1 I will give thanks to you, LORD, with all my heart;
I will tell of all your wonderful deeds. 2 I will be glad and rejoice in you;
I will sing the praises of your name, O Most High.
3 My enemies turn back;
they stumble and perish before you. 4 For you have upheld my right and my cause,
sitting enthroned as the righteous judge. 5 You have rebuked the nations and destroyed the wicked;
you have blotted out their name for ever and ever. 6 Endless ruin has overtaken my enemies,
you have uprooted their cities;
even the memory of them has perished.
7 The LORD reigns forever;
he has established his throne for judgment. 8 He rules the world in righteousness
and judges the peoples with equity. 9 The LORD is a refuge for the oppressed,
a stronghold in times of trouble. 10 Those who know your name trust in you,
for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.
11 Sing the praises of the LORD, enthroned in Zion;
proclaim among the nations what he has done. 12 For he who avenges blood remembers;
he does not ignore the cries of the afflicted.
13 LORD, see how my enemies persecute me!
Have mercy and lift me up from the gates of death, 14 that I may declare your praises
in the gates of Daughter Zion,
and there rejoice in your salvation.
15 The nations have fallen into the pit they have dug;
their feet are caught in the net they have hidden. 16 The LORD is known by his acts of justice;
the wicked are ensnared by the work of their hands. The Hebrew has
Higgaion and
Selah (words of uncertain meaning) here;
Selah occurs also at the end of verse 20. 17 The wicked go down to the realm of the dead,
all the nations that forget God. 18 But God will never forget the needy;
the hope of the afflicted will never perish.
19 Arise, LORD, do not let mortals triumph;
let the nations be judged in your presence. 20 Strike them with terror, LORD;
let the nations know they are only mortal.
8.And he shall judge the world in righteousness. As David has just now testified, that the power of God is not inactive, so that he dwells in heaven only indulging himself in pleasures; but that it is a constantly operating power which he exercises in preserving his authority, and
governing the world in righteousness and equity; so in this verse he adds the use of this doctrine, which is this, that the power of God is not shut up in heaven, but manifests itself in succouring men. The true doctrine on this subject, is not, like Epicurus, to imagine that God is a being wholly devoted to ease and pleasures, and who, satisfied with himself alone, has no care whatever about mankind, but to place him on the throne of power and equity, so that we may be fully persuaded, that
although he does not immediately succor those who are unrighteously oppressed, yet there is not a moment in which he ceases to take a deep interest in them. And when he seems for a time to take no notice of things, the conclusion to which we should come most assuredly is, not that he deserts his office, but that he wishes hereby to exercise the patience of his people, and that, therefore, we should wait the issue in patience, and with tranquillity of mind. The demonstrative pronoun He, in my opinion, is of great weight. The import of it is, as if David had said, No one can deprive God of his office as Judge of the world, nor prevent him from extending his judgments to all nations. Whence it follows, that he will much more be the judge of his own people. David declares these judgments to be righteous, in order to induce us, when we are
unrighteously and cruelly molested, to ask assistance from God, in the confident expectation of obtaining it; for since he judges the nations in righteousness, he will not suffer injustice and oppression always to reign with impunity in the world, nor deny his aid to the innocent.
