The Lord is high, yet he beholdeth the lowly :

And the proud he knoweth afar off.

Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou wilt revive me: Thou wilt stretch forth thine hand against the wrath of mine enemies,

And thy right hand shall save me.

The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me
Thy mercy, O Lord, endureth for ever:

Forsake not the works of thine hands.

Israel is bold through God-given strength. He is both proud and humble. Proud towards his foes and persecutors, for he is fearless unto death; humble towards God, for even his courage is not his own.

PILGRIMAGE SONGS

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CHAPTER VI

PSALMS OF PILGRIMAGE

§1. The Songs of Ascents.-Three groups of Psalms have passed before us. Prayers in Affliction; Peaceful Communings with God; Songs of Thanksgiving. There shall now follow a group marked out and distinguished in the Psalter itself by a special title or heading. In the Authorized Version the Psalms of this group are called Songs of Degrees; in the Revised Version they are called Songs of Ascents. The Hebrew word is 'Ma'aloth,' which may also be rendered (songs of) goings up,' or '(songs of) the pilgrimages.' The meaning of the term is obscure, but the majority of scholars regard these songs as having been composed for pilgrims who came up for worship and prayer to the Temple at Jerusalem. Professor Robertson-Smith, for instance, writes: According to the Mishnah and other Jewish traditions, these Psalms were sung by the Levites, at the Feast of Tabernacles, on the fifteen steps or degrees that led from the women's to the men's court of the Temple. But when we read the Psalms themselves, we see that originally they must have been sung not by Levites but by the laymen who came up to Jerusalem at the great feasts; and the word which Jewish tradition renders by "degree" or "step" ought rather to be translated "going up" to Jerusalem, so that the Songs of Degrees ought rather to be called "Pilgrimage Songs." But now the curious thing is that, according to the laws of Hebrew grammar, the title prefixed to each of these hymns must be translated not "a song of pilgrimage," but "the songs of pilgrimage." In other words, each title is properly the collective title of the whole fifteen Psalms, which must once have formed a separate hymnal for the use of pilgrims; and when the collection was taken into the greater Psalter, this general title was set at the head of each of the hymns.' On the other hand, as Professor Wellhausen observes, many of the hymns seem to have nothing

to do with pilgrimages, and to be unsuitable for such occasions. "The meaning of the expression (Songs of Ascents) cannot be regarded as finally determined.'

It did not seem right to separate the songs of this historic hymnal, so I have kept them together, and shall quote them (omitting only one) in the order in which we find them. I place them as my fourth group, because if one were to separate them, they could be distributed between the three previous groups, five of them falling to group one, five to group two, and four to group three. Their date is uncertain, but they probably belong to the late Persian and early Greek periods.

§ 2. The one hundred and twentieth Psalm.-The first pilgrimage song (cxx) depicts the community of Israel as suffering from hostile neighbours, but these 'neighbours' are not necessarily foreigners. Many may have been Israelites. But the key to the special circumstances is lost' (Cheyne).

In my distress I cried unto the Lord,

And he heard me.

Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips,

From the deceitful tongue.

What shall he give unto thee,

And what shall he add unto thee, thou deceitful tongue? (?) Sharpened arrows of a warrior,

With coals of broom. (?)

Woe is me, that I sojourn in Meshech,

That I dwell beside the tents of Kedar!

My soul hath too long dwelt

With him that hateth peace.

I am for peace, but when I speak
They are for war. (?)

A little Psalm full of obscurities. 'What shall he give unto thee?' The translation is disputed. Apparently the meaning is that God is asked to requite the 'deceitful tongue' in its own coin. The tongue of the wicked is sharp as the arrow and works ruin like fire. May the arrow and the fire destroy it! As to 'coals of broom,' Professor Cheyne says that the Bedawins of Sinai still burn this very plant into a charcoal which throws out the most intense heat.' Meshech (i.e. tribes between the Black and the Caspian Sea) and Kedar (i.e. nomad tribes of North Arabia) perhaps symbolize the malignant neighbours of the Jews at home.'

THE DIVINE KEEPER

547

§ 3. Psalm one hundred and twenty-one: 'Levavi oculos meos in montes.'-The second song (cxxi) can be its own interpreter. This famous religious lyric speaks to every heart. The hills' are those of Jerusalem, above which the Lord dwelleth.' They are 'the boundaries of the horizon, the limit beyond which the eye cannot pierce.' A belief in the hurtful influence of the moon under certain conditions was widely spread throughout antiquity. A similar fancy still prevails in many places. The sun hurts the body; the moon the mind.

I lift up mine eyes unto the hills:
Whence cometh my help?

My help cometh from the Lord,
Who made heaven and earth.

He will not suffer thy foot to be moved:
He that keepeth thee will not slumber.
Behold, he that keepeth Israel

Doth neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is thy keeper:

The Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day,

Nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep thee from all evil :

He will keep thy soul.

The Lord will keep thy going out and thy coming in
From this time forth, and even for evermore.

I will give here, so that we may dwell a little longer on this lovely Psalm, the translation of it by Richard Rolle of Hampole. I quote from Mr. Bramley's edition. Rolle died in 1349.

I liftid myn eghyn in hillis, whethen help cum till me. My help of the Lord, that made heven and erth. Gif he noght in styrynge thi fote, na slomyre he that kepis the. Lo he sall noght slomyre na he sall slepe, that kepis Israel. The Lord the kepis, the Lord thi hilynge on thi right hand. Be day the sunn sall noght bren the, na the mone be nyght. Lord kepis the fra all ill, Lord kepe thi saule. Lord kepe thin ingange and thin outgange, fra this now and in till warld.

Rolle's version is a word-for-word rendering of the Vulgate, and hardly less so is Wycliffe's.

I reiside myn ighen to the hillis, fro whannus help schal come to me. Myn help is of the Lord, that made hevene and erthe. The Lord gyve

not thi foot in to moving, nether he nappe that kepith thee. Lo, he schal not nappe, nether slepe, that kepith Israel. The Lord kepith thee; the Lord is thi proteccioun above thi right hond. The sunne schal not brenne thee bi dai, nether the moone bi nyght. The Lord kepe thee fro al yvel; the Lord kepe thi soul. The Lord kepe thi goyng in and thi goyng out, fro this tyme now and into the world.

Perhaps one of the most successful of the innumerable verse paraphrases of this Psalm is that recently published in the Jewish Year.

Unto the hills I lift mine eyes,

Whence comes my help, my help that lies
In God, enthroned above the skies,

Who made the heavens and earth to be.

He guides thy foot o'er mountain steeps,
He slumbers not, thy soul who keeps,
Behold he slumbers not, nor sleeps,
Of Israel the guardian he.

He is thy rock, thy shield and stay,
On thy right hand a shade alway,
The sun ne'er smiteth thee by day,

The moon at night ne'er troubles thee.

The Lord will guard thy soul from sin,
Thy life from harm without, within,
Thy going out and coming in,

From this time forth eternally.

§ 4. Psalm one hundred and twenty-two.-In the next song (cxxii) the singer either represents himself as just entering the city, or he recalls the pilgrimage which is just over. In the second alternative the third line should be rendered, 'Our feet stood.' The Hebrew will bear either translation.

The meaning of the words which art built up as a city that is well compact together' (Cheyne's translation) is extremely doubtful. Professor Cheyne thinks it refers to the compactness of the city itself, shut in by its ravines and ramparts. According to Wellhausen it implies that 'Jerusalem must have been destroyed not long before. The opposite to a compact city would be a city inhabited as an open country, a town without walls.'

The second stanza is an historic reminiscence. The 'thrones' are tribunals. Either the Davidic kings are referred to or princes of the royal house. The latter shared the judicial function with the king' (Cheyne). But other scholars translate the verbs by the present tense, and suppose that the 'tribes of the Lord are the Jews outside Jerusalem, scattered about Palestine or elsewhere in the dispersion.' The thrones of judgement would then be the Sanhedrin, the supreme court of justice.