詩篇註釋 第 1 章 第 6/23 段

and their inheritance shall be forever.

For the rewards of the saints are incorruptible and eternal.

They shall not be ashamed in the evil time,

In the times of persecutions, he says, when teachers fail, the Lord Himself will nourish, by His own Spirit, those who believe in Him.

[They shall not be ashamed in the evil time,

The evil time is that of the wrath against the impious, in which the latter will experience the just judgment of God;

The sinner, he says, does not give back thanksgiving for the good things he receives as benefits from God.

But the righteous man shows mercy, and gives.

For those who bless Him shall inherit the earth.

This is similar to what was said to Abraham:

Those who bless you I will bless, and those who curse you I will curse.

By the Lord are the steps of a man directed.

He accepts, he says, the practical course of life which a man makes throughout his life.

When he falls, he shall not be dashed down,

Even if, he says, it should happen that the righteous man stumbles a little, he will not be wronged, for he has God supporting him.

nor his seed seeking bread.

He means the intelligible breads, which are the divine words.

And dwell there for ever and ever,

And you shall inherit, he says, the eternal tabernacles.

In many places he has made mention of the land given to the meek, exhorting them to a desire for it.

The mouth of the righteous shall meditate wisdom,

It is fitting, he says, both with the tongue and in the mind, to carry about the divine oracles, and to make continual meditation upon them;

for thus the lover of virtue, learning what must be done, will remain steady and unshaken, prevailing over those who attempt to cast him down.

These same things he also said in the first psalm:

But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he will meditate day and night, and so forth.

And his tongue shall speak judgment.

The law of God is in his heart, and his steps shall not be tripped up.

The sinner watches the righteous,

but He will prepare a way for him to leap over the nets.

Of this providence Abraham partook, when Sarah was twice carried off;

of this Isaac too, having suffered this very same thing;

of this Jacob too, being envied by his brother and his father-in-law;

of this Joseph too, having been warred against by envy and false accusation.

And why must I list them all? For it is easy for those who love learning both to gather up the ancient examples and to observe the recent ones.

nor shall He by any means condemn him when he is judged.

In place of 'when he is judged': in the time of his being judged.

When sinners are utterly destroyed, you shall see it.

You shall behold, he says, the sinners being cut off.

I saw the impious man exalted on high, and lifted up like the cedars of Lebanon;

and I passed by, and behold, he was not.

Then, pondering such things and reconsidering them further, I was not able to see them again;

nor indeed was I able to find the place in which they seemed to stand.

Keep innocence, and behold uprightness, for there is a remnant for the peaceable man.

And let the punishment, he says, of the wicked, and the remnant — that is, the inheritance of good things — prepare you to practice simplicity.

He sings this psalm, reminding himself of the unrelenting affliction which he endured on account of sin.

He asks God, on his own behalf, to grant him sabbath-rests, that is, rest from his misfortunes.

Lord, do not reprove me in your wrath, nor chasten me in your anger.

The demons who minister to punishments, and the punitive powers, are called the wrath and anger of God.

He entreats, then, not to be rebuked through evil powers, nor chastened through the sending of grim angels, but through words of salvation. The Lord chastens us, leading us to remember virtue.

The saint does not refuse rebuke or chastening as such, but that which comes with wrath and anger.

For your arrows have stuck fast in me.

By 'arrows' he means the punitive powers.

And your hand has pressed down upon me.

Your hand, he says, has laid hold of me, chastening me for my sin.

There is no healing in my flesh because of your wrath.

I have been maimed in my flesh, since your wrath has been brought upon me.

There is no peace in my bones because of my sins.

The strength of my soul, he says, has grown weak;

and the cause of this weakness is sin.

For my iniquities have risen higher than my head.

The heavy burden of sin, he says, has bent me down.

I am also grieved by the stench of those festering wounds, which I incurred when I had cast aside prudence and become enslaved to folly.

For this reason, deprived of all cheerfulness, I am continually vexed and distressed, and I find no change from my gloom.

Like a heavy burden they have weighed upon me.

He speaks, with mounting intensity, of the heaviness of conscience that drives one to despair.

My wounds grow foul and fester because of my folly.

For every sin is loathsome and foul-smelling;

for unless the soul should fall into folly, it would not endure sin.

From this we come to know the nature of sin,

what sort it is — namely, that our sins befall us out of folly. 'I went about mourning all the day.'

This must be said to those who laugh much and take their pleasure.

'I was afflicted and bowed down utterly,' and so forth.

The heaviness of conscience, as a driving toward despair.

For my loins are filled with mockeries.

Since, he says, I now saw my enemies given over to mocking me;

and by these he means the intelligible enemies. 'I was afflicted and humbled exceedingly.'

From that desire, he says, I have reaped the fruit of stooping down to the earth, and of lamenting continually because of the bitter pains of my heart.

For this reason, having transformed the working of desire, I have made it a servant of the divine will.

I roared because of the groaning of my heart.

Scourging my conscience made my heart give forth groans.

And my groaning was not hidden from you.

Let the longing for repentance, he says, stand before you — the desire with which I wish to be saved.

And what is the desire of Christ? To accomplish the Passover on our behalf.

My heart is troubled, my strength has forsaken me.

By 'heart' he means the reasoning faculty.

And the light of my eyes, even that is no longer with me.

The light of the eyes is the Spirit shining upon the eyes of his understanding.

My friends and my neighbors drew near and stood over against me.

When I was struck down, he says, they set themselves against me.

He says this on account of Absalom and Ahithophel.

And those nearest to me stood far off.

...the angels forsook him on account of his sin.

For perhaps the holy powers too withdraw in the time of trial, either for the testing of the one being tried, or for punishment.

And those who sought my soul used violence.

Naturally, since the angels had abandoned him, the demons attacked all the more fiercely.

And those who sought evils against me spoke vain things.

They spoke, he says, among themselves, contriving a conspiracy against me.

But I, like a deaf man, did not hear, and so forth.

While they were saying these things, he says, I did not even seem to hear, nor to speak, since my boldness of speech had been taken away because of sin.

For in you, Lord, I have hoped.

Lest at any time my enemies rejoice over me.

Amid so many evils that have befallen me, he says, I have but one hope of salvation: the help that will come to me from you.

And when my feet were shaken, they spoke great and boastful things against me.

Sin, he says, having shaken my feet, gave them occasion to think great things against me.

For I am ready for scourges, and my pain is before me continually.

He speaks of gladly receiving the chastening that turns one back to God.

For I will declare my iniquity, and I will be anxious concerning my sin.

But my enemies live, and are stronger than I.

And yet, he says, though I am not insensible of my sin but am continually anxious about it, I see my enemies growing strong.

These enemies, having suffered no wrong from me, slandered my sin and made it a pretext for their war against me, pursuing me while claiming to act justly.

Therefore I have become in their sight like a loathsome dead man;

wherefore I also beseech you, the Lord, not to depart from me;

but rather to hasten to our aid.

A clear proof of a heart firmly established.

I set a guard upon my mouth, when the sinner stood against me.

For as the intelligible enemies stood by him, they reproached him for his sin.

"I was struck dumb, and was humbled, and kept silence, even from good things."

Being reviled, he says, I did not revile in return, being conscious of my falling away from good things.

"And my pain was renewed."

Instead of speaking to those who reviled me, I kept reminding myself of my sin.

And the remembrance of sin became like a fire around my heart.

"And in my meditation a fire shall be kindled."

In remembering the sin, he says, I was burned with fire.

"Make known to me, O Lord, my end."

The phrase "with the tongue" means, as it were, quietly and in a whisper, and not bringing the word out to many people.

And the word was a question concerning the remaining days.

He was asking because he wished to learn whether the time of the days remaining to him would suffice for repentance.

"Behold, you have made my days as handbreadths;"

"and my substance is as nothing before you."

Even if, he says, my life should be extended in length, it will be reckoned as nothing before you.

For if a thousand years in your sight are as one day, what then would the lifetime of a single man be? This again Symmachus rendered thus:

"Behold, you have given my days as spans, and my span of life is as nothing before you."

For you are without beginning and without end;

but our life has been measured out as though by mere spans and handbreadths.

"Yet all things are vanity, every man living."

"Surely man walks about as an image, yet he is troubled in vain."

But if, he says, man walks in an image, and not in truth, he rightly spoke beforehand of vanity;

since we do not live the true life, but a life that is, as it were, in an image;

nor do we exert our diligence toward the goods that truly exist;

The life, he says, of those on earth, since it revolves around worldly cares, would rightly be judged vanity.

All the years of our life are but vapor. Before you:

for instead of "vanity," Symmachus gave "vapor."

"He lays up treasure, and knows not for whom he shall gather it."

Since we do not now live the true life, but the life that is, as it were, in an image;

nor do we make our earnest effort concerning the things that truly are good;

therefore we are troubled in vain, occupied with worldly desires, gathering treasures whose heirs we do not know.

"And now, what is my hope? Is it not the Lord?" He rightly says that he has set his hope upon the Lord, since he has condemned the distractions of this life.

"And my substance is with you."

"Expectation," that is, patient endurance.

"Do not deliver me up," he says, "to reproach," because it is you who are reviled in me.

"I was struck dumb, and did not open my mouth, because it was you who did this."

Being reviled, he says, I kept silent, knowing exactly concerning it, that it was you who, for the sake of punishment—or rather, discipline—appointed me to this very thing, to be reproached.

"Remove your scourges from me."

He speaks of the punishments inflicted on him by the demons, God not allowing them to go further.

He speaks of the punishments inflicted on him by the demons as coming from God, inasmuch as God permits him to suffer on account of his sin.

"For because of the strength of your hand, I have fainted."

We have already many times noted that the punishing power is called "the hand of God."

Whenever God scourges them severely, the one being punished fails, precisely because he is such a being—namely, weak, and unable to hold out sufficiently against the scourges.

He who lives in lawlessness is one who also needs such discipline. "With rebukes for lawlessness you have chastened man;"

"Rebuking me," he says, "for sin, you disciplined me."

That is to say: "Hear, and forgive the sin before the end."

"For I am a sojourner." "Spare me, that I may be refreshed."

"Before my end," he says, "grant forgiveness of sins, that I may go down to Hades with confidence."

"And I shall be no more." I shall no longer exist as the one I would have become, because of the relief that has come to me from you.

And God's relief is the soul's freedom from passion, together with true knowledge of the things that exist.

The ode is uttered in the person of the new people who have been brought back up from the pit of misery.

Then, in between, the person of Christ is introduced, teaching those who give thanks the manner of the divine dispensation;

and then again the person of those from Israel who believed, entreating to be delivered from the sin caused by disobedience, while at the same time also recounting to them the evils that befell them because of their unbelief.

"I waited patiently for the Lord, and he attended to me."

"In your patient endurance possess your souls."

"And he brought me up out of the pit of misery."

And what did he grant you? Having heard him, he says:

He brought me up from the depth of sin, and from the sensual indulgence of this clay-like body, or from the gates of death and the corruption there, or from the distractions of the world. "And out of the miry clay;"

He brought me up out of the depth of sins, which, like mire, besmear those who are caught in them.

For the pit of misery is wickedness and ignorance.

"And he set my feet upon a rock, and directed my steps."

The apostle Paul says that "the rock was Christ";

for I learned to walk the way that pleases God, that is, through right practice and correct doctrines.

"And he put a new song into my mouth, a hymn to our God."

The gospel law;

for after freedom from passion, we sing a new song, our house having been renewed.

"Many shall see, and shall fear, and shall hope in the Lord."

He says that only the one who has fixed his hope upon God is blessed, not the one who has been distracted by the cares of this life, which are both madness and falsehood.

Then he also adduces another saying by way of exhortation:

Truly blessed, he says, is the one who has had God alone as his hope, and has not looked to the pursuits concerning the present life, which are vanities, false madnesses, and cares directed toward emptiness.

But the condition of the present life is a sober madness, on account of which the prophets seemed to many to be out of their minds; and glorying in this, the righteous one also says:

'I said in my ecstasy.' Many are the things you have done, O Lord my God — your wonders

What you have done, he says, in the time of the [divine] dispensation are many and wonderful;

And the promise, he says, ran through the whole world under heaven, so that those who believed became too many to number

Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me

From here the person of Christ is introduced, speaking to the Father

Since, he says, you did not desire sacrifice and offering, nor indeed were you pleased with the burnt offerings according to the law:

I have come, having taken the body which you yourself prepared for me

For the Holy Spirit and the power of the Most High overshadowed the holy Virgin

And I have come that I might do your will

For what was the will of the Father, but that which the Lord himself expounded when he said:

'This is the will of him who sent me, that of all he has given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up on the last day.' And the phrase 'in the head of the book' has this interpretation:

The Hebrews call the scroll a 'kephalis' [head-piece/roll]

And Isaiah, being instructed concerning the mystery of the incarnation of the

Only-begotten, heard [these words]:

Take a new scroll, and write on it with a man's stylus

It follows that the ordinances of the new law will be written not on tablets of stone, but of flesh, just as he says through the prophet Jeremiah:

I have proclaimed good tidings of righteousness in the great congregation

The 'great congregation' is the soul, from every nation, that has believed in the Savior;

which has also been justified, having him who justifies the ungodly

Your righteousness I have not hidden in my heart

And 'you have known' stands in place of 'I will make it my own'

Your truth and your salvation I have spoken

I have not kept silent, he says, nor have I held your truth within myself

And by 'truth' he means the evangelical proclamation

But neither have I hidden your salvation, that is, the way of the salvation given by you, namely, the grace that comes through faith

And by 'great assembly' he means the Church gathered from Israel and the nations

For Christ reveals to rational nature the words concerning mercy and truth, and also the words concerning salvation

And the words concerning truth one will find in contemplation, while those concerning salvation one will find in the practical life

But you, O Lord, do not remove your compassions far from me

For as one who disobeyed the mercy of God, and on account of this was overlooked, and fell into every evil, he now recovers his senses unto repentance, entreating to be pitied

And this signifies the calling of them that is to take place in the last time

May your mercy and your truth continually uphold me

We confess, he says, that he is one and the same who from of old has been saving us and upholding us

And the Church of God, having obtained salvation, again has need of God's providence because of the manifold uprisings of men and demons, of which he makes mention in what follows

For evils beyond number have surrounded me

He recounts the evils that befell them after their unbelief toward Christ

...me, and my heart has forsaken me

I have become like those who have neither mind nor heart:

for the people became foolish, and not wise

Let those who wish me evil be turned back and put to shame

They cry out either against the intelligible enemies, or against the Scribes and Pharisees who plotted against the salvation of his soul, who at one time said concerning Christ:

He does not cast out demons except by Beelzebul

Israel, that most insolent nation, having come to a change of mind, calls himself needy and poor

And indeed he also claims for himself the having of the Lord as his hope

You are my helper and my protector;

To these ends, he says, the Church will advance, having first become poor and having entered the world through much poverty, and having been enriched by power from you, and having been glorified by help from you — which help she asks not to delay; and because of this request it will not delay, just as it is said:

He who comes will come, and will not delay

The present psalm calls blessed those who have believed in Christ himself;

and indeed he also gives them, as recompense for their faith, his own help

And the person of the Savior himself is also introduced, enumerating those of the Jewish people who deny him, and especially the traitor himself: 'Blessed is he who considers the poor and needy.'

He calls Christ 'poor and needy,' according to what is said:

Though he was rich, he became poor for our sake

Here he has placed moral teaching before the prophecy, wishing the psalm to profit from both

And whom does he call blessed? The one who considers the poor and needy:

And what is the profit of loving the poor? 'In the evil day the Lord will deliver him.'

'He will deliver,' he says, those who love the poor — the Lord will.

For he owes them kindness, since he himself has, as it were, borrowed mercy from them;

and having said through Solomon:

He who has mercy on the poor lends to God;

Inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me

In the evil day the Lord will deliver him

By 'the evil day' he means the onset of trials and the persecutions of enemies

And he hints, I think, also at the day of judgment, which is fearsome, and which brings harm to the lawless

He promises the sincere knowledge of that poverty:

to deliver him from the evils of that fearsome day

'Blessed is that man who considers what is fitting concerning the poor' — instead of:

'He who is able to understand the poverty which Christ took upon himself for our sake.' May the Lord preserve him and give him life, and pronounce him blessed on the earth, and not deliver him into the hands of his enemies

Of the intelligible enemies, evidently

You have turned all his bed in his sickness

It will be transferred, he says, to the better, and will undergo a change toward soundness.

For it is the custom of divine Scripture to put 'turning' in place of 'change,' as in the verse:

You have turned my mourning into joy for me.

Lord, have mercy on me; heal my soul.

Again, he who suffers on behalf of men calls the sins of men his own, and seeks in himself the mercy shown to us on account of these sins — he who dissolves the contempt of those who are ignorant concerning him, by making manifest his glory:

in himself indeed according to his own power, but in us according to the grace of Christ.

My enemies spoke evil against me.

Up to the present verse, one must suppose that the prophet has spoken concerning the whole catholic Church, as being fitting rather to each of the earnest believers than to the Man of the Lord.

For it is not, as some have supposed, that he speaks the things said concerning him alone:

for he did not say it with the article:

Blessed is he who considers the poor and needy.

But this, being said without the article, signifies a certain someone, and one who is particular.

After these things, he passes from the other members of the Church to that Lord himself, namely Christ, who indeed also says:

'My enemies,' and what follows.

When will he die, and his name perish? For even to be seen is burdensome to us.

And if he came in to see me, he spoke in vain.

He says these things concerning Judas.

What he means is something like this:

Having had access to me, because he was numbered among the disciples, he was double-tongued and meddlesome:

for he spoke in vain, that is, he was not truthful.

His heart gathered iniquity for itself.

He had determined, he says, to hand me over to those who envied me.

He went out, and spoke about the same thing:

namely, 'What are you willing to give me, and I will hand him over to you?' All my enemies whispered against me.

The mockeries of the Jews against him signify the conspiracies of the Jews against him, and the hidden schemes signify the chief priests who agreed with Judas — he speaking of those who whispered, arranging with Judas the terms concerning Jesus:

for they did not dare to establish these things openly, being wary of the crowd.

They laid a lawless word against me.

Namely, 'Away with him, away with him, crucify him!'

That this was lawless is clear from what has been said:

You shall not kill the innocent and righteous.

How do you suppose to clothe Life with death? For to suffer is but sleep to me.

And necessarily he says that resurrection follows upon repose.

And repose is death:

resurrection also will necessarily follow death.

For even the man of my peace, in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.

Mockery, plot, deceit.

He calls Judas 'the man of peace,' because he seemed to be numbered among those well-disposed toward him and among his friends:

at least insofar as he had come to be a disciple.

But you, O Lord, have mercy on me, and raise me up, and I will repay them.

He makes this statement in a rather human manner, on account of the self-emptying, toward his own Father, although he himself is the mercy of God the Father, and the resurrection and the life.

By this I know that you have been well pleased with me.

Again he speaks as a man, so that he may commend himself to God the Father.

That my enemy shall not rejoice over me.

If Christ says these things from the person of his humanity, the enemy would be understood as the one who fashioned death for us:

but if as from Christ himself, he means the rulers of the Jews.

For that they were grieved is clear from their having slandered his resurrection.

But you have upheld me because of my guilelessness.

He says that the support of all has itself obtained support:

not that he himself needed this, insofar as he is understood to be God, but having become man, he makes these statements on behalf of men.

Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting.

And now he also seals the present ode with thanksgiving.

'From the present,' he says, 'unto the future':

therefore the blessing from us toward God begins indeed from the present, but is perfected in the future:

for we know in part, and we prophesy in part, wherefore also we bless in part:

But when the perfect comes, says Paul, that which is in part will be done away.

For by the advance toward the greater, that which is in part ceases.

for there they are not permitted to bless God in that limited way.

One must know that some, having divided this psalmic prophecy into five books, reckon the first to extend up to this psalm:

since toward its end it possesses, as it were a crown, the blessing directed to God.

Whence they likewise divide also the remaining four portions.

Unto the end: for understanding, of the sons of Korah.

And they introduce the very person of Israel itself, confessing to Christ through the change of mind which they will make at the consummation of the ages.

As the hart longs for the springs of water, so my soul longs for you, O God.

The rational harts, since the noetic spring had ceased flowing to them because of their transgressions, wept night and day for their own destruction.

When shall I come and appear before the face of God? The face of God is the Word.

He signifies that they greatly desire to arrive at the time in which their own calling will also take place:

so that they themselves also might become manifest before the face of God and the Father.

And this is the same as that of the Son.

With a voice of exultation and thanksgiving, the sound of one keeping festival.

He announces good news beforehand to himself, as one who will in due time obtain the salvation and life that come through Christ, and will dwell together with the other saints in the divine courts.

"Why art thou sorrowful, O my soul, and why dost thou trouble me?" He rebukes his sorrows, fortifying himself with hope in Christ.

"Since," he says, "my soul was troubled when I called to mind for myself your wonders, both those you showed us at the Jordan, and those at Mount Hermon, I will console myself."

"Having come," he says, "to the Jordan"—that is, having been counted worthy of holy baptism—"I will then remember you through the word of confession."

And I will also remember Hermoniim.

Now Hermoniim is interpreted "way of the lamp," since holy baptism opens for them the way of illumination.

"Deep calleth unto deep at the voice of your cataracts."

Again they remind themselves of other wonders.

For when the foreigners made war upon them, and a sacrifice was offered on their behalf by Samuel, so great a hail was brought down upon the enemy that almost all the foes fell, though not a single man fought against them.

He therefore calls the onrush of the hail "deep running upon deep."

And "calleth unto" is used in place of "is charged against."

And the "voices of the cataracts" may be understood as the onrushes of the hail.

But elsewhere the "cataracts" are the prophets of God.

"All your billows and your waves have gone over me."

Again he reminds himself of another wonder.

And the surgings of the waves, that is, their upliftings, seemed to be borne against them;

for the waters were congealed as a wall.

["Deep calleth unto deep."

The Father is a deep, the Son is a deep.

The deep of sins calls upon the deep of God's compassion, that it may cast down sin and those who are its authors, and corruption;

as though to say, "It is your custom to incline toward sinners who entreat you."

"And why do you overlook us as we fall down before you?"] "By day the Lord will command his mercy, and in the night his song shall be with me."

Again he calls to mind another wonder.

For Rabshakeh, having surrounded Jerusalem, threatened that not even God had the power to deliver them out of the hand of the Assyrians;

but God made a promise, saying,

"I will defend this city."