THE VOICE OF THE LORD

CHAPTER X

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PSALMS OF PRAISE

§ 1. The twenty-ninth Psalm: 'Afferte Domino.'-My last group of Psalms is now before us. It is the group containing those Psalms which praise in various ways and for various reasons the goodness and glory of God. And among these I will place first two or three beautiful Psalms which sing the praise of God in nature, and so link on to the first part of the nineteenth Psalm with which our last group ended.

My first Psalm in this group celebrates the majesty of God as revealed in the storm. To all races thunder and lightning have seemed to be the special operation of the divine powers, but to the Psalmist the sensuous images which he applies to God are consciously metaphorical. Some scholars believe that this twentyninth Psalm was imitated by the writer of the ninety-sixth.

It is, however, by no means certain that the Psalm is merely a description of a storm and of the marvels of nature. It is quite possible that, like the 'accession Psalms,' the song now before us celebrates the great 'judgement' which marks the opening of the Messianic age. The storm is the prelude to the Divine Assize which is to follow. Finally, God takes his seat as supreme sovereign and judge. Israel will at last be rescued from all its troubles.

Give unto the Lord, O ye sons of God,

Give unto the Lord glory and strength.
Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name ;
Worship the Lord in hallowed array.

The voice of the Lord is upon the waters:
The God of glory thundereth:

The Lord is upon great waters.

The voice of the Lord is powerful;

The voice of the Lord is full of majesty.

The voice of the Lord breaketh the cedars;
Yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars of Lebanon.
He maketh them also to skip like a calf

;

Lebanon and Sirion like a wild ox in its youth. The voice of the Lord cleaveth [the rocks];

[The voice of the Lord sendeth forth] flames of fire. The voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness;

The Lord shaketh the wilderness of Kadesh.
The voice of the Lord pierceth the oaks,
And strippeth the forest bare:

But in his temple every one saith: Glory!
The Lord sat enthroned at the Flood;
Yea, the Lord sitteth as king for ever.
The Lord will give strength to his people,

The Lord will bless his people with peace.

'Sons of God' are the angels. The thunderstorm comes up from the sea.

'Cleaveth the rocks.' Some words seem to have fallen out: those in brackets are supplied conjecturally by Wellhausen.

'The Lord sat enthroned at the Flood.' A difficult verse, which, as Professor Cheyne has shown, is capable of four different translations. As rendered above, the meaning must be, God showed or revealed his kingship at the Flood, and God has continued his kingship from then till now, and will continue it for all time to come. But the whole reference to the story of the Flood is very sudden and inappropriate. Professor Cheyne thinks the Hebrew word mabul can be here translated 'storm,' and translates: 'At the storm the Lord sat enthroned; the Lord is enthroned as king for ever'; and Professor Wellhausen, who adopts the idea of the grand assize, renders: The Lord has taken his judgement-seat to bring on a deluge, and as king he is throned to all eternity.'

"The Lord will bless his people with peace.' After a storm comes the calm: true in 'nature' and true in human life and experience. The storm may even give birth to peace: it may, as we say, 'clear the air'; and the greater the storm, the greater the peace. And the storm may strengthen. It may give knowledge. We may learn to 'know the Lord' through tempest; to render to the Divine Ruler the 'glory due unto his name.'

§ 2. The eighth Psalm: Domine, Dominus noster.'-With Psalms xix and xxix the commentators frequently associate Psalm viii, which connects nature with man. To the vastness and majesty of nature such a frail creature as man would seem

THE GREATNESS OF MAN

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to stand in contrast. Nevertheless it has pleased God that man should be even more wonderful than the greatest works of God's hands. Thus the Psalmist finds in man as the ruler of earth, a further theme in which to celebrate the divine glory. Man is God's best witness and praise. His greatness, not his smallness, testifies to the divine majesty. The Psalmist's point of view should be compared with an opposite conception in the Book of Job, where the hero seems to quote or parody the very words of our Psalmist (p. 137).

O Lord, our Lord,

How glorious is thy name in all the earth!

. thy glory upon the heavens.

Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou founded

a power

Because of thine enemies.

That thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.

When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers,
The moon and the stars, which thou hast established,
What is man, that thou art mindful of him,

And the son of man, that thou watchest over him?
For thou hast made him little lower than the angels,
And hast crowned him with glory and honour.

Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands;

Thou hast put all things under his feet:

All sheep and oxen,

Yea, and the beasts of the field;

The birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,

Which pass through the paths of the seas.
O Lord, our Lord,

How glorious is thy name in all the earth!

The Hebrew in the third line is partly untranslatable.

'Out of the mouth,' &c. A most obscure verse. Are the babes real babes or a metaphor (as Professor Cheyne thinks) for 'poor and humble believers'? Israel's praises are an adequate bulwark against the enemy. This seems very dubious; not less so the view that the glory of God is revealed by the inarticulate speech of infants, which is in itself a confutation of those who would deny God. Such a thought seems totally out of place in this

connexion. A baby, with all the promise and potency of manhood or womanhood concealed within it, is indeed a divine marvel, but a clearer expression of such a thought would be necessary when so suddenly introduced. Baethgen would partly combine both interpretations. If Israel, and even the youngest and smallest in Israel, proclaim God's praise, this will serve to put an end to paganism which has not yet acknowledged God's glory. Even the heathen will at last not be able to resist the impression of this glory, so revealed to them.' Wellhausen's note runs: 'The continued adoration of God is ensured by the next generation. Enemies trouble themselves in vain.'

Compare with this Psalm the praise of man that falls from the lips of Hamlet: 'What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals!'

The greatness of man is truer than his littleness. For is he not endowed with reason, and capable through reason of knowledge, of beauty and of love?

§3. The one hundred and third Psalm.-The greatest of the Nature Psalms' is the one hundred and fourth. But it cannot be separated from its immediate predecessor, for the two form part of a great hymn to providence,' in the first division of which the author speaks in the name of Israel, in the second, in that of the world' (Cheyne). Both Psalms have already been quoted in Part I. But they, no less than the few others to be also found there, well deserve repetition. I place Psalm ciii first. It is sometimes argued that the verbs in the first stanza, and the corresponding ones in the second and third, should be rendered in the perfect instead of in the present, and interpreted as referring to some special national deliverance (e.g. the return from Babylon). But more probably the thought is general. Professor Wellhausen says: This Psalm does not owe its origin to any particular historical occurrence, but it has an historic background. It is full of thanksgiving for the forgiveness of iniquity, that is, for the deliverance of the community out of great peril, for the renewal of youth in the time of old age.' We are able to give to this exquisite Psalm a meaning still more universal, and to interpret it almost exclusively of the inward or spiritual life of all mankind.

Bless the Lord, O my soul:

And all that is within me, bless his holy name.

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Bless the Lord, O my soul,

Who forgiveth all thine iniquities;

And forget not all his benefits:

Who healeth all thy diseases;

Who redeemeth thy life from the pit,

Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies;

Who satisfieth thy desire with good things;

So that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.

The Lord executeth righteousness

And judgement for all that are oppressed. He made known his ways unto Moses,

His acts unto the children of Israel. The Lord is merciful and gracious,

Slow to anger, and plenteous in lovingkindness.
He will not always chide:

Neither will he keep his anger for ever.
He doth not deal with us after our sins;
Nor requite us according to our iniquities.

For as the heaven is high above the earth,

So great is his mercy toward them that fear him. As far as the east is from the west,

So far doth he remove our transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children,

So the Lord pitieth them that fear him.

For he knoweth our frame;

He remembereth that we are dust.

As for man, his days are as grass:

As a flower of the field, so he blossometh.

When the wind passeth over it-it is gone;

And the place thereof shall know it no more.

But the lovingkindness of the Lord is from everlasting to

everlasting,

And his righteousness unto children's children;

To such as keep his covenant,

And to those that remember his commandments to do them.

The Lord hath prepared his throne in the heavens ;

And his kingdom ruleth over all.