詩篇註釋 第 1 章 第 31/42 段

and He caused frogs to well up from it, creeping like the slaughtered infants, invading the houses, and pressing on even to the very chambers of the king.

He spoke, and there came the dog-fly, and gnats in all their borders. For the deeds followed upon the words;

and immediately, at God's command and at Moses' word, both the dog-fly and the gnats filled the land, not passing beyond the borders of the Egyptians, nor bringing harm to other men, but visiting chastisement upon those who set themselves against God.

For this is the meaning of 'in all their borders,' that is: Outside the borders of the Egyptians no such thing was to be seen happening.

He made their rains into hail, fire flaming in their land.

And He struck their vines and their fig trees, and shattered every tree of their borders. For the clouds altered their accustomed travail, and instead of showers brought forth hail;

and thunderbolts and fiery blasts were borne along with the hail, and two natures opposed to one another, water and fire, did not harm each other.

For neither did the fire melt the frozen water of the hail, nor did the water quench the flame;

but laying aside their natural strife, they brought a chastisement in harmony against the Egyptians, and convicted their brutality;

because, though they were men, they had no respect for their common nature, but harshly compelled those of the same kind to serve as slaves.

For this reason both their vines and their fig trees, and the other kinds of plants, were utterly destroyed by them.

He spoke, and there came the locust and the caterpillar, of which there was no number.

And he consumed their grass.

And he smote every firstborn in their land, the firstfruits of all their labour. This was the last plague he brought upon the Egyptians;

after which he pressed the Jews to depart.

Every house was filled with lamentation and wailing, since all the firstborn met with a sudden death together.

For he brought the plague against what was most dear to them, striking with more bitter darts those who had remained unmoved by the earlier plagues.

And he brought them out with silver and gold. For since the Egyptians would not even permit the Hebrews to take their own goods, in addition to their own possessions they also received the wealth of the Egyptians, carrying off the gold and silver as a kind of wage for their harsh servitude.

For God did not command this to be done unjustly, but both chastening the wrongdoers and consoling those who had been wronged.

And there was not one who was sick among their tribes. For they did not experience any of the plagues brought upon the Egyptians.

Egypt was glad at their departure, for the fear of them had fallen upon them. Thus were they so terrified by the manifold punishments that they even reckoned the deliverance of the Hebrews to be a benefit to themselves.

and by night, becoming fiery for them, it supplied their need for light.

They asked, and the quail came, and he filled them with bread of heaven. For since they craved meat as well, he provided them of its own accord a hunt of birds, and when they asked for bread, he supplied it from above, bestowing through the clouds not rain but the very food itself.

For in a waterless land, deprived even of moisture, he commanded rivers to gush forth;

and by 'rivers' he means the streams of the waters that were brought forth from the rock.

Because he remembered his holy word, which was to Abraham his servant.

And he brought forth his people in exultation, and his chosen ones in gladness. For all these things he imparted to them, fulfilling the promises he had made to Abraham.

And he gave them the lands of the nations, and they inherited the labours of peoples. For not only did he free them from the servitude of the Egyptians, but he also bestowed upon them the land of the Canaanites, and made them masters of others' labours;

both punishing those men justly, and confirming his own promises.

That he did not unjustly cast out those who formerly dwelt in Palestine, he teaches also through the laws he gave to the Jews, commanding them to flee from imitating the manner of life of those people.

For 'the sins of the Amorites,' he says, 'are not yet filled up until now'; that is, they have not yet dared deeds worthy of utter destruction;

and it is not just to bring punishment upon them, nor to pronounce the sentence of punishment on the foreknowledge of a greater sin, but to await the outcome of their deeds.

For I employ measure, and I govern with the balance, and nothing is unweighed with me.

Thus he cast out those people also, and restored his promises to these.

In the one hundred and fourth psalm the prophetic word recounted the divine benefactions;

he accuses of ingratitude those who had been benefited, and teaches of the various punishments brought upon them.

It is composed as if from the person of the more godly, who lament the common calamities and beseech to obtain mercy.

Then he teaches that the recounting of the divine wonders surpasses the nature of men.

Who shall tell the mighty acts of the Lord, or make all his praises to be heard? No word suffices for the hymning of the God of all.

Blessed are they that keep judgment, and do righteousness at all times. Upon the awareness of sin there steals in the blessedness of virtue.

For he who pays the penalties for this counts blessed those who are freed from it, and who order their own life with righteousness.

But he pronounces blessed not the one who has practised righteousness once, but the one who ever and continually follows in its footsteps.

Remember us, O Lord, in the good pleasure toward your people; visit us with your salvation. Here he alludes to the new people, and the Church gathered from the nations, which he counted worthy of salvation, and whose fellowship the multitude of the Jews is taught to snatch for themselves.

And what follows agrees with this meaning.

That we may see in the goodness of your chosen ones, that we may be glad in the gladness of your nation, that we may glory with your inheritance. We beseech you, he says, to partake in the gladness of your new nation, and to become sharers in the goodness that is bestowed upon them.

We have sinned with our fathers;

we have committed iniquity, we have done wrong. For, he says, as it were an inheritance, we received from our fathers the transgression of your laws;

and by 'fathers' he means not the holy patriarchs, but those who came after them.

For this he made clear through what follows.

Our fathers in Egypt understood not your wonders, and remembered not the multitude of your mercy. For though so many wonders had been wrought in Egypt on their account, they would not perceive your power.

And they provoked him as they went up at the Red Sea. For beholding the Egyptians pursuing, and the sea barring their flight, they would not await your help;

but they cried out against the great Moses, saying:

Because there were no graves in Egypt, you have brought us out to kill us in this wilderness. Yet even though they proved ungrateful, you counted them worthy of salvation.

And he saved them for his name's sake, that he might make known his mighty power.

And he rebuked the Red Sea, and it was dried up;

and he led them through the deep as through a wilderness.

And he saved them from the hand of him that hated them, and redeemed them from the hand of the enemy. For by his word laying bare the bottom of the sea, he showed that great deep to be for them a wilderness fit for the passage of horses.

For since in wildernesses there is much ease for those who run, seeing there are neither plants nor fences to hinder, he indicated the ease of the crossing by the comparison with the wilderness.

The water covered those that afflicted them; not one of them was left. For he made all the Egyptians to sink beneath the waves;

and the same sea brought salvation to the Hebrews, but punishment to the Egyptians.

And they believed his word, and sang his praise. For as the men were singing hymns, the great Moses led them, and Miriam the prophetess led the choir of the women.

They hastened, they forgot his works, they did not await his counsel.

And he gave them their request, and sent fullness into their souls. He called their desire a 'request';

for they did not ask, but murmured;

yet nevertheless he gave them both an abundance of meat, and bread not made with hands, and water most sweet and plentiful.

And they angered Moses in the camp, and Aaron the holy one of the Lord. For Korah and his faction attempted to snatch the priesthood.

But Korah and those with him were consumed by fire sent from God.

God brought these punishments upon them, compelling the others to become sober-minded;

but they were unwilling to receive any benefit from this;

and this the narration of their reckless deeds makes clear.

And they made a calf in Horeb. Not simply did he mention the mountain, but to teach the excess of their impiety.

For in this place the Lord of all appeared;

in this place he filled them with terror, appearing amid abundant fire, employing trumpets, thundering with peals, and delivering the giving of the Law amid such great dread.

In this place they dared to commit their impiety.

And they worshipped the graven image. This too is an accusation of another kind of madness;

for that which they saw had received its form through human craft, to this they offered the reverence due to God.

And they exchanged his glory for the likeness of a calf that eats grass. Most fittingly did he set forth their folly as a tragedy.

For in place of him who had wrought so many wonders, and had bestowed that marvellous salvation, and was able to accomplish so many things, they honoured the image of a calf, whose very archetype is in need of food;

and the food of the calf is not bread, such as is offered to rational beings, but herbage and grass.

But of the calf, whose nature is irrational, and whose food is grass, and which has been given to men for servitude, the image is far more paltry still.

For it is not only irrational, but also lifeless, having no power to act, nor to low, nor to eat;

yet nevertheless they preferred this feeble thing to the God of all.

And they forgot God who saved them, who had done great things in Egypt.

Wondrous works in the land of Ham, terrible things at the Red Sea. For they remembered neither their own salvation, nor the punishment of the Egyptians, nor the great marvel of the sea, but spat out all of it at once.

And He said that He would utterly destroy them, had not Moses His chosen one stood in the breach before Him, to turn away His wrath, that He should not utterly destroy them. For when the God of all had said, 'Let Me alone, and being kindled in anger I will consume them, and I will make of thee a great nation,' the blessed Moses said, 'If Thou wilt forgive them their sin, forgive it;'

'but if not, blot me out of the book which Thou hast written.' (verses 24, 25)

And they set at naught the desirable land; they did not believe His word.

And they murmured in their tents; they hearkened not to the voice of the Lord. He recalls another act of disobedience.

For when God had commanded them to set foot upon the promised land, they, seized by the passion of cowardice, openly resisted, saying that the Canaanites were mighty, while they themselves had no strength worthy to face that array.

And this was a manifest proof of unbelief.

For it was altogether just that those who had been eyewitnesses of so many and such great wonders should take courage in all things through the power of Him who had saved them.

And He lifted up His hand against them, to cast them down in the wilderness.

And to cast down their seed among the nations, and to scatter them in the lands. He purposed to lay upon their unbelief a fitting punishment, and to bring destruction upon all of them together; nevertheless, employing His accustomed loving-kindness, He inflicted upon them only a partial chastisement.

And they were joined to Baal-peor;

in their own practices. Running aground once more into licentiousness, and mingling with the women of the Moabites, they learned anew their impiety.

Now Beel-phegor is an idol honoured among them.

And Phegor was the name of the place of the idol, while Baal was the idol itself.

And they say that this one is called Kronos in the Greek tongue.

And by 'sacrifices of the dead' he means what are called among the Greeks 'libations,' which they are wont to offer to the dead;

and one would not err in addressing those very ones who are called gods as dead.

And the calamity was multiplied among them. For again He brought upon them another death.

And Phinehas stood up and made propitiation, and the plague ceased.

And it was reckoned to him for righteousness, unto generation and generation for ever. Symmachus renders 'the plague' as 'the stroke.'

For when Zambri had openly presumed to consort with a certain Midianite woman, Phinehas, using a spear, slew him together with the woman.

God, accepting this man's zeal, proclaimed him openly, and stayed the punishment that was being brought upon the rest.

And they provoked Him at the water of contradiction, and Moses was afflicted for their sake.

Because they embittered his spirit, and he uttered a distinction with his lips. For while he was mourning his sister, they came to him and with great disorder demanded to have their need supplied.

And he, being both cast down by the dejection of mourning and beholding their intemperance, encompassed by anger and grief, ministered to the divine command not with his accustomed harmony;

but mixing a certain hesitation into his words, he struck the rock and brought forth the water.

Moses says to them, 'Shall we bring you forth water out of this rock?' For this cause the God of all, being as it were indignant, did not grant even to him the land promised to the fathers;

but He commanded him to receive the end of his life;

and through Joshua the son of Nun He fulfilled the promise.

And it seems indeed that the Ruler of all imposed this as a punishment upon him;

yet in ordering other things He brought this about.

For first, knowing the folly of the Jews, He did not allow the whole promise to be brought to its fulfilment through him, lest they should suppose him to be a god;

and besides this, He wished to show the temporary character of the legislation from the very things that befell the lawgiver himself.

For if the lawgiver did not enjoy the promised land, it is easy to perceive from this that neither would they themselves enjoy it for very long, according to His foresight.

Having thus narrated the events in the wilderness, he convicts them of the transgression that came about in the land of promise.

They did not utterly destroy the nations, of which the Lord had spoken to them.

And they were mingled among the nations, and learned their works.

And they served their graven images, and it became to them a stumbling-block. For He forbade intermingling because of the fellowship it brought in impiety, destroying the end together with the beginning, and doing away with the fruit together with the root, and by the lesser evil forestalling the worse.

But nevertheless these people, in this also transgressing the divine law, neither utterly destroyed the impious nations, nor fled from fellowship with them, but emulated their wicked manner of life.

And they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to the demons.

And they poured out innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the graven images of Canaan;

and the land was defiled with murder in the bloodshed.

And it was polluted in their works. As the crowning height of impiety they left this to the last;

for what excess of impiety does it leave over, to defile the land with the blood of sons and daughters, and to offer their sacrifices to the blood-devouring demons? For to God they did not offer even the appointed sacrifices;

but to the idols they offered even the slaughter of their children.

And they went a-whoring in their own practices. Here he calls 'whoredom' not only licentiousness, but also the worship of idols.

For since, having been joined to God, they loved the service of those idols, He fittingly called their superstition whoredom.

And the Lord was angered in wrath against His people, and He abhorred His inheritance.

And He delivered them into the hands of enemies, and those who hated them ruled over them.

And their enemies afflicted them, and they were brought low under their hands. These things both the history of the Judges teaches, and moreover the record of the Kingdoms.

For at one time He delivered them to the Moabites, at another to the Ammonites, and at other times to the Amalekites, and the Midianites, and the Philistines, reaping benefit through chastisement.

Many times He delivered them;

but they provoked Him in their counsel, and were brought low in their iniquities. For while bringing chastisement, He again imparted loving-kindness;

but they requited Him with the opposite.

And the Lord saw when they were afflicted, when He hearkened to their supplication. These things too the histories teach;

and that they besought God, being driven to it by their distress;

and that having besought Him, they were heard.

And by 'repentance' he means the cessation of the chastisement.

For God does not have the passion of repentance, nor is He pleased now with these, now with those;

but ordering all things wisely, He both brings chastisements and extends loving-kindness.

And He gave them over to compassions, in the sight of all who had led them captive. Thus He charmed Cyrus, and bent him to mercy, and made him grant freedom to the captives of the spear.

Save us, O Lord our God, and gather us together from among the nations;

that we may give thanks to Thy holy name, that we may glory in Thy praise. And these words show, as the prophetic word teaches them, how one ought to propitiate God and obtain His care.

And the inspired Apostle too foretold the salvation that would come to the Jews through Elijah the Tishbite;

'There shall come out of Zion,' he says, 'the Deliverer, and He shall turn away impieties from Jacob;'

'and this is My covenant with them, when I shall take away their sins.' It is not, then, that one must await the rebuilding of Jerusalem, according to the myths of the foolish, and the service according to the law, and the irrational sacrifices, and circumcision, and sabbath, and shadowy vessels of sprinkling after the all-holy baptism;

for these are the ravings of drunken old women.

Blessed be the Lord the God of Israel from everlasting and unto everlasting;

and let all the people say, So be it, so be it. For the Lord of all is worthy to be hymned above all things, He who was named the God of Israel, who wrought so many things for the salvation of men.

It is fitting that all the people should add their 'Amen' to the voice of those who sing the praises.

For what the Hebrew calls 'So be it, so be it', is 'Amen and amen'.

Hence the custom has also remained in the Churches, that the people join themselves by the 'Amen' to the doxology of the priest, and thereby offer their fellowship and receive the blessing.

We have often shown that the Old Covenant is a shadow of the New;

and it is no less easy to learn this from the present Psalm as well.

For it foretells the deliverance of the Jews, and also proclaims beforehand the salvation of all mankind.

It has a close sequence with the Psalms set before it.

For the hundred and fourth Psalm contains a narrative of the promises made by God to the patriarchs, and of the gifts bestowed upon their descendants.

And the one after it, besides the benefactions, taught also the ingratitude of the Jews, and the punishments brought upon them on account of it,

and the release that came about through the ineffable loving-kindness of God.

But since our own things are sketched out in shadow in those events, and we see in this Psalm too the oracles concerning our salvation,

the greater part of the prophecy fits us rather than them.

'Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures forever.' Again the prophetic word exhorts us to sing the praises of God our Benefactor;

and it says that the reason for the hymn of praise is his loving-kindness.

'Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he redeemed from the hand of the enemy.' The Jews too were bound to sing praises when they were set free from the bondage of the Babylonians;

and it is ever fitting for us also to do this, having been delivered from the tyranny of the devil.

'And he gathered them out of the lands;'

'from the east and the west, and the north and the sea.' That this happened thus in the case of the Jews we have not learned.

For throughout the whole inhabited world they continue scattered.

But the Church gathered from the nations he called and assembled in all the divisions of the inhabited world, eastern and western, southern and northern;

and such assemblies one may see everywhere on land and sea.

In the case of the Jews, however, this came to pass only dimly;

some returning from Babylon, and a few being gathered at that time out of Egypt and the neighbouring nations.

'They wandered in the wilderness, in a waterless place.' Babylon too was a wilderness and waterless;

for it was destitute of God;

and the multitude of the Jews, being enslaved to it, was deprived of spiritual watering;

and those who had believed from among the nations likewise passed their lives in a wilderness and a waterless place, having no hope and being without God, as the divine Apostle says.

'They found no way to a city of habitation.' For neither could the Jews escape those who had enslaved them and reach their own homeland;

nor did those who had believed from among the nations, before the incarnation of the Saviour, find the way that leads to the divine city.

By 'city' here we must understand the godly way of life.

'Hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them.' A famine of divine teaching pressed hard upon both these and those.

For the Jews, being in bondage in Babylon, were both deprived of priests and unable to fulfil the worship according to the Law.

And the nations again had neither received a divine law, nor enjoyed spiritual teaching, by which souls are naturally nourished.

This very famine God threatened against the Jews;

for he said, 'I will bring a famine upon the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord.'

'And they cried out to the Lord in their affliction, and he delivered them out of their distresses.' The more devout among the Jews offered their supplication to God;

for he himself, and Ananias, and Azarias, and Misael, interceding on behalf of all, sought the divine mercy.

But the nations groaned, wrestling with manifold calamities, and gave themselves over to wailings and inconsolable laments, having no hope of resurrection, and yet did not seek from the God of all the release from the evils that held them fast.

Nevertheless the loving God saw them groaning, and extended his mercy.

'And he led them in a straight way, that they might go to a city of habitation.' For to the Jews he granted the return through Cyrus the Persian;

but the nations he guided through the holy apostles, and showed them the city above, which has its foundations on the holy mountains, whose craftsman and maker is God.

'Let them give thanks to the Lord for his mercies, and for his wonders to the sons of men.' But Symmachus renders it thus:

'And his marvellous deeds that are toward the sons of men.'

It is not the mercy itself that offers the thanksgiving hymn to God, nor the wonders, but those who have enjoyed such great blessings.

Wonderful indeed and worthy of admiration is even the deliverance of the Jews;

the cessation of error, and the knowledge of the truth.

But of all these things the divine mercy is the author.

For 'not by reason of the righteous deeds which we did', says the divine Apostle, 'but according to his great mercy he saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly.'

'For he satisfied the empty soul, and filled the hungry soul with good things.'

'Those who sat in darkness and the shadow of death, fettered in poverty and iron.' The Jews too, yoked together with bondage and ill-treatment, and wasting away with famine, he set free from the evils that held them fast;

and the whole nature of mankind he nourished with the divine teachings, and having freed them from the gloom of ignorance, he illumined them with the light of the knowledge of God, and scattered the shadow of death that lay upon them, giving the hope of resurrection, and broke the mighty bonds of sin.

For 'each one', it says, 'is bound fast with the cords of his own sins.' And again:

'Woe to those who draw their sins after them as with a long cord, and their iniquities as with a heifer's yoke-strap.'

'Because they rebelled against the words of God, and provoked the counsel of the Most High.'

'And their heart was humbled with troubles;'

'they became weak, and there was none to help.' The cause of all these griefs, both for the Jews and indeed for all mankind, is sin;

for they too, paying the penalty, were delivered over to the bondage of the Babylonians;

and all mankind, after the transgression of the commandment, were made subject to the wretchedness of toils.

For after these things Adam heard, 'Cursed is the ground in your labours; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth to you, in griefs you shall eat of it all the days of your life;

in the sweat of your face you shall eat your bread, until you return to the ground from which you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return.' Hemmed in by so many calamities, they found no release from the evils that pressed upon them; but he who had allotted them to these, he himself also granted deliverance from them.

'And they cried out to the Lord in their affliction, and he saved them out of their distresses.'

'And he brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and broke their bonds asunder.' For having pitied both these and those, the one class he freed from the calamities that pressed upon them, and the other he delivered from the darkness of ignorance, and broke the bonds of bondage.

'Let them give thanks to the Lord for his mercies, and for his wonders to the sons of men.'

'For he shattered the gates of bronze, and broke in pieces the bars of iron.' By 'gates of bronze and bars of iron' he named the inescapability of the evils;

for just as it is impossible for one shut in within such doors and bars to escape,

so it was impossible both for the Jews to escape the bondage of the Babylonians, and for all mankind to escape the dominion of death.

But the divine mercy alone sufficed to dissolve the power both of the former and of the latter, and to grant release from the sorrows.

'He helped them out of the way of their iniquity;'

'for because of their iniquities they were brought low.' Neither the Jews, nor the whole nature of mankind, fell into these sorrows unjustly;

but both these and those pay the penalty for the offences they committed.

Yet nevertheless, though both these and those were wallowing in so many evils, He accounted them worthy of salvation.

'Their soul abhorred all manner of food.'

'And they drew near even to the gates of death.' For the Jews, hemmed in by the multitude of their evils, turned away even from food itself.

For this too the prophet has said in another psalm, as though speaking on their behalf:

'For I forgot to eat my bread.' But the nations were unwilling even to give heed to the teachings of their own philosophers.

For which very reason some condemned Socrates to death;

others handed Anaxarchus over to a strange torment;

and others, cruelly maltreating the successors of Pythagoras, brought upon them an untimely death.

He persuaded them, and set them free from the gates of death.