Commentary on the Psalms 1 part 24/24

Let them shoot in vain the arrows of their own envy against Christ, let them contrive plots that can do no harm at all against Him who knows nothing of suffering. 'The Lord is great in Zion.'

Not in the bodily Zion was the Saviour great or exalted, but rather in the spiritual Zion, that is, in the Church—

which He presented to Himself, having no spot or wrinkle, but rather holy and blameless, according to what is written. For He is not known by some as one of the falsely-named gods and unknown by others;

but He Himself is glorified in heaven by the spirits above, and worshipped on earth by us.

Exalted therefore in glory and instilling the fear of Himself in those who know Him—and this too is salvation for the soul. 'Let all confess to Thy name.'

The honours of kings, he says, love to have this: the power to judge and to legislate.

For upon the honour of a king there wholly follows the duty to judge and to legislate.

Now God is already the Judge and Lawgiver of the universe.

'For God is Judge.' And again:

'There is one Lawgiver and Judge.' And, 'The honour of a king loves judgment.' And to the Son belongs the power to judge and to legislate.

For 'the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honour the Son even as they honour the Father.' 'Let them confess to Thy great name.'

For great and exalted is the name of the Godhead, that is, its glory.

And nothing is like Him in nature, save only that God the Word, who is from Him and in Him and consubstantial with Him, who is glorified, having become man, by the Seraphim.

For He Himself is the name that is above every name;

for 'at His name every knee bows, of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth, and every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.'

Great therefore and wondrous is the name of the Godhead, if indeed at it every knee bows, the creation clearly worshipping and crowning Him with honours befitting God.

'Exalt the Lord our God.'

That is: believe that the Word of God who became man is the Most High, thinking nothing lowly concerning Him, as indeed the wretched Jews do.

'And worship at the footstool of His feet.'

...at the footstool? Then also hands and eyes? Do not suppose this.

For the discourse concerning Him is framed, as it were, from the things pertaining to us and from human affairs;

but the things said of Him are to be understood in a manner befitting God.

Since, then, it is the custom for those who worship earthly kings to kiss their feet, the Psalmist transfers the expression from human usage to God, saying:

'And worship at the footstool of His feet.' 'For they kept His testimonies.'

Therefore He has honoured them as those who honoured Him, He has loved them as genuine servants, as those who became keepers of His decrees.

Obedience therefore is not unrewarded; rather it procures the highest honour, on account of its ready compliance and docility. PSALM 99 (Hebrew 100)

That is: not sullen, not downcast, nor sluggish toward good works, but rather eager and cheerful and rejoicing in hope;

and hope, assuredly, in that which is prepared for the saints. But if anyone does not serve Him with gladness, let him not dare to come before Him, entering into His Church with unwashed feet. 'Know that the Lord Himself is God.'

This is the Christ, who by His own blood redeemed the whole earth.

He it is who is also the Maker of our very frame.

For we did not come into being spontaneously, but we are the work of His hands.

And 'the people' may well be those holding the more rational rank;

and 'the sheep' those who do not possess such discernment, nor experience of the divine oracles, according to the text:

'I have gone astray like a lost sheep.' PSALM 100 (Hebrew 101)

The person of a holy man is introduced, sketching for us the patterns of an excellent way of life—not that he might snatch honours from any, nor that he might chase after empty glory (for that is foreign to the saints), but rather that he might thereby benefit us, and that we might learn in what manner those who desire to please God ought to conduct their lives. 'Mercy and judgment will I sing to Thee, O Lord.'

'I know Thee,' he says, 'to be a merciful and a righteous Judge, and for these very things will I praise Thee.'

For God the Father had mercy on us, justifying us in Christ by faith, and freely granting us the forgiveness of our former transgressions, and bringing forth a righteous judgment upon us. 'I will sing and understand in a blameless way.'

and I will understand also in a blameless way. That is: with understanding and wisdom I will walk the straight and undistorted and blameless way.

For we who wish to be well-pleasing to God ought to be most intelligent, and to have a heart filled with wisdom;

and wisdom not of the earthly and worldly kind, but rather that which Christ bestows.

For in Him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; and He it is who makes the blind wise, and is the giver of all understanding. And what then is this? For so long as we are in filth and sins, we do not have Christ dwelling in us;

but when we have washed away the filth of sin, and cleansed ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, and have perfected holiness in the fear of God—then indeed He comes to be with us, and lodges within us, and we are His house.

What is the meaning of 'In the innocence of my heart'? It stands for: 'guilelessly and without meddlesomeness, not loving the tumults of worldly affairs nor idle distractions, but rather keeping within myself a steadfast and tranquil mind,' after the manner surely of that ancient Jacob, of whom it is written:

'And Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in a tent.' 'I set no lawless deed before my eyes.'

'I gave heed,' he says, 'to no base and unholy deed, nor to that which summons to lawlessness.'

And these things are many even among us.

For a man acts lawlessly whenever he falls into desire for things that in no way belong to him, and becomes an unjust lover of what is another's.

And likewise he acts lawlessly who is overcome by bodily pleasures, and has become liable to the charges of adultery.

He breaks the law who speaks evil of his brother, and who defrauds those weaker whom he is able to.

And, that I may not waste time speaking of each in turn, [Scripture] brings a charge against every form of baseness and lawlessness.

Was he then without sin? And how is this attainable? For freedom toward sin has been preserved [in us], and sinlessness befits God alone, who is over all.

'For He did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth.' And a little after:

How then ought one to understand the words:

'I set no lawless deed before my eyes'? He did not say:

'I have never fallen into a lawless deed,' but rather, 'I set no lawless deed before my eyes'—that is, 'I willed and resolved never to look upon a lawless deed.'

'But if it should also happen that one goes astray, as a man,' he says, 'that is nothing to wonder at;'

'for even pilots, though they know their craft well, are often endangered together with their ship when a fierce squall of wind storms upon them.' 'No crooked heart clove to me.'

That is: a man having a crooked heart, that is, one perverted.

'When the wicked one turned away from me, I did not acknowledge him.'

That is: 'I did not even pretend to recognise him.'

'For I did not deem it worthy to be their friend.'

Was it then out of arrogance? By no means, he says, but knowing that 'evil companionships corrupt good morals.'

It is the fruit of a mind befitting holiness to shun the wicked;

but the proof of utmost wickedness is to speak evil of the brethren.

For there are very many passions of the soul in us;

but there is one most of all more monstrous than the rest and unbearable to all, against which God Himself also does battle;

and this is pride, which has as its sister and companion covetousness, that is, the insatiable grasping for more.

These two are pits of souls and gates of destruction, and deserving of the unsleeping flame.

Who does not flee the braggart? Who does not shun the one who with insatiable hand gathers up hoards of money and defrauds many? 'My eyes are upon the faithful of the land.'

That is, the saints, so that they should even sit together with me—that is, be with me, and reign together forever, and be carried forward to what is profitable.

For a good counsellor is an especially excellent good for a man.

It renders him venerable and worthy of emulation, in that it carries him toward everything whatsoever that is profitable, and teaches him the things conducive to salvation, and proposes what tends to his benefit.] PSALM 101

[Incline thine ear unto me.

By 'tribulation' he means the onslaught of trials, whether of the sensible or of the intelligible kind.] PSALM 103

[And wine gladdens the heart of man.

Such a one is doubtless altogether spiritual, and productive of that saving inebriation.] [The trees of the plain shall be satisfied.

His discourse was not about trees, but rather about the saints who are rooted in the faith and bear fruit in righteousness.] [This great sea.

He likens the Church to a ship, in the figure of this sea which is here understood as our present world.

Therefore he compares human life to this sea of ours, on account of the unsteadiness and the ever-shifting nature of the affairs that are in it.

And by the innumerable kind of creeping things he signifies the manifold, and as it were many-faced, multitude of men, the variation being understood in respect of the diversity of their disposition.

For the nature is the same in all, and the mode of coming into being is no different; yet the mind is manifold, and the heart within us is of many opinions.

And one who knew this said:

Just as faces are not alike to faces, so neither are the thoughts of men.

And we say that the 'ships' which also traverse this intelligible sea are, according to what is written, the holy Churches of our Saviour, which are indeed in the world, yet above the world;

just as indeed it is possible to see the merchant vessels also,

as many as are in the waters, yet above the waters.

The Churches, then, ranked as ships, swimming across this intelligible sea, receive those who believe, and carry them off as though to some other pure land — the kingdom of the heavens, and the hope that is in Christ, and to the sanctification that is through the Spirit, and to the fatherland of the saints, which is virtue.

For being sojourners and strangers upon the earth, according to what is written, they have here no abiding city, but press on toward that one whose craftsman and maker is God.

The Church, therefore, shall be understood as a vessel or ship, having as its sailors the sanctified;

who also, through their having accepted the faith, have Christ ever present with them.

But sometimes a terrible storm bursts forth, and countless waves of adversities rise up against the holy vessel, and innumerable trials set it ablaze; and moreover the ferocity of evil spirits, swooping down upon it, brings against it the terror of death;

and Christ is indeed present with his own acquaintances, yet because he often permits them to suffer by way of dispensation, he somehow seems to imitate one who slumbers.

When, therefore, the tumult is truly beyond measure and no longer bearable to the sailors, and matters already look to the very extremity of evil, then, precisely then, it is fitting to cry out, all but saying:

Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? Arise, and cast us not off for ever.

Wherefore turnest thou thy face away? Dost thou forget our poverty and our tribulation? For without delay he will rise up, and will put every fear out of the way;

and he will rebuke those who tempt us, and will change the mourning into gladness, spreading abroad the calm, gentle and waveless fair weather.

For he will by no means overlook those who have put their trust in him.] Small animals along with great.

) And this too is a token of the divine care: that the small kinds dwell together with the great, and are not utterly consumed by them.

And we surely do not say that his discourse was about the things swimming in the sea, nor indeed did he wish to hint at the differences of fishes, nor yet at some bodily and sensible serpent swimming in the waters of the sea; but rather, as I said, through these things he indicates to us the turmoil in life, and, among the things in it, the tempest-tossed manner of living;

and moreover the serpent, the author of evil — that is, Satan, who goes about among all men and roams throughout our inhabited world, plotting against the souls of the saints.] May my meditation be sweet unto him.

for he who sings psalms converses with God.

Let sinners fail from the earth.

) But perhaps someone will say to this:

Does then the blessed Prophet imprecate,

and wish that those who have been overtaken should perish and be blotted out? And yet it were rather fitting that a holy and Spirit-bearing man should rather pray on behalf of those who have grown weak.

For before the sojourning of the Saviour, we were all in sins; Satan held sway over all beneath heaven; there was none that did good, there was not so much as one; all had turned aside, together they had become unprofitable.

For the Greeks, the worshippers of idols, knew not the ways of gentleness, understood not the road of upright living, or rather did not at all know even the very Author of all things and Saviour, Christ.

And the Jews again had the Law as a tutor, but it was not possible in the Law for a man to be justified.

Therefore we were all in sins; the earth was full of lawlessness.

But when the only-begotten Word of God appeared and became man, the sinners failed, those who were in lawlessness came to an end.

Therefore few have become those who are in sins, but very many are those who have been justified.

[Touch not mine anointed ones.

For it is among absurd things to imagine that those who are more illustrious in this life should assign all their concern to their genuine household servants, and deem them worthy of the care that befits them;

yet that the Lord of the powers, to whom all things are easy for accomplishment, should make no account of those who love him — this is among the absurdities.] PSALM 109

The Lord shall send forth a rod of power for thee out of Zion.

) For Christ has become for us a rod of power, who is from Zion — namely, the Zion that is above.

For he is not, like the first Adam, of the earth, earthy, but from heaven and from above, according to the word of the blessed Paul.

[With thee is the dominion in the day of thy power.

He speaks of the day of the power of God, in which he shall judge the whole inhabited world and render to each according to his works. He shall assuredly come then also, being himself in the Father and having the Father in himself, and having, as it were, the beginningless beginning of his own nature — beginning only in the sense of 'that from which';

in that he exists from the Father.] PSALM 113

Let those who make them become like unto them.

) Even if we make a likeness of God-fearing men, it is not for worshipping them as gods, but that, beholding them, we may come to a zeal for their example;

and if we make a likeness of Christ, it is that our mind may be borne aloft toward longing for him.

For we do not worship a corruptible image, or the image of a corruptible man;

but since God deigned, without change, to become man, we make an image of him as of a man, although we know him to be by nature God.

We do not, then, call the image itself God, but knowing to be God the one depicted in the image, of whom the image bears the likeness.

But the Greeks, going astray, glorify the likenesses as gods.

(Of Cyril and others.) 'I have loved' does not belong to everyone, but to him who is already perfected and surpasses the fear of servitude.

And the object, 'whom', is not added; but it is to be supplied by us that it is the God of all.

[I will take the cup of salvation.

For it is truly a cup of salvation, to hymn God the Saviour of all.

In this God delights; this incense he receives from us;

and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.] PSALM 117

) For there is not — there is not — any other way to attain to the knowledge of God the Father, than by this very one whom Christ named;

for 'No one,' he says, 'comes to the Father except through me.' For we enter into intimacy as toward God, and moreover into the kingdom of the heavens, as through a certain door or gate, namely our Saviour Christ.

He that cometh in the name of the Lord.

) For the others have come clothed about with the form and measure of servitude;

but he comes in the glory befitting God and in the name of the Lord — that is, plainly, of him who is by nature and truly Lord.

And what is it, 'In the name of the Lord'? That is: in glory befitting God, and in lordship and preeminence beyond all things.

In my heart have I hid thy oracles.

For just as, if someone should deposit a seed of fire in a vessel of bronze, he will assuredly make it also a partaker of the heat that proceeds from it, so the mind that holds fast within soul and heart the divine and heavenly word, through longing for every virtue, is ever warmed toward these things by means of it.

For just as it is not without profit unto life, and a thing of saving worth, to remember the words of God continually, so, I think, in the same manner is it a cause of ruin to love to forget them.

One must hide the commandments of God in the heart, because of the demons that snatch them away.

And Solomon likewise exhorts the same thing in the Proverbs, saying:

'My son,' he says, 'if, having received the utterance of my commandment, you hide it with yourself, your ear shall hearken unto wisdom.' Now the commandments here spoken of the Lord in the Gospels named a seed that is snatched away by the birds of heaven.

This man, then, hides the commandment: he who continually carries it out in deed;

for indeed those who snatch it away are said to snatch it, inasmuch as they do not permit us to do it.

In your righteousness give me life.

For God and Father makes us alive through his own righteousness;

Before I was humbled I went astray.

For in the mind's prior passions and, so to speak, its prior enervations that come through natural imaginings, the tyranny of the tempter becomes more unbearable;

and before we endure the humbling that comes from the devil, we ourselves first go astray, being sick with an inward overthrow older than his assault.

For before we suffer completely, we ourselves, by the consent of our reasonings, both honour sin and receive it, and through this give a place of entry to Satan;

and the passion of the betrayer shall be a type and image of the matter.

Your commandment is exceedingly broad.

For God welcomes spiritual manliness, self-control, endurance, and, besides these, still the other virtues.

My soul is in your hands continually.

By 'hands' he means the practical activities through which God is seen.

Nail down my flesh with the fear of you.

The word 'nail down' stands for 'fix fast.'

'Fix fast, therefore,' he says, 'my flesh unto purity.' PSALM 119.

Woe is me, that my sojourning has been prolonged.

Being weighed down by the present life, because this his sojourning is prolonged for him, he laments, groaning with wailing and mourning at the protraction of his sojourn in the flesh.

And in your book all shall be written.

By 'books' one must understand the all-encompassing knowledge of God, and his unforgetting memory. But to me your friends have been exceedingly honoured.

He who is able to recognise the friends of God from their fruits will honour them exceedingly;