Bible Commentaries

Temptation to Apostasy Overcome

After the one Asaph Psalm of the Second Book, Ps 50, follow eleven moreof them from Psalms 73-83. They are all Elohimic, whereas the KorahPsalms divide into an Elohimic and a Jehovic group. Psalm 84:1-12 forms thetransition from the one to the other. The Elohim-Psalms extend fromPsalms 42-84, and are fenced in on both sides by Jahve-Psalms.

In contents Psalms 73 is the counterpart of pendant of Ps 50. As in thatPsalm the semblance of a sanctity based upon works is traced back to itsnothingness, so here the seeming good fortune of the ungodly, by whichthe poet felt himself tempted to fall away, not into heathenism (Hitzig),but into that free-thinking which in the heathen world does not less castoff the deisidaimoni'a than it does the belief in Jahve within the paleof Israel. Nowhere does there come to light in the national history anyback ground that should contradict the לאסף, and the doubtsrespecting the moral order of the world are set at rest in exactly the same way as in Ps 37; Ps 49, and in the Book of Job. Theodicy, or the vindication of God's ways, does not as yet rise from the indication of the retribution in this present time which the ungodly do not escape, to a future solution of all the contradictions of this present world; and the transcendent glory which infinitely outweighs the suffering of this present time, still remains outside the range of vision. The stedfast faith which, gladly renouncing everything, holds fast to God, and the pure love to which this possession is more than heaven and earth, is all the more worthy of admiration in connection with such defective knowledge.

The strophe schema of the Psalm is predominantly octastichic: 4. 8. 8. 8; 8. 8. 5. Its two halves are Psalm 73:1, Psalm 73:15.

אך, belonging to the favourite words of the faith thatbids defiance to assault, signifies originally “thus = not otherwise,” andtherefore combines an affirmative and restrictive, or, according tocircumstances, even an adversative signification (vid., on Psalm 39:6). It maytherefore be rendered: yea good, assuredly good, or: only good, nothing butgood; both renderings are an assertion of a sure, infallible relation of things. God appears to be angry with the godly, but in reality He is kindlydisposed towards them, though He send affliction after affliction uponthem (Lamentations 3:25). The words ישראל אלהים are not to be taken together, afterGalatians 6:16 (ôïÉôïõÈåïõ); not, “only good isit with the Israel of Elohim,” but “only good to Israel is Elohim,” is theright apprehension of the truth or reality that is opposed to what seems tobe the case. The Israel which in every relationship has a good and loving God is limitedin Psalm 73:1 to the pure in heart (Psalm 24:4; Matthew 5:8). Israel in truth are not allthose who are descended from Jacob, but those who have put away allimpurity of disposition and all uncleanness of sin out of their heart, i.e.,out of their innermost life, and by a constant striving after sanctification(Psalm 73:13) maintain themselves in such purity. In relation to this, which is thereal church of God, God is pure love, nothing but love. This it is that hasbeen confirmed to the poet as he passed through the conflict of temptation, but it was through conflict, for he almost fell by reason of the semblance of the opposite. The Chethîb נטוּי רגלי (cf. Numbers 24:4) or נטוּי (cf. 2 Samuel 15:32) is erroneous. The narration of that which is past cannot begin with a participial clause like this, and כּמעט, in such a sense ((non) (multum) (abfuit) (quin), like כּאין, (nihil) (abfuit) (quin)), always has the perfect after it, e.g., Psalm 94:17; Psalm 119:87. It is therefore to be read נטיוּ (according to the fuller form for נטוּ, which is used not merely with great distinctives, as in Psalm 36:8; Psalm 122:6; Numbers 24:6, but also with conjunctives out of pause, e.g., Psalm 57:2, cf. Psalm 36:9, Deuteronomy 32:37; Job 12:6): my feet had almost inclined towards, had almost slipped backwards and towards the side. On the other hand the Chethîb שׁפּכה is unassailable; the feminine singular is frequently found as predicate both of a plural subject that has preceded (Psalm 18:35, cf. Deuteronomy 21:7; Job 16:16) and also more especially of one that is placed after it, e.g., Psalm 37:31; Job 14:19. The footsteps are said to be poured out when one “flies out or slips” and falls to the ground.

Now follows the occasion of the conflict of temptation: the good fortuneof those who are estranged from God. In accordance with the gloominessof the theme, the style is also gloomy, and piles up the full-toned suffixes(amo) and (emo) (vid., Psalm 78:66; Psalm 80:7; Psalm 83:12, Psalm 83:14); both are after the exampleset by David. קנּא with Beth of the object ion which the zeal orwarmth of feeling is kindled (Psalm 37:1; Proverbs 3:31) here refers to the warmth ofenvious ill-feeling. Concerning הולל vid., Psalm 5:6. Psalm 73:3 tellsunder what circumsntaces the envy was excited; cf. so far as the syntax isconcerned, Psalm 49:6; Psalm 76:11. In Psalm 73:4 חרצצבּות (from חרצב =חצּב from חצב, cognate עצב, whence עצב, pain,Arabic (‛aṣâbe), a snare, cf. חבל, ùand חבל σχοινίον ), in the same sense as the Latin tormenta(from torquere),is intended of pains that produce convulsive contractions. But in order togive the meaning “they have no pangs (to suffer) till their death,” להם (למו) could not be omitted (that is, assuming also that ל, which is sometimes used for עד, vid., Psalm 59:14, could in such an exclusive sense signify the terminus ad quem). Also “there are no pangs for their death, i.e., that bring death to them,” ought to be expressed by להם למּות. The clause as it stands affirms that their dying has no pangs, i.e., it is a painless death; but not merely does this assertion not harmonize with Psalm 73:18., but it is also introduced too early here, since the poet cannot surely begin the description of the good fortune of the ungodly with the painlessness of their death, and then for the first time come to speak of their healthy condition. We may therefore read, with Ewald, Hitzig, Böttcher, and Olshausen:

כי אין חרצבות למו

תּם ובריא אולם

i.e., they have (suffer) no pangs, vigorous (תּם like תּם,Job 21:23, תמים, Proverbs 1:12) and well-nourished is their belly;by which means the difficult למותם is got rid of, and thegloomy picture is enriched by another form ending with (mo). אוּל,here in a derisive sense, signifies the body, like the Arabic (allun), (âlun) (from(âl), (coaluit), (cohaesit), to condense inwardly, to gain consistency).

(Note: Hitzig calls to mind οὖλος , “corporeal;” but this word is Ionic and equivalent to ὅλος , solidus, the ground-word of which is the Sanscrit (sarvas), whole, complete.)

The observation of Psalm 73:4 is pursued further in Psalm 73:5: whilst one would havethought that the godly formed an exception to the common wretchednessof mankind, it is just the wicked who are exempt from all trouble andcalamity. It is also here to be written אינמו, as in Psalm 59:14,not אינימו. Therefore is haughtiness their neck-chain, andbrutishness their mantle. ענק is a denominative from ענק = αὐχήν : to hang round the neck; the neck is the seat of pride (áõ):haughtiness hangs around their neck (like ענק, a neck-ornament). Accordingly in Psalm 73:6 המס is the subject, although theinterpunction construes it differently, viz., “they wrap round as a garmentthe injustice belonging to them,” in order, that is, to avoid the constructionof יעטף (vid., Ps 65:14) with למו; but active verbs can take adative of the object (e.g., אהב ל,רפא ל) in the sense: to be or to grant to any one that which the primary notion of the verb asserts. It may therefore be rendered: they put on the garment of violence (שׁית חמס like בּגדי נקם, Isaiah 59:17), or even by avoiding every enallage numeri: violence covers them as a garment; so that שׁית is an apposition which is put forth in advance.

The reading עונמו, çááõ(lxx (cf. inZechariah 5:6 the עינם, which is rendered by the lxx in exactly the sameway), in favour of which Hitzig, Böttcher, and Olshausen decide, “theiriniquity presses forth out of a fat heart, out of a fat inward part,” isfavoured by Psalm 17:10, where חלב obtains just this signification bycombination with סגר, which it would obtain here as being theplace whence sin issues; cf. ååôçêáñäéMatthew 15:18.; and the parallelism decides its superiority. Nevertheless the traditional reading also gives a suitable sense; not (sincethe fat tends to make the eyes appear to be deeper in) “their eyes comeforward prae adipebut, “they stare forth ex adipe, out of the fat of theirbloated visage,” מחלב being equivalent to מחלב פּניהם, Job 15:27. This is a feature of the character faithfully drawnafter nature. Further, just as in general ôïðåñéôçêáñäéwells over in the gestures and language (Matthew 12:34), so is italso with their “views or images of the heart” (from שׂכה, like שׂכוי, the cock with its gift of divination as speculator): the illusions oftheir unbounded self-confidence come forth outwardly, they overflowafter the manner of a river,

(Note: On the other hand, Redslob (Deutsch. Morgenländ. Zeitschr. 1860, S. 675) interprets it thus: they run over the fencings of the heart, from שׂכה in the signification to put or stick through, to stick into (infigere), by comparing קירות לבּי, Jeremiah 4:19, and ἕρκος ὀδόντων . He regards משׂכית sdrag and mosaic as one word, just as the Italian ricamare (to stitch) and רקם is one word. Certainly the root זך, Arab. (zk), (ḏk), has the primary notion of piercing (cf. זכר), and also the notion of purity, which it obtains, proceeds from the idea of the brilliance which pierces into the eye; but the primary notion of שׂכה is that of cutting through (whence שׂכּין, like מחלף, a knife, from חלף, Judges 5:26).)

viz., as Psalm 73:8 says, in words that are proud beyond measure (Jeremiah 5:28). Luther: “they destroy everything” (synon. they make it as or into rottenness, from מקק). But חמיק is here equivalent to the Aramaic מיּק ( μωκᾶσθαι ): they mock and openly speak ברע (with (ā) in connection with (Munach) transformed from Dechî), with evil disposition (cf. Exodus 32:12), oppression; i.e., they openly express their resolve which aims at oppression. Their fellow-man is the sport of their caprice; they speak or dictate ממּרום, down from an eminence, upon which they imagine themselves to be raised high above others. Even in the heavens above do they set (שׁתּוּ as in Psalm 49:15 instead of שׁתוּ, - there, in accordance with tradition, (Milel); here at the commencement of the verse (Milra)) their mouth; even these do not remain untouched by their scandalous language (cf. Judges 1:16); the Most High and Holy One, too, is blasphemed by them, and their tongue runs officiously and imperiously through the earth below, everywhere disparaging that which exists and giving new laws. תּהלך, as in Exodus 9:23, a Kal sounding much like Hithpa., in the signification (grassari). In Psalm 73:10 the Chethîb ישׁיב (therefore he, this class of man, turns a people subject to him hither, i.e., to himself) is to be rejected, because הלם is not appropriate to it. עמּו is the subject, and the suffix refers not to God (Stier), whose name has not been previously mentioned, but to the kind of men hitherto described: what is meant is the people which, in order that it may turn itself hither (שׁוּב, not: to turn back, but to turn one's self towards, as e.g., in Jeremiah 15:19)

(Note: In general שׁוּב does not necessarily signify to turn back, but, like the Arabic (‛âda), Persic (gashten), to enter into a new (active or passive) state.))

becomes his, i.e., this class's people (cf. for this sense of the suffix as describing the issue or event, Psalm 18:24; Psalm 49:6; Psalm 65:12). They gain adherents (Psalm 49:14) from those who leave the fear of God and turn to them; and מי מלא, water of fulness, i.e., of full measure (cf. Psalm 74:15, streams of duration = that do not dry up), which is here an emblem of their corrupt principles (cf. Job 15:16), is quaffed or sucked in (מצה, root מץ, whence first of all מצץ, Arab. (mṣṣ), to suck) by these befooled ones (למו, αὐτοῖς = ὑπ ̓ αὐτῶν ). This is what is meant to be further said, and not that this band of servile followers is in fulness absorbed by them (Sachs). Around the proud free-thinkers there gathers a rabble submissive to them, which eagerly drinks in everything that proceeds from them as though it were the true water of life. Even in David's time (Psalm 10:4; Psalm 14:1; Psalm 36:2) there were already such stout spirits (Isaiah 46:12) with a (servûm) (imitatorum) (pecus). A still far more favourable soil for these לצים was the worldly age of Solomon.

The persons speaking are now those apostates who, deluded by the goodfortune and free-thinking of the ungodly, give themselves up to them asslaves. concerning the modal sense of ידע, quomodo sciveritvid., Psalm 11:3, cf. Job 22:13. With וישׁ the doubting question iscontinued. Böttcher renders thus: nevertheless knowledge is in the MostHigh (a circumstantial clause like Proverbs 3:28; Malachi 1:14; Judges 6:13); but firstof all they deny God's actual knowledge, and then His attributiveomniscience. It is not to be interpreted: behold, such are (according to theirmoral nature) the ungodly (אלּה, tales, like זה, Ps 48:15, Deuteronomy 5:26, cf. המּה, Isaiah 56:11); nor, as is more in accordance with theparallel member Psalm 73:12 and the drift of the Psalm: behold, thus it befalleththe ungodly (such as they according to their lot, as in Job 18:21, cf. Isaiah 20:6); but, what forms a better connection as a statement of the ground ofthe scepticism in Psalm 73:11, either, in harmony with the accentuation: behold,the ungodly, etc., or, since it is not הרשׁעים: behold, these are ungodly,and, ever reckless (Jeremiah 12:1), they have acquired great power. With the bitter הנּה, as Stier correctly observes, they bringforward the obvious proof to the contrary. How can God be said to be theomniscient Ruler of the world? - the ungodly in their carnal security becomevery powerful and mighty, but piety, very far from being rewarded, is joined with nothing but misfortune. My striving after sanctity (cf. Proverbs 20:9), my abstinence from all moral pollution (cf. Proverbs 26:6), says he who has been led astray, has been absolutely (אך as in 1 Samuel 25:21) in vain; I was notwithstanding (Ew. §345, a) incessantly tormented (cf. Psalm 73:5), and with every morning's dawn (לבּקרים, as in Psalm 101:8, cf. לבקרים in Job 7:18) my chastitive suffering was renewed. We may now supply the conclusion in thought in accordance with Psalm 73:10: Therefore have I joined myself to those who never concern themselves about God and at the same time get on better.

To such, doubt is become the transition to apostasy. The poet hasresolved the riddle of such an unequal distribution of the fortunes of menin a totally different way. Instead of כּמו in Psalm 73:15, to readכּמוהם (Böttcher), or better, by taking up the following הנה, which even Saadia allows himself to do, contrary to the accents(Arab. (mṯl) (hḏâ)), כּמו הנּה (Ewald), is unnecessary,since prepositions are sometimes used elliptically (כּעל, Isaiah 59:18),or even without anything further (Hosea 7:16; Hosea 11:7) as adverbs, which musttherefore be regarded as possible also in the case of כּמו (Aramaic, Arabic כּמא, Aethiopic (kem)). The poet means to say, IfI had made up my mind to the same course of reasoning, I should havefaithlessly forsaken the fellowship of the children of God, and shouldconsequently also have forfeited their blessings. The subjunctive signification of the perfects in the hypothetical protasisand apodosis, Psalm 73:15 (cf. Jeremiah 23:22), follows solely from the context; futuresinstead of perfects would signify si dicerem … perfide ageremדּור בּניך is the totality of those, in whom the filial relationshipin which God has placed Isreal in relation to Himself is become an inwardor spiritual reality, the true Israel, Psalm 73:1, the “righteous generation,” Psalm 14:5. It is an appellative, as in Deuteronomy 14:1; Hosea 2:1. For on the point of theuhiothesi'a the New Testament differs from the Old Testament inthis way, viz., that in the Old Testament it is always only as a people that Israel is called בן, or as a whole בנים, but that the individual, and that in his direct relationship to God, dared not as yet call himself “child of God.” The individual character is not as yet freed from its absorption in the species, it is not as yet independent; it is the time of the minor's νηπιότης , and the adoption is as yet only effected nationally, salvation is as yet within the limits of the nationality, its common human form has not as yet appeared. The verb בּגד with בּ signifies to deal faithlessly with any one, and more especially (whether God, a friend, or a spouse) faithlessly to forsake him; here, in this sense of malicious desertion, it contents itself with the simple accusative.

On the one side, by joining in the speech of the free-thinkers he would have placed himself outside the circle of the children of God, of the truly pious; on the other side, however, when by meditation he sought to penetrate it (לדעת), the doubt-provoking phenomenon (זאת) still continued to be to him עמל, trouble, i.e., something that troubled him without any result, an unsolvable riddle (cf. Ecclesiastes 8:17). Whether we read הוּא or היא, the sense remains the same; the Kerî הוּא prefers, as in Job 31:11, the attractional gender. Neither here nor in Job 30:26 and elsewhere is it to be supposed that ואחשׁבה is equivalent to ואחשׁבה (Ewald, Hupfeld). The cohortative from of the future here, as frequently (Ges. §128, 1), with or without a conditional particle (Psalm 139:8; 2 Samuel 22:38; Job 16:6; Job 11:17; Job 19:18; Job 30:26), forms a hypothetical protasis: and (yet) when I meditated; Symmachus (according to Montfaucon), ει ̓ ἐλογιζόμην . As Vaihinger aptly observes, “thinking alone will give neither the right light nor true happiness.” Both are found only in faith. The poet at last struck upon the way of faith, and there he found light and peace. The future after עד frequently has the signification of the imperfect subjunctive, Job 32:11; Ecclesiastes 2:3, cf. Proverbs 12:19 (donec nutem = only a moment); also in an historical connection like Joshua 10:13; 2 Chronicles 29:34, it is conceived of as subjunctive (donec ulciseretur, se sanctificarent), sometimes, however, as indicative, as in Exodus 15:16 (donec transibat) and in our passage, where אד introduces the objective goal at which the riddle found its solution: until I went into the sanctuary of God, (purposely) attended to (ל as in the primary passage Deuteronomy 32:29, cf. Job 14:21) their life's end. The cohortative is used here exactly as in ואבינה, but with the collateral notion of that which is intentional, which here fully accords with the connection. He went into God's dread sanctuary (plural as in Ps 68:36, cf. מקדּשׁ in the Psalms of Asaph, Psalm 67:7; Psalm 78:69); here he prayed for light in the darkness of his conflict, here were his eyes opened to the holy plans and ways of God (Psalm 77:14), here the sight of the sad end of the evil-doers was presented to him. By “God's sanctuaries” Ewald and Hitzig understand His secrets; but this meaning is without support in the usage of the language. And is it not a thought perfectly in harmony with the context and with experience, that a light arose upon him when he withdrew from the bustle of the world into the quiet of God's dwelling - place, and there devoutly gave his mind to the matter?

The strophe closes with a summary confession of the explanation received there. שׁית is construed with Lamed inasmuch as collocare is equivalent to locum assignare (vid., Psalm 73:6 ). God makes the evil-doers to stand on smooth, slippery places, where one may easily lose one's footing (cf. Psalm 35:6; Jeremiah 23:12). There, then, they also inevitably fall; God casts them down למשּׁוּאות, into ruins, fragores= ruinae, from שׁוא = שׁאה, to be confused, desolate, to rumble. The word only has the appearance of being from נשׁא: ensnarings, sudden attacks (Hitzig), which is still more ill suited to Psalm 74:3 than to this passage; desolation and ruin can be said even of persons, as הרס, Psalm 28:5, ונשׁבּרוּ, Isaiah 8:15, נפּץ, Jeremiah 51:21-23. The poet knows no other theodicy but this, nor was any other known generally in the pre-exilic literature of Israel (vid., Ps 37; Psalm 39:1-13, Jer. 12, and the Job 1:1). The later prophecy and the Chokma were much in advance of this, inasmuch as they point to a last universal judgment (vid., more particularly Malachi 3:13.), but not one that breaks off this present state; the present state and the future state, time and eternity, are even there not as yet thoroughly separated.

The poet calms himself with the solution of the riddle that has come to him; and it would be beneath his dignity as a man to allow himself any further to be tempted by doubting thoughts. Placing himself upon the standpoint of the end, he sees how the ungodly come to terrible destruction in a moment: they come to an end (ספוּ from סוּף, not ספה), it is all over with them (תּמּוּ) in consequence of (מן as in Psalm 76:7, and unconnected as in Psalm 18:4; Psalm 30:4; Psalm 22:14) frightful occurrences (בּלּהות, a favourite word, especially in the Book of Job), which clear them out of the way. It is with them as with a dream, after (מן as in 1 Chronicles 8:8) one is awoke. One forgets the vision on account of its nothingness (Job 20:8). So the evil-doers who boast themselves μετὰ πολλῆς φαντασίας (Acts 25:23) are before God a צלם, a phantom or unsubstantial shadow. When He, the sovereign Lord, shall awake, i.e., arouse Himself to judgment after He has looked on with forbearance, then He will despise their shadowy image, will cast it contemptuously from Him. Luther renders, So machstu Herr jr Bilde in der Stad verschmecht (So dost Thou, Lord, make their image despised in the city). But neither has the Kal בּזה this double transitive signification, “to give over to contempt,” nor is the mention of the city in place here. In Hosea 11:9 also בּעיר in the signification in urbem gives no right sense; it signifies heat of anger or fury, as in Jeremiah 15:8, heat of anguish, and Schröder maintains the former signification (vid., on Psalm 139:20), in fervore (irae), here also; but the pointing בּעיר is against it. Therefore בּעיר is to be regarded, with the Targum, as syncopated from בּהעיר (cf. לביא, Jeremiah 39:7; 2 Chronicles 31:10; בּכּשׁלו, Proverbs 24:17, and the like); not, however, to be explained, “when they awake,” viz., from the sleep of death (Targum),

(Note: The Targum version is, “As the dream of a drunken man, who awakes out of his sleep, wilt Thou, O Lord, on the day of the great judgment, when they awake out of their graves, in wrath abandon their image to contempt.” The text of our editions is to be thus corrected according to Bechai (on Deuteronomy 33:29) and Nachmani (in his treatise שׁער הגמול).)

or after Psalm 78:38, “when Thou awakest them,” viz., out of their sleep of security (De Wette, Kurtz), but after Psalm 35:23, “when Thou awakest,” viz., to sit in judgment.

Thus far we have the divine answer, which is reproduced by the poet after the manner of prayer. Hengstenberg now goes on by rendering it, “for my heart was incensed;” but we cannot take יתחמּץ according to the sequence of tenses as an imperfect, nor understand כּי as a particle expression the reason. On the contrary, the poet, from the standpoint of the explanation he has received, speaks of a possible return (כּי seq. fut. = ἐάν ) of his temptation, and condemns it beforehand: si exacerbaretur animus meus atque in renibus meis pungerer. התחמּץ, to become sour, bitter, passionate; השׁתּונן, with the more exactly defining accusative כּליותי, to be pricked, piqued, irritated. With ואני begins the apodosis: then should I be … I should have become (perfect as in Psalm 73:15, according to Ges. §126, 5). Concerning לא ידע, non sapere, vid., Psalm 14:4. בּהמות can be taken as compar. decurtata for כּבהמות; nevertheless, as apparently follows from Job 40:15, the poet surely has the (p-(ehe) -(mou), the water ox, i.e., the hippopotamus, in his mind, which being Hebraized is בּהמות,

(Note: The Egyptian p frequently passes over into the Hebrew (b), and vice versâ, as in the name Aperiu = עברים; p, however, is retained in פרעה = (phar-(aa), grand-house ( οἶκος μέγας in Horapollo), the name of the Egyptian rulers, which begins with the sign of the plan of a house = p.)

and, as a plump colossus of flesh, is at once an emblem of colossal stupidity (Maurer, Hitzig). The meaning of the poet is, that he would not be a man in relation to God, over against God (עם, as in Psalm 78:37; Job 9:2, cf. Arab. (ma‛a), in comparison with), if he should again give way to the same doubts, but would be like the most stupid animal, which stands before God incapable of such knowledge as He willingly imparts to earnestly inquiring man.

But he does not thus deeply degrade himself: after God has once taken himby the right hand and rescued him from the danger of falling (Psalm 73:2), heclings all the more firmly to Him, and will not suffer his perpetualfellowship with Him to be again broken through by such seizures whichestrange him from God. confidently does he yield up himself to the divineguidance, though he may not see through the mystery of the plan (עצה) of this guidance. He knows that afterwards (אחר with Mugrash:adverb as in Psalm 68:26), i.e., after this dark way of faith, God will כבוד receive him, i.e., take him to Himself, and take him from allsuffering (לקח as in Psalm 49:16, and of Enoch, Genesis 5:24). Thecomparison of Zechariah 2:12 [8] is misleading; there אחר is rightlyaccented as a preposition: after glory hath He sent me forth (vid., Köhler),and here as an adverb; for although the adverbial sense of אחר wouldmore readily lead one to look for the arrangement of the words ואחר תקחני כבוד, still “to receive after glory” (cf. the reverse Isaiah 58:8) is anawkward thought. כבוד, which as an adjective “glorious”(Hofmann) is alien to the language, is either accusative of the goal(Hupfeld), or, which yields a form of expression that is more like the styleof the Old Testament, accusative of the manner (Luther, “with honour”). In אחר the poet comprehends in one summary view what helooks for at the goal of the present divine guidance. The future is dark tohim, but lighted up by the one hope that the end of his earthly existencewill be a glorious solution of the riddle. Here, as elsewhere, it is faithwhich breaks through not only the darkness of this present life, but alsothe night of Hades. At that time there was as yet no divine utteranceconcerning any heavenly triumph of the church, militant in the presentworld, but to faith the Jahve-Name had already a transparent depth whichpenetrated beyond Hades into an eternal life. The heaven of blessednessand glory also is nothing without God; but he who can in love call God his,possesses heaven upon earth, and he who cannot in love call God his,would possess not heaven, but hell, in the midst of heaven. In this sensethe poet says in Psalm 73:25: whom have I in heaven? i.e., who there withoutThee would be the object of my desire, the stilling of my longing? without Thee heaven with all its glory is a vast waste and void, which makes me indifferent to everything, and with Thee, i.e., possessing Thee, I have no delight in the earth, because to call Thee mine infinitely surpasses every possession and every desire of earth. If we take בּארץ still more exactly as parallel to בּשּׁמים, without making it dependent upon חפצתּי: and possessing Thee I have no desire upon the earth, then the sense remains essentially the same; but if we allow בארץ to be governed by חפצתי in accordance with the general usage of the language, we arrive at this meaning by the most natural way. Heaven and earth, together with angels and men, afford him no satisfaction - his only friend, his sole desire and love, is God. The love for God which David expresses in Psalm 16:2 in the brief utterance, “Thou art my Lord, Thou art my highest good,” is here expanded with incomparable mystical profoundness and beauty. Luther's version shows his master-hand. The church follows it in its “Herzlich lieb hab' ich dich” when it sings -

“The whole wide world delights me not,

For heaven and earth, Lord, care I not,

If I may but have Thee;”

and following it, goes on in perfect harmony with the text of our Psalm -

“Yea, though my heart be like to break,

Thou art my trust that nought can shake;”

(Note: Miss Winkworth's translation.)

or with Paul Gerhard, [in his Passion-hymn “Ein Lämmlein geht und trägt die Schuld der Welt und ihrer Kinder,”

“Light of my heart, that shalt Thou be;

And when my heart in pieces breaks,

Thou shalt my heart remain.”

For the hypothetical perfect כּלה expresses something in spiteof which he upon whom it may come calls God his God: licet defeceritThough his outward and inward man perish, nevertheless God remainsever the rock of his heart as the firm ground upon which he, with his ego,remains standing when everything else totters; He remains his portion, i.e.,the possession that cannot be taken from him, if he loses all, even his spirit-life pertaining to the body, - and God remains to him this portion לעולם, he survives with the life which he has in God the death of the old life. The poet supposes an extreme case, - one, that is, it is true, impossible, but yet conceivable, - that his outward and inward being should sink away; even then with the merus actus of his ego he will continue to cling to God. In the midst of the natural life of perishableness and of sin, a new, individual life which is resigned to God has begun within him, and in this he has the pledge that he cannot perish, so truly as God, with whom it is closely united, cannot perish. It is just this that is also the nerve of the proof of the resurrection of the dead which Jesus advances in opposition to the Sadducees (Matthew 22:32).

The poet here once more gives expression to the great opposites intowhich good fortune and misfortune are seemingly, but only seemingly,divided in a manner so contradictory to the divine justice. The centralpoint of the confirmation that is introduced with כּי lies in Psalm 73:28. “Thy far removing ones” was to be expressed with רחק, which isdistinct from רחוק. זנה has מן instead ofמתּחת or מאחרי after it. Those who removethemselves far from the primary fountain of life fall a prey to ruin; thosewho faithlessly abandon God, and choose the world with its idols ratherthan His love, fall a prey to destruction. Not so the poet; the nearness ofGod, i.e., a state of union with God, is good to him, i.e., (cf. Psalm 119:71.) he regards as his good fortune. קרבה is nom. act. after the formיקהה, Arab. (waqhat), obedience, and נצּרה, a watch, Psalm 141:3,and of essentially the same signification with (ḳurba) (קרבה), theArabic designation of the unio mysticacf. James 4:8, åôùÈåùêáéåõJust as קרבת אלהים stands in antithesis to רחקיך, so לי טּוב stands inantithesis to יאבדו and הצמתה. To the former their alienation from Godbrings destruction; he finds in fellowship with God that which is good tohim for the present time and for the future. Putting his confidence (מחסּי, not מחסי) in Him, he will declare, and will one day be able to declare, all His מלאכות, i.e., the manifestations or achievements of His righteous, gracious, and wise government. The language of assertion is quickly changed into that of address. The Psalm closes with an upward look of grateful adoration to God beforehand, who leads His own people, ofttimes wondrously indeed, but always happily, viz., through suffering to glory.