ŠĻą”±į>ž’ x z ž’’’c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w ’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’ģ„Į#` šæ5„bjbj\.\. 4Š>D>D¾ķ’’’’’’¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤øœ œ œ œ $Ą ¤ø¶pppppKKK‡‰‰‰‰‰‰$Fh®‚­¤KKKKK­¤¤ppŪJkkkK¤p¤p‡kK‡kk¤¤kpd ąĮŖŪ‡Ēœ [k‡`0k0k0k0¤kKKkKKKKK­­kKKKKKKKøøøäœ øøøœ øøø¤¤¤¤¤¤’’’’ COMMENTARY THE BOOK OF PSALMS BY JOHN CALVIN TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL LATIN, AND COLLATED WITH THE AUTHOR'S FRENCH VERSION, BY THE REV. JAMES ANDERSON VOLUME THIED BAKER BOOK HOUSE Grand Rapids, Michigan COMMENTARY THE BOOK OP" PSALMS. PSALM LXVII. The following psalm contains a prayer for a blessing upon the Church, that besides being preserved in a state of safety in Judea, it might be enlarged to a new and unprecedented extent. It touches shortly upon the kingdom of God, which was to be erected in the world upon the coming of Christ.1 T To the chief musician on Neginoth. A psalm or song. 1. God be merciful unto us, and bless us; and cause his face to shine upon us. iSelah? 1 With this agrees the opinion of the ancient Jews, who apply this psalm to future times, to the world to come, the times of the Messiah. The particular time and occasion of its composition can only be conjectured. Bishop Patrick thinks that it was probably composed by David, when, having brought the ark to Jerusalem and offered sacrifices, as promised in the psalm foregoing, verse 15, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord of Hosts, (2 Sam. vi. 17, 18.) Horsley views it as " a hymn for the feast of tabernacles, prophetic of a general conversion of the world to the worship of God." Calmet is of opinion that the composition of this, as well as of the two preceding psalms, was posterior to the return of the Jews from Babylon ; and that the particular occasion was the restoration of fertility to the soil after the protracted drought and scarcity recorded by the prophet Haggai, (chap. i. 10,11; ii. 17-19.) But though the particular time and occasion on which it was written cannot with certainty be determined, it is evidently a prayer of the ancient Church for the appearance of the Messiah, and the universal diffusion of his gospel. 3 This verse contains a manifest allusion to the blessings which the priests were taught to pronounce upon the people of Israel, (Num. vi. 24-26.) COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVII. 2. That they may know thy way upon the earth, thy salvation among all nations. 3. Let the people praise thee, 0 God! let all the people praise thee. 4. Let the nations beglad, and shout for joy; forhe shall judge the people righteously, and thou shalt govern the nations upon earth. ISelah. 5. Let the people praise thee, 0 God! let all the people praise 6, The earth has given its increase; and God, even our own God, will bless us. 7. God shall bless us,1 and all ends of the earth shall fear him. 1. God be merciful unto us, and bless us. The psalm contains a prediction of Christ's kingdom, under which the whole world was to be adopted into a privileged relationship with God; but the Psalmist begins by praying for the Divine blessing, particularly upon the Jews. They were the first-born, (Exod. iv. 22,) and the blessing was to terminate upon them first, and then go out to all the surrounding nations. I have used the imperativemood throughout thepsalm, as othertranslators have done, although the future tense, which is that employed in the Hebrew, would suit sufficiently well, and the passage might be understood as encouraging the minds of the Lord's people to trust in the continuance and increase of the Divine favour. The words, however, are generally construed in the form of a prayer, and I merely threw out this as a suggestion. Speaking, as the Psalmist does, of those who belonged to the Church of God, and not of those who were without, it is noticeable that yet he traces all the blessings they received to God's free favour; and from this we may learn, that so long as we are here, we owe our happiness, our success, and prosperity, entirely to the same cause. This being the case, how shall any think to anticipate his goodness by merits of their own ? The light of God's countenance may refer either to the sense of his love shed abroad in our hearts, or to the actual manifestation of it without, as, on the other hand, his face may be said to 1 God, even our own God, will bless us, God shall bless us. There is here again clearly an allusion to the formula of blessing in Numbers vi. 24-26, where the name of God is, as here, repeated three times in succession. PSALM LXVII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 3 be clouded, when he strikes terrors into our conscience on account of our sins, or withdraws the outward marks of his favour. 2. That they may know thy way upon the earth. Here we have a clear prophecy of that extension of the grace of God by which the Gentiles were united into one body with the posterity of Abraham. The Psalmist prays for some conspicuous proof of favour to be shown his chosen people, which might attract the Gentiles to seek participation in the same blessed hope.1 By the way of God is meant his covenant, which is the source or spring of salvation, and by which he discovered himself in the character of a Father to his ancient people, and afterwards more clearly under the Gospel, when the Spirit of adoption was shed abroad in greater abundance.3 Accordingly, we find Christ himself saying, (John xvii. 3,) il This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God," &c. 3. Let the people praise thee, O God! Having spoken of all nations participating in the saving knowledge of God, he next tells us that they would proclaim his goodness, and exhorts them to the exercise of gratitude. The repetition used clearly shows of itself that he alludes to an event of a new and unprecedented kind. Had the allusion been to some such manifestation of his favour as he ordinarily made to the Jews, we would not have looked for the same vehe-mency of expression. First he says, Let the people praise thee; then he adds, Let all the people praise thee. Afterwards he repeats the exclamation once more. But he appropriately makes mention, between, of rejoicing, and the occasion there was for it, since it is impossible that we can 1 " A fin qne par la clarte d'icelle les Gentils soyent amenez a la participation de la mesme esperance."—Fr. 2 " The petition here offered is, that the Gospel, God's ' way,' might be universally spread;—a prayer that is not yet accomplished, but is in progress towards completion. The mention of nations and peoples, all of them, intimates, that the time which is the object of supplication is the time when God will no longer be the God of the Jews, but of the Gentiles also."— Watford. 4 COMMENTARY UPON l'SALM LXVIIf. praise God aright, unless our minds be tranquil and cheerful -. unless, as persons reconciled to God, we are animated with the hope of salvation, and " the peace of God, which passeth all understanding," reign in our hearts, (Philipp. iv. 7.) The cause assigned for joy plainly in itself points to the event of the calling of the Gentiles. The reference is not to that government of God which is general in its nature, but to that special and spiritual jurisdiction which he exercises over the Church, in which he cannot properly be said to govern any but such as he has gathered under his sway by the doctrine of his law. The word righteousness is inserted in commendation of his government. Language almost, identical is used by Isaiah and Micah when they speak of the times in which the word of salvation would be diffused throughout all the earth, (Isa. xi. 4; Micah iv. 3.) 6. Tlie earth has given its increase. Mention having been made of the principal act of the Divine favour, notice is next taken of the temporal blessings which he confers upon his children, that they may have everything necessary to complete their happiness. And here it is to be remembered, that every benefit which God bestowed upon his ancient people was, as it were, a light held out before the eyes of the world, to attract the attention of the nations to him. From this the Psalmist argues, that should God liberally supply the wants of his people, the consequence would be, to increase the fear of his name, since all ends of the earth would, by what they saw of his fatherly regard to his own, submit themselves with greater cheerfulness to his government. PSALM LXVIII. In this psalm it was David's design to celebrate the victories which, through the blessing of God, he had gained over his enemies;l but, 1 As to the time and occasion of the composition of this psalm, the majority of interpreters refer it to the translation of the ark from the house of LXVI1I, THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 5 in the opening verses, he commends the power and goodness of God generally, as seen in the government of the world at large. Prom this he passes to the consideration of what God had done in redeeming his chosen people, and of the continued proofs of fatherly care which he had manifested to the posterity of Abraham. He then proceeds to the subject which he had more particularly in view, prosecuting it at length, and in terms of the most exalted description; praising the signal display of Divine power which he, and the whole nation with him, had experienced. Now that he had been made king, he infers that the Church was brought to a settled condition, and that God, who seemed to have departed, would now at length erect his throne, as it were, in the midst of it, and reign. la this it would evidently appear, that he designed, typically, to represent the glory of God afterwards to be manifested in Christ. T To the chief musician. A psalm or song of David. 1. God shall arise : his enemies shall be scattered ; and they who hate him shall fiee before him. 2. As smoke is driven away, thou shalt drive them away; as Obed-Edom to Mount Zion, and with this every part of it would, no doubt, harmonize. But other critics, as Drs Geddes, Boothroyd, and Morrison, think (and Calvin's opinion seems to be the same) that it was penned after some great victory; probably after David's signal victory over the Ammonites and Syrians, when the ark was brought back in triumph to Jerusalem, (1 Chron. xix. 10-19.) That the ark accompanied the army in those wars we learn from the words of Uriah to David, in 2 Sam. xi. 11, compared with ch. xii. 31. As every thing under that dispensation was typical or prophetical, it is very natural to regard the triumphant manner in which the ark ascended the holy mountain, as an emblem of the far more triumphant and glorious ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ (of whom the ark, and the tabernacle, and the temple itself, were all figures) to the highest heavens, after he had overcome his own and his people's enemies; and in this application the 18th verse of this psalm is quoted by the Apostle Paul, (Eph. iv. 8, 9.) This inspired composition, though highly sublime and beautiful, is universally acknowledged by critics to be of very difficult interpretation. Dr Adam Clarke pronounces it " the most difficult psalm in the whole Psalter;" and, after quoting the words of Simon de Muis,—who observes, that " it may not be improperly termed the torture of critics, and the reproach of commentators,"—he says, " There are customs here referred to, which I do not fully understand: there are words whose meaning I cannot, to my own satisfaction, ascertain; and allusions which are to me inexplicable. Yet of the composition itself I have the highest opinion:— it is sublime beyond all comparison;—it is constructed with an art truly admirable;—it possesses all the dignity of the sacred language;—none but David could have composed it; and, at this lapse of time, it would require no small influence of the Spirit that was upon him to give it* true interpretation." 6 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM .LXVIII. wax inelteth be/ore the fire, the wicked shall perish from the presence of God. 3. But the righteous shall be glad; they shall rejoice before God, and leap for exultation. 4. Sing unto God, sing praises to his name : exalt Mm that rideth upon the clouds in Jah,1 his name, [or, in his name Jah,] and rejoice before him. 5. A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, is God in the habitation of his holiness. 6. God who setteth the solitary in families, who bringeth out those who are bound with chains ;2 but the rebellious shall dwell in a dry land. 1. God shall arise: his enemies shall be scattered. In this verse the Psalmist intimates, as it were by way of preface, the subject which he proposed to treat in the psalm, and  %which related to the truth that God, however long he may seem to connive at the audacity and cruelty of the enemies of his Church, will eventually arise to avenge it, and will prove himself able to protect it by the mere forth-putting of his hand. I agree with other interpreters in thinking that the sentiment is borrowed from Moses, (Num. x. 35.3) There can be little doubt that in dictating the form of prayer there 1 " C'est, Qui est Jah, ou l'Etemel ? "—Fr. marg. " That is, Who is Jah, or Jehovah ? " Jah seems simply a contraction of the word Jehovah, the name which expresses, as far as can be expressed by words, the essence, self-existence, and eternity of the Supreme Being. 2 The original word ni"lK>'O3> bakosharoth, which Calvin renders, with chains, is rendered by Dathe, ad abundantiarn; and by Berlin, ad opimi-tates; and is explained by Simeon, in his Lexicon, as "loca omnibus affluentia proprie abundantise." According to Gesenius, mK>13 denotes " happiness, abundance, prosperity." The LXX. render it h uul^sicf, in strength, i. e., bound firmly. Fry reads, " Bringing forth prisoners into scenes of plenty." 3 That passage contains the words which Moses used when the ark began a procession. Whenever the tabernacle was moved, and the Le-vites marched onward, bearing upon their shoulders the ark of the covenant, and the whole host of Israel proceeded on their march, "Moses said, Rise up, Lord," &c. Martin observes, that "the God whom these opening words of the psalm have in view is manifestly the same of whom it is said in verse 18, that he ascended up on high, and led captivity captive. Now he of whom that is said, being, according to the interpretation of the Apostle Paul, (Kph. iv. 8,) Jesus Christ, the Son of God, it clearly follows that it was the Son of God, the true God, Jehovah the eternal God, whom the Prophet had in his eye in the first verse and in the rest of the psalm." See Appendix. rSALll LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 7 referred to, he had an eye to the instruction and comfort of all succeeding ages, and would teach the Lord's people confidently to rely for safety upon the ark of the covenant, which was the visible symbol of the Divine presence. We may notice this difference, however, that Moses addressed the words to God as a prayer, while David rather expresses his satisfaction and delight in what he saw daily fulfilling before his own eyes. Some indeed read, Let God arise; but they appear to misapprehend the scope of the Psalmist. He means to say that observation attested the truth which Moses had declared of God's needing only to rise up that all his enemies might be scattered before his irresistible power. Yet I see no objections to the other reading, provided the idea now mentioned be retained, and the words be considered as intimating that God needs no array of preparation in overthrowing his enemies, and can dissipate them with a breath. We are left to infer, that Avhen his enemies at any time obtain an ascendancy, it is owing to an exercise of Divine forbearance, and that rage as they may, it is only with his permission; the time being not yet come for his rising. There is much comfort to be derived from the circumstance, that those who persecute the Church are here spoken of as God's enemies. When he undertakes our defence, he looks upon the injuries done to us as dishonours cast upon his Divine Majesty. The Psalmist adds a striking figure to illustrate how easily God can overthrow the machinations of our enemies, comparing them to smoke which vanishes ichen blown upon by the wind, or wax which melts before the fire.1 We consider it utterly incredible that such a formidable array of opposition should be made to disappear in a moment. But the Spirit takes this method of chiding the fearfulness of our carnal minds, and teaching us that there is no such strength in our enemies as we suppose,—that we allow the smoke of them to blind our eyes, and the solid mass of resistance which they present to deceive us into a forgetfulness of the truth, that the mountains themselves flow down at the presence of the Lord.2 1 As wax melteth before the fire, " a proverbial expression, denoting speedy dissolution, consumption, and death."—Bythner. 2 " Sed quasi fumo hebetari nostros oculos; falli etiam nos in ipsa 8 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII. 3. But the righteous shall be glad. It is here intimated by David, that when God shows himself formidable to the wicked, this is with the design of securing the deliverance of his Church. He would seem indirectly to contrast the joy of which he now speaks with the depression and grief felt by well-affected men under the reign of Saul—suggesting, that God succeeds a season of temporary trouble with returns of comfort, to prevent his people from being overwhelmed by despondency. He leaves us also to infer, that one reason of that joy which they experience is derived from knowing that God is propitious to them, and interests himself in their safety. The Hebrew words, sfet2) mipne, and ^Sh, Hphne, admit of the same meaning; but I think that the Psalmist intended to note a distinction. The wicked flee from the presence of God, aswhat inspires them with terror; the righteous again rejoice in it, because nothing-delights them more than to think that God is near them. When commenting upon the passage, Ps. xviii. 26, we saw why the Divine presence terrifies some and comforts others; for •' with the pure he will show himself pure, and with the froward he will show himself froward." One expression is heaped by the Psalmist upon another, to show how great the joy of the Lord's people is, and how entirely it possesses and occupies their affections. 4. Sing unto God, sing praises to his name: exalt him} that rideth, fyc. He now proceeds to call upon the Lord's people tlnritie, quia non reputamus solo Dei conspectu liquefleri montes ipsos."— Lot. " Mais qu'il y a comme une fum^e qu'il nous esbloiiist les yeux; semblablement que nous nous abusons quant a leur durete et obstination; ponrce que nous ne venons point a considerer qu'au seul regard de Dieu les montagnes mesmes fondent et s'ecoulent.'1—Fr. 1 The reading of the Septuagint is, 'Olcnroifoxre, " Make -way." The Hebrew word i^Di sollu, has this sense, as well as that of exalt. In two passages in Isaiah, the forms of expression are very like the present passage, (ch. lvii. 14,) "Cast ye up, east ye up, prepare the way;" and (ch. lxii. 10,) " Cast up, cast up the highway." Jerome has, " Praeparate viam," "Prepare ye a way." Walford adopts the same translation,— "Prepare a way for him who rideth through the deserts,"—which he explains in the following note: " The imagery is borrowed from the custom of Eastern princes, who sent pioneers before their armies, to reduce the hills, and cany raised roads through the valleys, to facilitate their progress. God is described as riding through the deserts, from his having accompanied Israel through the wilderness, to conduct them to Canaan." TSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 9 to praise God. And he begins by pointing out the grounds in general, as I have already hinted, which they have for this exercise, because he comprehends the whole world under his power and government, adding, that he condescends to take the poorest and the most wretched of our family under his protection. His infinite power is commended, when it is said that he rides upon the clouds, or the heavens,1 for this proves that he sits superior over all things. The Holy Spirit may signify by the expression, that we should exclude from our minds every thing gross and earthly in the conceptions we form of him ; but he would, doubtless, impress us chiefly with an idea of his great power, to produce in us a due reverence, and make us feel how far short all our praises must come of his glory. We would attempt in vain to comprehend heaven and earth; but his glory is greater than both. As to the expression which follows, in Jah, his name, there has been some difference of opinion. The Hebrew preposition %, beth, may here, as sometimes it is, be a mere expletive, and we may read, Jah is his name.2 Others read, in Jah is his name ;3 and 1 The word niail?3i haaraboth, here rendered the clouds, or the heavens, is by the LXX. translated the west, as if it were derived from 3157, ereb, evening; and by the Vulgate, " Super occasum," " Upon the going down of the sun." Others translate it " deserts." Thus, Jerome reads, " ascendent! per deserta," " for him that rideth through the deserts." In this he is followed by Dr Boothroyd, Bishops Lowth and Horsley, Drs Kennicott and Chandler, Fry, and others; but critics of no less note read heavens, as Paginus, Buxtorf, and Hammond. " The feminine nny," says this last critic, " is frequently taken for a plain, and so for the desert; but ni3"IJJi m the plural, is acknowledged by the Hebrews to signify the heavens." The idea is altogether fanciful which has been put forth by some, that this word, which frequently signifies a plain or desert, is applied to the highest heavens, " either as being plain and void of stars, and so a kind of superior desert, without anything in it, or (as the learned Grotius piously conjectures from 1 Tim. vi. 16) because, as a desert, it is ax^oairay, not approached or approachable by any." 2 This is the rendering in all the ancient versions, as the Septuagint, Chaldee, Syriac, Vulgate, &c. Many instances might be produced in which 2 is redundant; as, for example, Exod. xxxii. 22, Prov. iii. 26. 3 This is the translation given by Horsley, who applies the passage to Christ; and his criticism upon it is excellent. "Upon mature consideration," says he, " I am inclined to take the text as it stands, and render it literally with Jerome, ' In Jah is his name ;' i. e., his name, who is riding through the wilderness, is in Jehovah, in the Self-existent One. He who led the armies of Israel through the wilderness, when they first came up from Egypt, was Christ. He who brought the captives home from Babylon was Christ. lie who shall finally bring the revolted Jews 10 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII. I have no objection to this, though I prefer the translation which I have adopted. It is of less consequence how we construe the words, as the meaning of the Psalmist is obvious. The whole world was at that time filled with the vain idols of superstition, and he would assert the claim of God, and set them aside when he brought forward the God of Israel. But it is not enough that the Lord's people should bow before him with suppliant spirits. Even the wicked, while they fear and tremble before him, are forced to yield him reverence. David would have them draw near to him with cheerfulness and alacrity; and, accordingly, proceeds to insist upon his transcendent goodness shown in condescending to the orphans and widows. The incomprehensible glory of God does not induce him to remove himself to a distance from us, or prevent him from stooping to us in our lowest depths of wretchedness. There can be no doubt that orphans and widows are named to indicate in general all such as the world are disposed to overlook as unworthy of their regard. Generally we distribute our attentions where we expect some return. We home to his Church, and, in a literal sense, bring the nation home to its ancient seat, is Christ. Christ, therefore, is intended here, under the image of one riding through the wilderness, (' ascendenti per deserta,' Jerome,) not upon the heavens, at the head of the returning captives. ' His name is in Jah:' Christ's name is in Jehovah. qb>, ' the Name,' is used, in the Hebrew language, for the thing imperfectly apprehended, to which, however, a name belongs. Thus, for God all languages have a name; and all men have an idea of the Being intended by that name, as the First Cause, the Maker, and Governor of the universe. Yet the human intellect,—we may say, more generally, the created intellect,— comprehends not the nature of this Great Being, nor can it enumerate his attributes. ' The name of God' is the incomprehensible Being who is all that the name imports, more than is expressed; more, at least, than any name can express to the finite understanding. Thus, when we are commanded to fear the name of God, the injunction is, that we carry in our minds a constant fear of the Being to whom that name belongs. The name, therefore, of Christ is Christ himself, considered as known by a name, but yet imperfectly understood, or rather incomprehensible in his nature. The sentence, ' His name is in Jehovah,' is an emphatical assertion of his divinity, introduced here to justify and enforce the worship enjoined. ' Sing unto God, sing praises to his name: cast up a way for him that is riding through the wilderness.' Who is he that is riding through the wilderness, that we should pay him this respect ? ' He,' says the Psalmist, ' who cannot be described.' ' His name is in Jah.' His name and his nature are involved in the name and nature of the Godhead. Name him: you name the All-glorious One. Name the All-glorious One: yon name him. Name him as distinct from the All-Good and Glorious: you name him not aright." rSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 11 give the preference to rank and splendour, and despise or neglect the poor. When it is said, God is in the habitation of his holiness, this may refer either to heaven or to the temple, for either sense will suit the connection. God does not dwell in heaven to indulge his own ease, but heaven is, as it were, his throne, from which he judges the world. On the other hand, the fact of his having chosen to take up his residence with men, and inviting them familiarly to himself there, is one well fitted to encourage the poor, who are cheered to think that he is not far off from them. In the next verse, other instances of the Divine goodness are mentioned—that he gives the bereaved and solitary a numerous offspring, and releases the bonds of the captive. In the last clause of the verse, he denounces the judgment of God against those who impiously despise him, and this that he might show the Lord's people the folly of envying their lot, as well as strike terror into their minds. The sense of the words is, That we ought to comfort ourselves under the worst afflictions, by reflecting that we are in God's hand, who can mitigate all our griefs and remove all our burdens. The wicked, on the other hand, may congratulate themselves for a time upon their prosperity, but eventually it will fare ill with them. By dwelling in a dry land, is meant being banished, as it were, to a wilderness, and deprived of the benefits of that fatherly kindness which they had so criminally abused. 7. 0 God! when thouwentest forth before thy people, when thou didst march through the wilderness ; Selah : 8. The earth was moved, the heavens also dropped at the presence of this God : Sinai at the presence of God, the God of Israel.1 9. Thou, 0 God ! shalt make a liberal2 rain to fall upon thine inheritance, and thou refreshest it when it is weary. 10. Thy congregation5 shall dwell therein; thou, 0 God! wilt prepare in thy goodness for the poor. 1 This verse and the preceding seem to be copied from the Song of Deborah, Judges v. 4, 5. 2 " C'est, par ta volonte et liberalite."—Fr. marg. " That is, by thy free will and liberality." 3 Thy congregation, or company. This is the reading adopted also by 12 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVI1I. 7. O God! when thou loentest forth before thy people, Sfc. The Psalmist now proceeds to show that the Divine goodness is principally displayed in the Church, which God has selected as the great theatre where his fatherly care may be manifested. What follows is evidently added with the view of leading the posterity of Abraham, as the Lord's chosen people, to apply the observations which had been just made to themselves. The deliverance from Egypt having been the chief and lasting pledge of the Divine favour, which practically ratified their adoption under the patriarch, he briefly adverts to that event. He would intimate that in that remarkable exodus, proof had been given to all succeeding ages of the love which God entertained for his Church. Why were so many miracles wrought ? why were heaven and earth put into commotion ? why were the mountains made to tremble ? but that all might recognise the power of God as allied with the deliverance of his people. He represents God as having been their leader in conducting them forth. And this not merely in reference to their passage of the Eed Sea, but their journeys so long as they wandered in the wilderness. When he speaks of the earth being moved, he would not seem to allude entirely to what occurred upon the promulgation of the law, but to the fact that, throughout all their progress, the course of nature was repeatedly altered, as if the very elements had trembled at the presence of the Lord. It was upon Mount Sinai, however, that God issued the chief displays of his awful power; it was there that thunders were heard in heaven, and the air was filled with lightnings; and, accordingly, it is mentioned here by name as having presented the most glorious spectacle of the Divine majesty which was ever beheld. Some read, THIS Sinai, &c, connecting the pronoun HTj zeh, with the mountain here named; but it is much more emphatical to join it with the preceding clause, and to read, the heavens dropped at the presence of this God; David Dathe, Berlin, and De Rossi; and it " is a much better exposition than those of the two latest English translators, Bishop Horsley and Mr Pry: ' Thy flocks dwelt in the mansion which thou preparcdst.'  Horsley.  % Thy food settled upon it.' Fry." Ropers' Booh of Psalms in Hebrew, A-t., vol. ii. p. 220. PSALM LXVIII. THE ]JOOK OF PSALMS. 13 meaning to commend the excellency of the God of Israel. The expression is one frequently used by the prophets to denote that the God worshipped by the posterity of Abraham was the true God, and the religion delivered in his law no delusion, as in Isaiah xxv. 9, " This, this is our God, and he will save us." To establish the Lord's people in their faith, David leads them, as it were, into the very presence of God; indicates that they were left to no such vague uncertainties as the heathen; and indirectly censures the folly of the world in forsaking the knowledge of the true God, and fashioning imaginary deities of its own, of wood and stone, of gold and silver. 9. Thou, O God! shalt make a liberal rain to fall * upon thine inheritance. Mention is made here of the continued course of favour which had been extended to the people from the time when they first entered the promised land. It is called the inheritance of God, as having been assigned over to his own children. Others understand by the inheritance spoken of in the verse, the Church, but this is not correct, for it is afterwards stated as being the place where the Church dwelt. The title is appropriately given to the land of Canaan, which God made over to them by right of inheritance. David takes notice of the fact, that, from the first settlement of the seed of Abraham in it, God had never ceased to make the kindest fatherly provision for them, sending his rain in due season to prepare their food. The words translated a liberal rain, read literally in the Hebrew a rain of freenesses, and I agree with interpreters in thinking that he alludes to the blessing as having come in the exercise of free favour,2 and to God, as having of his own unprompted goodness provided for all the wants of his people. Some read a desirable rain; others, a rain flowing without violence, or gentle ; but neither of these renderings seems eligible. Others read a copious or plentiful rain; but I have already stated what appears to 1 Heb. Shall shake out, i. e., from the clouds, a liberal rain. 2 Ainsworth reads, " a rain of liberalities." Horsley, " a shower of unmerited kindnesses;" " literally," says he, " a plentiful rain, rain being used here metaphorically." 14 COMMENTAEY UPON PSALM LXVIII. me to be the preferable sense. It was a proof, then, of his Divine liberality, that God watered the land seasonably with showers. There is clearly a reference to the site of Judea, which owed its fertility to dews and the rains of heaven. In allusion to the same circumstance, he speaks of its being refreshed when weary. The reason is assigned—because it had been given to his chosen people to dwell in. On no other account was it blessed, than as being the habitation of God's Church and people. The more to impress upon the minds of the Jews their obligations to Divine goodness, he represents them as pensioners depending upon God for their daily food. He fed them upon the finest of the wheat, giving them wine, and honey, and oil in abundance—still he proportioned the communication of his kindness so as to keep them always dependent in expectation upon himself. Some, instead of reading, Thou wilt prepare with thy goodness, &fc, render it, Thou wilt prepare with rich food; but, without absolutely objecting to this translation, I rather think that he adverts to the circumstance of God's being led to provide for his people entirely by his own good pleasure. 11. The1 Lord shall give the word to the women who announce the great army.2 12. Kings of armies shall flee—shall flee ; and she that tarries at home shall divide the spoil. 13. Though you should lie among the pots, yet shall ye be as the 1 Dr Gedcles here observes, that " the poet passes rapidly from former times to his own days, and the occasion of composing his psalm, namely, the discomfiture and flight of the combined kings of Syria, Auimon, Moab, and Edom : for with all these David had been engaged in this war." 2 The original word for "the women who announce" is miB^On, hamebasseroih. It is from -|£O, bisser, " to announce joyous tidings ;" and, being a participle of the feminine gender, is very properly referred to women, who were wont to celebrate victories, or any kind of good news, with songs and music. But we find it on one occasion used to express melancholy news, (1 Sam. iv. 17.) The women here are represented as announcing the victory by singing congratulatory songs. AH the difficulty is, whether nilKOOrii hamebasseroth, be in the dative or the genitive case. If in the genitive case, then }OVi tsaba, which Calvin renders army, must, as Hammond observes, be rendered company—great was the company of the women who thus sang ; and jO„> an host, is often taken for the congregation or assembly employed in the service of God. But it may also be taken in the dative, as the same critic remarks, and as TSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 15 wings of a dove covered with silver, and which behind is of the paleness of gold.1 14. When the Almighty scattered kings in it, thou shalt make it white* in Salmon. 11. The Lord shall give the word, 8fc. David now adverts to the victories by which God had signally displayed his power in behalf of his people. He had himself been the instrument of restoring peace to the country, by putting down its foes, and he had extended the boundaries of the kingdom ; but he ascribes the praise of all that had been done in stratagems and counsels of war to God. In representing God as issuing orders for the song of triumph, he intimates, figuratively, that it is he who determines the successful issue of battles. Notice is taken of the women who announce the army, for it was the custom anciently for women to sing the song of triumph, as Miriam, the sister of Moses, with her companions, sounded the praises of God upon the timbrel, and the women celebrated David's victory upon the harp, when he slew Goliath, and routed the Philistines, (Exod. xv. 20; Judges xii. 34; i Sam. xviii. 6.) In making this reference to a song of praise, the Psalmist, as I have already said, intended to impress the truth upon the people, that the victories gained were entirely owing to God; though, at the same time, he tacitly reminds them of its being their duty to proclaim his benefits with due gratitude. From the verse which succeeds, we are taught that the mightiest preparations which the enemies of the Church may make for its destruction shall be overthrown. We may consider the words as spoken in the person of the Psalmist himself, Calvin here renders it. Castellio gives a similar translation. " And thus the LXX. may be understood: '0 &e6s Kvgio; Idatt piiftu. toi; ibayyihi-axfcei/oic (I suppose it should be ra7; svayye^iirxfiiiaii) Ttvvaftu sroMijj; 'the Lord shall give the word or matter to the women that evangelise to or for the great army;' i. e., which supply the office of preecones thereto, in proclaiming their victories ; though it is certain the Latin that renders it 1 virtute multa,' ' by much virtue,' did not thus understand it."—Hammond. 1 " Et posteriora ejus in pallore auri."—Lot. In the French it is, " Et laquelle par derriere est comme fin or bien jaune;"—" and which behind is as fine yellow gold." 2 " Ou, elle fust blanche."—Fr. marg. " Or, it was white." 1(5 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII, or as forming the song of the women mentioned above. It was a circumstance illustrative of the Divine favour, that the most formidable kings, before whom the Jews could never have stood in their own strength, had been put to flight. That princes, whocould easily have overrun the world with theirforces,should have not only departed without obtaining their purpose, but been forced to fly to a distance, could be accounted for on no other supposition than God's having stood forward signally as their defender. In the Hebrew the verb is repeated, they shall jlee, they shall flee, signifying that the attacks of the enemy had been repelled by Divine assistance once and again. The greatness of the spoil taken is intimated by the circumstance stated, that a share of it would come even to the women who remained at home. While the soldiers would return from battle clothed with the spoils, such would be the quantity of booty taken, that the females, who took no part in war, would partake of it. 13. Though ye should lie among the pots.1 Having spoken 1 The interpretation of this verse is attended with great difficulty. Speaking of it and the following verse, Dr Lowth says, " I am not at all satisfied with any explication I have ever met with of these verses, cither as to sense or construction, and I must give them up as unintelligible to me. Houbigant helps out the construction in his violent method: ' Aut invenit viam, out facit.'" It is pretty generally admitted, that in the first part of this verse a " state of wretchedness and distress," as Calvin remarks, is indicated; but it is difficult to ascertain the meaning of the word OTlSES shephataim, which he renders pots, and, consequently, to ascertain to what the allusion particularly is. None of the old translators have so rendered it; and numerous significations have been given to it. The Chaldee renders it, " bounds in the divisions of the way;" the Syriac and Arabic, " paths" or " ways;" the Sep-tuagint, xXjjjai/, " allotments," " inheritances," or " portions," apparently deriving the word from nSKS divisit, ordinavit, and perhaps attaching to it a similar idea as in the preceding translations, men's portions of land or possessions having been divided and distinguished by patlis. Jerome, adhering to the Septuagint, makes it " inter medios terminos." Thus, the word will not be without significance, expressing a forlorn and wretched condition, lying down betwixt the bounds; that is, in the highways. But many modern critics think that it signifies something in relation to pots, and that it may very probably be the same as that which the Arabs call ifixntf, Atkaphi, stones set in a chimney for a pot to rest on, the pots being without legs. " Of these," says Hammond, " the Arabians had three, and the third being commonly (to them in the desert) some fast piece of a rock, or the like, behind the pot,—as in a chimney the back of the chimney itself, and that not looked on as distinct from PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 17 of God as fighting the battles of his people, he adds, by way of qualification, that they may lie for a time under darkness, though eventually God will appear for their deliverance. There can be little doubt that he hints at the state of wretchedness and distress to which the nation had been reduced under the chimney,—the other two at the sides, which were loose, might fitly be here expressed in the dual number O'nSK'; ai'd tnen tne tying between these will betoken a very low, squalid condition, as in the ashes, or amidst the soot and filth of the chimney." " These two renderings," he adds, " may seem somewhat distant; and yet, considering that the termini or bounds in divisions of ways were but heaps of stones, or broken bricks, or rubbish, the word ”%inSB'i which signifies these, may well signify these supporters of the pots also, in respect of the matter of these being such stones or broken bricks." Parkhurst takes a view somewhat similar to this last interpretation. He reads, "among the fire ranges," or "rows of stones." "Those," says he, " on whicii the caldrons or pots were placed for boiling; somewhat like, I suppose, but of a more durable structure, than those which Niebuhr says are used by the wandering Arabs. ' Their fire-place is soon constructed: they only set their pots upon several separate stones, or over a hole digged in the earth.' Lyinj; among these denotes the most abject slavery; for this seems to have been the place of rest allotted to the vilest slaves. So, old Laertes, grieving for the loss of his son, is described by Homer (in the Eleventh Book of the Odyssey) as, in the winter, sleeping where the slaves did, in the ashes near the fire :— '------'0$/ ifcas; tvi oix.a Ey xovi, oty)ct Tvgof.' " See his Lexicon on naK>, ii. The Chaldee has " broken bricks," or " rubbish," that are thrown away; the word, according to this sense, being derived from rtBB', shephah, to bruise, to trample on. A similar noun, ]-|QE>K, ashpoth, derived from the verb na£S is used in Psalm cxiii. 7, for a dunghill, or the vilest place, whither all ldnds of rubbish are cast out, and where the poor are said to lie. When Job was brought by Satan to the lowest depths of affliction, he sat down among the ashes, and scraped himself with a potsherd, which indicated the state of extreme sadness and debasement to whicii he was reduced. If this is the sense here, " lying among the broken bricks or rubbish" expresses, in like manner as the preceding translations, the most mean, dejected, and wretched condition. Harmer's attempt to explain this passage is at least very ingenious : —As shepherds in the East betake themselves, during the night, for shelter to the caves which they find in their rocky hills, where they can kindle fires to warm themselves, as well-as dress their provisions, and as doves, a3 well as other birds, frequently haunt such places, he conjectures that the afflicted state of Israel in Egypt is here compared to the condition of a dove making its abode in the hollow of a rock which had been smutted by the fires which the shepherds had made in it. He supposes the word here translated pots to mean the little heaps of stones on whicii the shepherds set their pots, there being a hollow under them to contain the fire.—Harmer's Observations, vol. i. pp. 176, 177. Gesenius thinks the word is equivalent to D*nDCDi"l> hammishpethaim, which occurs in Judges v. 16, and which our English version makes 18 COMMENTAKY UPON PSALM LXVI1I. the government of Saul, for the interposition was the more remarkable, considering the misery from which it had emerged. The words, however, convey a further instruction than this. They teach us the general truth, that believers are, by the hidden and mysterious power of God, preserved unhurt in the midst of their afflictions, or suddenly recovered so as to exhibit no marks of them. The language admits of being interpreted to mean either that they shine even when lying under filth and darkness, or that, when freed from their troubles, they shake off any defilement which they may have contracted. Let either sense be adopted, and it remains true that the believer is never consumed or overwhelmed by his afflictions, but comes out safe. An elegant figure is drawn from the dove, which, though it lie amongst the pots, retains the beauty which naturally belongs to it, and contracts no defilement on its wings. From this we learn that the Church does not always present a fair or peaceable aspect, but rather " sheepfolds," the only difference between the two words being, that the word here wants the formative letter o, mem. Thus, it may refer to the condition of the Israelites when living among their flocks in the wilderness. We have not yet exhausted the different significations affixed by commentators to this word; but, without referring to more, we shall only add, that, according to some, the allusion is to the condition of the Israelites in Egypt, who were doomed to the drudgery of brick-making and pottery, and had probably to sleep among the brick-kilns or earthenware manufactories in which they were employed. With respect to the second clause of the verse, in which an image taken from the dove is introduced, a difficulty which has been stated is, how her feathers can be said to resemble yellow gold. From the circumstance, that the splendour of gold is here intermingled, Harmer concludes that this is not a description of the animal merely as adorned by the hand of nature, but that the allusion is to white doves that were consecrated to the Syrian deities, and adorned with trinkets of gold, the meaning being, "Israel is to me as a consecrated dove; and though your circumstances have made 3*ou rather appear like a poor dove, blackened by taking up its abode in a smoky hole of the rocks, yet shall you become beautiful and glorious as a Syrian silver-coloured pigeon, on which some ornament of gold is put." —Harmer's Observations, vol. i. p. 180. But there are certainly doves which answer to the description here given, some of them having the feathers on the sides of the neck of a shining copper colour, which in a bright sun must resemble gold. See Encyc. Brit. Art. Columbia. Besides, the reference is not necessarily to the colour of gold, but to its brilliancy. How highly poetical an emblem, to depict the glorious change effected in the condition of the Hebrews by the deliverance which God had granted them over the proud and formidable enemies who had kept them in the degrading condition represented in the first clause of the verse! PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 19 emerges occasionally from the darkness that envelops it, and recovers its beauty as perfectly as if it had never been subjected to calamity. 14. When the Almighty scattered kings in it. We might read extended, or divided kings, &c., and then the allusion would be to his leading them in triumph. But the other reading is preferable, and corresponds better with what was said above of their being put to flight. There is more difficulty in the second part of the verse, some reading, it was white in Salmon; that is, the Church of God presented a fair and beautiful appearance. Or the verb may be viewed as in the second person—Thou, O God! didst ma/te it fair and white, as mount Salmon1 with snows. The reader may adopt either construction, for the meaning is the same. It is evident that David insists still upon the figure of the whiteness of silver, which he had previously introduced. The country had, as it were, been blackened or sullied by the hostile confusions into which it was thrown, and he says that it had now recovered its fair appearance, and resembled Salmon, which is well known to have been ordinarily covered with snows.2 Others think that Salmon is not the name of a place, but an appellative, meaning a dark shade.* I would retain the commonly received 1 Salmon is the name of a mountain in Samaria, in the tribe of Ephraim, (Judges ix. 48,) white with perpetual snow. * Carrieres, in his paraphrase, has, " You became white as snow on mount Salmon." " We certainly think," says the author of the Illustrated Commentary upon the Bible, " that Carrieres has seized the right idea. The intention evidently is, to describe by a figure the honour and prosperity the Hebrews acquired by the defeat of their enemies, and to express this by whiteness, and superlatively by the whiteness of snow. Nothing can be more usual in Persia, for instance, than for a person to say, under an influx of prosperity or honour, or on receiving happy intelligence, ' My face is made white;' or gratefully, in return for a favour or compliment, ' You have made my face white;' so also, ' His face is whitened,' expresses the sense which is entertained of the happiness or favour which has before been received. Such a figurative use of the idea of whiteness docs, we imagine, furnish the best explanation of the present and some other texts of Scripture." 3 Instead of " in Salmon," the Targum has, " in the shade of dentil ;" and Boothroyd has, " The Almighty having scattered these kings, Hath by this turned death-shade to splendour." Wai ford gives a similar version, and explains the meaning to bi>.  %20 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII. reading. At the same time, I think that there may have been an allusion to the etymology. It comes from the word D7& tselem, signifying a shade, and mount Salmon had been so called on account of its blackness.1 This makes the comparison more striking; for it intimates, that as the snows whitened this black mountain, so the country had resumed its former beauty, and put on an aspect of joy, when God dispelled the darkness which had lain upon it during the oppression of enemies.2 15. The hill of God, the hill of Bashan, a Ugh hill,9 the hill of Bashan. 16. Why leap ye, ye high hills ? the hill which God desireth to dwell in; yea, Jehovah will dwell in it for ever. 17. The chariots of God are twenty thousand thousands of angels: the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place. 15. The hill of God, the hill of Bashan. Here he adverts to the spring and source of all the kindness which God had shown, this being the circumstance that he had chosen mount Zion as the place of his palace and temple, whence all blessings should go out to the nation. A Divine declaration to that effect had been made to David, and this pre-eminence "Though yon have been in bondage and the darkness of a dejected condition, yon are now illuminated with the splendour of victory and prosperity." 1 That is, it was so called from the dark shade produced by its trees. 2 " Que commeles neiges font blanchir ceste montagne, laquelle de soy est obscure et noire, ainsi quand il a pleu a Dieu d'oster l'obscurite qu'apportoit 1'affliction des ennemis, lors on a veu la terre reluh-e d'un lustre naif, et par maniere de dire, porter une face joyeuse."—Fr. 3 "Lamontagnedeshauteurs," "the hill of highnesses or eminences."—Fr. That is, ("says Calvin, on the margin,) " treshaute," " very high." The literal rendering of the original words is, " a hill of gibbosities," " a hill  %with humps," i. e., projections, eminences. This seems peculiarly applicable to Bashan, which had many tops; and this may explain the origin of the name of that mountain. It has its name from |jj>, a tooth; and jb»3 "irii the mountain with teeth, might be given to it, from the appearance of the face of it studded over with small hills. See Street, in loco. What is here rendered " a high hill," is, in the Septuagint, rendered 050s rnu^uy.ii/ou, and in the Vulgate, " mons coagulatus," "cheesey, full of cheeses;" or, as Hammond renders it, "a hill that yielded much butter and cheese," Bashan being a rich and fertile mountain beyond Jordan. Horsley has, " a hill of lofty brows;" and Fit. " a hill of swelling heights." TSALM LXV11I. THE BOOK O3? PSALMS. 21 and dignity conferred upon mount Zion is very properly adduced as a proof of his being king, lawfully and by Divine appointment; for there was an inseparable connection between God's dwelling upon that mountain, and David's sitting upon the throne to govern the people. The words of the verse admit of two senses. We may suppose that the mountain of God is compared to mount Bashan as being like it, or we may understand that it is opposed to it. The first is the sense adopted almost by all interpreters, that while Bashan was famed for its fertility, Zion excelled it. It is of little importance which we prefer; but perhaps the distinction would be brought out as well were we to construe the words the hill of God by themselves, and consider that Bashan with its boasted height is afterwards ordered to yield precedence, as if David would say, that there was but one mountain which God had consecrated to himself by an irrevocable decree, and that though Bashan was renowned for height and fertility, it must rank with other mountains, which might in vain exalt themselves to an equality with Zion, honoured as the chosen residence of God. If we read the verse differently, and consider it as applying to mount Zion throughout, then the Psalmist extols it as high and illustrious, and this because there emanated from it the Divine favour, which distinguished the Jews from every other nation. 16. Why leap ye,1 ye high hills'? In this verse there is no 1 The word here rendered leap ye " occurs only here," observes Hammond, " and is by guess rendered to leap, or lift up, or exalt one's self; but may best be interpreted, not leap as an expression of joy, but lift up, or exalt yourselves, as an effect of pride;" and he understands the meaning to be, Why do ye lift up or exalt yourselves, ye high hills, God not having chosen any of the highest hills to build his temple on, but the hill of Zion, of a very moderate size, lower than the hill of Hermon, and at the foot of it, (Ps. cxxxiii. 3.) Some Jewish commentators, founding their opinion on the cognate Arabic word Yi"i, would render it, to look after. This gives the same sense. What look ye for ? what expect ye, ye high hills, to be done to you? Ye are not those which God has chosen to beautify with his glorious presence, but mount Zion is the object of his choice. Aquila and Jerome read, "Why contend ye?" Dr Chandler renders it, "Why look askance?" i.e., "with jealous leer malign," as Milton expresses it. "Why are ye jealous?" Horsley, following Jerome, has, "For what would ye contend?" 22 COMMENTAKY UPON I'SALM LXVIII. obscurity or ambiguity. David having said that there was only one mountain in all the world which God had chosen, calls upon the highest hills to yield it the pre-eminency. As he repeats in the plural number what had been said immediately before of Bashan, this leads me to think that he intended first to oppose that mountain, and then all other high mountains generally, to Zion.1 Mountains are here to be understood figuratively, and the great truth conveyed is, that the kingdom of Christ, which God had begun to shadow forth in the person of David, far excels all that is reckoned glorious by the world. The reproof which the Psalmist administers, in order to humble the proud boasting of the world, is justified by that contempt which we know that carnal and ungodly persons entertain of Christ's kingdom, devoted as they are to their own pleasures or wealth, and unable to appreciate spiritual blessings. The lesson will *be felt to be the more useful and necessary, if we consider that this vain pride of man rises to an additional height, when the slightest occasion is afforded for its exercise. When we see those indulging it who have no grounds to do so, we need not wonder at the arrogance of such as are possessed of wealth and influence. But the Lord's people may afford to leave them to their self-complacency, resting satisfied with the privilege of knowing that God has chosen to take up his habitation in the midst of them. They have no reason to repine at their lot so long as they have union with God, the only and the sufficient source of their happiness. 17. The chariots of God are twenty thousand thousands of 1 " The Psalmist," says Horsley, " having settled the Israelites between their hills, proceeds to the circumstance of God's choice of a hill for the site of his temple. He poetically imagines the different hills as all ambitious of the honour, anxiously waiting God's decision, and ready to enter into a jealous contention; watching each other with an anxious eye. The lofty hill of Bashan first puts in his claim, pleading his stately height— The hill for God is the hill of Bashan; A hill of lofty brows is the hill of Bashan. The Psalmist cuts short the contention— For what would ye contend, yc hills of lofty brows V This is the hill desired of God for himself to dwell ill; y/ea, Jehovah will dwell in it for ever." PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 23 angels.1 For the most part, we are apt to undervalue the Divine presence, and therefore David presents us with a description fitted to exalt our thoughts of it. Owing to our unbelieving hearts, the least danger which occurs in the world weighs more with us than the power of God. We tremble under the slightest trials; for we forget or cherish low views of his omnipotence. To preserve us from this error, David directs us to the countless myriads of angels which are at his command,—a circumstance, the consideration of which may well enable us to defy the evils which beset us. Twenty thousand are spoken of; but it is a number designed to intimate to us that the armies of the living God, which he commissions for our help, are innumerable; and surely this should comfort us under the deadliest afflictions of this life. In adding that the Lord is among them, the Psalmist is still to be considered as designing to give us an exalted view of 1 The words ){«£? ''sba, alphey shinan, which Calviu renders "thousands of angels," are literally " thousands of repetition;" the noun |t«s»>, shanan, being derived from n3E>> shanafi, he repeated or reiterated. Accordingly, the reading which many prefer is, " The chariots of God are twenty thousand thousands multiplied or reiterated." Hammond, who adopts this translation, observes, that " though angels are not mentioned, they are to be understood, as Jude 1*1, pvyafos iyi*i, holy myriads." Horsley reads, " Twenty thousand thousand of thousands is the cavalry of God." " The cavalry of God," says he, " is every thing in nature which he employs as the instruments or vehicles of his power. The image, which some would introduce here of God riding in a car drawn by angels, I cannot admire; nor do I think that it is really to be found in any passage of Scripture rightly understood." But God, though not here represented as riding on a car drawn by angels, is undoubtedly, in the most magnificent style of Eastern poetry, represented as riding on his exalted car, attended by legions of angels, mounted also on cars. Comp. Deut. xxxii. 3, and 2 Kings vi. 16. French and Skinner give a different view of the passage, which brings out a very good sense— " God hath been to them [the Israelites] twice ten thousand chariots, Even thousand of thousands." Chariots were much used in war by the nations of antiquity; and the chosen people were forbidden to use chariots and horses in war; but God was to them as effectual a safe-guard as innumerable war-chariots would have been. He was " the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof," 2 Kings ii. 12. Comp. Ps. xx. 7. And in his protection and aid they were to trust. " When thou goest out to battle against thine enemies, aud seest horses, and chariots, and a people more than thou, be not afraid of them: for the Lord thy God is with thee, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." " For the Lord your God is he that goeth with you, to fight for you against your enemies to save you," (Deut. xx. 1 and 4.) 21 COMMENTARY UPON FtiALM LXVI1I. what is included in God's presence; for the words suggest that he can no more divest himself of his existence than not have this power whereby angels are subordinated to his will. Another idea suggested is, that one God is better than a universe of angels. The great distance to which we are apt to conceive God as removed from us is one circumstance which tries our faith, and in order to obviate this, the Psalmist reminds us of Sinai, where there was a display of his majesty. The inference was conclusive that he still abode in the sanctuary. For why did God appear upon that occasion in such a glorious manner ? Evidently to show that his covenant formed a sacred bond of union between him and the posterity of Abraham. Hence the words of Moses—" Say not in thine heart, Who shall go up into heaven ? or who shall descend into the deep ? or who shall go over the sea ? For the word is nigh unto thee," &c. (Deut. xxx. 12.) Sinai accordingly is mentioned by David, to teach us that if we would fortify our minds with a firm faith in the Divine presence, we must derive it from the Law and the Prophets. 18. Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive:1 thou hast received gifts among men;" even the rebellious, that the Lord Jehovah3 might dwell amongst Ms people. 19. Blessed be the Lord daily : this Lord will load us with de- liverances. Selah. 20. He that is our God is the God of salvations; and to the Lord Jehovah* belong the issues from death. 1 " That is, a number of prisoners captive. See Judges v. 12 ; Esth. ii. 6; Isaiah xx. 4."—Archbishop Seeker. See the like phrase in 2 Chron. xxviii. 5, 11; Num. xxi. 1; Deut. xxi. 10. " The allusion may be to public triumphs, when captives were led in chains, even kings and great men, that had captivated others."—Or Gill. 2 Heb. DifcO baadam, in man, "in human nature,'1' says Dr Adam Clarke, " and God, manifest in human flesh, dwells among mortals." " The gifts which Jesus Christ distributes to man he has received in man, in and by virtue of his incarnation, and it is in consequence of his being made man that it may be said, 'the Lord God dwells among them;' for Jesus was called Immanuel, 'God with us,' in consequence of his incar-uation." 3 The Hebrew here is not nirv> Jehovah, but ns Jah. 1 "It is worthy of remark, that whilst Q'TI^N occurs twenty-six times. >3"18 seven times, and ?x five times in this psalm, nirv only occurs twice." —Rogers' Booh of Psalms in Hebrew, &c. vol. ii. p. 221. TSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 25 21. Surely God shall wound the head of his enemies, the crown of the hair of him who walketh on in his wickedness. 22. The Lord said, I will bring bach from Bashan ; I will bring again from the depths of the sea : 23. That thy foot may be stained with blood, the tongue of thy dogs even in that of thine enemies. 24. They have seen thy goings, 0 God! even the goings of my God, my King, in the sanctuary. 18. Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive. There can be little doubt that these words are intended to magnify the proofs of Divine favour granted upon the elevation of David to the throne, by contrasting the state of matters with that under Saul. The ascending on high implies the being previously low, and intimates, that under the melancholy confusions which had prevailed in the kingdom, there was no longer the same conspicuous display of the Divine glory as formerly. The government of Saul, which, from the first, had originated in a way that was condemnable, was doomed to fall under the displeasure of God, while his favour, on the other hand, was to be restored under David; and the undeniable appearances of this left no room for doubt that one who began his reign under such auspices was the object of the Divine choice. David, although he had acquitted himself with courage in the battles which were fought, ascribes all the glory of them to God, saying, that it was he who had taken captive the enemy, and forced them to pay tribute, and reduced the more fierce and rebellious to subjection. By the term C^TilDj sorerim, rebellious, contumacious, or revolt-ers, he would evidently seem to mean a distinct class of persons from the other enemies, whom he mentions as having been taken captive; and it intimates, that while those who did not venture to resist, and who surrendered, had been brought under the yoke, the more proud and unyielding had been forced into submission. The end designed by this is stated in the words which follow, that God might divell in the midst of his people; and that he might demonstrate himself to be an all-sufficient protector to those who put their trust in him. 2li COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII. As the passage which we have now been considering is applied by Paul in a more spiritual sense to Christ, (Eph. iv. 8,) it may be necessary to show how this agrees with the meaning and scope of the Psalmist. It may be laid down as an incontrovertible truth, that David, in reigning over God's ancient people, shadowed forth the beginning of Christ's eternal kingdom. This must appear evident to every one who remembers the promise made to him of a never-failing succession, and which received its verification in the person of Christ. As God illustrated his power in David, by exalting him with the view of delivering his people, so has he magnified his name in his only begotten Son. But let us consider more particularly how the parallel holds. Christ, before he was exalted, emptied himself of his glory, having not merely assumed the form of a servant, but humbled himself to the death of the cross. To show how exactly the figure was fulfilled, Paul notices, that what David had foretold was accomplished in the person of Christ, by his being cast down to the lowest parts of the earth in the reproach and ignominy to which he was subjected, before he ascended to the right hand of his Father, (Ps. xxii. 7.) That in thinking upon the ascension, we might not confine our views to the body of Christ, our attention is called to the result and fruit of it, in his subjecting heaven and earth to his government. Those who were formerly his inveterate enemies he compelled to submission and made tributary—this being the effect of the word of the Gospel, to lead men to renounce their pride and their obstinacy, to bring down every high thought which exalteth itself, and reduce the senses and the affections of men to obedience unto Christ. As to the devils and reprobate men who are instigated to rebellion and revolt by obstinate malice, he holds them bound by a secret control, and prevents them from executing intended destruction. So far the parallel is complete. Nor when Paul speaks of Christ having given gifts to men, is there any real inconsistency with what is here stated, although he has altered the words, having followed the Greek version in accommodation to the unlearned reader.1 It was not him- 1 Paul's words arc not exactly those of the Septuagint, the present PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 27 self that God enriched with the spoils of the enemy, but his people; and neither did Christ seek or need to seek his own advancement, but made his enemies tributary, that he might adorn his Church with the spoil. From the close union subsisting between the head and members, to say that God manifest in the flesh received gifts from the captives, is one and the same thing with saying that he distributed them to his Church. What is said in the close of the verse is no less applicable to Christ—that he obtained his victories that as God he might dwell among us. Although he departed, it was not that he might remove to a distance from us, but, as Paul says, " that he might fill all things," (Eph. iv. 10.) By his ascension to heaven, the glory of his divinity has been only more illustriously displayed, and though no longer present with us in the flesh, our souls receive spiritual nourishment from his body and blood, and we find, notwithstanding distance of place, that his flesh is meat indeed, and his blood drink indeed. 19. Blessed be the Lord, Sfc. David would have us to understand, that in recounting the more particular deliverances which God had wrought, he did not mean to draw our minds away from the fact, that the Church is constantly and at all times indebted for its safety to the Divine care and protection. He adds, Blessed be God daily. And he intimates, that deliverances might be expected from him with great abundance of every blessing. Some read, lie will load, others, he tvill carry ;l but it is of little importance which reading we reading of which is, foxfit; io/mr« h di/$gawa, "Thou hast received gifts for man;" while Paul's words are, iTiuxs ~Hiia.ro. role a^jsreif. But Bloomfteld thinks that h Q%u'x amas, which we translate to load, signifies to lift, bear up, support, or, to bear a burden for another. Hence it would not bo going far from the ideal meaning to translate, ' Blessed be the Lord, day by day, who bears our burthens for us.'"—Dr Adam Clarke. Boothroyd, 28 COMMENTARY UPON l'SALM LXVI1I. adopt. He points at the fact, that God extends continued proofs of his kindness to his people, and is unwearied in renewing the instances of it. I read this Lord in the second part of the verse, for the letter H, he, prefixed in the Hebrew, has often the force of a demonstrative pronoun; and he would point out, as it were with the finger, that God in whom their confidence ought to be placed. So in the next verse, which may be read, this our God is the God of salvation. What is here said coincides with the scope of what immediately precedes, and is meant to convey the truth that God protects his Church and people constantly. In saying this God, he administers a check to the tendency in men to have their minds diverted from the one living and true God. The salvation of God is set before the view of all men without exception, but is very properly represented here as something peculiar to the elect, that they may recognise themselves as continually indebted to his preserving care, unlike the wicked, who pervert that which might have proved life into destruction, through their unthankfulness. The Hebrew word in the 20th verse is salvations, in the plural number, to convince us that when death may threaten us in ever so many various forms, God can easily devise the necessary means of preservation, and that we should trust to experience the same mercy again which has been extended to us once. The latter clause of the verse bears the same meaning, where it is said, that to the Lord belong the issues of death. Some read, the issues unto death,1 supposing that the on the contrary, asserts, that " as an active verb it signifies ' to load, to lay a burthen on another,' but in no instance to bear or support one, 1 Kings xii. 2." 1 The Septuagint has, ToS Kvj/oi/ hi%oloi rou dxi/arov, " To the Lord belong the passages of death," expressing the ways by which death goes out upon men to destroy them. The Vulgate has, " exitus mortus," " the goings out of death;" and the Chaldee Paraphrast, " From before the Lord, death, and the going out of the soul to suffocation, do contend or fight against the wicked." Hammond follows the LXX. He observes, that the original words " must literally be rendered goings forth to death, and must signify the several plagues and judgments inflicted by God on impenitent enemies, the ways of punishing and destroying the Egyptians and Canaanites, drowning in the sea, killing by the sword, infesting by hornets, &c.; and these are properly to be attributed and imputed to God, as the deliverances of the Israelites, his people, in the former part PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 29 reference is to the ease with which God can avenge and destroy his enemies; but this appears a constrained interpretation. The more natural meaning obviously is, that God has very singular ways, unknown to us, of delivering his people from destruction.1 He points at a peculiarity in the manner of the Divine deliverances, that God does not generally avert death from his people altogether, but allows them to fall in some measure under its power, and afterwards unexpectedly rescues them from it. This is a truth particularly worthy of our notice, as teaching us to beware of judging by sense in the matter of Divine deliverances. However deep we may have sunk in trouble, it becomes us to trust the power of God, who claims it as his peculiar work to open up a way where man can see none. 21. Surely God shall wound, Sfc. The enemies of the Church are fierce and formidable, and it is impossible that she can be preserved from their continued assaults, without a vigorous protection being extended. To persuade us that she enjoys such a defence, David represents God as armed with dreadful power for the overthrow of the ungodly. The verse stands connected as to scope with the preceding, and we might render the Hebrew particle *Ttf, ach, by wherefore, or on which account; but it seems better to consider it as expressing simple affirmation. We are to notice the circumstance, that God counts all those his enemies who unjustly persecute the righteous, and thus assures us of his being always ready to interpose for our defence. The concern he feels in our pre- of the verse; and to this sense the consequents incline, verse 21, ' Even God shall wound.' Horsley reads the verse, " He that is our God is a God of salvation, And for death are the goings forth of the Lord Jehovah; " i. e." says he, " When Jehovah takes the field, deadly is the battle to his enemies." 1 Agreeably to this, Hewlett observes, that the " issues of death mean the many providential escapes and deliverances from death;" and Booth-royd reads, " For to Jehovah we owe our escapes from death." The Syriac version has, " The Lord God is the Lord of death and of escaping." 30 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIIT. servation is forcibly conveyed by the expressions which follow, that he will wound the head of his enemies, and the crown of their hair;' intimating, that he will inflict a deadly and incurable wound upon such as harass his Church. This is still more strikingly brought out in what is added immediately afterwards, when God is described as wading through destruction. 22. The Lord said, I will bring back from Bashan. That the Israelites might not be led to take an irreligious and self-glorious view of their victories; that they might look to God as the author of them ; and rest assured of his protection in time to come, David sends them back to the first periods of their history, and reminds them how their fathers had been originally brought by the victorious hand of God out of the lowest depths of trouble. He would have them argue that if God rescued his people at first from giants, and from the depths of the Red Sea, it was not to be imagined that he would desert them in similar dangers, but certain that he would defend them upon every emergency which might occur. The prophets are in the constant habit, as is well known, of illustrating the mercy of God by reference to the history of Israel's redemption, that the Lord's people, by looking back to their great original deliverance, might find an argument for expecting interpositions of a future kind. To make the deeper impression, God is introduced speaking himself. In what he says he may be considered as asserting his Divine prerogative of raising the dead to life again, for his people's passage through the Red Sea, and victory over warlike giants, was a species of resurrection.2 Some read, I will cause the enemy to 1 Bishops Hare and Horsley suppose that there is here an allusion to the usage of the people in those Arabian regions, who nourished their hair on the crown of their head, that by their unshorn heads and shaggy hair they might appear more fierce. " The expressions, ' the head,' and 'the hairy crown,'" observes Bishop Home, " denote the principal part, the strength, the pride, and the glory of the adversary which was to be crushed;" and Roberts, in his Oriental Illustrations, observes, that " this language, ' wounding the crown of the hair,' still used in the East, is equivalent to saying, ' I will kill yon.'" 2 Or, " I will bring again from Bashan," may be thus explained: I will perform for my people the like wonders which I did in the days of PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 31 fly from Bashan ;• but this cannot be received, and does not agree with the context, as it follows, I will bring back from the depths of the sea. In representing God as bedewed or stained with blood, David does not ascribe to him anything like cruelty, but designs to show the Lord's people how dear and precious they are in his sight, considering the zeal which he manifests in their defence. We know that David himself was far from being a man of cruel disposition, and that he rejoiced in the destruction of the wicked from the purest and most upright motives, as affording a display of the Divine judgments. That is here ascribed to God which may be asserted equally of his Church or people, for the vengeance with which the wicked are visited is inflicted by their hands. Some read the close of the verse, the tongue of thy dogs in thine enemies, even in Mm, i. e., the king and chief of them all. This is not the meaning of the Psalmist, which simply is, that the tongues of the dogs would be red with licking blood, such would be the number of dead bodies scattered round. 24. They have seen thy goings, O God! This verse may refer to processions of a warlike kind, or to such as are made in times of peace by those who give thanks for victory. old; I will render them victorious over their proud enemies, as I before enabled them to triumph in the conflict with Og king of Bashan, (Dent, iii. 3, 4;) and I will deliver them from the greatest dangers, as I saved them from the Red Sea, by opening up a passage for them through the midst of it. 1 Walford considers the persons here intended, not God's people, but their enemies. " It is evident," says he, " from the next verse, that the persons who are here meant are the enemies of God and his people; because the purpose for which they were to be brought was, that his people might completely triumph over them in their utter slaughter and destruction. These, he says, I will bring back from Bashan, and from the abysses of the sea; thus referring to the victories that had been gained over the kings of the Canaanites, and the triumph of Israel at the Red Sea. The design of this declaration is, to express the determination of God to bring forth all his enemies to destruction: be they on the heights of Bashan, or in the profoundest depths of the ocean, they shall not escape; his hand will lay hold upon them, and his power utterly destroy them. In Amos ix. 2, and in Obad. 4, there are two sublime illustrations of the sentiment that is here delivered." " Bashan was east of Judea," says Boothroyd, " and the sea in the west, so that the meaning is, that God would bring his enemies from every quarter to be slain by his people." 32 COMMENTABY UPON PSALM LXVIII. It is customary for the people of God, on occasions of the latter description, to go forth and present peace-offerings in the temple. This has led some to understand by the goings of God,1 the crowds of his people when they proceed to the temple. But I am disposed to think that God himself is here represented as a king leading and marshalling forth his armies. Accordingly, it is added, in the sanctuary, under which expression there is an apt allusion to the visible symbol of the Divine presence. The great reason why God undertakes the guardianship of his people, and goes before them to repel the attacks of the enemy, is his having promised that he will hear their prayers in the sanctuary. He is therefore described as if he were seen coming out of his holy habitation, that he might conduct his people to victory. David calls him his King, to divert the attention of the people from himself, and lead them to view a name which belonged to a frail mortal man such as he was, in its higher application to the supreme Head of all. He speaks, it is true, in the name of the people, but not to the exclusion of himself. 25. The singers went before, the players on instruments followed after; in the midst were the damsels playing with timbrels.'2 26. Bless ye God in the congregations, even the Lord, 0 ye who are of the fountain of Israel! 1 " This doubtless refers to the order of the procession then on its march, and to that of religious processions in general. In the religious and festal processions of the Hindoos there is the same order and classes of performers. The singers, men and women, precede, singing songs appropriate to the occasion; and then the players on instruments follow after." —Illustrated Commentary upon the Bible. 3 " The musical instrument here rendered ' timbrel,' was a sort of small drum, carried in the hand, (Exod. xv. 20,) and played on by beating with the hand or fingers, as is probable from Nahum ii. 7. It was used both on civil and religious occasions ; and is often mentioned, as here, to have been beaten by women, but was sometimes played on by men. It was very like, if not the same kind of instrument as the modern Syrian diff, which is described by Dr Kussell as ' a hoop, (sometimes with bits of brass fixed in it to make a jingling,) over which a piece of parchment is distended. It is beat with the fingers; and is the true tympanum of the ancients, as appears from its figure in several relievos representing the orgies of Bacchus, and the rites of Cybele. It is worth observing, that, according to Juvenal, the Romans had this instrument from Syria.' Niebuhr also has given us a similar description, and a print of an instrument which, (according to his German spelling,) he says, they eall duff. FSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 33 27. There is little Benjamin their ruler, the princes of Judah in their assembly, the princes of Zebulun, and the princes of Naphtali. 25. The singers went before. It is evident that he does not now speak of an army in battle array, but of a solemn assembly held for offering up thanksgivings to God for victory. God had openly shown that he was their leader in war, and to him the song of triumph is with propriety addressed. Mention is made of distinct choirs employed in his service, and particularly of such as played upon the timbrel; for, absurd as the practice may appear to us, it was then customary for the women to play upon that instrument. By the fountain} from •which they are called upon to bless God, some understand the heart, as it is known that those praises which proceed from the lips merely, and are hypocritical, meet with the Divine reprobation. But I conceive the true meaning to be, that all are summoned to praise the Lord who could deduce their origin from the patriarch Jacob. Many might not sustain the character which answered to their high vocation; but, as the whole race had been chosen of God, the Psalmist very properly invites them to engage in this devotional exercise. At the same time, I see nothing objectionable in the opinion, if any persist in preferring it, that the term is here used to distinguish the true saints of God from those who vainly boasted He informs us that they ' hold it by the bottom, in the air, with one hand, while they play on it with the other.' The Oriental diff appears to be very like what is known to the French and English by the name of tam-bourin."—Mant. 1 " A metaphor denoting the posterity of Israel, springing, as it were, from a common source or fountain."—Mant. Bishop Hare's conjectural emendation gives a good sense; but it seems unnecessary. Instead of "lipDD) mimmehor, he proposes to read iipDi mekor; and then the passage would run thus:— " The fount whence blessings spring to Israel's race." Horsley reads, " The Lord of the stock of Israel j" and explains it of the Messiah, who was of the stock of Israel according to the flesh. Fry conceives that the reading more strictly may be, "from the quarry of Israel; dug, as it were, from this pit, hewn from this rock. See Isaiah li. 1." " They blessed Elohim in the congregations, The Lord from the stock of Israel, (or from the quarry of Israel.)" 34 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXV1II. of being the posterity of Abraham, while they had degenerated from his spirit. Those only who walk in the footsteps of his faith are reckoned to be his children. It has caused some surprise that, in a general description of the sacred assemblies of the people, precedence should have been given to the tribe of Benjamin. According to certain interpreters, this is owing to the position which it occupied, as being next to David ; and honour is put upon the tribes of Zebulun and Naphtali,1 which, though they lay at a great distance, were in a particular manner friendly and attached to him. Others think that the whole nation is represented under the tribes specified, which were at once the nearest and most distant.2 These conjectures3 are probable enough, but the point is one which may be left in uncertainty, as there may have been some other reason, which it is impossible for us to discover. It has been suggested that Benjamin is called little on account of the smallness of its numbers, the tribe having been nearly exterminated for the crime of the men of Gibeah, (Judges xix. 20;) but David would not probably have adverted to any reproach of this kind in calling them to take so prominent a part in the praises of God.4 The inspired writers, in speak- 1 Zebulun and Naphtali were in Galilee, divided from the country of the half-tribe of Manasseh; the former by the Jordan, the latter by the Lake of Gennesareth. 2 « Why- these tribes in particular ? May it be, Judah (having, instead of Eeuben, succeeded to the blessing which conveyed the privilege of having the Chief Ruler and Messiah of his line) and Benjamin Cvyy) the youngest ? or Judah and Benjamin, as two of the tribes most southern and nearest to Jerusalem; and Zebulun and Naphtali, as two of the most northern and most remote ? as another way of expressing ' from Dan to Beersheba,' to include them all."—Dr Lowth. 3 Of other conjectures the following are a specimen: "As for Zebulun and Naphtali, why their names are here added rather than any of the other tribes, the reason may, perhaps, best be taken from what we find prophesied of those two (Gen. xlix. and Deut. xxxiii. and Judges v.) by Jacob and Moses and Deborah, that learning and knowledge should be most eminent in those two tribes. Of Naphtali it is said, (Gen. xlix. 21,) ' Naphtali is a hind let loose; he giveth goodly words;' and of Zebulun, (Judges v. 14,) ' They shall handle the pen of the writer.'"  % Hammond. " It then specifies the tribes of Judah, Zebulun, and Naphtali, not as if they were the only tribes present, but as occupying, perhaps, the foremost ranks of the procession, and followed by all the other tribes."—Walford. 4 " Car David appelant yci ceux qui devoyent faire le plus grand devoir et estve les premiers a annoncer les louanges de Dieu, n'enst pas PSALM LXVIH. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 35 ing of the tribes, often allude to the patriarchs from whom they respectively took their origin; nor is it surprising that the posterity of Benjamin, who was the youngest of Jacob's children,1 should receive the designation here given to them; and the truth is, that even antecedently to the heavy stroke which befell them, they were not numerous. Interpreters, by general consent, have considered that Benjamin is called ruler, as Saul, who was first made king in Israel, belonged to this tribe; but I cannot bring myself to think it probable that David would have made such an unseasonable allusion to Saul's memory, whose government is everywhere represented in Scripture as pregnant with disaster, and which was to be buried in that of his successor, whose reign is so prominently brought forward in this psalm. The more likely conjecture is, that this title of dignity is applied in order to put honour upon a tribe, which some might despise for its smallness, and to intimate that the Benjamites, though few in numbers, and not possessed of great influence, formed one head in Israel as well as the rest.2 Others may be disposed to think that there must have been some illustrious individual in this and the two tribes mentioned along with it, or that the whole tribe had signalized itself in a recent battle. Though honourable mention is made of these tribes, yet the chief place in the numbers assembled together at this time is assigned to the princes of Judah. Some think that the copulative is understood, and read, the princes of Judah and their congregation. The Hebrew word which we translate congregation is by others translated stoning? But it seems preferable to construe the words as implying that this tribe presided over the assembly fait mention de ceste acte qui estoit ignominieux, et tendoit grande-ment a leur deshonneur."—Fr. 1 The Septuagint has, " There is Benjamin the younger." He was the son of Jacob's old age; and to this there is an allusion in the name, which is compounded of p, ben, a son, and |»q», yamin, of days, (according to the Chaldee plural termination, ji, yin,) intimating that he was the son of his father's old age, (Gen. xliv. 20,) and not, as is commonly said, the son of my right hand.—Bythner. 2 " Caput tamen unum efflcere."—Lai. " Font toutesfois un chef comme les autres lignees."—Fr. 3 The word Dnt33"l, rigmatham, here translated congregation or assembly, signifies, according to Parkhurst, a heap of stones for defence, a bulwark of stones; and ho considers it to be here applied metaphorically 36 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII. which marched under its auspices in war. The power of summoning the people together is thus asserted as belonging to Judah, and it is represented as honoured with the government and primacy of the kingdom. 28. Thy God hath commanded thy strength ; strengthen, 0 God ! that which thou hast wrought in us. 29. From thy temple upon Jerusalem kings shall bring presents unto thee. 30. Destroy the company of spearmen, (literally, of the reed,) the multitude of bulls with the calves of the people, treading with their feet upon pieces of silver: scatter thou the people that delight in war. 28. Thy God hath commanded thy strength. Men are always disposed to arrogate to themselves the glory of what they may have done instead of tracing their success to God, and David reminds the people once more that they had not triumphed by their own strength, but by power communicated from above. If they had acquitted themselves with energy on the field, he would have them consider that it was God who inspired them with this valour, and would guard them against the pride which overlooks and disparages the Divine goodness. As a consideration which might farther tend to promote humility in their minds, he adverts to the dependence in which they stood of the future continuance of the same favour and protection; this being the great cause of presumptuous confidence, that we do not feel our own helpless- to the princes of Judah, who, so to speak, were the bulwark of Israel. Horsley adopts the same reading: " The princes of Judah their bulwark." Hammond, after stating that the word signifies a stone, observes, that it "is here used in a metaphorical sense for a ruler ox governor, as a, foundation-stone which supports the whole building may fitly be applied to a commonwealth, and then signify the prince thereof." In this sense the LXX., no doubt, understood QnWli rigmatham, who render it yytfiivis au-ratt, " their governors." " It may mean," says Pike, in his Hebrew Lexicon, " their supreme authority, signified by stoning, a capital punishment among the Israelites, in the same manner as it was represented among the Romans by the Fasces and Securis, the instruments of punishment carried before the Consuls." Jerome, however, has taken it for another word nearly similar to it in its letters, signifying purple,—" in purpura sua;"—but this comes to the same thing as the Septuagint translation. Dathe has " agmen," " a troop;" and according to Gesenius, it signifies " a multitude, crowd, band." PSALM LXVlir. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 37 ness, and are not led under a sense of it to resort humbly to God for the supply of our wants. Another lesson which the passage teaches us is, that more is required than that God should visit us at first with his preventing grace; that we stand constantly in need of his assistance throughout our whole lives. If this be true in the literal warfare, where our conflict is with flesh and blood, it must be still more so in matters of the soul. It is impossible that we could stand one moment in the contest with such enemies as Satan, sin, and the world, did we not receive from God the grace which secures our perseverance. What is said of the temple in the following verse is intended to carry out the same strain of sentiment which has been already expressed. It gives the reason why God had exerted his power in behalf of the Israelites rather than others; which was, that it might be displayed as coming forth from the sanctuary and the ark of the covenant. Hence the emphasis with which David calls him in a previous part of the psalm—the God of Israel. It was not in vain that God had erected his sanctuary, or promised his presence in connection with it; and his power is here represented as issuing from the temple, to denote that the only security for his favour was to be found in his gracious covenant and promises. Some read, From thy temple in Jerusalem—a frigid interpretation, and one which does not express the meaning of the Psalmist. His prayer is to the effect that the Divine power might be commanded from the sanctuary upon his chosen people, here denoted by a common figure of speech by Jerusalem. It may be asked how he speaks of the temple, when it had not been yet built. The word temple or palace may have been used to express the tabernacle. This, at least, I think more probable than that he should speak of the temple by anticipation, as some suppose; and there can be no doubt that the ark had already been placed in Zion. Having already traced all the honour «f the recent victories to God, he next proceeds to vindicate his claim to reap the fruits of them, by asserting that the kings who had been subdued would acknowledge God to have been their conqueror, as well as yield themselves tribu- 38 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXVIII. tary to David and his successors,—a circumstance which should lay the people of God under an additional obligation to present him with their free-will offerings of praise. 30. Destroy the company of spearmen. Some read rebuke, but I approve of the distinction which has been noticed by those who are most skilled in the Hebrew language, that while the verb "IJ^I, gear, has this meaning when the letter 3, beth, is interposed, it signifies without it to destroy. The word rVPlj chayath, which I have rendered company, has been translated beast,1 but no such sense can apply to it here. David evidently prays in this passage that God would deliver his chosen people by destroying their cruel and bloody enemies. In calling these the company of the reed or cane,i he does not 1 Instead of tlie company of spearmen, the greater number of modern critics consider the wild beast of the reeds as the most correct translation; and this is understood by many to represent the Egyptian people and government under the emblem of the hippopotamus or river-horse, the behemoth of Scripture. This animal—which is a quadruped of enormous size, of prodigious strength, fierce and cruel in its disposition, and whose skin is so impenetrable that no arrows can pierce it—shelters and reposes itself among the tall reeds which skirt in abundance the banks of the Nile, (Job xl. 21.) It is a very appropriate emblem of the Egyptian power, in the height of its greatness so formidable, and the inveterate enemy of Israel. And that the Psalmist here refers to it has beeu thought the more probable, from his mentioning, in the clause immediately following, the bulls and calves of the people, these animals having been honoured and worshipped as deities by that degenerate and superstitious nation. Or, the wild beast of the reeds may, as is supposed by others, denote the same power under the representation of the crocodile, to which the characteristics of the hippopotamus, now specified, are equally applicable. By this ferocious and truculent animal Pharaoh king of Egypt is represented in Ezekiel xxix. 3, 5, and xxxii. 2; and in • Psalm lxxiv. 14. This, it would appear, was anciently employed as an emblem of Egypt. On a medal which the Emperor Augustine caused to be struck after he had completely reduced this powerful kingdom, Egypt is represented by the figure of a crocodile bound with a chain to a palm-tree, with the inscription, Nemo antea relegavit. Dathe, however, rejects the opinion, that the crocodile, and under it the King of Egypt, is pointed at; and observes, that David cultivated peace with the King of Egypt, and that, in verse 31st, the Egyptians are commemorated as worshippers of the true God. He supposes that the wild beast of the reeds may be an epithet applied to the lion, who is accustomed to haunt places where reeds grow, and that under this image the King of Syria may be referred to, with whom David carried on lengthened and bloody wars, as is abundantly evident from sacred history. Dr Lowth also supposes that the lion is meant, (see his Lectures on Sacred Poetry, vol. i. p. 135 ;) and the same view is adopted by Schnurrer, Rosenmuller, and others. 3 The original term is ropi hane; hence the English word cane. PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OP PSALMS. 39 mean to say that they are weak, but alludes to the kind of armour which they wore, and which were lances or spears. The reed grows in some countries to a tree, or at least has all the consistency of wood, and the people are in the habit of making darts from it. In the East missile weapons are commonly used in war. He compares them for their fierceness to bulk, so I have rendered the word Q^SX, abbirim; for though it may be translated strong or stout persons—the congregation of the strong—it occasionally bears the other meaning ; and as David adds, calves of the people,1 it would seem evident that he uses a figure to represent the rage and fury of the enemy, and perhaps their strength, which the Israelites were wholly unequal to combat except with Divine assistance. It is not so easy to discover the meaning of the next clause in the verse, treading upon pieces of silver. The Hebrew verb QS"\, raphas, signifies to tread, or literally, (for it is here in the hithpael conjugation,) causing themselves to tread; and some consider that the allusion is to the arrogance and vain-glorious boasting of the enemy. Others attach exactly the opposite sense to the words, holding that they denote submission, and that the enemy would bring pieces of silver in token of subjection.2 But how could we suppose that David would pray for the destruction of enemies who were already subdued, and paying tribute in the character of suppliants ? To this it has been said in reply, that enemies may retain their animosity in all its force within their own breasts, ready to vent itself in rebellion upon the first opportunity, although when deprived of arms they cannot display it openly, and that this is especially true of the enemies of 1 While by the multitude of bulls some understand powerful leaders, by the calves of the people they understand the mass of the people, undistinguished for rank or power, and particularly the young men. But others, as Bishop Home, suppose, that by the calves of the people is meant the idol-calves of the Egyptians, their Apis, Osiris, &c, whom they made the objects of their religious worship. Horsley reads, " The assembly of those who place their strength in the calves;" that is, as he explains it, "The people of Egypt, who worshipped calves, and trusted in them as their gods." 2 In Bagster's interlinear version, the rendering is, " shall be each submitting itself with pieces of silver." Wheatland and Silvester translate, " Till each submiss, from hostile acts shall cease, And with the tribute-silver sue for peace." 40 COMMENTARY UPON P8ALAI LXVIII. the Church, whose antipathies are virulent, ever breaking forth afresh so soon as an occasion offers. But I see no necessity for doing violence to the words of the Psalmist, and would take them in their plain acceptation, as meaning that the enemy in their pride trampled upon pieces of silver. The reference may be to attachments of silver upon their sandals, as the Eastern nations were always proverbial for their luxury.1 What imme- 1 Various other explanations have been given of the words sjDp—*yi3 DBinOi mithrappes beratsey-kaseph, rendered by Calvin, treading with their feet upon pieces of silver, and by which critics have been much perplexed. " Berlin translates the words ' calcantem frusta argenti,' which he explains by ' pavimentum argento tessellatum.' De Eossi explains the words thus,' Who advance with laminae of silver under their horses' hoofs.' Immanuel Ben Solomon, whose Scholia on select passages of the Psalms were published by De Kossi, gives the following explanation: 1 Dicit [vates scil.] quod Deus disperdit nationes, quse volunt malum inferre Israeli, et ccetum taurorum, seu reges illustriores, ut reges Assy-rise et Babylonis, quorum quisque conculcat frusta argentea; i. e., ince-dnnt cum lamina aurea sub pedibus suis ob multitudinem divitiarum Buarum.'"—Rogers' Booh of Psalms, vol. ii. p. 223. Dr Geddes' version fa: " The assemblage of the potent lords of nations, Who tread on tiles of silver;" and he supposes that the poet alludes to the floors in the palaces of the Oriental kings, which were paved with silver. Dr Jubb renders the phrase, " who excite themselves with fragments of silver;" and considers the allusion to be to the dancing of the Egyptians before their idol-calves, with the tinkling instruments called Sistra. That they were accustomed to dance before these idols is evident from Exodus xxxii. 6, where we are taught that the people of Israel, in imitation of the Egyptian idolatry, rose up to shout and dance before the golden calf; for such is the meaning of the words, " they rose up to play," as appears from verses 17, 18, and 19. And that they used the sistrum in religious feasts, Herodotus informs us in the second book of his History. The words, pieces of silver, according to Jubb, signify the little loose pieces of metal with which the sistrum was hung round, which produced the jingling noise when the instrument was played upon. This description fits the Egyptians; and that it really belongs to them may be inferred, with some degree of probability, from the following verse, where it is said, " Princes shall come out of Egypt," as if the subjugation of this nation, imprecated in the preceding verse, were here supposed complete. Tucker has here a very good remark. " David," says he, " invokes the Messiah to bring down the power of Egypt; but in his abhorrence of their idolatry, deigns not to designate them except in the most contemptuous terms. He says not, Rebuke the assembly of those who worship bulls and calves, and dance round altars to the sound of instruments of silver, but he classes the people on a par with the idols which they worshipped,—' the assembly of bulls and calves, who dance to bits (or pieces) of silver.'" " The sistrum was of an oval figure, or a dilated semicircle, in the shape of a shoulder-belt, with brass wires across, which played in holes wherein they were stopped by their flat heads. The performer played on it by shaking the sistrum in cadence, and thereby the brass wires made a shrill and loud noise."—Mont. PSALJI LXA'III. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 41 diately follows by no means favours the sense we have formerly adverted to, scatter the people who delight in war, where he hints that they sought groundless occasions for quarrel and tumult, and gratuitously attacked such as were disposed for peace. When we find David, after all the victories he had gained, still commending himself and his people to the protection of God, it should teach us to abandon the hope of ever seeing the Church placed in a state of perfect tranquillity in this world, exposed, as it is, to a succession of enemies raised up by the malice of Satan, and designed by God for the trial and exercise of our patience. In comparing their enemies to the beasts here mentioned, and taking notice that they delighted in war, it was no doubt his intention to influence the minds of the people of God to the contrary dispositions of clemency and mercy, as being that frame of spirit in the exercise of which they might expect to receive the Divine assistance. The more violently their enemies raged, and the more lawless their attempts might prove, they had only the more reason to expect the interposition of God, who humbles the proud and the mighty ones of this world. Such being the character of God, let us learn from this prayer of David to resort to him with confidence when the objects at any time of unmerited persecution, and to believe that he is able to deliver us at once from all our enemies. 31. Princes shall come out of Egypt ;Ethiopia shall soon stretch out [or, shall hasten to stretch out] her hands unto God. 32. Sing unto God, ye kingdoms of the earth: sing praises to the Lord. Selah. 33. To him that rideth upon the heaven of heavens, which were of old, [literally the heavens of ancientness;] lo! he shall send forth in his voice a mighty voice. 34. Give strength unto God over Israel; his excellency and his strength are in the clouds. 35. 0 God ! thou art terrible out of thy holy places: the God of Israel himself shall give strength and power unto his people. Blessed he God! 31. Princes shall come out of Egypt. He resumes the strain of thanksgiving, and confirms what he had previously asserted, 42 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXV1II. that kings would come and pay tribute unto God. The examples whicli he brings forward are those of the Egyptians and Ethiopians. This sufficiently proves that the prediction must be extended to Christ, by whom the Egyptians and Ethiopians were brought under the sway of God. The word ^"Hl"!, tarits, translated, shall soon stretch out, might have been rendered, shall cause to run} But it seemed necessary to soften the harshness of the figure. It is doubtful whether the allusion be to the promptness with which they should yield subjection, or whether he means that they would stretch out their hands to entreat pardon, this being an attitude common to suppliants. According to either interpretation, it is their submission which is intended, and it is enough to know that David asserts that Ethiopia and Egypt would come under the power of God, and not they only, but the most distant parts of the world. In the next verse he goes farther than before, and calls upon the kingdoms of the earth to praise God, language which implies that those who had once been distinguished by their hostility to him would be ranked amongst his willing worshippers. There must be the knowledge of God, as I have remarked elsewhere, before men can celebrate the praises of his name; and we have a proof of the calling of the Gentiles, in the fact that Moses and the prophets invite them to offer sacrific.es of praise. That it might not seem a strange and incredible thing to speak of the extension of the worship of God from one land, within which it had been hitherto confined, to the whole world, David insists upon God's rightful dominion over all parts of the earth. He rideth upon the heaven of heavens; that is, as we have observed at the beginning of the psalm, he has supreme power over all creatures, and governs the universe at his will. This truth is one which, even in its general application, is well fitted to beget a reverential consideration of the majesty of God; but we must not overlook the more particular reason for which it is here introduced. Mention having been made 1 " The Hebrew is very emphatic:—' Cush will cause her hands to run out to God.' She will with great alacrity and delight surrender her power and influence unto God."—Dr Adam Clarke. PSALM LXVIII. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 43 of the Gentiles, who lay as yet without the pale of the Church, he proves them to be embraced in the government of God by virtue of his sovereignty as Creator, and intimates that there was nothing wonderful in the fact, that he who sits upon the heavens should comprehend the whole inhabitants of the earth under his sway. By the heavens of ancient times, it is meant to intimate that the whole human family were under his power from the very beginning. We have a signal proof of the glorious power of God in the fact, that, notwithstanding the immensity of the fabric of the heavens, the rapidity of their motion, and the conflicting revolutions which take place in them, the most perfect subordination and harmony are preserved; and that this fair and beautiful order has been uninterruptedly maintained for ages. It is apparent then how the ancientness of the heavens may commend to us the singular excellency of the handiwork of God. Having touched upon the work of creation, he particularises thunder, for this is what he intends by a mighty voice, as in Psalm xxix. 4. There are two constructions which we may put upon the words used, either that by his voice of command he calls forth the thunders which shake heaven and earth with the loudness of their sound, or that he sends forth his mighty voice in the thunder. I have already shown, at some length, in commenting upon the other passage just quoted, that there is a propriety in God's being represented as thundering; for the phenomenon is one which, more than any other, impresses an awe upon the spirits of men. And the words are introduced with the exclamation lo ! or behold! the better to arrest our wandering thoughts, or rather to reprehend our security. 34. Give strength unto God over Israel. The expression is in allusion to the sentence which went before, and in which God was said to send forth a strong of mighty voice. Not that, properly speaking, we can give anything to Him, but, disposed as we are to withhold that honour which is his due, David subjoins to what he had said of his thundering with a mighty voice, an injunction that we should, on our part, be ready to sound forth his praises. To guard the Gentile nations against those false ideas upon religion in which they were 44 COMMENTARY UPOX PSALM LXVIII. accustomed to indulge, he brings them back to the doctrine of the Law, in which God had specially revealed himself, and intimates that, if they would not lose themselves in error, they must advance by necessary steps from the creation and government of the world, to that doctrine in which God had condescended to make a familiar revelation of himself to men. So much is included when God is spoken of here as the God of Israel. But he does not satisfy himself with enjoining them to celebrate the power of God with praises of the voice. He exhorts them to the exercise of faith, for in reality we cannot better ascribe strength unto God, than by reposing in his protection as all-sufficient. Thus, after having said that his strength is in the clouds,1 he adds, that he is terrible out of his holy places, by which is meant, that he exerts a power in his temple which is sufficient to confound his enemies. Some understand heaven and earth to be the holy places intended, but this does not agree with the context, for it is immediately added, that the God of Israel would, give strength unto his people. It is evident, therefore3 that the Psalmist speaks of God's protection of his Church. The plural number is used in speaking of the sanctuary, here as in other places, because the tabernacle was divided into three parts. He points, in short, to the ark of the covenant, as that which the believing people of God should recognise as a symbol of confidence, remembering the promise, " I will dwell in the midst of you," and thus resting with security under the wings of the Divine protection, and confidently calling upon his name. Any right which Israel might have in distinction from others to trust in the guardianship of God, rested entirely upon that covenant of free grace by which they had been chosen to be God's peculiar heritage. Let it be remembered, however, that God continues to exert in behalf of his Church still these terrible displays of his power of which the Psalmist speaks. 1 "This refers to the phenomena of thunder and lightning; for all nations have observed that the electric fluid is an irresistible agent—destroying life, tearing towers and castles to pieces, rending the strongest oaks, and cleaving the most solid rocks; and the most enlightened nations have justly considered it as an especial manifestation of the power and sovereignty of God."—Greenfield. l'SALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 45 PSALM LXIX. There is a close resemblance between this psalm and the twenty-second. In the opening verses, David complains of the barbarous cruelty of his enemies, and of the grievous wrongs which they had inflicted upon him.1 But his mind, he affirms, was not hereby reduced to such a state of distress as to prevent him from patiently relying on the protection of God, or to discourage him from continuing in the undeviating course of a holy and an upright life. He rather testifies that his piety, and the courage and activity which he had manifested in maintaining the interests of the divine glory, were the cause of the hostility borne to him by the generality of men. After having again complained of being not less shamefully than cruelly oppressed by his enemies, he invokes God to visit them with deserved punishment. In the close, exulting as if he had obtained his highest wishes, he engages to yield to God a solemn sacrifice of praise. IT To the chief musician upon Shoshannim of David. We have already spoken elsewhere of the word Shoshannim. Its proper meaning is uncertain and obscure; but the most probable conjecture is, that it was the commencement of some song. If, however, any would prefer considering it as the name of some musical instrument, I have no objections. But the opinion held by some that this psalm was composed at the season of spring, when the lilies begin to blossom, is altogether unfounded and frivolous.3 Before proceeding farther, we would have you to observe that David wrote this inspired ode not so much in his own name, as in the name of the whole Church, of whose Head he was an eminent type, as will be more clearly brought out in the sequel. This is highly worthy of our notice, that from this consideration we may be led 1 The particular enemies of whom he speaks are uncertain; some referring the occasion of the composition of the psalm to his persecution by Saul, and others to the rebellion of Absalom. But to whatever part of David's eventful life the psalm primarily refers, it may be concluded, from the frequency with which it is quoted and applied to Christ in the New Testament, that it was prophetic of him, of whom David, rejected and persecuted, was an eminent type. It is quoted in the New Testament at least seven times; the 4th verse in John xv. 25; the 9th verse in John ii. 17, and Kom. xv. 3 ; the 21st verse in Matth. xxvii. 34, 48, and John xix. 28, 29; the 22d and 23d verses in Kom. xi. 9, 10; and the 25th verse in Acts i. 16, 20. 2 They rest this opinion upon the meaning which they attach to the word EME>e>, Shoshannim, in the title of the psalm, which they translate lilies. 46 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. to contemplate with the greater attention the representation which is here given of the common condition of all the people of God. Besides, it is highly probable that David did not here comprehend only one kind of persecution, but all the evils which he had suffered during the course of many years. 1. Save me, 0 God! for the waters have entered in unto my soul. 2. / am sunk in deep mire, where there is no footing, [or stand- ing place :] / am come into deep waters, and the floodx of the water overfloweth me. 3. / am weary of crying ; my throat has become hoarse there- with : my eyes have failed with [or in] waiting for my God. 4. They who hate me without cause are more in number than the hairs of my head : my lying adversaries, who eagerly desire to destroy me, are increased ; 2 that which I took not by spoil, then 8 / restored it. 5. O God! thou hnowest my foolishness ; and my faults are not hidden from thee. 1. Save me, 0 God! for the waters, Sfc. Under the figure of waters, the Psalmist represents his condition as so extremely distressing that it brought him even to the brink of despair; and yet we know that, so far from being a soft and an effeminate person, he was one who encountered and overcame dreadful temptations with extraordinary courage. Whence we may infer the bitterness of the distress with which he was at that time afflicted. Some understand the word soul as denoting life;4 but this gives a very cold and unsatisfactory meaning. It rather signifies the heart. A man when he falls into an abyss of waters, may prevent for some time the water from entering his body, by stopping his mouth and his nostrils, but at length, from its being impossible for a human being to live without respiration, suffocation will compel him to let in 1 " Ou, la force et le fll."—Fr. marg. " Or, the force and course." a " Ou, fortifiez."—Fr. marg. " Or, strengthened." 3 The Hebrew word fx, for then, appears to be emphatic, "jx; in ipso articulo, (Schultens in Prov. vii. 22;) immediately, without any contention, or delay." Lowth, quoted in Merrick's Annotations. 4 " The waters are come in unto my soul; i.e., a iood of overwhelming calamities threaten my life: comp. verse 16."—Cresswell. Williams thinks the allusion i,-» to a leaky vessel, or to an inundation. PSALM LX1X. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 47 the waters, and they will penetrate even to the heart. David by this metaphor would intimate, not only that the waters had covered and overwhelmed him, but also that he had been forced to draw them into his body. 2. / am sunk in deep mire, where there is no standing place. Here he compares his afflictions to a deep sink of mire, where there is still greater danger; for if a man fixes his feet upon a solid bottom, he may raise himself up, there having been many instances in which persons, placing their feet on the bottom, have by a sudden spring emerged and escaped the peril of the waters; but when a man finds himself once sunk in some slough or muddy river, it is all over with him, he has no means of saving himself.1 The Psalmist adduces additional circumstances in illustration of his afflicted condition. He declares that he was inundated by the flowing of the waters; an expression indicating the disorder and confusion which his distresses and persecutions produced. 3. I am weary of crying. David, in seeking and calling upon God, when his affairs were in such a confused and desperate condition, exhibited an instance of rare and wonderful patience. He complains of having continued crying until he was exhausted and became hoarse, and all to no purpose. By the word weary, he does not mean that he gave up with prayer, as if he had cast from him all love to and delight in that exercise upon finding that it proved unavailing as a means of deliverance. He rather describes his untiring perseverance ; and the same idea is expressed by his hoarse throat and failing eyes.2 He certainly did not cry out before men from mere affectation, nor was this hoarseness contracted in the course of one day. We perceive, then, that although his bodily senses failed him, the vigour of his faith was by no 1 " Comme nous en voyons plusieurs qui donnans du pied au fond, de roideur trouvent fa9on d'eschapper le peril de l'eau: mais depuis qu'on se trouve une fois enfonce en quelque bourbier ou riviere limonneuse, c'est fait, il n'y a nul moyen de ae sauyer."—Fr. 2 " %' My sight faileth me,' &c. This is said metaphorically, the metaphor being taken from the pain occasioned to the eyes when they are long and intently fixed upon the same point." CressweU. 48 COMMENTAKY UPON PSAI.ll LXIX. means extinguished. When we reflect that David has spoken, as it were, out of the mouth of Christ, and, as it were, out of the mouth of all true saints who are the members of Christ, we ought not to think that any strange thing happens to us, if at any time we are so overwhelmed with death, as to be unable to discern the slightest hope of life. Yea, rather let us learn betimes, while God spares us, to meditate on this truth, and derive the aid which it is fitted to impart under calamity, That even in the most profound depths of adversity faith may hold us up, and, what is more, may elevate us to God; there being, as Paul testifies, (Rom. viii. 39,) no height nor depth which can separate us from the infinite love of Him who swallows up all depths, yea, even hell itself. 4. They who hate me without cause are more in number than the hairs of my head. The Psalmist now expresses without figure what he had said under the metaphors of the mire and of the impetuous rushing of the waters. Persecuted as he was by so great a multitude of enemies, he had too good reason to be afraid of death in innumerable ways. Nor is his language hyperbolical, when he represents his enemies as more in number than the hairs of his head, since he was mortally hated and detested by the whole kingdom, it being the universal belief that he was a base and wicked traitor to his country. Farther, we know from the sacred history how numerous and powerful the armies were which Saul sent forth to pursue him. He expresses the mortal hatred which they bore to him, when he tells us that they were intently set upon his destruction, being eagerly desirous to have him cut off" by a violent death; and yet he avows that he had done nothing to merit such unrelenting persecution. The Hebrew word DJH, chinnam, which we have rendered, without cause, and which some translate, for nothing, intimates that they were impelled by a strong desire to do him injury, although he had not done them even the slightest wrong, nor given them the smallest provocation by ill usage of any kind. For this reason he applies to his enemies the appellation *lpJJ>, sheher, that is, liars, because they had no just ground to make war upon him, although they pretended the PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. ii) contrary. Let us, therefore, after his example, if at any time we. are subjected to persecution, study to have the support arising from the testimony of a good conscience, and to be able freely to protest before God, that the hatred which our enemies cherish against us is altogether causeless. This implies a self-control to which it is very difficult for a man to inure himself; but the more difficult it is, the more strenuous ought to be his efforts to attain it. It is mere effeminacy to regard it as an intolerable evil to be unrighteously afflicted; and the folly of this is very happily exposed by that noble answer of Socrates to his wife, who, having one day lamented, in prison, that he was condemned wrongfully, received from him this reply, " What then—would you rather that I should have suffered death for my offences ?" Farther, David adds, that he not only had to suffer the wrongs of violence, but had'also to bear much reviling and contumely, as if hehad been convicted of many crimes; a trial which, to an ingenuous mind, is more bitter and hard to bear than a hundred deaths. Many are to be found resolutely prepared to encounter death, who are by no means prepared to exhibit equal fortitude in the endurance of shame. Farther, David was not only despoiled of his goods by the violence of robbers, but he had been also mangled in his person, as if he had been a thief and a robber : That which I took not by spoil, then I restored it.1 When his enemies thus plundered and maltreated him, they doubtless boasted that they were acting as the judges of a perverse and wicked man ; and we know that they were held in honourable estimation as judges. Let us therefore learn from this example to prepare ourselves not only to bear 1 " There is an apparent impropriety in the language of this verse, though the sense is perfectly clear. It is a proverbial expression, to mark the injustice and extortion of the enemies that are referred to, who compelled the speaker, without any right, to yield up his goods to persons to whom he was not indebted."—Watford. Horsley observes, that this last clause is a proverbial expression, the meaning of which is, " I have been accountable for the crimes of others." Dr Adam Clarke also remarks, that this is a sort of proverbial expression like these : " Those who suffered the wrong pay the costs"—" Kings sin and the people are punished." This pre-eminently applies to Christ, who was perfectly holy, but who, by bearing the punishment due to the guilt of man, made satisfaction to Divine justice for sins which he never committed, and restored those blessings which he never took away. 50 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. patiently all losses and troubles, yea, even death itself, but also shame and reproach, if at any time we are loaded with unfounded accusations. Christ himself, the fountain of all righteousness and holiness, was not exempted from foul calumny, why then should we be dismayed when we meet with a similar trial ? It may well fortify our minds against it when we consider, that to persevere stedfastly in the practice of righteousness, although such is the reward which we receive from the world, is the genuine test of our integrity. 5. O God! thou hnowest m\j foolishness. Augustine has laboured to little purpose to show in what way these words are applicable to Christ; and at length he transfers to his members that which could not properly be said of the Head.' David here uses the language of irony; and by this mode of 1 According to Augustine, the Messiah, when he says " my foolishness" and "my iniquities," speaks of the. sins of men which were imputed to him, and for which he suffered and died under the curse of the law, which treated him as if he had been a sinner, in consequence of the sins thus imputed to him. A similar interpretation is given by Bishops Horslcy and Home, as well as many others. " The Messiah," says the first of these critics, " here, as iu many places, may speak of the follies and crimes of men, for which lie had made himself answerable as his own." Admitting, as we are disposed to do, although Calvin takes an opposite view, that the passage is applicable to Christ, it may be doubted whether this is the correct interpretation. The sins of those for whom Christ died, by being imputed to him, no doubt became his in the eye of the law, in such a sense as to make him answerable for them. But the Scriptures, be it observed, while they speak of him as "wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities," and as " bearing our sins in his own body on the tree," as if afraid to use any forms of expression which would even seem to derogate from his immaculate purity, never speak of the sins of those for whom he died as his own sins. What Horsley adds, as an additional explanation, is very unguarded. " Perhaps," says he, " lie who, although ho was without sin, was yet tempted in all points like unto us, might, iu his humility, speak of the incitement of the passions in Ins mvn mind as weakness and fault, making confession of it before the Father " ISTothiug, doubtless, was farther from the mind of the prelate, than to teach any thing inconsistent with the.perfect holiness of the Son of God; and he expressly affirms that "he was without sin ;" but the language which he employs is scarcely consistent with this position, and it can convey no idea on the subject except an erroneous one. " The prince of this world cometh," said Jesus to his disciples, " and hath nothing in me''—hath nothing in me, that is, to use the words of DrDoddridgc, " no guilt of mine, to give him power over me ; nor any inward corruption, to take part with his temptations." The explanation of the text, which appears to be the most natural and consistent, is that which considers the Saviour as solemnly appealing to the Father iu vindication of PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 51 expressing himself he meant to intimate, that, overwhelmed with the unrighteous judgments of men, he betakes himself to God, and implores him to appear as the defender of his cause. This is much more emphatic than if he had affirmed plainly, and without figure, that his integrity was known to God. In this way he administers a sharp rebuke to his enemies, and as it were looks down with a noble contempt upon the calumnious speeches which they uttered against him; as Jeremiah does when he says, (chap. xx. 7,) " O Lord! thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived." Some ignorant people put a violent construction on these words of Jeremiah, as if they implied that he was actually deceived; whereas he is rather to be understood as deriding with bitter sarcasm his calumniators, who, in speaking evil of him, were chargeable with reproaching and blaspheming God himself. David in like manner, in the passage before us, as a means of preserving himself from succumbing under the perverse judgments of men, appeals to God as the judge of his cause; and possessing as he did the approving testimony of a good conscience, he regards in a great measure with indifference the unjust estimate which men might form of his character. It were indeed desirable that our integrity should also be acknowledged and approved of by men, and that not so much on our own account as for the edification of our brethren. But if, after we have done all in our power to make men form a favourable opinion respecting us, they misconstruct and pervert every good word which we utter, and every good action which we perform, we ought to maintain such great ness of mind as boldly to despise the world and all false accusers, resting contented with the judgment of God and with his innocence. His enemies falsely charged him with crimes, and made these charges the ground of their cruel and malignant proceedings against him. The Divine Sufferer, therefore, with confidence appeals to God, saying, Thou, who art the omniscient and all-righteous Judge, knowest that I am innocent of the crimes laid to my charge, and I invoke thee to plead my cause. This interpretation, which is adopted by many eminent critics, as Dr Boothroyd, Df Morrison, Walford, and others, is strongly supported by the context. The preceding verse contains strong assertions of his innocence ; and it was very natural to accompany these with an appeal from the falsehood and calumny of men, to the all-seeing and righteous Judge of the universe. 52 COMMENTARY UPON 1'SALM LXIX. that alone; for those who are over anxious about maintaining their good name cannot but often experience fainting of heart. Let us be always ready to satisfy men; but if they refuse to listen to what we have to say in self-vindication, let us proceed in our course through evil report as well as good report, following the example of Paul in 1 Cor. iv. 5, where he fearlessly appeals to the judgment of God, " who will bring to light the hidden things of darkness." 6. 0 Jehovah, Lord of Hosts ! let not them that wait for thee ho ashamed in me : let not them who seek thee be put to shame in me, 0 God of Israel! 7. For on thy account I have suffered reproach : shame Jialh covered my face. 8. / have .been a stranger to my brethren, and am become an alien to the children of my mother.' 0. For the zeal of thy house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of then that reproached thee are fallen upon me. 6. O Jehovah, Lord of Hosts ! let not them that wait for thee be ashamed in me. David declares that he is set forth as an example from which all the people of God may derive matter either of hope or despair. Although he was held in detestation and execrated by the great body of the people, there yet remained a few who were ready to bear just and impartial testimony to his innocence : knowing as they did that he was unrighteously afflicted by his persecutors, that he constantly reposed on the grace and goodness of God, and that no temptations could discourage or prevent him from continuing stedfast in the practice of true godliness. But when they observed the 1 In the East, where polygamy prevails, those who are children of the same father, but by different mothers, scarcely look upon each other as brothers and sisters at all, but as strangers or enemies ; while those who are children of the same mother regard each other with peculiarly strong affection. Hence said Gibeon to Zebah and Zalmunna, who had put to death his brethren, " They were my brethren, even the sons of my mother; as the Lord liveth, if ye had saved them alive, I would not slay yon," (Judges viii. 19.) It therefore greatly aggravated the affliction of David that he had " become an alien to the children of his mother," from whom he might have expected affection and sympathy, however much he might have been disregarded by his brethren, who were the children of his father's other wives. See vol. ii. p. 277, note 3. PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OP PSALMS. 53 distresses and calamities to which he was notwithstanding subjected, the only conclusion to which they were able to arrive was, that all the pains and labour which he had taken in devoutly serving God were entirely thrown away. As all the instances in which God extends his succour to his servants are so many seals, by which he confirms and gives us assurance of his goodness and grace towards us, the faithful must have been exceedingly discouraged had David been forsaken in the extremity of his distress. The danger of their being thus discouraged he now lays before God; not that God has ever need of being put in mind of any thing, but because he allows us to deal familiarly with him at the throne of grace. The word wait is properly to be understood of hope, and the expression to seek God, of prayer. The connecting of the two together teaches us the profitable lesson, that faith is not an inactive principle, since it is the means of stirring us up to seek God. 7. For on. thy account I have suffered reproach. He now expresses more distinctly what he had stated ironically in the fifth verse, where he asserts that his faults were not hidden from God. Nay, he proceeds farther, declaring not only that the evil treatment which he met with from his enemies was unjust and altogether unmerited, but also that his cause was really God's cause, since whatever he had undertaken and engaged in was expressly in obedience to the command of God. Saul no doubt had other reasons, or at least other pretences, for persecuting David; but as the hatred which he entertained against him most unquestionably proceeded from God's having called and anointed him to be king, David here justly protests that it was not for any wickedness which he had committed, but because he had obeyed God, that men in general disapproved of and rashly condemned him. It is a source of great consolation to true believers when they can protest that they have the warrant and call of God for whatever they undertake or engage in. If we are hated by the world for making a public confession of the faith, a thing which we are to expect, it being evident from observation that the wicked ordinarily are never more 54 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. fierce than when they assault the truth of God and the true religion, we have ground to entertain double confidence.1 We also learn from this passage how monstrous is the malice of men, who convert into a ground for reproach and reprehension the zeal for the Divine glory by which true believers are animated.2 But it is well for us that God not only wipes away the reproaches with which the wicked load us, but also so ennobles them, that they surpass all the honours and triumphs of the world. The Psalmist farther aggravates his complaint by the additional circumstance, that he was cruelly cast off by his own relations and friends; from which we are taught, that when by our devotedness to the cause of religion we cannot avoid exciting the displeasure of our brethren iigainst us, it is our duty simply to follow God, and not to confer with flesh and blood. 9. For the zeal of thy house hath eaten me up.3 David's enemies, no doubt, professed that nothing was farther from their mind than to touch the sacred name of God; but he reproves their hypocritical pretences, and affirms that he is fighting in God's quarrel. The manner in which he did this, he shows, was by the zeal for the Church of God with which his soul was inflamed. He not only assigns the cause of the evil treatment which he received—his zeal for the house of God—but also declares that whatever evil treatment he was undeservedly made the object of, yet, as it were, forgetting himself, he burned with a holy zeal to maintain the Church, and at the same time the glory of God, with which it is 1 That is, the confidence arising from the reflection that we are, in the first place, suffering unjustly; and, secondly^ that we are suffering in the cause of God. 2 " Qui convertissent en diffame et blasme le desir que les fideles ont de sa gloire."—Fr. 3 " The verb means not only ' to eat up, to devour,' but ' to corrode or consume,' by separating the parts from each other, as fire, (see Park-hurst on ^>3K, ii.;) and the radical import of the Hebrew word for ,' zeal,' seems to be ' to eat into, corrode, as fire.' The word (says Parkhurst) is, in the Hebrew Bible, generally applied to the fervent or ardent affections of the human frame, the effects of which are well known to be even like those of fire, corroding and consuming; and, accordingly, the poets, both ancient and modern, abound with descriptions of these ardent and consuming affections, taken from fire and its effects. (See on SOP-)"— Mant. PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OP PSALMS. 55 inseparably connected. To make this the more obvious, let it be observed, that although all boast in words of allowing to God the glory which belongs to him; yet when the law, the rule of virtuous and holy living, presents its claims to them, men only mock him, and not only so, but they furiously rush against him by the opposition which they make to his Word. They do this as if he willed to be honoured and served merely with the breath of the lip, and had not rather erected a throne among men, from which to govern them by laws. David, therefore, here places the Church in the room of God ; not that it was his intention to transfer to the Church what is proper to God, but to show the vanity of the pretensions which men make of being the people of God, when they shake themselves loose from the control of God's holy law, of which the Church is the faithful guardian. Besides, David had to deal with a class of men who, although a hypocritical and bastard race, professed to be the people of God; for all who adhered to Saul boasted of having a place in the Church, and stigmatised David as an apostate or a rotten member. With this unworthy treatment David was so far from being discouraged, that he willingly sustained all assaults for the defence of the true Church. He declares that he is unmoved by all the wrongs and revilings which he personally suffered at the hands of his enemies. Laying aside all concern about himself, he is disquieted and distressed only for the oppressed condition of the Church, or rather burns with anguish, and is consumed with the vehemence of his grief. The second clause of the verse is to the same effect, denoting that he has nothing separate from God. Some explain it in a different sense, understanding it to mean that the wicked and proud, with the view of making an assault upon David, directed their fury and violence against God himself, and in this way indirectly pierced the heart of this holy man with their blasphemies, knowing as they did that nothing would be more grievous to him to bear than this. But this interpretation is too forced. Equally forced is that of those who consider David as intimating that he did not less prostrate himself in humble supplication at the mercy-seat when- $G COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX, ever he heard the name of God torn by reproaches and blasphemy, than if he himself had been guilty of treason against the Divine Majesty. I therefore adhere to the opinion which I have already expressed, That David forgot what concerned himself, and that all the grief which he felt proceeded from the holy zeal with which he burned when he saw the sacred name of God insulted and outraged with horrible blasphemies. By this example we are taught, that whereas we are naturally so tender and delicate as to be unable to bear ignominy and reproach, we must endeavour to get quit of this unhappy state of mind, and ought rather to be grieved and agonised with the reproaches which are poured forth against God. On account of these, it becomes us to feel deep indignation, and even to give expression to this in strong language; but we ought to bear the wrongs and reproaches which we personally suffer without complaining. Until we have learned to set very little value upon our own reputation, we will never be inflamed with true zeal in contending for the preservation and advancement of the interests of the Divine glory. Besides, as David speaks in the name of the whole Church, whatever he says concerning himself behoved to be fulfilled in the supreme Head. It is, therefore, not surprising to find the Evangelists applying this passage to Christ, (John ii. 17.) In like manner, Paul, in Romans xv. 3, 5, 6, exhorting the faithful to imitate Christ, applies the second member to them all, and there also teaches us that the doctrine contained in it is very comprehensive, requiring them to devote themselves wholly to the advancement of the Divine glory, to endeavour in all their words and actions to preserve it unimpaired, and to be carefully on their guard that it may not be obscured by any fault of theirs. Since Christ, in whom there shines forth all the majesty of Deity, did not hesitate to expose himself to every species of reproach for the maintenance of his Father's glory, how base and shameful will it be for us to shrink from a similar lot. 10. And I wept, my soul fasted; and that was laid to me as a reproach. 11. I also made sackcloth my clothing : and I became a proverb to them. PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 57 12. They who sit in the gate defame me : and I am the song of those who drink intoxicating liquor. 13. But as for me, my prayer is to thee, 0 Jehovah ! in a time of thy favour, [or good-will,] 0 God : answer me in the multitude of thy mercy, in the truth of thy salvation. 10. And I wept, my soul fasted. David here proves, by the signs or effects, that his efforts to promote the Divine glory proceeded from a pure and well-regulated zeal, inasmuch as he was not impelled or inflamed by the impetuosity of the flesh, but rather humbly abased himself before God, choosing him to be the witness of his sorrow. By this he shows the more evidently the incorrigible perversity of his enemies. It frequently happens, that those who set themselves boldly for the vindication of the glory of God, provoke and exasperate the wicked to a higher pitch by opposing them conten-tiously and without moderation. But David's zeal was so tempered that it ought to have softened even the hardness of steel. By this circumstance he, however, intended to show that he was oppressed with such violence by the frowardness of his enemies, that he dared not even open his mouth to speak a single word in defence of the cause of God, and no other means were left him of defending it but tears and mourning. Pie was deprived, as we know, of the liberty of giving utterance to the sentiments of his heart, or rather his words, as being those of a condemned person, would have been repelled with cruel reproaches. It was a proof of the greater constancy when in such circumstances he continued to burn with a zeal as unabated as ever, and persevered in the voluntary sorrow which he had engaged to exercise with the view of maintaining the honour and glory of God. He accordingly declares, that he wept, and that his soul fasted, and that he was clothed with sackcloth; which were the tokens of mourning among the Jews. But his enemies turned all these things into mockery and jesting;1 from which it is manifest that they were carried away with the fury of demons. It is of importance for us to be fortified with such an example, 1 " That was turned to my reproach; i. e., it was made a subject of reproach to me."—Cresswell. 58 COMMENTARY UPOK PSALM LXIX. that in the present day we may not be discouraged when we meet with the same perversity by which the enemies of the Gospel prove themselves to be rather devils than men. We must, however, beware of pouring oil upon the fire which is already burning too fiercely, and should rather imitate David and Lot, who, although they had not liberty to rebuke the wicked, were yet deeply grieved in their hearts. And even when the wicked are constrained to hear us, mildness and humility will be a powerful means, or rather will be the best seasoning, for tempering holy zeal. Those who conceive of David as intimating that he resigned himself to suffer punishment in the room or stead of his enemies, attempt to confirm their opinion from his having clothed himself in sackcloth. But I take it more simply as meaning, that when he saw things in such a state of confusion, he voluntarily engaged in this sorrowful exercise to testify that nothing was more grievous to him than to witness the sacred name of God exposed to contumely. 12. They who sit in the gate defame me. Had David been molested only by vulgar buffoons and the refuse of the people, it would have been more easily endured; for it is not surprising that mean persons, who have no regard to what is becoming and honourable, degrade themselves by indulging in defamation without shame. But when the very judges, forgetful of what is demanded by the dignity of their office, abandon themselves to the same audacious conduct, the iniquity and baseness of it is greatly aggravated. Accordingly, David expressly complains that he was made a by-word and a proverb by those in the highest ranks of life. The opinion of some who, by the expression, they who sit in the gate, understand the whole people,1 is both frigid and inconsistent with the words of the text; for although men of every rank and condition assembled at the gates, yet none but the judges 1 " They that sit in the gate—vain and idle persons who spent their time there, in which there used to be a confluence of people."—Rosen-muller. " They that sit in the gate; i. e., the elders. The expression may, however, be put for the crowd assembled there to hear the decisions of the magistrates: compare 2 Kings vii. 1-18."—Cresswell. PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 59 and counsellors sat there.1 This is confirmed by the second clause of the verse; for by those who drink strong drink,2 is doubtless meant the rulers who were elevated by their wealth and dignity. It was, indeed, very cruel treatment, that this holy man was not only harassed by the lower classes of the people, but that the very persons who presided in the cause of justice, and the dignitaries of the Church, were in this ringleaders to others. As the same thing happens in our own day, it is not without cause that the Holy Spirit has set this example before our eyes. In the Papacy we find that the higher a man is exalted in honour, he is proportionally the more violent and outrageous in his opposition to the Gospel and its ministers, that he may exhibit himself a more valiant defender of the Catholic faith. Yea, this is a malady with which almost all kings and princes are smitten; which arises from their not regarding true dignity and excellence as consisting in virtue, and from their thinking that they are entitled to act without restraint as they please. And what is the estimation in which they hold the faithful servants of Christ ? It is a fact which cannot be denied, that one of the principal things about which they are concerned is, to scoff at and defame them, not only at their tables, but also on their thrones, in order,.if possible, to shame them into a renunciation of their faith. In general, also, they sneer at all the people of God, and enjoy themselves in descanting upon their simplicity, as if they were fools in wearying and wasting themselves in the service of God. ] 3. But as for me, my prayer is to thee, O Jehovah! It was a sign of uncommon virtue in David, that even this hard 1 Judges sat there in the exercise of their judicial functions ; the gates of cities being anciently the places where courts of judicature were held for trying all causes, and deciding all affairs. See Job xxix. 7, compared with verses 12,16, and 17 ; Deut. xxv. 7; Ruth iv. 1, 2 ; 1 Kings xxii. 10; Esther ii. 19. 2 " Bibentes siceram."—Lat. Cresswell has the following note on this clause of the verse: " More literally, / am the subject of the songs of them that drink sicera. Sicera was, according to Chrysostom, an intoxicating liquor, made from the juice of the palm-tree; the fruit of that tree being bruised and fermented, was probably the beverage of the lower orders, like the bouza of Ethiopia." 60 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. treatment could not shake his mind, and sink him into despondency. He informs us of the means by which he fortified himself against that terrible stumbling-block. When the wicked directed against him their witty and scoffing remarks, as if engines of war, to overthrow his faith, the means to which he had recourse for repelling all their assaults was pouring out his heart in prayer to God. He was constrained to keep silence before men, and, being thus driven out from the world, he betook himself to God. In like manner, although the faithful in the present day may be unable to make any impression upon the wicked, yet they will ultimately triumph, provided they retire from the world, and go directly to God to present their prayers before him. The meaning, in short, is, that David, having tried every means in his power, and finding that his labour was to no purpose, left off dealing with men, and dealt with God only. What follows, a time of thy favour, O God! is explained otherwise by many interpreters, who read the two clauses of the verse in one sentence, thus: But as for me, I prayed to God in a time of his favour; corresponding to that passage in Isaiah, (lv. 6,) " Call ye upon him while he is near." Others resolve it thus : I prayed that the time of favour might come, and that God would begin to be merciful to me. But David is rather speaking of the consolation which he then received by reflecting with himself, that although it was now a time of trouble with him, and although his prayers seemed to be altogether unavailing, yet God's favour would have its turn also. Thus the Prophet Habakkuk says, (ch. ii. 1,) " I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what he will say unto me." In like manner, Isaiah (ch. viii. 17) says, "I will wait upon the Lord, that hideth his face from the house of Jacob;" and Jeremiah, (ch. xiv. 22,) " We will wait upon thee." The only means by which, in our affliction, we can obtain the victory, is by our having hope shining in us in the midst of darkness, and by our having the sustaining influence which arises from waiting for the favour of God. After David has thus fortified himself for continued perseverance in the attitude of waiting, he immediately adds, Answer me in the multitude of thy goodness; PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF TSALMS. 61 and to goodness he joins the truth of salvation,1 intimating that God's mercy is proved by indubitable effect when he succours his servants who are reduced to the very depths of despair. What prompted him to present this prayer was, the full persuasion which he had, that the darkness in which he was now involved would in due time be dispelled, and that a serene and unclouded season of God's favour would succeed; a persuasion which arose from his recalling all his thoughts to God, lest he should faint by reason of the harassing treatment which he met with from the wicked. 14. Deliver me from the mire, that I may not sink : let me he delivered from my adversaries, and from the deep waters. 15. Let not the flood of waters overflow me ; and let not the deep swallow me up ; and let not the pit2 close its mouth upon me. 16. Answer me, 0 Jehovah! for thy mercy3 is good: in the multitude of thy compassions4 look upon me. 17. And hide not thy face from thy servant; for I am in trouble : hasten ! answer me ! 18. Draw near to my soul, redeem it; deliver me, on account of my enemies. 14. Deliver me from the mire, that I may not sink. The Psalmist repeats the same similitude which he had used before, but in a different manner. He had previously said that he was sunk in the mire, and now he prays that he may not sink in it. In short, he now prays that those things may not now befall him which he had formerly complained of as having befallen him. But it is very easy to reconcile this diversity of statement; for in the opening of the psalm he spake according to his actual feeling and experience; but now, looking to the issue, although living in the midst of death, he 1 Dr Wells explains, the truth of thy salvation, as meaning, " according to the promises thou hast made of saving me." a " The Chaldee interpreter understands by the pit, Gehenna."—Cress-well. 3 The original word lorii chesed, here translated mercy, signifies, as Dr Adam Clarke obsgrves, " exuberance of kindness." 4 "pDPrii rachamecka, for compassions, signifies, according to the same author, such affection as mothers bear to their young, and in God there is ai, rob, a multitude of these. 62 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. cherishes the hope of deliverance. This is expressed still more clearly in the last clause of the 15th verse, where he prays, Let not the pit close its mouth upon me ,* which is as if he had said, Let not the great multitude and weight of my afflictions overwhelm me, and let not sorrow swallow me up. 16. Answer me, O Jehovah ! for thy mercy ii good. The appeal which he here makes to the mercy and compassion of God is an evidence of the distressed condition into which he was brought. There can be no doubt that he sustained a dreadful conflict, when he had recourse to these as the only means of his safety. It is a very difficult matter to believe that God is merciful to us when he is angry with us, and that he is near us when he has withdrawn himself from us. David, aware of this, brings to his view a subject which he may oppose to this distrust, and by pleading for the exercise of the mercy and great compassions of God towards him, shows, that the only consideration which inspired him with hope was the benignant and merciful character of God. When he says, a little after, Look upon me, it is a prayer that God would make it manifest in very deed that he had heard him by granting him succour. In the following verse he utters a similar prayer. And by repeating so often the same things, he declares both the bitterness of his grief and the ardour of his desires. When he beseeches God not to hide his face, it is not from any apprehension which he entertained of being rejected, but because those who are oppressed with calamities cannot avoid being agitated and distracted with mental disquietude. But as God, in a peculiar manner, invites his servants to him, David avows that he is one of their number. In thus speaking, as I have already shown, and will afterwards have occasion to state at greater length, he does not boast of services on account of which he could prefer any claim to a divine reward, but rather depends on the gratuitous election of God ; although, at the same time, he is to be understood as adducing the service which he had faithfully yielded to God by whom he was called, as an evidence of his godliness. PSALM LXIX. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 63 18. Draw near to my soul, redeem it. David was doubtless fully persuaded by faith that God was near him; but as we are accustomed to measure the presence or absence of God by the effects, David here tacitly complains, judging according to the flesh, that he is far from him. By the expression, Draw near, he means, that in so far as could be gathered from his actual condition, God appeared to have no regard to his welfare. Again, by calling upon God to draw near to his life, which he seemed to have forsaken, he exhibits a striking proof of the strength of his faith. The more cruelly he is molested by the wicked and proud, the more does he trust that God will appear to deliver him. As has been elsewhere observed, it is always to be held as an undoubted truth, that since " God resisteth the proud," (James iv. 6,) he must at length repress the insolence and pride of those who obstinately resist him, although he may seem to connive at them for a time. 19. Thou knowest my reproach, and my confusion, and my ignominy: all my adversaries are before thee. 20. Reproach hath broken my heart, and I am afflicted: and I looked for one to take pity upon me, but there was none ; and for comforters, but I found none. 21. And they put gall into my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. 19. Thou knowest my reproach, and my confusion. This is a confirmation of the preceding sentence. Whence is it that the greater part of men become dispirited when they see the wicked outrageously rushing upon them, and their wickedness, like a water-flood, carrying all before it, but because they think that heaven is so obscured and overcast with clouds as to prevent God from beholding what is done upon the earth ? It becomes us, therefore, in this matter, to call to our remembrance the doctrine of a Divine Providence, that contemplating it we may be assured beyond all doubt, that God will appear for our succour in due season; for he cannot, on the one hand, shut his eyes to our miseries, and it is impossible for him, on the other, to allow the license which the 64 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. wicked take in doing evil to pass with impunity, without denying himself. David, therefore, takes comfort from the consideration that God is the witness of his grief, fear, sorrows, and cares ; nothing being hidden from the eye of Him who is the judge and governor of the world. Nor is it a vain repetition when he speaks so frequently of his reproach and shame. As he was subjected to such dreadful assaults of temptations as might have made the stoutest heart to tremble, it was indispensably necessary for his own defence to oppose to them a strong barrier for resistance. Nothing is more bitter to men of an ingenuous and noble spirit than reproach ; but when this is repeated, or rather when shame and reproach are heaped upon us, how needful is it then for us to possess more than ordinary strength, that we may not thereby be overwhelmed ? for when succour is delayed, our patience is very apt to give way, and despair very easily creeps in upon us. This shame and reproach may very properly be referred both to the outward appearance and to the actual feelings of the mind. It is well known that he was everywhere held in open derision ; and the mockeries which he experienced could not but strike into him both shame and sorrow. For the same reason he subjoins that his enemies are before God, or known to him; as if he had said, Lord, thou knowest how, like a poor sheep, I am surrounded by thousands of wolves. 20. Reproach hath broken my heart, and I am afflicted. He expresses more distinctly not only that he was confounded-or ashamed at the sad aspect which he presented of having been deserted, but that he was well nigh overwhelmed with sorrow by lying so long under reproach and shame. Whence it is evident that he did not overcome this sorrow without a struggle; and that the reason why he so firmly withstood the waves of temptations was, not because they did not reach his heart, but because, being sorely smitten, he made resistance with a corresponding degree of intrepidity. He states, as an additional aggravation of his distress, that every office of humanity was withheld from him: that there was nobody who had compassion upon him, or to whom he could PSALM LX1X. THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 65 disburden his griefs. Some take the word 1^, nud, for to tell or recount; and undoubtedly when we pour out our complaints to our friends, it affords some alleviation to our distress. Thus he employs as an argument for obtaining mercy from God, the consideration that he was deprived of all aid and comfort from his fellow-men. 21. And they put gall into my meat. Here he again repeats that his enemies carry their cruelty towards him to the utmost extent in their power. He speaks metaphorically when he describes them as mingling gall or poison with his meat, and vinegar with his drink ;l even as it is said in Jeremiah, (chap. ix. 15,) " Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink." But still the Apostle John justly declares that this Scripture was fulfilled when the soldiers gave Christ vinegar to drink upon the cross, (John xix. 28-30;) for it was requisite that whatever cruelty the reprobate exercise towards the members of Christ, should by a visible sign be represented in Christ himself. We have stated on the same principle, in our remarks upon Psalm xxii. 18, that when the soldiers parted the garments of Christ among them, that verse was appropriately quoted, "They parted my garments among them, 1 The word wi, rosh, here denominated gall, is thought by Celsius, Michaelis, Boothroyd, and others, to be hemlock. According to Dr Adam Clarke and Williams, it refers to bitters in general, and particularly those of a deleterious nature. Bochart, from a comparison of this passage with John xix. 29, thinks that e>ki, rosh, is the same herb as the Evangelist calls vaauKo;, " hyssop;" a species of which growing in Judea, he proves from Isaac Ben Orman, an Arabian writer, to be so bitter, as not to be eatable. Theophylact expressly tells us that the hyssop was added as being deleterious or poisonous; and Nonnus' paraphrase is, " one gave the deadly acid mixed with hyssop." See Parkhurst on %w\. The word occurs in Deut. xxix. 18 ; xxxii. 33 ; and is, in the latter place, rendered poison. In Hosea x. 4, it is rendered hemlock; and in Amos vi. 12, it is put in apposition with a word there translated hemlock, although the same word is also rendered wormwood. Vinegar, we conceive, here means sour wine, such as was given to slaves or prisoners in the East. Persons in better circumstances used lemons or pomegranates to give their drink a grateful acidity. It was therefore a great insult offered to a royal personage to give him in his thirst the refreshment of a slave or of a wretched prisoner; and David employs this figure to express the insults which were offered to him by his e leinies. See Harmer's Observations, vol. ii. pp. 158, 159. 66 COMMENTARY UPON PSALM LXIX. and upon my vesture did they cast lots;" although David's object was to express by figurative language that he was robbed, and that all his goods were violently taken from him, and made a prey of by his enemies. The natural sense must, however, be retained; which is, that the holy prophet had no relief afforded him; and that he was in a condition similar to that of a man who, already too much afflicted, found, as an additional aggravation of his distress, that his meat was poisoned, and his drink rendered nauseous by the bitter ingredients with which it had been mingled. 22. Let^ their table he/ore them be for a snare; and their pros- perity2 [or things for peace] for a net. 23. Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see ; and make their loins continually to tremble. 24. Pour out thy wrath upon them; and let thy hot displeasure seize them. 25. Let their habitation be desolate ; let none dwell in their tents. 26. For they have persecuted him whom thou hast smitten ; and they have added to the grief of those whom thou hast wounded, [literally of thy wounded ones.] 27. Add iniquity to their iniquity ; and let them not enter into thy righteousness. 28. Let them be blotted out from the book of the living ; and let them not be vjritten among the righteous. 1 This and the following verses, which are here expressed in the form of imprecations, are translated by many in the future tense, as predictions : " Their table before them shall be for a snare," &c. 2 The LXX. have rendered the word here translated prosperity by a word which signifies recompense: " Let their table before them be for a snare, xxi it's dvTct7r6io