Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

which contains the strength of its succulent verdure as an essence. The ecclesia pressa is then triumphans. The eye, which was wont to look timidly and tearfully upon the persecutors, the ears, upon which even their name and the tidings of their approach were wont to produce terror, now see their desire upon them as they are blotted out. 3 WW (found only here) follows the sense of 3 n*n, cf. ^J Ja), to lose one's self in the contemplation of anything. *"W is either a substantive after the form H3, TO, or a participle in the signification " those who regarded me with hostility, those who lay in wait for me," like D13, fled, Num. xxxv. 32, "ttD, having removed themselves to a distance, Jer. xvii. 13, 3V^, turned back, Mic. ii. 8; for this participial form has not only a passive signification (like b^D, circumcised), but sometimes, too, a deponent perfect signification; and OTl in Num. xxxii. 17, if it belongs here, may signify hurried = in haste. In *JH^ however, no such passive colouring of the meaning is conceivable; it is therefore: insidiati (Luzatto, Grammatical § 518: coloro che mi guatavano). There is no need for regarding the word, with Bottcher and Olshausen, as distorted from *THP (the apocopated participle Pilel of the same verb); one might more readily regard it as a softening of that word as to the sound (Ewald, Hitzig). In ver. 12b it is not to be rendered: upon the wicked doers (villains) who rise up against me. The placing of the adjective thus before its substantive must (witli the exception of 3"} when used after the manner of a numeral) be accounted impossible in Hebrew, even in the face of the passages brought forward by Hitzig, viz. 1 Chron. xxvii. 5, 1 Sam. xxxi. 3;* it is therefore: upon those who as villains rise up against. The circumstance that the poet now in ver. 13 passes from himself to speak of the righteous, is brought about by the fact that it is the congregation of the righteous in general, i.e. of those who regulate their life according to the divine order of salvation, into whose future he here takes a glance. When the prosperity [lit. the blossoming] of the un-

* In the former passage p'fcO jri3 is taken as one notion (chief priest), and in the latter T\Wp2 WJN (men with the bow) is, with Keil, to be regarded as an apposition.

godly comes to au end, the springing up and growth of the righteous only then rightly has its beginning. The richness of the inflorescence of the date-palm ("i£?) *s clear from the fact, that when it has attained its full size, it bears from three to four, and in some instances even as many as six, hundred pounds of fruit. And there is no more charming and majestic sight than the palm of the oasis, this prince among the trees of the plain, with its proudly raised diadem of leaves, its attitude peering forth into the distance and gazing full into the face of the sun, its perennial verdure, and its vital force, which constantly renews itself from the root — a picture of life in the midst of the world of death. The likening of the righteous to the palm, to the u blessed tree," to this u sister of man," as the Arabs call it, offers points of comparison in abundance. Side by side with the palm is the cedar, the prince of the trees of the mountain, and in particular of Mount Lebanon. The most natural point of comparison, as nafe^ (cf. Job viii. 11) states, is its graceful lofty growth, then in general to Saav teal OepfLbv kcl\ 0pi'sfn/jLov (Theodoret), i.e. the intensity of its vegetative strength, but also the perpetual verdure of its foliage and the perfume (Hos. xiv. 7) which it exhales.

Vers. 14-16. The soil in which the righteous are planted or (if it is not rendered with the LXX. ire^xnevfievoi, but with the other Greek versions /jbera^vTevOivres;) into which they are transplanted, and where they take root, a planting of the Lord, for His praise, is His holy Temple, the centre of a family fellowship with God that is brought about from that point as its starting-point and is unlimited by time and space. There they stand as in sacred ground and air, which impart to them ever new powers of life; they put forth buds (D^ian as in Job xiv. 9) and preserve a verdant freshness and marrowy vitality (like the olive, lii. 10, Judg. ix. 9) even into their old age (ay of a productive force for putting out shoots; vid. with reference to the root aj, Genesis, S. 635 sq.), cf. Isa. lxv. 22: like the duration of the trees is the duration of my people; they live long in unbroken strength, in order, in looking back upon a life rich in experiences of divine acts of righteousness and loving-kindness, to confirm the confession which Moses, in Deut. xxxii. 4, places at the head of his great song. There the expression is b\V ]% here it is *3 nrfry pK. This 'oldtha, softened from ' awldtlia — so the Keri — with a transition from the aw, an into o, is also found in Job v. 16 (cf. n?'y =?W ps. lviii. 3, lxiv. 7, Isa. lxi. 8), and is certainly original in this Psalm, which also has many other points of coincidence with the Book of Job (like Ps. cvii., which, however, in ver. 42 transposes nn>y into »*w).

majesty; Jahve hath clothed Himself, He hath girded Himself with might: Therefore the world standeth fast without tottering.

The floods have lifted up their roaring, The floods lift up their noise.

4 More than the rumblings of great waters, Of the glorious, of the breakers of the sea, Is Jahve glorious in the height.

5 Thy testimonies are inviolable, Holiness becometh Thy house, Jahve, unto length of days.

Side by side with those Psalms which behold in anticipation the Messianic future, whether it be prophetically or only typically, or typically and prophetically at the same time, as the kingship of Jahve's Anointed which overcomes and blesses the world, there are others in which the perfected theocracy as such is beheld beforehand, not, however, as an appearing (parusia) of a human king, but as the appearing of Jahve

Himself, as the kingdom of God manifest in all its glory. These theocratic Psalms form, together with the christocratic, two series of prophecy referring to the last time which run parallel with one another. The one has for its goal the Anointed of Jahve, who rules out of Zion over all peoples; the other, Jahve sitting above the cherubim, to whom the whole world does homage. The two series, it is true, converge in the Old Testament, but do not meet; it is the history that fulfils these types and prophecies which first of all makes clear that which flashes forth in the Old Testament only in certain climaxes of prophecy and of lyric too (yid. on xlv. 1), viz. that the parusia of the Anointed One and the parusia of Jahve is one and the same.

Theocracy is an expression coined by Josepbus. In contrast with the monarchical, oligarchical, and democratic form of government of other nations, he calls the Mosaic form OeoKparia, but he does so somewhat timidly, d>9 av rt? elirob fiiaaanevos rbv \6yov [c. Apion. ii. 17]. The coining of the expression is thankworthy; only one has to free one's self from the false conception that the theocracy is a particular constitution. The alternating forms of government were only various modes of its adjustment. The theocracy itself is a reciprocal relationship between God and men, exalted above these intermediary forms, which had its first manifest beginning when Jahve became Israel's King (Deut. xxxiii. 5, cf. Ex. xv. 18), and which will be finally perfected by its breaking through this national self-limitation when the King of Israel becomes King of the whole world, that is overcome both outwardly and spiritually. Hence the theocracy is an object of prediction and of hope. And the word v£ is used with reference to Jahve not merely of the first beginning of His imperial dominion, and of the manifestation of the same in facts in the most prominent points of the redemptive history, but also of the commencement of the imperial dominion in its perfected glory. We find the word used in this lofty sense, and in relation to the last time, e.g. in Isa. xxiv. 23, lii. 7, and most unmistakeably in Apoc. xi. 17, xix. 6. And in this sense njnj "n?0 is the watchword of the theocratic Psalms. Thus it is used even in Ps. xlvii. 9; but the first of the Psalms beginning with this watchword is Ps. xciii. They are all post-exilic. The prominent point from which this eschatological perspective opens out is the time of the new-born freedom and of the newly restored state.

Hitzig pertinently says: "This Psalm is already contained in nuce in ver. 9 of the preceding Psalm, which surely comes from the same author. This is at once manifest from the jerking start of the discourse in ver. 3 (cf. xcii. 10), which resolves the thought into two members, of which the first subsides into the vocative nin\" The LXX. (Codd. Vat. and Sin.) inscribes it: Eh rrjv rjfieprjv tov 7rpoGa/3/3aTOV, ore KajwKiarai rj 777, alvos wSt}? tu> Aavih. The third part of this inscription is worthless. The first part (for which Cod. Alex, erroneously has: tov o-af3f3aTov) is corroborated by the Talmudic tradition. Ps. xciii. was really the Friday Psalm, and that, as is said in Rosh ha-shana 31a, |.T$>y "jbttt (Wn) irDtfta "IDJIB>' DP by, because God then (on the sixth day) had completed His creative work and began to reign over them (His creatures); and that ore fcaTwfciaTcu (al. KarwKiaro) is to be explained in accordance therewith: when the earth had been peopled (with creatures, and more especially with men).

Vers. 1, 2. The sense of?!PD (with a beside Zinnor or Sarka as in xcvii. 1, xcix. 1 beside Dechi*) is historical, and it stands in the middle between the present:jb» 'n and the future •pD* 'n: Jahve has entered upon the kingship and now reigns. Jahve's rule heretofore, since He has given up the use of His omnipotence, has been self-abasement and self-renunciation: now, however, He shows Himself in all His majesty, which rises aloft above everything; He has put this on like a garment; He is King, and now too shows Himself to the world in the royal robe. The first Vi? has Olewejored; then the accentuation

* It is well known that this pausal form of the 3d masc. prset. occurs in connection with Zakeph; but it is also found with Rebia in cxii. 10 (the reading Dym), Lev. v. 23 (^3), Josh. x. 13 (1DV), Lam. ii. 17 (D£t i but with Munach in 1 Sam. vii. 17 (BD&O, and according to Abulwalid with takes rH CO^ together by means of Declii, and IJWjn?ty together by means of Athnach. T'y, as in Ps. xxix., points to the enemies; what is so named is God's invincibly triumphant omnipotence. This He has put on (Isa. li. 9), with this He has girded Himself— a military word (Isa. viii. 9): Jahve makes war against everything in antagonism to Himself, and casts it to the ground with the weapons of His wrathful judgments. We find a further and fuller description of this "itsnn ty in Isa. lix. 17, lxiii. 1 sq., cf. Dan. vii. 9.* That which cannot fail to take place in connection with the coming of this accession of Jahve to the kingdom is introduced with *]K. The world, as being the place of the kingdom of Jahve, shall stand without tottering in opposition to all hostile powers (xcvi. 10). Hitherto hostility towards God and its principal bulwark, the kingdom of the world, have disturbed the equilibrium and threatened all Godappointed relationships with dissolution; Jahve' s interposition, however, when He finally brings into effect all the abundant might of His royal government, will secure immoveableness to the shaken earth (cf. lxxv. 4). His throne stands, exalted above all commotion, TSD; it reaches back into the most distant past. Jahve is BpijJD; His being loses itself in the immemorial and the immeasurable. The throne and nature of Jahve are not incipient in time, and therefore too are not perishable; but as without beginning, so also they are endless, infinite in duration.

Vers. 3-5. All the raging of the world, therefore, will not be able to hinder the progress of the kingdom of God and its final breaking through to the glory of victory. The sea with its mighty mass of waters, with the constant unrest of its waves, with its ceaseless pressing against the solid land and foaming against the rocks, is an emblem of the Gentile world alienated from and at enmity with God; and the rivers (floods) are emblems of worldly kingdoms, as the Nile of the Egyptian (Jer. xlvi. 7 sq.), the Euphrates of the Assyrian (Isa. viii. 7 sq.), or more exactly, the Tigris, swift as an arrow, of the Assyrian, and the

* These passages, together with Ps. xciii. 1, civ. 1, are cited in Cant. Rabba 26& (cf. Debarim Rabba 291c?), where it is said that the Holy One calls Israel T\?2 (bride) ten times in the Scriptures, and that Israel on the other hand ten times assigns kingly judicial robes to Him.

tortuous Euphrates of the Babylonian empire (Isa. xxvii. 1). These rivers, as the poet says whilst he raises a plaintive but comforted look upwards to Jahve, have lifted up, have lifted up their murmur, the rivers lift up their roaring. The thought is unfolded in a so-called "parallelism with reservation." The perfects affirm what has taken place, the future that which even now as yet is taking place. The curat; \ey. ^"1 signifies a striking against (collinio), and a noise, a din. One now in ver. 4 looks for the thought that Jahve is exalted above this roaring of the waves. \0 will therefore be the min of comparison, not of the cause: " by reason of the roar of great waters are the breakers of the sea glorious" (Starck, Geier), — which, to say nothing more, is a tautological sentence. But if IP is comparative, then it is impossible to get on with the accentuation of D^TIK, whether it be with Mercha (Ben-Asher) or Declii (Ben-Naphtali). For to render: More than the roar of great waters are the breakers of the sea glorious (Mendelssohn), is impracticable, since M"i D^D are nothing less than D1 (Isa. xvii. 12 sq.), and we are prohibited from taking D^lTu'D DH^K as a parenthesis (Koster) by the fact that it is just this clause that is exceeded by 'n D11D1 THK. Consequently D^TIK has to be looked upon as a second attributive to WD brought in afterwards, and Dp'ia^p (the waves of the sea breaking upon the rocks, or even only breaking upon one another) as a more minute designation of these great and magnificent waters (DHHK, according to Ex. xv. 10 *), and it should have been accented: D* *HB>D ttVlK Ml tto ■ m!>p». Jahve's celestial majesty towers far above all the noisy majesties here below, whose waves, though lashed never so high, can still never reach His throne. He is King of His people, Lord of His church, which preserves His revelation and worships in His temple. This revelation, by virtue of His unapproachable, all-overpowering kingship, is inviolable; His testimonies, which minister to

* A Talmudic enigmatical utterance of R. Azaria runs: JTiSW "V1X N3* D^TIKn D*T"IND Dn'HK^, Let the glorious One (Jahve, Ps. xciii. 4, cf. Isa. x. 34, xxxiii. 21) come and maintain the right of the glorious ones (Israel, Ps. xvi. 3) against the glorious ones (the Egyptians, Ex. xv. 10 according to the construction of the Talmud) in the glorious ones (the waves of the sea, Ps. xciii. 4).

the establishment of His kingdom and promise its future manifestation in glory, are \6yoc ircarol icai uXtjOlvol, Apoc. xix. 9, xxii. 6. And holiness becometh His temple (BhjrnjW, 3d prcet. Pilely or according to the better attested reading of Heidenheim and Baer, n]^T;* therefore the feminine of the adjective with a more loosened syllable next to the tone, like y"3BW in xl. 18), that is to say, it is inviolable (sacrosanct), and when it is profaned, shall ever be vindicated again in its holiness. This clause, formulated after the manner of a prayer, is at the same time a petition that Jahve in all time to come would be pleased to thoroughly secure the place where His honour dwells here below against profanation.

4 They gush over, they speak arrogant things, They boast themselves, all the workers of evil.

6 The widow and stranger they slay, And they murder the fatherless;

7 And say as they do it: " Jah seeth not, And the God of Jacob hath no knowledge."

* The Masora on Ps. cxlvii. reckons four illfcO, one iilX31, and one rnw, and therefore our ni&U is one of the Jv5> in ioi P]ta ppSDl p!?D P p^DD (cf. Frensdorf's Ochla we-Ochla, p. 123), i.e. one of the seventeen words whose Aleph is audible, whilst it is otherwise always quiescent; e.g. n^1D2, otherwise DN^D-

8 Be sensible, ye senseless among the people! And ye fools, when will ye become wise?

9 He who hath planted the ear, ought He not to hear] Or He who formed the eye, ought He not to see?

10 He who chastiseth the nations, ought He not to reprove, He who teacheth men knowledge?

11 Jahve knoweth the thoughts of men That they are vanity.

12 Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, Jah, And teachest out of Thy Law;

13 To give him rest from the days of adversit}*, Until the pit be digged for the evil-doer.

14 For Jahve doth not thrust away His people, And He doth not forsake His inheritance.

15 But right must turn unto righteousness, And all the upright in heart shall follow it.

Who would stand up for me against the workers of

17 If Jahve had not been my help, [iniquity? My soul would quickly have dwelt in the silence of death.

19 In the multitude of my cares within me Thy comforts delight my soul.

20 Hath the judgment-seat of corruption fellowship with Thee, Which frameth trouble by decree?

23 He turneth back upon them their iniquity, And for their wickedness He will destroy them, Jahve our God will destroy them.

This Psalm, akin to Ps, xcii. and xciii. by the community of the anadiplosis, bears the inscription WaXficx; g>S?}? ratAavLZ, T€TpdBc eafifiaiov in the LXX. It is also a Talmudic tradition * that it was the Wednesday song in the Temple liturgy (rerpdhi aafifidrov = r\2V2 *]P3"Q). Athanasius explains it by a reference to the fourth month (Jer. xxxix. 2). The tg5 AavlBy however, is worthless. It is a post-Davidic Psalm; for, although it comes out of one mould, we still meet throughout with reminiscences of older Davidic and Asaphic models. The enemies against whom it supplicates the appearing of the God of righteous retribution are, as follows from a comparison of vers. 5, 8, 10, 12, non-Israelites, who despise the God of Israel and fear not His vengeance, ver. 7; whose barbarous doings, however, call forth, even among the oppressed people themselves, foolish doubts concerning Jahve's omniscient beholding and judicial interposition. Accordingly the Psalm is one of the latest, but not necessarily a Maccabaean Psalm. The later Persian age, in which the Book of Ecclesiastes was written, could also exhibit circumstances and moods such as these.

Vers. 1-3. The first strophe prays that God would at length put a judicial restraint upon the arrogance of ungodliness. Instead of ^Bin (a less frequent form of the imperative for VBin, Ges. § 53, rem. 3) it was perhaps originally written njrain (lxxx. 2), the He of which has been lost owing to the He that follows. The plural rri&i?? signifies not merely single instances of taking vengeance (Ezek. xxv. 17, cf. supra xviii. 48), but also intensively complete revenge or recompense (Judg. xi. 36, 2 Sam. iv. 8). The designation of God is similar to nippa?K in Jer. li. 56, and the anadiplosis is like vers. 3, 23, xciii. 1, 3. Kj^n, lift Thyself up, arise, viz. in judicial majesty, calls to mind vii. 7. ^B3 ^n is construed with?V (cf. <>, xxviii. 4, Isa. lix. 18) as in Joel iv. 4. With D^H accidentally accord ayavos and /cvSe'C yalcov in the epic poets.

* According to B. Erachin 11a, at the time of the Chaldaean destruction of Jerusalem the Levites on their pulpits were singing this 94th Psalm, and as they came to the words "and He turneth back upon them their iniquity" (ver. 23), the enemies pressed into the Temple, so that they were not able to sing the closing words, " Jahve, our God, will destroy them." To the scruple that Ps. xciv. is a Wednesday, not a Sunday, Psalm (that fatal day, however, was a Sunday, r\2W "•NVIO), it is replied, it may have been a lamentation song that had just been put into their mouths by the circumstances of that time (viMD1B3 \rb ten Xtbyi 50"6n).

Vers. 4_7# The second strophe describes those over whom the first prays that the judgment of God may come. 2s?n (cf. fp^n) is a tropical phrase used of that kind of speech that results from strong inward impulse and flows forth in rich abundance. The poet himself explains how it is here (cf. lix. 8) intended: they speak pny, that which is unrestrained, unbridled, insolent (vid. xxxi. 19). The Hithpa. TO$nn Schultens signifies in Hebrew the top of a tree (vid. on Isa. xvii. 9); and from the primary signification to tower aloft, whence too "IBK, to speak, prop, efferre = effari, "^Nnn, like "^^n in Isa. lxi. 6, directly signifies to exalt one's self, to carry one's self high, to strut. On *8?T cf. Prov. xxii. 22, Isa. iii. 15; and on their atheistical principle which V)JpK51 places in closest connection with their mode of action, cf. x. 11, lix. 8 extrem. The Dagesh in PlJ, distinct from the Dag. in the same word in ver. 12, cxviii. 5, 18, is the Dag. forte conjunct, according to the rule of the so-called P*m (vol. ii. p. 354, note).

Vers. 8-11. The third strophe now turns from those bloodthirsty, blasphemous oppressors of the people of God whose conduct calls forth the vengeance of Jahve, to those among the people themselves, who have been puzzled about the omniscience and indirectly about the righteousness of God by the fact that this vengeance is delayed. They are called &~\V2 and Dv1?? in the sense of lxxiii. 21 sq. Those hitherto described against whom God's vengeance is supplicated are this also; but this appellation would be too one-sided for them, and EiD refers the address expressly to a class of men among the people whom those oppress and slay. It is absurd that God, the planter of the ear (JH?In, like JJD*&? in Lev. xi. 7, with an accented ultima, because the prcet. Kal does not follow the rule for the drawing back of the accent called Tins J1D:) and the former of the eye (cf. xl. 7, Ex. iv. 11), should not be able to hear and to see; everything that is excellent in the creature, God must indeed possess in original, absolute perfection.* The

* The questions are not: ought He to have no ear, etc.; as Jerome pertinently observes in opposition to the anthropomorphites, membra tulit, ejficientias dedit.

poet then points to the extra-Israelitish world and calls God D^ia ID*, which cannot be made to refer to a warning by means of the voice of conscience; "i?s used thus without any closer definition does not signify " warning," but " chastening " (Prov. ix. 7). Taking his stand upon facts like those in Job xii. 23, the poet assumes the punitive judicial rule of God among the heathen to be an undeniable fact, and presents for consideration the question, whether He who chasteneth nations cannot and will not also punish the oppressors of His church (cf. Gen. xviii. 25), He who teacheth men knowledge, i.e. He who nevertheless must be the omnipotent One, since all knowledge comes originally from Him? Jahve, — thus does the course of argument close in ver. 11, — sees through (JHS of penetrative perceiving or knowing that goes to the very root of a matter) the thoughts of men that they are vanity. Thus it is to be interpreted, and not: for they (men) are vanity; for this ought to have been ^\} bsn vp? whereas in the dependent clause, when the predicate is not intended to be rendered especially prominent, as in ix. 21, the pronominal subject may precede, Isa. lxi. 9, Jer. xlvi. 5 (Hitzig). The rendering of the LXX. (1 Cor. iii. 20), ore elal fidratot, (Jerome, quoniam vance sunt), is therefore correct; nan, with the customary want of exactness, stands for n%\}. It is true men themselves are bin; it is not, however, on this account that He who sees through all things sees through their thoughts, but He sees through them in their sinful vanity.

Vers. 12-15. The fourth strophe praises the pious sufferer, whose good cause God will at length aid in obtaining its right. The u blessed" reminds one of xxxiv. 9, xl. 5, and more especially of Job v. 17, cf. Prov. iii. 11 sq. Here what are meant are sufferings like those bewailed in vers. 5 sq., which are however, after all, the well-meant dispensations of God. Concerning the aim and fruit of purifying and testing afflictions God teaches the sufferer out of His Law (cf. e.g. Deut. viii. 5 sq.), in order to procure him rest, viz. inward rest (cf. Jer. xlix. 23 with Isa. xxx. 15), i.e. not to suffer him to be disheartened and tempted by days of wickedness, i.e. wicked, calamitous days (Ew. § 287, 5), until (and it will inevitably come to pass) the pit is finished being dug into which the ungodly falls headlong (cf. cxii. 7 sq.). flj has the emphatic Dage*hy which properly does not double, and still less unite, but requires an emphatic pronunciation of the letter, which might easily become inaudible. The initial Jod of the divine name might easily lose its consonantal value here in connection with the preceding toneless u* and the Dag. guards against this: cf. cxviii. 5, 18. The certainty of the issue that is set in prospect by IV is then confirmed with *3. It is impossible that God can desert His church — He cannot do this, because in general right must finally come to His right, or, as it is here expressed, L33E;D must turn to P"i¥, i.e. the ri^ht that is now subdued must at length be again strictly maintained and justly administered, and " after it then all who are upright in heart," i.e. all such will side with it, joyously greeting that which has been long missed and yearned after. CQ&'p is fundamental right, which is at all times consistent with itself and raised above the casual circumstances of the time, and P^V, like riDK in Isa. xlii. 3, is righteousness (justice), which converts this right into a practical truth and reality.

Vers. 16-19. In the fifth strophe the poet celebrates the praise of the Lord as his sole, but also trusty and most consolatory help. The meaning of the question in ver. 16 is, that there is no man who would rise and succour him in the conflict with the evil-doers:? as in Ex. xiv. 25, Judo-, vi. 31, and Dy (without Erp? or the like) in the sense of contra, as in lv. 19, cf. 2 Chron. xx. 6. God alone is his help. He alone has rescued him from death. njn is to be supplied to W: if He had not been, or: if He were not; and the apodosis is: then very little would have been wanting, then it would soon have come to this, that his soul would have taken up its abode, etc.; cf. on the construction cxix. 92, cxxiv. 1-5, Isa. i. 9, and

* If it is correct that, as Aben-Ezra and Parchon testify, the }, as being compounded of o (u) -f j, was pronounced u [like the u in the French word pur] by the inhabitants of Palestine, then this Dagesh, in accordance with its orthophonic function, is the more intelligible in cases like n> U"iD*n and n» »nmp, cf. Pinsker, Einleitung, S. 153, and Geiger, Urschrift, S. 277. In ^^ ioip, Gen. xix. 14, Ex. xii. 31, ijjd i^p, Deut. n. 24, Tsade and Samech have this Dagesh for the same reason as the Sin in "flNfr W3BT1, Ex. xii. 15 (vid. Heidenheim on that passage), viz. because there is a danger in all these cases of slurring over the sharp sibilant. Even Chajug' (vid. Ewald and Dukes' Beitrage, iii. 23) confuses this Dag. orthophonicum with the Dag. forte conjunctivum.

on BiM?3 with the prceL lxxiii. 2, cxix. 87, Gen. xxvi. 10 (on the other hand with the fut. lxxxi. 15). no^ is, as in cxv. 17, the silence of the grave and of Hades; here it is the object to nJ3j^j as in xxxvii. 3, Prov. viii. 12, and frequently. When he appears to himself already as one that has fallen, God's mercy holds him up. And when thoughts, viz. sad and fearful thoughts, are multiplied within him, God's comforts delight him, viz. the encouragement of His word and the inward utterances of His Spirit. D^SJW, as in cxxxix. 23, is equivalent to DWP, from *\$W, *jyp, c^*-i, to split, branch off (Psychology, S. 181; tr. p. 214). The plural form WV_V\, like the plural of the imperative in Isa. xxix. 9, has two Pathachs, the second of which is the " independentification" of the Chateph

Vers. 20—23. In the sixth strophe the poet confidently expects the inevitable divine retribution for which he has earnestly prayed in the introduction. Tl^ir is erroneously accounted by many (and by Gesenius too) as fut. Pual = TWP — Itsy "I3IT, a vocal contraction together with a giving up of the reduplication in favour of which no example can be advanced. It is fut. Kal = T£ni, from "13IT = larr, with the same regression of the modification of the vowel* as in ^nj = larp in Gen. xliii. 29, Isa. xxx. 19 (Hupfeld), but as in verbs prima? gutturalis, so also in E^ns, E?1??, inflected from 3TI3, Ew. § 251, d. It might be more readily regarded as Poel than as Pual (like iraxn, Job xx. 26), but the Kal too already signifies to enter into fellowship (Gen. xiv. 3, Hos. iv. 17), therefore (similarly to *H?*, v. 5) it is: num consociabitur tecum. ND3 is here the judgment-seat, just as the Arabic cur si directly denotes the tribunal of God (in distinction from ^J*jj&\ the throne of His majesty). With reference to n^n vid. on v. 10. Assuming that pn is a divine statute, we obtain this meaning for pn"9y; which frameth (i.e. plots and executes) trouble, by making

* By means of a similar transposition of the vowel as is to be assumed in nn«n, Prov. i. 22, it also appears that pznDD = P3D1D (lying uPon tne table, dvoe.Kiifji.ivoi) of the Pesach-Haggada has to be explained, which Joseph Kimchi finds so inexplicable that he regards it as a clerical error that has become traditional.

the written divine right into a rightful title for unrighteous conduct, by means of which the innocent are plunged into misfortune. Hitzig renders: contrary to order, after Prov. xvii. 26, where, however, "^'V is intended like eveicev Sikcuoavvrjs, Matt. v. 10. Olshausen proposes to read XW (lvi. 7, lix. 4) instead of 'Hir, just as conversely Aben-Ezra in lvi. 7 reads VW. But Tis, *na, has the secured signification of scindere, incidere (cf. J^, but also Jci-, supm, i. 399), from which the signification invadere can be easily derived (whence W3, a breaking in, invasion, an invading host). With reference to *j?J tt vid. Psychology, S. 243 (tr. p. 286): because the blood is the soul, that is said of the blood which applies properly to the person. The subject to IW are the seat of corruption (by which a high council consisting of many may be meant, just as much as a princely throne) and its accomplices. Prophetic certainty is expressed in W and 2VM. The figure of God as 33K>D is Davidic and Korahitic. ^DHD "TO? is explained from xviii. 2. Since 2^n designates the retribution as a return of guilt incurred in the form of actual punishment, it might be rendered u requite " just as well as u cause to return;" &nvV, however, instead of D»T> (liv. 7) makes the idea expressed in vii. 17 more natural. On Bnjnn Hitzig correctly compares 2 Sam. xiv. 7, iii. 27. The Psalm closes with an anadiplosis, just as it began with one; and tf\T>K affirms that the destruction of the persecutor will follow as surely as the church is able to call Jahve its God.

Let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation!

2 Let us come before His face with thanksgiving, Let us make a joyful noise unto Him in songs I

4 He, in whose hand are the deep places of the earth, And to whom belong the tops of the mountains;

5 To whom belongeth the sea, and He hath made it, And His hands have formed the dry land,

6 Come, let us worship and bow down, Let us kneel before Jahve our Maker!

And we are the people of His pasture and the flock of His hand.

9 When your fathers tempted Me, Proved me, although they saw My work.

And said: " They are a people that do err in their heart." But they knew not My ways,

This Psalm is related to the preceding by the celebration of Jahve as a " Rock." If it has any definite occasion, it is at any rate not manifest what that occasion is. It consists of a four-line introduction and two groups of ten lines.

Vers. 1, 2. Jahve is called the Rock of our salvation (as in lxxxix. 27, cf. xciv. 22) as being its firm and sure ground. Visiting the house of God, one comes before God's face; CHj? \3S, prceoccupare faciem, is equivalent to visere (yisitare). «"ilin is not confessio peccati, but laudis. The Beth before min is the Beth of accompaniment, as in Mic. vi. 6; that before riiipt (according to 2 Sam. xxiii. 1 a name for psalms, whilst "ibTB can only be used as a technical expression) is the Beth of the medium.

Vers. 3-76. The adorableness of God receives a threefold confirmation: He is exalted above all gods as King, above all things as Creator, and above His people as Shepherd and Leader. E^N (g°ds) here, as in xcvi. 4 sq., xcvii. 7, 9, and frequently, are the powers of the natural world and of the world of men, which the Gentiles deify and call kings (as Moloch (Molech), the deified fire), which, however, all stand under the lordship of Jahve, who is infinitely exalted above everything that is otherwise called god (xcvi. 4, xcvii. 9). The supposition that D^n rriDjjifi denotes the pit-works (fieTaWa) of the mountains (Bottcher), is at once improbable, because to all appearance it is intended to be the antithesis to n^"v?.i?r,P, the shafts of the earth. The derivation from *\V\ (^J), ^dfiveLv, tcoTziav, also does not suit msyin in Num. xxiii. 22, xxiv. 8, for " fatigues " and " indefatigableness " are notions that lie very wide apart. The nisyifl *]D3 of Job xxii. 25 might more readily be explained according to this " silver of fatigues," i.e. silver that the fatiguing labour of mining brings to light, and roajnn Dnn in the passage before us, with Gussetius, Geier, and Hengstenberg: cacumina montium quia defatigantur qui eo ascendunt, prop, ascendings = summits of the mountains, after which niDjnn pjdd, Job xxii. 25, might also signify " silver of the mountain-heights." But the LXX., which renders Boga in the passages in Numbers and tcl vyfrrj t&v opecav in the passage before us, leads one to a more correct track. The verb *)?£ C^t)j transposed from y& (]?ai), goes back to the root *p, % to stand forth, tower above, to be high, according to which mDjnn = niyam signifies eminentice, i.e. towerings = summits, or prominences — high (the highest) perfection (yid. on Job xxii. 25). In the passage before us it is a synonym of the Arabic

^a*, *lix*» pars terrce eminens (from *u = J^, prop, instrumentally: a means of rising above, viz. by climbing), and of the names of eminences derived from «Jb (after which Hitzig renders: the teeth of the mountains). By reason of the fact that Jahve is the Owner (cf. 1 Sam. ii. 8), because the Creator of all things, the call to worship, which concerns no one so nearly as it does Israel, the people, which before other peoples is Jahve's creation, viz. the creation of His miraculously "Hghty grace, is repeated. In the call or invitation, njqplWI signifies to stretch one's self out full length upon the ground, the proper attitude of adoration; JH3, to curtsey, to totter; and ipa, Arabic baraka, starting from the radical signification Jlectere, to kneel down, in genua (Trpo^Wj pronum = procnuni) vrocumbere, 2 Chron. vi. 13 (cf. Holemann, Bibelstudien, i.

135 f.). Beside iJVJTO Dy, people of His pasture, hj |* is not the flock formed by His creating hand (Augustine: ipse gratia sua nos oves fecit), but, after Gen. xxx. 35, the flock under His protection, the flock led and defended by His skilful, powerful hand. Bottcher renders: flock of His charge; but T in this sense (Jer. vi. 3) signifies only a place, and "flock of Hi& place" would be poetry and prose in one figure.

Vers. 7c-ll. The second decastich begins in the midst of the Masoretic ver. 7. Up to this point the church stirs itself up to a worshipping appearing before its God; now the voice of God (Heb. iv. 7), earnestly admonishing, meets it, resounding from out of the sanctuary. Since 3 yipw signifies not merely to hear, but to hear obediently, ver. 1c cannot be a conditioning protasis to what follows. Hengstenberg wishes to supply the apodosis: u then will He bless you, His people;" but DK in other instances too (lxxxi. 9, cxxxix. 19, Prov. xxiv. 11), like v, has an optative signification, which it certainly has gained by a suppression of a promissory apodosis, but yet without the genius of the language having any such in mind in every instance. The word Disn placed first gives prominence to the present, in which this call to obedience goes forth, as a decisive turning-point. The divine voice warningly calls to mind the self-hardening of Israel, which came to light at Meribah, on the day of Massah. What is referred to, as also in lxxxi. 8, is the tempting of God in the second year of the Exodus on account of the failing of water in the neighbourhood of Horeb, at the place which is for this reason called Massah u- Meribah (Ex. xvii. 1-7); from which is to be distinguished the tempting of God in the fortieth year of the Exodus at Meribah, viz. at the waters of contention near Kadesh (written fully Me-Meribath Kadesh, or more briefly Me-Meribah), Num. xx. 2-13 (cf. on lxxviii. 20). Strictly PCPlDa signifies nothing but instar Meriba?, as in lxxxiii. 10 iristar Midianitarum; but according to the sense, 3 is equivalent to by3, cvi. 32, just as Dft3 is equivalent to Bta3. On IBfc, quum, cf. Deut. xi. 6. The meaning of v{?EJ MfyDI is not they also (DJ as in lii. 7) saw His work; for the reference to the giving of water out of the rock would give a thought that is devoid of purpose here, and the assertion is too indefinite for it to be understood of the judgment upon those who tempted

God (Hupfeld and Hltzig). It is therefore rather to he rendered: notwithstanding (o/^w?, Ew. § 354, a) they had (= although they had, cf. DJ in Isa. xlix. 15) seen His work (His wondrous guiding and governing), and might therefore be sure that He would not suffer them to be destroyed. The verb Dip coincides with /coreo), koto?. "N^?, for which the LXX. has rfj yevea itceivrj, is anarthrous in order that the notion may be conceived of more qualitatively than relatively: with a (whole) generation. With TOW Jahve calls to mind the repeated declarations of His vexation concerning their heart, which was always inclined towards error which leads to destruction — declarations, however, which bore no fruit. Just this ineffectiveness of His indignation had as its result that ^^, not ore but wore, as in Gen. xiii. 16, Deut. xxviii. 27, 51, 2 Kings ix. 37, and frequently) He sware, etc. (OK = verily not, Ges. § 155, 2, /, with the emphatic future form in un which follows). It is the oath in Num. xiv. 27 sqq. that is meant. The older generation died in the desert, and therefore lost the entering into the rest of God, by reason of their disobedience. If now, many centuries after Moses, they are invited in the Davidic Psalter to submissive adoration of Jahve, with the significant call: " To-day if ye will hearken to His voice!" and with a reference to the warning example of the fathers, the obedience of faith, now as formerly, has therefore to look forward to the gracious reward of entering into God's rest, which the disobedient at that time lost; and the taking possession of Canaan was, therefore, not as yet the final nrn:D (Deut. xii. 9). This is the connection of the wider train of thought which to the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, ch. iii., iv., follows from this text of the Psalm.

SING unto Jahve a new song, Sing unto Jahve, all lands. 2 Sing unto Jahve, bless His Name,

3 Declare His glory among the heathen, His wonders among all peoples.

4 For great is Jahve and worthy to be praised exceedingly, Terrible is He above all gods.

5 For all the gods of the peoples are idols, But Jahve hath made the heavens.

6 Brightness and splendour are before Him, Might and beauty are in His sanctuary.

7 Give unto Jahve, O ye races of the peoples, Give unto Jahve glory and might.

8 Give unto Jahve the honour of His Name, Take offerings and come into His courts.

9 Worship Jahve in holy attire, Tremble before Him, all lands.

10 Say among the heathen: " Jahve is now King, Therefore the world will stand without tottering, He will govern the peoples in uprightness."

What Ps. xcv. 3 says: " A great God is JaJive, and a great King above all gods" is repeated in Ps. xcvi. The LXX. inscribes it (1) whr) tw AavlS, and the chronicler has really taken it up almost entire in the song which was sung on the day when the Ark was brought in (1 Chron. xvi. 23-33); but, as the coarse seams between vers. 22 and 23, 33 and 34 show, he there strings together familiar reminiscences of the Psalms (vid. on Ps. cv.) as a sort of mosaic, in order approximately to express the festive mood and festive strains of that day. And

(2) ore 6 dlfcos w/coSofielro (Cod. Vat. a>/coS6fjL7]rai) fiera Tr\v alx/jLaXcoalav. By this the LXX. correctly interprets the Psalm as a post-exilic song: and the Psalm corresponds throughout to the advance which the mind of Israel has experienced in the Exile concerning its mission in the world. The fact that the religion of Jahve is destined for mankind at large, here receives the most triumphantly joyous, lyrical expression. And so far as this is concerned, the key-note of the Psalm is even deutero-Isaianic. For it is one chief aim of Isa. ch. xl.-lxvi. to declare the pinnacle of glory of the Messianic apostolic mission on to which Israel is being raised through the depth of affliction of the Exile. All these post-exilic songs come much nearer to the spirit of the New Testament than the pre-exilic; for the New Testament, which is the intrinsic character of the Old Testament freed from its barriers and limitations, is in process of coming into being (im Werden begriffen) throughout the Old Testament, and the Exile was one of the most important crises in this progressive process.

Ps. xcvi.-xcviii. are more Messianic than many in the strict sense of the word Messianic; for the central (gravitating) point of the Old Testament gospel (Heilsverkilndigung) lies not in the Messiah, but in the appearing (parusia) of Jahve — a fact which is explained by the circumstance that the mystery of the incarnation still lies beyond the Old Testament knowledge or perception of salvation. All human intervention in the matter of salvation accordingly appears as purely human, and still more, it preserves a national and therefore outward and natural impress by virtue of the national limit within which the revelation of salvation has entered. If the ideal Davidic king who is expected even does anything superhuman, he is nevertheless only a man — a man of God, it is true, without his equal, but not the God-man. The mystery of the incarnation does, it is true, the nearer it comes to actual revelation, cast rays of its dawning upon prophecy, but the sun itself remains below the horizon: redemption is looked for as Jahve's own act, and " Jahve cometh " is also still the watchword of the last prophet (Mai. iii. 1).

The five six-line strophes of the Psalm before us are not to be mistaken. The chronicler has done away with five lines, and thereby disorganized the strophic structure; and one line

(ver. 10a) he has removed from its position. The originality of the Psalm in the Psalter, too, is revealed thereby, and the non-independence of the chronicler, who treats the Psalm as an historian.

Vers. 1-3. Call to the nation of Jahve to sing praise to its God and to evangelize the heathen. WK* is repeated three times. The new song assumes a new form of things, and the call thereto, a present which appeared to be a beginning that furnished a guarantee of this new state of things, a beginning viz. of the recognition of Jahve throughout the whole world of nations, and of His accession to the lordship over the whole earth. The new song is an echo of the approaching revelation of salvation and of glory, and this is also the inexhaustible material of the joyful tidings that go forth from day to day (DV? DisD as in Esth. iii. 7, whereas in the Chronicles it is DV"7K DVD as in Num. xxx. 15). We read ver. la verbally the same in Isa. xlii. 10; ver. 2 calls to mind Isa. Hi. 7, lx. 6; and ver. 3a, Isa. lxvi. 19.

Vers. 4-6. Confirmation of the call from the glory of Jahve that is now become manifest. The clause ver. 4a, as also cxlv. 3, is taken out of xlviii. 2. D\"6tr^D is the plural of roK"73, every god, 2 Chron. xxxii. 15; the article may stand here or be omitted (xcv. 3, cf. cxiii. 4). All the elohim, i.e. gods, of the peoples are Oy yK (from the negative?N), nothings and good-for-nothings, unreal and useless. The LXX. renders SaifAovia, as though the expression were &1W (cf. I Cor. x. 20), more correctly elBcoXa in Apoc. ix. 20. What ver. 5 says is wrought out in Isa. ch. xl., xliv., and elsewhere; D"W>K is a name of idols that occurs nowhere more frequently than in Isaiah. The sanctuary (ver. 6) is here the earthly sanctuary. From Jerusalem, over which the light arises first of all (Isa. ch. lx.), Jahve' s superterrestrial doxa now reveals itself in the world, "tinrtn is the usual pair of words for royal glory. The chronicler reads ver. 6b topon nnm TjJ, might and joy are in His place (nJ^ a ^a^e word, like n}C|K, brotherhood, brotherly affection, from an old root, Ex. xviii. 9). With the place of God one might associate the thought of the celestial place of God transcending space; the chronicler may, however, have altered IBhpM into llDplD3 because when the Ark was brought in, the Temple (vftpnn rva) was not yet built.

Vers. 7-9. Call to the families of the peoples to worship God, the One, living, and glorious God. *3H is repeated three times here as Ps. xxix., of which the whole strophe is an echo. Isaiah (ch. lx.) sees them coming in with the gifts which they are admonished to bring with them into the courts of Jahve (in Chron. only: VSB?). Instead of BHp ITVina here and in the chronicler, the LXX. brings the courts (mvn) in once more; but the dependence of the strophe upon Ps. xxix. furnishes a guarantee for the u holy attire," similar to the wedding garment in the New Testament parable. Instead of VJBO, ver. 96, the chronicler has VJD9D, just as he also alternates with both forms, 2 Chron. xxxii. 7, cf. 1 Chron. xix. 18.

Vers. 10, 11. That which is to be said among the peoples is the joyous evangel of the kingdom of heaven which is now come and realized. The watchword is " Jahve is King," as in Isa. lii. 7. The LXX. correctly renders: 6 icvpios iftaai- Xevae* for ^n is intended historically (Apoc. xi. 17). H**, as in xciii. 1, introduces that which results from this fact, and therefore to a certain extent goes beyond it. The world below, hitherto shaken by war and anarchy, now stands upon foundations that cannot be shaken in time to come, under Jahve' s righteous and gentle sway. This is the joyful tidings of the new era which the poet predicts from out of his own times, when he depicts the joy that will then pervade the whole creation; in connection with which it is hardly intentional that ver. 11a and 116 acrostically contain the divine names nirp and Vft This joining of all creatures in the joy at Jahve' s appearing is a characteristic feature of Isa. ch. xl.-lxii. These cords are already struck in Isa. xxxv. 1 sq. u The sea and its fulness" as in Isa. xlii. 10. In the chronicler ver. 10a (nBfrOl instead of ViEX) stands between ver. 116 and lie, — according to Hitzig, who uses all his ingenuity here in favour of that other recension of the text, by an oversight of the copyist.

* In the Psalterium Veronense with the addition apo xylu, Cod. 156, Latinizing axo t£ I^Aw; in the Latin Psalters (the Vulgate excepted) a ligno, undoubtedly an addition by an early Christian hand, upon which, however, great value is set by Justin and all the early Latin Fathers.

Vers. 12, 13. The chronicler changes Hfe> into the prosaic mfcn, and -ly-^vy"^ with the omission of the b into "iJJ'n ^y. The psalmist on his part follows the model of Isaiah, who makes the trees of the wood exult and clap their hands, ch. lv. 12, xliv. 23. The tN, which points into this festive time of all creatures which begins with Jahve's coming, is as in Isa. xxxv. 5 sq. Instead of *JB>, a before," the chronicler has the M??*? so familiar to him, by which the joy is denoted as being occasioned by Jahve's appearing. The lines ver. 13bc sound very much like ix. 9. The chronicler has abridged ver. 13, by hurrying on to the mosaic-work portion taken from Ps. cv. The poet at the close glances from the ideal past into the future. The twofold N3 is a participle, Ew. § 200. Being come to judgment, after He has judged and sifted, executing punishment, Jahve will govern in the righteousness of mercy and in faithfulness to the promises.

2 Clouds and darkness are round about Him, Eighteousness and judgment are the pillars of His throne.

5 Mountains melt like wax before Jahve, Before the Lord of the whole earth.

6 The heavens declare His righteousness, And all the peoples see His glory.

7 Confounded are all those who serve graven images, Who boast themselves of idols;

9 For Thou, Jahve, art the Most High over all the earth, Thou art highly exalted above all gods.

11 Light is sown for the righteous, And for the upright-minded joy.

12 Eejoice, ye righteous, in Jahve, And sing praise unto His holy Name.

This Psalm, too, has the coming of Jahve, who enters upon His kingdom through judgment, as its theme, and the watchword " Jahve is King" as its key-note. The LXX. inscribes it: tw AavlB, ore r) <yr) avrov /caOto-Tarcu (tcaOlo'- TaTo); Jerome: quando terra ejus restitula est. The t&> AaviB is worthless; the time of restoration, from which it takes its rise, is the post-exilic, for it is composed, as mosaic-work, out of the earlier original passages of Davidic and Asaphic Psalms and of the prophets, more especially of Isaiah, and is entirely an expression of the religious consciousness which resulted from the Exile.

Vers. 1-3. We have here nothing but echoes of the older literature: ver. 1, cf. Isa. xlii. 10-12, li. 5; ver. 2a, cf. xviii. 10, 12; ver. 2b = lxxxix. 15; ver. 3a, cf. 1. 3, xviii. 9; ver. 35, cf. Isa. xlii. 25. Beginning with the visible coming of the kingdom of God in the present, with?£o 'n the poet takes his stand upon the standpoint of the kingdom which is come. With it also comes rich material for universal joy.?}n is indicative, as in xcvi. 11 and frequently. ETCH are all, for all of them are in fact many (cf. Isa. lii. 15). The description of the theophany, for which the way is preparing in ver. 2, also reminds one of Hab. ch. iii. God's enshrouding Himself m darkness bears witness to His judicial earnestness. Because 11 e comes as Judge, the basis of His royal throne and of His judgment-seat is also called to mind. His harbinger is fire, which consumes His adversaries on every side, as that which broke forth out of the pillar of cloud once consumed the Egyptians.

Vers. 4-6. Again we have nothing but echoes of the older literature: ver. Aa = lxxvii. 19; ver. 46, cf. lxxvii. 17; ver. 5a, cf. Mic. i. 4; ver. 56, cf. Mic. iv. 13; ver. 6a = 1. 6; ver. 66, cf. Isa. xxxv. 2, xl. 5, Hi. 10, lxvi. 18. The poet goes on to describe that which is future with historical certainty. That which lxxvii. 19 says of the manifestation of God in the earlier times he transfers to the revelation of God in the last time. The earth sees it, and begins to tremble in consequence of it. The reading bnrn, according to Hitzig (cf. E\v. § 232, 6) traditional, is, however, only an error of pointing that has been propagated; the correct reading is the reading of Heidenheim and Baer, restored according to mss., 5>nrri (cf. 1 Sam. xxxi. 3), like pn\ Dpnv Dim, and DJwn. The figure of the wax is found even in lxviii. 3; and Jahve is also called " Lord of the whole earth" in Zech. iv. 14, vi. 5. The proclamation of the heavens is an expression of joy, xcvi. 11. They proclaim the judicial strictness with which Jahve, in accordance with His promises, carries out His plan of salvation, the realization of which has reached its goal in the fact that all men see the glory of God.

Vers. 7, 8. When the glory of Jahve becomes manifest, everything that is opposed to it will be punished and consumed by its light. Those who serve idols will become conscious of their delusion with shame and terror, Isa. xlii. 17, Jer. x. 14. The superhuman powers (LXX. ayyeXot,), deified by the heathen, then bow down to Him who alone is Elohim in absolute personality. HQWn is not imperative (LXX., Syriac), for as a command this clause would be abrupt and inconsequential, but the perfect of that which actually takes place. The quotation in Heb. i. 6 is taken from Deut. xxxii. 43, LXX. In ver. 8 (after xlviii. 12) the survey of the poet again comes back to his own nation. When Zion hears that Jahve has appeared, and all the world and all the powers bow down to Him, she rejoices; for it is in fact her God whose kingship has come to be acknowledged. And all the daughter-churches of the Jewish land exult together with the mother-church over the salvation which dawns through judgments.

ver. 9&, cf. xlvii. 3, 10) might close the Psalm; there follows still, however, a hortatory strophe (which was perhaps not added till later on).

Vers. 10-12. It is true ver. 12a is = xxxii. 11, ver. 126 = xxx. 5, and the promise in ver. 10 is the same as in xxxvii. 28, xxxiv. 21; but as to the rest, particularly ver. 11, this strophe is original. It is an encouraging admonition to fidelity in an age in which an effeminate spirit of looking longingly towards [lit. ogling] heathenism was rife, and stedfast adherence to Jahve was threatened with loss of life. Those who are faithful in their confession, as in the Maccabaean age ('Acri- Saloi,), are called V'TDn. The beautiful figure in ver. 11 is misapprehended by the ancient versions, inasmuch as they read niT (cxii. 4) instead of JDT. 3TJT does not here signify sown = strewn into the earth, but strewn along his life's way, so that he, the righteous one, advances step by step in the light. Hitzig rightly compares KiSvaTai, afelSvaTCU) used of the dawn and of the sun. Of the former Virgil also says, Et jam prima novo spargebat lumine terras.

the house of Israel, All the ends of the earth saw the salvation of our God.

4 Make a joyful noise unto Jahve, all ye lands, Break forth into rejoicing and play —

6 With trumpets and the sound of the horn, Make a joyful noise before the King Jahve I

7 Let the sea roar, and that which filleth it, The world, and those who dwell therein.

8 Let the rivers clap their hands, Together ler the mountains rejoice

9 Before Jahve, for He cometh to judge the earth — Pie shall judge the world with righteousness, And the peoples with uprightness.

This is the only Psalm which is inscribed "top without further addition, whence it is called in B. Aboda Zara^ 246, NDirv fcmDTB (the orphan Psalm). The Peshito Syriac inscribes it De redemtione populi ex JEgypto; the u new song," however, is not the song of Moses, but the counterpart of this, cf. Apoc. xv. 3. There "the Lord reigneth" resounded for the first time, at the sea; here the completion of the beginning there commenced is sung, viz. the final glory of the divine kingdom, which through judgment breaks through to its full reality. The beginning and end are taken from Ps. xcvi. Almost all that lies between is taken from the second part of Isaiah. This book of consolation for the exiles is become as it were a Castalian spring for the religious lyric.

the opposite of hearsay (cf. #JjjJJ, from one's own observation, opp. j^vU, from the narrative of another person). The dative

Vers. 4-6. The call in ver. 4 demands some joyful manifestation of the mouth, which can be done in many ways; in ver. 5 the union of song and the music of stringed instruments, as of the Levites; and in ver. 6 the sound of wind instruments, as of the priests. On ver. 4 cf. Isa. xliv. 23, xlix.

Vers. 7-9. Here, too, it is all an echo of the earlier language of Psalms and prophets: ver. la = xcvi. 11; ver. lb like xxiv. 1; ver. 8 after Isa. lv. 12 (where we find *l? Nnp instead of the otherwise customary *!? yj?n, xlvii. 2; or *)? H^5?, 2 Kings xi. 12, is said of the trees of the field); ver. 9 = xcvi. 13, cf. 10. In the bringing in of nature to participate in the joy of mankind, the clapping rivers (J^"1??) are original to this Psalm: the rivers cast up high waves, which flow into one another like clapping hands;* cf. Hab. iii. 10, where the abyss of the sea lifts up its hands on high, i.e. causes its waves t9 run mountain-high.

4 And the might of a king who loveth the right Hast Tnou established in righteousness;

And Samuel among those who call upon His name — They called unto Jahve and He answered them;

* Luther renders: " the water-floods exult" (froMucken); and Eychman'a Vocabularius predicantium explains plaudere by " to exult (frohlocken) for joy, to smite the handsitogether prx gaudio;" cf. Luther's version of Eztk. xxi. 17.

7 In a pillar of cloud He spoke to them; They kept His testimonies,

8 Jahve our God, Thou hast answered them; A forgiving God wast Thou unto them, And one taking vengeance of their deeds.

This is the third of the Psalms (xciii., xcvii., xcix.) which begin with the watchword "^El X It falls into three parts, of which the first (vers. 1-3) closes with wn Kni|J, the second (vers. 4, 5) with Kin Bfilp, and the third, more full-toned, with wrpf* 'n Bflljj — an earthly echo of the trisagion of the seraphim. The first two Sanctuses are two hexastichs; and two hexastichs form the third, according to the very same law by which the third and the sixth days of creation each consists of two creative works. This artistic form bears witness against Olshausen in favour of the integrity of the text; but the clare-obscure of the language and expression makes no small demands upon the reader.

Bengel has seen deepest into the internal character of this Psalm. He says, " The 99th Psalm has three parts, in which the Lord is celebrated as He who is to come, as He who is, and as He who was, and each part is closed with the ascription of praise: He is holy." The Psalm is laid out accordingly by Oettinger, Burk, and C. H. Bieger.

Vers. 1-3. The three futures express facts of the time to come, which are the inevitable result of Jahve's kingly dominion bearing sway from heaven, and here below from Zion, over the world; they therefore declare what must and will happen. The participle insidens cherubis (lxxx. 2, cf. xviii. 11) is a definition of the manner (Olshausen): He reigns, sitting enthroned above the cherubim. du, like jj, is a further formation of the root fcO, vv, to bend, nod. What is meant is not a trembling that is the absolute opposite of joy, but a trembling that leads on to salvation. The Breviarium in Psal- teriurn, which bears the name of Jerome, observes: Terra quamdiu immota fuerit, sanari non potest; quando vero mota fuerit et intremuerit, tunc recipiet sanitatem. In ver. 3a declaration passes over into invocation. One can feel how the hope that the " great and fearful Name" (Deut. x. 17) will be universally acknowledged, and therefore that the religion of Israel will become the religion of the world, moves and elates the poet. The fact that the expression notwithstanding is not nn« B>ftjJ, but RV1 B^ljjj is explained from the close connection with the seraphic trisagion in Isa. vi. 3. wn refers to Jahve; He and His Name are notions that easily glide over into one another.

Vers. 4, 5. The second Sanctus celebrates Jahve with respect to His continuous righteous rule in Israel. The majority of expositors construe it: u And (they shall praise) the might of the king, who loves right;" but this joining of the clause on to nr over the refrain that stands in the way is hazardous. Neither can 2HK bbto!]?D Tjn however, be an independent clause, since 3nx cannot be said of T'y, but only of its possessor. And the dividing of the verse at 2HK, adopted by the LXX., will therefore not hold good. an« ldd^d is an attributive clause to "]?D in the same position as in xi. 7; and T"y, with what appertains to it, is the object to IjSte placed first, which has the king's throne as its object elsewhere (ix. 8, 2 Sam. vii. 13, 1 Chron. xvii. 12), just as it here has the might of the king, which, however, here at the same time in B*}^? takes another and permutative object (cf. the permutative subject in lxxii. 17), as Hitzig observes; or rather, since Dns^D is most generally used as an adverbial notion, this Dn^D (lviii. 2, lxxv. 3, ix. 9, and frequently), usually as a definition of the mode of the judging and reigning, is subordinated: and the might of a king who loves the right, i.e. of one who governs not according to dynastic caprice but moral precepts, hast Thou established in spirit and aim (directed to righteousness and equity). What is meant is the theocratic kingship, and ver. 4c says what Jahve has constantly accomplished by means of this kingship: He has thus maintained right and righteousness (cf. e.g. 2 Sam. viii. 15, 1 Chron. xviii. 14, 1 Kings x. 9, Isa. xvi. 5) among His people. Out of this manifestation of God's righteousness, which is more conspicuous, and can be better estimated, within the nation of the history of redemption than elsewhere, grows the call to highly exalt Jahve the God of Israel, and to bow one's self very low at His footstool. D'W V?:n, as in cxxxii. 7, is not a statement of the object (for Isa. xlv. 14 is of another kind), but (like bx in other instances) of the place in which, or of the direction (cf. vii. 14) in which the trpoatcvvqcri*; is to take place. The temple is called Jahve* s footstool (1 Chron. xxviii. 2, cf. Lam. ii. 1, Isa. lx. 13) with reference to the ark, the capporeth of which corresponds to the transparent sapphire (Ex. xxiv. 10) and to the crystal-like firmament of the mercaba (Ezek. i. 22, cf. 1 Chron. xxviii. 18). Vers. 6-9. The vision of the third Sanclus looks into the history of the olden time prior to the kings. In support of the statement that Jahve is a living God, and a God who proves Himself in mercy and in judgment, the poet appeals to three heroes of the olden time, and the events recorded of them. The expression certainly sounds as though it had reference to something belonging to the present time; and Hitzig therefore believes that it must be explained of the three as heavenly intercessors, after the manner of Onias and Jeremiah in the vision 2 Mace. xv. 12-14. But apart from this presupposing an active manifestation of life on the part of those who have fallen happily asleep, which is at variance with the ideas of the latest as well as of the earliest Psalms concerning the other world, this interpretation founders upon ver. 7 a, according to which a celestial discourse of God with the three " in the pillar of cloud " ought also to be supposed. The substantival clauses ver. Qab bear sufficient evidence in themselves of being a retrospect, by which the futures that follow are stamped as being the expression of the cotemporaneous past. The distribution of the predicates to the three is well conceived. Moses was also a mighty man in prayer, for with his hands uplifted for prayer he obtained the victory for his people over Amalek (Ex. xvii. 11 sq.), and on another occasion placed himself in the breach, and rescued them from the wrath of God and from destruction (cvi. 23, Ex. xxxii. 30-32; cf. also Num. xii. 13); and Samuel, it is true, is only a Levite by descent, but by office in a time of urgent need a priest (cohen), for he sacrifices independently in places where, by reason of the absence of the holy tabernacle with the ark of the covenant, it was not lawful, according to the letter of the law, to offer sacrifices, he builds an altar in Raman, his residence as judge, and has, in connection with the divine services on the high place (Bama) there, a more than high-priestly position, inasmuch as the people do not begin the sacrificial repasts before he lias blessed the sacrifice (1 Sam. ix. 13). But the character of a mighty man in prayer is outweighed in the case of Moses by the character of the priest; for he is, so to speak, the protopriest of Israel, inasmuch as he twice performed priestly acts which laid as it were a foundation for all times to come, viz. the sprinkling of the blood at the ratification of the covenant under Sinai (Ex. ch. xxiv.), and the whole ritual which was a model for the consecrated priesthood, at the consecration of the priests (Lev. ch. viii.). It was he, too, who performed the service in the sanctuary prior to the consecration of the priests: he set the shew-bread in order, prepared the candlestick, and burnt incense upon the golden altar (Ex. xl. 22-27). In the case of Samuel, on the other hand, the character of the mediator in the religious services is outweighed by that of the man mighty in prayer: by prayer he obtained Israel the victory of Ebenezer over the Philistines (1 Sam. vii. 8 sq.), and confirmed his words of warning with the miraculous sign, that at his calling upon God it would thunder and rain in the midst of a cloudless season (1 Sam. xii. 16, cf. Sir. xlvi. 16 sq.).

The poet designedly says: Moses and Aaron were among His priests, and Samuel among His praying ones. This third twelve-line strophe holds good, not only of the three in particular, but of the twelve-tribe nation of priests and praying ones to which they belong. For ver. la cannot be meant of the three, since, with the exception of a single instance (Num. xii. 5), it is always Moses only, not Aaron, much less Samuel, with whom God negotiates in such a manner. E^vK refers to the whole people, which is proved by their interest in the divine revelation given by the hand of Moses out of the cloudy pillar (Ex. xxxiii. 7 sq.). Nor can ver. Qc therefore be understood of the three exclusively, since there is nothing to indicate the transition from them to the people: crying (DW^ syncopated like D\xtph, 1 Sam. xiv. 33) to Jahve, i.e. as often as they (these priests and praying ones, to whom a Moses, Aaron, and Samuel belong) cried unto Jahve, He answered them — He revealed Himself to this people who had such leaders (choragi).

in the cloudy pillar, to those who kept His testimonies and the law which He gave them. A glance at ver. 8 shows that in Israel itself the good and the bad, good and evil, are distinguished. God answered those who could pray to Him with a claim to be answered. Ver. Ibc is, virtually at least, a relative clause, declaring the prerequisite of a prayer that may be granted. In ver. 8 is added the thought that the history of Israel, in the time of its redemption out of Egypt, is not less a mirror of the righteousness of God than of the pardoning grace of God. If vers. 7, 8 are referred entirely to the three, then Ttbbv, and E£J, referred to their sins of infirmity, appear to be too strong expressions. But to take the suffix of DHi^pv objectively (ea quae in eos sunt moliti Coo I socii ejus), with Symmachus {jcal e/cSifcos eVt rat? iir^peiat^ avrcov) and Kimchi, as the ulciscens in omnes adinventiones eorum of the Vulgate is interpreted,* is to do violence to it. The reference to the people explains it all without any constraint, and even the flight of prayer that comes in here (cf. Mic. vii. 18). The calling to mind of the generation of the desert, which fell short of the promise, is an earnest admonition for the generation of the present time. The God of Israel is holy in love and in wrath, as He Himself unfolds His Name in Ex. xxxiv. 6, 7. Hence the poet calls upon his fellow-countrymen to exalt this God, whom they may with pride call their own, i.e. to acknowledge and confess His majesty, and to fall down and worship at Q cf.?K, v. 8) the mountain of His holiness, the place of His choice and of His presence.

1 MAKE a joyful noise unto Jahve, all ye lands!

* Vid. Raemdonck in his David propheta cet. 1800: in omnes injurias ipsis illatas, uti patuit in Core cet

4 Come into His gates with thanksgiving, Into His courts with praise.

This Psalm closes the series of deutero-Tsaianic Psalms, which began with Ps. xci. There is common to all of them that mild sublimity, sunny cheerfulness, unsorrowful spiritual character, and New Testament expandedness, which we wonder at in the second part of the Book of Isaiah; and besides all this, they are also linked together by the figure anadiplosis, and manifold consonances and accords.

The arrangement, too, at least from Ps. xciii. onwards, is Isaianic: it is parallel with the relation of Isa. ch. xxiv.-xxvii. to ch. xiii.-xxiii. Just as the former cycle of prophecies closes that concerning the nations, after the manner of a musical finale, so the Psalms celebrating the dominion of God, from Ps. xciii. onwards, which vividly portray the unfolded glory of the kingship of Jahve, have Jubilate and Cantate Psalms in succession.

Prom the fact that this last Jubilate is entirely the echo of the first, viz. of the first half of Ps. xcv., we see how ingenious the arrangement is. There we find all the thoughts which recur here. There it is said in ver. 7, He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture and the flock of His hand. And in ver. 2, Let us come before His face with thanksgiving (rnina^ let us make a joyful noise unto Him in songs!

This mm is found here in the title of the Psalm, mini? ntorp. Taken in the sense of a " Psalm for thanksgiving,'' it would say but little. We may take mini' in a liturgical sense (with the Targum, Mendelssohn, Ewald, and Hitzig), like mtrn Dv!?, xcii. 1, in this series, and like T:tfr6 in xxxviii. 1, lxx. 1. What is intended is not merely the toda of the heart, but the shelatnim-toda, rntn fUT, cvii. 22, cxvi. 17, which is also called ab- solutelv min in lvi. 13, 2 Chron. xxix. 31. That kind of shelamun is thus called which is presented muvSjJ, i.e. as thankful praise for divine benefits received, more particularly marvellous protection and deliverance (yid. Ps. cvii.).

Vers. 1-3. The call in ver. 1 sounds like xcviii. 4, lxvi. 1. P{JrJ"')? are all lands, or rather all men belonging to the earth's population. The first verse, without any parallelism and in so far monostichic, is like the signal for a blowing of the trumpets. Instead of " serve Jahve with gladness (nnpba)," it is expressed in ii. 11, " serve Jahve with fear (nNT2)." Fear and joy do not exclude one another. Fear becomes the exalted Lord, and the holy gravity of His requirements; joy becomes the gracious Lord, and His blessed service. The summons to manifest this joy in a religious, festive manner springs up out of an all-hopeful, world-embracing love, and this love is the spontaneous result of living faith in the promise that all tribes of the earth shall be blessed in the seed of Abraham, and in the prophecies in which this promise is unfolded. OT (as in iv. 4) Theodoret well interprets oY avrcbv fidOeTe rwv Trpayfidrcov. They are to know from facts of outward and inward experience that Jahve is God: He hath made us, and not we ourselves. Thus runs the Chethib, which the LXX. follows, avrb? iiroiTjaev rj/jLcis /cal ov% 97/xet? (as also the Syriac and Vulgate); but Symmachus (like Rashi), contrary to all possibilities of language, renders avrbs eiroirjcrev r][ia<; ovk ovras. Even the Midrash {Bereshith Rabba, ch. c. init.) finds in this confession the reverse of the arrogant words in the mouth of Pharaoh: "I myself have made myself" (Ezek. xxix. 3). The Keri, on the other hand, reads Sh* which the Targum, Jerome, and Saadia follow and render: et ipsius nos sumus. Hengstenberg calls this Keri quite unsuitable and bad; and Hupfeld, on the other hand, calls the Chethib an " unspeakable insipidity." But in reality both readings accord with the context, and it is clear that they are both in harmony with Scripture. Many a one has drawn balsamic consolation from the words ipse fecit nos et non ipsi nos; e.g. Melancthon when disconsolately sorrowful over the body of his son in Dresden on the 12th July 1559. But in ipse fecit nos et ipsius nos sumus there is also a rich mine of comfort and of admonition, for the Creator is also the Owner, His heart clings to His creature, and the creature owes itself entirely to Him, without whom it would not have had a being, and would not continue in being. Since, however, the parallel passage, xcv. 7, favours V] rather than N7i; since, further, fcO] is the easier reading, inasmuch as Kin leads one to expect that an antithesis will follow (Hitzig); and since the u His people and the sheep of His pasture " that follows is a more natural continuation of a preceding tirutf \?) than that it should be attached as a predicative object to tt^JJ over a parenthetical urttK ifr); the Keri decidedly maintains the preference. In connection with both readings, nb>y has a sense related to the history of redemption, as in 1 Sam. xii. 6. Israel is Jahve's work (n^D), Isa. xxix. 23, lx. 21, cf. Deut. xxxii. 6, 15, not merely as a people, but as the people of God, who were kept in view even in the calling of Abram.

Vers. 4, 5. Therefore shall the men of all nations enter with thanksgiving into the gates of His Temple and into the courts of His Temple with praise (xcvi. 8), in order to join themselves in worship to His church, which — a creation of Jahve for the good of the whole earth — is congregated about this Temple and has it as the place of its worship. The pilgrimage of all peoples to the holy mountain is an Old Testament dress of the hope for the conversion of all peoples to the God of revelation, and the close union of all with the people of this God. His Temple is open to them all. They may enter, and when they enter they have to look for great things. For the God of revelation (Hi. 11, liv. 8) is "good" (xxv. 8, xxxiv. 9), and His loving-kindness and faithfulness endure for ever — the thought that recurs frequently in the later Hallelujah and Hodu Psalms and is become a liturgical formula (Jer. xxxiii. 11). The mercy or loving-kindness of God is the generosity, and His faithfulness the constancy, of His love.

When wilt Thou come unto me?! I will walk in the innocence of my heart that they may be round about me; Whoso walketh in the way of uprightness, he shall serve me.

who practiseth deceit; He who speaketh lies shall not continue before mine eyes.

all the wicked of the earth, That I may root out of Jahve's city all workers of iniquity.

* Eyring, in his Vita of Ernest the Pious [Duke of Saxe-Gotha, b. 1601, d. 1675], relates that he sent an unfaithful minister a copy of the 101st Psalm, and that it became a proverb in the country, when an official had done anything wrong: He will certainly soon receive the prince's Psalm to read.

Luther's version, " David's mirror of a monarch." Can there be any more appropriate motto for it than what is said of Jahve's government in xcix. 4? In respect of this passage of Ps. xcix., to which Ps. c. is the finale, Ps. ci. seems to be appended as an echo out of the heart of David. The appropriateness of the words "tiDTD 1YJ7 (the position of the words is as in Ps. xxiv., xl., cix., ex., exxxix.) is corroborated by the form and contents. Probably the great historical work from which the chronicler has taken excerpts furnished the postexilic collector with a further gleaning of Davidic songs, or at least sonns that were ascribed to David. The Psalm before us belongs to the time during which the Ark was in the house of Obed-Edom, where David had left it behind through terror at the misfortune of Uzzah. David said at that time: u How shall the Ark of Jahve come to me (the unholy one)? " 2 Sam. vi. 8. He did not venture to bring the Ark of the Fearful and Holy One within the range of his own house. In our Psalm, however, he gives utterance to his determination as king to give earnest heed to the sanctity of his walk, of his rule, and of his house; and this resolve he brings before Jahve as a vow, to whom, in regard to the rich blessing which the Ark of God diffuses around it (2 Sam. vi. 11 sq.), he longingly sighs: u When wilt Thou come to me?! " This cotemporaneous reference has been recognised by Hammond and Yenema. From the fact that Jahve comes to David, Jerusalem becomes " the city of Jahve," ver. 8; and to defend the holiness of this the city of His habitation in all faithfulness, and with all his might, is the thing to which David here pledges himself.

The contents of the first verse refer not merely to the Psalm that follows as an announcement of its theme, but to David's whole life: graciousness and right, the self-manifestations united ideally and, for the king who governs His people, typically in Jahve, shall be the subject of his song. Jahve, the primal source of graciousness and of right, it shall be, to whom he consecrates his poetic talent, as also his playing upon the harp. IDn is condescension which flows from the principle of free love, and BBttto legality which binds itself impartially and uncapriciously to the rule (norm) of that which is right and good. They are two modes of conduct, mutually temper- ing each other, which God requires of every man (Mic. vi. 8, cf. Matt, xxiii. 23: rrjv Kpiaiv teal rbv eXeov), and more especially of a king. Further, he has resolved to give heed, thoughtfully and with an endeavour to pursue it (2 /*3B>n as in Dan. ix. 13), unto the way of that which is perfect, i.e. blameless. What is further said might now be rendered as a relative clause: when Thou comest to me. But not until then?! Hitzig renders it differently: I will take up the lot of the just when it comes to me, i.e. as often as it is brought to my knowledge. But if this had been the meaning, "ma would have been said instead of TH? (Ex. xviii. 16, 19, 2 Sam. xix. 12); for, according to both its parts, the expression D^DD ITT is an ethical notion, and is therefore not used in a different sense from that in ver. 6. Moreover, the relative use of the interrogative '•no in Hebrew cannot be supported, with the exception, perhaps, of Prov. xxiii. 35. Athanasius correctly interprets: ttoOcj gov ttjv irapovGiav, w Secr7roTa, IfieipofiaL gov rrjs eTTityaveiaS) aXka So? to iroOovfjuevov. It is a question of strong yearning: when wilt Thou come to me? is the time near at hand when Thou wilt erect Thy throne near to me? If his longing should be fulfilled, David is resolved to, and will then, behave himself as he further sets forth in the vows he makes. He pledges himself to walk within his house, i.e. his palace, in the innocence or simplicity of his heart (Ixxviii. 72, Prov. xx. 7), without allowing himself to be led away from this frame of mind which has become his through grace. He will not set before his eyes, viz. as a proposition or purpose (Deut. xv. 9, Ex. x. 10, 1 Sam. xxix. 10, LXX.), any morally worthless or vile matter whatsoever (xli. 9, cf. concerning 2^??, xviii. 5). The commission of excesses he hates: HKW is infin. constr. instead of JWV as in Gen. xxxi. 28, 1. 20, Prov. xxi. 3, cf. rwr\ Gen. xlviii. 11, Snf Prov. xxxi.,4. D^p (like SW in Hos. v. 2), as the object of njyy, has not a personal (Kimchi, Ewald) signification (cf. on the other hand xl. 5), but material signification: (facta) declinantia (like CHt, xix. 14, insolentia; Bvlin, Zech. xi. 7, vincientia); all temptations and incitements of this sort he shakes off from himself, so that nothing of the kind cleaves to him. The confessions in ver. 4 refer to his own inward nature: W\N 2? (not 2?~W\?yy Prov. xvii. 20), a false heart that is not faithful in its intentions either to God or to men, shall remain far from him; wickedness (JH as in xxxvi 5) he does not wish to know, i.e. does not wish to foster and nurture within him. Whoso secretly slanders his neighbour, him will he destroy; it will therefore be so little possible for any to curry favour with him by uncharitable perfidious tale-bearing, of the wiliness of which David himself had had abundant experience in his relation to Saul, that it will rather call forth his anger upon him (Prov. xxx. 10). Instead of the regularly pointed W'TO the Keri reads ^B^p, mel8shn% a Poel (JKv lingua peter e> like \!'V oculo petere, elsewhere PBvH, Prov. xxx. 10) with 6 instead of 6 (vid. on cix. 10, lxii. 4) and with Chirek compaginis (vid. on Ps. cxiii.). The " lofty of eyes," i.e. supercilious, haughty, and the u broad of heart," i,e. boastful, puffed up, self-conceited (Prov. xxviii. 25, cf. xxi. 4), him he cannot endure (/-px, properly fut. Uoph.j I am incapable of, viz. AN^?, which is to be supplied as in Isa. i. 13, after Prov. xxx. 21, Jer. xliv. 22).* On the other hand, his eyes rest upon the faithful of the land, with the view, viz., of drawing them into his vicinity. Whoso walks in the way of uprightness, he shall serve him (n?.^, 0epairevtiv, akin to "TO, 8ov\eveiv). He who practises deceit shall not stay within his house; he who speaks lies shall have no continuance (f&\ is more than equivalent to jtaj) before (under) his eyes. Every morning (D^ap as in lxxiii. 14, Isa. xxxiii. 2, Lam. iii. 23, and O^.iJ??, Job vii. 18), when Jahve shall have taken up His abode in Jerusalem, will he destroy all evil-doers CV.^l as in cxix. 119), i.e. incorrigibly wicked ones, wherever he may meet them upon the earth, in order that all workers of evil may be rooted out of the royal city, which is now become the city of Jahve.

* In both instances the Masora writes iniK (plene), but the Talmud, B. Erachin 156, had tflK before it when it says: " Of the slanderer God says: I and he cannot dwel] together in the world, I cannot bear it any longer with him (ins)."

PRAYER OF A PATIENT SUFFERER FOR HIMSELF AND FOR THE JERUSALEM THAT LIES IN RUINS.

2 O JAHVE, hear my prayer, And let my cry come unto Thee.

3 Hide not Thy face from me in the day that I am in trouble, Incline Thine ear unto me,

5 Smitten like a green herb and dried up is my heart, For I have forgotten to eat my bread,

6 Because of my loud crying my bones cleave to my flesh.

7 I am like a pelican of the wilderness, I am become as an owl of the ruins.

9 All the day mine enemies reproach me; Those who are mad against me swear by me.

10 For I have eaten ashes like bread, And mingled my drink with weeping,

11 Because of Thine indignation and Thy raging, That Thou hast lifted me up and cast me down.

15 For Thy servants cling lovingly to her stones, And they cry sore over her dust.

16 And the heathen shall fear the Name of Jahve, And all the kings of the earth Thy glory,

17 Because Jahve hath rebuilt Zion, He hath appeared in His glory,

18 He hath turned to the prayer of the destitute, And not despised their prayer.

19 It shall be written for the generation to come, And a people yet to be created shall praise J ah,

20 That He hath looked down from His holy height, From heaven unto earth hath Jahve looked,

22 That they may declare in Zion the Name of Jahve, And His praise in Jerusalem,

23 When the peoples are gathered together, And the kingdoms, to serve Jahve.

25 I said, My God, take me not away in the midst of my

And the heavens are the work of Thy hands.

27 Those shall perish, but Thou remainest, They all shall wax old like a garment,

29 The children of Thy servants shall dwell, And their seed shall continue before Thee.

Ps. ci. utters the sigh: When wilt Thou come to me? and Ps. cii. with the inscription: Prayer for an afflicted one when Ite pineth away and poureth forth his complaint before Jahve, prays, Let my prayer come unto Thee. It is to be taken, too, just as personally as it sounds, and the person is not to be construed into a nation. The song of the ^V is, however, certainly a national song; the poet is a servant of Jahve, who shares the calamity that has befallen Jerusalem and its homeless people, both in outward circumstances and in the very depth of his soul, *l*?y signifies to pine away, languish, as in lxi. 3,

Isa. lvii. 16; and ta*b>?JBtJ> to pour out one's thoughts and complaints, one's anxious care, as in cxlii. 3, cf. 1 Sam. i. 15 sq. As is the case already with many of the preceding Psalms, the deutero-Isaianic impression accompanies us in connection with this Psalm also, even to the end; and the further we get in it the more marked does the echo of its prophetical prototype become. The poet also allies himself with earlier Psalms, such as xxii., lxix., and lxxix., although himself capable of lofty poetic flight, in return for which he makes us feel the absence of any safely progressive unfolding of the thoughts.

Vers. 2, 3. The Psalm opens with familiar expressions of prayer, such as rise in the heart and mouth of the praying one without his feeling that they are of foreign origin; cf. more especially xxxix. 13, xviii. 7, lxxxviii. 3; and on ver. 3: xxvii. 9 {Hide not Thy face from me); lix. 17 (^ ns DVa); xxxi. 3 and frequently {Incline Thine ear unto me); lvi. 10 (aopx DV3); lxix. 18, cxliii. 7 QW 1HO).

Vers. 4-6. From this point onward the Psalm becomes original. Concerning the Beth in |W3, vid. on xxxvii. 20. The reading 1$ iE3 (in the Karaite Ben-Jerucham) enriches the lexicon in the same sense with a word which has scarcely had any existence. "T£to (Arabic maukid) signifies here, as in other instances, a hearth. ¥iru is, as in lxix. 4, Niphal: my bones are heated through with a fever-heat, as a hearth with the smouldering fire that is on it. H3W (cf. Wfaj, xciv. 21) is used exactly as in Hos. ix. 16, cf. Ps. cxxi. 6. The heart is said to dry up when the life's blood, of which it is the reservoir, fails. The verb nap is followed by |D of dislike. On the cleaving of the bones to the flesh from being baked, i.e. to the skin (Arabic ^1j, in accordance with the radical signification, the surface of the body = the skin, from "id, to brush along, rub, scrape, scratch on the surface), cf. Job xix. 20, Lam. iv. 8. p (78) with P2i is used just like 2. It is unnecessary, with Bottcher, to draw *Jin3K #pHD to ver. 5. Continuous straining of the voice, especially in connection with persevering prayer arising from inward conflict, does really make the body waste away.

Isaiah, ii. 73), according to the LXX., is the pelican, and Dte is the ni^ht-raven or the little horned-owl.* W% obtains the signification to be like, equal (cequalem esse), from the radical signification to be flat, even, and to spread out flat (as the Dutch have already recognised). They are both unclean creatures, which are fond of the loneliness of the desert and ruined places. To such a wilderness, that of the exile, is the poet unwillingly transported. He passes the nights without sleep Oi?^, to watch during the time for sleep), and is therefore like a bird sitting lonesome (*^3, Syriac erroneously 15fa) upon the roof whilst all in the house beneath are sleeping. The Athnach in ver. 8 separates that which is come to be from the ground of the u becoming " and the " becoming " itself. His grief is that his enemies reproach him as one forsaken of God. ^np, part. Pool, is one made or become mad, Eccles. ii. 2: my mad ones = those who are mad against me. These swear by him, inasmuch as they say when they want to curse: " God do unto thee as unto this man," which is to be explained according to Isa. lxv. 15, Jer. xxix. 22.

Vers. 10-12. Ashes are his bread (cf. Lam. iii. 16), inasmuch as he, a mourner, sits in ashes, and has thrown ashes all over himself, Job ii. 8, Ezek. xxvii. 30. The inflected ^ipt?

* The LXX. renders it: I am like a pelican of the desert, I am become as a night-raven upon a ruined place (oixoKela). In harmony with the LXX., Saadia (as also the Arabic version edited by Erpenius, the Samaritan Arabic, and Abulwalid) renders nxp by jy (here and in Lev. xi. 18, Deut. xiv. 17, Isa. xxxiv. 17), and DID by *jj; the latter (bum) is an onomatopoetic name of the owl, and the former (kuk) does not even signify the owl or horned-owl (although the smali horned-owl is called urn kueik in Egypt, and in Africa abu kueik; vid. the dictionaries of Bocthor and Marcel s.v. chouette), but the pelican, the "long-necked water-bird" (Damiri after the lexicon el- Obdb of Hasan ben-Mohammed el-Saghani). The Grseco-Veneta also renders riKp with *«*«*«*,— the

Peshito, however, with ^CLD. What Ephrem on Deut. xiv. 17 and the

Phyriologus Syrus (ed. Tychsen, p. 13, cf. pp. 110 sq.) say of loo, viz. that it is a marsh-bird, is very fond of its young ones, dwells in desolate places, and is incessantly noisy, likewise points to the pelican, although the Syrian lexicographers vary. Cf. also Oedmann, Vermischte Sammlungen, Heft 3, Cap. G. (Fleischer after a communication from Rodiger.)

has 1?^ = ftpB> for Its principal form, instead of which it is ^pB> in Hos. ii. 7. " That Thou hast lifted me up and cast me down" is to be understood according to Job xxx. 22. First of all God has taken away the firm ground from under his feet, then from aloft He has cast him to the ground — an emblem of the lot of Israel, which is removed from its fatherland and cast into exile, i.e. into a strange land. In that passage the days of his life are ^DJ?¥3, like a lengthened shadow, which grows longer and longer until it is entirely lost in darkness, cix. 23. Another figure follows: he there becomes like an (uprooted) plant which dries up.

Vers. 13-15. When the church in its individual members dies off on a foreign soil, still its God, the unchangeable One, remains, and therein the promise has the guarantee of its fulfilment. Faith lays hold upon this guarantee as in Ps. xc. It becomes clear from ix. 8 and Lam. v. 19 how 2&n is to be understood. The Name which Jahve makes Himself by selfattestation never falls a prey to the dead past, it is His everliving memorial ("13T, Ex. iii. 15). Thus, too, will He restore Jerusalem; the limit, or appointed time, to which the promise points is, as his longing tells the poet, now come. "JM, according to lxxv. 3, Hab. ii. 3, is the juncture, when the redemption by means of the judgment on the enemies of Israel shall dawn. n^rPj from the infinitive |3n, has #, flattened from a, in an entirely closed syllable, nyj seq. ace. signifies to have pleasure in anything, to cling to it with delight; and \}h9 according to Prov. xiv. 21, affirms a compassionate, tender love of the object. The servants of God do not feel at home in Babylon, but their loving yearning lingers over the ruins, the stones and the heaps of the rubbish (Neh. iii. 34 [iv. 2]), of Jerusalem.

Vers. 16-18. With WW we are told what will take place when that which is expected in ver. 14 comes to pass, and at the same time the fulfilment of that which is longed for is thereby urged home upon God: Jahve's own honour depends upon it, since the restoration of Jerusalem will become the means of the conversion of the world — a fundamental thought of Isa. ch. xl.-lxvi. (cf. more particularly ch. lix. 19, lx. 2), which is also called to mind in the expression of this strophe. This prophetic prospect (Isa. xl. 1-5) that the restoration of Jerusalem will take place simultaneously with the glorious parusia of Jahve re-echoes here in a lyric form. S3, ver. 17, states the ground of the reverence, just as ver. 20 the ground of the praise. The people of the Exile are called in ver. 18 Ijnjjn, from "njf, to be naked: homeless, powerless, honourless, and in the eyes of men, prospectless. The LXX. renders this word in Jer. xvii. 6 a<ypiofjLvpl/c7]) and its plural, formed by an internal change of vowel, "W">J7, in Jer. xlviii. 6 6Vo<? aypcos, which are only particularizations of the primary notion of that which is stark naked, neglected, wild. Ver. lSb is an echo of Ps. xxii. 25. In the mirror of this and of other Psalms written in times of affliction the Israel of the Exile saw itself reflected.

Vers. 19-23. The poet goes on advancing motives to Jahve for the fulfilment of his desire, by holding up to Him what will take place when He shall have restored Zion. The evangel of God's redemptive deed will be written down for succeeding generations, and a new, created people, i.e. a people coming into existence, the church of the future, shall praise God the Redeemer for it. P"1!]^ "^ as in xlviii. 14, lxxviii. 4, N"}23 Dy like *vfa Dy xxii. 32, perhaps with reference to deutero- Isaianic passages like Isa. xliii. 7. On ver. 20, cf. Isa. lxiii. 15; in ver. 21 (cf. Isa. xlii. 7, lxi. 1) the deutero-Isaianic colouring is very evident. And ver. 21 rests still more verbally upon lxxix. 11. The people of the Exile are as it were in prison and chains ("^?N), and are advancing towards their destruction (nrnsn ^3)j if God does not interpose. Those who have returned home are the subject to ">spp. 2 in ver. 23 introduces that which takes place simultaneously: with the release of Israel from servitude is united the conversion of the world. yzp) occurs in the same connection as in Isa. lx. 4. After having thus revelled in the glory of the time of redemption the poet comes back to himself and gives form to his prayer on his own behalf.

Vers. 24-29. On the way (2 as in ex. 7)— not " by means of the way" (2 as in cv. 18), in connection with which one would expect to find some attributive minuter definition of the way — God hath bowed down his strength (cf. Deut. viii. 2); it was therefore a troublous, toilsome way which he has been led, together with his people. He has shortened his days, so that he only drags on wearily, and has only a short distance still before him before he is entirely overcome. The Chethib ina

(LXX. la^vo? avTov) may be understood of God's irresistible inio-ht, as in Job xxiii. 6, xxx. 18, but in connection with it the designation of the object is felt to be wanting. The introductory "ifttf (cf. Job x. 2), which announces a definite moulding of the utterance, serves to give prominence to the petition that follows. In the expression *3<?J?fl"7K life is conceived of as a line the length of which accords with nature; to die before one's time is a being taken up out of this course, so that the second half of the line is not lived through (lv. 24, Isa. xxxviii. 10). The prayer not to sweep him away before his time, the poet supports not by the eternity of God in itself, but by the work of the rejuvenation of the world and of the restoration of Israel that is to be looked for, which He can and will bring to an accomplishment, because He is the ever- living One. The longing to see this new time is the final ground of the poet's prayer for the prolonging of his life. The confession of God the Creator in ver. 26 reminds one in its form of Isa. xlviii. 13, cf. xliv. 24. Hftn in ver. 27 refers to the two great divisions of the universe. The fact that God will create heaven and earth anew is a revelation that is indicated even in Isa. xxxiv. 4, but is first of all expressed more fully and in many ways in the second part of the Book of Isaiah, viz. li. 6, 16, lxv. 17, lxvi. 22. It is clear from the agreement in the figure of the garment (Isa. li. 6, cf. 1. 9) and in the expression ("i^y, jierstare, as in Isa. lxvi. 22) that the poet has gained this knowledge from the prophet. The expressive wn nntf, Thou art He, i.e. unalterably the same One, is also taken from the mouth of the prophet, Isa. xli. 4, xliii. 10, xlvi. 4, xlviii. 12; wn is a predicate, and denotes the identity (sameness) of Jahve (Hofmann, Schriftbeweis, i. 63). In ver. 29 also, in which the prayer for a lengthening of life tapers off to a point, we hear Isa. lxv. 9, lxvi. 22 re-echoed. And from the fact that in the mind of the poet as of the prophet the post-exilic Jerusalem and the final new Jerusalem upon the new earth under a new heaven blend together, it is evident that not merely in the time of Hezekiah or of Manasseh (assuming that Isa. ch. xl.-lxvi. are by the old Isaiah), but also even in the second half of the Exile, such a perspectively foreshortened view was possible. When, moreover, the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews at once refers vers. 26-28 to Christ, this is justified by the fact that the God whom the poet confesses as the unchangeable One is Jahve who is to come.

5 Who satisfieth thy mouth with good, [mercies, So that thy youth renews itself like the eagle.

10 He doth not deal with us after our sins, Nor recompense us after our iniquities.

11 For as the heaven is high above the earth,

12 As far as the east is from the west,

13 Like as a father pitieth his children, So Jahve pitieth those who fear Him,

As a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.

upon those who fear Him, And His righteousness is manifested to children's children,

19 Jahve hath established His throne in the heavens, And His kingdom ruleth over all.

22 Bless Jahve, all ye His works, In all places of His dominion. Bless, O mv soul, Jahve!

To the " Tliou wilt have compassion upon Zion" of cii. 14 is appended Ps. ciii., which has this as its substance throughout; but in other respects the two Psalms stand in contrast to one another. The inscription IvA is also found thus by itself without any further addition even before Psalms of the First Book (xxvi.-xxviii., xxxv., xxxvii.). It undoubtedly does not rest merely on conjecture, but upon tradition. For no internal grounds which might have given rise to the annotation Tfi? can be traced. The form of the language does not favour it. This pensive song, so powerful in its tone, has an Aramaic colouring like Ps. cxvi., cxxiv., cxxix. In the heaping up of Aramaizing suffix-forms it has its equal only in the story of Elisha, 2 Kings iv. 1-7, where, moreover, the Keri throughout substitutes the usual forms, whilst here, where these suffix-forms are intentional ornaments of the expression, the Chethib rightly remains unaltered. The forms are 2d sing. fern, echi for ech, and 2d sing, plur. djcJii for ajich. The i without the tone which is added here is just the one with which originally the pronunciation was *JW instead of fiK and w for y. Out of the Psalter (here and cxvi. 7, 19) these suffix-forms echi and ajchi occur only in

Jer. xi. 15, and in the North-Palestinian history of the prophet in the Book of Kings.

The groups or strophes into which the Psalm falls are vers. 1-5, 6-10, 11-14, 15-18, 19-22. If we count their lines we obtain the schema 10. 10. 8. 8. 10. The Coptic version accordingly reckons 46 CTYX0C, i.e. <tji^ol.

Vers. 1-5. In the strophe vers. 1-5 the poet calls upon his soul to arise to praiseful gratitude for God's justifying, redeeming, and renewing grace. In such soliloquies it is the Ego that speaks, gathering itself up with the spirit, the stronger, more manly part of man (Psychology, S. 104 sq.; tr. p. 126), or even, because the soul as the spiritual medium of the spirit and of the body represents the whole person of man {Psychology, S. 203; tr. p. 240), the Ego rendering objective in the soul the whole of its own personality. So here in vers. 3-5 the soul, which is addressed, represents the whole man. The &2Vp which occurs here is a more choice expression for D'Vp (D!VP): the heart, which is called T}P tear t^oyjqv, the reins, the liver, etc.; for according to the scriptural conception (Psychology, S. 266; tr. p. 313) these organs of the cavities of the breast and abdomen serve not merely for the bodily life, but also the psycho-spiritual life. The summoning ^3 is repeated per anaphoram. There is nothing the soul of man is so prone to forget as to render thanks that are due, and more especially thanks that are due to God. It therefore needs to be expressly aroused in order that it may not leave the blessing with which God blesses it unacknowledged, and may not forget all His acts performed (7D}="ID|) on it (^03, prj/na /xeaov, e.g. in cxxxvii. 8), which are purely deeds of loving-kindness (benefits). Now follow attributive participles, which attach themselves to 'n~r\it. Most prominent stands mercy (loving-kindness), which is the primal condition and the foundation of all the others, viz. sinpardoning mercy. The verbs n^p and KB"} with a dative of the object denote the bestowment of that which is expressed by the verbal notion. D^qn (taken from Deut. xxix. 21, cf. 1 Chron. xxi. 19, from t6n = r6n root 5>n, solutiim, laxum esse)