Latin original · 37 verses · some words can be tapped for a gloss · long chapter, split into parts; this part covers 1:1767–1:1803 (2058 verses in all)
The psalm is begun from the person of a man anxious amid many assaults of enemies, against whom there are many snares and numerous deceits: and all these things seem to fit the person of this prophet David, whose life was everywhere beset and always full of dangers, Saul persecuting him in the desert, in the cities, by war and by wiles, his own son Absalom too plotting and daring much against his kingdom and his life. He was besides subjected always to many other snares, both domestic and foreign. But nothing particular out of all these is contained in the psalm, that it might be believed to be the prayer proper to his person.
But it is recognized as a general psalm, or perhaps one from the spirit of prophecy, teaching each one of us, by the example of prayer, when we are tossed amid the hatreds of those assailing us, with what prayer we ought to beseech God. But when I consider inwardly certain virtues and properties of the words, which speak something higher and more sublime than I know beyond the custom of human speech, this psalm was found rather to be understood as of that man in whom, from the birth of the Virgin, unto the mystery of human salvation the Only-begotten Son of God was born. For according to that nature which was in him of both kinds,
namely of God and of man, he spoke—not only in the Gospels but also in the prophets—with sayings thus fitted to both, so that, while he teaches the impassible and immutable power of his divinity, he might yet not be silent about the weakness of his bodily nature; and again, when from the assumption of the flesh there was in him speech of weakness, he might straightway also add a proclamation of a divinity in no way to be weakened by anything. For that which is God is of his own nature; but that which he was as man is an assumption of our nature.
He speaks therefore in the psalm out of the affection of our weakness, which he assumed, when he knows his betrayer, when he foresees the counsels entered into against him, when he endures the battles of questionings and the poisons of detractions, when he avoids the scandals of temptations and the snares of words, when he confesses to the Father, when he prays to him, when all his power is from him, when—although he is anxious from the weakness of the body—he yet remembers that he is not to be left alone in the day of the passion. All these things, therefore, we are taught to be contained in the psalm from his person: and this in such a way that, in those things which the fellowship of human nature permits, the prayer even of our own person may from something be understood. For this—that is thus begun:
'Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man; from the unjust man free me,' pertains also to the common prayer of all believers. For all the snares which the spiritual wickednesses stretch out against us are chiefly fitted through men: and the perversity of another's nature furnishes occasions to our vices. The wicked man drives us into quarrels; the terror of adversaries and those lying in wait for us impels us into anxieties; the opportunity of one offering herself for it invites us into lust. For the eye of the harlot is a snare of the sinner; we pray therefore, set in these evils, saying: 'Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man; from the unjust man free me.' But that this is the Lord's own prayer is taught from what follows, when he says: 'They who devised evils in their heart.'
To know the thoughts of the heart is not ours, but belongs to Him of whom it is said: 'God, who searches the hearts and reins'; and also to Him who said, knowing their thoughts: 'Why do you think evil in your hearts?' He beholds all the hidden feelings of malignant hearts, the penetrating nature of His power making its way even by approaches otherwise impassable. But he who prayed to be delivered from one man, evil and wicked, in whom he is thought to signify his betrayer, now speaks of the many who devise evil in their hearts, saying: 'who have devised malice in their heart; all the day long they appointed battles. They have sharpened their tongues like serpents: the venom of asps is under their lips.'
It was not every day and all day long that men fought against David with arms, nor always in pitched battles. But against the Lord, according to His gospel works, we find that no time was ever free from the hatred of persecutors. He heals a paralytic: at once, on account of what they supposed to be an unlawful remission of sin, He is assailed with venomous tongue. He restores a withered hand: immediately He is charged as guilty of violating the Law. He cures demoniacs: forthwith He is accused of accomplishing this through Beelzebul, the prince of demons. There is nothing that was not always full of snares against Him, nothing that was not exposed to the venom of the viper's tongue.
Our life too, the life of us all, and most of all of those who are devoted to religion, what wars of opposing powers it endures, what venomous darts of detraction it receives! With what poison of deceitful flattery it is assailed! And all these things come to be through men, in whom spiritual wickednesses work. For it is written: 'The Lord stirred up an adversary against Solomon, Hadad the Edomite.' And Hadad opposed Solomon, not as a man, but as an adversary, all the days of his life. And against Solomon indeed, because he so deserved it, Hadad was stirred up by God as an adversary; but through men of this kind these manifold hatreds of those who assail us rage, and hostile powers advance through their ministry.
The intervention of the 'selah' seems to bring a change either of person or of sense. And there occurs a repetition of the same prayer, yet in such a way that things which before were added confusedly are now more fully rehearsed, and what earlier had been a complaint about words is now a complaint about deeds. 'Keep me, O Lord, from the hand of the sinner, and deliver me from unjust men, who have devised to supplant my steps.' The prayer, begun concerning one alone, is referred to many, so that the betrayer might be recognized in the one and the people in the many. And to the one, both now and before, it reproaches malice and sin and iniquity;
but in the many it censures the devised supplantings, the hidden snares, the outstretched captures of ropes, and the stumbling-blocks set continuously along the paths, saying: 'Who have devised to supplant my steps. The proud have hidden a snare for me, and they have stretched out cords as a net for my feet; along the path they have set continual stumbling-blocks for me.' For the rulers of the synagogue devised to supplant His steps, when, after the death of Lazarus had been undone, they plot to kill Him; when, on account of the eyes restored to the man blind from birth, they revile Him; when they resolve that He be passed over in silence; when they threaten death to those who confess Him. Thus they devised by such means to supplant the excellent step and course of His divine works.
And the proud hid their snares when the Sadducees concealed the fraud of their feigned question about the resurrection, when they held out the snare of an answer with a captious speech; the proud, when they disdained to mingle with sinners, when they reproached the banquets of the publicans to Him who is the remitter of sins. They also stretched out cords as a net for His feet, when tribute is demanded, when He is questioned about paying tribute to Caesar. Above there was a hidden snare, but now the cords are stretched into a snare, so that this snare of questioning might be recognized as stronger in the cords, when through the outstretched snare of the question a captious answer of profession against the name of Caesar was sought from Him.
But setting stumbling-blocks continuously along the path, they placed them for Him, when He is questioned about the commandments of the Law, when the rich man, as though satisfying the Law, asks what he still lacks, when the matter of the terms of divorce is treated before Him. For they set up these stumbling-blocks of questions, laying them continuously along the way of His teaching and of the Law, so that under the appearance and familiarity of those things which are written in the Law, these stumbling-blocks of questions and answers might everywhere be set for Him along the path of their continual questionings. But let us remember that in our own life too stumbling-blocks meet us everywhere, cords everywhere, snares everywhere, and that there is nowhere that snares are not always spread out before us. And it is difficult now to free the belly from the snare:
for their confusion is that of those whose god is the belly. It is likewise rare now to free the eye from the snare: for he who has looked upon a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery in his heart. It is also hard to extract the tongue from the snare: for of every idle word an account shall be rendered in the day of judgment. And it is of greatest labour to bring back the heart from the snare: for evil thoughts come forth from the heart. These snares are spread out everywhere for us all; and the Lord must be prayed to, that from all these snares we may fly away on the wings of our faith and of the spirit. Then follows: 'I said to the Lord: You are my God: give ear, O Lord, to the voice of my prayer. O Lord, the strength of my salvation, You have overshadowed my head in the day of battle. Deliver me not, O Lord, to the sinner against my desire:'
'they have devised—deliver me not, O Lord—lest at any time they be exalted.' And here too the intervening 'selah' seems to have brought some change, and no small one; for whereas above all the discourse was about the devised supplanting, the hidden snares, the outstretched nets, the stumbling-blocks set, now the prayer is directed to God: 'I said to the Lord: You are my God.' It is of no light or slight confidence to have said to the Lord: 'You are my God.' A mind that is lustful, greedy, insolent, drunken cannot say this faithfully. All these things must be renounced, and one must cease from their servitude and bondage, so that, ceasing from them, we may dare to say: 'I said to the Lord: You are my God.'
And these things indeed are so fitted to our own person, which we mingle with the psalm only in so far as is lawful. But it is also usual and frequent and proper to the Lord to have said: 'I said to the Lord: You are my God.' He never denied the honour of this confession, so as both to confess Him as Lord and to call Him God, saying: 'I confess to You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth'; and again: 'to my God and your God.' His every prayer too was always to God. About to raise Lazarus, He prays; about to bless the loaves and fishes, He entreats by the very look toward heaven; about to drink the cup, He prays through the night. After the confession, therefore, of His Lord and God there follows: 'Give ear, O Lord, to the voice of my prayer.' The confession of honour went before, when He calls Him His Lord and God.
Then the petition for the prayer to be heard follows, when He prays that He be heard. But in what follows, 'O Lord, the strength of my salvation,' it is no ordinary profession of confidence. For He does not say: 'the salvation of my strength.' For that is a matter of human vow, that we should pray for the health of our strength, that soundness in those things wherein we are strong should come from God. But this prayer is the contrary, that not the salvation of His strength, but the strength of His salvation should be from God. He who prays for strength for his salvation is already in no doubt about his salvation, and is certain that there is in himself nothing perishable, nothing mortal. But He prays that strength be granted to that weak nature which He assumed:
The Lord bore in Himself a body which, although according to our nature it was owed to death, was nevertheless not subject to corruption, He Himself speaking through the prophet: 'For You will not leave my soul in hell, nor will You give Your holy one to see corruption.' He is therefore not uncertain, in Himself, about the salvation of this weak nature. He prays to God only for the strength of that salvation which is in Himself, and He prays through this confidence, whereby He says: 'You have overshadowed my head in the day of battle.' If this whole psalm is spoken from the person of every man, how will things so diverse agree in him, that, whereas it was said, 'Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man,' and, 'Keep me from the hand of the sinner, O Lord,' now again, secure about all things, he should say:
'You have overshadowed my head in the day of battle'? And whereas above the prayer was from fear, now it is a rejoicing from security? But all this can be said by Him with reason, who, bearing the nature of man and of God, had both from man's weakness the affection of trembling, and from the consciousness of His divinity the confidence of security. For He knows that He is overshadowed and protected in the day of that glorious battle, in which He will destroy death, in which He will conquer the devil, in which He will fasten all the hostile powers to the triumph of His cross. For when it had before been said of Him from the person of God the Father, 'I am with him in tribulation,' and again:
'For My hand shall help him, and My arm shall strengthen him; the enemy shall gain nothing against him, and the son of iniquity shall not add to harm him.' For what does the enemy gain by inspiring Judas to the will of betrayal? For the body was allowed to suffer; but death did not gain dominion over the body allowed to it: for the Holy One did not see corruption. And when the son of iniquity betrayed Him, what did he add to harm Him? Not only did the body return from death to life, but the nature of corruption was even absorbed into the glory of divinity. Secure therefore and confident that He is overshadowed in the day of battle, He prays also this: 'Deliver me not, O Lord, to the sinner against my desire.' He who says:
'I came not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me'—He hastens to fulfil the work He has undertaken, even out of the compliance of obedience; yet in such a way that we may remember there is in Him an exercise of will. For He wills the things which the Father willed. For that which He says, 'I came not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me,' shows Him by whom He was sent and whom He obeyed; yet it does not take will away from Himself. He desires, therefore, to accomplish all things whatsoever are pleasing to the Father, and He hastens to carry out everything whatsoever is desirable to Him in the passion, that there be nothing of these which a sinner, forestalling, might hinder. 'With desire He desired to eat the passover with His disciples,' and He completed the supper of the passover in haste.
He desires to drink the cup of the passion, saying: 'The cup which My Father has given Me, shall I not drink it?' To those who had come to arrest Him and were of their own accord asking who Jesus was, He offered Himself. He knows that the cup of vinegar is to be drunk by Him: this He asks to drink. And, receiving in Himself a great fruit of His will when He had drunk, He says: 'It is finished'—in which word is contained the rejoicing of His longed-for vow. He had frequently prayed in the psalms that His soul be delivered from the sword; He had signified that His bones should not be broken; He had foretold that His garment should be obtained by lot. All these things, which belong to His desire, He prays that they may be fulfilled unto the assurance of prophecy:
that the sinner have no power over any of these things: that he not forestall the passover, which is desired with desire; that he not fail to dare to press upon Him the cup of the passion—for at the Lord's first answer every sinner who had come to arrest Him fell to the ground—; that the vinegar which is to be offered be not wanting; that, before He gives up His spirit, the soldier not pierce His side with the lance; that no occasion be given for breaking the bone while the spirit yet remains; that nothing of the prophecy be left undone; that nothing of His desires be surrendered to the sinner, but that in Himself all things which were both desired by Him and prophesied be fulfilled. And He prays about these things, not because they were not to be fulfilled, but that they might be understood to have been prophesied of Him. 'They have devised,' He says, 'against me:'
'Forsake me not, lest at any time they be exalted.' Many things were devised against Him; but chiefly this, that with money paid to the soldiers a rumour might be sold abroad that the body had been stolen by them. But when He stood again in that body, this scheming of impious thought proved empty. No place at all is left to sinners for exalting themselves: the prophecy is fulfilled. Their Life hangs upon the tree, is given vinegar and gall to drink; His soul is delivered from the sword; His bone is not broken; the lot is cast upon His garment; nothing of the desires of the only-begotten Son of God is surrendered to the sinner; on the third day He rises again; He is not left in hell, nor does the Holy One see corruption:
and all things which are done in the Lord have, for the confounding and confusing of the thoughts of the impious, both the admirable efficacy of present events and the immutable truth of prophecy. Then follows: 'The head of their compassing about, the labour of their own lips shall cover them. Coals of fire shall fall upon them; You will cast them down, and they shall not stand in their miseries.' After the foregoing discourse, in which the whole prayer had been about Himself to God, now too, by the intervention of the 'selah,' He has changed the order of sense. For by this He has related the most just punishment of sinners, whom first that very head of their assembly, then the labour of their lips and every work of malediction shall cover.
For as Christ is the head of all the saints, so the devil is the head of all the wicked. And the Lord frequently attests these impious compassings about Him, when He says: 'The groans of death compassed me,' and again: 'Fat bulls beset me,' and again: 'Compassing they compassed me about,' and at once: 'They surrounded me like bees.' That these things were done with the devil as their prince, the Gospels attest, when they say: 'And the devil put himself into the heart of Judas, that he should betray Him.' And it was laboured with the loud voice of the people, when it was cried out: 'Crucify, crucify.' Therefore the head of their compassing and the labour of their lips shall cover them, so that, while others are clothed with the glory of immortality, they may be covered with the shame of their impiety and the damnation of the devil.
And what that damnation would be, wherewith they should be covered, He added: 'Coals of fire shall fall upon them; You will cast them down upon the earth; they shall not stand in their miseries.' These are the coverings of the impious, this is the eternal garment of the irreligious: that, unable to stand against the coals falling down and the miseries rushing upon them, they may be pressed down, together with the very head of their compass and the labour of their lips, by the burden of their damnation. And even now He has kept that order which He used in the foregoing, so that, while in the many He points to the people, now in the one He seems to signify Judas, saying: 'A man full of tongue shall not be directed upon the earth: evils shall take the unjust man unto destruction.'
In 'the man full of tongue' is shown the double, doubtful, and deceitful mouth of the betrayer, who, late recognizing the wickedness of his crime, a fugitive from life and faith, hanged himself with a noose. For there was in him nothing direct, nothing simple, nothing complete: first a thief, then a betrayer, at last a fitting avenger upon himself; now accusing the woman of useless loss for the ointment poured on the Lord's head, now reporting to the Jews all the Lord's comings and goings, now bargaining over the price of the just blood; always full of tongue, always in words, so that the prophet's saying is fitly applied to him: 'In much talking you shall not escape sin.'
This sinner, therefore, in this much talking of his, was not directed unto life, nor did he hold the straight path of faith, but, as is fitting, evils took him unto destruction. Having been impious toward the Lord, he afterward remained impious even toward himself. A thief of money, a seller of just blood, a betrayer of God and, so far as in him lay, a murderer, he could obtain pardon neither for life nor for death. The only-begotten God is therefore not ignorant of this His vindication; for He says: 'I have known that the Lord will execute judgment for the needy and vengeance for the poor.' The Lord is poor according to His humanity. For, according to the Apostle, He impoverished Himself that we might be enriched—He to whom in the things of this world there was nothing but a body. For the sake of this salvation He willed to be born poor of a Virgin:
the Lord of the heavens chose neither money, nor field, nor cattle. He was poor, therefore, only in His humanity. But the Lord will execute not only judgment for the needy, but also vengeance for the poor. The judgment for the needy must be referred to the damnation of those who stood forth as unjust against the Lord. For it befits them to be judged according to judgment, not according to vengeance. It is of an inferior nature to be one who ought to be avenged. The other poor are avenged, that is, those who followed the Lord by the example of the passion, who were poor from contempt of the world and of money. Judgment for the needy comes about, therefore, when the impious are judged on account of the Lord's passion. But the poor are avenged, whose blood, slain beneath the altar, cries out demanding vengeance upon the impious:
those who, daily abiding in the glory of martyrdom, confess to the name of God. And the very discourse with which the psalm is closed speaks thus: 'Nevertheless the just shall confess to Your name, and the upright shall dwell with Your countenance.' The confession of the just may also seem to be bodily, because many, though still placed in the flesh, confess to the name of God. But the upright who dwell with the face of God are understood to retain nothing bodily in themselves. For the nature of the flesh does not admit the sight of God, He Himself saying: 'No man shall see My face and live.'
This now belongs to the heavenly ones and to those who are transformed and who change earthly corruption for heavenly incorruption—whom, already glorious with the honour of divinity and about to reign together with Him, our Lord Jesus Christ Himself will deliver into the kingdom to God the Father, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen. PSALM 140. A Psalm of David. 'O Lord, I have cried to You, hear me: attend to the voice of my prayer, while I cry to You,' and the rest. The faithful prayer of all the saints is a cry to God; for it is by faith, not by the cry of the voice, that one cries to Him. Moses, with the king of the Egyptians pressing on, stood mournful on the shore; but though he was silent, the Lord heard the faithful prayer of his exalted mind, saying: 'Why do you cry to Me?' The blood of the martyrs too lacks the voice of the body;
but the unworthiness of their slaying is a cry to God, the Lord Himself saying of Abel to Cain: 'The voice of your brother's blood cries to Me.' So too beneath the altar of God the souls of the martyrs are written to cry out with a loud voice, saying: 'How long, O Lord, holy and true, do You not judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?' If, therefore, in the spirit of faith we pray things not lowly, nor earthly, nor bodily, our prayer, though silent, is a cry to God. And therefore the prophet, wholly intent upon God in the spirit of prayer, thus began: 'O Lord, I have cried to You, hear me.' And, to teach that this cry is not of the voice but of faith, he added: 'Attend to the voice of my prayer, while I cry to You.'
A cry penetrates into our hearing even against our will, and of its own accord thrusts itself into our ears by the force of a strained voice. But because the prophet does not cry with such a cry, he prays that, as he cries, God may attend to the voice of his prayer: for by that which is attended to there is an inspection of faith, not a hearing of a cry. For that which is inward is attended to; but a bodily cry need not be attended to, since by itself it occupies the whole sense of the ears. Then follows: 'Let my prayer be directed as incense in Your sight, O Lord.' Those whose prayer is pure and right and sincere will be able to say: 'Let my prayer be directed'; but if it is corrupted by the intrusion of external thoughts, it will not be directed. But as to what he says:
'Let it be directed as incense,' we must understand what the comparison here set forth of incense means. And first, the nature of incense is such that it raises itself on high from lowly things, breathing forth most sweetly and casting itself into our sense of fragrance. Hence it is compounded from four most fragrant kinds ground into the utmost fineness: stacte, onycha, galbanum, and frankincense; and that all these are established as a figure of the prayers of the faithful, the Apocalypse of blessed John shows, when it says: 'And those twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp and golden bowls full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints.' And that there are four kinds of prayer the Apostle signifies, writing to Timothy:
'Exhort therefore that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made.' It belongs to our humility to supplicate; to the magnificence of God to be prayed to; to faith to make intercession; to confession and praise to give thanks. And perhaps those four kinds of perfumes, compounded of the finest parts into one incense, can also be fitted, each to each, to the perfecting of prayer. Although the nature and character of these four perfumes seems also to signify the character of the four elements: so that frankincense, which is most translucent, may be compared to spirit, stacte to water, galbanum and onycha to earth and fire:
so that through these things this prayer of praise, pleasing to God, may be borne up in the manner of incense on behalf of all who are in heaven and beneath heaven and on earth and in the waters. But let us leave these matters to those whom the knowledge of deeper science delights: for us the prophetic and apostolic authority suffices, which both signifies that prayers are incense and prays that prayers be directed as incense. But he who prayed that his prayer be directed as incense says also this afterward: 'The lifting up of my hands, an evening sacrifice.' In very many places we have treated that in the lifting up of the hands the duty of a lofty work is shown—so that, when Moses was commanded to stand with hands uplifted, the people was either victor or vanquished according to the lifting up and the lowering of his hands.
The Apostle also bids those who pray to lift up pure hands. And when he says 'without anger and disputation,' he does not prescribe a posture of prayer, but adds a precept of divine working. Finally, the Lord, condemning the prayers of the impious through the prophet Isaiah, spoke thus: 'If you stretch out your hands, I will turn My eyes away from you'—not indeed 'if you lift them up,' but 'if you stretch them out'; because the posture of prayer is in stretching out the hands, but the efficacy of perfect work is in lifting them up. The lifting up of the hands, therefore, is an evening sacrifice. For we, upon whom the consummation of the ages has come, do not sacrifice to God with blood and holocausts. But that the evening sacrifice may be pleasing, let us hear the Lord saying in the Gospels: