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the past. But the Psalter is instinct with vitality. It breathes and lives. Its religion was not made up to order: it was no laborious imitation of a pattern which no longer represented the real religious feelings and beliefs of its authors. The fusion between the individual and the community is complete and organic. The Psalmist does not merely speak in the name of his community for the time being he is the community, and the community for the moment is summed up and expresses itself in him.

THE TRIUMPH OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

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CHAPTER V

PSALMS OF THANKSGIVING

§1. The Present and the Future.-The Psalms which I bring together in this group under the title of Psalms of Thanksgiving are not all of one type. Some render thanks to God for actual deliverance; some, as in the first group, anticipate, and are songs of praise and gratitude for the deliverance which is yet to come. The Psalmists see the end at the beginning. For the deliverance they celebrate is always connected with the final deliverance of the Messianic or Golden Age. Any movement among the nations is sufficient to rouse their hopes and stir their expectations. Especially eager, as it would seem, were their anticipations during the conquering career of Alexander. No. wonder that the immense and sudden changes which he wrought on the map and history of the world provoked their enthusiasm and excitement. Their hopes for the speedy coming of that Golden Age of righteousness, the age in which God should be king over all the earth, and every human soul should praise him, were doomed to disappointment; but some of the hymns to which those hopes gave birth are probably still preserved to us in the Psalter. And though the Psalmists were too confident in their expectations for the immediate future, they were no whit too confident in the goodness of God and in the triumph of righteousness. Sharing this faith with them, clinging to it with all our might and main, we can also appropriate their Psalms for our own use and comfort, and find in them the expression of our own highest hopes and aspirations. For the events of the moment which produced their hymns were transmuted by the Psalmists into forms and figures that are suitable for all time. They looked at the present, and utilized it for their poetry, sub specie aeternitatis, as the philosophers would say. Their words, though prompted by or even written for special circumstances, were in manner and

expression general enough to endure through the ages. Particular events were regarded in a universal light, and thus a poem for the occasion was capable of becoming a poem for eternity. The Psalmists, true poets as so many of them were, followed unconsciously the maxim of Rückert :

'Nur wenn es Ewiges im Zeitlichen enthält,

Ist heut es für das Fest und morgen für die Welt.'

§ 2. The thirtieth Psalm: Exaltabo te, Domine.'-I include twenty-three Psalms in this group. Only two belong to the first collection, and these stand out sharply in tone and language from the rest. Of the twenty-one others, the majority fall into minor groups of their own, and are so found together in the Psalter. Thus we get the three successive Psalms xlvi to xlviii, the six Psalms xcv to c, and the six Psalms cxiii to cxviii.

Beginning with Psalm xxx, we find it difficult to decide whether it has an individual or a national signification. Is the deliverance personal to the singer, or is he the spokesman of his people? Probably the latter. The heading to the Psalm is very interesting: 'A song at the dedication of the house' (i. e. the Temple). It is tolerably certain that these words may be taken to mean that this Psalm was used at the re-dedication of the Temple by Judas Maccabeus. It still remains the Psalm for the festival of Chanukah. When it was written is doubtful. If it be a national Psalm, the distressful close of the Persian period may mark the troubles from which the career of Alexander the Great either brought or was expected to bring deliverance. There are frequent parallels in thought and language to many Psalms in the first group, which we have already heard. These the reader can find out for himself. The famous verse, 'For his anger is but for a moment,' is rendered in Coverdale's translation :

For his wrath endureth but the twinkling of an eye,

And in his pleasure is life:

Heaviness may endure for a night,

But joy cometh in the morning.

The Hebrew word which I, borrowing from the Revised Version, have rendered 'tarry' means literally to lodge,'' to pass the night as a traveller,' and thus beautifully expresses the central idea. Weeping is the passing guest, joy will come to stay.

I will extol thee, O Lord; for thou hast lifted me up,

And hast not made my foes to rejoice over me.

O Lord my God,

I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me.

'JOY COMETH IN THE MORNING'

O Lord, thou hast brought up my soul from Sheol :

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Thou hast kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit.

Sing unto the Lord, O ye his loving ones,

And give thanks to his holy name.

For his anger is but for a moment; his favour is for a lifetime:

Weeping may tarry for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.

As for me, in my prosperity I said,

'I shall never be moved.'

Lord, by thy favour thou hadst set me on strong mountains: Then didst thou hide thy face, and I was troubled.

I cried to thee, O Lord;

And unto the Lord I made supplication :

'What profit is there in my blood, if I go down to the pit? Can the dust praise thee? can it declare thy truth? Hear, O Lord, and have mercy upon me:

Lord, be thou my helper.'

Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing:
Thou hast loosed my sackcloth, and girded me with joy;
To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not
be silent;

O Lord my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever.

§ 3. The fortieth Psalm.-Psalm xl, or rather the first twelve verses of it (for a short prayer for deliverance from sore affliction seems to have been awkwardly appended to a hymn of thanksgiving), may belong to the same period as Psalm xxx. In its estimate of sacrifice it reminds us of the great fifty-first, and the no less great fiftieth Psalm, which we have yet to hear. The speaker is the true Israel, as represented by the corps d'élite of true believers.

I waited patiently for the Lord;

And he inclined unto me and heard my cry.

He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay,

And set my feet upon a rock, and made firm my steps.

And he put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God,

That many might see it and fear, and put their trust in the Lord.

Happy is the man that maketh the Lord his trust,

And hath not inclined unto the proud, or such as turn aside to lies.

Many, O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done,

And thy thoughts which are to us-ward:
None can be compared unto thee;

If I would declare and speak of them,

They are more than can be numbered.

Sacrifice and offering please thee not;

Burnt offering and sin offering thou hast not required. Open ears hast thou made for me, (?)

In the roll of the book is my duty written.

I delight to do thy will, O my God:

Yea, thy law is within my heart.

I have declared the salvation of thy righteousness in the great congregation:

Lo, I do not restrain my lips,

O Lord, thou knowest.

I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart;

I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation:

I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth from the great congregation.

So do not thou restrain thy tender mercies from me, O Lord: Let thy lovingkindness and thy truth continually pre

serve me.

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The passage about the open ears' is very obscure. The line translated In the roll of the book is my duty written' (more literally, 'In the roll of the book it is prescribed to me') seems to come awkwardly after the declaration that God has not demanded sacrifices. For the 'book' can hardly be other than the Pentateuch; at least it must include the Pentateuch, and in that book 'sacrifices' are demanded. The Psalmist is in a different position from Jeremiah, who preceded him on the same lines (Part I, p. 408). Professor Wellhausen, while holding that the book is probably the Law, thinks we can get over the difficulty by

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