TITLE. A Song of Degrees. I fail
to see how this is a step beyond the previous Psalm; and yet it
is clearly the song of an older and more tried individual, who
looks back upon a life of affliction in which he suffered all
along, even from his youth. Inasmuch as patience is a higher, or
at least more difficult, grace than domestic love, the ascent or
progress may perhaps be seen in that direction. Probably if we
knew more of the stations on the road to the Temple we should
see a reason for the order of these Psalms; but as that
information cannot be obtained, we must take the songs as we
find them, and remember that, as we do not now go on pilgrimages
to Zion, it is our curiosity and not oar necessity which is a
loser by our not knowing the cause of the arrangement of the
songs in this Pilgrim Psalter.
AUTHOR, ETC. It does not seem to us at
all needful to ascribe this Psalm to a period subsequent to the
captivity...indeed, it is more suitable to a time when as yet
the enemy bad not so far prevailed as to have carried the people
indo a distant land. It is a mingled hymn of sorrow and of
strong resolve. Though sorely smitten, the afflicted one is
heart whole, and scorns to yield in the least degree to the
enemy. The poet sings the trials of Israel, Ps 129:1-3; the
interposition of the Lord, Ps 129:4; and the unblessed condition
of Israel's foes, Ps 129:5-8. It is a rustic song, full of
allusions to husbandry. It reminds us of the books of Ruth and
Amos.
EXPOSITION
Verse 1. Many a time have they afflicted me from my
youth, may Israel now say. In her present hour of trial she
may remember her former afflictions and speak of them for her
comfort, drawing from them the assurance that he who has been
with her for so long will not desert her in the end. The song
begins abruptly. The poet has been musing, and the fire burns,
therefore speaks he with his tongue; he cannot help it, he feels
that he must speak, and therefore "may now say" what
he has to say. The trials of the church have been repeated again
and again, times beyond all count: the same afflictions are
fulfilled in us as in our fathers. Jacob of old found his days
full of trouble; each Israelite is often harassed; and Israel as
a whole has proceeded from tribulation to tribulation.
"Many a time", Israel says, because she could not say
how many times. She speaks of her assailants as
"they", because it would be impossible to write or
even to know all their names. They had straitened, harassed, and
fought against her from the earliest days of her history—from
her youth; and they had continued their assaults right on
without ceasing. Persecution is the heirloom of the church, and
the ensign of the elect. Israel among the nations was peculiar,
and this peculiarity brought against her many restless foes, who
could never be easy unless they were warring against the people
of God. When in Canaan, at the first, the chosen household was
often severely tried; in Egypt it was heavily oppressed; in the
wilderness it was fiercely assailed; and in the promised land it
was often surrounded by deadly enemies. It was something for the
afflicted nation that it survived to say, "Many a
time have they afflicted me." The affliction began
early—"from my youth"; and it continued late. The
earliest years of Israel and of the Church of God are spent in
trial. Babes in grace are cradled in opposition. No sooner is
the man child born than the dragon is after it. "It
is", however, "good for a man that he bear the yoke in
his youth", and he shall see it to be so when in after days
he tells the tale.
Verse 2. Many a time have they afflicted, me from
my youth. Israel repeats her statement of her repeated
afflictions. The fact was uppermost in her thoughts, and she
could not help soliloquizing upon it again and again. These
repetitions are after the manner of poetry: thus she makes a
sonnet out of her sorrows, music out of her miseries. "Yet
they have not prevailed against me." We seem to hear
the beat of timbrels and the clash of cymbals here: the foe is
derided; his malice has failed. That "yet"
breaks in like the blast of trumpets, or the roll of
kettledrums. "Cast down, but not destroyed", is the
shout of a victor. Israel has wrestled, and has overcome in the
struggle. Who wonders? If Israel overcame the angel of the
covenant, what man or devil shall vanquish him? The fight was
oft renewed and long protracted: the champion severely felt the
conflict, and was at times fearful of the issue; but at length
he takes breath, and cries, "Yet they have not prevailed
against me." "Many a time; " yes, "many a
time", the enemy has had his opportunity and his vantage,
but not so much as once has he gained the victory.
Verse 3. The plowers plowed up on my back. The
scourgers tore the flesh as ploughmen furrow a field. The people
were maltreated like a criminal given over to the lictors with
their cruel whips; the back of the nation was scored and
furrowed by oppression. It is a grand piece of imagery condensed
into few words. A writer says the metaphor is muddled, but he is
mistaken: there are several figures, like wheel within wheel,
but there is no confusion. The afflicted nation was, as it were,
lashed by her adversaries so cruelly that each blow left a long
red mark, or perhaps a bleeding wound, upon her back and
shoulders, comparable to a furrow which tears up the ground from
one end of the field to the other. Many a heart has been in like
case; smitten and sore wounded by them that use the scourge of
the tongue; so smitten that their whole character has been cut
up and scored by calumny. The true church has in every age had
fellowship with her Lord under his cruel flagellations: his
sufferings were s prophecy of what she would be called hereafter
to endure, and the foreshadowing has been fulfilled. Zion has in
this sense been ploughed as a field. They made long their
furrows:—as if delighting in their cruel labour. They missed
not an inch, but went from end to end of the field, meaning to
make thorough work of their congenial engagement. Those who laid
on the scourge did it with a thoroughness which showed how
hearty was their hate. Assuredly the enemies of Christ's church
never spare pains to inflict the utmost injury: they never do
the work of the devil deceitfully, or hold back their hand from
blood. They smite so as to plough into the man; they plough the
quivering flesh as if it were clods of clay; they plough deep
and long with countless furrows; until they leave no portion of
the church unfurrowed or unassailed. Ah me! Well did Latimer say
that there was no busier ploughman in all the world than the
devil: whoever makes short furrows, he does not. Whoever balks
and shirks, he is thorough in all that he does. Whoever stops
work at sundown, he never does. He and his children plough like
practised ploughmen; but they prefer to carry on their
pernicious work upon the saints behind their backs, for they are
as cowardly as they are cruel.
Verse 4. The LORD is righteous. Whatever men
may be, Jehovah remains just, and will therefore keep covenant
with his people and deal out justice to their oppressors. Here
is the hinge of the condition: this makes the turning point of
Israel's distress. The Lord bears with the long furrows of the
wicked, but he will surely make them cease from their ploughing
before he has done with them. He hath cut asunder the cords
of the wicked. The rope which binds the oxen to the plough
is cut; the cord which bound the victim is broken; the bond
which held the enemies in cruel unity has snapped. As in Ps
124:7 we read, "the snare is broken; we are escaped",
so here the breaking of the enemies' instrument of oppression is
Israel's release. Sooner or later a righteous God will
interpose, and when he does so, his action will be most
effectual; he does not unfasten, but cuts asunder, the harness
which the ungodly use in their labour of hate. Never has God
used a nation to chastise his Israel without destroying that
nation when the chastisement has come to a close: he hates those
who hurt his people even though lie permits their hate to
triumph for a while for his own purpose. If any man would have
his harness cut, let him begin to plough one of the Lord's
fields with the plough of persecution. The shortest way to ruin
is to meddle with a saint: the divine warning is, "He that
toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye."
Verse 5. Let them all be confounded and turned back
that hate Zion. And so say we right heartily: and in this
case vox populi is vex Dei, for so it shall be. If
this be an imprecation, let it stand; for our heart says
"Amen" to it. It is but justice that those who hate,
harass, and hurt the good should be brought to naught. Those who
confound right and wrong ought to be confounded, and those who
turn back from God ought to be turned back. Loyal subjects wish
ill to those who plot against their king.
"Confound their politics,
Frustrate their knavish tricks,"
is but a proper wish, and contains within it no trace of
personal ill will. We desire their welfare as men, their
downfall as traitors. Let their conspiracies be confounded,
their policies be turned back. How can we wish prosperity to
those who would destroy that which is dearest to our hearts?
This present age is so flippant that if a man loves the Saviour
he is styled a fanatic, and if he hates the powers of evil he is
named a bigot. As for ourselves, despite all objectors, we join
heartily in this commination; and would revive in our heart the
old practice of Ebal and Gerizim, where those were blessed who
bless God, and those were cursed who make themselves a curse to
the righteous. We have heard men desire a thousand times that
the gallows might be the reward of the assassins who murdered
two inoffensive men in Dublin, and we could never censure the
wish; for justice ought to he rendered to the evil as well as to
the good. Besides, the church of God is so useful, so beautiful,
so innocent of harm, so fraught with good, that those who do her
wrong are wronging all mankind and deserve to be treated as the
enemies of the human race. Study a chapter from the "Book
of Martyrs", and see if you do not feel inclined to read an
imprecatory Psalm over Bishop Bonner and Bloody Mary. It may be
that some wretched nineteenth century sentimentalist will blame
you: if so, read another over him.
Verse 6. Let them be as the grass upon the
housetops, which withereth afore it groweth up. Grass on the
housetop is soon up and soon down. It sprouts in the heat, finds
enough nutriment to send up a green blade, and then it dies away
before it reaches maturity, because it has neither earth nor
moisture sufficient for its proper development. Before it grows
up it dies; it needs not to be plucked up, for it hastens to
decay of itself. Such is and such ought to be the lot of the
enemies of God's people. Transient is their prosperity; speedy
is their destruction. The height of their position, as it
hastens their progress, so it hurries their doom. Had they been
lower in station they had perhaps been longer in being.
"Soon ripe, soon rotten", is an old proverb. Soon
plotting and soon rotting, is a version of the old adage which
will suit in this place. We have seen grass on the rustic thatch
of our own country cottages which will serve for an illustration
almost as well as that which comes up so readily on the flat
roofs and domes of eastern habitations. The idea is—they make
speed to success, and equal speed to failure. Persecutors are
all sound and fury, flash and flame; but they speedily
vanish—more speedily than is common to men. Grass in the field
withers, but not so speedily as grass on the housetops. Without
a mower the tufts of verdure perish from the roofs, and so do
opposers pass away by other deaths than fall to the common lot
of men; they are gone, and none is the worse. If they are missed
at all, their absence is never regretted. Grass on the housetop
is a nonentity in the world: the house is not impoverished when
the last blade is dried up: and, even so, the opposers of Christ
pass away, and none lament them. One of the fathers said of the
apostate emperor Julian, "That little cloud will soon be
gone"; and so it was. Every sceptical system of philosophy
has much the same history; and the like may be said of each
heresy. Poor, rootless things, they are and are not: they come
and go, even though no one rises against them. Evil carries the
seeds of dissolution within itself. So let it be.
Verse 7. Wherewith the mower filleth not his hand;
nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom. When with his sickle
the husbandman would cut down the tufts, he found nothing to lay
hold upon: the grass promised fairly enough, but there was no
fulfilment, there was nothing to cut or to carry, nothing for
the hand to grasp, nothing for the lap to gather. Easterners
carry their corn in their bosoms, but in this case there was
nothing to bear home. Thus do the wicked come to nothing. By
God's just appointment they prove a disappointment. Their fire
ends in smoke; their verdure turns to vanity; their flourishing
is but a form of withering. No one profits by them, least of all
are they profitable to themselves. Their aim is bad, their work
is worse, their end is worst of all.
Verse 8. Neither do they which go by say, The
blessing of the LORD be upon you: we bless you in the name of
the LORD. In harvest times men bless each other in the name
of the Lord; but there is nothing in the course and conduct of
the ungodly man to suggest the giving or receiving of a
benediction. Upon a survey of the sinner's life from beginning
to end, we feel more inclined to weep than to rejoice, and we
feel bound rather to wish him failure than success. We dare not
use pious expressions as mere compliments, and hence we dare not
wish God speed to evil men lest we be partakers of their evil
deeds. When persecutors are worrying the saints, we cannot say,
"The blessing of the Lord be upon you." When they
slander the godly and oppose the doctrine of the cross, we dare
not bless them in the name of the Lord. It would be infamous to
compromise the name of the righteous Jehovah by pronouncing his
blessing upon unrighteous deeds. See how godly men are roughly
ploughed by their adversaries, and yet a harvest comes of it
which endures and produces blessing; while the ungodly, though
they flourish for a while and enjoy a complete immunity,
dwelling, as they think, quite above the reach of harm, are
found in a short time to have gone their way and to have left no
trace behind. Lord, number me with thy saints. Let me share
their grief if I may also partake of their glory. Thus would I
make this Psalm my own, and magnify thy name, because thine
afflicted ones are not destroyed, and thy persecuted ones are
not forsaken.
EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS
Whole Psalm. In the "degrees" of Christian
virtue the Psalm corresponds to the tenth step, which is
patience in adversity.—H. T. Armfield.
Whole Psalm. The following incident in connection with
the glorious return of the Vaudois under Henri Arnaud is related
in Muston's "Israel of the Alps":—"After these
successes the gallant patriots took an oath of fidelity to each
other, and celebrated divine service in one of their own
churches, for the first time since their banishment. The
enthusiasm of the moment was irrepressible; they chanted the
seventy-fourth Psalm to the clash of arms; and Henri Arnaud,
mounting the pulpit with a sword in one hand and a Bible in the
other, preached from the Hundred and twenty-ninth Psalm, and
once more declared, in the face of heaven, that he would never
resume his pastoral office in patience and peace, until he
should witness the restoration of his brethren to their ancient
and rightful settlements."
Verse 1. Many a time have they afflicted me from my
youth. 1. How old these afflictions are: "From
my youth." Aye, from my infancy, birth and conception.
2. There is the frequency and iteration of these
afflictions. They were oft and many: "many a
time." 3. There is the grievousness of these
afflictions, expressed by a comparison. "The plowers plowed
upon my back: they made long their furrows." So these were
old afflictions—from her youth. They were many a time:
more times than can be numbered. And then they were grievous,
even like iron ploughs, drawing deep and long furrows on their
back.—Alexander Henderson.
Verse 1. Many a time have they afflicted me,
etc. God had one Son, and but one Son, without sin; but never
any without sorrow. We may be God's children, and yet still
under persecution; his Israel, and afflicted from our youth up.
We may feel God's hand as a Father upon us when he strikes us as
well as when he strokes us. When he strokes us, it is lest we
faint under his hand; and when he strikes us, it is that we
should know his hand.—Abraham Wright (1611-1690), in
"A Practical Commentary upon the Psalms."
Verse 1. They. The persecutors deserve not a
name. The rich man is not named (as Lazarus is) because not
worthy: Lu 16:1-31 "They shall be written in the
earth": Jer 17:13.—John Trapp.
Verse 1. They. In speaking of the enemies of
Israel simply by the pronoun "they", without
being more specific, the Psalmist aggravates the greatness of
the evil more than if he had expressly named the Assyrians or
the Egyptians. By not specifying any particular class of foes,
he tacitly intimates that the world is filled with innumerable
bands of enemies, whom Satan easily arms for the destruction of
good men, his object being that new wars may arise continually
on every side. History certainly bears ample testimony that the
people of God had not to deal with a few enemies, but that they
were assaulted by almost the whole world; and further, that they
were molested not only by external foes, but also by those of an
internal kind, by such as professed to belong to the Church.—John
Calvin.
Verse 1. They afflicted me. Why are these
afflictions of the righteous? Whence is it that he who has given
up his Son to death for them, should deny them earthly
blessings? Why is faith a mourner so frequently here below, and
with all that heroic firmness in her aspect, and hope of glory
in her eye, why needs she to be painted with so deep a sorrow on
her countenance, and the trace of continual tears on her check?
First, we reply, for her own safety. Place religion out
of the reach of sorrow, and soon she would pine and perish. God
is said to choose his people in the furnace, because they most
often choose him there. It is ever from the cross that the most
earnest "My God" proceeds, and never is the cry heard
but he speeds forth at its utterance, who once hung there, to
support, to comfort, and to save. As it is only in affliction
God is sought, so by many it is only in affliction God is
known. This, one of the kings of these worshippers of the Temple
found. "When Manasseh was brought to affliction, then
he knew that the Lord he was God": 2Ch 33:12-13.
But, further, it is only by affliction we ourselves are
known. What is the source of that profound and obstinate
indifference to divine truth which prevails among men of the
world, except the proud conviction that they may dispense with
it? It is only when they are crushed as the worm they are made
to feel that the dust is their source; only when earthly props
are withdrawn will they take hold of that arm of omnipotence
which Jesus offers, and which he has offered so long in vain.
While men know themselves, they know their sin also in
affliction. What is the natural course and experience of the
unbelieving of mankind? Transgression, remorse, and then
forgetfulness; new transgression, new sorrow, and again
forgetfulness. How shall this carelessness be broken? How
convince them that they stand in need of a Saviour as the first
and deepest want of their being, and that they can only secure
deliverance from wrath eternal by a prompt and urgent
application to him? By nothing so effectually as by affliction.
God's children, who had forgotten him, arise and go to their
Father when thus smitten by the scourge of sorrow; and no sooner
is the penitent "Father, I have sinned" spoken,
than they are clasped in his arms, and safe and happy in his
love.
It is, further, by affliction that the world is known
to God's children. God's great rival is the world. The lust of
the flesh, pleasure; the lust of the eye, desire; the pride of
life, the longing to be deemed superior to those about
us,—comprise everything man naturally covets. Give us ease,
honour, distinction, and all life's good will seem obtained. But
what wilt thou do, when he shall judge thee? This is a
question fitted to alarm the happiest of the children of
prosperity. What so frequently and effectually shows the
necessity of piety as the sharp teachings of affliction? They
show what moralists and preachers never could, that riches
profit not in the day of death, that pleasures most fully
enjoyed bring no soothing to the terrors which nearness to
eternity presents, and that friends, however affectionate,
cannot plead for and save us at the bar of God. "Miserable
comforters are they all", and it is for the very purpose of
inspiring this conviction, along with a belief that it is Jesus
alone who can comfort in the hour of need, that affliction is
sent to God's children.—Robert Nisbet.
Verse 1. From my youth. The first that ever
died, died for religion; so early came martyrdom into the
world.—John Trapp.
Verses 1-2.
1. The visible Church from the beginning of the world is one
body, and, as it were, one man, growing up from infancy to riper
age; for so speaketh the church here: Many a time have they
afflicted me from my youth.
2. The wicked enemies of the church, they also are one body,
one adverse army, from the beginning of the world continuing war
against the church: "Many a time have they afflicted me
from my youth."
3. As the former injuries done to the church are owned by the
church, in after ages, as done against the same body, so also
the persecution of former enemies is imputed and put upon the
score of present persecutors: "Many a time have they
afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say."
4. New experience of persecution, when they call to mind the
exercise of the church in former ages, serves much for
encouragement and consolation in troubles: "Many a time
have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel mow say."
5. Albeit this hath been the endeavour of the wicked in all
ages to destroy the church, yet God hath still preserved her
iron age to age: Yet they have not prevailed.—David
Dickson.
Verses 1-2. When the prophet says twice, "They
have afflicted me", "they have afflicted me",
the repetition is not superfluous, it being intended to teach us
that the people of God had not merely once or twice to enter the
conflict, but that their patience had been tried by continual
exercises.—John Calvin.
Verse 2. Many a time, etc. The Christian Church
may adopt the language of the Hebrew Church: "Many a time
have they afflicted me from my youth: yet they have not
prevailed against me." What afflictions were endured by the
Christian Church from her youth up! How feeble was that youth!
How small the number of the apostles to whom our Lord gave his
gospel in charge! How destitute were they of human learning, of
worldly influence, of secular power! To effect their
destruction, and to frustrate their object—the glory of God
and the salvation of men—the dungeon and the mine, the rack
and the gibbet, were all successively employed. The ploughmen
ploughed their back, and made long their furrows. Their property
was confiscated; their persons were imprisoned; their civil
rights were taken from them; their heads rolled on the scaffold;
their bodies were consumed at the burning pile; they were
thrown, amidst the ringing shouts of the multitude, to the wild
beasts of the amphitheatre. Despite, however, of every
opposition, our holy religion took root and grew upward. Not all
the fury of ten persecutions could exterminate it from the
earth. The teeth of wild beasts could not grind it to powder;
the fire could not burn it; the waters could not drown it; the
dungeon could not confine it. Truth is eternal, like the great
God from whose bosom it springs, and therefore it cannot be
destroyed. And because Christianity is the truth, and no lie,
her enemies have never prevailed against her.—M. M'Michael.
Verse 2. Yet they have not prevailed against me.
The words are the same as in Ge 32:28. The blessing won by
Jacob, when he wrestled with the angel, remained on his
descendants. During the long night of the Captivity the faithful
had wrestled in faithful prayer; now the morning had appeared,
and Israel was raised to a higher stage of privilege.—W.
Kay.
Verse 2. Yet they have not prevailed against me.
Israel prevailed with God in wrestling with him, and therefore
it is that he prevails with men also. If so be that we will
wrestle with God for a blessing, and prevail with him, then we
need not to fear but we shall wrestle the enemies out of it
also. If we be the people of God, and persist in wrestling
against his enemies, we need not fear but that we shall be
victorious.—Alexander Henderson.
Verse 3. The plowers plowed, etc. There does
not seem to be any need to look for an interpretation of this in
scourging, or any other bodily infliction of pain; it seems to
be "a figurative mode of expressing severe
oppression." Roberts informs us that when, in the East, a
man is in much trouble through oppressors, he says, "How
they plough me and turn me up."—Ingram Cobbin,
1839.
Verse 3. The plowers plowed, etc. The great
Husbandman who owns this plough (at least by whose permission
this plough goes), is God. Not only is it God who makes your
common ploughs to gang, and sends the gospel into a land, but it
is God also who disposes and overrules this same plough of
persecution. For without his license the plough cannot be yoked;
and being yoked, cannot enter to gang till he direct; and he
tempers the irons, so that they cannot go one inch deeper than
he thinks meet. When he thinks it time to quit work, then
presently he cuts their cords, so that they cannot go once about
after he thinks it time to quit work. Albeit when they yoke,
they resolve to have all the land upside down, yet he will let
them plough no more of it than he sees meet. Now for the
ploughmen of this plough, they are Satan and the evil angels;
they hold the plough, and are goad men to it; and they yoke in
the oxen into the plough, and drive them up with their goads.
And they have a sort of music also, which they whistle into
their ears, to make them go the faster; and that is the
allurements and provocations of the world. And for the oxen who
draw into this plough, it may be princes when they turn
persecutors of the kirk; it may be prelates; it may be
politicians in the world: these are the oxen, Satan and the ill
spirits inciting them, and stirring them up to go forward in
their intended course. Then consider here that the plough and
the ploughmen and oxen go about as God thinks meet; but what is
it that they are doing in the meantime? Nothing else but
preparing the ground for seed, and so the Lord employs them to
prepare his people better to receive the seed of his word and of
his Spirit.—Alexander Henderson.
Verse 3.—God fails not to sow blessings in the
furrows, which the plowers plow upon the back of the church.—Jeremy
Taylor, 1613-1667.
Verse 3. The plowers plowed upon my back: they made
long their furrows. When the Lord Jesus Christ was in his
suffering state, and during his passion, these words here
predicted of him were most expressly realized. Whilst he
remained in the hands of the Roman soldiers they stript him of
his raiment; they bound him with cords to a pillar; they flogged
him. This was so performed by them, that they made ridges in his
back and sides: they tore skin and flesh, and made him bare even
to the bone, so that his body was like a ploughed field; the
gashes made in it were like ridges made in a ploughed field;
these were on his back. "The plowers plowed upon my
back: they made long their furrows." Whilst every part
of our Lord's sorrows and sufferings is most minutely set forth
in the sacred hymns, Psalms, and songs, contained in what we
style the Book of Psalms, yet we shall never comprehend what our
most blessed Lord, in every part of his life, and in his passion
and death, underwent for us: may the Lord the Spirit imprint
this fresh expression used on this subject effectually upon us.
Our Lord's words here are very expressive of the violence of his
tormentors and their rage against him, and of the wounds and
torments they had inflicted on him. What must the feelings of
our Lord have been when they made such furrows on his back, that
it was all furrowed and welted with such long wounds, that it
was more like a ploughed field than anything else. Blessings on
him for his grace and patience, it is "with his stripes we
are healed."—Samuel Eyles Pierce.
Verse 3. They made long their furrows. The
apparent harshness of this figure will disappear if it be
considered to refer to severe public scourgings. To those who
have been so unhappy as to witness such scourgings this allusion
will then appear most expressive. The long wales or wounds which
the scourge leaves at each stroke may most aptly be compared
either to furrows or (as the original admits) to the ridges
between the furrows. The furrows made by the plough
in the East are very superficial, and (although straight) are
usually carried to a great length, the fields not being enclosed
as in this country.—John Kitto, in "The Pictorial
Bible."
Verse 4. The LORD is righteous: he hath cut asunder
the cords of the wicked; i.e., he has put an end to their
domination and tyranny over us. In the Hebrew word which is
rendered "cords" there is a reference to the harness
with which the oxen were fastened to the plough; and so to the involved
machinations and cruelties of the enemy. The Hebrew
word properly denotes thick twisted cords;figuratively,
intertwined wickedness; Mic 7:8. "The cords of the
wicked", therefore, signify their power, dominion,
tyranny, wickedness, and violence. These cords God is said "to
have cut", so that he should have made an end; and,
therefore "to have cut" for ever, so that they
should never be reunited.—Hermann Venema.
Verse 4. He hath cut asunder the cords of the
wicked. The enemies' power has been broken; God has cut
asunder the cords of the wicked, has cut their gears, their
traces, and so spoiled their ploughing; has cut their scourges,
and so spoiled their lashing; has cut the bands of union, by
which they were combined together; he has cut the bands of
captivity, in which they held God's people. God has many ways of
disabling Wicked men to do the mischief they design against his
church, and shaming their counsels.—Matthew Henry.
Verse 4. He hath cut asunder the cords of the
wicked. He repeateth the same praise of God in delivering
his church from oppression of the enemy, under the similitude of
cutting the cords of the plough, which tilleth up another man's
field. Whence learn, 1. The enemies of the church do no more
regard her than they do the earth under their feet, and do seek
to make their own advantage of her, as usurpers use to do in
possessing and labouring of another man's field. "The
plowers plowed upon my back." 2. The Lord useth to
suffer his enemies to break up the fallow ground of his people's
proud and stiff hearts with the plough of persecution, and to
draw deep and long furrows on them: "They made long
their furrows." 3. What the enemies do against the
church the Lord maketh use of for maturing the church, which is
his field, albeit they intend no good to God's church, yet they
serve in God's wisdom to prepare the Lord's people for receiving
the seed of God's word; for the similitude speaketh of their
tilling of the church, but nothing of their sowing, for that is
reserved for the Lord himself, who is owner of the field. 4.
When the wicked have performed so much of God's husbandry as he
thinketh good to suffer them, then he stoppeth their design, and
looseth their plough. "He Hath cut asunder the cords of
the wicked."—David Dickson.
Verse 5. If any one be desirous to accept these words,
Let them be confounded and turned backward, as they
sound, he will devoutly explain the imprecation: that is to say,
it may be an imprecation of good confusion, which leads to
repentance, and of turning to God from sin: thus Bellarmine.
There is a confounding by bringing grace, glory, and turning
from the evil way. Thus some enemies and persecutors of the
Christians have been holily confounded and turned to the faith
of Christ; as St. Paul, who full of wrath and slaughter was
going to Damascus that he might afflict the believers, but was
graciously confounded on the road.—Thomas Le Blanc.
Verse 5. Let them all be confounded. Mr.
Emerson told a convention of rationalists once, in this city,
that the morality of the New Testament is scientific and
perfect. But the morality of the New Testament is that of the
Old. "Yes", you say; "but what of the imprecatory
Psalms", A renowned professor, who, as Germany thinks, has
done more for New England theology than any man since Jonathan
Edwards, was once walking in this city with a clergyman of a
radical faith, who objected to the doctrine that the Bible is
inspired, and did so on the ground of the imprecatory Psalms.
The replies of the usual kind were made; and it was presumed
that David expressed the Divine purpose in praying that his
enemies might be destroyed, and that he gave utterance only to
the natural righteous indignation of conscience against
unspeakable iniquity. But the doubter would not be satisfied.
The two came at last to a newspaper bulletin, on which the words
were written,—"Baltimore to be shelled at twelve
o'clock." "I am glad of it", said the radical
preacher; "I am glad of it." "And so am I",
said his companion, "but I hardly dare say so, for fear you
should say that I am uttering an imprecatory Psalm."—Joseph
Cook, in Boston Monday Lectures. "Transcendentalism."
Verse 5. And turned back; from pursuing their
designs and accomplishing them; as the Assyrian monarch was, who
had a hook put into his nose, and a bridle in his lips, and was
turned back by the way he came: Isa 37:29.—John Gill.
Verse 5. All those who hate Zion. Note that he
does not say, All who hate me;but "all who hate
Zion." Thus the saints are not led to this from the
desire of revenge, but from zeal for the people of God, so that
they pray for the confusion and repression of the ungodly.—Wolfgang
Musculus.
Verse 6. Let them be as the grass upon the
housetops. They are rightly compared to grass on the
housetops; for more contemptuously the Holy Ghost could not
speak of them. For this grass is such, that it soon withereth
away before the sickle be put into it. Yea, no man thinketh it
worthy to be cut down, no man regardeth it, every man suffereth
it to brag for a while, and to show itself unto men from the
housetops as though it were something when it is nothing. So the
wicked persecutors in the world, which are taken to be mighty
and terrible according to the outward show, are of all men most
contemptible. For Christians do not once think of plucking them
up or cutting them down; they persecute them not, they revenge
not their own injuries, but suffer them to increase, to brag and
glory as much as they list. For they know that they cannot abide
the violence of a vehement wind. Yea, though all things be in
quietness, yet as grass upon the housetops, by little and
little, withereth away through the heat of the sun, so tyrannies
upon small occasions do perish and soon vanish away. The
faithful, therefore, in suffering do prevail, and overcome; but
the wicked in doing are overthrown, and miserably perish, as all
the histories of all times and ages do plainly witness.—Martin
Luther.
Verse 6. Like grass upon the housetops. The
flat roofs of the Eastern houses "are plastered with a
composition of mortar, tar, ashes, and sand", in the
crevices of which grass often springs. The houses of the poor in
the country were formed of a plaster of mud and straw, where the
grass would grow still more freely: as all the images are taken
from country life, it is doubtless to country dwellings that the
poet refers.—J. J. Stewart Perowne.
Verse 6. Like grass upon the housetops. The
enemies of Zion may have an elevated position in the nation,
they may seem to promise growth, but having no root in
themselves, like the hearers on the stony ground, give no
promise of fruit. Their profession dies away and leaves no
benefit to the church, as it claims no blessing from others.—William
Wilson (1783-1873), in "The Book of Psalms, with an
Exposition."
Verse 6. Grass upon the housetops. In the
morning the master of the house laid in a stock of earth, which
was carried up, and spread evenly on the top of the house, which
is flat. The whole roof is thus formed of mere earth, laid on
and rolled hard and flat. On the top of every house is a large
stone roller, for the purpose of hardening and flattening this
layer of rude soil, so that the rain may not penetrate; but upon
this surface, as may be supposed, grass and weeds grow freely,
but never come to maturity. It is to such grass the Psalmist
alludes as useless and bad.—William Jowett, in
"Christian Researches in Syria and the Holy Land",
1825.
Verse 7. The mower filleth not his hand, etc.
The grain was rather pulled than cut, and as each handful was
taken the reaper gave it a flourishing swing up into his
bosom.—Mrs. Finn, in "Home in the Holy Land",
1866.
Verse 7. He that bindeth sheaves his bosom. A
practice prevails in hot climates of sending out persons into
the woods and other wild places to collect the grass, which
would otherwise be wasted; and it is no uncommon tiling in the
evening to see groups of grass cutters in the market, waiting to
dispose of their bundles or sheaves, which are often so large
that one is disposed to wonder how they could have been conveyed
from the woods upon one man's shoulders.—Maria Calcott, in
"A Scripture Herbal," 1842.
HINTS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHER
Verse 1. Affliction as it comes to saints from men of
the world.
1. Reason for it—enmity of the serpent's seed.
2. Modes of its display—persecution, ridicule, slander,
disdain, etc.
3. Comfort under it. So persecuted they the prophets: so the
Master. It is their nature. They cannot kill the soul. It is but
for a time, etc.
Verses 1-2.
1. How far persecution for righteousness' sake may go.
a) It may be great: "afflicted",
"afflicted."
b) It may be frequent: "Many a time."
c) It may be early: "From my youth."
2. How far it cannot go.
a) It may seem to prevail.
b) It may prevail in some degree.
c) It cannot ultimately prevail.
d) It shall cause that to which it is opposed increasingly to
prevail.—G. R.
Verses 1-4. Israel persecuted but not forsaken.
Persecution.
1. Whence it came: "they."
2. How it came: "Many a time", "from my
youth", severely: "afflicted",
"ploughed."
3. Why it came. Human and Satanic hatred, and Divine
permission.
4. What came of it: "not prevailed"—to destroy,
to drive to despair, to lead to sin. God's righteousness
manifested in upholding his people, baffling their foes, etc.
Verses 1-4. The enemies of God's church.
1. Their violence: "The plowers plowed", etc.
2. Their persistency: "Many a time...from my youth."
3. Their failure: "Yet they have not prevailed."
4. Their great opponent: "The Lord...hath cut
asunder."
—J. F.
Verse 3.
1. Literally fulfilled.
a) In Christ. Mt 27:26 20:19 Mr 15:15 Lu 18:33 Joh 19:1.
b) In his followers. Mt 10:17 Ac 16:23 2Co 6:5 2Co 11:23-24 Heb
11:36. And frequently in subsequent persecutions.
2. Figuratively. In secret calumnies both in Christ and his
followers.—G. R.
Verse 4. Israel's song of triumph.
1. The Lord is righteous in permitting these afflictions to
come upon his people.
2. He is righteous in keeping his promise of deliverance to
his people.
3. He is righteous in visiting the enemies of his people with
judgment.—W. H. J. P.
Verse 5.
1. An inexcusable hatred described: "hate Zion",
God's church and cause. For,
a) Her people are righteous.
b) Her faith is a gospel.
c) Her mission is peace.
d) Her very existence is the world's preservation.
2. An inveterate sinfulness indicated: "Them that hate
Zion." For, whatever moral virtues they may boast of, they
must be,
a) Enemies to the human race.
b) In defiant opposition to God.
c) Perversely blind, as Saul, or radically vile.
d) Devil like.
3. An instinctive feeling of a good man expressed: "Let
them all be", etc. Prompted by,
a) His love to God.
b) Love to man.
c) Love to righteousness. Hence, its existence is in itself a
pledge that the righteous God will respect and comply with
it.—J. F.
Verses 5-8.
1. The characters described.
a) They do not love Zion. They say not, "Lord, I have
loved the habitation of thine house", etc.
b) They hate Zion—both its King and its subjects.
2. Their prosperity: "As the grass", etc.
3. Their end.
a) Shame: "Let them be confounded."
b) Loss: "Turned back."
c) Disappointment. No mowing; no reaping.
d) Dishonour. Unblessed by others as well as in themselves.—G.
R.
Verses 6-9. The wicked flourishing and perishing.
1. Eminent in position.
2. Envied in prosperity.
3. Evanescent in duration.
4. Empty as to solidity.
5. Excepted from blessing.