3 I remembered God, and was troubled: I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.

Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak. 5 I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.

:

6 I call to remembrance my song in the night I commune with mine own heart and my spirit made diligent search.

7 Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more?

lowed by most moderns, ἡ χείρ μου ἐκτεταμένη, “ my hand was stretched out," scil. in prayer. Obj. Någar always in this voice (and we believe in its other common voice, the Hiphîl) involves the idea of "pouring out," a metaphor inapplicable to the extension of the hands in prayer. LXX. and Syr. both misread the 2nd root-letter of niggrâh, the one giving Taîs xepoí μov vuкtòs évavríov avtoû, as if niggrâh were 17 negdô, "before him,” the other "his hand in the night chastened me,” as if it were a part of the Syr. verb nagêd, “flagellavit.”

3. Prob. "When I remember God I am troubled: when I muse my spirit languishes. Selah." I.e. when I remember how near God once was, the present seems more bitter and the thought brings increase of sadness. Or, as the same verb denotes musings, and utterances which are the results of musings, "I will remember God when I am troubled: I will utter complaints [to Him] when my spirit languishes. Selah:" nearly as P.B.V.

4. Rend. "Thou hast held my eyelids [so that I cannot sleep, and] I am stricken so that I cannot speak." His affliction forbids him to close his eyelids in sleep or to open his mouth in coherent speech.

Eyelids. Lit. "watchers of my eyes.” The phrase is thus explained by Targ., Ab. Ez., Aq., Theod. Others interpr. ashmurôth, "watches."- "Thou hast held [in the] watches mine eyes, etc.”LXX. (Vat.) has προκατελάβοντο φυλακὰς πάντες οἱ ἐχθροί μου ; but in cod. Complut. and Ald. oi opaλpoi pov, and so Vulg. anticipaverunt vigilias oculi mei, from Ps. cxix. 148.

6. Rend. "I will give my mind to my song, in the night; I will muse with my heart, while my spirit makes search." I.e. in this sleepless night he resolves to compose the present poem, the purport of which is an investigation into the cause of these afflictions. Similarly LXX. Hengst. Others, "I will remember my song” of past times, scil. that in which I used to praise God for days of prosperity.

7-9. His spirit thus making search, there first came to his mind gloomy despondent reflections. The selah at the close of v. 9 denotes the cessation of these, and prepares the way for the transition to the better thoughts that follow.

8 Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore? :9 Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his

tender mercies? Selah.

IO And I said, This is my infirmity: but I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High.

10. Rend. "But I said, This is my consolation,—the [past] years of the mighty power of the most High." [Lit. the years of the right hand of the Most High.] I.e. but in my trouble my relief and mental resting-place is the consideration of the mighty works which God has done in years past, viz. those which he proceeds to recount. Cf. Hab. iii. 2.

This verse is one of great obscurity on account of the ambiguity of the word challôthê, which we render "my consolation," and the uncertainty whether sh'nôth means "years of" or "changing of." These difficulties have given rise to a great variation of exegesis. We enumerate the most noted renderings, leaving it to the Hebrew student to trace out their grammatical explanation.

1. The Targ. gives two renderings, (a) "My sickness is, the strength of the right hand of the Most High is changed;" (b) “This is my supplication, that the years of the end should come from the Most High."

2. Mendelssohn combines these, and renders, "It is my part to pray, to change is in the power of the Most High."

3. LXX. νῦν ἠρξάμην, αὕτη ἡ ἀλλοίωσις τῆς δεξίας τοῦ ὑψίστου, which is distinguished by the peculiar rendering of challôthi.

4. J. H. Mich. "My infirmity is [i. e. consists in] a changing of the right hand of the Most High."

5. Del. "My [decree of] affliction is--the years of the Right Hand of the Most High," i.e. my affliction continues during the years which the Almighty Hand of God has decreed.

We are led to the rendering adopted above, by a consideration of the context. Before this verse the Psalmist is almost in despair: in the verses succeeding he calls to mind the former mighty works of God: the natural transition seems to be, "Why think only of the present? surely I may draw comfort from the contemplation of God's mighty works of old." We take challôthi to be a subst. or infin. used as a subst. from R. châlal=Ar. challa, solvit (cf. the form nipi zammôthî, Ps. xvii. 3, from □ zâmam), and understand it to mean my loosing" or the loosing of my burden," so "my resting-place on my journey" (the Ar. challatun). The sense of "loosing" or "opening " may be traced throughout all the voices of the H. châlal. Its metaphorical use is justified by the common application of tsârâh,

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III will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old.

12 I will meditate also of all thy work, and talk of thy doings.

13 Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary who is so great a God as our God?

14 Thou art the God that doest wonders: thou hast declared thy strength among the people.

15 Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.

16 The waters saw thee, O God, the

waters saw thee; they were afraid: the depths also were troubled.

17 The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: thine arrows also went abroad.

18 The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven: the lightnings lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook.

19 Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.

20 Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.

rowness" to "straits;" harchiv, "making broad" to a relief from straits, and the frequent use of the same figure in other terms.

12. "And talk, etc." Or, "and on thy doings will I muse,” the verb sîach denoting, as we observed in v. 3, either "musing" or "utterance of musings."

13. "Is in the sanctuary." P.B.V. rightly "is holy,” lit. “is in holiness."

14. Better, "Thou, O God, doest wonders."

15. Why "and of Joseph"? Because, though Jacob was their father who gave them life and perpetuated his name among them, Joseph in Egypt was their father in preserving their lives from famine. The Selah marks the transition to the circumstances of the departure from Egypt, or rather to the details of the chief circumstance, the passage of the Red Sea. On the following verses, the Hebrew student should cf. Hab. iii. 10, 11, 15.

17. Lit." The clouds were poured out in water." "Thine arrows," i.e. lightning flashes.

18.

"Was in the heaven." Rend. "Was with a whirlwind," Hitzig, or "was with a rolling noise," Ab. Ezra.

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM LXXVIII.

A WARNING GROUNDED ON THE PAST NATIONAL HISTORY.

TITLE. "A Mascîl to Asaph."

THE general purport of this Psalm is obvious to every reader. It is in fact fully declared by the Psalmist in the first eight verses of his poem. The past mercies of God, and transgressions of Israel, from the time of the Exodus to that of David's accession, are detailed "in a parable,” i. e. in such a form as may suggest a parallel between the past and the present, and lead the people to beware of a form of transgression, ancient but not extinct.

It has been noticed that in his recital of past delinquencies and punishments, the writer gives peculiar prominence to those in which "Ephraim,” either as a tribe or as the representative of the whole northern people, is said to be specially implicated. Early in the Psalm he refers to a disgraceful defeat which the "sons of Ephraim" sustained on the field of battle, and as the conclusion of the historical sketch is neared, a marked emphasis is given to the removal of the sanctuary from Shiloh in Ephraim to Mount Zion. This feature has given rise to a variety of suggestions, of which the most plausible appears to be, that the Psalm was written after the defection of the ten tribes, and that to them, here as frequently in the poetical writings designated by the term Ephraim, its reproofs are particularly addressed. The secession of the northern tribes was, it must be remembered, regarded as an act of disobedience towards God. We may well imagine some pious writer, who strongly regretted the disintegration of the people, endeavouring to illustrate the folly of the schism by the warning light of a past eventful history. Adopting this view, we refer the mention of the weak-hearted sons of Ephraim in v. 9 to a noted defeat of the northern tribes, which was regarded as a punishment for their secession (vide notes), and are inclined to think that this event is to be regarded as the great starting-point of the poem. The Psalmist would fain have his people view it from the analogy of past historical disasters, and he recounts these at length, laying a marked stress on all that is attributable to the sins of the northern tribes. That the recent schism of these tribes is not more particularly dwelt upon, is exactly in accordance with the designation of the Psalm as a "parable," and "dark saying” (v. 2), it being customary in such forms of composition that the antitype should suggest itself spontaneously to the reader without explanation on the part of the writer. The ancient defections and rebellions of Israel are thus treated as if

prefiguring or symbolizing events still fresh in the minds of men, and naturally brought to mind by the suggestive utterance of the Psalmist. With this view we may reasonably suppose that the writer lived at the time in which the defection and the civil war were yet recent events, about the time of Asa king of Judah. The probability is that he was himself a native of the northern kingdom to which his teaching is addressed.

His Psalm is remarkable for terse but realistic portraiture, and an easy regularity of construction which renders it one of the most appropriate for liturgical purposes. Notwithstanding that the author's view of the national history is one by no means flattering to his compatriots, the poem is not of a sombre character, the mention of miracles and mercies on behalf of the thankless people introducing ever and anon a note of triumph, and imparting to the whole an undertone of hopefulness.

2. Lit. "I will open my mouth in a parable: I will declare dark sayings of old time," i.e. events of old time treated as presenting a hidden or enigmatic relation to those of the present (vide Introd.). This verse is quoted in Matt. xiii. 35 as illustrative of our Lord's system of teaching and receiving a new significance from it; and therefore capable of being regarded as quasi-prophetic. Its form in St Matt. is "I will open my mouth in parables: I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world."

3, 4. "Rend. (3) The things which we have heard, and known, and our fathers have declared unto us, (4) Let us not hide from their children, declaring [=but declare] to the succeeding generation the praises of Jehovah, and His strength, and His wonderful works which he has wrought."

6. Rend. "In order that the succeeding generation should know it, even the children born afterwards; that they should rise up, and tell it again to their children."