
dance and come up to the horns of the altar from the door of the fore
court by which they had entered, or perhaps touch the horns of the
altar with their branches, so as to communicate its holiness to the pro
cession itself Rosenmiiller's objection that they could not have reached
nine cubits high ignores the fact that we do not know how high the
altar was in the year 161 B.o.
28-29. The last two verses have no special signification, and are
to be regarded as a summary of the joyful songs just concluded, and an
echo oivfo. 1-4. PSALM CXIX.
N ALEPH,
1 Blessed are the undefiled in the way,
Who walk in the law of Jhvh.
2 Blessed are they that keep his testimonies.
That seek him with the whole heart.
3 They do no iniquity :
They walk in his '^ways."'
4 Thou hast commanded us thy precepts
To keep them dihgently.
5 0 that my ways were directed
To keep thy statutes I
6 Then shall I not be ashamed.
When I have respect unto aU thy commandments.
7 I wiU praise thee with uprightness of heart.
When I shall have learned thy righteous judgments.
8 I will keep thy ^statutes"':
0 forsake me not utterly. 3 BETH.
9 Wherewithal shaU a young man cleanse his way ?
By taking heed ''...? to thy word.
10 With my whole heart have I sought thee :
0 let me not wander from thy commandments.
11 Thy word have I hid in mine heart,
That I might not sin against thee.

CXIX. 12-28] PSALMS 341
12 Blessed art thou, Jhvh :
Teach me thy statutes.
13 With my lips have I declared
All the judgments of thy mouth.
14 I have rejoiced in the way of thy testimonies,
More than in aU riches.
15 I wiU meditate in thy precepts,
And have respect unto thy ways.
16 I wiU deUght myself in thy statutes :
I wiU not forget thy '"word."

-1

J GIMEL.
17 Deal bountifuUy with thy servant, that I may live,
And keep thy word.
18 Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold
Wondrous things out of thy law.
19 I am a stranger in the earth :
Hide not thy commandments from me.
20 My soul breaketh for its longing
Unto thy judgments at all times.
21 Thou hast rebuked the proud :
Cursed are they which do err from thy commandments.
22 Remove from me reproach and contempt :
For I have kept thy '"testimonies."'
23 Princes also did sit and speak [[against me]] :
Thy servant did meditate in thy statutes.
24 Thy testimonies also are my deUght :
My counseUors [are thy precepts].
"7 DALETH.
25 My soul cleaveth unto the dust :
Quicken thou me according to thy word.
26 I have declared my ways, and thou heardest me :
Teach me thy statutes.
27 Make me to understand the way of thy precepts :
So shaU I talk of thy wondrous works.
28 My soul melteth for heaviness :
Strengthen thou me according unto thy '"word."'

342 PSALMS [CXIX. 29-45
29 Remove from me the way of lying :
And grant me thy law graciously.
30 I have chosen the way of truth :
Thy judgments have I ""laid before me7
31 I have stuck unto thy testimonies :
Jhvh, put me not to shame.
32 I will run the way of thy commandments.
When thou shalt enlarge my heart.
n HE.
33 Teach me, Jhvh, the way of thy statutes :
And I shaU keep it ''u/nto the end."'
34 Give me understanding, and I shall keep thy law :
Yea, I shall observe it with my whole heart.
35 Make me to go in the path of thy commandments :
For therein do I deUght.
36 Incline my heart unto thy testimonies.
And not to covetousness.
37 Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity :
And quicken thou me in thy ''way.'
38 Stablish thy word unto thy servant,
hThat he may fear thee.-l
39 Turn away my reproach which I fear :
For thy judgments are good.
40 Behold, I have longed after thy precepts :
Quicken me in thy righteousness. 1 VAU.
41 Let thy mercies come also unto me, Jhvh,
Thy salvation, according to thy word.
42 Let me have wherewith to answer him that reproacheth me :
For I trust in thy word utterly.
43 And take not the word of truth out of my mouth :
For I have hoped in thy judgments.
44 Let me keep thy law continually
For ever and ever.
45 Let me walk at liberty :
For I seek thy precepts.

CXIX. 46-62] PSALMS 343
46 Let me speak of thy testimonies also before kings,
And not be ashamed.
47 Let me delight myself in thy commandments,
Which I have loved.
48 My hands also will I Uft up unto thy commandments, [[which
I have loved|:
And I wiU meditate in thy statutes.
T ZAIN.
49 Remember the word unto thy servant.
Upon which thou hast caused me to hope.
50 This is my comfort in my affliction :
For thy word hath quickened me.
51 The proud have had me greatly in derision :
Yet have I not declined from thy '"law."'
52 I remembered thy judgments of old, Jhvh :
And have comforted myself.
53 Horror hath taken hold upon me
Because of the wicked that forsake thy law.
54 Thy statutes have been my songs
In the house of my pUgrimage.
55 I have remembered thy name, Jhvh, in the night,
And have kept thy '"law."'
56 This I had,
Because I kept thy precepts. n CHETH.
57 "Jhvh is my portion," do I say :
In order that I may keep thy words.
58 I intreated thy favour with my whole heart :
Be merciful unto me according to thy word.
59 I thought on my ways,
And turned my feet unto thy testimonies.
60 I made haste, and delayed not
To keep thy commandments.
61 The bands of the wicked have hambushed-1 me :
But I have not forgotten thy law.
62 At midnight I wiU rise to give thanks unto thee
Because of thy righteous judgments.

344 PSALMS [CXIX. 63-79
63 I am a companion of all them that fear thee.
And of them that keep thy precepts.
64 The earth, Jhvh, is full of thy mercy :
Teach me thy statutes. E3 TETH.
65 Thou hast dealt well with thy servant,
Jhvh, according unto thy word.
66 Teach me [[goodj judgment and knowledge :
For I have believed thy commandments.
67 Before I was afflicted I went astray :
But now have I kept thy word.
68 Thou art good, and doest good :
Teach me thy statutes.
69 The proud have forged a lie against me :
But I wiU keep thy precepts with my whole heart.
70 Their heart is as fat as grease :
But I deUght in thy '"law."'
11 It is good for me that I have been afflicted :
That I might learn thy '"statutes."'
72 The law of thy mouth is better unto me
Than thousands of gold and silver.
'> JOD.
73 Thy hands have made me and fashioned me :
Give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments.
74 They that fear thee will be glad when they see me :
Because I have hoped in thy word.
75 I know, Jhvh, that thy judgments are right :
And that thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me.
76 Let, I pray thee, thy merciful kindness be for my comfort,
According to thy word unto thy servant.
11 Let thy tender mercies come unto me, that I may Uve :
For thy law is my deUght.
78 Let the proud be ashamed ; for they dealt perversely with
me without a cause :
But I will meditate in thy precepts.
79 Let those that fear thee turn unto me,
And those that know thy testimonies.

CXIX. 80-96] PSALMS 345
80 Let my heart be sound in thy statutes :
That I be not ashamed. 3 CAPH.
81 My soul fainteth for thy salvation :
But I hope in thy word.
82 Mine eyes fail for thy word,
Saying, When wilt thou comfort me?
83 For I am become like a bottle in the smoke :
Yet do I not forget thy statutes.
84 How many are the days of thy servant ?
When wilt thou execute judgment on them that persecute me?
85 The proud have digged pits for me,
Which are not after thy law.
86 AU thy commandments are faithfiil :
They persecute me wrongfully; help thou me.
87 They had almost consumed me [[upon earth]] :
But I forsook not thy precepts.
88 Quicken me after thy loringkindness :
So shall I keep the testimony of thy mouth.

h

LAMED.

89 For ever, Jhvh,
Thy word is settled in heaven.
90 Thy '"faithfiilness'' is unto all generations :
Thou hast estabUshed the earth, and it abideth.
91 They continue this day according to thine ordinances
For aU are thy servants.
92 Unless thy law had been my delights,
I should then have perished in mine affliction.
93 I wiU never forget thy precepts :
For with them thou hast quickened me.
94 I am thine, save me :
For I have sought thy '"precepts."'
95 The wicked have waited for me to destroy me :
But I wUl consider thy testimonies.
96 I have seen an end of all perfection :
But thy commandment is exceeding broad.

346 PSALMS [CXIX. 97-112
)t3 MEM.
97 0 how love I thy law !
It is my meditation all the day.
98 Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than
mine enemies :
For they are ever with me.
99 I have more understanding than aU my teachers :
For thy testimonies are my meditation.
100 I understand more than the ancients.
Because I keep thy '"precepts."'
101 I have refrained my feet from every eril way,
That I might keep thy word.
102 I have not departed from thy judgments :
For thou hast taught me.
103 How sweet are thy words unto my taste !
Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth !
104 Through thy '"precepts"' I get understanding :
Therefore I hate every false way.
i NUN.
105 Thy word is a lamp unto my feet.
And a light unto my path.
106 I have swom, and I will perform it.
That I will keep thy righteous judgments.
107 I am afflicted very much :
Quicken me, Jhvh, according unto thy ' word."'
108 Accept, I beseech thee, the freewiU offerings of my mouth,
Jhvh,
And teach me thy '"judgments."'
109 My soul is continuaUy in my hand :
Yet do I not forget thy law.
110 The wicked have laid a snare for me :
Yet I erred not from thy precepts.
Ill Thy testimonies have I taken as an heritage for ever:
For they are the rejoicing of my heart.
112 I have inclined mine heart to perform thy statutes
Alway, even unto the end.

CXIX. 113-128] PSALMS 347
D SAMECH.
113 I hate h double-minded meuH :
But thy law do I love.
114 Thou art my hiding place and my shield :
I hope in thy word.
115 Depart from me, ye erildoers :
For I will keep the commandments of my God.
116 Uphold me according unto thy word, that I may live :
' And let me not be ashamed of my hope,
117 Hold thou me up, and I shall be safe :
And I will have respect unto thy statutes continually,
118 Thou hast trodden down aU them that err from thy
'"statutes"' :
For their thought is falsehood.
119 Thou puttest away all the wicked of the earth like dross:
Therefore I love thy testimonies.
120 My flesh trembleth for fear of thee :
And I am afraid of thy judgments.
y AIN".
121 I have done judgment and justice :
Leave me not to mine oppressors.
122 hPledge thy word-! for good :
Let not the proud oppress me.
123 Mine eyes fail for thy salvation.
And for the word of thy righteousness.
124 Deal with thy servant according unto thy mercy,
And teach me thy statutes.
125 I am thy servant ; give me understanding,
That I may know thy testimonies.
126 It is time for thee, Jhvh, to work :
For they have made void thy law.
127 Therefore I love thy commandments
Above gold; yea, above fine gold.
128 I h keep -I all thy precepts ^concerning all things to be
right]] :
And I hate every false way.

348 PSALMS [CXIX, 129-144
3 PE.
129 Thy testimonies arre wonderful :
Therefore doth my soul keep them.
130 The entrance of thy words giveth light :
It giveth understanding unto the simple,
131 I opened my mouth, and panted :
For I longed for thy commandments,
132 Look thou upon me, and be merciful unto me,
As hit is right for theeH to do unto those that love thy
name.
133 Order my steps in thy word :
And let not any iniquity have dominion over me.
134 DeUver me from the oppression of man :
So will I keep thy precepts,
135 Make thy face to shine upon thy servant :
And teach me thy statutes.
136 Rivers of waters run down mine eyes,
Because they keep not thy law.
5f TZADDL
137 Righteous art thou, Jhvh,
And upright are thy judgments.
138 Thy testimonies that thou hast commanded are righteous
And very faithfuL
139 My zeal hath consumed me.
Because mine enemies have forgotten thy words.
140 Thy word is very pure :
Therefore thy servant loveth it.
141 I am smaU and despised :
Yet do not I forget thy precepts.
142 Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness.
And thy law is the truth.
143 Trouble and anguish have taken hold on me :
Yet thy commandments are my deUghts,
144 The righteousness of thy '"testimonies'' is everlasting :
Give me understanding, and I shaU Uve,

CXIX. 145-160] PSALMS 349
p KOPH.
145 I cried with m/y whole heart; hear me, Jhvh :
I wiU keep thy statutes.
146 I cried unto thee, save me :
And I shall keep thy testimonies.
147 I prevented the dawning of the morning, and cried :
I hoped in thy word.
148 Mine eyes prevent the night watches,
That I may meditate in thy word.
149 Hear my voice according unto thy lovingkindness :
Jhvh, quicken me according to thy judgment.
150 They draw nigh that foUow after mischief:
They are far from thy law.
151 Thou art near, Jhvh :
And aU thy commandments are truth.
152 Concerning thy '"testimonies,"' I have known of old
That thou hast founded them for ever.
*1 BESH.
153 Consider mine affliction, and deUver me :
For I do not forget thy law.
154 Plead my cause, and deliver me :
Quicken me according to thy word.
155 Salvation is far from the wicked :
For they seek not thy statutes.
156 Great are thy tender mercies, Jhvh :
Quicken me according to thy judgments.
157 Many are my persecutors and mine enemies :
Yet do I not decUne from thy testimonies.
158 I beheld the transgressors, and was grieved :
Because they kept not thy '"word."'
159 Consider how I love thy precepts :
Quicken me, Jhvh, according to thy loringkindness,
160 Thy word is true frmn the beginning :
And every one of thy righteous judgments endu/reth for
ever.

350 PSALMS [CXIX. 161-176
^ SCHIN.
161 Princes have persecuted me without a cause :
But my heart standeth in awe of thy word.
162 I rejoice at thy word.
As one that flndeth great spoil.
163 I hate and abhor lying :
But thy law do I love.
164 Seven times a day do I praise thee
Because of thy righteous judgments.
165 Great peace have they which love thy law :
And nothing shall offend them.
166 Jhvh, I have hoped for thy salvation,
And done thy commandments.
167 My soul hath kept thy testimonies :
And I love them exceedingly.
168 I have kept thy precepts and thy testimonies :
For all my ways are before thee.
n TAU.
169 Let my cry come near before thee, Jhvh :
Give me understanding according to thy word.
170 Let my supplication come before thee :
DeUver me according to thy word.
171 Let my lips utter praise,
For thou hast taught me tliy statutes.
172 Let my tongue speak of thy word :
For all thy commandments are righteousness.
173 Let thine hand help me :
For I have chosen thy precepts.
174 I have longed for thy salvation, Jhvh :
And thy law is my delight.
175 Let my soul live, and it shall praise thee :
And let thy judgments help me.
176 I have gone astray pike a lost sheep]] ; seek thy servant :
For I do not forget thy ''commandments."'
The most elaborate, and at the same time most monotonous of the
Alphabetic Pss. The 176 distichs, of which it is composed, are dirided
into 22 " ogdoads," and the eight distichs of each ogdoad begin with

CXIX.] PSALMS 351
the same letter of the Hebrew alphabet, the order of which is
foUowed. Delitzsch maintains, as against most moderns, that the Ps. contains
a sequence of thought throughout, and the foUowing is his summary of
the contents of each ogdoad :
K Praises fidelity to God's word;
3 That word is the young man's guide;
J A prayer for enlightenment;
"1 A prayer for strength;
n A prayer for preservation;
1 A joyful confession;
1 The sole sufiiciency of God's word;
n The Psalmist cleaves to those who love God;
£3 The salutary efiects of being chastened;
' The need of comfort;
2 The longing for peace;
7 The fixity of God's word;
D Its power to give wisdom;
J A promise to be faithful to it;
D Hatred of apostates;
y An appeal against oppressors;
S A prayer for help;
S Zeal is consuming him;
p A prayer for release;
"n A prayer for deliverance;
tJ' An assertion of innocency;
n A prayer to be remembered.
Undoubtedly these thoughts are to be found embedded in their
respective ogdoads, but they do not dominate them, nor are they
carried through them, and we are forced to conclude against Delitzsch
that the Ps. as a whole is a coUection of sayings in praise of the Law,
which are unified, not by any logical sequence of thought, but only by
the mood of the writer.
Who then was he ? And does the Ps. give any indication of his
circumstances? To answer the last question first. He has many per
secutors {v. 157); they persecute him wrongfully {vv. 84, 86); they
never leave him alone {v. 98); they have forgotten God's words
{v. 139) ; they have been too wily for him {vv. 85, 110) ; he is caught
in their toUs {v. 61) ; therefore he is in afiliction {vv. 50, 67, 71, 75,
107, 153); and that for some considerable time {v. 92); his life is in
danger {v. 109); therefore is he in trouble and anguish {v. 143); while
his enemies are preparing his fate {v. 23) — but see note — they are the
" proud " {v. 21) ; they deride him {v. 51) ; they are liars and oppressors
{vv. 69, 78); they are apostates {v. 158) and trimmers {v. 113).
Against such enemies, and under such circumstances, the Psalmist
supports himself on the Law, and by virtue of its promises appeals to

352 PSALMS [cxix.
Jhvh (whose Name he mentions 22 times) for consolation, help and
deliverance. Moreover the Psalmist seems to have been a man of some note. He
speaks of bearing testimony before kings {v. 46); he says that the
"fearers of Jhvh will be glad to see him again" {v. 74); and bears
himself as one not too low for princes to persecute {v. 161).
The whole tone of the Ps., with its glorification of the Law, with its
invective against false Israelites (Hitzig says heathen, but apparently
without reason), is eloquent of a late date, and fits in with the Macca
bean age. In 1 Mace. 12"° the capture of Jonathan at Ptolemais is
described; in the next chapter, v. 16, Tryphon says that he has him in
hold ; and in v. 23 his murder is recorded. The length of time of his
imprisonment is not given with any precision, but it was long enough
apparently to allow of the composition of such a Ps. as this. Hitzig,
therefore, goes so far as to suggest Jonathan as the probable author of
Ps. 119. But, on the other hand, vv. 154, 161, and the references to
apostates, favour a purely civil strife. It is not easy either to go with
Hitzig when he says that the Ps. is ein Spiel der Musse — the mere
diversion of a prisoner, who made the time go more quickly by writing
down in an artificial form his thoughts about Jhvh and His Law. That
the Ps. is couched iu an artificial form is admitted, but yet the tone of
complaint, of anger, of devotion and loyalty is too strong to justify us
in caUing the Ps, a mere pastime.
The artificial character of the Ps. is seen not merely in its alphabetic
character, but also in the care with which it introduces a catch-word
into every distich. (Verse 22 is no exception.) This catch-word is in one
of eight forms corresponding to the eight-fold form of each division of
the Ps., and is in every case a homon3rm for tbe Law, under one or
other of its aspects. These eight terms are as follows:
T6rS,h, law, in the special sense of the instruction given by Jhvh to
His people, originally the authoritative directions given by priests on
matters of ceremonial observance, but afterwards codified under the
name of Moses, and enlarged by later Novelise, with a history in short
not unlike that of the Corpus Juris Civilis and the Corpus Juris
Canonici. Pikkftdlm, precepts, of Jhvh, as the overseer of Israel, or the in
structions He had given them as His deputy, or ambassador to the
nations of the world.
!6d6th, testimonies, a term used in the singular peculiarly of the
Decalogue, but in the Ps. for Jhvh's warnings aud exhortations.
Mishpi,tlm, judgments, related to Tdr^h in its later sense, as case-
law is to law in general, as leges to jus.
MitzvS,h, "a definite command imposed by authority."
Chukklm, statutes, as being inscribed, as were the Decalogue and
the Twelve Tables. The form used here is the favourite form in Job,
Pss. and Prov., and the plural in Deuteronomy.
Dabir, word, a general term for Jhvh's communications to man. In
the N.T. it is sublimated and personified as the Logos.

cxix.] PSALMS 353
Imrih, saying, related to d'bar as logion to logos, a poetical variant
for d'bar.
The eight words above occur in every ogdoad according to H. Miiller.
He is so sure of the intention of the author in this respect that he sub
stitutes any that fails for any that occur twice in the same ogdoad, and
for a word which may be thought to oust the lawful claimant. The
words he queries are marked with h H in the text.
To these eight are added by Kirkpatrick two others :
Derek, way, that is the Way marked out by Jhvh for man's conduct.
Cf. "The Two Ways" ofthe !Didache, "the Way" as an early name for
the Christian "sect," and the Path of Buddhism.
Orach, path, a poetical variant for the former. These two last are
not recurring terms of the Ps. before us.
As iUustrating the guess-work which must be the frequent accom
paniment of attempts to explain the Psalter, it may be noted that
Delitzsch holds the author for a young man, Ewald for an old man, and
Kirkpatrick for one of mature age. Baethgen and Hengstenberg give it
a national character, Duhm and Hitzig an individual; while Olshausen
occupies the safe middle position which makes it a national Ps. infiuenced
by the circumstances of the individual who composed it. Some trace a
sequence of thought, but most deny that any exists. According to one
account the whole Ps. was meant to be a eulogy of the Law to be learned
by heart. According to another it was a human document.
On the Ps. as a whole, lastly, two very opposite verdicts may be put
side by side, by way of iUustrating the tendency of the human eye to
see what it brings the power of seeing. Dr Liddon says that the
119th Ps. displays "the paradox of seeming simplicity overlying
fathomless depth.,,, It is infinitely varied in its expressions, yet in
cessantly one in its direction; its variations are so delicate as to be
almost imperceptible, its unity so emphatic as to be inexorably stamped
upon its every line." {The Priest in his Inner Life, p. 46.)
On the other hand, Duhm is equaUy expUcit :
"What purpose the author had in his eye in the coinposition of
these 176 verses I do not know. In any case is this 'Psalm' the
emptiest production which ever blackened paper. If only the author
had given us something out of the much-lauded results of his study !
Even from the literary point of view it would be difiicult to point to
any piece which is the equal of this Psalm for clumsiness and poverty
of thought. The author may, as Dr Miiller says, have been an excellent
schoolmaster, but it was not exceUent of him to turn author, and
V. 99 a may well have been more suitable in the mouth of one of his
scholars than in his own. Still, vv. 62, 147f , 164 are not without
their value for the history of the scribes ; even for the psychology of
the Book-reUgion may much be taken directly or indirectly from
tills Ps."
The just judgment probably Ues half-way between that of Liddon
and that of Duhm,
As an iUustration of the artificial character of Jewish exegesis of the
a 23

354 PSALMS [cxix.
Law may be mentioned the saying that God gave Moses 613 Com
mandments — 365 negative, according to the days of the year, and 248
positive, according to the number of the members of the human body.
Ps. 15 reduced these to 11 ; Is. 33'° makes them 6 ; Micah 6° reduces
them to 3 ; Amos 6" (or Hab. 2") to 1 final precept only.
1-8. In V. 1 perfect in the way = integer vitse. To seek Jhvh here
is to enquire into His will, not to visit His Temple as in 24°, 27", In
3 in his word for in his way (Miiller). In 6 not ashamed, 16 §b6sh,
means he will not fail to reach his goal, whatever it may be. The
Hebrew word occurs in Ish-bosheth = man of shame. In 8 imrah for
dabi,r (MiiUer).
9-16, The question in 9 a is answered in 9 &. In 9 & omit thereto
according of R.V, by reading bidbirechi for kidbfi,rech^ with LXX.
In 14 read m'al for k'al. In 16 t6rfi,h for chukkdth.
17-24. The wondrous things, v. 18, are the hidden meanings, the
mystical interpretations of the Law. Thirty-two rules of interpretation
were devised for the proper interpretation of the Law. Later Judaism
discovered a fourfold meaning in Scripture, of which the word PaRaDiSe
contains the memoria technica in its consonants.
These were : P'shat = the literal meaning.
Remez = the meaning put in.
D'riish = that deduced by investigation.
S6d = the theosophic meaning.
These passed over into patristic exegesis, and are applied without
reserve in Neale and Littledale's Commentary on the Pss.
19 = 39", What the stranger was among the Israelites, a person on
sufferance, and imperfectly acquainted with the laws, so is man on
earth ; therefore, lest in ignorance he break God's laws, he prays (19 b)
that God will reveal His commandments. In 21 transfer, with LXX,
cursed are they, to the second clause. Replace it in 22 by imr8,h
(Miiller). In 23 Duhm omits bl, against me, and so gets the sense of
Ecclus, 11' : wisdom sets a man among princes. As the princes of His
people delight to sit and discuss the Law, so are Jhvh's testimonies the
dehght of the Psalmist also. Complete 24 b as above (after LXX) by
inserting pikUddlm, which otherwise fails in the ogdoad.
25-32. Verse 25 implies that the Psalmist is at the point to die.
In 26 darkai, ways, is a general term = fate, or doings, or circumstances.
Cf 37°. Whether he refers to the past, present, or future the Psalmist
does not make clear. In 28 read pikUddim for dab^r (or else in 25)
(Miiller). In 29 tlie way of lying is that of apostasy from the Law. In
30 Duhm and Baethgen follow Zenner in reading ivvlthl (132 '°) for
shivvlthl. But perhaps I'negdi (16°) has dropped out. Verse 31 = v. 6.
In 32 b the enlarged hea/rt = one freed from its anxieties (25"', Is. 60°),
or increased wisdom, as in 1 Kings 4".
33--40, In 33 b gkeb (an adverb from §,k^b, a heel, whence the
derivative meaning oi follow, and so what foUows, as reward, end,
insidiousness — cf the Bibhcal explanation of yaakSb, Jacob) may mean
here reward, or to the ewe? = thoroughly. If the former, then the

CXIX.] PSALMS 355
Psahnist says that virtue is its own reward. But cf v. 112. Verse 36
sets out the eternal antithesis, "the flesh lusteth against the spirit." In
37 vanity is aU that is not according to God's will, e.g. idolatry or
covetousness. The two are combined in Col. 3" and perhaps in Ps. 24".
In 37 b read wotd for ways (Miiller). In 38 b follow the LXX (as
above), which gives the best sense. The reproach in 39 is that which
always cuts deepest into the heart of the pious : " He trusted in God ;
let Him deliver him," The pious man can neither justify his faith nor
surrender it. He would gladly be spared the scorn of the ungodly,
since he has no reply, and he prays, therefore, take away my reproach
= lead me not into temptation,
41-48. The Psalmist is confident that he will have an answer to
his calumniators, if only Jhvh will deUver him. Without that he must
be dumb. In 43 the ad m'6d, utterly (and in v. 8), must be omitted
and transferred to 42 b. The remaining verses of this ogdoad outline
the argument that it is to Jhvh's honour and interest to deliver the
Psalmist because of the faithful obedience he will then be able to
render to the Law, It is a pious bargain which he would strike. If
Jhvh will set him at liberty, he will cause His law to be extolled. The
cohortative meaning should be preserved in 42, 44, 45, 46. In 48 /
will lift up my harUds is a formula of prayer. Ambabus quasi manibus
excipiam et avide complectar praecepta tua (RosenmiiUer). Which I
have loved is by an error repeated from 47 b.
49—56. Law occurs three times here, in 51, 53, and 55, while
mitzvl,h and Sd6th are wanting. The proud = those worldly notables,
whether heathen or apostate Jews, who scoff" at the chasidim. The
judgments of old {v. 52) are "the valid, verified decisions" of Jhvh
which have come down from the days of Moses. In 53 the apostate
IsraeUtes are the subject.
The earth hath Jhvh given to the children of men (116'^), but yet
it is His (24'). On it man has no abiding place (1 Chron, 29'°), his
long home (Ecclus. 12°) is elsewhere. On earth man is a pilgrim and a
stranger {v. 19, Gen. 47», 1 Pet._2", Ps. 39"). In 56 we must (after
V. 57) either interpret "Jhvh is my portion because, &c,," or "My
portion has been this, viz,, that I have kept Thy precepts." Both are
permissible, and both belong to the thought of Jewish piety. (For the
construction cf Rev. 2".)
57-64. In 57 1 say (ek'rg, is inserted in 18' just as 4martl is here)
should be taken, after the analogy oi vv. 4, 5, 9, 60, with the first
clause: "Jhvh is my portion, I say, in the sense that I keep His
words," A vocative is concealed in the /irrif, 58. Entreated the favour:
ci. the Latin caput mulcere. 61 = 18°. Not imprisonment but ambush
is referred to, not vincula but laquei. Cf v. 110.
64 a =33°.
65-72. T6b, good, is the first word of 65, 66, and should be
omitted in 66 with Wellhausen as a scribe's error. What the Psahnist
means is that his faith in Jhvh's lovingkindness and truth has never
failed him, but he has found it difficult to understand Jhvh's ways
23—2

356 PSALMS [CXix.
with him; therefore he prays for judgment and understanding. The
Psalmist's judgment on pain is that of modern science, " This hideous
hatred and strife, this wholesale famine and death, furnish the indis
pensable conditions for the evolution of higher and higher types of life" ;
and of modern poetry :
Put pain from out the world, what room were left
For thanks to God, for love to man ?
Jerome renders 68 tersely bonus es et beneficus. The lie, or calumny,
of 69 is as a daub concealing and disfiguring the truth. Those who so
slander the Psalmist are spiritually stupid. Their heart is as unrecep-
tive as fat. That fatness and stupidity go together is rooted in popular
feeling. The Psalmist, on the contrary, is open to leam, and he has
learned in sorrow's school, and found the preciousness of Jhvh's Law.
Law and statutes occur twice each in this ogdoad ; judgments and
testimonies fail,
73-80. 73a = JoblO^ 74 = 63. The /a?^?*^^^ of 75 has for
its antithesis the wrongfully of 78. The juxtaposition of the two is
closer in 86. But it is possible that sheker, falsely, in 78, is a gloss
derived from 86, 79 b may be either a wish or a coordinate subject
to 79 a — either May they know Thy testimonies or May those turn to me
who fear Thee, and who know Thy testimonies ; cf 63 and 125,
81-88, 83 a is a concessive sentence, as in 27'°, Is, 64'°. Though
my body be so emaciated with misery that it becomes like a bottle in
the smoke, wrinkled and dry, yet, &c. So Rosenmiiller. The use of
smoking the wine-cask or leather bottle was common in antiquity,
Accipit Eetatem quisquis ab igne cadus. Martial, Ep. x, 36.
Prodit fumoso condita vina cado. Grid, Fast. v. 517.
And Horace urges Maecenas on the kalends of March to take out the
cork: ^ Amphorae fumum bibere institutse
Consule TuUo. Carm. iii, 8,
Duhm, however, thinks that the reference in the Ps. is to an unused
bottle hanging up in the roof of a room which has no chimney, and
getting dry and dirty. DeUtzsch, too, fails to see that the custom of
meUowing wine by smoke elucidates the Ps, at all. Hitzig sees the
point of the comparison in the neglect to which the Psalmist is subject.
He is put on one side and forgotten like a disused wine-skin, and with
similar results. _ He has become dried up and ready to perish.
The subject in 85 a is the proud. In 87 BickeU omits on earth as
tasteless. It^may, however, be in antithesis to in heaven of 89,
89-96. This ogdoad carries out its leading thought more thoroughly
than others. The fixity of Jhvh's will is contrasted with the transitori
ness of man's Hfe. Pulris et umbra sumus. We walk in a shadow, and

CXIX.] PSALMS 357
grope for Reality. That Reality is God, and God is good. "Omne ens
est bonum" was a truth of religion long before it became a postulate of
philosophy. The Psalmist's faith finds its counterpart in modern
psychology: " Courage is glorious because it involves a conquest over our own
conscious shrinking in the presence of danger. Who fears not knows
not conscious courage. Endurance is noble, because it includes a
voluntary defeat of our own unwillingness to endure. And, in general,
every form of more complex rational life means a triumph over ourselves
whereby alone we win ourselves. Whoever has not faced problems as
problems, mysteries as mysteries, defeats as defeats, knows not what
that completer possession of his own life means which is the outcome
and also the present experience of triumph in the midst of finitude and
disaster. For in the rictorious warfare with finitude consists the per
fection of the spirit." (Royce, The World and the Individual, p. 381.)
The truth of Jhvh being a fixed rock in the sea of change is the
Psalmist's stay. All things serve Him by His ordinance ; His law is
like its author, constant. But for this to hold by he would have
perished in his afiliction.
There was once a man who pledged his dearest faith to a maiden,
beautiful and true. For a time all passed pleasantly, and the maiden
lived in happiness. But then the man was called from her side. He
left her ; long she waited, but he did not return. Friends pitied her
and rivals mocked her. Tauntingly they pointed at her and said, "He
has left thee, he wiU never come back." The maiden sought her
chamber, and read in secret the letters which her lover had written
to her, the letters in which he promised to be ever faithful, ever true.
Weeping she read them, but they brought comfort to her heart; she
dried her eyes, and doubted not, A joyous day dawned for her; the
man she loved returned, and when he learned that others had doubted,
and asked how she had preserved her faith, she showed his letters to
him, declaring her eternal trust.
96. AU things when they come to perfection decay and give place
to something higher. Jhvh's commandment alone knows no such
limiting law.
96a. "Life is the product and accompaniment of change, and the
self-same power that tears the fiank of the hills to pieces is the main
spring of the animal and vegetable worlds. Still, there is something
chilling in the irresistible and remorseless character of those infinitesimal
forces whose integration through the ages pulls down even the Matter-
horn." (Tyndall, Hours of Exercise in the Alps, ch. 24.)
96 6. "Waves may change to ripples, and ripples to waves —
magnitude may be substituted for number, and number for magni
tude — asteroids may aggregate to suns, suns may invest their energy
in florse and faunse, and florae and faunse may melt in air — the flux of
power is eternally the same. It rolls in music through the ages, whUe
the manifestations of physical Ufe, as well as the display of physical
phenomena, are but the modulations of its rhythm." (Ibid., Heat a mode

358 PSALMS [cxix.
of Motion, Lect. 17.) But a Lucretian materialism does not satisfy the
soul. The Jewish Psalmist and the Christian thinker are aUke. The
one affirms that God's commandment is exceeding broad, not limited
by space or time, and the other that "the idea of phenomenon or
appearance, in order to be intelligible, must presuppose not only a
being or thing which appears, but also, and quite as indispensably,
a second being by whom this appearance is perceived." (Lotze, Micro-
cosmus, Eng. trans., ii, p, 160,) Every phenomenon implies a reality.
Religion calls that Reality God.
97-104. The Psalmist speaks as an Evangelical who knows his
Bible and is taught directly from it, and so is in a position to pass
judgment on Broad Churchmen. He is a controversialist, and so has
enemies ; he is wiser than they. He lived in an age which had doctores
publici; he has more understanding than they. He has kept Jhvh's
precepts, and therefore he understood more than the z'klnim, the elders,
the gerousia, who were the heads in Church and State, This is the
voice of the pious layman in every age ; he never forgets the promise
that "all thy people shall be taught of God," and puts personal know
ledge above mere official precepts. As Dr Salmon said to the class he
was lecturing to : " If you give no heed to theological study, the mere
fact of your ordination will not entitle you to claim deference for your
opinion from members of your congregation, among whom you may
easily find some better informed than yourself" (infallibility of the
Church, p, 50.) As Luther said: "Antiquity is no help against
stupidity, when it does not accord with the commandments of God."
105-112. Law and judgments occur twice each; oracle and com
mandment fail. "The commandment is a lamp; and the law is light"
(Prov. 6"*). God's cabinet of revealed counsel 'tis:
Where weal and woe
Are ordered so
That every man may know what shall be his ;
Unless his own mistake
False application make.
It is the Index to Btemitie,
He cannot miss
Of endless bliss
That takes this chart to steer his voyage by;
Nor can he be mistook
That speaketh by this Book, George Herbert,
113-120. Statutes comes twice while precepts is wanting.
113. Doubtful-minded men=l Kings 18". Half-hearted men,
"moderates," as the vulgar describe them, men who halted between
the worship of Zeus and that of Jhvh, Sadducean opportunists, and
political time-servers, devoid of all patriotism which could base itself on
the ancestral rehgion of the Jewish people. The Law of Jhvh claimed
an individual allegiance. No man can serve two masters, when one of
them is God. He who in later days said "Jesus is God" could not

CXIX.] PSALMS 359
burn incense as confession that Augustus was divine. Depart from me,
ye evil-do&rs, is an echo of the anathema which it was the business of the
"ancients" {v. 100) to pronounce against every member of the Synagogue
who disgraced his religion.
The last three verses (118-120) describe the Psalmist's belief in
the impotence of eril ; it is permitted for a time, but in the long run
aU that is false will be brought to nought. As Matthew Arnold said in
a simUar strain of thought : " The line of Jesus perpetually tends to
establish itself, independently of our wishes, and whether we will or
not." Comment on Christmas.
It is this goodness of Jhvh which the Psalmist fears {v. 120). Evil
may be overcome, bribed, hoodwinked, but goodness is proof agamst all.
It is as a fate, to which men must bend, or it will break them.
121-128. In 122 read d'b^r'chS. for ab'd'chg,, thy word iov ihy
servant ; otherwise this would be the one verse which did not contain
one of the key-words. The therefore in vv. 127, 128 has no sense.
Hupfeld assigns it a purely acrostic meaning, on which Duhm remarks
that this is to make the Psalmist write twaddle. So conservative a
commentator as Kirkpatrick declares the text of 128 to be " almost cer
tainly corrupt." Kol, all, has been repeated in error after precepts, and
ousted a kl, for, before / hate. Translate therefore,
AU Thy precepts do I keep.
For the way of falsehood do I hate.
129-136, The wonders of Jhvh's self-testimony strike the Psalmist
with a sense of awe, therefore does he keep what they impose. Miracle
was his native element, as in some sense it is of all religion. But
whether the miraculous is in the past or the present is a point of the
first importance. " Directly a religion forms for itself a canon of in
spired writings, far-reaching consequences follow. Religion becomes
more concrete and more definite, but also harder and stiffer. The bed
in which it flows becomes narrower, but it saves it from overflowing.
The history of religion falls into two sections, one dealing with the
inspired Past, be it near or distant, and one with the Present, abandoned
as it is by the Spirit — the creative age, and that of the Epigoni."
(Bousset, Die Religion des Judenthums, p. 128.) The Psalmist lived in
the latter. The wonders he hymned were recorded in the Law ; and
yet his Religion was too strong for his Theology. He looked for a
present intervention of Jhvh, and that, if it happened, would be a
miracle. But Religion is never tied to Logic, else it would cease to be
Religion. The word n§.tzar in 129 b is almost a technical term of scribism, and
occurs ten times in this Ps. in the sense of guard with fidelity.
In 130 commentators cannot agree whether pgthach, entrance, or
p6thach, door, is the proper reading. Delitzsch and Duhm declare for
the former, Baethgen for the latter. As the Hebrew loves the concrete
Baethgen's conclusion is the better. The sense is much the same in
either case. The inner light is a revelation from God. All religion is

360 PSALMS [CXIX.
a revelation. All latitudinarian conceptions of religion have been in
fertile because they neglected this fundamental fact. "NuUafides si
non primum Deus ipse loquitur. NuUaque verba Dei nisi quae in pene-
tralibus audit ipsa fides." " Thou wouldst not seek Me hadst thou not
already found Me " is Pascal's profound way of putting the Psahnist's
thought. The simple who are the recipients are the open-minded, the
children of Mt. 18'
132 b. As Thou usest to do (R.V.) hardly expresses the Hebrew
k'mishpat. It is meet and right that Jhvh should show grace to those
who love Him — " fas est," " wie es biUig ist." The iniquity of 133 b is
specially apostasy. 136 = Lam. 3"*.
137-144. Testimonies occurs twice, and statutes fails. 137. When
the centurion Phocas rose against the Emperor Maurice he despatched
the ministers of death to Chalcedon : " they dragged the Emperor from
his sanctuary ; and the five sons of Maurice were successively murdered
before the eyes of their agonising parent. At each stroke which he felt
in his heart, he found strength to rehearse a pious ejaculation : ' Thou
art just, 0 Lord ! and Thy judgments are righteous,' " (Gibbon, Decline
and Fall, ch, 46,)
138. The same two attributes characterise Messiah in Is. 11°.
139 = 69°; 140=12^
141. The LXX render tzMr, small, by ne6teros, young, which
would form an antithesis to the elders of v. 100, But "parvus, non
setatem, sed conditionem hie indicat, ut Judg. 6'°" (Rosenmiiller),
Verse 142 reminds us of Dr Salmon's dictum that " we may talk
about the right of private judgment, or the duty of private judgment,
but a more important thing to insist on is the necessity of private judg
ment." The Psalmist is unable to escape from this necessity. He
surveys Jhvh's righteousness as delineated in the Law and affirms that
it corresponds to ideal righteousness. He takes the Law, and says it is
true. What is his canon? His own inner light. Verse 142 proceeds
from an act of private judgment.
143-152, Testimonies occurs twice, precepts is wanting,
145 has for foil 113. The expression in 148 is peculiar, and
Baethgen interprets it to mean that the writer is a Levite who rises
to meditate before his night-watch is due. But this is far-fetched.
Better, with Rosenmiiller, to say, "my eyes awake before the night-
watches depart." Cf 63", The juxtaposition of 151a and 150a has
a beauty of its own, 152 is a guarantee against apostasy,
153-160. Imr^h, word, occurs both in 154 and 158; in one of
them commandment should be read.
An importunate appeal for an advocate (cf 109 '') to take his part
against the legal oppression of the Psalmist's foes. They are traitors
{v. 158) to the covenant, and the sight of them moves sorrow more than
anger. Yet, as always, the Psalmist's conviction of the truth being on
his side sustains him. Salvation is promised in the Law; he has kept
the Law; the Law is truth. Therefore salvation must be his, and it
must be far from the wicked, double-minded Sadducees.

PSALMS 361
161-168. Law in 163 and 165, once instead of precepts. The
princes are the rulers of the Sadducean party. The seven times a day
of 164 may be taken literally, or it may be a synonym for always, in
the sense of " pray without ceasing."
169-176. Commandments in 172 and 176, once instead of testi
monies. Like a hst sheep in 176 is probably a gloss, as it overloads the
verse.
THE SONGS OF ASCENTS.
No agreement has yet been arrived at as to the precise meaning of
this title to Pss. 120-134, It has been taken to mean :
(1) Songs sung when the Israelites were returning from Babylon to
Jerusalem, going up to the Holy City; the plural ascents being used
because there were two of them, one in B.o. 536 and another in b.c. 468.
But Pss. 122 and 134 presume the existence of the Temple and its
serrices, and therefore negative this explanation.
(2) Others refer it to the yearly pilgrimages to Jerusalem on the
three great feasts. It would not be necessary, of course, that each Ps.
should have been composed originally for this purpose, any more than
each Ps. of the Hallel (113-118) was, but merely that these Pss. were
selected for that purpose, and so were given the heading of " Pilgrim
Psalms," a heading which was then cut up and given to each Ps. indi-
viduaUy. . But it is to be wished that some eridence were forthcoming
that the Jews of the Diaspora were in the habit of singing Pss. on the
road to Jerusalem. Then this, which is the most generaUy received
explanation, would be much better grounded than it is at present.
Even if with WeUhausen we read m'alSth (84°), in whose heart are
pilgrimages, and treat 119°" as an allusive reference to the custom, we
are still at a loss for a sufficient reason for the selection of special Pss.
for such a purpose.
(3) The explanation that the "ascent" is musical and not local,
that the word stands for something sung " elati, sublimique voce," is a
suggestion of despair. Similarly, the explanation started by Gesenius
that we have here a poetical climax, as in Greek rhetoric, is rightly
rejected by Rosenmiiller, We may also dismiss as ungrounded the
conjecture that the Pss. were sung as " stations " on the 15 steps which
led from the Court of the Men to the Court of the Women.
(4) The analogy of the Hallel, of Pss. 24, 118, and others, would
favour an explanation not unlike that of (2) above. It may be sug
gested that the Temple -service did not always begin in the courts of
the Temple itself, but that processions were as popular in Jerusalem as
in London. On great festivals it is not unusual to add a procession to
a Christian service, not merely from blind obedience to custom, but also
from a desire to express in more moving fashion the more lively feelings
of the worshipper. As the same feelings of human nature produce the
same effects in the same circumstances, it is no very hazardous conjec
ture that a procession was part of the ceremonial of the three great

362 PSALMS [CXX. 1-7
feasts among the Jews, as it is nowadays at Christmas, Easter or
Pentecost. We have only to assume that a procession in which many
pilgrims would take part started from the bottom of Mount Moriah and
ascended to the Temple and its plateau, to have a simple and natural
explanation both of the title Pilgerlied and Song of Ascent.

PSALM CXX.
A Song of degrees.
1 In my distress I cry unto Jhvh,
And he hears me.
2 DeUver my soul, Jhvh, from lying Ups,
And from a deceitful tongue.
3 What shall be given unto thee ? or what shall be done
unto thee,
Thou false tongue?
4 Sharp arrows of the mighty.
With coals of juniper.
5 Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech,
That I dwell in the tents of Kedar !
6 My soul hath long dwelt
With him that hateth peace.
7 '"I am for peace :
But when I speak, they are for war."'
No mark of time is given by this Ps, and nothing to mark ifc
specially suitable for a feast-day — at least in what may be supposed to
be its original form. At the end of v. 4 the flow of feeling and thought
runs into another channel. In the earlier verses the Ps, condemns a
domestic tyrant, one who had brought on the Psalmist a judicial wrong;
in the later it sounds as if the hand of a pious pilgrim had been at work
to fit the Ps, for his own circumstances. This hypothesis saves us from
following the commentators on v. 5, nearly all of whom take Kedar and
Mesech figuratively, a course for which there is not the least reason.
According to Cheyne {Ency. Bib. 2'°°'*) the true reading is Kedar and
Cusham, and the reference is to the North Arabian tribes, Baethgen,
Duhm and others are led to this false mode of interpretation by the
contradiction between the first half of the Ps. and the second, a contra
diction which disappears when the second half is seen to be a liturgical
addition for the use of the pilgrims,
1-4. The Psalmist says that when he is oppressed by his enemy he
turns to Jhvh for support, and, confident in that support, he knows

CXXI. 1-3] PSALMS 363
that the perjurer (who has lightly said, " God do so to me and more
also ") shall find more than he expected. His tongue had been a
poisoned arrow, aud by the enemies' arrow should he fall. He had
done his best to destroy the Psalmist's home; his own should be
burned down with blazing genista, Cf Jer. 9', Tlieir tongue is a
deadly arrow; and Is, 50", Behold all ye that kindh a fire, that gird
yourselves about with firebrands: walk ye in the flame of your fire.
5-7. Here the situation is altered. It is no longer a home tyrant
that is the enemy, but the Gentile people in the midst of whom the
pilgrim lived. They were hostile. We are not told why. But we
know that within the circle of the Roman Empire the Jew aroused a
strong dishke of himself by the obstinacy with which he maintained a
wall of separation between his nation and all others. Tacitus says,
"Apud ipsos fides obstinata, misericordia in promptu, sed adversus
omnes alios hostile odium" {Hist. 6°), and Juvenal satirises them:
Non monstrare rias eadem nisi sacra coleuti,
Qusesitum ad fontem solos deducere verpos. Sat. XIV. 103, 104.
In Alexandria the Jews, in spite of their vast numbers, were the
favourite butt of the quick-witted journalists of the day. It was these
who gave currency to the story that the Jews of the Exodus were ex-
peUed lepers; that their name was derived from Mount Ida; that they
worshipped Bacchus, or an ass's head, or paid divine honour to swine ;
that their fasts were a memorial of their starvation in the wilderness,
and their unleavened bread of the corn they stole at the Exodus; or
that they offered a Greek once a year in sacrifice. These slanders
enable us to understand the dislike which the Jew caused, a dislike
which was kept within bounds by the policy of the Roman Emperors,
but was free to express itself in countries which knew nothing of the
cosmopolitan tolerance of the Empire. Our Psalmist laments the
quarrelsomeness of Kedar and Mesech, and describes himself as not
one of those who stirred up strife. When he spoke of peace — so the
text should probably run — they made themselves ready for a quarrel.

PSALM CXXI.
A Song of degrees.
1 I [[will]] lift up mine eyes unto the hills:

From whence cometh my help?
2 My help cometh from Jhvh,
Which made heaven and earth.
3 He wiU not suffer thy foot to be moved
He that keepeth thee will not slumber.

364 PSALMS [cxxi. 4-8
4 Behold, he that keepeth Israel
Shall neither slumber nor sleep.
5 Jhvh is thy keeper :
Jhvh is thy shade upon thy right hand.
6 The sun shall not smite thee by day,
Nor the moon by night.
7 Jhvh shall preserve thee from all evil :
He shall preserve thy soul.
8 Jhvh shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in
From this time forth, and even for evermore.
This Ps, is interesting on two accounts. First, as showing the
process by which a Ps. composed by an individual for his own satisfac
tion was adopted by the community, and fitted with a new point.
Secondly, as illustrating the comparative purity of Jewish religion
when face to face with evil. The writer was not necessarily in view of
the Temple-height — Duhm suggests the low-lying ground of the Philis
tine territory — any more than Daniel was when he prayed towards
Jerusalem (6'°). But he shared the belief of every pious Jew that Zion
was the place whence came Jhvh's helping power, and thither his
thoughts would turn naturally when he prayed. That power was of
itself sufficient against all evil influences, such as those of evil spirits.
Against these he seems to know nothing of magic, of amulets and
incantations, and of other superstitious means by which men sought to
ward off the evil power of the sh§dlm. The Talmud offers numerous
illustrations of the devices by which it was sought to avert the sinister
action of evil spirits. Of course those which worked at night were the
more dangerous, and special care was to be taken not to sleep alone in
a house, not to salute anybody in the dark (because he might be a
demon), not to go near trees, gardens, vineyards, or ruined and desolate
houses, or dirty places especially. Fortunately demons had no "power
over that which had been counted, measured, tied up and sealed ; they
could be conquered by the ' Ineffable Name ' ; and they might be
banished by the use of certain formulas, which, when written and worn,
served as amulets." From all this whole circle of ideas the Psalmist
was free, more free indeed than the author of Ps. 91, He believes in
the malignant influence of sun and moon, but he is sure that Jhvh by
Himself, and not through any intermediary, is the keeper of every
Israelite. His monotheistic faith almost unconsciously preserved him
from that trust in magic, in spirits, in incantations, which gave birth
to the monstrous forms of Gnostic and Mediaeval ghost- and devil-
worship. The poet lifts up his eyes to "the mountains of Israel" towards
which Ezekiel (6') set his face from the plain of Mesopotamia. Cf
Pss. 48', 87', 125', 133", Rhetorically, he asserts his faith in the form

CXXII. 1-7] PSALMS 365
of question and answer, that Jhvh is the creator of heaven and earth.
As Jhvh the covenant-God, He will help, as creator He can. The
clause 4 6, "shall neither slumber nor sleep," recurs in Is, 5", where it
is referred to the Assyrian, but is, according to Marti, a marginal gloss
inserted in the text. In 5 6 Jhvh is thy shade could be used only in a
climate where the sun was oppressive. The image is a favourite one
with Isaiah, e.g. 32', 49'- Shadow has in the Bible two other figurative
meanings; it stands for what is transitory, like man's life, and for what
is unsubstantial, as the old Law was in comparison with the new.
Those under Jhvh's shadow were free from sunstroke, lunacy, fever,
pestilence, or other ills due to sun or moon, indeed from all evil of all
sorts, and at all times. From the Israelite's going out to his work in
the morning down to his coming in from it at night he should be kept
by Jhvh. The address to the second person which runs through vv. 3-8 is a
rhetorical figure by which the higher self— the Self within the self — is
made to address the lower.
Then of the thee in me who works behind
The Veil, I lifted up my hands to flnd
A Lamp amid the Darkness; and I heard
As from Without — "the me within thee blind."
That is the last word of Pantheism, He that keepeth Isi-ael shall
neither slumber nor sleep is the lofty confidence of Monotheism.

PSALM CXXII.
A Song of degrees : of Darid.
1 I was glad when they said unto me,
"Let us go into the house of Jhvh."
2 Our feet have stood within thy gates,
0 Jerusalem.
3 Jerusalem is builded
As a city I- where all are oneH together :
4 Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of Jhvh,
l-For it is a law unto-l Israel,
To give thanks [there] unto the name of Jhvh.
5 For there are set thrones of judgment.
The thrones of the house of David.
6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem :
l-May thy tabernacles be secure.-!
7 Peace be within thy waUs :
Prosperity within thy palaces.

366 PSALMS [cxxii. 8-9
8 For my brethren and companions' sakes,
I will now say, "Peace be within thee."
9 Because of the house of Jhvh our God
I will seek thy good.

The first Ps. of which the subject is conditioned by a pilgrimage.
It is a return from a pilgrimage, however, that calls it forth, and not
the pilgrimage proper. The beailty and delicacy of its spirit are patent
to aU. If it be true that religion is the soul of a people, then we cease
to wonder at the indestructibility of the Jews. To the writer of this
Ps. patriotism was an essential factor of rehgion. His fellows might be
dispersed abroad in all lands, but they were bound together in the
same bundle of life by common traditions, by their Law, and by the ties
which knit them to Jerusalem — mother Zion, as another Psalmist (87°)
loringly calls her — ties light as air but strong as iron, because forged
out of man's most undying forces, bis affections. Affection for Zion,
and the feeling of unity were reinforced strongly by periodical pil
grimages to the metropohs of Judaism, the city of David and Solomon
and Isaiah.
Looking back on his visit the writer recalls the joy he felt when his
companions in the foreign city proposed a pilgrimage. Now the visit
is over its memory remains. The after-glow perhaps of memory is
fairer than the reality was. The vulgar details are forgotten. Imagina
tion has clothed the city in celestial light. The Jerusalem is not that
of " 0 Hierosolyma restituta," but of a city which is the meeting-point
of all Jews, just as Rome is for Roman Catholics to-day. As the Pope
holds them together so did Jerusalem and its law-givers hold the Jews.
There the Diaspora were all at one together ; there the Church found
its unity. For it was a law in Israel that the tribes should go up three
times a year to appear before Jhvh (Ex. 23", 34'", Deut. 16"^). True,
it was no longer possible to carry this law out in its rigour; but all the
greater was the joy when it was. What is rare is more precious.
Moreover, on the principle omne ignotum pro magnifico, those who saw
the thrones of David least often were most impressed by their dignity.
The powers of the Sanhedrin and the Beth-din were the lineal de
scendants of David's judicial authority. The scribes too sat in Moses'
seat. What then could any pious Israelite do save pray for his mother
city, for it was the symbol of his country's past and future greatness ?
Might she enjoy health and wealth ! Might her tabernacles be sure ;
peace be her sentinels without and prosperity her guest within I We,
thy sons, as we depart salute thee, Shg,l6m ! So said the Psalmist in
the name of his fellow-pilgrims, and as he looks back on Zion's walls
and battlements he says, " Good-bye, may God bless thee, 0 house of
Jhvh, our God."
In 3 & Duhm is to be followed in rejecting the reference of R.V. to

CXXIII. 1-4] PSALMS 367
the walls as weU and truly laid, and in rendering instead a reference to
national unity.
In Ab-c the testimony, or law to Israel, is that it should praise
Jhvh in Jerusalem. Sh^m, there, i.e. in Jerusalem, has been omitted
by mistake, caused perhaps by the proximity of I'sh^m, to the name.
Ewald reads 6 b : May thy tabernacles be secure, by a slight change in
the text.

PSALM CXXIII.
A Song of degrees,
1 Unto thee lift I up mine eyes,
0 thou that dweUest in the heavens.
2 Behold, as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their
masters,
As the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress :
So our eyes wait upon Jhvh our God,
Until that he have mercy upon us.
3 Have mercy upon us, Jhvh, have mercy upon us :
For we are exceedingly filled with contempt.
4 Our soul is exceedingly filled
With the scorning of those that are at ease.
And with the contempt of the proud.
A Ps. which has been pithily described as an "oculus sperans."
A modest httle poem, but perfect in its way, giving one clear picture
and a prayer full of repose. (Duhm.) If its day of grace be not directly
and explicitly the day of fulfilment of eschatological hope, it, at all
events, is a link in the chain of hope which ended in "the day of
Jhvh." It is not too much to say that a belief, or at least a hope,
in the Kingdom of God is a necessary consequence of such a religion as
that represented uniformly in the Psalter. Whatever differences of
outlook are depicted in it, one note is never failing, the note of trust
in the final triumph of the cause of Jhvh's servants. The form, and
time, and place of that triumph are uncertain, but that it will come is
never a matter for doubt. But such a triumph is what is meant by the
day of the Lord, or by the Kingdom of God. The Christian hope may
move on a higher plane, but it is substantially identical with that of the
Psalter. Not only to the Psalter, nor even to Israel is the attitude of this Ps.
peculiar. It is in truth the constant attitude of humanity. AU
scientific investigation, all study of psychology, every work of art,
all moral endeavour, the whole world of philanthropic activity, is each
but a mute appeal to God to be pleased to reveal Himself, and in

368 PSALMS [cxxiv. 1-8
revealing Himself to exalt the humble and meek, and to put down the
mighty from their seat. The present century is specially an age of
expectancy; it is on tip-toe scanning eagerly the horizon whence is
to come, it is felt, some fresh revelation of Nature, and, therefore,
of Nature's God. It is an age too in which the pious and enthusiastic
are as impatient of those who are terribly at ease in Zion, as of the rich
and sensual who show their contempt for the poor, the " lower classes,"
the meek and quiet, and for all who do not faU down and worship the
golden image they have set up.

PSALM CXXIV.
A Song of degrees : of Darid.
1 If it had not been Jhvh who was on our side,
Let Israel say :
2 If it had not been Jhvh who was on our side.
When men rose up against us :
3 Then they had swallowed us up alive,
When their wrath was kindled against us :
4 Then the waters had overwhelmed us,
The stream had gone over our soul :
5 |[Then the proud waters had gone over our soul.]]
6 Blessed be Jhvh,
Who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth.
7 Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers :
The snare is broken, and we are escaped.
8 Our help is in the name of Jhvh,
Who made heaven and earth.
A simple and spirited Ps, of which the occasion is no longer
recoverable. The Babylonian Captivity is favoured by Baethgen ;
the days of Nehemiah and Sanballat hy Kirkpatrick ; while Duhm
refers it to the siege of Jerusalem by Antiochus Sidetes in the year
circa B.o. 134.
" In the first year of John Hyrcanus, B.C. 135-134, he invaded
Judsea, devastated the whole country, a,nd finaUy laid siege to Hyrcanus
in his capital Jerusalem, He surrounded the whole city with a rampart
and a trench, and cut ofi' the besieged from all egress from the city.
Hyrcanus on his part sought to harass the besiegers by sallies. In
order to make the victuals last longer, he sent the non-combatants out
of the city. But Antiochus would not let them pass, and drove them
back again ; so that they were obliged to roam, about between the circle
of the besiegers and the city, and many of them perished of hunger. It

cxxv. 1-3] PSALMS 369
was not till the Feast of Tabernacles that Hyrcanus received them
again into the city." Finally, negotiations were opened, and Hyrcanus
submitted to hard conditions. See Schiirer, i. 1, 8,
If this be a correct guess at the occasion, then the Ps. illustrates
once more the divergent view-points of religion and common-sense.
The latter would say that Hyrcanus extricated himself with adroitness
from a very difficult position ; the former says that it was by the help
of Jhvh who made heaven and earth. The one walks by sight, and
the other by faith. Though reason may know how to find a formula
which shaU cover both riew-points, yet the difference of spiritual
attitude is the cause of the perennial conflict between science and
religion, the world and the Church, the life of this side and the life of
that side.
The debt which the world owes to such men as our Psalmist lies
precisely in the clear emphasis laid by them on personal reUgion as the
light of Ufe. "Henceforth Israel transferred to the Eternal all his
obhgations. Instead of saying, 'Whoso keepeth the commandment,
keepeth his own soul,' he rather said, 'My soul, wait thou still upon
God, for of Him cometh my salvation 1' Instead of saying, 'Bind them
(the laws of righteousness) continually upon thine heart, and tie them
about thy neck!' he rather said, ' Have I not remembered Thee on my
bed, and thought upon Thee when I was waking?' The obligation
of a grateful and devout self-surrender to the Eternal replaced all sense
of obligation to one's own better self, one's own permanent interest.
The morahst's 'rule,' 'Take thought for your permanent, not your
momentary well-being,' became now, ' Honour the Eternal, not doing
thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own
words.' " Matthew Arnold, Literature and Dogma, ch. i, § 4,
BickeU and Duhm omit -y, 4 as a variant on v. 5. The reverse
seems more probable.

PSALM CXXV.
A Song of degrees,
1 They that trust in Jhvh
Are as mount Zion, which cannot be removed :
l-He abideth for ever as Jerusalem
2 Which the hills surround.-!
Jhvh is round about his people
From henceforth even for ever.
3 For the rod of the wicked shall not rest upon the lot of
the righteous :
Lest the righteous put forth their hands unto iniquity.
n. 24

370 PSALMS [cxxv. 4-cxxvi. 2
4 Do good, Jhvh, unto those that be good.
And to them that are upright in their hearts.
5 As for such as turn aside unto their crooked ways,
Jhvh shaU lead them forth with the workers of iniquity.

Peace be to Israel.
It is certain that the text of 1 6 and 2 a Ues before us in a corrupt
form. A comparison of R.V. with the suggested text above shows that
by a little grammatical alteration a far better sense is obtained. It is
not so much the trust of the people which is unshakeable (against
Baethgen) as their fortune. Zion is safe in its rampart of surrounding
hills ; so is the righteous safe in Jhvh's protection. The Syrians and
other " godless " people might triumph for a time, but their wicked
power (= sceptre) could not be allowed to rest permanently over the
land which Jhvh had assigned to His people by lot. Otherwise might
the righteous (= those true to the Law) be tempted to follow the
sinister example of those wicked men of their own nation "who
persuaded many, saying, ' Let us go and make a covenant with the
heathen that are round about us,' " in the days of Antiochus Epiphanes
(1 Mace. 1"). The lax conduct of the " double-souled men" is so
often alluded to that it is well to remember that Israel's religion, as we
know it in the Psalter, was not a religion that dropped into his mouth
ready made, but was the result of struggle as well within the community
as against strong foes without. Of the Jewish religion it may be said
that it represents the evolution of the fittest, that is, of the best, for in
the religious and ethical sphere that which is fittest is the best. The
Force behind all phenomena is what supplies that continuum which
evolution postulates ; it is, therefore, the life and soul of all religious
progress, such as we may trace in the history of Judaism. Because
it is behind that history, we are justified in saying that Jewish
history is a revelation of God, We see the outlines of such a revelation,
perhaps, in the confident belief that Jhvh would " do good," and tum
away the workers of iniquity, and with them the half-hearted, and the
double-hearted, " Peace be upon Israel " is the addition of some pious scribe.

PSALM CXXVI.
A Song of degrees.
1 l-If Jhvh would-! turn again the captivity of Zion,
Then should we be like them that dream.
2 Then would our mouth be filled with laughter.
And our tongue with singing :

CXXVI. 2-6] PSALMS 371
Then l-would men say [[among the nations,]]-!
"Jhvh hath done great things for them.
3 Jhvh hath done great things for them :
Whereof we are glad."
4 Turn again our captivity, Jhvh,
As the streams in the South.
5 They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.
6 He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed.
Shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his
sheaves tjoith him.
Exegetes differ within the limits of the possibilities of the Hebrew
tenses here. The LXX adopt the past meaning ; Luther the future.
Delitzsch, Hitzig, Olshausen, Baethgen, RosenmiiUer, and indeed most
commentators follow the LXX, Duhm points to the tenses in 124'"^
as being identical with those used here and asks why the conditional
meaning put on them there should not be equally valid here. The
difference between the two groups of interpreters is not unimportant.
According to the former we get a " narrative of facts used to awaken
a hopeful prayer"; according to the latter we have a Messianic Ps.
The interpretation of the Ps. is certainly smoother on the latter
reading. For if the Psalmist begins by celebrating a past deliverance
he ends by confessing its imperfection ; the deliverance from Babylon,
or some other calamity, needed to be supplemented by a stiU further
deliverance. Israel in its first release was a trickling rivulet ; it prayed
that it might become a flowing river. If, on the other hand, we follow
the lines of Ps. 124 and regard vv. 1-3 as a conditional protasis to 4-6
we get a Messianic Ps, of unsurpassed beauty, and running parallel to
Is. 53' (see Karl Marti's comment in loco). The joy which the Psalmist
says Israel will feel in "the day of Jhvh" is an excellent ground
for an appeal to Him to hasten its coming, that His people who are
now sowing with toil and suffering the seed of good works may then
joyfuUy reap the reward of merit.
If this be the correct mode of interpreting the Ps, then We have no
longer any reason for referring it to the return from Babylon, or to the
days of Nehemiah. It belongs to the age when prophetic hopes were
" sung in the higher choir " of the Apocalyptic seers. The Jewish
people "had inherited a legacy from better times which spoke of
a fuU satisfaction of all needs in the Messianic future. In the
comfortless Yesterday and To-day which, like everything else, pro
ceeded out of divine Necessity, there remained for the longing spirit
nothing else than to cling to this anchor of deliverance. Just as
from the prophets of the Messianic hope the religious deficit of the
present was concealed, so it was in a still higher degree in the
bosom of Judaism. Religious reaction against the one-sidedness
24—2

372 PSALMS [CXXVII. 1-5
and rigidity of the ruUng conception of God, that is the meaning and
import ofthe now re-awaking and blossoming of the Messianic hopes."
What Baldensperger says in prose, our Ps. says in its own exquisite
poetry.

PSALM CXXVIL
A.
A Song of degrees : of Solomon,
1 Except Jhvh buUd the house.
They labour in vain that build it :
Except Jhvh keep the city.
The watchman waketh but in vain.
2 It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late,
To eat the bread of sorrows :
This he giveth his beloved while they sleep.
B.
3 Lo, children are an heritage of Jhvh :
The fruit of the womb is his reward.
4 As arrows in the hand of a mighty man :
So are children of youth.
5 Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them :
They shaU not be ashamed.
When they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.
Very wisely Rudinger says of this Ps, what may be said, and should
be said, of many others : "When, or for what occasion, this Psalm was
written, we cannot say. Nor is it always possible to say more for our
modem poems ; it is enough in such things to know what is said,
or what is taught." One thing in the Ps, before us is certain, and that
is, that we have two Pss. which have somehow been joined to make
one. The first verses condemn anxiety and excessive care for the
morrow. The last three verses imply indeed a truth, which though
complementary to the first, cannot well be included in the same poem
without destroying all its effective force, viz,, the truth of the duty and
necessity of self-assertion on the part of him who yet trusts in God.
But this is not the primary, or the proper thought of m. 3-5 ; rather
they are concemed with a quite independent truth, viz., that children
are a great blessing to a man when he is attacked and wants supporters,
and that this blessing too is from Jhvh.

CXXVII.] PSALMS 373

In early days men placed a victim, sometimes human, sometimes
animal, in the ground underneath a house or city which they were
building, in order to propitiate the di inferi, or bring themselves into
communion with them. Kuenen, Winckler, and others have seen such
a sacrifice implied in the building of Jericho by Hiel, related in
1 Kings 16^, and in the prophecy ^os^ eventum contained in Josh. 6'".
No doubt this custom is closely connected with the belief that the
spirits of the dead, especially of the ancestors, were beneath the earth,
and needed sustenance. Of all this there is of course nothing in
the Ps. before us. Nor is there anything of the purely commercial
spirit which prompts the modern builder. He buys a piece of land, he
nurses it, and when it has become sufficiently valuable he builds on it —
perhaps on mortgage — perhaps to sell and build again elsewhere, but
with Uttle feeling that God has anything to do with the transaction.
Nor does anything happen to make him repent of his heedlessness.
Being a shrewd man and a laborious man he prospers, and at his death
is widely extoUed, and enjoys the distinction of having his funeral
service read by a dignitary of the Church. Where then is the truth
which the Psalmist sings ? Not assuredly on the physical plane. Our
builder has obeyed instinctively the laws of prudence which mle there,
and he has had his reward. But where he has failed has been to
spiritualise his work by giving it a spiritual end, a tc'Xos tcXhov. He
has rested in the proximate end, instead of referring it to the ultimate
end which Christianity calls God, and Aristotle was approximating to
when he defined it as that which had a moral worth and goodness, as
being to be found "in a perfect life."
Ps. 127 A is interesting too in another respect. It is not a very
hazardous conjecture that He whose thoughts were referred to one Ps.
when He was tempted to build up His Kingdom on miracle (Mt, 4'),
whose soul had been nurtured on Deuteronomy, Deutero-Isaiah, and
the Psalter, should have been made familiar with this Ps. long before
He bade men leave to God the care of their bodily life. The thought
of V. 2 that while others fail to get rich by toil and worry, God's
beloved ones get aU that they require while they sleep, is on the same
plane of thought as, "Behold the birds of the heaven... your heavenly
Father feedeth them." Said a Rabbi, "I intermit all the trades of
the world, and teach my disciples the Law only, of the recompense
whereof a man eats in this age, and his love increases toward that
which is to come. Not so are any other trades besides ; whensoever
anyone faUs ill, or grows old, or is kept captive, he cannot do without
his toil, and so is consumed away by hunger ; but the study of the
Law, even when one is in utter extremity, bids have a good hope, and
is a solace both in youth and old age." (Kiddushin, 1 Kings 3".)
2 c. Duhm rejects what Baethgen accepts — the adverbial use of
shgn^, shep — on the ground that it is a gloss, expressing a truth indeed,
but not one which an O.T. poet would be likely to express. On the

374 PSALMS [cxxviii. 1-6
contrary, it is the very truth which is required as the antithesis
to 2 a-b. B.
The Hebrews had no incitement to consider the relations between
population and means of subsistence, but were so few in number
compared to what their soil could maintain, that children were always
regarded as an addition to a man's wealth. The Psalmist emphasises
this fact, and adds that while ancestors may hand down house and
goods, yet children, a still more precious gift, are an inheritance from
Jhvh Himself The children of a man's youth will be grown up when
he is old and helpless, and they will then be as his weapons against any
who might attack him, whether in the gate of judgraent (Deut. 21",
Ps, 69") or in the gates where there is war (Judg. 5*, Gen, 22", 24*°).
In the children of youth {v. 4) there may be also an allusion to the
belief that the son first begotten was physicaUy more vigorous than
those who came after, as in Gen, 49", a belief which lay at the root of
the preference of the first-born as a sacrificial victim.

PSALM CXXVIII.
A Song of degrees.
1 Blessed !-be thouH that feareth Jhvh :
That walketh in his ways.
2 For thou shalt eat the labour of thine hands :
Happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee.
3 Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine '"by the sides"' of thine
house :
Thy children like olive plants round about thy table.
4 Behold, thus shall the man be blessed
That feareth Jhvh.
5 Jhvh shall bless thee out of Zion :
And thou shalt see the good of Jerusalem all the days of
thy life.
6 Yea, thou shalt see thy children's children.

Peace be to Israel.
No occasion would be so suitable for the composition or use of this
Ps. as a wedding, for it celebrates those joys precisely whieh marriage
brought to the pious Israelite, In early days the wife was under the
power of her husband, was an important part of his goods and chattels.

CXXIX. 1-7] PSALMS 375
and felt no degradation in this position. In Ex, 20" the wife appears
as a part of the household goods which were not to be coveted. In the
parallel passage in Deut. 5" she is given a more independent position.
But the Jewish wife was never a merely useful working tool. Her
position was that of a potential mother, and hence it was a dignified
position, inasmuch as what she could give the family was that most
precious treasure — sons to perpetuate the father's name and line. The
strong desire for offspring may be traced back to the primary religious
ideas of the race — we find these in "la cit6 antique," and in almost
every tribe. But though they lie far away behind our Ps,, as they
do behind the fifth commandment of the Decalogue, it is a more
developed system of the family which is presented to us here. The
Psalmist places the fear of Jhvh (= obedience to His Law) as the
precondition of a prosperous and continued family hfe. His wife shall
be free from the curse of childlessness ; no need with her to cry with
Rachel, "Give me children, or else I die"; no need either for the
husband to have recourse to a concubine, that so the family tree might
be kept alive ; she should be a fruitful vine ; her children should be
hke the evergreen oUve-plants round about the parent stem (cf Verg.
jEn. 3^). She attains the full dignity of the matrona (cf 113"), and
fulfils the highest ideal ofthe husband, meriting, like the Roman matron,
the epitaph : Domi mansit, lanam fecit.

PSALM CXXIX.
A Song of degi-ees.
1 Many a time have they afilicted me from my youth.
Let Israel now say :
2 Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth :
Yet they have not prevailed against me.
3 The plowers plowed upon my back :
They made long '"their furrows."'
4 Jhvh is righteous :
He hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked.
5 Let them all be confounded and turned back :
That hate Zion.
6 Let them be as the grass upon the housetops,
Which withereth afore it groweth up :
7 Wherewith the mower fiUeth not his hand :
Nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom.

376 PSALMS [cxxix. 8-cxxx. 2
8 Neither do they which go by say,
" The blessing of Jhvh be upon you :
[We bless you in the name of Jhvh."]]
" National character is the abiding product of a nation's past ; and
that conception of the past is most valuable which accounts, not so
much for the present environments of a people, as for the animating
spirit which produced it, and which must still exist if it is to be main
tained." (Creighton, Romanes Lecture, 1896.)
If one were asked what was the animating spirit of the religion
of the Psalmists and Prophets, the answer would be that it was a living
hope, or waiting on Jhvh, which found its reasonable basis in the
experience of His goodness in the past. Israel had learned to suffer,
and one who shrinks from no suffering is master of his fate. Many
a time since its youth in Egypt had Israel been afflicted, been like a land
dug into by the plough, or like a slave whose back was scored by the
lash. Yet out of death comes life, out of the strong sweetness, and
since Jhvh, the Righteous, was on Israel's side, the cords which bound
the yoke upon its neck had been cut through. The first half of the Ps.
is but the hne of ^neas sung by " a higher choir " : —
O passi grariora, dabit Deus his quoque finem.
Verg. ^n. i. 199.
The second half (5-8) is a prayer for the confusion of the wicked,
couched in the language of the natural history of Palestine. Length of
days with shlllSm was the Israelite's summum bonum ; shortness of life
¦ — days few and evil — was what he wished for his enemies. Of this,
corn springing up in the dust, blown on to the flat housetop, haring no
depth of earth, was a fitting symbol. Before it could come to the
stalk stage it dried up ; it had no chance of harvest-blessing, or of
hearing one reaper salute the other, as Boaz saluted the reapers :
Jhvh be \rith you ;
and they replied : Jhvh bless thee (Ruth 2*).
In 3b it is doubtful whether we are to read the singular or the
plural. If the latter, then R,V. will stand ; if the singular we must
render : They made broad their field ; i.e. they did as much ploughing
as they could on the back of their victim,
8 c is probably an addition, supplying the respond to the versicle.
PSALM CXXX.
A Song of degrees.
1 Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, Jhvh.
2 Lord, hear my voice :
Let thine ears be attentive
To the voice of my supplications.

cxxx. 3-8] PSALMS 377
3 If thou, Jhvh, shouldest mark iniquities
Who shaU stand?
4 But with thee is forgiveness,
'"For thy name's sake."'
5 I wait for thee, Jhvh, my soul doth wait.
And in thy word do I hope.
6 My soul waiteth for the Lord
More than they that watch for the morning :
More than they that watch for the morning.
7 Israel waiteth for Jhvh :
For with Jhvh there is mercy.
And with him is plenteous redemption.
8 And he shall redeem Israel
From aU his iniquities.
The sixth of the seven Penitential Pss. (=6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130, 143)
and included by Luther among " the Pauline " because of the way it
expresses man's deprarity, God's free grace, and the need of free
redemption. Yet the Ps. is thoroughly wanting in the spirit of the
theologian, and "can hardly be called a Penitential Psalm." (Duhm.)
Nor does the assertion of Delitzsch seem tenable that the Ps. speaks of
"complete and final redemption, above all, in the genuinely New
Testament manner, spiritual redemption."
The deep = in all probability, the deep of trouble (cf 69 '• '^) rather
than of humiUty ("Jhvh above, man below" — Duhm), and the
iniquities {v. 8), from which Jhvh will give "redemption plentifully"
(rabbah is used as an adverb), are the punishment, or consequences of
wrong-doing, rather than the sinful state of the heart. Moreover, the
speaker is an individual, and not the people. The Israel oi v. 8 = every
Israelite. In 46 the LXX should be followed, though Duhm thinks that
the M.T. and that of the LXX are both corrupted from tSbchfi., because
of thy goodness. Cf. 79 ^ In ba,for thee has perhaps dropped out,
and in 5 ft the second person should be read, according to some codices
(see Swete's LXX).
In 6 the LXX omit (again in some codices) the repeating clause. If
it is suppUed with R,V. we seem compelled to supply also a repetition
of 7 a.
That the Ps. in its primary sense is simply an earnest petition
of some Israelite for deliverance from present trouble, based on his
faith that Jhvh prefers mercy to retributive justice is no hindrance to
Luther, or any other Christian using it as a heartfelt petition for
deliverance from a greater evil than the consequences of wrong-doing,
that is from sin itself The Psalmist sought redemption from temporal

378 PSALMS [cxxxi. 1-3
pain ; the Christian seeks it from eternal sin (Mk. 3°)._ The Ps. in any
case is adapted for use when man seeks from God deliverance from his
evil state, of whatever sort it be.
The third verse was one of the proof-texts quoted by the Catholics
against the Novatians, by way of refuting the propriety of their rigorous
exclusion of all apostates from re-admission to communion.
Luther's version of the Ps. is as follows : —
Aus tiefer Wot schrei ich zu dir,
Herr Gott hor mein Rufen,
Dein gnadig Ohren kehr zu mir,
Und meiner Bitt sie oflFen.
Denn so Du wilt das sehen an
Was siind und unrecht ist getan,
Wer kann Herr vor Dir bleiben ?
See Layriz, Kern des deutschen Kirchengesangs, No. 14.
The Ps, consoled the dying hours of Charles V, Bishop Milman,
Crusius, and Bishop Selwyn. It is a Burial Ps. in the Roman use ; an
Ash Wednesday Ps. in the EngUsh ; and a Ps. used daily at Evensong
by the Greek Church.

PSALM CXXXI.
A Song of degrees of Darid,
1 Jhvh, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty :
I do not exercise myself in great matters.
Or in things too high for me.
2 Surely I have stilled and quieted myself,
As a child that is weaned of his mother :
My soul is even as a weaned child.

3 Let Israel hope in Jhvh
From henceforth and for ever.
One of the most exquisite Pss, in the Psalter, and as interesting as
it is beautiful, on account of the light it throws on the development of
psychology among the Hebrews. Ordinarily the soul is but the peri
phrasis for self, Hebrew having no proper word for this latter (cf
Ps, 103' and Mt, ll'"). But also soul had its own proper meaning,
though one indeed which was modified by historical growth. In an
early stage it was located in the blood, if not identified with it : " the
blood is the hfe" (Deut, 12''; Gen. 9*-^). It was that undefined some
thing in man which felt, longed, loved, and hated, and did not come to
an end when death destroyed the body, but survived in She61 in a
shadowy way. Body and soul were the two elements of which mau

CXXXI.] PSALMS 379
was composed according to the earher view. But this naive psychology
did not satisfy the men who had been to Babylon, had come into
contact with Persian thought, been under the influence of Greek
culture, and above all had developed a belief in the spiritual nature of
Jhvh, the One and Supreme God. The earlier twofold division became
a threefold. Man consisted of a body which was his temporal organ ;
of a soul which was the principle of earthly hfe, and of a spirit which
was that by which man was qualified for communion with (jod. It is
true that the nature, function,?, and relations of these two latter
fiuctuated, that sometimes the soul denoted the weaker feelings, and
spirit the stronger ; that body and spirit sometimes represented the older
dichotomy of body and soul, and that the soul sometimes was thought
of as being equivalent with animal life, and so as perishing with the
body — the dust returning to the earth, and the spirit to God who
gave it. The N.T. reflects this confusion of views when it tells us of
the Sadducean theory of the non-existence of angel or spirit, and of
the denial of a resurrection — a theory which was the logical outcome
of the riew of the writer of Eeclesiastes that at death the whole man
was dissolved into his elements, — body to earth, and spirit to the
ocean of the Eternal Spirit ; — and also of the theory of the Pharisees,
affirmed by St Paul, that man has (or is) an immaterial principle,
which is the seat of the higher life, and the ground of persistence in
and through death. But in popular language the Sadducees were
held to believe that man had essentially but one life, functioning here
in manifold ways ; while their opponents held that he had two, one
which went out when the body perished, and a higher which was inde
pendent of a bodily organism.
In our Ps. the Psalmist clearly distinguishes between himself and
his soul. He says that he, i.e. his higher principle = his spirit, has
smoothed down and calmed his soul, i.e. that he has stilled its
turbulent passions, its unsatisfied longings, and all its agitated move
ments, just as a child which has been weaned completely is quietly
happy in its mother's arms, and no longer frets and cries for her
breasts. The volcanic energy of haughty self-assertion, that pride of
the heart of which a Napoleon, a Nebuchadnezzar (as represented in
Daniel), a Nero, a Heliogabalus or Le Grand Monarque (who is said to
have declared that God would think twice before damning a person of
his consequence) is the historical type, had been stiUed. The eye,
that index of the soul, did not flash out a sense of superiority;
the great affairs of high office no longer attracted him ; he had settled
down to a humble admission of his own limitations ; he had, therefore,
learned life's lesson, and therefore as the sea is calmed after storm
till it reflects the glory of the heavens (so Baethgen), or as a field
(Is. 28") whose "face had been made plain," so was his soul even and
tranquil, like the soul of a happy and contented child.
The last verse of the Ps. is clearly an addition, whether made by the
author, or by a later hand, which adapts the individualistic vv. 1 and 2
to the uses of the community.

380 PSALMS [cxxxii. i-i6
PSALM CXXXII.
A Song of degrees,
1 Jhvh, remember David :
All his afflictions :
2 How he sware unto Jhvh,
Vowed unto the mighty One of Jacob :
3 " Surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house.
Nor go up into my bed :
4 I will not give sleep to mine eyes.
Or slumber to mine eyelids,
5 Until I find out a place for Jhvh,
An habitation for the mighty God of Jacob.
6 Lo, we heard of it at Ephratah :
We found it in the field of the wood.
7 We will go into his tabernacles :
We will worship at his footstool.
8 Arise, Jhvh, into thy rest:
Thou, and the ark of thy strength.
9 Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness :
And let thy saints shout for joy.''
10 For thy servant Darid's sake
Turn not away the face of thine anointed.
11 Jhvh hath sworn in truth unto David:
He will not turn from it:
" Of the fruit of thy body will I set upon thy throne.
12 If thy children wiU keep my covenant
And my testimony that I shall teach them.
Their children shall also sit upon thy throne for evermore."
13 For Jhvh hath chosen Zion :
He hath desired it for his habitation.
14 "This is my rest for ever:
Here will I dwell; for I have desired it.
15 I will abundantly bless her prorision:
I will satisfy her poor with bread.
16 1 will also clothe her priests with salvation :
Her saints shall shout aloud for joy.

CXXXII. 17-18] PSALMS 381
17 There will I make the horn of David to bud :
I have ordained a lamp for mine anointed.
18 His enemies will I clothe with shame :
But upon himself shall his crown flourish."
Ps. 132 can only be regarded as an intruder into the little Psalter
composed of Pss. 120-134, since, in length, tone, and subject-matter,
it differs from all the rest. It is the only Ps, in the whole Psalter in
which the ark is mentioned — an undesigned coincidence perhaps which
points to the late date of the Psalter as a whole, especially as Ps. 132
bears strong marks of its being one of the latest of all. It uses
the phraseology of 2 Chron. 6*°"^ — not conversely— and that the more
naturaUy, because both the Chronicle and the Ps. are of the nature
of Haggadistic writings in which old history is used (and adapted) for
a present purpose. What the purpose of the Ps, is is not very
obscure. - It is to claim for some prominent personage of the Greek
period aU the promises once made to David. It is not the Messiah as
an object of desire who is in the writer's mind, but an actually living
person. We can hardly think of any but a Asmonsean prince —
Solomon, or Zerubbabel, or Judas Maccabseus are aU excluded by the
purpose of the Ps. as Olshausen sees, Hitzig's reference to the
recovery of Mount Zion by Simon related in 1 Mace, 13*8"''2 is interest
ing, but hardly apposite. Tbe only suitable explanation is one which
gives full weight to the clear intention of the Ps. itself This presumes
some claimant for Davidic honour, whether because his own ambition,
or official pressure motived the claim, or because the need of a
descendant of David, as ruler, was felt by the people. At all events
the priestly body speaks in the Ps. and supplicates for the ruler
"the sure mercies of Darid," i.e. the application to him of the
promises made by Jhvh out of His lovingkindness to David. As
Zion was in the ruler's power, and as he is in possession of David's
place and power, the suggestion of the priestly body is that he is
Darid's son, if not by blood descent, at all events by official lineation.
Hence the people may rest contented and happy in the knowledge that
Jhvh is still present with them, and is represented for all purposes of
grace and well-being by the ruler. We shall not be far wrong perhaps
in seeing in the ruler referred to, Simon.
1, 2. No such oath of Darid is named in the historical books, and
we can only suppose, either that the Psalmist is quoting a lost book,
or is himseU freely haggadisiug. " The Mighty One of Jacob " is a
poetic title for Jhvh, used also in Gen. 49'^, Is. 49'", 60'". " The
Mighty One of Israel " occurs in Is. 1'*- The same word (with a slight
difference of vocalisation) is used to describe heroes, and mighty men,
and angels. It occurs also in the phrase bulls of Basan (22'-) ; in
Is. 10" the King of Assyria is called a bull; and in Ps. 50'" bulls' desk
is what Jhvh does not require. How much of rejected religious
symbolism lies at the back of the history of the title the bull, or

382 PSALMS [CXXXII.
the strong One of Jacob, it is now impossible to say. Judah, so far as
our extant authorities go, was not a participator in bull-worship. But
as the Jews as a whole were largely influenced by Canaanite worship,
and as in that the bull was a symbol of Baal, and the cow of Astarte,
it is not likely that the Southern Kingdom was as pure of this
symbolism in its early days, as it was in the days of Hosea. The
title found twice in the Ps. before us looks like a fossil, recording the
belief of an earlier age, which was now incorporated in a higher
stratum of thought. It is not improbable that the bull of Assyria,
and even Mithras, with his heavenly bull, may have helped to form the
symbolism of the Jews as represented by the title the Mighty One of
Jacob. 3-9. Duhm omits 9 and 10 as an interpolation which does not
fit the context. But v. 9 fits in very well with the preceding, and 10
is the Psalmist's own personal connecting link between the oath of
David and the oath of Jhvh, just as 13 serves to help on the
transition from the first half of Jhvh's oath to the second, 4 is
identical with Prov. 6* — "which passage is the original no man can
know," 6 has given rise to much controversy. But it is certain that
the Psalmist did not mean that David said he had beard that the
ark was at Ephratah, and that he found it at Kirjath-jearim. The
parallelism requires that Ephratah and the field of the wood be under
stood as synon3rms. The history is condensed, and at the same time
treated freely, so as to emphasise the salient fact that it was Zion
which David had selected for the resting-place of the ark. No stress
can be laid on the change from the / of 3-5 to the we of 6, 7. The
Psalmist is not a chronicler, but is using history with " a tendency,"
and so he merges David almost unconsciously in the national history,
and represents David and all his fellow- Israelites as saying, "Now
that we have found the ark at Kirjath-jearim and brought it to Jeru
salem let us go into His tent of glory and pay homage at His foot
stool." In 9 righteousness has a different side of its elastic meanings pre
sented from that which meets us in 16. Here it is correctness of
ceremonial procedure; in 16 it is salvation as in Is. 60'°-
10—11. The first of these verses is a prayer for Simon, who is
a present David, his descendant-at-law, if not by birth, and, therefore,
Jhvh's Anointed ; the second verse is but an introduction to 11 c and
12, and then 13 is a verse breathing the spirit of a priest, who almost
unconsciously makes the royal office an appanage of the Temple cult.
The former is secure because Jhvh has chosen Zion, and as prosperity
is thus assured for the whole people, the King himself shall have his
share according to 17 and 18. David's horn shall be exalted in Simon
(cf Ezek. 29"); and his light shall not be allowed to go out. Accord
ing to 1 Kings 11"" one tribe was to be reserved as a lamp for David ;
in 1 Kings 15* Rehoboam is spoken of as a lamp of David in Jerusalem,
and again in 2 Kings 8'" Judah is not destroyed lest Darid's lamp
should be extinguished. FoUowing the clue given by these three

CXXXIII. 1-3] PSALMS 383
passages we interpret the lamp of mine anointed to be the line of
descendants which should be assured to Simon as it had been to
David. This sums up the purpose of the Ps. : Simon is declared to
be a second David ; therefore, what was promised to the first shall be
bestowed on the second; hence the people will be wise if they
acquiesce in his appointment as prince, and claim their share of the
blessings promised to Jhvh's Anointed.
Hitzig remarks on the limitations of the Psalmist's vocabulary :
twice he uses the same title for Jhvh (2 and 5) ; in 9, 16, 18 the image
of being clothed is used ; to sit or place on a throne occurs twice (11,
12) ; and desire is used hoth in 13 and 14.

PSALM CXXXIIL
A Song of degrees : of Darid.
1 Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brethren to dwell together in unity !
'2 It is Uke the precious oil upon the head.
That runs down upon the beard,
Even Aaron's beard:
That comes dovm to the skirts of his garments:
3 As the dew of Hermon,
That descended upon the mountains of Zion:
For there Jhvh commands the blessing.
Life for evermore.
Two riews are possible as to the occasion of this Ps. : (1) that it
celebrates the joy of a family reunion ; or, (2) that it celebrates the
joy of a national and religious unity as represented by participation in
a Temple-feast. If (1) be adopted, then Duhm is probably right in
excising 2 c, 3 b and (perhaps) 3 d, but even so he has to allow that
the image in 2 a-b is "for us somewhat strange." But inasmuch as it
is admitted that some kind of anointing does form part of the imagery
of the Ps., and as the Temple-anointing is as ready to our hands as
that of an honoured guest (Lk. 7^), and does not require us moreover
to do any riolence to the text, it is better to adopt the second hypo
thesis, and to see in the Ps. a eulogium of unity, as symbolised by
public worship. Such unity is good in itself, and beautiful in its
manifestation — like the KaXoKayadla of Aristotle {Nikom. Eth. 4, 3'",
and 10, 9"), which however he leaves undefined, beyond indicating that
it is what is supremely noble.
The image of v. 2, which Duhm finds " strange to us," is not very
far-fetched. As the anointing oil of the high-priest (Aaron here is
any high-priest) effects its object by dispersion, and not by stagnation,

384 PSALMS [cxxxiv. 1-3
so the spirit of concord is a diffusive force. It is the spirit of brotherly
love, and such love finds its satisfaction in dispersing abroad and
giving to others. " Commendatur hsec Vs. 1 non tantum ut suavis
res et jucunda, sed etiam ut salutaris et commoda, neque enim delectat
tantum, sed juvat etiam et non singulos tantum, sed totas communi-
tates" (Rosenmiiller, in hco). That which reaches down to the
coUar of the high-priest's garments is his beard, not the anointing oil,
according to most commentators, but it is not easy to see what point
there is in emphasising the fact that the high-priest's beard was long
enough to reach to the opening of his garment through which his
head went. The common explanation is on the whole the better, which
makes the oil the thing which descends, and so enhances its dispersive
action. The second image used to illustrate the value of brotherly love is
that of Hermon-dew, i.e. dew in copious abundance, such as the
snow-capped hiUs of Hermon produced. Such dew would fitly descend
on Zion, for dew was a blessing, or gift, from Jhvh, and where could it
more fitly descend than on Jhvh's favourite hill ? Where our own poet
saw dew to be a type of God's grace, the Hebrew Psalmist saw it to be
a type of the beneficent power of brotherly love,
3 d sounds like the addition of a later hand.
If the Ps. is to be regarded as written originally for a family feast
and adapted afterwards for public worship (which is not impossible),
then its original form would be something like this :
1 Behold how good and pleasant it is
For brethren to dwell together in unity;
2 It is like the fragrant oil upon the head.
Which runs down upon the beard.
3 It is like the Hermon-dew,
Which falls on Zion's hiUs,

PSALM CXXXIV.
A Song of degrees.
1 Behold, bless ye Jhvh, all ye servants of Jhvh,
Which (by night) stand in the house of Jhvh.
2 Lift up your hands to the sanctuary.
And bless Jhvh.
3 Jhvh bless thee out of Zion :
That made heaven and earth.
A night-song of or for the Temple watchmen, perhaps used at their
dismissal to their post, to consecrate their silent duties, or even, as
Duhm suggests, to give them confidence in the midst of the terrors,

cxxxv. 1-8] PSALMS 385
which night, or the dread of the Temple might cause. If Christian
cities acted up to their profession this Ps. might serve as the consecra
tion of our ciril Lerites, the police, when they are told off to their
nightly rounds.
It is very doubtful, however, whether this little Respond and
Versicle was intended originally for night service at all. Bal^yl5th,
at night, stands as the last word of v. 1, and spoils the swing of the
metre. The similarity of the Ps. too to the first two verses of the next
Ps. seems to suggest that we have here a common form of anthem
which happens to have been adapted for use at night, or else that the
addition is due to the caprice of an unknown editor.
1. To stand is to stand in service, as in Deut. 10^ the Lerites are
set apart "to stand before the Lord to minister unto Him," and in
Heb, 10" "every priest standeth day by day ministering." "They also
serve who only stand and wait."
2. To lift up the hands has been the natural gesture of prayer
ever since the days when mau saw in the sky, the sun, moon, and stars,
gods who ruled his life on earth. It is a gesture still used in Holy
Communion, going back, with the procession from the east through the
south, and the wafer shaped like the flaming sun, to the very earliest
days of rehgious worship.
PSALM CXXXV.
1 Praise ye Jhvh.
Praise ye the name of Jhvh:
Praise him, 0 ye servants of Jhvh.
2 Ye that stand in the house of Jhvh,
In the courts of the house of our God.
3 Praise Jhvh ; for Jhvh is good :
Sing praises unto his name; for it is pleasant.
4 For Jhvh hath chosen Jacob unto himself,
Israel for his pecuUar treasure.
5 [[For I know that Jhvh is great.
And that our Lord is above all gods.
6 Whatsoever Jhvh pleased, that did he
In heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and all deep places.
7 He causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth :
He maketh lightnings for the rain:
He bringeth the wind out of his treasuries.]]
8 Who smote the firstborn of Egypt,
Both of man and beast.
a. 25

386 PSALMS [cxxxv. 9-21
9 Who sent tokens and wonders pnto the midst of thee,
0 Egypt,]
Upon Pharaoh, and upon all his servants.
10 |[Who smote great nations.
And slew mighty kings:
11 Sihon king of the Amorites,
Og king of Bashan,
And all the kingdoms of Canaan:
12 And gave their land for an heritage.
An heritage unto Israel his people.]]
13 Thy name, Jhvh, endureth for ever:
Thy memorial, Jhvh, throughout aU generations.
14 [[For Jhvh will judge his people,
And repent himself concerning his servants.]]
15 [[The idols of the heathen are silver and gold,
The work of men's hands.
16 They have mouths, but they speak not:
Eyes have they, but they see not:
17 They have ears, but they hear not :
Neither is there any breath in their mouths.
18 They that make them are like unto them:
So is every one that trusteth in them.
19 The house of Israel blesseth Jhvh:
The house of Aaron blesseth Jhvh:
20 The house of Levi blesseth Jhvh :
They that fear Jhvh bless Jhvh.]]
21 Blessed be Jhvh out of Zion,
Which dwelleth at Jerusalem.
Praise ye Jhvh.
That Ps. 135 is a composite Ps. is obvious on the face of it.
Verses 1 and 2 are a variant of Ps. 134, and are a superfluous opening
in the face of the opening contained in v. 3. Verse 5 is the pious
marginal remark of one scribe, and v. 6 of another. Verse 7 is taken
bodily from Jer. 10'". In the midst of thee, 0 Egypt, verse 9, bears
a suspicious likeness to 116'". 10, 11, 12 are also found in Ps, 136'""".
Verse 13 is from Ex. 3'". Verse 14 is taken from Deut. 32"", and
15-20 are from 115*~". It might perhaps have been a question in one

cxxxvi. 1-12] PSALMS 387
or two of the cases which was the borrower, e.g. in the case of 136'"~",
but there is no doubt in others, and hence we must regard the Ps. as,
like some others, a mere mosaic.
The contents too do not favour the theory that it was composed
imo ictu, but rather that each addition stands independently by itself
This gives us, what otherwise would be lacking, viz. an original
nucleus, and round this have clustered all the passages which are
enclosed in the text in double brackets.
No importance can be attached to the fact that the borrowed
passages do not agree precisely with their originals. The carelessness
of a transcriber is as likely to be in fault as a variation in the MSS.

PSALM CXXXVI.
1 0 give thanks unto Jhvh; for he is good:
For his mercy endu/reth for ever.
2 0 give thanks unto the God of gods :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
3 0 give thanks to the Lord of lords :
For his mercy endtvreth for ever.
4 To him who alone doeth great wonders :
For his mercy endu/reth for ever.
5 To him that by wisdom made the heavens :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
6 To him that stretched out the earth above the waters :
Por his mercy endu/reth for ever.
1 To him that made great Ughts :
For his mercy endu/reth for ever :
8 The sun to rule by day :
For his mercy endureth for ever :
9 The moon and stars to rule by night :
For his mercy endu/reth for ever.
10 To him that smote Egypt in their firstborn :
For Ms mercy endureth for ever :
1 1 And brought out Israel from among them :
For his mercy endureth for ever :
12 With a strong hand, and with a stretched out arm:
For his mercy endureth for ever.
25—2

388 PSALMS [cxxxvi. 13-26
13 To him which dirided the Red sea into parts:
For his mercy endureth for ever :
14 And made Israel to pass through the midst of it:
For his mercy endu/reth for ever:
15 But overthrew Pharaoh and his host pn the Red sea:]]
For his mercy endureth for ever.
16 To him which led his people through the wilderness :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
17 To him which smote great kings :
For his m,ercy endureth for ever :
18 And slew famous kings :
For his mercy endureth for ever :
19 Sihon king of the Amorites:
For his mercy endureth for ever :
20 And Og the king of Bashan :
For his mercy endureth for ever :
********
21 And gave their land for an heritage:
For his mercy endureth for ever :
22 Even an heritage unto Israel his servant :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
23 Who remembered us in our low estate :
For his mercy endureth for ever :
24 And hath redeemed us from our enemies :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
25 Who giveth food to all flesh :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
26 0 give thanks unto the God of heaven :
For his mercy endureth for ever.
A composite Ps., which probably was compiled for service in
the synagogue. Just as some of our modern hymn-books betray by
their general character the circle out of which they spring, so does this
Ps. Between The Hymnal Noted and Sacred Songs and Sohs are
many steps, represented by such compilations as Hymns Ancient and
Modern, The Hymnary, Church Hymns, The Congregational Hymn
Book, and many others. We should not confuse the select circle in
which the two first mentioned books move. We could not transplant
Sacred Songs and Solos to St Alban's, Holborn, or satisfy the Seventh-

CXXXVII. 1-5] PSALMS 389
Day Baptists with The Hymnal Noted. So in Ps. 136 rings an
unmistakeable congregational note, not merely by reason of the
chorus, but also, and more strongly, by reason of the untheological
character of the whole compilation. It is a song of thanksgiving ;
a T6d4h. It is not easy now to say how yS,d§,h, to throw, came to
be restricted to such special senses as to give thanks, or confess {acknow
ledge) ; perhaps there lies buried a ritual gesture behind the word, or
else a mere obedience to the law by which we express spiritual acts by
material images, e.g. "Roll thy burden on Jhvh." In any case the
TddSh, thanksgiving, of this Ps. should be distinguished in thought
from the HaUelujah, praise, of the preceding.
There is little to note in the Ps. beyond its indebtedness. The first
verse = 106', 107', 118'. The 2nd and 3rd are from Deut, 10". The
(doing) great wonders of v. 4 occurs also in 72'" and 86'°. Verse 5
depends on Jer. 10" and Prov, 3". Verse 6 = Is. 42^ 44'*; vv. 7-9
depend on Gen. 1. Verse 12 enshrines a Deuteronomic formula —
"with a mighty hand and a stretched out arm," 5'", 6", 7"'", 9'", 11',
26", 34" — (in one or two of these passages the formula is abbreviated) ;
13-16 repeat a favourite theme of the Psalmists ; 17-22 are paraUel
to 135'°~" {all the kingdoms of Canaan of 135" has however dropped
out, though it is required by v. 21, and Israel his servant replaces
Israel his peoph) ; the remembrance of His people when under foreign
oppressors {v. 23), their deliverance {v. 24), and Jhvh's goodness in
giving food to all living things {v. 25) are common-places of Jewish
religion.

PSALM CXXXVII.
1 By the rivers of Babylon we wept,
[[There we sat down, yea,]]
When we remembered Zion.
2 We hanged our harps
Upon the wUlows in the midst thereof
3 For there they that carried us away captive required of us
a song:
And they that wasted us required of us mirth, ^saying.
Sing us tme]]
Of the songs of Zion.
4 How shaU we sing Jhvh's song
In a strange land?

5 If I forget thee, 0 Jerusalem,
Let my right hand forget her cunning.

390 PSALMS [cxxxvii. 6-9
6 Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,
If I do not remember thee,
If I prefer not Jerusalem
Above my chief joy.
7 Remember, Jhvh, against the children of Edom
The day of Jerusalem:
Who said, "Rase it, rase it.
To the foundation thereof"
8 0 daughter of Babylon, '"who art to be destroyed:"'
Happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee
As thou hast served us.
9 Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy Uttle ones
Against the stones.

Conservative commentators hold, of course, that this Ps. was
composed soon after the Exile by one who had been a captive in
Babylon, and had felt its iron enter into his soul. None of them, however,
deny the force of the perfects in 1-3, and hence it is curious that they
do not also take the implicit present of vv. 4-6 literally. These
clearly imply that the Psalmist was at the time of writing in a strange
land, and that land not Babylon, but Edom; for how else can we
account for the introduction of Edom and the bitterness of the
Psalmist's feeling towards it? Bearing this in mind we shall put
Edom in the forefront of the Ps. and interpret Babylon as a standing
type of any heartless oppressor of Judah introduced here figuratively,
by way of giving a pictorial description of Edom and of the feelings
which Edom excited in the breast of an exile, perhaps an oppressed exile,
from Judsea, residing in her midst. This explanation is not open to
the objections which lie against the conservative view, (l) that this
latter takes no note of the present circumstances of the poet, and
(2) that it ignores the purely artificial character of the description of
the exiles' troubles in Babylon. It is more satisfactory than Duhm's
view, according to which we have a folk-song handed down orally, and
at length incorporated in the national song-book, for it accounts for
the introduction of Edom as no other theory does satisfactorily.
The "argument" of the Ps., then, is something of this sort:
"As our forefathers in exile, in Babylon, could not sing Zion's
songs, with Bel and Nebo's worshippers around them, so neither can I,
a pious Jew of (say) 178 B.C., an exile in Edom (a people who refused
help to Jerusalem in the day of her need, even if they did not actuaUy
help on her downfall), sing Jhvh's songs among the Edomites. Jeru
salem is my joy; may my right hand wither, and my tongue dry up, if
I ever sing other songs than hers to any harp. 0 Edom, true

CXXXVUI. 1-4] PSALMS 391
daughter of Babylon, ill hast thou served us ; ill may thy latter
end be."
In v. 1 Bickell omits there we sat down, yea ; Duhm prefers to omit
when we remembered Zion, on the ground that sitting down has
nothing to do with the weeping or singing. But the whole point
of the Ps. is contained in the relation of Zion to Babylon, and as the
verse is overladen it is better to follow Bickell. In v. 3 sing to us is
to be omitted for the same reason. In v. 8 the word rendered that-
art-to-be-destroyed may possibly be destroyer, destroyed, or that-is-to-be-
destroyed — vastatrix, vastata, or vastanda. The ambiguity lies probably
in the fact that it is merely a word of cursing. A cursed tree may be
either one of the three.
The relations of Edom and Israel are one of the by-problems of
O.T. history. When Nebuchadnezzar was threatening Judsea the
Edomites and other nations sent envoys to Jerusalem to discuss means
of defence. If Jer. 49'"" and Obadiah's prophecy both refer to the
conduct of the Edomites after the fall of Jerusalem — ^which is doubtful,
as is the relation of the two writings to one another — then the
language of our Ps. in v. 7 is justifi^ed. But there seems good
reason for the behef that the embittered feeling of the Jews against
the Edomites was of slow growth during the post-exilic period, due
partly to the appropriation by the latter of part of Southern Judeea,
to which the name of Idumsea was thence given. A passage inter
polated in Ecclus. (50'") about the days of Herod the Great shadows
out the hostiUty : " There be two manner of nations which my heart
abhorreth, and a third, which is no nation : They that inhabit Mount
Seir, they that dwell among the Philistines, and the foolish people that
dweU in Sichem."
For the vengeful feelings expressed in vv. 8-9 against Edom see
Introduction to Ps. 109.

PSALM CXXXVIIL
A Psalm of David.
1 1 wiU praise thee, Jhvh, with my whole heart:
Before the gods will I sing praise unto thee.
2 I will worship toward thy holy temple.
And praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy
truth :
For thou hast magnified '"thy word above all thy name."'
3 In the day when I cry thou answerest me :
Thou dost strengthen me uoith strength in my soul.
4 All the kings of the earth shall praise thee, Jhvh,
When they hear the words of thy mouth.

392 PSALMS [cxxxviii. 5-8
5 Yea, they shaU sing of the ways of Jhvh :
For great is the glory of Jhvh.
6 Though Jhvh be high, yet hath he respect unto the lowly:
But the proud he knoweth afar ofl'.
7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou wilt revive me :
Thou shalt stretch forth thine hand against the wrath of
mine enemies.
And thy right hand shall save me.
8 hJHVH will bring to nought them that are against me: -I
Thy mercy, Jhvh, endureth for ever:
Forsake not the works of thine own hands.
According to v. 4 this Ps, is put into the mouth of one who regards
himself as not so unimportant as to be beneath the notice of kings.
Delitzsch, recognising this, regards Darid as the author ; Olshausen
thinks of Simon or one of his successors ; Baethgen, as usual, refers
the "I" to the community, and assigns it to the age of Nehemiah;
Hitzig declares for John Hyrcanus. AU that is clear is that the
Psalmist has received a signal proof of Jhvh's goodness in delivering
him on so large a scale as to attract the notice of the kings of the
earth (called gods in lb), and to justify the hope that they will
acknowledge the glory of Jhvh. Por the rest, the text of the Ps. is
so uncertain, and its interpretation so obscure that nothing but a
merely general conclusion is possible. A deliverance of an Israelitish
prince (and his army ?) ; the glory of Jhvh manifested ; the kings
astonished ; the greatness of Jhvh, and His opposition to the haughty;
and a sure hope of further benefits ; — these are the main thoughts of
the Ps.
Inv. la supply "Jhvh" from the LXX. The gods oi lb are not
the angels (so LXX), but the great ones of the earth. A king was the
deputy of his god — very often the incarnation of him — and so the
title could easily be transferred, 2 c can neither be accepted, nor
emended. Some would excise name, and some word. Perhaps the
best rendering on the whole would be : Thou hast exalted Thy name
over all.
3 a. On the whole it is better to take the verb as denoting, as so
often, a frequentative action : Whenever I call, Thou hearest. 3 b again
is impossible as it stands. The least unsatisfactory correction is that
supplied by the tentative suggestion of Jennings and Lowe, to read
r&chab for rihab. If we adopt this and take 6z, strength, as an
adverbial accusative we get what is at least a tolerable and probable
meaning ; Thou dost mightily enlarge my soul. This would then
support Hitzig's conjecture that the "enlargement" referred to is
that of Hyrcanus's safe return home from the field on which Antiochus
Sidetes met his death, when fighting against the Parthians in b.c 128.

cxxxix. 1-7] PSALMS 393
In 6 a R.V. reads :
For though the Lord be high yet hath He respect unto the lowly,
which represents ki-ri,m Jhvh v'sh^phM yir'eh. Duhm says Jhvh is
an interpolation. A simpler explanation is that it and r^m have
changed places, and that the true rendering is that of the text. Jhvh
looks down on high and low alike from heaven (116"); the haughty
He knows (cf 1") from afar = He knows all about their intentions
long before they are carried out, and so He brings them to nought
(Baethgen) ; or He knows them without the trouble of approaching to
see what they are like (Duhm); or though the lofty one thinks him
self unobserved, and conducts himself as if he were answerable to uo
high being, yet Jhvh sees him from afar (Delitzsch).
8 a. The phrase is peculiar, and it is not easy to say whether it
should be rendered by the help of the parallel phrase in 57', "Jhvh
that performeth aU things for me," or whether we should take yigmdr
as meaning bring to an end, in the sense of its being no more (as in 7",
12'). The verb occurs in the Pss. only. The R.V. and all the com
mentators take the former alternative, and give
Jhvh will perfect that which concerneth me.
But the rendering in the text gives a better sense, and a parallelism as
in V. 7.
8 c. The works of Thine own hands is that work of deliverance
which Jhvh had begun. Duhm, however, treats it as a synonym
for me.
PSALM CXXXIX.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of David.
1 Jhvh, thou hast searched me, and known me.
2 Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising.
Thou understandest my thought afar ofi'.
3 Thou compassest my path and my lying down,
And art acquainted with all my ways.
4 For there is not a word in my tongue,
But, lo, Jhvh, thou knowest it altogether.
5 Thou hast beset me behind and before.
And laid thine hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me :
It is high, I cannot attain unto it.
7 Whither shall I go from thy spirit ?
Or whither shaU I flee from thy presence?

394 PSALMS [cxxxix. 8-22
8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there :
If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, thou art there.
Qlfl take the wings of the moriung.
And dweU in the uttermost parts of the sea:
10 Even there shall thy hand lead me.
And thy right hand shaU hold me.
11 If I say. Surely the darkness shaU cover me,
I- And the night shut me in,-l
12 Then even the darkness would not hide from thee; but the
night would shine as the day:
[[The darkness and the light are both alike to fhecj
14 I wiU praise thee because of all thy fearful works :
Marvellous are thy works:
I- And my soul thou knowest right well.-]
13 For thou hast possessed my reins:
Thou hast covered me in my mother's womb.
15 My substance was not hid from thee,
When I was made in secret,
And curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
16 '"Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect :
And in thy book all m/y members were written,"'
^Which in continuance were fashioned.
When as yet there was none of them.]]
17 How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, 0 God !
How great is the sum of them !
IQ If 1 should count them, they are more in number than the
sand:
When I awake, I am stiU with thee.
19 Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, 0 God:
Depart from me therefore, ye bloody men.
20 For they speak against thee wickedly,
And thine enemies take thy name in vain.
21 Do not I hate them, Jhvh, that hate thee?
And am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee ?
22 I hate them with perfect hatred :
I count them mine enemies.

CXXXIX. 23-24] PSALMS 395
23 Search me, 0 God, and know my heart:
Try me, and know my thoughts:
24 And see if there be any wicked way in me.
And lead me in the way everlasting.
A Ps. in three parts, the first of which extols the Omnipresence
and Omniscience of Jhvh, the second the wonders of physiology, and
the third expresses the hatred felt by the orthodox against the un
believing. "From a theological point of view it is one of the most
instructive of the Pss.," but not quite in the sense of Delitzsch, for of
theology proper in it there is none. Indeed, the first part owes its
vitahty to its freedom from theology, and to the naive way in which
it describes the feeUng of the soul that Jhvh is omnipresent. The
Deist, who regards God as present by His power ; the Pantheist who
posits Him as the anima mundi ; the philosopher who sees His
presence, power and grace everywhere ; the simple piety which thinks
of Him as an aU-seeing Eye, or an all-knowing Overlord ; all can use
the simple creed of vv. 1—12 of this Ps., just because it is not couched
in the philosophic terms of any school of any age.
It is evident, of course, that the Ps. is of a late stage in the
development of Jewish thought, for in Pss. 30 and 88 She6l is outside
the range of Jhvh's actirity, just as it was when Enoch and Elijah were
taken straight from earthly Ufe to immortality, without being subjected
to any sojourn in the land of shadows. From the days of Amos onwards
Jhvh's power was thought of as extending to Shedl ; in earlier days it
was the ancestral spirits who held sway there.
If the first part of this Ps. lives because of its formal independence
of theology, so may the second because of its ignorance of science.
The best commentary on it, and at the same time the best illustration
of the truth that the deepest religion is the most real, may be taken
from Huxley's Lay Sermons :
The student of Nature wonders the more, and is astonished
the less, the more conversant he becomes with her operations ; but
of aU the perennial miracles she offers to his inspection, perhaps
the most worthy of admiration is the development of a plant, or
of an animal, from its embryo. Examine the recently-laid egg of
some common animal, such as a salamander, or a newt. It is a
minute spheroid in which the best microscope will reveal nothing
but a structureless sac, enclosing a glairy fluid, holding granules
in suspension. But strange possibilities lie dormant in that semi
fluid globule. Let a moderate supply of warmth reach its watery
cradle, and the plastic matter undergoes changes so rapid, and yet
so steady and purpose-like in their succession, that one can only
compare them to those operated by a skilled modeller upon a
formless lump of clay. As with an invisible trowel, the mass is
divided and subdivided into smaUer and smaUer portions, until it is
reduced to an aggregation of granules not too large to build withal

396 PSALMS [cxl. i-4
the finest fabrics of the nascent organism. And then it is as if a
delicate finger traced out the line to be occupied by the spinal
column, and moulded the contour of the body ; pinching up the
head at one end, the tail at the other, and fashioning flank and
limb into due salamandrine proportions, in so artistic a way that,
after watching the process hour by hour, one is almost involun
tarily possessed by the notion that some more subtle aid to
vision than an achromatic would show the hidden artist, with his
plan before him, striving with skilful manipulation to perfect his
work. {Sermon 12, p, 200,)
Religion, in the person of the Psalmist, says that the " more subtle
aid " desiderated by Huxley is caUed " Faith."
The third part of the Ps, is of a more familiar character, expressing
as it does, but with even more explicitness than usual, the writer's
hatred of all who do not follow " in the way everlasting." That the
same man in the same Ps. should write down the feelings of mystic
adoration caused by the sight of Jhvh's presence and His wondrous
works, and also the words of uncompromising hatred of the wicked which
occur in part 3, is but another example of the closeness with which
intolerance can follow after piety, of the fact that a saint in the closet
may be an inquisitor on the bench of power.
I have placed (with Hitzig, Wellhausen and others) v. 14 before
V. 13 as required by the sense.
What the exact sense of v. 16 is is uncertain. It is true that the
wonders of gestation are dwelt on in Job 10"~", and in Eccles. 11°, but
there is nothing wonderful in the fact that so obtrusive a wonder
should be sometimes referred to. But it is not certain that golml does
mean my substance (g61em occurs here only in M.T.). Duhm would
place y6mlm immediately after golml, and read :
Thine eyes did see the bundh of my days, &c.
But it may be su.spected also that 16 c-d are glosses added by a prosaic
scribe.

PSALM CXL.
For the chief Musician : A Psalm of David.
1 Deliver me, Jhvh, from the eril man:
Preserve me from the riolent man:
2 Which imagine mischiefs in their heart :
Continually are they gathered together for war.
3 They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent:
Adders' poison is under their lips. Selah.
4 Keep me, Jhvh, from the hands of the wicked:
Preserve me from the violent man:

CXL. 4-13] PSALMS 397
Who have purposed to overthrow my goings.
5 The proud have hid a snare for me, and cords :
They have spread a net [for my feet]:
By the wayside have they set gins for me. Selah.
6 I say unto Jhvh, " Thou art my God" :
Hear the voice of my suppUcatlons, Jhvh.
7 0 God the Lord, the strength of my salvation.
Cover my head in the day of battle.
8 Grant not, Jhvh, the desires of the wicked :
Further not his wicked device I- against me. -I ^Selah!^
9 Let not the head of those that compass me about I- be exalted,-]
Let the mischief of their own Ups '"cover"' them.
10 Let burning coals fall upon them :
Let them be cast into the fire:
Into deep pits, that they rise not up again.
11 Let not an evil speaker be established in the earth:
Let eril hunt the riolent man to overthrow him.
12 Let them know that Jhvh maintains the cause of the afflicted.
And the right of the poor.

13 Surely the righteous shall give thanks unto thy na/me :
The upright shall dwell in thy presence.
Hitzig holds that this and the two former Pss. have John Hyrcanus
for their subject, and that this Ps. 140 in particular expresses his
hatred of the Pharisees after he had espoused openly the side of the
Sadducees. Duhm, on the contrary, holds that the g^im {proud) of
V. 5 are undoubtedly the military and priestly caste of the Sadducees,
and the righteous of v. 13 are the Pharisees ; and his opinion is the
more probable where none can claim certainty. What is clear is that
the author is the leader of a party at least, for he has an adversary and
a party against him, who carry on a campaign of lies, intrigues, and
stratagems. It is not clear that their campaign is a civil war, or that
the "war" of v. 2 is to be taken in its literal sense. It is rather in the
din that the battle is fought, and it is perjury which is the weapon
used, sharpened by conspiracy, just as the EvangeUst speaks of men
being suborned to do Jesus Christ to death (Mt, 26""), What the
Psalmist imprecates for his enemies is the fate of Sodom and Gomorrha
— fire from heaven — and of Korah — to go down into the pit ; and it is
hardly too much to say that Jhvh figures in his Ps. as little more than
the instrument of his triumph.

398 PSALMS [cxli. i-io
The doubt suggested above as to whether the Ps. is of Pharisaic or
Sadducean origin would seem to be dispelled by v. 12, since it is
doubtful whether the words §.ni, afilicted, and eby6n, poor, are ever
applied to the latter. Moreover the time came when they could no
longer be applied to the former, and so became the property of the
humble and scattered few who were content to wait for the consolation
of Israel, From the powerful orthodox party it passed on to those who
were the Methodists or Quakers of the day, who did not depart from
the Law, but found their chief dehght in eschatological hopes and
apocal3rptic visions.
The few changes made in the text above have their origin in the
suggestions from the text of the LXX.

PSALM CXLL
A Psalm of Darid.
1 Jhvh, I cry unto thee: make haste unto me:
Give ear unto my voice, when I cry unto thee.
2 Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense :
The Ufting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
3 Set a watch, Jhvh, before my mouth :
Keep the door of my lips.
4 Incline not my heart to any evil thing,
[[To practise wicked works
With men that work iniquity:]]
And let me not eat of their dainties.
5 If the righteous smite me, it shall be a kindness :
If he reprove me, it shall be an oil hfor the head-|:
My head shall not refuse it:
hBut, "Yet again," shall be my prayer.-j
6 [[Their judges are overthrown in stony places.
They shall hear my words; for they are sweet.
7 Our bones are scattered at the grave's mouth.
As when one cutteth and cleaveth the earth.|
8  But mine eyes are unto thee, 0 God the Lord:
In thee is my trust; leave not my soul destitute.
9 Keep me from the snares which they have laid for me,
And the gins of the workers of iniquity.
10 Let the wicked faU into their own nets,
Whilst that I withal escape.

CXLI.] PSALMS 399
This would be a much more valuable Ps, if we could be sure of its
text. But as it is, no ingenuity of commentators has succeeded in
making any tolerable sense of v. 6, or in showing how v. 7 fits in with
the rest of the Ps. Hitzig stands alone in transferring v. 6 to foUow
145'", for the sole reason apparently that the nun verse is missing there,
and v. 6 begins with that letter. His emendation, however, of 5<^
is the most plausible of aU, and is adopted in the text, while that of
Olshausen and Wellhausen, according to which an initial petition has
dropped out of 8 a, seems self-evident.
The course which is usually to be deprecated, viz. the drastic one of
rejecting the text as an interpolation, seems, after all, the proper course
to foUow in deaUng with w. 6 and 7. The fact, moreover, that the
concluding word of v. 5 {in their calamities, A.V.) is out of place, is
so far an argument that the text has somehow suff'ered corruption.
Moreover, though sense can be made of these two verses when taken
word by word, no sense can be made of them where they stand ; and
finally 5 and 8 are quite congruous.
What now remains is a prayer of a Psalmist for guidance in deciding
upon his course of action when overtures have been made to him by
a party whom he cannot but regard as enemies of Jhvh. He seems to
feel the force of the temptation, and, therefore, it must have taken
a specious form, for he is forced to pray that he may not make any rash
promises, or commit himself in such a way as to side with those who
work wickedness. It is far better, he feels, to remain where he is, in
the party of the righteous, and submit to the discipline which their
conduct towards him supplies ; from which we may perhaps conclude
that he belonged to a party which had its own internal differences and
disputes. At aU events his conscience and his God would be his
supports in the party of the righteous, and if he has his trials there, he
can turn them to good account by learning from them patience. So
he ends with a note of greater decision, for he sees more clearly that
the temptation from the opponents is a snare laid for him, and he
expresses the usual hope that not he but they will fall into it,
1-3 is a petition that the house- or private prayer of the Psalmist
may be an acceptable surrogate for the solemn morning and evening
sacrifice. 4. The text here again is certainly corrupt, as is shown by the eth
before ishlm. Probably the two middle clauses should be omitted.
Then we get exceUent sense. The Psalmist prays that he may not be
tempted by the advantages which the enemies of the righteous offer
him, but may stay and accept the blows of his friends.
5 d. If the emended text be accepted, it raises the very interesting
question, whether we have not here the O.T, analogue of Mt, 5"'",
"Whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other
also." Then Jesus would have said in effect : The elders bid you accept
the blows of a friend, but I say unto you, "Do more; accept even those
of an enemy."

400 PSALMS [cxLii. 1-7
PSALM CXLII.
Maschil of David, when he was in the cave : A Prayer.
1 I cry unto Jhvh aloud:
[[With my voice| unto Jhvh do I make my suppUcation.
2 I pour out my complaint before him:
I shew him my trouble.
3 When my spirit is overwhelmed within me, then thou
knowest [[my path.]]
In the way wherein I walk have they privily laid a snare
for me.
4 I look to right and left,
I- And there is no man that knoweth me:H
Refuge faUeth me; no man careth for my soul.
5 I cry unto thee, Jhvh :
I say to thee, "Thou art my refuge.
My portion in the land of the living."
6 Attend unto my cry ; for I am brought very low :
Deliver me fi-om my persecutors; for they are stronger
than I.
7 Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name :
I- On me are the righteous expectantly waiting:
Until that thou deal bountifuUy with me. -I
A beautiful little Ps,, written by a man in high position, who had
faUen a victim to the accidents of party strife, and finds his solace
in pouring out his trouble to his God, without seU-laudation, or
rindictiveness. It is impossible to say whether he was actually a
prisoner, for prison in v. 1 may be used literaUy or figuratively, and
the path of V. 4 by which it is sought to establish the figurative
meaning of prison in v. 7 does not imply necessarily that the author
was treading that path at the moment of writing. Yet a curious mind
may detect a striking similarity of tone between this Ps. and the Epistle
to the Philippians. In both the writer feels above aU things his
solitude ; no man careth for my soul, says one ; / have no man like-
minded, says the other of Timothy ; both leave the issue with God ;
both look forward to a joyful issue of the present distress, and a
rejoicing of the saints, and both dwell on the expectant attitude of
their sympathisers. On the whole the balance is in favour of prison
being rendered literally, especiaUy in view of the LXX rendering
of V. 7.

CXLIII. 1-5] PSALMS 401
1. With my voice (kdll) of R.V. should be as in the text and in
3* where kdll is not an accusative of the instrument but a second
subject. The three bracketed words in 16, 2b, and 3a represent three
editorial amendments.
4. If hok is to be taken as imperative then God, or the Psalmist's
friends are addressed. But as Baethgen truly remarks it is more
natural that the singer in his distress should look round him for
himseU, than that he should call on others to do it. He thinks,
however, that the right hand (without the left) is mentioned because
on that side the TrapaoTaVi?? stood (cf 16", 109"' "', 110=, 121"). But if
so the addition of a second verb saw is inexplicable. Olshausen would
be inclined to replace s'm61, left hand, but for the fact that the metre
would thereby be destroyed. This difficulty, however, Duhm gets
over by omitting the second verb, so as to make room for the dropped
word. 8. The verb kS,thar occurs six times in the M.T,, in Judg. 20",
Ps. 22", Job 36', Ps. 142", Prov. 14", Hab. 1*, and always denotes
surround, but also always connotes a secondary idea, whether of
expectation, of triumph, or of glory (cf the noun which means a crown,
whether on a royal head, as in Esther, or the capital of a piUar, as in
the accounts of Solomon's Temple). It is the secondary sense which
the LXX give in their rendering of yakthiril, and in so doing give
us a better sense. That the righteous should compass him about when
Jhvh had set the writer at liberty in the R.V. gives it a less natural
close than that which gives Jhvh a reason why He should deliver His
servant speedily, riz. that the righteous, = His own adherents, are
anxiously expecting His truth to be manifested in action.
PSALM CXLIIL
A Psalm of David.
1 Hear my prayer, Jhvh, give ear to my supplications:
In thy faithfulness answer me, in thy righteousness [hear me].
2 (But enter not into judgment with thy servant:
For in thy sight shall no man Uving be justified.)
3 For the enemy hath persecuted my soul :
He hath smitten my Ufe down to the ground:
He hath made me to dweU in darkness, [[as those that have
been long dead.J
4 Therefore is my spirit overwhelmed within me :
My heart within me is desolate.
5 I remember the days of old:
I meditate on aU thy works:
I muse on the work of thy hands.
c. 26

402 PSALMS [cxLin. 6-12
6 I stretch forth my hands unto thee:
My soul thirsteth after thee, as a thirsty land. Selah.
1 Hear me speedily, Jhvh : my spirit faileth :
Hide not thy face from me, lest [if thou be silent unto
me] I be like unto them that go down into the pit.
8 Satisfy me with thy lovingkindness in the morning:
For in thee do I trust:
Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk:
For I Uft up my soul unto thee.
9 Deliver me, Jhvh, from mine enemies :
I flee unto thee to hide me.
10 Teach me to do thy will ; for thou art my God :
Let thy good spirit lead me into the l-wayH of uprightness.
11 Quicken me, Jhvh, for thy name's sake:
For thy righteousness' sake bring my soul out of trouble.
12 And of thy mercy cut off mine enemies:
Destroy all them that afflict my soul:
For I am thy servant.
The last of the seven Penitential Pss., and according to Duhm not
a Ps. of penitence at all, but rather of cursing. This judgment,
however, is not just, for underlying the writer's prayer for deliverance
and imprecation on his foes, is the presupposition that his words can
win a hearing only as they proceed from a heart conscious of its
simpleness {v. 2), and as they are accompanied by a life of uprightness
{v. 10). But it is a question which the borrowed phraseology of
the Ps. suggests, whether we can regard the whole Ps. as anything
more than an artificial mosaic representing no actual distress in the
writer's life.
For example: 3a = 7"; 3c = Lam, 3"; 4a=77", 142"; ba,b,c =
776,11,12. 6a = 63^ 7 = 27", 84', 28'; 8a = 90'*; 86, c?=25'''; 8c =
32"; 96 = Is. 10"; 106 = NeL 9'"; 10a,6 = 27"; lla = 138l
But in spite of the fact that hardly a verse in this Ps. is original, it
would be rash to conclude that it is a product of a dilettante spirit.
The natural way in which the older expressions are used, and the
undesigned character of some of the coincidences {e.g. in 10a, b),
rather point to the conclusion that the author was one who knew the
sacred writings by heart, to whom it came easy to express himself in
the terms they supphed, who thought in fact in their language.
He is clearly one who is in great straits, and even in danger of his
life, but for aU that feels that he can appeal to Jhvh's faithfulness,
Le. to His sure keeping to His promises. He remembers, however,
that mercy is the accompaniment of this faithfulness, else might Jhvh

cxLiv. 1-5] PSALMS 403
withdraw His help because it had been forfeited by sin. His need is
great, and he would be crushed by it did he not find comfort in the
teaching of history — whether his people's, or his own, is not clear. But
the thought of Jhvh's doings in the past emboldens him to look for
speedy deliverance, and he gives an implicit promise that he will foUow
in Jhvh's way, if He will but cut off his enemies.
Ic should be certainly completed as above from the LXX. The
righteousness of Jhvh here is that emphasised so often in Deutero-
Isaiah = that shown in making His people right before the nations =
salvation. Verse 2 is a parenthesis which seeks to anticipate the
Sossible refusal of Jhvh to grant his prayer, by saying that, even if
hvh's righteousness (= salvation) is barred out by man's unrighteousness
(=16-yitz'ddak), yet His chesed or mercy remains, and that will prevent
Jhvh from entering into judgment altogether.
3 c. Those that have been long dead = to whom, therefore, there is no
hope of a restoration to hfe.
7 c. The verse must be completed from its original (28').
8 a. The verb is corrected by the original from which the clause is
quoted. In 9 6 the verb as in Is. 10"!
10 b. Way ioT land aiter 21^^. ¥ or good spirit (liteially spirit is
good) ci. note on holy spirit in 61" We must not read a Christian
meaning into either phrase, Jhvh's good spirit, or holy spirit, was not
thought of, of course, as being internal to the Godhead, but as a spirit,
or angel, who once led the Israelites in the wilderness (Neh. 9 '"), but
now is sought for to guide an individual.
PSALM CXLIV.
A.
A Psalm of Darid.
1 Blessed be Jhvh my strength,
Which teacheth my hands to war:
My fingers to fight:
2 My t-rock,H and my fortress:
My high tower, and my deUverer:
My shield, and he in whom I trust:
Who subdueth the peoples under me.
3 Jhvh, what is man, that thou takest knowledge of him I
Or the son of man, that thou makest account of him!
4 Man is like to vanity :
His days are as a shadow that passeth away.
5 Bow thy heavens, Jhvh, and come down :
Touch the mountains, and they shall smoke. 26—2

404 PSALMS [CXLIV. 6-15
6 Cast forth lightning, and scatter them :
Shoot out thine arrows, and destroy them.
7 Send thine hand from above :
Rid me, and deliver me out of great waters,
From the hand of strange children:
8 Whose mouth speaketh vanity,
And their right hand is a right hand of falsehood.
B.
9 I will sing a new song unto thee, 0 God:
Upon a psaltery and an instrument of ten strings will I
sing praises unto thee.
10 It is he that giveth salvation unto kings:
Who delivereth David his servant from the hurtful sword.
11 Rid me, and deliver me from the hand of strange children.
Whose mouth speaketh vanity,
And their right hand is a right hand of falsehood:
C.
12  That our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth :
Our daughters as corner stones, poUshed after the simUitude
of a palace:
13 That our garners may be fuU, affording all manner of store:
Our sheep bring forth thousands and ten thousands in our
streets :
14 ''That our oxen may be strong to labour:"'
No breaking in, no going out:
No complaining in our streets.
15 Happy is that people, that is in such a case:
Happy is that people, whose God is Jhvh.
One is almost tempted to think that Ps. 144 is nothing but two or
three fragments of songs which some writer put down together on the
same roU, and that that material unity is the only kind of unity which
they possess. Three such fragments seem, at any rate, to run together
to form Ps. 144 ; there is firstly. A, verses 1-8 (with a foreign element
in 3, 4), which is an adaptation of phrases from Ps, 18 ; there is
secondly, B, verses 9-11, which consists of three verses that have no
connecting thought as they stand ; and there is thirdly, C, a quite

CXLV. 1-2] PSALMS 405
independent folk-song contained in vv. 12-15, which by its abrupt and
ungrammatical opening betrays plainly its fragmentary character.
Perhaps it is even too much to claim for A any unity at all ; perhaps
we ought to content ourselves with saying that both A and B are
most like a coUection of texts written down almost promiscuously
for a scholar to learn by heart, and that C was excerpted for the same
reason. la = 18''"; lb = 18^ — Ic which describes the fitness of the fingers
for the bow-string is an addition ; 2 = 18' — chas'dl, my lovingkindness,
being a misprint for sal'l, my rock; 2d=18*^ — amml for ammlm,
nations; 3=8^ with variations; 4a = 39"'"; 4^) = Jobl4'; 5a=18"'';
5«. = 104""'; 6 = 18'^ 7,8 = 18'".
So in B 9 = 33'-"; 10 a =18"°"; 10b seems a free paraphrase of
jgMi. rpjjg difference between the original in Ps. 18 and elsewhere and
the quotations in Ps. 144 afford another proof of the fiuid character of
early Hebrew texts of the O.T.
C, on the other hand, is original to us. With this fragmentary
character of the Ps. before us it is useless to seek for any continuity
of thought. C is clearly a song celebrating the future material happiness of
Israel, and has therefore, an eschatological character. It is of the same
spirit of the passage in the Apocalypse of Baruch which says that when
the Messiah is revealed " the earth will yield its fruits ten thousand
fold, and on each rine there will be a thousand branches, and each
branch will produce a thousand clusters, and each cluster will produce
a thousand grapes, and each grape will produce a cor of wine" (29").
So the Psalmist sees young men like palm-trees (so Targum) in their
strength; — cf Vergil, AEn. ix. 674 : Abietibusjuvenes patr iis et montibus
cequos; — maidens strong and comely as caryatides on a palace wall;
sheep and oxen in abundance (the meaning of 14 a is doubtful) ; no
enemy breaking in, and no prisoners led out, and no complaints of loss
or poverty (or want of work) in the happy Messianic State.
This fragment describing those joys of the Kingdom of God, which
Jesus Christ rejected so decisively (Mt. 4*), is so beautiful, and so
instructive for the study of the Messianic hope, that we can but regret
that we do not possess the whole of it, and the many others like it which
must at one time have been in existence.

PSALM CXLV.
A Psalm of praise : of Darid.
1X1 will extol thee, my God, 0 king:
And I wiU bless thy name for ever and ever.
2 3 Every day wiU I bless thee :
And I will praise thy name for ever and ever.

406 PSALMS [CXLV. 3-20
3 i Great is Jhvh, and greatly to be praised:
And his greatness is unsearchable.
4 *1 One generation shall praise thy works to another,
And declare thy mighty acts.
5 n Of the glorious honour of thy majesty [shall they speak] :
And of thy wondrous works will I meditate.
6 "1 And men shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts :
And declare thy greatness.
7 T They shall abundantly utter the memory of thy great
goodness.
And shall sing of thy righteousness.
8 n Jhvh is gracious, and fuU of compassion :
Slow to anger, and of great mercy.
9 13 Jhvh is good to aU [that wait for him] :
And his tender mercies are over aU his works.
10 '' All thy works shall praise thee, Jhvh:
And thy saints shall bless thee.
113 They shaU speak of the glory of thy kingdom.
And talk of thy power:
12 7 To make known to the sons of men his mighty acts.
And the glorious majesty of his kingdom.
13 fi Thy kingdom is an everlasting kingdom.
And thy dominion endureth throughout all generations.
5*******
14 D Jhvh upholdeth all that faU,
And raiseth up all those that be bowed down.
15 y The eyes of all wait upon thee:
And thou givest them their meat in due season.
16 S Thou openest thine hand.
And satisfiest the desire of every living thing.
17 X Jhvh is righteous in all his ways.
And holy in all his works.
18 p Jhvh is nigh unto aU them that call upon him.
To all that call upon him in truth.
19 1 He will fulfil the desire of them that fear him:
He also will hear their cry, and will save them.
20 EJ' Jhvh preserveth aU them that love him :
But all the wicked will he destroy.

CXLV. 21] PSALMS 407
21 n My mouth shall speak the praise of Jhvh :
And let aU flesh bless his holy name for ever and ever.
Ps. 145 is the last of the nine acrostic Pss. — the others being 9, 10,
25, 34, 37, 111, 112, 119. The nUn strophe, however, is wanting and
is supplied in the LXX, but not from the original. Hitzig sees it in
141", but he is alone in what Delitzsch pleasantly caUs his clair
voyance. The Ps. is full of allusions to earlier writings, and the fact that it
displays so freely the habit of borrowing should be decisive for the
priority of Dan. 4"' "^ over Ps. 146'". Baethgen, however, in discussing
the relation of Ps. 1' to Josh. 1" takes occasion to lay down the canon
that " a prose writer cites the poet and not conversely." On the other
hand, Gunkel is on firmer ground when he builds on the dependency of
the Psalmists on the Prophets — the former are he says "epigoni"
of the latter {Die Christliche Welt, Nov. 26, 1903). The Book of
Daniel is, in form at least, a historical book, and in substance an
apocalyptic, and it would seem more probable, therefore, that the poet
in 145'" is following a usage that is common in the Pss., when he bases
his praise on historical facts, and so gives us a presumption that he has
in his mind a historical document. It is of course always possible that
both are quoting from traditional material, written or oral. In any
case the hope of the Psalmists is "that of the epigoni ; for of this there
can be no doubt that eschatology, at least in the form it took in Israel,
had its proper source not in the pious singers but in the Prophets ; the
latter are the teachers, and the Psalmists are the scholars ; the Prophets
have coined the thoughts, and aU that the singers have done is to put
them in circulation." (Gunkel, ut supra.)
Ps. 145 is the only Ps. which has in its title T'hilllh, a psalm,
a word of which the plural T'hilldth has given its name to the Psalter.
In the Talmud is a saying that whoever repeats this Ps. three times a
day may be sure that he is a child of the world to come.
As to the borrowing of the Ps. : —
3 a is from 48' ; 4 a is reminiscent of 19', as is «;. 7 ; 8 = Ex. 34",
Ps. 103", Jonah 4'; 13 is from Dan. 4"- "^; 15 and 16 = 104''' '"; 18
resembles 34'" — another alphabetic Ps.
In V. 1 the phrase my God, 0 King, should be noticed as peculiar —
the usual phrase being (as in 6') my King and my God. The Psalmist
implies that Jhvh is his God, and all nations' King.
5 a. The conclusion is supplied from the LXX ; and in 6 6 read
also the 3rd person : also in 9 a the LXX reading seems correct, and
a word to have dropped out of the M.T, through its simUarity to the
following word {mercies). After v. 13 supply : " The Lord is faithful
in His words, and holy in all His works," but the absence of the clause
in other versions points to its want of authority.
The most important part of the Ps, is vv. 11-13, which extol the
Kingdom of God. Duhm thinks that the Psalmist is not referring

408 PSALMS [CXLV.
to the Kingdom in an eschatological sense, but is thinking of Jhvh's
Lordship over the world of nature and of men, and this in spite of the
fact that he regards v. 13 as taken from Daniel, where the words have
admittedly an eschatological sense. But as (for the reasons given
above) we regard the Ps. as indebted to Daniel, and not conversely, we
are compeUed to take these verses in an eschatological meaning. " The
Kingdom of Jhvh " (malkUt Jhvh) was the formula under which later
piety summed up all its hopes of the future. In general it denoted
Jhvh's rule = " Jhvh in His rule"; in particular, it denoted the
province over which He ruled. But the dominant conception contained
under the phrase was that of the eternal sovereignty of Jhvh. "Before
our father Abraham came into the world, God was, as it were, only
the King of heaven ; but when Abraham came, he made Him to be
King over heaven and earth." This sovereignty was an actual fact on
earth wherever Jhvh was obeyed. " One should not say : ' I have no
inchnation for garments of mixed stuffs, swine's fiesh, forbidden wed
lock ' ; but one should say : ' I have indeed inclination for such things,
but what shall I do when my heavenly Pather has forbidden them to
me ? ' " Hence, it was only in Israel that the Kingdom was actual, for
in Israel only was the Law known, and those who took on them "the
yoke of the Law" as every pious Jew did at puberty, took on himseii
"the yoke of the Kingdom of God." Two things, however, were
wanting before this sovereignty could " appear" in all its power : Israel
must be free from foreign rulers, and all nations must acknowledge
Jhvh as their King and their God. It was the former of these two
points which eschaltology laboured in the two centuries before Christ.
In a large circle of thought and patriotism God's sovereignty became
narrowed down to the sovereignty of His people. " Gottes Herrschaft
ist Volkes Herrschaft." The Kingdom of Jhvh became the kingdom
of the saints, (Dan. 7"' " ; Ps. 149.) This was the salient feature of
a powerful school of eschatology. It had lost the purer idea of the
Prophets that Jhvh should rule, and had practically identified Jhvh
with Israel's supremacy. Whether this supremacy was to be effected
immediately by Jhvh or mediately by His Messiah was a matter of
inferior imporiance, even as to the Prophets it was a matter of the first
importance that Jhvh should rule, whether with or without Israel ; cf.
the prophecies of Amos for example, in which he contemplates the utter
destruction of Israel.
The hope of the Kingdom is enshrined in the Sh'm6neh esreh, the
" Eighteen thanksgirings," which every Israelite — even women, slaves
and children — was supposed to repeat three times a day. "Sound
with the great trumpet to announce our freedom ; and set up a standard
to collect our captives, and gather us together from the four comers of
the earth. Blessed art Thou, 0 Lord, who gatherest the outcasts
of Thy people Israel. 0 restore our Judges as formerly, and our
Counsellors as at the begiimiug; and remove from us sorrow and
sighing ; and reign over us. Thou 0 Lord alone, in grace and mercy,
and justify us. Blessed art Thou, 0 Lord, the King, for Thou lovest

CXLVI. l-io] PSALMS 409
righteousness and justice" (Nos. 10, 11). The whole is given in
Schiirer, n. ii. § 27.
It was to such hopes that Jesus of Nazareth linked His preaching
of the Gospel of the Kingdom, while universalising the current con
ceptions in a way which led to the Cross, but led also to His world-wide
power. It is on a mutual understanding of what is implied by the
formula Kingdom of God that Jew and Christian can alone build up
any future union.

PSALM CXLVI.
1 Praise ye Jhvh.
Praise Jhvh, O my soul.
2 WhUe I Uve wiU I praise Jhvh :
I wiU sing praises unto my God while I have any being.
3 Put not your trust in princes.
Nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.
4 His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth :
In that very day his thoughts perish.
5 Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help.
Whose hope is in Jhvh his God:
6 Which made heaven, and earth,
The sea, and aU that therein is:
Which keepeth truth for ever:
7 Which executeth judgment for the oppressed :
Which giveth food to the hungry.
Jhvh looseth the prisoners:
8 Jhvh openeth the eyes of the blind :
Jhvh raiseth them that are bowed down:
Jhvh loveth the righteous:
9 Jhvh preserveth the strangers :
He relieveth the fatherless and widow:
But the way of the wicked he turneth upside down.
10 Jhvh shaU reign for ever.
Thy God, 0 Zion, unto all generations.

Praise ye Jhvh.
Pss. 146-160 form a separate Hallel — called sometimes the Greek
HaUel in contradistinction to the Egyptian Hallel, 113-118, and to

410 PSALMS [CXLVII. 1-7
the Great Hallel, Ps. 136. Ps. 146 is like its two predecessors, a
mosaic, and like them, too, probably composed for didactic purposes.
Its debt to earlier writers is large. Verse 1=103', 104'; 2 = 104"";
3 = 118"' " ; (4 is quoted in 1 Mace. 2"" ;) 5 = 144'" ; 6 a, 6 = Ex. 20" ;
7a = 103"; 76 = 105'"; 86 = 145'^"; 10a = Ex, 15'"— but whether the
bopowing is direct, or which is borrower, which lender, is doubtful. In
spite, however, of the unoriginal form of our Ps, it has a native beauty
of its own, and a unity of spirit. It is a worthy hymn of praise to Him
whose titles to adoration are His power. His truthfulness, and His
loringkindness ; those who are privileged to know such a God are in
far better case than other nations whose highest object of regard is
a man — even though he be a prince. Such a Ps. as this was worthy to
take its place in the group of O.T. documents which have for their
subject the coming Kingdom of God, and for their task that of
describing it under one or other of its many characteristics. Verses
7-9 must be placed alongside of Is. 61''' as a passage which went
to form the conception of the Kingdom of God in the mind of Jesus
Christ. BickeU would delete the first and third clauses of v. 4 to fit the
metre, and in so doing he has the support of 1 Mace. 2"" He would
also place 8 c immediately before 9 c.

PSALM CXLVIL
A.
1 Praise ye Jhvh : for it is good to sing praises unto our God :
For it is pleasant; and praise is comely.
2 Jhvh doth build up Jerusalem :
He gathereth together the outcasts of Israel.
3 He healeth the broken in heart :
He bindeth up their wounds.
4 He telleth the number of the stars :
He calleth them all by their names.
5 Great is our Lord, and of great power:
His understanding is infinite.
6 Jhvh lifteth up the meek :
He casteth the wicked down to the ground.
B.
7 Sing unto Jhvh with thanksgiving :
Sing praise upon the harp unto our God:

cxLvn. 8-20] PSALMS 411
8 Who covereth the heaven with clouds.
Who prepareth rain for the earth.
Who maketh grass to grow upon the mountains.
9 He giveth to the beast his food,
And to the young ravens which cry.
10 He deUghteth not in the strength of the horse:
He taketh not pleasure in the legs of a man.
11 Jhvh taketh pleasure in them that fear him.
In those that hope in his mercy. C.
12 Praise Jhvh, 0 Jerusalem:
Praise thy God, 0 Zion.
13 For he hath strengthened the bars of thy gates :
He hath blessed thy children within thee.
14 He maketh peace in thy borders :
He fiUeth thee with the finest of the wheat.
15 He sendeth forth his commandment upon earth:
His word runneth very swiftly.
16 He giveth snow like wool :
He scattereth the hoar frost like ashes.
17 He casteth forth his ice Uke morsels :
hBefore his cold the waters stand.-!
18 He sendeth out his word, and melteth them :
He causeth his wind to blow, and the waters flow.
19 He sheweth his word unto Jacob,
His statutes and his judgments unto Israel.
20 He hath not dealt so with any nation :
And as for his judgments, they have not known them.
Praise ye Jhvh.
This Ps. consists of three independent doxologies, two of which were
recognised by the LXX translators who divide the Ps. into 1-11 and
12-20, obriously following the text before them.
A.
1-6 is chiefly remarkable as being founded on Deutero-Isaiah;
26 = Is. 56"; 3 = 61'; 4 = Is. 40'"; 5 = 40'"''".
Moreover, its dependence on its original is more than verbal; it
echoes the Prophet's view of the attributes of Jhvh, and, what is even
more striking, catches too his tone of hope. For 2 a is to be explained

412 PSALMS [CXLVIL
from 2 b, as no literal building of the stone walls of Jerusalem, but of
peopling of her with her scattered sons, once more gathered together.
What the prophet of the ExUe hoped for, the Psalmist knew had not
happened, but he echoes the hope of his leader.
The lessons of their Persian teachers lie behind the Jewish ex
pressions of V. 4 and Is, 40'". Jhvh's greatness is seen, not merely in
the creation of the stars, but also in His giving them names, as Adam
gave names to the beasts, and in His knowing their number. Like the
general of an army He knows His regiments, the signs of the zodiac,
and His soldiers even, one by one. He is Jhvh Tz'bi,6th, Both
authors, perhaps, regard the stars as Uring beings, and in any case as
obedient to Jhvh's word. They do not appear to have shared the
belief — the product of Persian dualism — of the author of the Apocalypse
in Is. 24-27 that " the host of the high ones " stood in need of punish
ment (Is. 24"). This latter meets us again in Enoch 18'" — a document
of the same period as Is. 24-27 : "The stars which roU over the fire
are they which transgressed the commandment of God before their
rising, because they did not come forth at the appointed time." Cf
Jude 13, "wandering stars." This belief is the direct parent of the
principalities of Rom. 8"", the thrones, dominions, principalities, powers
of Col. 1'", the powers of Mt. 24", Lk. 21'", the ruh, authority, power,
dominion of Eph. 1 ".
But the Nature-power of Jhvh in A, as in B and C, is only the
background which heightens the privilege of the Israelite. This
powerful and wise God it is who careth for Israel so much that He will
bring back the Jews of the Dispersion to their home ; will ease their
heimweh, and so bind up their broken hearts ; who careth for the meek
= Israel, and overthrows the wicked = the heathen powers.
B.
7-11, As in A, Jhvh's greatness, seen in His Proridence, is only
alluded to because it heightens His moral Nature. Great though He
be, He careth nothing for cavalry or infantry, war-horse or speed of
man ; what He takes pleasure in is Israel = the fearers of Him (y'r§S,iv),
It is not slaves He cares for, as Bel or Nebo might ; it is sons who look
to Him with moral sympathy, hope and fear that He delights in.
C.
12-20, The blessings of " the Kingdom of God " which form the
ground of the appeal in this Ps. are of the material order as in 144 C.
Its interesting feature is the semi-personification of the Dfi,b§,r, or Word
of Jhvh ; this is represented as an angel, or messenger, which at His
bidding goes forth, sends snow, hoar-frost and ice, and again sends the
soft wind which melts the ice and sets the rivers free. That is, however,
but a subordinate form of the activity of this Word of Jhvh. What is
stiU more august in its working is its communication to Israel of
Jhvh's judgments and statutes. The Law is Jhvh's supreme mani
festation. The Psalmist thinks of it as mediated by His Word;

CXLVIIL 1-11] PSALMS 413
Stephen referred it to an angel (Acts 7""), as did St Paul (Gal. 3'").
The author of the Fourth Gospel, occupying a stiU higher plane of
spiritual thought, says that this " Word of God " became a man, and its
risible envoy from God was John Baptist (1"), (But see Dr Jannari's
Zeitschrift fur neutestamentliche Wissenschaft (Feb. 1901), and
Expository Times, Vol. xm. p, 477,) But the filiation of the N.T.
"Word," on Gen. 1 and incidentally on our Ps. is undoubted.
For snow like wool, cf Martial : —
Aspice quam densum tacitarum vellus aquarum
Defluat in voltus Csesaris inque sinus. Epigram, rv. 3.
On 16 b Hitzig quotes Pliny, Epp. vi, 20, 18 : " omnia alto cinere
tanquam nive obducta."
In 17 6 read with Derenbourg and others maylm yaam6dfl = iAe
waters standfast for ml yaam'd = who will stand ?
PSALM CXLVIIL
1 Praise ye Jhvh. 
Praise ye Jhvh from the heavens:
Praise him in the heights.
2 Praise ye him, aU his angels :
Praise ye him, aU his hosts.
3 Praise ye him, sun and moon :
Praise him, aU ye stars of light.
4 Praise him, ye heavens of heavens.
And ye waters that be above the heavens.
5 Let them praise the name of Jhvh :
For he commanded, and they were created.
6 He hath also stablished them for ever and ever :
He hath made a decree which they shaU not transgress.
7 Praise Jhvh from the earth,
Ye dragons, and aU deeps:
8 Fire, and hail ; snow, and ' vapours"' :
Stormy wind fulfilling his word:
9 Mountains, and aU hiUs :
Fruitful trees, and all cedars:
10 Beasts, and all cattle :
Creeping things, and flying fowl:
11 Kings of the earth, and all peoples:
Princes, and aU judges of the earth:

414 PSALMS [cxl VIII. 12-cxlix. 2
12 Both young men, and maidens :
Old men, and children:
13 Let them praise the name of Jhvh:
For his name alone is exceUent:
His glory is above the earth and heaven.
14 [He also exalteth the horn of his people.
The praise of all his saints:
Of the children of Israel, a people near unto him.]]

Praise ye Jhvh.
This Ps. is an expansion of 103"' ", and gave rise to a yet further
expansion in w- 34-65 of the " Song of the Three Children," the
Benedicite of the Book of Common Prayer. The reason given for
calling on the heavens to praise Jhvh (1-4), and the earth with its
inhabitants (7-12) is given in each case (w. 5 a, 6, 13), The author
repeats the cosmogony of the author of Genesis. He believes in a
plurality of heavens (4 a); in a double division of the element of water,
part being bound in the earthly ocean, and part being set fast in the
domain above the solid and visible vault of the sky. He implies
the same belief in dragons and monsters stiU rebellious at the bottom
of the ocean as meets us in Job, and in Pss. 8 and 74. (Baethgen
indeed says of v. 7 that the tannlnlm are personified water-spouts
as the paraUel word deeps shows. But this argument is perverse.
What should be said is that t'h6m6th is not deeps, but monsters of the
deep (Babylonian Tifi,m4t), and that, therefore, tannlnlm are dragons
and not water-spouts.) The Psalmist holds that Jhvh, being Nature's
Lord, is Lord also of aU men, and not merely of the Jews {v. 11),
In V. 6 read 16 vayyaabfidii, they shall not transgress, for 16 yaabdd,
if shall not pass. In 8 vapour is less likely than ice. The LXX give
krustalhs, and as the writer is grouping the more abnormal and striking
phenomena of nature, cloud is a less likely companion of lightning, hail,
snow and storm than ice.
Verse 14 is an added gloss after the spirit of Ps. 149.

PSALM CXLIX.
1 Praise ye Jhvh.
Sing unto Jhvh a new song:
Praise him in the congregation of saints.
2 Let Israel rejoice in him that made him :
Let the children of Zion be joyful in their King.

CXLIX. 3-9] PSALMS 415
3 Let them praise his name in the dance :
Let them sing praises unto him with the timbrel and harp.
4 For Jhvh taketh pleasure in his people :
He will beautify the meek with salvation.
5 Let the saints be joyful in glory :
Let them sing aloud '"upon their beds.'
6 Let the hmighty doings-l of God be in their mouth.
And a twoedged sword in their hand:
7 To execute vengeance upon the nations.
And punishments upon the peoples :
8 To bind their kings with chains.
And their nobles with fetters of iron:
9 To execute upon them the judgment written :
This honour have all his saints.

Praise ye Jhvh.
A song of the Chasldim, perhaps by the same author as 1 Mace.
(Duhm), belonging to the days of John Hyrcanus (Olshausen), or
Aristobulus (Hitzig), certainly to Maccabean times. Its latter part
is of a martial spirit — "not of the spirit of Him who said that His
kingdom was not of this world " (Baethgen). This is true, but not the
whole truth. The value of the Ps. lies in the witness it bears to
the strong Apocal)?ptic character of its age. The victory with which
Jhvh had lately "beautified" the meek (anl,vim) was a pledge and
foretaste of the final world-judgment which was to usher in the
Messianic age. This was not yet conceived of apparently as a supra-
natural age — and so far the Ps, is eschatological rather than properly
apocalyptic — but as one which would be a continuation of this age.
The Psalmist's eye, however, does not travel beyond the initiating
world-judgment. He and his feUows will have the high honour of
slaying, or fettering, the mighty ones of the earth, of wielding the
many-edged sword of Dirine judgment — the sword which (by mixture
of an earlier and a later conception, of victory and of judgment) is
placed by the N.T. Apocalyptic writer in the mouth of Messiah
(Rev. 1'"). That judgment too was predestined, written in the heavenly
books, as every human change and chance were written. This belief
in a predestined course of affairs was the support of apocalyptic circles
in those dark two or three centuries which preceded the extinction of
Israel as a nation by Titus and finaUy by Hadrian. The judgment
was predestined, so was the Messiah, and the subsequent and abiding
bliss of the chasidim of Jhvh. It was the fact that the judgment was
written {v. 9) which gave apocalyptic faith its support and tenacity of
fibre.

416 PSALMS [CXLIX.
1. HaUelujah is a liturgical preface.
lb. A new song because of a new occasion for rejoicing, not
necessarily a song new in idea or phrase (33", 40", 96', 98', Is. 42",
Judith 16'", Rev. 5").
1 c. The precise translation of the whole Ps. demands the slight
change here made. The assembly of the saints, k'hal chasldim = the
synagogue ofthe Hasidseans (I Mace, 2^).
2. That made him, not perhaps a reference to the general creation,
but to the special creation of Israel as a people of pecuUar possession
(Is. 44', 51'"). In their King = JE.Yii, as in 1 Sam, 8'.
4 b. To adorn is a favourite image in Is. 60''' "' '", 61".
The meek = ant'vim are those who bear their troubles, and wait
patiently for Jhvh's deliverance. Both this term and that of chasidlm
have departed from their earlier purity in this Ps. and regained it in
the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth.
5 b. What this means I do not know. Lamentations are changed
into rejoicing (Delitzsch) ; rest at home instead of watchfulness in the
camp (Hitzig) ; the rejoicing of the day carried over into the night
(Duhm), have aU been suggested. The parallelism requires some generic
analogy to the glory oi 5 a, perhaps the Shekinah.
6 = 2 Mace. 15"'- A favourite text with Fifth Monarchy men.
Rom'moth occurs also in 118'" = w'c^orwsa,
7, 8, 9 form a complex subject to the final verb. To execute the
Messianic vengeance, to bind the magnates of the earth, and to execute
the predestinated judgment, that is the honour reserved for the
chasidlm. But it is an honour gained by a humility which has lost
itseU in ecclesiastical pride, and reminds us of the humihty of the
fisherman now disguised under the official garb of the servus servorum
Dei. The. following passage from the Book of Jubilees will serve to
iUustrate the extent to which the idea of predestination prevailed in
the Apocalyptic period : —
"And the judgment of all is ordained and written on the heavenly
tables in righteousness— even (the judgment of) all who depart from
the path which is ordained for them to walk in ; and if they walk not
therein, judgment is written down for every creature and for every
kind. And there is nothing in heaven or on earth, or in light or in
darkness, or in Sheol or in the depth, or in the place of darkness (which
is not judged) ; and aU their judgments are ordained and written and
engraved." (Book of JubUees, edited by Charles, 1902.)
Daniel too speaks of the " book of truth " (10") and of " the book "
simply in 12 '.

CL. 1-6] PSALMS 417
PSALM CL.
1 Praise ye Jhvh.

Praise God in his sanctuary:
Praise him in the firmament of his power.
2 Praise him for his mighty acts :
Praise him according to his excellent greatness.
3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet :
Praise him with the psaltery and harp.
4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance :
Praise him with stringed instruments and organs.
5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals :
Praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.
6 Let every thing that hath breath praise Jhvh.

Praise te Jhvh.
The HaUelujah of the Psalter, and the compendium of Ps. 148.
The writer calls on his fellows to praise Jhvh in His sanctuary— whether
that is heaven (Duhm), or the Temple in Jerusalem (Delitzsch"), or both
(Baethgen). "Those whom he calls upon are the priests (with thef
trumpets) ; the Levitical choir (with lyre and cittern) ; the women
(with timbrel or hand-drum), and the rest of the laity with stringed
instruments and flutes, to which are added two kinds of cymbals, whose
difference is unknown, — they may be castanets, and bronze discs, which
were struck together to mark time.
The last verse is a fitting close to the whole Psalter in its call, not
to priests, Lerites or Israelites in general, but to all the heathen, to aU
that draw breath, to praise Jhvh.

For Jhvh is good and His lovingkindness is for ever.

0. 27

INDEX.

Advocate 35, 315, 401
Aiiba, Eabbi 145, 271
Alexander Jannseus 4, 21, 46, 56, 176,
180, 247, 259, 264, 266
Angels 226, 228, 257, 291
Animism 257, 364
ABtioobus IV. 231
„ Epiphanes 131, 200, 201,
221, 222, 224, 262, 370
„ the Great 226, 236
„ Sidetes 368
Apostates 33, 281
Appendixes Euphemistic Liturgical 5,
7, 15, 28, 31, 48, 53, 78, 82, 88,
98, 150, 219, 295, 311
Aristobulus 1, 4
Ark 170, 217, 278, 381, 382
Arnold, Matthew 29, 121, 265, 359,
369
Ascents, Songs of 361
Augustine, St 89
Baruch, Book of 305, 405
Book of the Dead 1
Browning, B, 32
Bull 382
CsBsar, Julius 197
Calumny. See Perjury
Canaan 21, 37, 73, 121, 123, 126, 133,
166, 181, 249, 270, 281, 300, 306,
322
Captivity, to turn the 31, 221, 236
Charles, E, H, 12, 21
GhMd, Chesed 8, 36, 37, 40, 48, 72,
77, 84, 94, 104, 105, 109, 124, 127,
137, 142, 149, 150, 154, 160, 163,
186, 198, 200, 258, 259, 260, 265,
274, 283, 365, 403, 405, 415, 416
Cherubim 47, 62, 221, 277
Chesed (lovingkindness). See Chasid
Children 374
Christianity and the O.T. 2, 6, 33, 34,
35, 41, 56, 79, 80, 88, 90, 98, 129,

161, 168, 186, 187, 233, 255, 314 f.,
399, 409, 410
Cicero 10
Commandments 52, 323, 352, 354, 361
(see also Decalogue)
Dances, EeligiouB 336 f.
Dead, cult of 51, 306, 373
Death, Shadow of 67, 310
Decalogue 1, 52, 69, 141, 143, 215 (see
also Commandments)
Deissmann 27
Dispersion, Jews of 77, 136, 160, 192,
233, 234, 240, 241, 280, 306, 310,
366, 412
Double-minded 239, 283, 299, 358, 370
Dove, symbol of Israel 182, 201
filchal 166 (see also KShal)
fildhar 200 (see also Kahal)
Edom 121, 127, 165, 230, 320, 390, 391
Egypt 102, 129, 174, 183, 201, 217,
222, 225, 248, 262, 300, 304
Eleazar, Eabbi 33
Elohim 16, 81, 129 f,, 151, 161, 188,
227 (see also Angels)
El-Shaddai 52, 182, 256
Endor 231
Enoch, Book of 4, 94, 227, 412
Essenes 34
Ever for 121, 130
Evil, problem of 83, 108, 114, 120,
137 f,, 248, 265, 356
Evolution 253, 370
Paith 93, 287, 333
Fetishism 329
Fortune 88, 168, 203
Genesis 16, 51, 201, 294
Glory = soul 15, 37, 63, 85, 159, 290
Glosses 5, 90, 157, 174, 182, 236, 241,
252, 254, 260, 265, 288, 291, 294,
310, 315, 414

INDEX

419

God, the living 123
God as Eeality 357 f.
Gods. See Angels
Haggadah 215, 216, 291, 881
Hallel, The 325, 861
,, The Greek 409
Hebrew religion, character of 15, 30,
109, 304, 376
Herbert, George 358
Holy One of Israel 191
Horace 287
Horn 203, 260
Huxley 395
Hypocrite 101
"I" in Psalter 36, 38, 64, 67, 88,
105, 156, 204, 207, 243, 282, 290,
291 337 364 377
Idolatry 171, 224, 268, 273, 306, 328
Immortality 12, 38, 41, 84, 114, 139,
195, 243, 286 (see also Shedl)
Inspiration 65, 190
Ismael, Eabbi 2
Jacob, Eabbi 116
Jeremiah 87, 118
Jews. See Dispersion
,, Alexandrian 363
Jhvh, Angel of 96, 147, 403
,, as Covenant God (see Chasid)
„ as Creator 68, 93, 133, 183, 209,
225, 248, 261, 268, 294, 295,
320, 327, 865
„ Euphemisms for 97, 269 f.
„ Face of 77, 97, 121, 128, 146
„ Fear of 2, 52, 97, 322, 375
,, Fearers of (see Proselytes)
„ Guests of 9, 32, 104, 174, 256
„ as King 261, 291
„ the Mighty One 381
,, in Nature 17, 51, 273, 868
,, Bighteousness of 10, 25, 34, 105,
119, 148, 169, 174, 190, 286,
237, 275, 316, 828, 832, 360,
403
„ as the Book 42, 79, 203, 250,
357
,, root meaning of 47
„ Saba&th 69, 163, 222, 412
,, seekers of 231, 299, 354
,, Servant of 61, 65, 247, 825,
383, 367
,, transcendence of 200, 205, 208,
234, 268, 277, 278, 285, 398
,, as tribal God 12, 270
„ Voice of 81, 142, 279
,, waiters ou 108
„ Word of 98, 412 f.
John Hyrcanus 77, 127, 160, 165, 176,

182, 219, 264, 277, 819, 368, 392,
397, 415
Jonathan Maccabteus 48, 181, 187, 277,
282, 286, 318, 352
Josephus 84
Jubilees, Book of 215, 416
Judas Maccabseus 83, 126, 181, 183,
202, 204, 262, 272, 275, 278, 318, 381
Judgments 33, 52, 93, 104, 109, 136,
203, 299, 352
Kahal 63, 248 (see also Echal)
Kant 16, 18, 50
Khayyam, Omar 10, 170, 253, 271, 291,
365
Kingdom of God. See Messianism
Leprosy 88, 112, 146, 242
Levi, Eabbi 169
Liddon, Dr 353
Life 97, 105, 157, 333, 376
Luther 28, 131, 377, 378
Maccabees 8, 24, 126, 127, 163, 176,
200, 205, 206, 219, 259, 277, 283,
286, 299, 337, 415
Man's littleness 16, 286
Martial 413
Meek 26, 46, 68, 73, 96, 97, 120, 187,
192, 193, 228, 325, 368, 398, 416
(see Poor and needy)
Melchizedek 240, 277, 320
Mercy and Truth 26, 80, 104, 119,
124, 145, 200, 236, 248, 259, 275,
280, 402 (see also Chasid)
Mesha 46
Messiah 3, 5, 55, 65, 167, 222, 247,
270, 275, 339, 360, 381, 415
Messianism, Messianic age, &a. 2, 4,
37, 46, 64, 108, 177, 192, 193, 197,
206, 271, 277, 318, 320, 367, 371,
405, 408, 412, 415, 416
Midrash 27, 269^ 298, 304
Milton 159
Miracles 359
Moses, Assumption of 820
Most High 132, 138, 156, 158, 196,
206, 225, 256, 305, 320
Muirhead 36
Mysticism 129
Ndhhal 29 f., 150, 201
Name, The 16, 81, 84, 88, 151, 219,
258, 274, 326, 364
Neighbour 33, 266
Oil 66, 130, 295, 316, 883
Onias III. 123, 149
Oracle 79, 103, 165, 182, 288, 318
Ovid 123

420

INDEX

Pantheism 865
Parable 138, 214, 215
Peace 73, 97, 109, 110, 187, 193, 226,
237, 265, 332, 376
Perjury 77, 101, 171, 172, 186, 397
Persia and Judaism 412
Pharisees 2, 30, 40, 75, 198, 397
Pious. See Meek
Pliny 418
Pompey 329
Poor and needy. See Meek and Pious
Precepts 52, 352
Predestination 415
Priests, blessing of 7, 177, 291
Prophecy, character of 65, 186
Proselytes 77, 91, 324, 329
Proud, See Ungodly
Psalms, Alphabetical 20, 71, 96, 107,
321, 322, 350, 407
Psalms, Imprecatory 79, 161, 187, 314,
391, 402
Psalms, mosaic 93, 238, 272, 386, 388,
402, 405, 410, 411
Psalms, Penitential 12, 89, 111, 144,
285, 377, 402
Psalms of Solomon 4, 22, 23, 87, 48,
79, 80, 222, 247, 268, 319
Psalmists and Prophets 407 f.
Psychology, Biblical 879
Ptolemy 123, 129, 226
Qina-strophe 52, 282
Quiet in the land 101
Bamses II. 45, 47
Eevelation 360
Righteousness 69, 93, 102, 287
Sacrifice 8, 118, 141, 142, 152, 174,
177, 187, 280, 333, 338, 373
Sadducees 2, 30, 151, 158, 160, 197,
259, 260, 264, 265, 281, 283, 360,
397
Salvation 7, 100, 177, 236, 274, 275
Samaritans 31, 37, 88, 203, 214, 216
Scripture, meanings of 354
Selah 7
Shalmaneser II. 45
Shechinah 12, 236, 266
Shemaiah, Eabbi 109
She61, 12, 87, 78, 79, 84, 139, 155,
395 (see also Immortality)
" " J=King 67

Shimeon, Eabbi 101, 230
Sh'moneh Esreh 408
Simon Maccabseus 46, 49, 56, 77, 181,
277, 286, 318, 381
Simple, The 332, 402
Sin 90, 112, 145, 147, 163, 305, 311
Sin (moon-god) 257
Son of God 5, 249
Son of Man 18, 271
Song, A New 93, 118, 275, 416
Soul 290, 378 (see also Glory)
Spencer, Herbert 12
Spirit, Holy 147, 403
Stranger 116, 152, 354
Sybillines 4
Syria 231, 273, 337
Talmud 10, 85, 97, 138, 142, 146,
155, 193, 253, 291
Temple 10, 32, 41, 53, 68, 75, 83, 98,
118, 123, 124, 134, 147, 148, 154,
166, 170, 173, 174, 181, 197, 200,
224, 233, 235, 261, 264, 270, 275,
278, 280, 322, 332, 333, 336, 861
Temple, Music iu the 93, 100, 336
Tennyson 28, 287
Testimony 52, 73, 262, 852, 360, 367
Tiamat 16, 94, 201, 414
Toldoth Jesu 139
Torah 2, 33, 52, 78, 200, 201, 215,
323, 351, 852
Trees, Worship of 389
Ungodly 2, 22, 38, 103, 105, 115, 124,
196, 260, 324, 355
UniversaHsm 134, 163, 172, 173, 174,
183, 334
Urim and Thummim 124
Usury 84
Vergil 154, 274, 376, 405
Yows 84, 332
TVay, The 72, 104, 109, 147, 178, 286,
358
Wife, position of 875
Wisdom 93, 104, 108, 141, 148, 168,
242, 252, 259, 290, 310
Zephaniah 280
Zion 6, 54, 69, 128, 135 f., 136, 142,
182, 205, 240, 241, 278, 288, 364,
366, 370

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