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Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 94:1

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O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, show thyself.

1. God of vengeance, Jehovah,

God of vengeance, shine forth!

The Psalmist appeals to Jehovah, Who has the power and the right to punish (Deu 32:35; Nah 1:2; Rom 12:19), to manifest Himself in all the splendour of His Presence (Deu 33:2; Psa 50:2; Psa 80:1). God is El, ‘the mighty God’; and the word for vengeance is plural, denoting the completeness of the retribution which He can inflict. Cp. “God of recompences,” Jer 51:56. For the ‘anadiplosis’ cp. Psa 94:3 ; Psa 94:23, and Psa 92:9, note.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

1, 2. An appeal to Jehovah to manifest Himself as Judge of the world and Avenger of wrong.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth … – Margin, God of revenges The idea is, that it pertains to God to take vengeance, or to punish for crimes. See the notes at Rom 12:19. The appeal here is made to God in view of the crimes committed by others, and which are referred to in the subsequent part of the psalm. God is addressed as having the right to restrain and punish wicked people, and he is asked to interpose and assert that right in a case which clearly demanded it. The appeal is repeated to make it emphatic, or to denote earnestness in the petition.

Show thyself – Margin, as in Hebrew, shine forth. The meaning is, Manifest thyself; come forth as such a God; prove thy right; display thy power, and show that thou art a God opposed to crime and wrong. The same Hebrew word is used here which is found in Psa 80:1, and which is there rendered shine forth. See the notes at that passage.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Psa 94:1-23

O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth . . . show Thyself.

Persecutors and their victims

I. The awful condition of the wicked persecutor. The persecutors referred to (Psa 94:1-10) are represented as proud, speaking hard things, as workers of iniquity, as breaking in pieces the people of God, as slaying the widow and the stranger, and murdering the fatherless. Every age and country has abounded with such oppressors, they are rife even in this land of liberty.

1. They are prayed against by their godly victims (Psa 94:1-2).

2. They are understood by their godly victims, who saw in their hearts–

(1) Atheism (Psa 94:7).

(2) Brutality (Psa 94:8).

(3) Folly (Psa 94:8-10).

II. The blessed condition of their pious victims. These victims regarded their persecution–

1. As a Divine chastisement (Psa 94:12). All afflictions even when they come by the cruel persecution of men are employed by the Almighty Father as chastisements and corrections. Although He does not originate the evil He directs it and uses it for good.

2. As a Divine chastisement that would come to an end (Psa 94:13). The afflictions will not continue for ever, a long and blessed repose will ensue. The persecutors will fall into the pit which they have dug. The sinner is ever his own destroyer; with every crime he is sinking his own dark bottomless pit into which he must fall.

3. As a chastisement under which they were guaranteed Divine support. The pious victims experienced

(1) Divine help (Psa 94:17-18).

(2) Divine consolation (Psa 94:19).

4. As a Divine chastisement that would end in the ruin of their enemies (Psa 94:20-23). (Homilist.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

PSALM XCIV

An appeal to God against oppressors, 1-7.

Expostulations with the workers of iniquity, 8-11.

God’s merciful dealings with his followers, 12-15;

and their confidence in him, 16-19.

The punishment of the wicked foretold, 20-23.

NOTES ON PSALM XCIV

This Psalm has no title either in the Hebrew or Chaldee. The Vulgate, Septuagint, AEthiopic, and Arabic, have “A Psalm of David, for the fourth day of the week;” but this gives us no information on which we can rely. In three of Kennicott’s MSS. it is written as a part of the preceding. It is probably a prayer of the captives in Babylon for deliverance; and was written by the descendants of Moses, to whom some of the preceding Psalms have been attributed. It contains a description of an iniquitous and oppressive government, such as that under which the Israelites lived in Babylon.

Verse 1. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth] God is the author of retributive justice, as well as of mercy. This retributive justice is what we often term vengeance, but perhaps improperly; for vengeance with us signifies an excitement of angry passions, in order to gratify a vindictive spirit, which supposes itself to have received some real injury; whereas what is here referred to is that simple act of justice which gives to all their due.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

As thou art the supreme Judge of the world, the Patron and Protector of the righteous, and the declared enemy of all wickedness and wicked men.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

1, 2. God’s revenge is Hisjudicial infliction of righteous punishment.

show thyself(CompareMargin).

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth,…. As it does to God, and to him only; not to Heathen deities, one of which has the name of Vengeance given it, Ac 28:4, nor to Satan, the enemy and avenger, and his spiteful principalities and powers; nor to men, who are not to exercise private revenge on their fellow creatures; only to civil magistrates, to whom public revenge belongs, they being God’s viceregents, and representing him; otherwise to God only it belongs, against whom sin is committed; and he will, in his own time and way, execute it; he is “the God of revenges” e, as the words may be rendered; and this is applicable to Christ, who is the true Jehovah, and God over all: it was he that took vengeance on Sodom and Gomorrah, and rained from the Lord fire and brimstone on them; and who took vengeance on the inventions of the Israelites in the wilderness; and when he came in the flesh, he came with vengeance to destroy Satan and his works, as it was promised and prophesied he should, Isa 35:4, forty years after his death, resurrection, and ascension, he came in his power and kingdom, and took vengeance on the Jewish nation, for their unbelief and rejection of him, Lu 21:22, and at the opening of the sixth seal his wrath came upon Rome Pagan in a manner intolerable to them, for their cruel persecutions of his church and people; and the cry of the souls under the altar was much like what is uttered in this psalm; see Re 6:9, and at the time of his spiritual coming and reign he will avenge the blood of his saints on Rome Papal, or antichrist, whom he will destroy with the breath of his mouth, and the saints will be called upon to rejoice, and will rejoice, when they see the vengeance, Re 18:20 and his personal coming will be in flaming fire, to take vengeance on them that know not God, and obey not his Gospel, and when all the wicked will suffer the vengeance of eternal fire, 2Th 1:8.

O God, to whom vengeance belongeth; which is repeated to observe the certainty of it, and to express the vehement and importunate desire of the psalmist, and those he represents, that he would show himself to be so, follows:

show thyself; or “shine forth” f, as in Ps 80:1 either at his incarnation, when he appeared as the dayspring from on high; yea, as the sun of righteousness; or, in the ministry of the Gospel, the great light which shone first on the inhabitants of Judea and Galilee, and then on the Gentile world; or in his gracious presence with his people, which is expressed by causing his face to shine upon them, Ps 80:7, or in the protection of them, and destruction of their enemies; which is a showing himself strong on their behalf, an appearing to the joy of the one, and the confusion of the other; and in this manner will Christ show himself in the latter day.

e “Deus ultionum”, V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Junius Tremellius, Piscator, c. f “irradia”, Montanus “illucesce”, Junius Tremellius, Piscator “effulsit”, Cocceius “adfulge”, Michaelis.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

The first strophe prays that God would at length put a judicial restraint upon the arrogance of ungodliness. Instead of (a less frequent form of the imperative for , Ges. 53, rem. 3) it was perhaps originally written (Psa 80:2), the He of which has been lost owing to the He that follows. The plural signifies not merely single instances of taking vengeance (Eze 25:17, cf. supra Psa 18:48), but also intensively complete revenge or recompense (Jdg 11:36; 2Sa 4:8). The designation of God is similar to in Jer 51:56, and the anadiplosis is like Psa 94:3, Psa 94:23, Psa 93:1, Psa 93:3. , lift Thyself up, arise, viz., in judicial majesty, calls to mind Psa 7:7. is construed with (cf. , Psa 28:4; 59:18) as in Joe 3:4. With accidentally accord and in the epic poets.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Appeal to God against Persecutors; The Folly of Atheists and Oppressors.

1 O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, show thyself. 2 Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud. 3 LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? 4 How long shall they utter and speak hard things? and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves? 5 They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage. 6 They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless. 7 Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it. 8 Understand, ye brutish among the people: and ye fools, when will ye be wise? 9 He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see? 10 He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? he that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know? 11 The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.

In these verses we have,

I. A solemn appeal to God against the cruel oppressors of his people, Psa 94:1; Psa 94:2. This speaks terror enough to them, that they have the prayers of God’s people against them, who cry day and night to him to avenge them of their adversaries; and shall he not avenge them speedily? Luk 18:3; Luk 18:7. Observe here,

1. The titles they give to God for the encouraging of their faith in this appeal: O God! to whom vengeance belongeth; and thou Judge of the earth. We may with boldness appeal to him; for, (1.) He is judge, supreme judge, judge alone, from whom every man’s judgment proceeds. He that gives law gives sentence upon every man according to his works, by the rule of that law. He has prepared his throne for judgment. He has indeed appointed magistrates to be avengers under him (Rom. xiii. 4), but he is the avenger in chief, to whom even magistrates themselves are accountable; his throne is the last refuge (the dernier ressort, as the law speaks) of oppressed innocency. He is universal judge, not of this city or country only, but judge of the earth, of the whole earth: none are exempt from his jurisdiction; nor can it be alleged against an appeal to him in any court that it is coram non judice–before a person not judicially qualified. (2.) He is just. As he has authority to avenge wrong, so it is his nature, and property, and honour. This also is implied in the title here given to him and repeated with such an emphasis, O God! to whom vengeance belongs, who wilt not suffer might always to prevail against right. This is a good reason why we must not avenge ourselves, because God has said, Vengeance is mine; and it is daring presumption to usurp his prerogative and step into his throne, Rom. xii. 19. Let this alarm those who do wrong, whether with a close hand, so as not to be discovered, or with a high hand, so as not to be controlled, There is a God to whom vengeance belongs, who will certainly call them to an account; and let it encourage those who suffer wrong to bear it with silence, committing themselves to him who judges righteously.

2. What it is they ask of God. (1.) That he would glorify himself, and get honour to his own name. Wicked persecutors thought God had withdrawn and had forsaken the earth. “Lord,” say they, “show thyself; make them know that thou art and that thou art ready to show thyself strong on the behalf of those whose hearts are upright with thee.” The enemies thought God was conquered because his people were. “Lord,” say they, “lift up thyself, be thou exalted in thy own strength. Lift up thyself, to be seen, to be feared; and suffer not thy name to be trampled upon and run down.” (2.) That he would mortify the oppressors: Render a reward to the proud; that is, “Reckon with them for all their insolence, and the injuries they have done to thy people.” These prayers are prophecies, which speak terror to all the sons of violence. The righteous God will deal with them according to their merits.

II. A humble complaint to God of the pride and cruelty of the oppressors, and an expostulation with him concerning it, v. 3-6. Here observe,

1. The character of the enemies they complain against. They are wicked; they are workers of iniquity; they are bad, very bad, themselves, and therefore they hate and persecute those whose goodness shames and condemns them. Those are wicked indeed, and workers of the worst iniquity, lost to all honour and virtue, who are cruel to the innocent and hate the righteous.

2. Their haughty barbarous carriage which they complain of. (1.) They are insolent, and take a pleasure in magnifying themselves. They talk high and talk big; they triumph; they speak loud things; they boast themselves, as if their tongues were their own and their hands too, and they were accountable to none for what they say or do, and as if the day were their own, and they doubted not but to carry the cause against God and religion. Those that speak highly of themselves, that triumph and boast, are apt to speak hardly of others; but there will come a day of reckoning for all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against God, his truths, and ways, and people, Jude 15. (2.) They are impious, and take a pleasure in running down God’s people because they are his (v. 5): “They break in pieces thy people, O Lord! break their assemblies, their estates, their families, their persons, in pieces, and do all they can to afflict thy heritage, to grieve them, to crush them, to run them down, to root them out.” God’s people are his heritage; there are those that, for his sake, hate them, and seek their ruin. This is a very good plea with God, in our intercessions for the church: “Lord, it is thine; thou hast a property in it. It is thy heritage; thou hast a pleasure in it, and out of it the rent of thy glory in this world issues. And wilt thou suffer these wicked men to trample upon it thus?” (3.) They are inhuman, and take a pleasure in wronging those that are least able to help themselves (v. 6); they not only oppress and impoverish, but they slay the widow and the stranger; not only neglect the fatherless, and make a prey of them, but murder them, because they are weak and exposed, and sometimes lie at their mercy. Those whom they should protect from injury they are most injurious to, perhaps because God has taken them into his particular care. Who would think it possible that any of the children of men should be thus barbarous?

3. A modest pleading with God concerning the continuance of the persecution: “Lord, how long shall they do thus?” And again, How long? When shall this wickedness of the wicked come to an end?

III. A charge of atheism exhibited against the persecutors, and an expostulation with them upon that charge.

1. Their atheistical thoughts are here discovered (v. 7): Yet they say, The Lord shall not see. Though the cry of their wickedness is very great and loud, though they rebel against the light of nature and the dictates of their own consciences, yet they have the confidence to say, “The Lord shall not see; he will not only wink at small faults, but shut his eyes at great ones too.” Or they think they have managed it so artfully, under colour of justice and religion perhaps, that it will not be adjudged murder. “The God of Jacob, though his people pretend to have such an interest in him, does not regard it either as against justice or as against his own people; he will never call us to an account for it.” Thus they deny God’s government of the world, banter his covenant with his people, and set the judgment to come at defiance.

2. They are here convicted of folly and absurdity. He that says either that Jehovah the living God shall not see or that the God of Jacob shall not regard the injuries done to his people, Nabal is his name and folly is with him; and yet here he is fairly reasoned with, for his conviction and conversion, to prevent his confusion (v. 8): “Understand, you brutish among the people, and let reason guide you.” Note, The atheistical, though they set up for wits, and philosophers, and politicians, yet are really the brutish among the people; if they would but understand, they would believe. God, by the prophet, speaks as if he thought the time long till men would be men, and show themselves so by understanding and considering: “You fools, when will you be wise, so wise as to know that God sees and regards all you say and do, and to speak and act accordingly, as those that must give account?” Note, None are so bad but means are to be used for the reclaiming and reforming of them, none so brutish, so foolish, but it should be tried whether they may not yet be made wise; while there is life there is hope. To prove the folly of those that question God’s omniscience and justice the psalmist argues,

(1.) From the works of creation (v. 9), the formation of human bodies, which as it proves that there is a God, proves also that God has infinitely and transcendently in himself all those perfections that are in any creature. He that planted the ear (and it is planted in the head, as a tree in the ground) shall he not hear? No doubt he shall, more and better than we can. He that formed the eye (and how curiously it is formed above any part of the body anatomists know and let us know by their dissections) shall he not see? Could he give, would he give, that perfection to a creature which he has not in himself? Note, [1.] The powers of nature are all derived from the God of nature. See Exod. iv. 11. [2.] By the knowledge of ourselves we may be led a great way towards the knowledge of God–if by the knowledge of our own bodies, and the organs of sense, so as to conclude that if we can see and hear much more can God, then certainly by the knowledge of our own souls and their noble faculties. The gods of the heathen had eyes and saw not, ears and heard not; our God has no eyes nor ears, as we have, and yet we must conclude he both sees and hears, because we have our sight and hearing from him, and are accountable to him for our use of them.

(2.) From the works of providence (v. 10): He that chastises the heathen for their polytheism and idolatry, shall not he much more correct his own people for their atheism and profaneness? He that chastises the children of men for oppressing and wronging one another, shall not he correct those that profess to be his own children, and call themselves so, and yet persecute those that are really so? Shall not we be under his correction, under whose government the whole world is? Does he regard as King of nations, and shall he not much more regard as the God of Jacob? Dr. Hammond gives another very probably sense of this: “He that instructs the nations (that is, gives them his law), shall not he correct, that is, shall not he judge them according to that law, and call them to an account for their violations of it? In vain was the law given if there will not be a judgment upon it.” And it is true that the same word signifies to chastise and to instruct, because chastisement is intended for instruction and instruction should go along with chastisement.

(3.) From the works of grace: He that teaches man knowledge, shall he not know? He not only, as the God of nature, has given the light of reason, but, as the God of grace, has given the light of revelation, has shown man what is true wisdom and understanding; and he that does this, shall he not know? Job 28:23; Job 28:28. The flowing of the streams is a certain sign of the fulness of the fountain. If all knowledge is from God, no doubt all knowledge is in God. From this general doctrine of God’s omniscience, the psalmist not only confutes the atheists, who said, “The Lord shall not see (v. 7), he will not take cognizance of what we do;” but awakens us all to consider that God will take cognizance even of what we think (v. 11): The Lord knows the thoughts of man, that they are vanity. [1.] He knows those thoughts in particular, concerning God’s conniving at the wickedness of the wicked, and knows them to be vain, and laughs at the folly of those who by such fond conceits buoy themselves up in sin. [2.] He knows all the thoughts of the children of men, and knows them to be, for the most part, vain, that the imaginations of the thoughts of men’s hearts are evil, only evil, and that continually. Even in good thoughts there is a fickleness and inconstancy which may well be called vanity. It concerns us to keep a strict guard upon our thoughts, because God takes particular notice of them. Thoughts are words to God, and vain thoughts are provocations.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary

Psalms 94

Complaint and Comfort

Scripture v. 1-23:

This Psalm opens with a complaint against delayed judgment against the oppressors of the godly.

Verses 1, 2 appeal to the Lord God, to whom vengeance belongs, to “show himself,” or shine forth in His judgment-glory, Deu 32:35; Nah 1:2. As judge of the earth He is asked to lift Himself up (exalt himself) before the proud heathen and render to them a just reward or retribution for their sins, Gen 18:25; Psa 50:6; Joh 5:22-23; 2Co 5:10; 2Th 1:6-8; Psa 7:6; Psa 28:4.

Verses 3, 4 lament just “how long” shall the wicked triumph, repeatedly uttering, speaking hard things, and boast in their working of iniquities? As also related Job 10:5; Psa 75:5; Psa 31:18; Jud 1:15. See also Psa 31:19; Psa 59:7; Psa 59:12; Psa 64:3-4; Psa 73:8-9; Psa 140:3.

Verses 5, 6 charge that “they break in pieces thy people, O Lord, and afflict thine heritage; As Pharaoh did to Israel, Gen 15:13; Exo 1:12; Psa 79:1.
Verse 6 adds “they slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless,” the orphans, without compassion toward old or young; Perhaps this alludes to the cruelty of the Assyrians and Chaldees against Israel, 2Ch 36:17. Such moved God to compassion toward the oppressed, Deu 10:18; Psa 68:5; Exo 20:13; Exo 22:22.

Verses 7, 8 describe the atheistic attitude of Israel’s oppressors who said that the Lord neither sees their oppression nor does the God of Jacob pay attention to it, Job 22:13; Psa 10:4; Psa 92:6; Psa 53:1. The brutish and fools who defy God and oppress His people are asked if they will never come to understand, be wise, or fear God, Pro 1:7.

Verses 9, 10 rhetorically ask if the creator who planted the ear in man shall not hear the prayer of the godly and blasphemy of the wicked and He that made the eye shall see, will he not? Gen 1:26: Exo 4:11; 2Sa 22:7; Isa 59:1; Gen 6:5.
Verse 10 adds, “shall not He who chastened the heathen correct those in wrong?” implying He will, Psa 89:32. And shall not He know who teaches man knowledge? Job 35:11; Isa 2:3; Isa 28:26; Isa 54:13; Joh 6:45.

Verse 11 asserted that the Lord knows the thoughts of man, in his natural state, that they are vain, wholly inclined to covetous vanity, 1Co 1:21; 1Co 3:20; See too Deu 15:9; 1Sa 2:3; Pro 15:26: Gen 6:5; Psa 40:17.

Verse 13 states that this chastening is designed to be to bring him to rest from the day of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked, until their full and final punishment. God chastens His own, that, they may not be judged finally with the world, 1Co 11:31-32; Exo 33:14; Pro 11:5.

Verses 14, 15 assures that God will not cast off (disclaim or abandon) His people, nor forsake His inheritance. But judgment shall turn back His heritage to righteousness, and all those upright in heart will follow after Him and His laws, in that day, Exo 19:5; Deu 1:6; Deu 4:31; 1Ki 6:13; Jer 33:25-26; Rom 11:2. See also Deu 32:4; Isa 42:3; Mic 7:9; Hos 6:3; Rom 8:23.

Verse 16 questions just who will rise up as my defense against evil doers or stand up for me against continual workers of iniquity, except the Lord? Psa 46:1; Exo 32:16; Psa 34:16; Psa 119:115.

Verses 17, 18 witness that except the Lord had been the Psalmist’s help, his soul would have quickly dwelt in the silence of death; He would have been slain, La 3:22; Deu 32:29; Psa 27:13.
Verse 18 adds “when I said, (in a cry of despair) my foot slippeth; Thy mercy O Lord, held me up,” and helped in every moment of trouble, Exo 19:4; Psalms 73; Psalms 2; 2Co 4:3-4; Mat 14:30-31.

b relates that in the multitude of the Psalmist’s frustrated, conflicting thoughts, God’s comforts came to delight his soul, to cheer him out of the fear and dread of man and death, Gen 24:63; Psa 71:21; Ezr 6:22.

Verse 20 inquires “Shall the throne (reign) of iniquity have fellowship with thee?” be sanctioned by you; it will not, will it? Deu 27:19; For sin separates the righteous from the unrighteous, Exo 33:3. For the wicked frames wickedness continually, trying to justify it by a law, (making new laws) against the law of God, Deu 16:19; See also Psa 52:1; Psa 82:1; Amo 6:3; 2Co 6;14; also Psa 58:2; Isa 10:1.

Verse 21 charges that the wicked assemble in collusion against the soul of the righteous, and they condemn (to death) the blood-life of the innocent, even prophetically inclusive of that of our Savior, Jesus Christ, Mat 27:1; Exo 23:7; Pro 17:15; See also Jos 9:2; Ezr 3:9; Psalms 71; Psalms 19; Psa 109:20; Deu 19:10; Isa 59:7.

Verse 22 rejoices “But the Lord is my defense; And my God is the rock (support, security) of my refuge,” a sure God and a safe refuge indeed! 2Sa 22:2; Psa 5:11; Deu 32:4. He is an high tower of defensive strength, above all, Rom 8:28.

Verse 23 concludes that God will bring upon the wicked the full penalty of their unconfessed iniquities, cutting them off from His mercies forever, Pro 29:1; Rom 2:1-2; So that they are punished forever, without excuse, Pro 1:21-28; Pro 2:22; Pro 5:22; Jer 2:19. Their recompense will be just, Isa 59:18; Job 18:8; Psa 34:21; Job 22:16.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

1 O Jehovah! God of vengeances We know that the Jews were surrounded by many neighbors who were not well affected towards them, and were thus incessantly subject to the assaults and oppression of bitter enemies. As this intestine persecution was even more afflictive than the rampant and unrestrained violence of the wicked, we need not wonder that the Psalmist should earnestly beseech God for deliverance from it. The expressions which he uses, calling upon God to shine forth conspicuously, and lift himself up on high, amount in common language to this, that God would give some actual manifestation of his character as judge or avenger; for in that case he is seen ascending his tribunal to exact the punishment due to sin, and demonstrate his power in preserving order and government in the world. The phraseology is used only in reference to ourselves, disposed as we are to feel as if he overlooked us, unless he stretched out his hand to help us in some visible and open manner. In calling him twice successively the God of vengeances, and then, judge of the earth, the Psalmist uses these titles as applicable to the present situation in which he stood, reminding Him in a manner of the office which belonged to him, and saying — O Lord! it is thine to take vengeance upon sinners, and judge the earth — see how they take advantage of the impunity which is extended to their guilt, and triumph audaciously in their wickedness! Not that God needs to be admonished of his duty, for he never resigns himself to indifference, and even when he seems to delay his judgments, is only adjusting them according to what he knows to be the best season; but his people conceive of him in this way to themselves, and take occasion from this to embolden and stimulate themselves to greater vehemency in prayer. (14) The same may be said of the repetition which the Psalmist uses. When the wicked then indulge in unrestrained excesses, we are to remember that God can never cease to assert his character as the judge of the earth who takes vengeance upon iniquity. Does he seem in our carnal apprehension to have at any time withdrawn and hidden himself? let us put up without hesitation the prayer which is here taught us by the Holy Spirit, that he would shine forth

(14) “ Mais les fideles s’arrestent a mediter ainsi en eux-mesmes la nature d’iceluy, afin de s’accourager, meilleure esperance, et soliciter a prier avec plus grande ardeur et vehemence.” — Fr.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

INTRODUCTION

There is no superscription to this Psalm. There is no indication of its authorship, of the period at which it was written, or of the circumstances to which it refers. There are many of these anonymous hymns in Gods Book, nameless utterances, voices of the night of weeping, shouts from the mountain tops of thought, prayers unto the God of Life, which belong to no individual, can be fathered on no solitary period, but descend as an heirloom to successive ages, and enrich every generation. As the circumstances, the victories, the shortcomings, and the possibilities of man are continually being repeated, so the religious experiences of the Church do often reappear in its history, and we may receive the inspired utterances of them in one age as almost equally appropriate to the sorrows and joys of another age.Dr. H. R. Reynolds.

This Psalm, as may be easily apprehended, is a prayer of all the pious children of God, and of spiritual people, against all their persecutors, so that it may be used by all pious godly people from the beginning till the end of the world.Luther.

A CRY FOR JUDGMENT

(Psa. 94:1-7)

Consider

I. The complaint of the Church.

Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? &c. (Psa. 94:3-7). The poet complains to the Lord of the enemies of the Church, and names mention of

1. Their general character. The wicked the workers of iniquity. They are depraved in character, and diabolic in conduct. Mark the terrible energy implied in the designation, workers of iniquity. Reference is not made to men who make a pastime of iniquity, or who occasionally commit themselves to its service, but to those who toil at it as a business. As the merchant man is industrious in commerce, as the philosopher is assiduous in study, as the artist is indefatigable in elaboration, so those slaves of iniquity toil in their diabolic pursuits with an ardour which the most powerful remonstrance seldom abates. They are always ready to serve their master.Parker.

2. Their arrogant triumph (Psa. 94:3-4.) How long shall the wicked triumph? They belch out, they speak arrogant things; all the workers of iniquity carry themselves proudly.Perownes trans. In the first line of Psa. 94:4, the two verbs have one noun as the objectthey pour forth hard, or, proud speeches. The enemies of the people of God were triumphant over them, and were proud and insolent in their triumph. It is not seldom that the wicked in their prosperity and power have arrogantly lorded it over the righteous. Prosperity, apart from Divine grace, engenders presumption, and fancied self-sufficiency, and self-boasting.

3. Their oppression and cruelty (Psa. 94:5-6.) The word which in the A.V. is translated, they break in pieces, Perowne and Hengstenberg translate, they crush. The wicked oppressed the people and heritage of the Lord. How frequently was this the case in the history of the chosen people! How frequently has it been so in the history of the Christian Church! The Psalmist complains of cruelty as well as oppression. They slay the widow, &c. The widow and the fatherless are mentioned, as often, as particular instances of those whose misery ought to excite compassion, but whose defencelessness makes them the easy prey of the wicked.Perowne. This is invariably represented in Scripture as a crime of great enormity, and especially abhorrent to God. See Exo. 22:21-24.

4. Their practical Atheism. Yet they say the Lord shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it. The Divine names, says Alexander, are, as usual, significant. That the self-existent and eternal God should not see, is a palpable absurdity; and scarcely less so, that the God of Israel should suffer His own people to be slaughtered without even observing it. We need not suppose that they uttered this blasphemy in words, but it was expressed in their conduct. Their atheism was not theoretical, but practical. This practical atheism is very prevalent and pernicious at the present time. Immense numbers utter the Apostles Creed regularly, who exclude God from almost every province of their life. In the formation of their plans, in the management of their business, in their relations to society, &c. God is not in all their thoughts.

II. The appeal of the Church. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth, &c., (Psa. 94:1-3). Let it be noted at once and closely that the appeal is for justice, not for revenge. I do not think that we sufficiently attend to the distinction that exists between revenge and vengeance. Revenge, says Dr. Johnson, is an act of passion, vengeance of justice, injuries are revenged, crimes avenged. The call which the Psalmist here makes on God, as a God to whom vengeance belongeth, is no other than if he had said, O God, to whom justice belongeth! Vengeance indeed is not for man, because with mans failings and propensities it would ever degenerate into revenge. I will be even with him, says nature; I will be above him, says grace!Bouchier.

1. Judgment is the prerogative of God alone. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth. The two names of the Divine Being which the Psalmist uses, El and Jehovah, recognise God as almighty, self-existent, and alone entitled to take vengeance. Literally it is, God of vengeances, the plural indicating that there is in God a fulness of vengeance for His persecuted people; and the repetition of the appeal denotes the earnestness with which it is made. To Me belongeth vengeance and recompense. Avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath; for it is written, Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. The vindication of His people and the punishment of their enemies is His sole prerogative. He will render righteous judgment to the wicked. He alone has the right to do so.

2. Judgment is sometimes apparently long delayed. Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? The persecution seems to the Psalmist to have been of long continuance. He would fain know when it would end. Our time of suffering and trial always seems long and wearisome. In the night of weeping and waiting, wearily drag the hours, and we cry, How long? In due season God will appear, &c.

3. Judgment is earnestly invoked. Here is a cry for the manifestation of God. Show Thyself. Margin, as in Heb., Shine forth. It is an appeal to God to manifest Himself as a God of righteous retributions. Here is a cry for the judgment of God. Lift up Thyself, thou judge, &c. God is conceived as sitting at ease, and entreated to arise and execute judgment, and to give a just recompense to those enemies of His people who, having got the upper hand, exulted proudly over them. Here is a cry for His speedy interposition, Lord, how long? &c.

CONCLUSION.Deep in the heart of man is the sense of justice, the conviction that there is a judge of all the earth who will do right. Oppressed humanity in all ages and in all lands has cried to heaven for judgment. That cry will certainly, sooner or later, meet with a full response.

The sun of justice may withdraw his beams
A while from earthy ken, and sit concealed
In dark recess, pavilioned round with clouds:
Yet let not guilt presumptuous rear her crest,
Nor virtue droop despondent: soon these clouds,
Seeming eclipse, will brighten into day,
And in majestic splendour He will rise,
With healing and with terror on His wings.

G. Bally.

THE FOLLY OF PRACTICAL ATHEISM

(Psa. 94:8-11)

The Psalmist addresses not the theoretical, but practical atheists. He speaks to men who acknowledged the existence of God, and His creatorship, and His government of the world; but who thought that He did not see and would not recompense their conduct. This is the atheism which is the most prevalent and perilous in the present day. The folly of such atheists is seen

I. In supposing that God does not observe their conduct. He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He that formed the eye, shall He not see? The principle upon which this interrogation is based is this, that an effect cannot be greater than its cause. The picture with the beauty of which we are charmed is not greater than the conceptive and executive power of the artist who produced it. He saw it mentally long before we saw it visually. This argument, says R. Watson, is as easy as it is conclusive, obliging all who acknowledge a first cause, to admit His perfect intelligence, or to take refuge in atheism itself. It fetches not the proof from a distance, but refers us to our bosoms for the constant demonstration that the Lord is a God of knowledge, and that by Him actions are weighed. And Tillotson: We find in ourselves such qualities as thought and intelligence, power and freedom, &c., for which we have the evidence of consciousness as much as for our own existence. Indeed, it is only by our consciousness of these, that our existence is known to ourselves. We know, likewise, that these are perfections, and that to have them is better than to be without them. We find also that they have not been in us from eternity. They must, therefore, have had a beginning, and consequently some cause. Now this cause, as it must be superior to its effect, must have those perfections in a superior degree; and if it be the First Cause, it must have them in an infinite or unlimited degree, since bounds or limitations, without a limiter, would be an effect without a cause. If we see and hear and know, then God does so in a much greater, indeed, in an infinite degree. His knowledge is clear and distinct, ours is dim and confused; His is intimate and thorough, ours is partial and superficial; His is universal and infallible, ours uncertain and limited. The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man. How foolish, then, to imagine that God does not hear the arrogant speech, or see the oppressive deed, or note the wickedness of men!

II. In supposing that God will not recompense their conduct. He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not He correct? There is, says Perowne, a change in the argument. Before it was from the physical constitution of man; now it is from the moral government of the world. The idea seems to be that even the heathen are governed by God. He has revealed to them by means of creation His eternal power and Godhead; His law He has written in their hearts; their conscience also bears witness for Him. They are subject to His control. He visits them in mercy; and He reproves them with judgment. Is it not folly then to suppose that He will overlook the injuries inflicted upon His own people by those who have a clearer and fuller revelation than the heathen? Every additional illustration of the judgment of God imparts increased force to the already conclusive evidence, that God will correct those who break His law and oppress His people.

The Psalmist mentions two things which considerably strengthen his argument.

1. That the evil complained of was of long continuance. Ye fools, when will ye be wise? The inquiry implies that their folly had existed for a long period. During that period they had been treasuring up unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God. If they repent not, that accumulated wrath will surely burst upon them.

2. That God knows not only words and actions, but thoughts and purposes also. The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity. He has set our secret sins in the light of His countenance. The thoughts that He would not see and judge for these sins He knew. All thoughts of arrogance and oppression He knew. Let them not imagine that He did not see or regard their conduct; for even their hearts were known unto Him. Thoughts are words to God, and vain thoughts are provocations.

CONCLUSION.

1. Here is warning to practical atheists. You are acting as though God had nothing to do with some departments of your life and conduct. You do things in business, or in politics, or in pleasure, which will not bear His scrutiny. You say in practice, The Lord shall not see, neither shall God regard it. But He does see; and know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment. Your practical atheism is utter folly.

2. Here is encouragement to the oppressed righteous. You cannot pass beyond the region of Gods knowledge. He is acquainted with all your afflictions. His love and power are as great as His knowledge. He will sustain you in all your afflictions; and when He ariseth for judgment He will triumphantly vindicate you.

THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE DIVINELY-INSTRUCTED MAN

(Psa. 94:12-15)

The Psalmist, having complained of the enemies of the Church and appealed to God for judgment, and having warned the enemies of the folly of their conduct, proceeds in these verses to speak of the blessedness of the people of God, even in the midst of the oppressions to which they were subjected. Blessed is the man, &c. The good man is here represented as blessed,

I. Because of the instruction which he receives. Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, O Lord, &c. (Psa. 94:12-13). The word which is here rendered chastenest does not mean to afflict or punish; but to instruct, to admonish, &c. Perowne renders it, instructest; and Hengstenberg, admonishest. He says, Those who allow themselves to be admonished and taught by the Lord stand in opposition to the foolish among the people, who go to school with the blind ungodly heathen.

1. The Teacher. Thou instructest, O Lord. As a Teacher, the Lord is incomparable, supreme, perfect.

(1) In the extent of His attainments. All things are known to Him. His resources are inexhaustible. His understanding is infinite.

(2) In His method of instruction. His knowledge of each pupil is perfect. He knows the faculties, capacities, attainments, &c., of each one; and adapts His communications and methods of instruction to each one. The Lord is an infallible, perfect Teacher.

2. The Text-book. Out of Thy law. By means of His Word, God teaches His people the great principles of His government. The law appears here, says Hengstenberg, as the means which God uses in this instruction, the fountain out of which He draws it, and then satisfies with it by His Spirit the thirsty soul. It comes into notice in connection with its doctrine of recompense, and its rich consolatory promises for the people of the Lord, whose end is always salvation. The Word of God is the best expositor of His Providence.

3. The end of the instruction. That Thou mayest give him rest, &c. Perowne, as we think, expounds truly: This is the end of Gods teaching, that His servant may wait in patience, unmoved by, safe FROM THE DAYS OF EVIL (comp. Psa. 49:5), seeing the evil all round him lifting itself up, but seeing also the secret, mysterious retribution, slowly but surely accomplishing itself. In this sense the rest is the rest of a calm, self-possessed spirit, as Isa. 7:4; Isa. 30:15; Isa. 32:17. The Divinely-instructed man has such views of the Divine administration as inspire him with confidence and calmness, even when the wicked arrogantly triumph over him. God has taught him out of His law that the pit is being digged, into which, if he repent not, the wicked will fall and perish. So the good man has inward rest in the midst of outward affliction and persecution. He is not the creature, but the conqueror of circumstances. His enemies may oppress him, but they cannot invade his peace, &c.

II. Because of the faithfulness of God. For the Lord will not cast off His people, &c. The Divinely-instructed man is in covenant relation with God, by virtue of which he is both secure and blessed. He is blessed, for God will never forsake him. The Lord may perhaps forsake His people for a time (comp. Jdg. 6:13; Isa. 2:6), as a righteous punishment for forsaking Him, Deu. 32:15, but not forever.Hengstenberg. The righteous are Gods inheritance, and He will not give up His title to it, nor suffer it to be wrested from Him. For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee, &c., Isa. 54:7-8. Blessed, indeed, is the man who has the assurance that whatever may befall him, God will not forsake him. Being sure of his interest in God, he will want no good thing.

III. Because of the righteousness of His judgments. But judgment shall return unto righteousness, &c. There are times when judgment seems turned aside from righteousness, such as, when the wicked triumph and the good are oppressed. But at the proper time these apparent perversions will be seen in their true light, and righteousness will be seen to be supreme. Even in appearance, judgment and justice cannot always fail. It must sooner or later appear in its true character as perfect righteousness. In the judgment of the great day this manifestation of the righteousness of the Divine rule will be on a grand scale. This manifestation of the righteousness of Gods judgments will be viewed with satisfaction by the righteous. All the upright in heart shall follow it. They will approve of it, avow their attachment to it. They will rejoice in it. They shall follow it with joyous hearts and triumphant songs.

CONCLUSION.Blessed, indeed, is the Divinely-instructed man; for he has rest in the midst of trouble, an everlasting interest in God, and a glorious prospect in the judgment.

A DECLARATION OF CONFIDENCE IN GOD

(Psa. 94:16-23)

The Psalmist now applies the general doctrine of the Psalm to his own case, and the result is this clear declaration of sublime trust in God. Here is

I. Confidence in the midst of formidable enemies. It is an easy matter to declare a triumphant trust when we are free from trial and danger. But the Poet was threatened and afflicted by unscrupulous and powerful enemies when he uttered these trustful and brave words.

1. His enemies were evil in character. The evil doers, the workers of iniquity. See remarks on Psa. 94:4.

2. His enemies were in positions of authority. They occupied the throne or judgment seat. They were not common assassins or thieves, but tyrants who, under a false pretext of justice, oppressed the Church. The throne of the king, the seat of the judge, which is consecrated to God, they stained or defiled with their crimes.Perowne. The people of God have often had wicked kings, and corrupt and cruel judges for their enemies.

3. His enemies acted legally. Which frameth mischief by a law. They enacted wicked laws, or propounded wicked interpretations of the law. Iniquity is never so daring as when it is supported by the sanctions of law. A thing may be right legally, yet utterly wrong morally, and right morally, yet wrong legally. We have a notable example of this in the life of Daniel (Dan. 6:7).

4. His enemies were confederate in council and action. They gather themselves together, &c. The enemies of Daniel afford an illustration, Dan. 6:6; Dan. 6:11; Dan. 6:15. Surely the enemies of the Psalmist were sufficiently formidable to have aroused his fears. Yet he unfalteringly declares his confidence.

II. Confidence in the midst of many and anxious thoughts. The Psalmist speaks of the multitude of his thoughts within him. Perowne: In the multitude of my anxious thoughts within me. Anxious thoughts, or perplexities, lit. divided or branching thoughts, whether doubts or cares. He was fully alive to the dangers of his position. His thoughts were anxious and perplexed. They were also multitudinous. Luther He speaks of the many thoughts which one has in such a state of despair, how he could or might come out of it. Then he thinks this way and that way, and visits all holes and corners, but finds none. Yet faith triumphs over these anxious thoughts. Notwithstanding his deep solicitude, he expresses his firm confidence in God and His Providence. He is anxious, yet victorious.

III. Confidence in the Divine support. Unless the Lord had been my help, my soul had soon dwelt in silence, &c. (Psa. 94:17-18). Notice here

1. The danger, and the need of help.

(1) He was in danger of death. His soul was nearly dwelling in silence. The grave is represented as a place of silence. He was near to the gates of death.

(2) He was also in danger of falling. He felt his feet slipping. When the soul is painfully exercised as to the Divine administration of human affairs, there is danger of falling into unbelief and rebellion, or of sinking into despair.

(3) The danger was imminent. His soul was already near to the land of darkness and silence, and his feet were slipping.

2. The failure of human help. Unless the Lord had been my help, &c. There are times when human help fails for want of faithfulness; and times when it fails for want of ability. There are experiences in life in which the truest and most devoted of human helpers are powerless to sympathise with or aid us.

3. The sufficiency of the Divine help. The Lord was the Helper of the Psalmist, and His mercy held him up. The help of the Lord was

(1) sufficient. It saved him from falling and from death.

(2) Seasonable. It was afforded when he was near the silent land, when his feet were slipping.

(3) Gracious. It was the expression of His mercy. He saves us in His lovingkindness. So the Psalmist proclaims his confidence in God, &c.

IV. Confidence in the Divine protection. The Lord is my defence; and my God is the Rock of my refuge. Perowne: Jehovah hath been a high tower for me. The Psalmist is confident of

1. The Security of the Divine Protection. Jehovah was his high tower. In Him he would be raised far above the reach of danger. He was the Rock of his refuge, in the clefts of which he may safely hide.

2. The Stability of the Divine Protection. The Rock is firm, strong, immovable. It stands securely and calmly amid the driving winds, and pelting storms, and surging, thundering seas. The soul that trusts in Jehovah may exult, for she is inviolably and eternally safe.

V. Confidence in the Divine retribution. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with Thee? He shall bring upon them their own iniquity, &c. Here is a threefold assurance:

1. God has no fellowship with the wicked. He will have no alliance with injustice, even when it is sanctioned by human laws. He has no complicity with evil. All His arrangements are utterly hostile to it.

2. God will cut of the persistently wicked. He shall cut them off in their own wickedness, &c. A terrible retribution awaits the workers of iniquity.

3. God will cut of the persistently wicked by means of their own wickedness. He shall bring upon them their own iniquity. It is an ill work wicked ones are about; they make fetters for their own feet, and build houses for to fall upon their own heads; so mischievous is the nature of sin that it damnifies and destroys the parents of it.Greenhill. A man cannot be more miserable than his own wickedness will make him if God visit it upon him.M. Henry.

VI. Confidence in the Lord a source of joy, even in the midst of dangers and anxieties. We have reserved this consideration to the last, because it seems to us the crowning triumph and glory of confidence. Even in the midst of oppression, peril, and multitudinous anxieties, the trust of the Psalmist brought joy to his soul. Thy comforts delight my soul. Meditation on the perfections of God, trust in His promises, and the realisation of His presence, are Divine comforts which exceedingly rejoice the soul. They not only pacify the mind, but they joy it; they do not only satisfy it, but ravish it; they not only quiet, but delight it. They not only take away the present grief, but likewise put in the room and place of it most unspeakable comfort and consolation, as the sun does not only dispel darkness, but likewise brings in a glorious light in the stead of it.T. Horton. Thus, by faith in God, the soul is more than conqueror over all hostile powers without, and anxious thoughts and fears within. Let us cultivate such faith. For such faith let us pray. Lord, increase our faith.

THE SUMMONS TO HOLY WORK

(Psa. 94:16)

We may regard these words as parallel at least to those of the Judges and Lawgivers of Israel, who when the very existence of Israel as a nation was trembling in the balance, and when devotedness and loyalty were demanded by the circumstances of the case, called with trumpet-voice to the brave and true-hearted among them to be on the Lords side, and cursed bitterly those who would not come to the help of the Lord against the mighty.

I. Let us review a few characteristics of the evildoers.

1. Look at the number of the evildoers. Not more than one-seventh of the human race is even nominally Christian; and among these Christians are reckoned all the populations of Austria, France, Russia, America, and Spain; the Greeks, the Copts, and the Armenians; the priest-ridden inhabitants of Brazil and Mexico, and all the crowds of our English cities; the Sabbath-breakers, the despisers of Gods love, the haters of Gods law, the drunkard, the harlot, the miser, the dotard, and the fool. Turn to the six-sevenths of this worlds population. We are passing out of Goshen into Egyptian darkness.

2. The variety of the evildoers. In one place there is subtle speculation, in another gross vice; here utter indifference, there wild fanaticism; in one tribe crushing ignorance, in another daring philosophy and luxuriant imagination. The regiments of the prince of this world wear various uniforms; the mutineers in Gods army are widespread and bear divers colours: they speak a hundred dialects or tongues, and are scattered over the whole world.

3. They are closely organised. There are subtle links of faith that bind the millions of the East, and move them in vast masses. In China there is abundant organisation, and much coincidence of action. In India, with all the varieties of faith that prevail, there are great and startling signs of combination against God and His Christ.

4. The depravity of these evildoers. It is not the mere ignorance which heathendom reveals which constitutes their chief danger or our main responsibility, but it is the fearful corruption of man under these various forms of Christless, Godless life. In these lands of which we are speaking there is no public opinion against sins of the foulest, most unmentionable kinds.

II. Consider the course which God has taken with these evildoers, and also what is involved in the appeal here uttered. Who will rise up for Me against the evildoers? Who is on the Lords side? By these appeals God seems to tell us that He is not going to crush, or destroy, or convert, or save these evildoers by any fiat of omnipotence, by any touch of His imperial sceptre. His method has always been to teach men by men; to uproot error by truth; to conquer darkness by light; to drive out hatred by love. Nature has unveiled her charms, &c., to men first, and afterwards to nations. Gods greatest acts of revelation have been made through human minds. When He intends to reach the hearts and conquer the wills of men by His love, He calls the sons of men to His help against the mighty. It is not, however, that God is weak and needs our help, but that for infinitely perfect reasons He chooses thus to conquer His enemies, &c. Who will rise up for Me against the evildoers? The evildoing is done against Him.

III. Examine the response which is made to this appeal. Nature is ready to rise up for God against the evildoers. Tremendous ocean once heaved from his rocky bed, and in the roaring of his billows said, I will sweep the accursed race of man from the face of the earth. And the lust of rule, the spirit of conquest, the demon of war, have come up before Him. And they have said one to another, We will go and make inroads on these hoary superstitions; we will bring the civilisation of distant tribes together, &c. The enemies of the Lord have fought against each other, and the wrath of man has been made to praise Him. But He needs other and nobler service. Led by Death himself, Cholera, Plague, Famine, and Madness have often risen up against the evildoers. And now a peaceful group come smiling on, confident in their strength, instinct with hope and promisethey are Science and Commerce, Civilisation and Law. But powers like these cannot reach the root of the evil. In the Gospel of Christ there is the only stay of human corruption, the only rival to the worlds fascinations, the only power which is merciful to the sinner while it is just to his sin. It is Gods method to overwhelm and subdue the heart of man, to change the evildoer, not by His threats, but by His amnestynot by the thunder of law, but by the sovereign pleading of love. How shall we obey the summons of the text?A bridged from Notes of the Christian Life, by Dr. Reynolds.

A COMMON INCIDENT OF THE JOURNEY

(Psa. 94:18)

My foot slippeth.
The whole verse is, When I said, My foot slippeth; Thy mercy, O Lord, held me up. Here we have one of the simplest forms of prayer, the bare statement of danger. The childs cry, without introduction or finis. The soul in peril can seldom say much, but that which is said is generally expressive. Take, for example, these words: they imply faith in the presence of One able to helpabhorrence of the sin to which he is temptedand confidence in His willingness to save.

This experience is a common one. All of us are, at some time, found in slippery places. They are of various kinds, more or less dangerous. There are many things incident to ourselves which render them the more perilous. And we have the same method for preservation the Psalmist enjoyed. Let us notice each of these points.

I. Some slippery places. We are the more exposed to falling when we are brought into circumstances of

1. Poverty and want. Christ was tempted when He hungered.

2. Of annoyance and vexation. Moses smote the rock in anger.

3. Of dejection and perplexity. Psa. 73:2-3.

4. Of sore bereavement and trial. Job.

II. Some things concerning the traveller, rendering these the more perilous.

1. The absence of the staff, or negligence in its use. Learn the promises and use them.

2. The foot ill-shod.

3. Drowsiness. Watch and pray, that, &c.

4. Carelessness.

5. The lantern untrimmed or insecure, so that it goes out or burns dimly.

III. The sure means for preservation. We have simply to cry to the Deliverer. How absurd would it be for a traveller to wait a moment before he cried for help, or took means to extricate himself from peril! Yet some are content merely to cry, Lead us not into temptation, when the Sabbath service is performed.

The secret of a secure and blessed life is constant ejaculatory prayer. The moment danger is even anticipated, to ask for timely assistance.R. A. Griffin.

THE COMFORTS OF CHRISTIANS UNDER EITHER WORLDLY OR SPIRITUAL TRIALS

(Psa. 94:19)

Consider

I. Some of the distressing thoughts which are apt to oppress the mind of a good man. They may be considered as relating to

1. The state of the world. When a good man surveys the general prevalence of irreligion and impiety, when he considers how few there are, comparatively, who seek after God, or are moved by any impression of a serious nature, he cannot but be affected. I beheld the transgressors, and was grieved, &c. (Psa. 119:158; Psa. 119:53). When, again, he considers whither such a course must tend, and in what it will possibly issue, the prospect is still more alarming. Wide is the gate, &c. (Mat. 7:13).

2. The state of the Church. The palpable inconsistency between the lives of numerous professors of religion, and the real import of that profession, is the subject of much distressing reflection to the sincere follower of Christ. Many walk of whom I have told you often, &c. (Php. 3:18-19).

3. His state as an individual. The heart knoweth his own bitterness, &c. We may advert to

(1) Trials of a worldly nature. Under these religion neither demands nor boasts a perfect insensibility. The Psalmist displayed great vicissitude of feeling, arising from this quarter; he mourned under the calumny and oppression of his enemies, and gave utterance to cries and tears under his affliction. Psa. 42:9-10. Job is another example.

(2) Trials of a spiritual nature. When we consider our low attainments in religion, compared with our opportunities, our latent corruption, and our frequent miscarriages and failures, we are often tempted to call in question the reality of our religion, and to fear that, after all, we are only almost Christians.

Under the hidings of Gods countenance how many painful thoughts arise!
In the prospect before him; in the contemplation of the dangers and temptations which still await him; while he feels himself nothing but frailty and weakness, how apt is he to apprehend some fatal overthrow! He is ready to cry, I shall never see the King in His beauty, nor behold the land which is so far off.

II. The consolations of God opposed to these uneasy thoughts.

1. Such as arise from the disordered state of the world. On this subject great consolation springs from the conviction that the Lord reigneth. There sit at the helm infinite power, wisdom, and goodness. They are in perpetual operation; and, in the final result, they will appear with ineffable splendour and beauty.

2. Under painful apprehensions respecting the state of the Church, the comforts of God are neither few nor small. Reflect: it is incomparably more His care than ours. As the Saviour bought it with His blood, He will not fail to guide and govern it in the best manner possible. His interpositions in its favour afford a pledge of what He will still accomplish. Isa. 43:3-4; Mat. 16:18. Afflictions are designed to purify the Church.

3. Under the distressing thoughts arising from the state of a Christian, as an individual, the Divine comforts are proposed. Affliction and privations are all ordered in infinite wisdom, and proceed from the purest benignity; they will issue in our advantage, and they will be but of short duration. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.Robert Hall.Abridged.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Psalms 92-97
DESCRIPTIVE TITLE

A Service of Song for a Sabbath Day.

ANALYSIS

Psalms 92 : Personal SongProbably by a King.

Psalms 93 : Jehovah Proclaimed King.

Psalms 94 : Prayer for Vengeance on the Lawless.

Psalms 95 : InvitationO Come! Come in! Warning: Harden not your Hearts!

Psalms 96 : The Land called upon to Sing to Jehovah, and to Proclaim his Kingship to the Nations.

Psalms 97 : Third ProclamationDecisive Results, by way of Joy, Fear. Conviction, Shame, Homage, Thanks, Exhortation and Triumph.

Psalms 92

(Lm.) PsalmSongFor the Sabbath-day.

It is good to give thanks to Jehovah,

and to make melody[291] unto thy name O Most High!

[291] Or: to sweep the strings.

To declare in the morning thy kindness,

and thy faithfulness in the nights:[292]

[292] So Dr.; night-seasonsDel.; dark night(plural of intensification)Br.

With an instrument of ten strings and with a lute,[293]

[293] Ml.: with ten and with a lute.

with murmuring music[294] on a lyre.

[294] with murmuring soundDr.; with skilful musicDel.

For thou hast made me glad Jehovah by thy doings,

in the works of thy hands will I ring out my joy.

How great have grown thy works Jehovah!

how very deep have been laid thy plans!

A man that is brutish cannot get to know,

and a dullard cannot understand this:

When the lawless bud like herbage,

and all the workers of iniquity have blossomed
It leadeth to their being destroyed for ever.

But thou art on high[295] to the ages O Jehovah!

[295] Ml.: a height. ExaltednessDel.

For lo! thine enemies Jehovah,

For lo! thine enemies shall perish,

scattered abroad shall be all the workers of iniquity.[296]

[296] Or: mischief (naughtinessDr.). Cp. Psa. 94:4; Psa. 94:16; Psa. 94:23.

But thou wilt uplift like those of a wild ox my horn,

I am anointed[297] with fresh oil;

[297] The passage is doubtfulO.G.

And mine eye shall gaze on my watchful foes,

of them that rise up against me as evil-doers mine ears shall hear,

The righteous like the palm-tree shall bud,

like a cedar in Lebanon become great.

Transplanted into the house of Jehovah

in the courts of our God shall they shew buds.

Still shall they bear fruit in old age,

full of sap and of bloom shall they be:

To declare that upright is Jehovah,

my Rock with no injustice in him.

(Nm.)

Psalms 93

(Nm.)

Jehovah hath become king[298]in majesty hath he clothed himself,

[298] Is now kingDel. Hath proclaimed himself kingKp. The same 1Ch. 16:31; Psa. 47:8; Psa. 96:10; Psa. 97:1; Psa. 99:1; Isa. 24:23; Isa. 52:7.

Jehovah hath clothed himselfwith strength hath he girded himself:
surely he hath adjusted[299] the worldit shall not be shaken.

[299] So it shd. be (w. Aram., Sep., Syr., Vul.)Gn.

Established is thy throne from of old,[300]

[300] Ml.: from then.

from age-past time art thou.

The streams have lifted up O Jehovah,

the streams have lifted up their voice,
the streams lift up their crashing:

Beyond the voices of many waters,

more majestic than the breakers of the sea[301]

[301] So Gt.

Majestic on high is Jehovah.

Thy testimonies are confirmed with might,

to thy house befitting is holiness,

O Jehovah! to length of days.

(Nm.)

Psalms 94

(Nm.)

O GOD of avengings[302] Jehovah!

O GOD of avengings[302] shine forth!

[302] Or: dire vengeance.

Lift up thyself thou judge of the earth:

bring back a recompense on the proud.

How long shall lawless ones Jehovah,

how long shall lawless ones exult?

They pour forth they speak arrogancy,

vain-glorious are all the workers of iniquity.[303]

[303] Or: mischief. (NaughtinessDr.), and cp. Psa. 92:9 and Psa. 94:16; Psa. 94:23.

Thy people O Jehovah they crush,

and thine inheritance they humble;

The widow and the sojourner they slay,

and the fatherless they murder;

And sayYah seeth not,

and The God of Jacob perceiveth not.

Understand ye brutish among the people,

and ye dullards when will ye comprehend?

He that planteth the ear shall he not hear?

or that fashioneth the eye not look on?[304]

[304] Have power of sightO.G.

He that correcteth nations not shew what is right,

he that teacheth men knowledge?

Jehovah knoweth the devices of men,

for they themselves are a breath![305]

[305] Or: are vapour.

How happy the man whom thou correctest O Yah,

and out of thy law dost instruct:

That thou mayest give him rest from the days of misfortune,

till there be digged for the lawless one a pit.

For Jehovah abandoneth not his people,

and his inheritance doth he not forsake;

For unto righteousness shall judgment[306] return,

[306] Or: sentence.

and be following it all the upright in heart.

Who will rise up for me against evil-doers?

who will make a stand for me against the workers-of iniquity?[307]

[307] Or: mischief. (NaughtinessDr.). Cp. Psa. 94:23.

Unless Jehovah had been a help to me

soon had sunk into silence my soul!

If I saySlipped hath my foot!

thy kindness Jehovah! stayeth me.

In the multitude of my disquieting thoughts[308] within me

[308] As in Psa. 139:23.

thy consolations delight my soul.

Can the throne of engulfing ruin be allied to thee,

which frameth mischief by statute?[309]

[309] Under the pretext of rightDel.

They make a raid on[310] the life[311] of the righteous one,

[310] They gather themselves in bands againstDr. They rush in uponDel.
[311] U.: soul.

and innocent blood they condemn.

Nay! Jehovah hath become for me a lofty retreat,

and my God my rock of refuge.

Nay! he hath brought back on themselves their iniquity,[312]

[312] Or: mischief. (NaughtinessDr.). Cp. Psa. 94:16

and through their own evil will he exterminate them,
exterminate them will Jehovah our God.

(Nm.)

Psalms 95

(Nm.)

O Come! let us ring out our joy to Jehovah,

let us shout to the rock of our salvation;[313]

[313] Dr: our rock of safety.

Let us come to meet his face with thanksgiving,

with psalms let us shout unto him.

For a great GOD is Jehovah,

and a great king above all messengers divine:[314]

[314] See Psa. 8:5. Heb.: elohim.

In whose hand are the recesses[315] of the earth,

[315] Lit. places to be explored; cf. Job. 38:16Dr. Gt.: distant partsGn.

and the summits of the mountains belong to him:

Whose is the sea and he made it,

and the dry land his hands formed.

Come in! oh let us bow down and bend low,

oh let us kneel before Jehovah our maker;

For he is our God,

and we are the people of his hand and the flock of his shepherding.[316]

[316] So Gt. Cp. Psa. 79:13, Psa. 100:3. M.T.: people of his shepherding and flock of his hand.

Today if to his voice ye would but hearken!

Do not harden your heart as at Meribah,

as in the day of Massah in the desert:

When your fathers put me to the proof

tested me although they had seen my work.

For forty years loathed I that[317] generation,

[317] So it shd. he (w. Sep. and Vul.)Gn.

and saidA people going astray in heart are they,
even they have not known my ways:

So that I sware in mine anger,

Surely they shall not enter into my place of rest!

(Nm.)

Psalms 96

(Nm.)

Sing ye to Jehovah a song that is new,

sing to Jehovah all the land:

Sing to Jehovah bless ye his name,

proclaim the glad-tidings from day to day of his victory:[318]

[318] Or: salvation.

Tell among the nations his glory,

among all the peoples his wondrous works.

For great is Jehovah and to be highly praised,

Fear inspiring is he above all messengers divine;[319]

[319] Heb.: elohim. Cp. Psa. 8:5. Clearly some elohim are more than nothings.

For all the gods[320] of the peoples are nothings,[321]

[320] Heb.: elohim. The addition of all the peoples is deemed enough to turn the scale in translating.

[321] NothingnessesDr. IdolsDel. (who thus comments: nothings and good-for-nothings, without being and of no use.)

But Jehovah made the heavens.

Majesty and state[322] are before him,

[322] Glory and grandeurDel.

Strength and beauty[323] are in his sanctuary.

[323] The word used here denotes glory which is also a decoration or ornament (Isa. 60:7; Isa. 60:19)Dr.

Ascribe unto Jehovah ye families of the peoples,

ascribe unto Jehovah glory and strength:

Ascribe unto Jehovah the glory of his name,

bring ye a present[324] and come into his courts:[325]

[324] Heb.: minhah. Viz, to secure admission to His presence. Cf. 2Sa. 8:2; 2Sa. 8:6, Jdg. 3:18 endDr.

[325] Some cod. (w. Aram.): come in before himGn.

Bow down unto Jehovah in the adornment of holiness.[326]

[326] Cp. Psa. 29:2.

be in birth-throes[327] at his presence all the earth.

[327] Cp. Psa. 77:16.

Say among the nationsJehovah hath become king:[328]

[328] See Psa. 93:1, Psa. 97:1, Psa. 99:1.

Surely he hath adjusted the world, it shall not be shaken,
He will minister judgment unto the peoples with equity.

Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice,

let the sea thunder and the fulness thereof:

Let the plain exult and all that is therein,

Yea[329] let all the trees of the forest ring out their joy:

[329] So Gt.

Before Jehovah for he is coming,[330]

[330] So (participle) Del. Is comeDr. and others.

for he is coming[331] to judge the earth:

[331] In some cod. this clause is not repeated. Cp. 1Ch. 16:33Gn.

He will judge the world with righteousness,
And peoples with his faithfulness.

(Nm.)

Psalms 97

(Nm.)

Jehovah hath become king[332]let the earth exult,

[332] As in Psa. 93:1, Psa. 96:10, Psa. 99:1.

let the multitude of coastlands rejoice.

Clouds and darkness are round about him,

righteousness and justice[333] are the foundations of his throne:

[333] Or: judgment.

Fire before him proceedeth,

and setteth ablaze round about his adversaries.

His lightings illumined the world,

the earth saw and was in birth-throes:[334]

[334] Cp. Psa. 96:9.

The mountains like wax melted at the presence of Jehovah,

at the presence of the Lord[335] of the whole earth:

[335] Heb,: adon.

The heavens declared his righteousness,

and all the peoples saw his glory.

Put to shame are all they who were serving an image,

who were boasting themselves in nothings:[336]

[336] NothingnessesDr.

all messengers divine[337] bow ye down to him.

[337] Or: gods. Heb. elohim. But see Psa. 8:5, Psa. 96:4.

Zion heard and was glad,

and the daughters of Judah exulted,
Because of thy righteous decisions[338] O Jehovah.

[338] Or: thy judgments.

For thou Jehovah art Most High over all the earth,

greatly hast thou exalted thyself above all messengers divine.*

[*] See Pro. 8:5 . Heb.: elohim.

Ye lovers of Jehovah! hate ye wrong.

He preserveth the lives[339] of his men of kindness,

[339] Or, persons; Heb. naphshoth; U.: souls. Intro., Chap. III. Souls.

from the hand of lawless ones he rescueth them,

Light hath arisen[340] for the righteous one,

[340] So in some MSS. (w. Aram., Sep., Syr., Vul.). Cp. 112:14Gn. M.T.: is sown.

And for such as are upright of heart gladness.

Be glad O ye righteous in Jehovah,

and give thanks unto his Holy Memorial.

(Nm.)

PARAPHRASE

Psalms 92

A Song To Sing On The Lords Day[341]

[341] Literally, for the Sabbath day.

It is good to say, Thank You to the Lord, to sing praises to the God who is above all gods.
2 Every morning tell Him, Thank You for Your kindness, and every evening rejoice in all His faithfulness.
3 Sing His praises, accompanied by music from the harp and lute and lyre.
4 You have done so much for me, O Lord. No wonder I am glad! I sing for joy.
5 O Lord, what miracles you. do! And how deep are Your thoughts!
6 Unthinking people do not understand them! No fool can comprehend this:
7 That although the wicked flourish like weeds, there is only eternal destruction ahead of them.
8 But the Lord continues forever, exalted in the heavens,
9 While His enemiesall evil-doersshall be scattered.
10 But You have made me as strong as a wild bull. How refreshed I am by your blessings![342]

[342] Literally, anointed with fresh oil.

11 I have heard the doom of my enemies announced and seen them destroyed.
12 But the godly shall flourish like palm trees, and grow tall as the cedars of Lebanon.
13 For they are transplanted into the Lords own garden, and are under His personal care.
14 Even in old age they will still produce fruit and be vital and green.
15 This honors the Lord, and exhibits His faithful care. He is my shelter. There is nothing but goodness in Him!

Psalms 93

Jehovah is King! He is robed in majesty and strength. The world is His throne.[343] O Lord, you have reigned from prehistoric times, from the everlasting past.

[343] Laterally, The world is established . Your throne is established.

3 The mighty oceans thunder Your praise.
4 You are mightier than all the breakers pounding on the seashores of the world!
5 Your royal decrees cannot be changed. Holiness is forever the keynote of Your reign.

Psalms 94

Lord God, to whom vengeance belongs, let Your glory shine out. Arise and judge the earth; sentence the proud to the penalties they deserve.
3 Lord, how long shall the wicked be allowed to triumph and exult?
4 Hear their insolence! See their arrogance! How these men of evil boast!
5 See them oppressing Your people, O Lord, afflicting those You love.
6, 7 They murder widows, immigrants, and orphans, for The Lord isnt looking, they say, and besides, He[344] doesnt care.

[344] Literally, the God of Jacob.

8 Fools!
9 Is God deaf and blindHe who makes ears and eyes?
10 He punishes the nationswont He also punish you? He knows everythingdoesnt He also know what you are doing?
11 The Lord is fully aware of how limited and futile the thoughts of mankind are,
12, 13 So He helps us by punishing us. This makes us follow His paths, and gives us respite from our enemies while God traps them and destroys them.
14 The Lord will not forsake His people, for they are His prize.
15 Judgment will again be just and all the upright will rejoice.
16 Who will protect me from the wicked? Who will be my shield?
17 I would have died unless the Lord had helped me.
18 I screamed, Im slipping Lord! and He was kind and saved me.
19 Lord, when doubts fill my mind, when my heart is in turmoil, quiet me and give me renewed hope and cheer.
20 Will You permit a corrupt government to rule under Your protectiona government permitting wrong to defeat right?
21, 22 Do You approve of those who condemn the innocent to death? No! The Lord my God is my fortressthe mighty Rock where I can hide.
23 God has made the sins of evil men to boomerang upon them! He will destroy them by their own plans! Jehovah our God will cut them off.

Psalms 95

Oh, come, let us sing to the Lord! Gove a joyous shout in honor of the Rock of our salvation!
2 Come before Him with thankful hearts. Let us sing Him psalms of praise.
3 For the Lord is a great God, the great King of[345] all gods.

[345] Literally, above.

4 He controls the formation of the depths of the earth and the mightiest mountains; all are His.
5 He made the sea and formed the land; they too are His.
6 Come, kneel before the Lord our Maker,
7 For He is our God. We are His sheep and He is our shepherd! Oh, that you would hear Him calling you today and come to Him!
8 Dont harden your hearts as Israel did in the wilderness[346] at Meribah and Massah.

[346] Exo. 17:7.

9 For there your fathers doubted Me, though they had seen so many of My miracles before. My patience was severely tried by their complaints.
10 For forty years I watched them in disgust, the Lord God says. They were a nation whose thoughts and heart were far away from Me. They refused to accept My laws.
11 Therefore in mighty wrath I swore that they would never enter the Promised Land, the place of rest I planned for them.

Psalms 96

Sing a new song to the Lord! Sing it everywhere around the world!
2 Sing out His praises! Bless His name. Each day tell someone that He saves.
3 Publish His glorious acts throughout the earth. Tell everyone about the amazing things He does.
4 For the Lord is great beyond description, and greatly to be praised. Worship only Him among the gods!
5 For the gods of other nations are merely idols, but our God made the heavens!
6 Honor and majesty surround Him; strength and beauty are in His Temple.
7 O nations of the world, confess that God alone is glorious and strong.
8 Give Him the glory He deserves! Bring your offering and come to worship Him.[347]

[347] Literally, enter His courts.

9 Worship the Lord with the beauty of holy lives.[348] Let the earth tremble before Him.

[348] Or, in the priestly robes.

10 Tell the nations that Jehovah reigns! He rules the world. His power can never be overthrown. He will judge all nations fairly.
11 Let the heavens be glad, the earth rejoice; let the vastness of the roaring seas demonstrate His glory.
12 Praise Him for the growing fields, for they display His greatness. Let the trees of the forest rustle with praise.
13 For the Lord is coming to judge the earth; He will judge the nations fairly and with truth!

Psalms 97

Jehovah is King! Let all the earth rejoice! Tell the farthest island to be glad.
2 Clouds and darkness surround Him! Righteousness and justice are the foundation of His throne.
3 Fire goes forth before Him and burns up all His foes.
4 His lightning flashes out across the world. The earth sees and trembles.
5 The mountains melt like wax before the Lord of all the earth.
6 The heavens declare His perfect righteousness; every nation sees His glory.
7 Let those who worship idols be disgracedall who brag about their worthless godsfor every god must bow to Him!
8, 9 Jerusalem and all the cities of Judah have heard of Your justice, Lord, and are glad that You reign in majesty over the entire earth and are far greater than these other gods.
10 The Lord loves those who hate evil; He protects the lives of His people, and rescues them from the wicked.
11 Light is sown for the godly and joy for the good.
12 May all who are godly be happy in the Lord and crown[349] Him, our holy God.

[349] Literally, give glory to His holy name.

EXPOSITION

It will be observed that there is but one original headline to Psalms 92-97; and therefore it will be no great strain on our credulity if, from this circumstance, we assume that these psalms, thus undivided from each other in the Hebrew text, at a very early period in their history formed one continuous Service of Song for a Sabbath Day. That the series was composed of several distinct psalms, probably written by two or three psalmists, is clear from internal evidence.

Psalms 92 is intensely personal: as witness the phrases hast made me gladI will ring out my joy (Psa. 92:4)my hornI am anointedmine eyesmy lurking foesmy wicked assailantsmine ears (Psa. 92:10-11). It is at the same time thoroughly experimental: which is evident, not only from the above expressions, but also from the writers thankfulness (Psa. 92:1), and from his persuasion that he has been blessed with some insight into Jehovahs works and plans (Psa. 92:5), as well as from that sense of nearness to God which leads him to designate him My Rock (Psa. 92:15). The writer of the psalm is probably a king in the line of David: which accounts for his expectation that his horn will be exalted, in spite of his unscrupulous foes (Psa. 92:10-11). He is not only a king, but an enthusiastic musician: understanding what it is to sweep the strings (Psa. 92:1), and appreciating differences in musical instruments, as his selection of the deeptoned lyre to accompany his poetic soliloquy in his royal chambers sufficiently indicates. Out of these observations emerges the natural conclusion, that its writer was King Hezekiah.

Psalms 93 forms a striking contrast. It is by no means personal; but public, lofty, grand. It propounds a thesis worthy of the most far-seeing prophetic gift: for it tells of nothing less than an especial assumption of sovereignty by Jehovah himself, who on the basis of his ancient rule and being makes a new Divine advance to manifested kingship over the earth. The psalm is but brief, calling sea-streams to witness to the Divine Majesty, and claiming that the Divine Testimonies and Temple-worship are confirmed by Jehovahs Royal Proclamation. The two most remarkable things about this short psalm are: first, that it gives the key-note of the series; in which, be it noted, Jehovah is proclaimed King three times, which key-note is carried over to the abbreviated Sabbath Service of Song which we may assume to be formed by Psalms 98, 99; so that four times in the double series is this Proclamation made; second, another remarkable thing is that King Hezekiahhimself a king in the royal, covenant line of Davidshould have given so much prominence to such a theme, if he prepared this Service of Song, a theme to give currency to which looks greatly like an act of self-effacement on his part, as though neither he nor any of his descendants could be regarded as The Coming King. Not only, then, does this psalm demand a lofty prophetic gift for its production, but it requires a prophet of unquestionable standing and commanding weight to secure its insertion in this Service of Song. These conditions are remarkably well fulfilled in ISAIAH; especially if we may safely come backas it would appear we mayto the old-fashioned custom of regarding him as the author of the whole of the book which goes under his name. For, in that case, we have not only the vision of Isaiah, chapter 6, to give a commanding place to the conception of Jehovahs becoming King of all the earth, but we have patterned by Isaiah himselfof course under Divine guidancein Psa. 52:7 almost the exact formula for proclaiming Divine Kingship which stands out so prominently in these psalms. Isaiah is the man who has had the vision, and who is possessed by the conception which the vision conveys. And he has the age, the standing, and the unquestionable spiritual authority to secure Hezekiahs ready acceptance of Jehovahs own Royal proclamation of Himself as suitable for a large place in this Sabbath Service of Song. From this point of view, the bringing together of the two menIsaiah and Hezekiahunder the dominancy of a great expectation, throws an unexpected but most welcome sidelight on that strange wail of disappointment issuing from Hezekiahs sick-room (Isaiah 38) that nowif he must at once diehe will not see Yah in the land of the living, as under Isaiahs tuition he had conceived that he might. So that any imagined unlikelihood that Hezekiah would make such a theme so prominent in his Sabbath Service of Song, is completely overborne by the evidence which shews how naturally he might have done this very thing.

Psalms 94 differs from both the preceding: from 92 by not being mainly joyous, and from 93 by rather lamenting that Jehovah has not become King, than by proclaiming that he has ascended his earthly Royal Seat. This psalm, again, has a rather strong personal note, and may very well have been written by Hezekiah himself or at his dictation. If so, however, its totally different tone would drive us to conclude that it must have been written at another and probably an earlier time, evidently a time of sore national trouble. Indeed, so predominant is the note of lamentation throughout this psalm, that some critics have concluded it to be wholly out of its place where it now stands. Perhaps they have been hasty in their judgment. But let us glance through the psalm. Three stanzas (Psa. 94:1-7) suffice to make it clear that Israels foes are dominant, relentless and persecuting. That they are foreigners is already made probable by their being called lawless (Psa. 94:3) and practically certain by the way they speak of the God of Jacob (Psa. 94:7). Their doings are so wicked as to call for the vengeance of the Judge of all the earth, and so protracted as to lead the sufferers to cry out How long, O Jehovah! Their pride and arrogance strongly remind us of the haughty speeches of that villain Rabshakeh, the Assyrian general. Stanza IV. (Psa. 94:8-11) induces the belief that even some Israelites were in danger of falling away to the foreigner, and needed to be severely reasoned with. Stanza V. (Psa. 94:12-15) might have been a photograph for which Hezekiah himself sat; and goes far to persuade us that the actual writer of this psalm was one of Hezekiahs men, who could say of his master what his master would scarcely have said of himself. In Stanza V. (Psa. 94:16-19) the voice of Hezekiah is again plainly heard: the drawing is true to the lifeHezekiah has confronted the silence of deathhas slippedhas had disquieting thoughts and restorative consolations. Stanza VI. (Psa. 94:20-23) reminds us that all the while, behind the arrogant menaces of Rabshakeh, stood the iniquitous throne of Assyria, which, as cruel and God-defying, could well be described by a godly Israelite as a throne of engulfing ruin. Suffice it to remind ourselves of the signal way in which these perfect tenses of prophetic certaintyhath become a lofty retreat, hath brought back on themselves their trouble were at least typically fulfilled in the overthrow of Sennacherib. Such is the psalm. Is there need any longer to ask, what it does here in this Sabbath-day Service of Song: as though the Jewish Sabbath were not, above all things, a day of hallowed memories? On what principle it appears so interlocked, as it does here, with Jehovahs Royal Advent, we may yet discover. After this, we need not concern ourselves further with the question of authorship in its bearing on this Sabbath-day Service of Song. With Hezekiah and Isaiah at work in its production, we are ready for any contingency which Hezekiahs Chief Musician could suggest; since we can conceive of no suggestion as to either words or music, which Hezekiah and his godly helpers could not easily supply. But let us rapidly push forward this survey to a conclusion.

Psalms 95 is remarkable for the facility with which, after a 4-line invitation to worship, it resolves itself into two 10-line stanzas, the former joyous, and the later admonitory. As to the fitness of the latter to find place here,with such waverers in view as the previous psalm reveals (Psa. 94:8-11), it cannot be said that the solemn warning of this psalm (Psa. 95:7-11) is in any wise out of place. It is, further, something to rememberthat this Sabbath-days Service of Song points onwards to a Divine Sabbath of Sabbaths, which undoubtedly will be inaugurated by the Coming Divine King.

Psalms 96 enriches us with fresh thoughts: by bringing us into sight of a new manifestation of Divine Kingship, calling for a song that is new; that it commissions a particular land to herald the glad tidings of the Coming Divine Reign to the other nations of the earth (Psa. 96:2-3; Psa. 96:10); that, while there are Divine representatives (Elohim) who are real beings (Psa. 96:4), there are other so-called Elohim (gods) who have no existence (Psa. 96:5); that even in the Coming Divine Reign, there will be a sanctuary (Psa. 96:6) into which the families of the peoples (Psa. 96:7) can enter with their presents (Psa. 96:8) and there worship (Psa. 96:9); and that such a changed state of things will amount to a New Birth for or a Readjustment of the world (Psa. 96:9-10), whereat all Natureincluding the heavens, the earth, the sea, the plain, the forestmay well go into ecstasies; for the good reason that Jehovah is coming to reign over all the peoples of the world in righteousness and faithfulness (Psa. 96:10; Psa. 96:13).

Psalms 97, the last of this longer Sabbath-day series, is notable in that, whatever cause for fear and trembling any of the individuals and nations of the world may have, in prospect of this new and immediate Divine Rule, the great event itself is mainly an occasion for joy: Let the earth exult. Probably not without peculiar interest to Europeans (and it may be Americans also) the Westunder the significant Biblical name of Coastlandsis particularly called upon to rejoice:a glimpse into the future which was, as we know, vouchsafed to Isaiah, independently of this psalm (Isa. 24:15; Isa. 41:1; Isa. 42:4; Isa. 49:1; Isa. 59:18; Isa. 60:9; Isa. 66:19). Other things observable in this closing psalm of the first series are: that the promised Divine Advent is to be, in some way, open and palpable to the whole earth; conveying its testimony of Divine righteousness to all mens minds (Psa. 97:4-6); that it will be sufficiently sudden to put some boastful idolaters to shame (Psa. 97:7); sufficiently demonstrative to cause all true messengers divine to prostrate themselves before the worlds Divine King (Psa. 97:7); and yet sufficiently local in some phases of its manifestation to give occasion to carry the joyful tidings thereof to Zion and the daughters of Judah (Psa. 97:8). Real divine messengers, such as kings and judges, will be permitted to govern longer, only on condition of being manifestly in subjection to Jehovah as Most High over all the earth (Psa. 97:9). No wonder that such good news as this should be finally employed by way of admonition: Ye lovers of Jehovah! hate ye wrong (Psa. 97:10). They who persist in wrong will be punished. The wrongedthe imperiledare to be preserved, to be rescued (Psa. 97:10). Truly we may say, light has arisen for the righteous king Hezekiah (Psa. 97:11), and for myriads besides who will open their eyes. And, ye righteous, who are made glad in Jehovah, forget not to give thanks to his Holy Memorial; with the understanding that his Holy Memorial is his Holy Name, Jehovah (Exo. 3:15, Psa. 135:1-3); that is, Yahweh; that is, the Becoming One; and that here, in this beautiful Sabbath Service of Song, He hath prophetically BECOME the King of all the earth, as unveiled to your believing and rejoicing eyes.

For further General Reflections, see at the close of Psalms 99.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

Psalms 92

Why are these psalms (i.e. 92 through 97) placed under one heading?

What is meant by the thought that this psalm is both intensely personal and also thoroughly experimental?

The writer of the psalm is a king and a musician. How do we know this?

Psalms 93

What is the theme of this psalm?

How is the theme developed?

What are the two most remarkable things about this psalm?

Why does Rotherham feel Isaiah is probably the author of this psalm?

Psalms 94

This psalm differs from 92 or 93. In what way?

What is the general tenure of this psalm?

Rotherham seems to have a definite set of circumstances for the writing of this psalm. What are they? Who is Rabshekeh?

In what way is this psalm appropriate as a part of the sabbath day service in the Temple?

Psalms 95

We should sing and be thankful to Godi.e., according to Psa. 95:1-2. Give at least two reasons for doing so according to Psa. 95:3-5.

Show how the solemn warning of this psalm was appropriate when written and also today,

Psalms 96

What are the new thoughts introduced by this psalm?

This is called a missionary song. Why?

The material reign of Christ on earth in Jerusalem in a restored Temple seems to be the suggestion of the comments on this psalm. Discuss.

Psalms 97

Someone seems to think America and Europeans should take a particular interest in this psalm. Why?

Read and interpret Isa. 24:15; Isa. 41:1; Isa. 42:4; Isa. 49:1; Isa. 59:18. Discuss.

Rotherham has a marvelous ability of seeing a literal earthly fulfillment of Psa. 97:4-11. Discuss.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

(1) The original is far more striking in its conciseness. God of retributions, Jehovah, God of retributions shine forth. The emphatic repetition of a phrase is a feature of this psalm. (See Psa. 94:3; Psa. 94:23.)

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

1. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth The original is very vehement: O God of vengeance, Jehovah; God of vengeance, shine forth. “Vengeance” is in the plural, vengeances, or revenge, and is twice repeated to give intensity. The cry comes from the lowest depths. The “shine forth” is a call for such a signal manifestation of God’s power as shall leave no doubt of its divine origin, and finds its ground idea in the theophanies of the cloud in the wilderness and the shekinah. Exo 16:6-7; Exo 16:10; Lev 9:23; Num 14:10. Compare Deu 33:2; Psa 50:2-3; Psa 80:1-2. The spirit and motive of the prayer are explained in Psa 94:2-3, and the urgent cause of it in Psa 94:5-6

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Psalms 94

Structure – In Psa 94:1-15 a nation cries out for God to take vengeance. In Psa 94:16-23 an individual cries out for the same help.

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

Against Tyrants in the Church.

The psalmist, whose name is not given, appeals to God in view of the oppression of the adversaries, who included not only the enemies from without, but also the tyrants within the external organization of the Church.

v. 1. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, show Thyself. The statement yielding all judicial power to the Lord alone is followed by the request that He should shine forth, make known His judicial authority by inflicting a righteous punishment upon the oppressors.

v. 2. Lift up Thyself, arising, as from an indifferent attitude, Thou Judge of the earth, in the almighty exaltation of His judicial power; render a reward to the proud, punishing the arrogant pride of the adversaries.

v. 3. Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? Note the force of the figure of repetition in emphasizing the insolence of the wicked and the increasing impatience of the believers in awaiting the interference of the Lord.

v. 4. How long shall they utter, bubbling and sputtering, and speak hard things, spouting arrogance against the Lord, and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves, exalting themselves as though the Lord would not or could not keep them in check?

v. 5. They break in pieces Thy people, O Lord, crushing the believers by their tyranny, and afflict Thine heritage, the Church of God being known by this designation, and the affliction including every form of oppression and hindering of the work of the Church.

v. 6. They slay the widow and the stranger and murder the fatherless, such outrages being reported from almost every period of the Church’s history.

v. 7. Yet they say, The Lord shall not see, would deliberately ignore their wickedness, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it, that they might continue their insolent outrages unpunished. The psalmist now turns to the wicked in a sharp rebuke of their folly.

v. 8. Understand, ye brutish among the people, on a level with the irrational beasts on account of their folly; and ye fools, when will ye be wise? For the arrogant behavior of the wicked showed a lack of ordinary common sense, of the simplest form of observation.

v. 9. He that planted the ear, giving it its position and causing it to function as one of the senses of the body, shall He not hear? Would the wicked actually be so dense as to think that this Creator of the sense of hearing could not hear their insolent taunts? He that formed the eye, fashioning it to serve for the sense of sight, shall He not see? Did the tyrants believe that their acts of oppression were really unnoticed by the omniscient God?

v. 10. He that chastiseth the heathen, punishing entire nations for their sins, shall not He correct? punishing the enemies for their wicked deeds. He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not He know? Before Him, the Source of all wisdom and knowledge, nothing is hidden.

v. 11. The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, He is familiar with even the inmost workings of tile minds of men, that they are vanity, all their objects and intentions by nature being vain. Cf 1Co 3:20.

v. 12. Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, O Lord, correcting him in the manner in which a father chastises his child, and teachest him out of Thy law, giving him true understanding out of His eternal Word,

v. 13. that Thou mayest give him, as a consequence of the saving knowledge thus gained, rest from the days of adversity, those of real evil, of being rejected from the face of the Lord, until the pit be digged for the wicked, until they receive their well-deserved punishment, the result being the relief of the faithful.

v. 14. For the Lord will not cast off His people, the believers being His in spite of the present oppression, neither will He forsake His inheritance, His Church.

v. 15. But judgment shall return unto righteousness, the latter being bound to be vindicated and set upright once more; and all the upright in heart shall follow it, eagerly hailing the restoration of right and justice after such a long period of oppression.

v. 16. Who will rise up for me, in behalf of the petitioner, taking his part, against the evil-doers? Or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity? This rhetorical question emphasizes the answer given in the next verse.

v. 17. Unless the Lord had been my Help, upholding and defending him in the midst of his troubles, my soul had almost dwelt in silence, namely, in that of death.

v. 18. When I said, in a complaint and prayer to tile Lord, My foot slippeth, when there was danger of his falling as a result of the enemy’s oppression, Thy mercy, O Lord, held me up, sustaining him in the midst of all dangers.

v. 19. In the multitude of my thoughts within me, as worries and anxious cares multiply in his heart, Thy comforts delight my soul, reassuring and refreshing it for cheerfully enduring the afflictions of this life.

v. 20. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with Thee, the judgment-seat of destruction, the tribunal of wicked rulers being allied with God, their boast being that God Himself sanctioned their oppression, which frameth mischief by a law? by abusing the divine right for iniquitous procedure, by using the name and Word of God as a cloak for their oppression. It has often been the case that tyrants quoted the Bible in support of their attacks on the Church, trying to defend their unjust measures by appealing to Holy Writ.

v. 21. They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, planning his destruction, and condemn the innocent blood, laying the penalty of the law upon the believers with a show of right.

v. 22. But the Lord is my Defense, a Fortress against such attacks; and my God is the Rock of my refuge, protecting the believer against all enemies.

v. 23. And He shall bring upon them their own iniquity, paying them back in their own coin, and shall cut them off in their own wickedness, destroy them for all the evil done by them; yea, the Lord, our God, shall cut them off. This psalm is clearly written for all periods of the Church’s history and will therefore give consolation to the believers whenever they are beset by difficulties and persecutions.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

THIS psalm is primarily (Psa 94:1-11) a “cry for vengeance on Israel’s oppressors, passing into an appeal for more faith to God’s own people” (Cheyne). In the latter half (Psa 94:12-23) the psalmist comforts himself with the thought that God will assuredly protect his own, and bring destruction upon the evil doers (Psa 94:12-23). Metrically, the psalm is made up of four strophesthe first of seven verses (Psa 94:1-7); the next of four (Psa 94:8-11); the third of eight (Psa 94:12-19); and the last of four (Psa 94:20-23).

Psa 94:1-7

The cry for vengeance. Israel is suffering oppressionnot, however, from foreign enemies, but from domestic tyrants (Psa 94:4-6). Innocent blood is shed; the widow and the orphan are trodden down. God, it is supposed, will not see or will not regard (Psa 94:7). The psalmist, therefore, cries out to God to manifest himself by taking signal vengeance on the evil doers (Psa 94:1, Psa 94:2).

Psa 94:1

O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth (comp. Deu 32:35, “To me belongeth vengeance and recompence;” and Jer 51:56, where God is called “the Lord God of reeompences,” as he is hereliterally”the Lord God of vengeances”). O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, show thyself; or, “shine forth”make thy justice to appear; show thyself in thy character of a God who will by no means clear the guilty (Exo 34:7).

Psa 94:2

Lift up thyself (comp. Psa 7:6; Isa 33:10). “Rouse thyself,” that is, “from thy state of inaction”come and visit the earth as Judge. Thou Judge of the earth (comp. Gen 18:25; Psa 58:11). Render a reward to the proud; rather, render a recompenseas the same phrase is translated in Lam 3:64.

Psa 94:3

Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? “How long?” is the continual cry of the psalmists to God, as it is of the souls under the altar (Rev 6:10; comp. above, Psa 6:3; Psa 13:1, Psa 13:2; Psa 35:7; Psa 74:10; Psa 79:5; Psa 89:46; Psa 90:13). It is a cry of weakness and impatience, but has an element of faith in it, on which God looks with favour.

Psa 94:4

How long shall they utter and speak hard things? rather, they pour forth, they utter arrogant things; literally, arrogance. And all the workers of iniquity boast themselves; or, “carry themselves proudly” (Cheyne).

Psa 94:5

They break in pieces thy people, O Lord; or, “crush,” “oppress” (comp. Isa 3:15; Pro 22:22, where the verb is evidently used, not of foreign foes, but of domestic oppressors). And afflict thine heritage; or, “thine inheritance”those whom thou hast taken to be thy “peculiar people” (Deu 14:2), thine own exclusive possession.

Psa 94:6

They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless (comp. Isa 1:17-23; Isa 10:2; Eze 22:6-9; Mal 3:5; also Psa 10:8-10).

Psa 94:7

Yet they say, The Lord shall not see (comp. Psa 10:11, Psa 10:13). Foreign enemies did not suppose that Jehovah would not see, but trusted that their own gods were stronger than he, and would protect them (2Ki 18:33-35). Neither shall the God of Jacob regard it. “The God of Jacob” would not be a natural expression in the mouth of Israel’s foreign foes. They knew nothing of Jacob. But it was an expression frequently used by Israelites (Gen 49:24; Psa 20:1; Psa 46:7; Psa 75:9; Psa 76:6; Psa 81:1, Psa 81:4; Isa 2:3; Isa 41:21; Mic 4:2, etc.).

Psa 94:8-11

The appeal to Israel. The oppressors thought that their conduct would not be observed by God, or would not be taken into account. The psalmist appeals to them not to be so brutish and foolish (Psa 94:8), and argues, from the first principles of natural theology, that God must see and hear (Psa 94:9). If he chastises the heathen, why should he not also punish them (Psa 94:10)?

Psa 94:8

Understand, ye brutish among the people (comp. Psa 92:6). That there were among God’s people some so “brutish” as to suppose that God either did not see or did not regard their misdoings, appears also from Psa 10:11, Psa 10:13. And ye fools, when will ye be wise? When will ye put away your folly, and allow Wisdom to enter into your hearts? She is always crying in the streets: when will ye consent to listen (comp. Pro 1:20-23)?

Psa 94:9

He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see? This argument for a real, personal, intelligent God appears here, for the first time. It is of irresistible force. “Can it be possible that God, who planned and made the curious mechanism of hearing and vision, is himself without those faculties, or something analogous to them? Must he not hear those cries, and see those outrages, which men, who are his creatures, see and hear? Is it conceivable that he can be an unobservant and apathetic God?” (Cheyne).

Psa 94:10

He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? i.e. if God does not leave even the heathen without rebukes and chastisements, shall he not much more punish those among his own people who do amiss? He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know? Our version supposes an ellipse, which it fills up with great boldness, producing a very excellent sense. But the insertion made does not appear necessary (see the Revised Version).

Psa 94:11

The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man. Not only does the Almighty see and know all the actions of men (Psa 94:9), but he is even acquainted with their thoughts (comp. Psa 7:9; Psa 26:2; Psa 139:17; Isa 66:18; 1Co 3:20). That they are vanity (comp. Ecc 2:14, Ecc 2:15).

Psa 94:12-19

The blessedness of the righteous. The psalmist proceeds to console and comfort himself by considering in how many ways the righteous man is blessed.

1. God chastises him.

2. God teaches him.

3. God gives him a time of rest.

4. God never forsakes him.

5. God judges him righteously.

6. God helps him against evil doers (Psa 94:16, Psa 94:17).

7. God upholds him when he is in danger of falling.

8. God inwardly comforts his soul.

Psa 94:12

Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O Lord. The blessedness of chastening appears in Deu 7:5; 2Sa 7:14, 2Sa 7:15; Job 5:17; Psa 89:32, Psa 89:33; Pro 3:12; and is the main point of Elihu’s teaching in Job 33:15-30. It is not, as some have argued, entirely a New Testament doctrine. Unassisted human reason might discover it. Greek poets noted the connection between and . Our own great dramatist draws upon his experience when he says-

“Sweet are the uses of adversity;
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Bears yet a precious jewel in his head.”

And teachest him out of thy Law. The existence of “the Law,” and the general knowledge of it by God’s people, is assumed here, as elsewhere in the Psalms (see especially Psa 119:1-176.). Also it is assumed that “the Law” is a revelation from God.

Psa 94:13

That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity. Trials and afflictions are means to an end, and the intended end is “rest” and peace. “There remaineth, therefore, a rest to the people of God” (Heb 4:9). Until the pit be digged for the wicked (comp. Psa 9:1; Psa 35:7, Psa 35:8).

Psa 94:14

For the Lord will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance (comp. Deu 4:31; 1Sa 12:22; 1Ki 6:13; Isa 41:17). However long God’s chastisements continue (see Psa 94:3), the faithful may be sure that God has not forsaken, and never will forsake, them, since “he forsaketh not his saints, but they are preserved forever” (Psa 37:28). The promise is made equally to the faithful individuals (“his saints”) and to faithful Churches (“his people,” “his inheritance”).

Psa 94:15

But judgment shall return unto righteousness. “Judgment,” i.e. God’s actual award of good and evil upon the earth, which has seemed to be divorced from justice, while the ungodly have prospered and the pious been afflicted (Psa 94:3-6), shall in the end “return unto righteousness,” i.e. once more, evidently, conform to it and coincide with it. And all the upright in heart shall follow it; i.e. “and then all honest hearted men shall recognize the fact, see it, and rejoice in it.”

Psa 94:16

Who will rise up for me against the evil doers? or, who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity? But meanwhile, until this happy time come, what is the condition of the godly? Are they not left a prey to the evil doers, at their mercy, without a champion? The answer is given in the next verse.

Psa 94:17

Unless the Lord had been my Help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence. No; they are not without a champion; Jehovah is their Help. It is a part of their blessedness (Psa 94:12), that they are preserved. in life and protected from the wicked, by God himself. Otherwise they “had soon dwelt in silence.” Their soul had gone down to the pit, to the abyss of Sheol, the silent land (comp. Psa 115:17).

Psa 94:18

When I said, My foot slippeth; thy mercy, O Lord, held me up. Another respect in which the godly, even though suffering affliction, are blessed. God upholds their tottering feet, and, when they are in danger, keeps them from falling.

Psa 94:19

In the multitude of my thoughts within me; rather, my various thoughts, “my busy thoughts.” Sarappim (as Dr. Kay observes) “are anxious, perplexing, branchings of thoughts,” such as continually vex faithful yet doubting souls. Thy comforts delight my soul. Internal comfort is given by God himself to the perplexed and troubled in spirit, whereby they are “delighted,” or, rather, “soothed and solaced.”

Psa 94:20-23

The destruction of the evil doers. There can be no fellowship between light and darknessbetween God and evildoers, especially those who carry out their wicked purposes under the forms of law (Psa 94:20), and go the length of condemning innocent blood (Psa 94:21). Such persons God, who defends the righteous (Psa 94:22), will assuredly bring to utter destruction (Psa 94:23).

Psa 94:20

Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee? The interrogative is here, as so often, an emphatic negative. By “the throne of iniquity” is meant iniquity in high places, wickedness enthroned upon the judgment seat, and thence delivering its unjust sentences. Oppressors in Israel made a large use of the machinery of the law to crush and ruin their victims (see Isa 1:23; Isa 10:1, Isa 10:2; Amo 5:7; Amo 6:12, etc.). Which frameth mischief by a law; i.e. which effects its mischievous purposes by means of the decrees of courts.

Psa 94:21

They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood. A Messianic allusion is possible, but not necessary.

Psa 94:22

But the Lord is my Defence; and my God is the Rock of my refuge (comp. Psa 18:2).

Psa 94:23

And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity. Most manifestly when he makes them fall into their own snare (Psa 7:15; Psa 35:8; Psa 57:6; Psa 141:9, Psa 141:10), but really also whenever he punishes them for their sins. And shall cut them off; or, “destroy,” “exterminate” them. In their own wickedness; or, “by their wickedness.” The wicked man is often “hoist with his own petard.” Yea, the Lord our God shall cut them off. The repetition, like that in Psa 94:1, is emphatic, and solemnly confirms the entire section (Psa 94:20-23).

HOMILETICS

Psa 94:3

The saint’s perplexity at the triumph of sin.

“Lord, how long?” etc. This question, which the inspired psalmist, in the anguish of his spirit, could not help putting, is not one of those which are solved by the lapse of time. Rather it grows more urgent. Thousands of years have rolled by since these words were written, and still the awful mystery confronts us which St. Paul so forcibly describessin reigning unto death. It is true that in each particular case “the triumphing of the wicked is short”at least, compared with eternity. True, also, that nothing can shake the truth of the promise, which runs through the whole Bible, that, come what may, “it shall be well with the righteous”eternally welland that “all things shall work together for good to them that love God.” Nevertheless, when we think, if we could wield absolute power with unerring knowledge, how eagerly we should make short work with injustice, cruelty, tyranny, lawless crime, we cannot but marvel at the spectacle, prolonged age after age, of our heavenly Father “making his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sending rain on the just and on the unjust.” The psalmist assumes the fact as unquestionable, and reverently, yet urgently, appeals to God, as the Judge of the earth How long is it to be suffered to continue?

I. First, HERE IS THE UNDENIABLE FACT, WHICH WOULD ASTONISH US INFINITELY MORE THAN IT DOES, IF WE WERE NOT SO FAMILIAR WITH IT. “The wicked triumph.”

1. They do so every day, often for long years, in two wayswhen they are strong enough, by defying justice; and when they are crafty enough, by evading justice. It is the former of these which especially awakens the indignation and distress of the psalmist. He sees might, which ought to be the servant of right, become the ally of wrong; and justice poisoned at its fountain. It is the spectacle which meets us on every page of history. Joseph a slave and an exile in the dungeon, while his brothers are peacefully feeding their flocks in Canaan, and his wicked, false accuser is dwelling in a palace. Pharaoh blaspheming on the throne, and God’s people bleeding and weeping under the lash. Saul in his court, and David hiding in dens and caves. Nebuchadnezzar at the height of earthly glory, and God’s faithful servants in the fiery furnace. Herod worshipped as a god, and James slain with the sword. Nero on the judgment seat, and Paul a prisoner at his bar. Popes receiving Divine honours, and martyrs for Christ burning at the stake. Ages roll on, and still, in one form or another, this hideous anomaly bears witness that we live in a world whose whole moral frame is disordered. True, as those ages roll, they show us another side to the picture. Joseph in power, and his brethren trembling before him. Pharaoh’s host buried in the waters or bleaching on the shore, and Israel free. Saul stark on Gilboa, and David crowned and victorious. Nebuchadnezzar a maniac, herding with beasts. Herod eaten of worms. Nero a wretched suicide, hooted out of life with curses. But still, successors arise. History repeats itself. The One Arm which could strike down oppression, not only here and there, now and then, but everywhere and forever, seems to delay the blow (Ecc 8:11). Still the cry goes up, which St. John heard from the souls beneath the altar, “How long, O Lord?” In our own land, thanks be to God, we must look back two hundred years if we would see tyranny and injustice openly triumphing on the throne and on the judgment seat, and God’s servants exiled, starved, imprisoned merely for preaching the gospel. Englishmen have almost forgotten that such things ever were in England. But we see crime continually evading justice, and even successfully concealing itself behind a mask of respectability. One terrible vicedrunkennesshas this mitigating circumstance, that it cannot long be concealed, and the mischief and misery it works cannot be denied. But if dishonesty, extortion, gambling, false speaking, secret immorality, could in like manner be brought to view, it would be found (alas!) that the crimes human law can reach are but a fraction of crimes actually committed against the Law of God.

2. There is a wider and deeper view we cannot help taking. The power of sin is the power of Satan. He is expressly declared to be “the prince of this world,” “the god of this world,” who blinds the minds of “them that believe not.” Apart from this, neither the extreme wickedness of men nor the slow progress of Christ’s kingdom and gospel can be accounted for.

II. IS THERE NO ANSWER TO THIS CRY WHICH HAS GONE UP FOR SO MANY AGES FROM GOD‘S PEOPLE TO HIS THRONE? The tempest of his vengeance does not awaken. The lightning does not strike the tyrant, the slave dealer, the seducer, the assassin. The earthquake does not yawn under guilty cities. Satan is not yet chained. But yet, to the ear of faith there comes from God’s Word an answer; not, indeed, such as to end the trial of faith, by clearing away the whole mystery of God’s dealings; but enough to sustain faith, nourish patience and courage, kindle hope and stimulate labour. How long?

1. Long enough to answer those Divine purposes for which sin was at first permitted to enter, and the wickedwicked men or wicked spiritsever to exist at all. We cannot avoid seeing that it was possible for God to have prevented sin from ever existing; if in no other way (of which we cannot judge), at all events by refraining from creating beings, angels or men, capable of sin. The lower creatures are incapable of sin, and, therefore, incapable also of obedience to moral law and of likeness to God. God has seen fit to create beings capable of loving him, knowing him, obeying him; therefore capable of sinning against him. Knowing infinitely better than we the mischief and misery of sin, he has seen it worth while to allow room for sin to display its character and consequences. And we may well believe the lessons thus taught wilt never be forgotten or need repeating in eternity.

2. Long enough to reveal the infinite preciousness of the Divine atonement for sinthe blood of Jesus Christ which cleanseth from all sin; and the glorious power of Divine love, truth, and grace; the power, that is, of God’s Spirit to restore even souls dead in sin to God’s likeness.

3. Long enough to perfect that trial of faith and discipline of character, by means of which God is training, in a world of temptation, sorrow, sin, and death, those whom he redeems “from this present evil world,” for a life of perfect holiness and endless joy.

4. Long enough to show beyond all question God’s patience and long suffering, “not willing that any should perish;” and to justify his righteousness when at last he will “render to every man according to his deeds” (Rom 2:2-11; Joh 5:22; 2Pe 3:9, 2Pe 3:10).

HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY

Psa 94:3

How long shall the wicked triumph?

I. SUPPOSE THEY NEVER DID.

1. Then the devil would be right when he asked, “Doth Job serve God for nought?” He meant to say that men serve God only from selfish, interested motives.

2. Men would want to sin, though from fear they held back. The heart would remain unchanged, character would be the same.

3. The essential discipline and test of the righteous would be destroyed. We are tested when, though we see the wicked triumph, we still cleave to God.

4. The wicked would wax worse and worse. “The strength of sin is the Law.”

5. It would be a confession that men cannot be governed by higher motives than earthly gain.

II. SUPPOSE THEY ALWAYS DID.

1. Earth would become hell, because of the wickedness of them that dwell therein.

2. The faith and fear of God would disappear.

III. SUPPOSE THEY SOMETIMES DO. This is the case. And sometimes they appear generally to triumph. Nevertheless, it is not always, nor for long. But the present order avails:

1. To glorify God by the fidelity of his people.

2. To lift them to a higher life.

3. To convince the world of the reality of the faith the believer holds.S.C.

Psa 94:8-10

An argument all should understand.

I. ITS NATURE. It is an argument from what we see in ourselves to what exists in God. If God has given to us certain powers, such powers must exist in him.

II. ITS FORCE. It is inconceivable that it should be otherwise. A man must have brutalized his soul, and become a fool, not to see this. God is not as man isthe mere employer of force which he does not and cannot create, but he is behind all force, its Creator and Source.

III. ITS SAFEGUARD.

1. For this argument needs guarding. If it be said that the presence of faculties in ourselves proves the existence of them in God, which is the argument in these verses, then might it not be said God is the author of the sin that is in us as well as the good, of that which is wrong as well as of that which is right? The heathen thought so, and hence they regarded their gods as altogether like themselvesembodiments of not merely good qualities, but also of lust and hate and all abomination. The idea of a holy God they never knew. And sinful men now often say, “God made us so,” and thus cast on him the responsibility for their sin. “He that planted in me the love of sin, doth he not love it too?” So they falsely reason.

2. But how must such wrong extension of the argument of these verses be met? By noting that man has not merely the powers of thought, feeling, will, but also of conscience. This last is the regal, the judicial faculty, and decides what is of God, and what is only the product of our corrupt nature. Apart from conscience, there could be no right or wrong, but it infallibly tells, by its “excusing and accusing,” how far we may go in arguing from what we see in ourselves to what exists in God. Else a man might say, “He that made me to lust, shall he not lust?” The ancient Greeks and the whole heathen world did say this.

IV. ITS MINGLED COMFORT AND WARNING.

1. As to the comfort this argument supplies.

(1) It shows that all our gifts are of God. “It is he that planted the ear,” etc. (cf. Jas 1:16-18). As we think of the manifold advantages that come to us through these gifts of God, and what joy, can we fail to see the beneficence of our God?

(2) That they are reflections of God, mirrors, minute indeed, but yet true, of what he is. Therefore my thought tells of thought in him; my love, of his, my conscience, of moral judgment in him. It is our Lord’s argument (Mat 7:9-11; Luk 15:1-32.). But:

2. There is warning likewise. Against pride: “What hast thou that thou hast not received?” Against envy. We are as God willed us to be, and, if we be but obedient, equally well pleasing in his sight. Against trifling with sin. If we condemn it, and will to punish it if unrepented of, that condemnation and that will reveal what is yet more in God. They tell of judgment to come.S.C.

Psa 94:12, Psa 94:13

A strange Beatitude.

These verses contain more than this, but all they contain is linked on to this. Therefore consider

I. THE STRANGE BEATITUDE. “Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest.” Wherein is the blessedness? We reply:

1. Because of what such chastening often reveals. If he were not really a child of God, he would not endure it; he would start aside and rebel. An infidel told a minister of Christ, who has been stricken with total blindness, that if God served him so, he would curse him to his face. Then this ministerwell known to the writerbore his testimony to the wonderful grace of God, how his soul had been kept in peace, and that he could and did rejoice in God, notwithstanding all his trouble. The text is like the last of the Beatitudes, “Blessed are ye when men shall persecute you,” etc. (Mat 5:1-48.). The endurance, and yet more the meek acquiescence in it, are a real revelation from God, that such a man is one of the Lord’s very own. To know that is blessedness indeed.

2. Because of what it is followed by. The Lord teaches him out of his Law. We are all of us laggard scholars; some of us are too proud to learn. But God’s chastenings have a wonderfully humbling and softening effect, and bring the soul into the blessed and indispensable condition for receiving the teachings of God.

3. Because of what it ministers. “Rest from the days of adversity.” They cannot trouble him. A while ago some works were being carried on at Dover pier; the men had to go down deep in diving bells to reach their work. One evening one of the men was drawn up, the day’s work being done, and went to his home. It suddenly occurred to him that he had left one of his tools on the stone which he had been working at. That night a furious storm raged, and the sea was lashed into a wild tumult. When at length on the following day the man went back to his work, he made up his mind that he should never again see the tool he had left the previous day. But lo! when he got down to the depths where he had been at work, there was his tool, just where he had left it the night before. The fury of the storm had not penetrated so far down; it only had power on the surface; in the depths beneath all had been quiet and still. So is it with the soul of him to whom God gives rest from the days of adversity. His soul is in the depths of God’s love, where no power of adversity can reach. And this has been proved true a thousand times, and will be for us all if we be really the Lord’s. And by and by the adversity itself shall depart; it continues only “until the pit be digged for the wicked.” Then there shall be rest without as well as within. Now he can have only the inward rest, and blessed indeed is that; but then externally as well as internally he shall be at rest.

II. A STERN NECESSITY. The destruction of the wicked; for that is what the words just quoted mean. For until then God’s people cannot be perfected, but then they shall. Many object to this stern doctrine. They say God is too merciful ever to let such doom fall upon any soul. But what about his own people? If they cannot enter into God’s rest until what is here said is fulfilled, does not this make it altogether likely that it will be fulfilled; yea, that it must be? If mercy to the wicked be cruelty to the righteous, as it is, what is it likely that God will do? There can be but one answer.

III. A TERRIBLE ONLOOK. “The pit digged,” etc.

1. These words assert the fact that such retribution will surely come. Scripture evermore affirms it. Conscience confirms the Scripture, and observed facts in the constant acting of God’s providencethe awful retributions that we see do actually come on the wickedattest the same awful truth.

2. They tell the nature of this retribution. “The pit.” It brings up before the mind the dark horror which awaits sin.

3. Its gradual approach. The pit is not yet dug, but is being made ready. It becomes wider and deeper every day.

4. Those who are preparing it. God and the sinner himself. In an awful sense he is a “coworker with God.”

5. Its loud appeal. “Stop the digging!” If man stops, God will; he will not go on if you will not. Turn to him, and he will deliver you out of the horrible pit (Psa 40:1).S.C.

Psa 94:19

The throng of our thoughts.

It is not difficult to see how the experiences which are more or less plainly referred to in this psalm should produce a “multitude of thoughts.” The text reminds us that

I. THOUGHTS COME IN THRONGS. To one standing on the golden gallery that surmounts the dome of St. Paul’s in London, and looking down on the streets below, the sight of the thronging multitudes of people, hastening hither and thither, each intent on his or her own business, the traffic never ceasing, is very striking. How the people come and, some one way, some another, crossing and recrossing each other, never still for a moment,it is all a picture of the minds of most men. Who could count or remember the multitude of thoughts that pass and repass, that come and go across the pathways of the mind? It is an incessant traffic, a concourse that is never still. And they are of all kinds, good, bad, and indifferent, grave and gay, coming one scarce knows whence, and going one as little knows whither.

II. MANY OF THEM OFTEN LEAVE THE SOUL SAD. There are those of an opposite character, and by God’s mercy they are the most numerous and ordinary. And there are people who seem never to think seriously at allthe mere butterflies of life. But the Christian cannot be one of them. We know what our Lord said of the “wayside” hearers. The good seed never takes root there. But the soul awakened to things that are eternal must often think seriously, and, not seldom, sadly likewise. It was so with the writer of this psalm. To him also the enigmas of this unintelligible world came clamouring for solution, as they do still. “Lord, how long shall the wicked triumph?” (Psa 94:3). That was to him one of the many inexplicable and heart saddening facts of life. And how many minds are today agitated, perplexed, well nigh shipwrecked, and their lives darkened by the mysteries they must meet, but cannot comprehend? But

III. GOD HAS PROVIDED RELIEF FOR SUCH SOULS. Indeed, much more than simply relief. He has provided “delight” for them. Unquestionablyblessed be his holy Name for it!God has done this. The testimony of saints in all ages has shown that God giveth “songs in the night.” See the life and letters of men like Paul; above all, listen to “the Man of sorrows” himself telling of his “joy,” and praying that it may “be fulfilled” in his disciples. And there are children of God now plunged in poverty or pain, or both, and yet who know and confess that God is their “exceeding Joy.”

IV. THIS IS ACCOMPLISHED BY MEANS OF HIS “COMFORTS.” “Thy comforts delight,” etc.

1. They are of God. Those that this world supplies could never accomplish this.

2. They come through various channels. Sometimes through Natureher calm and beauty and grandeur uplift the soul. Or through revelation. Think of all the “exceeding great and precious promises.” Or through providence. Or by his Spirit in the soul. This best of all.

V. THE CONDITION ISTRUST IN GOD.S.C.

HOMILIES BY R. TUCK

Psa 94:1

A God of vengeances.

Aglen, in Ellicott’s ‘Commentary,’ proposes to render, “God of retributions, Jehovah, God of retributions, shine forth.” The idea in the term “vengeances” would be better expressed by the term “avengements.” God is thought of as the great Goel-Avenger of his oppressed and afflicted people, and therefore the One to whom appeal should be made in any particular time of distress. The word “vengeance” includes the idea of heated personal feeling. The word “avengement” sets prominently family relations and duties. The Apostle St. Paul expresses this thought of God, when he commands that “no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter, because that the Lord is the Avenger of all such” (1Th 4:6). The “avenger of blood” is a familiar figure in the Mosaic constitution. But Moses only adopted and modified an original tribal institution. The main functions of the Hebrew Goel, Avenger, or Redeemer, were three.

1. If any Hebrew had fallen into penury, and been compelled to part with his ancestral estate, the family avenger was bound to redeem it and restore it.

2. If any Hebrew had been taken captive, or had sold himself as a slave, the goel had to buy him back, and set him free.

3. If any Hebrew had suffered wrong, or had been killed, the goel had to exact compensation for the wrong, or to avenge the murder. It is evident that the psalmist lived in a time when wickedness triumphed in high places. We may think of the reign of Ahab and Jezebel, when the condition of Jehovah’s prophets and people seemed to be hopeless; they could only cry mightily to God, seeking his preservations and his deliverances. The psalmist had no confidence in the existing rulers, who should have been the avengers of all the poor, the wronged, and the distressed. He had confidence in God, of whom it can be said, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay.”

I. MAN CANNOT AVENGE HIMSELF.

1. Because those who wrong him are often quite beyond his reach or control.

2. Because he has not at command the requisite forces.

3. Because he is not self master enough to temper justice with mercy.

4. Because he cannot be strictly judicial, but is sure to spoil his avengings by introducing personal feeling.

5. Because he is in grave peril of injuring himself in his avengings.

II. MAN MAY RESTFULLY LET GOD AVENGE HIM.

1. Because his power is sufficient.

2. His self-restraints are perfect.

3. His time is best.

4. His avengings prove to be blessings both for the wronged and for the wrong doer.R.T.

Psa 94:2

The Judge of all the earth.

The older Scriptures constantly set God forth as the actual, living Judge, concerned now in his Divine magistracy, deciding causes, vindicating the oppressed, punishing the wrong doer. The idea of some one single judgment day, in the far future, when all earth complications are to be put straight, and all earth evils are to be rectified, does not appear to have been in the minds of Old Testament saints. It may be that the New Testament figure of the “judgment seat of Christ” has unduly limited the Christian idea of the present and ever-continuous judging of God. It may be that this present judging needs to be set more clearly before the Christian mind. Our notion of the Judge is of one who, at a fixed time, holds a grand assize; and this notion helps to shape our figure of a single final judgment. But the Israelite thought of judging, magistracy, as the most important continuous function of his king, which every faithful king would exercise daily, sitting in the gate to hear and decide all causes that might be presented, and so coming into constant judicial relation to the life of the people. Shifting God’s judgment on to a future great assize should not be allowed to loosen our Christian sense of God’s present rule as involving a present magistracy, and present punishments and rewards. Read life aright, and the signs of a present Divine magistracy will abundantly appear.

I. GOD THE JUDGE IS DISTINGUISHING IN DIFFICULT CASES. Illustrate from the nisi prius courts. Constantly in life we find ourselves bewildered. We do not know what to think, or what to do, or where to go. We are in danger of being carried away by the merely attractive. If we will but wait, God will surely decide for us, and make the right for us quite unquestionable.

II. GOD THE JUDGE IS RECOGNIZING AND REWARDING THE RIGHTEOUS. We never have any doubt of this until we become impatient, and want the recognition at once. Because the Judge is also the Sanctifier, he may delay the reward which he decides to be due. But he is keen to notice everything that is good.

III. GOD THE JUDGE IS THE PUNISHER OF ALL THE WICKED. We need never be deceived by the apparent prosperity of the unjust. It is part of their judgment. It is making them top-heavy in preparation for some irremediable fall.R.T.

Psa 94:3

The tether of the ungodly.

“How long shall the wicked triumph?” Men ask this question only when they cannot see the rope, or the chain, which keeps the movements of the ungodly within strict limitations. In Jersey and Guernsey the cattle are not left free in the fields, but are tethered so that they can only feed within a defined circle; and the visitor is interested in the different lengths of tether allowed to each animal. Bunyan represents his pilgrim as alarmed at the lions at the entrance to the palace Beautiful, and reassured when told that they were chained, and the chains did not permit of their reaching the middle of the pathway: he would be quite safe if he kept to the middle. The waves lift up themselves, and sometimes seem as if they would overwhelm; but God holds the waters in the hollow of his hand, puts his limitations even on their storm time swellings. The martyr souls are represented in Rev 6:10 as crying from under the altar of God, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?”

I. THE TETHER OF THE UNGODLY IS FIXED FOR THE HONOUR OF GOD. He will not permit his Name to be dishonoured or his work to be hindered. Nebuchadnezzar finds he has reached the limit of his tether when he begins to boast himself against God. Herod reaches his limit when, unreproved, he allows the people to shout concerning him, “It is the voice of a god, and not of a man.” Because God is and must be supreme, every man is under limitations. Against that men fret, but they can only hopelessly fret.

II. THE TETHER OF THE UNGODLY IS FIXED FOR THE SAFETY OF GOD‘S PEOPLE. “What can harm you if ye be followers of that which is good?” The figure is presented of Satan, the deceiver and persecutor of the saints, as bound for a thousand years. He is always bound. See the figure of Satan, in the Book of Job, obliged to get Divine permission ere he can touch Job, or a thing that Job has. Even the malice of persecuting ages, and the shameless wickedness of the Inquisition, were in Divine limitations.

III. THE TETHER OF THE UNGODLY IS FIXED IN THE INTERESTS OF THE UNGODLY THEMSELVES. Illustrate from the antediluvians. Their life tether was about a thousand years, so they became gigantic in wickedness. What would proud, vicious men become now, if they could get free from Divine restraints? Mercy puts limits on the wicked.R.T.

Psa 94:9, Psa 94:10

From man to God.

The argument here is, that whatever powers are found in man are surely found in him who made man. The workman must have in him everything that gains expression in his work. A machine is an embodiment of thought, and the thought is altogether higher than the machine. Here the point ismen hear the cry of the oppressed; men see the sufferings of the godly; then they may be quite sure that God both sees and hears; and they must seek some better explanation of his delayed help than can be found by assuming his ignorance or indifference. “Whatever is in man must be in the Power that made manwhether by evolution out of lower natures or otherwise it matters notand whatever exists in that Power must show itself in active energy in the direction of man’s history.” (Barry).

I. MAN IS ALWAYS READY TO HELP HIS SUFFERING NEIGHBOUR. Man as man is. Some men, self-centred and self-seeking, are not. All true men are sympathetic toward sufferers, easily roused to champion the oppressed, and vigorous against the violent wrong doer. History is full of illustrations of the sacrifices men will make in behalf of the innocent and oppressed. No doubt the advancing civilization, which crowds cities, tends to put the disabled and oppressed out of sight and hearing; but let their condition come into view, and then men are ready with generous hand and gift, prepared to help. The psalmist is dealing with those who pleaded that, in the humiliations and distresses of his time, there were no more than signs of human sympathy and help; and who groaned that these were proving quite ineffective.

II. GOD IS ALWAYS READY TO HELP HIS SUFFERING PEOPLE. First, this is absolutely certainhe can see and hear. And this is quite as certainhe does see and hear. Then why does he not immediately intervene? To get the reason we must always take a large and comprehensive view of God’s rule. And especially we must remember that he is the God of the wrong doer as well as of the saint; of the oppressor as well as of the oppressed. And it may be that the need of the hour is chastening for the good, and this may require that the evil be maintained as the chastening agency.R.T.

Psa 94:11

The vanity of men’s idea of the Divine indifference.

“The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.” Clearly the reference is not a general one, to the common and usual thoughts of men, but a special one to the particular thoughts about the delay of God’s vindication of the oppressed, which was at the time distressing the psalmist (see Psa 94:7). The idea that God does not regard the suffering of his people, and will not intervene in their behalf, is characterized as “vanity,” a foolish, baseless, and altogether unsound notion. This idea concerning God is sometimes the doubt of the pious soul, as in Isa 40:27; here it is the reproach of the ungodly. The doubt of the pious soul is properly met by Divine comfortings and assurances; the reproach of the ungodly is properly met by scornful and withering reproof. “So far from ‘not seeing,’ ‘not regarding,’ as these brutish persons fondly imagine, Jehovah reads their inmost thoughts and devices, as he reads the hearts of all men, even though for a time they are unpunished” (see 1Co 3:20).

I. SUCH THOUGHTS ARE VANITY BECAUSE THEY ARE UNTRUE. They do not answer to the facts. If God be God, he must know what is going on; he must be controlling everything; he must be working toward the blessing of the good. Such thoughts are untrue if tested

(1) by right knowledge of God;

(2) by the assurances and promises of God;

(3) by the history of his dealings with men;

(4) by the personal experiences of believers.

II. SUCH THOUGHTS ARE VANITY BECAUSE THEY ARE UNWORTHY. The men who encourage them are not in a right state of mind. Men ought to trust God, not doubt him. Men ought to be quick to observe everything that can nourish confidence. If God’s ways ever seem perplexing, our assumption should always be in favour of their wisdom and loving kindness. It is unworthy of men to doubt God in one thing, seeing he gives them such abundant reason for trusting him in a thousand things. He is “too good to be unkind.”

III. SUCH THOUGHTS ARE VANITY BECAUSE THEY ARE UNSTABLE. They are but the feelings of the hour; they are based on no careful considerations. Men take them up when they are vexed at not getting what they wish, or not having things according to their minds. The moods of the hour may well be called “vanity.”R.T.

Psa 94:12

The triumph of the wicked may be the chastening of the righteous.

It alters everything when we can see our trouble to be Divine chastening. Look on it as human oppression, the masterfulness of unprincipled magistrates, the persecution of an idolatrous Jezebel, the scheme of those who cherish enmity against the righteous, anti our trouble is hard to bear; everything noble in us rises up to resist. But have a supreme faith in God; feel sure of his comprehensive ruling; apprehend that he works for the highest moral ends, and uses even the self-will and the wrong doing of men as agents in the accomplishing of his loving purposes;and then the soul goes down into the quietness of a holy submission, and out of its enduring sings its songs of hope, even as apostles sang their joy in God when in the dungeon at Philippi. We can never read life aright until we can fully receive the idea of the Divine chastening. “Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.” Illustration may be found in God’s dealings with his ancient people. In Egypt, in the days of the judges, and in the age of the later kings, we find what, at first sight, seem to be pure calamities. But we are helped to read them aright, and then we see that they are chastenings, designed to secure the moulding and the correcting of God’s people. See also the story of the patriarch Job. There, too, we have calamities, but we are taught to see in them chastenings, and chastenings of the highest order, not meant to secure mere correction, but designed to effect the noblest spiritual culture.

I. WE MAY MISTAKE IF WE READ THE TRIUMPH OF THE WICKED FROM BELOW. That is, as those actually crushed down under it. Suffering prevents both right feeling and right thinking.

II. WE MAY MISTAKE IF WE READ THE TRIUMPH OF THE WICKED FROM THE LEVEL. That is, as those who are not suffering themselves, but are watching the depressions and woes of God’s people. So far as earthly issues are concerned, we can see no good in the trouble. Indeed, evil seems better off than good.

III. WE CAN ONLY READ THE TRIUMPH OF THE WICKED FROM ABOVE. From God’s point of view. Then we can see how things fit, and what things work towards. The wicked are only his staff with which he chastises his children for their good.R.T.

Psa 94:19

The comfortable thoughts God gives.

They are the thoughts God starts in our minds concerning himself. The “multitude of thoughts” here suggest “anxious thoughts,” “distractions;” “divided or branching thoughts.” Keep before the mind that this psalm was written in some time of personal or national anxiety, which was causing very grave perplexity. Multitude of thoughts, complexity, conflict of thoughts.

I. OUR MULTITUDE OF THOUGHTS. A suitable and suggestive term. A true description. Have you ever tried to watch the process of the mind in ordinary times or in special times? Explain how the law of association brings up not one string of orderly thoughts, but various series, which branch and cross and conflict one with the other. Past, present, future, bring in their various thoughts. The importance of good ordering of thoughts, to the pious man, may be seen from these considerations,

1. Sin lingers in them.

2. Character is exhibited to God as much by them as by our actions; for “as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.”

3. The power of religion is first felt in them.

4. They are the real springs of action, and they give character to our action.

II. GOD‘S COMFORTING THOUGHTS. He gives comforting assurances for us to think about. God makes himself a Key-thought to the thoughts that we should cherish. Illustrate how the godly soul may fill his mind with the “exceeding great and precious promises,” and how these will be always ready to come up, to dispel distracting thoughts, and soothe troubled thoughts. God’s comforts are thoughts that realize God as the holy Father, Christ as the elder Brother, the Spirit as the present Guide, and “all things working together for good.”

III. THE DUTY OF CHERISHING GOD‘S COMFORTING THOUGHTS. They will ease our distress; they will recall us to trust; they will put a “song into our mouth.” We may cherish them by full acquaintance with God’s Word, which is the great storehouse of Divine thought suggestions, and by daily communion with God, which is sure to start fresh comfortings in our souls.R.T.

Psa 94:20

Man’s rival law.

“Frameth mischief by a law.” “Making legislation a means of wrong.” The idea is that, in the psalmist’s time, the courts of justice were corrupt; and man’s law, instead of being in harmony with God’s Law, and its expression, had become a rival. It had come to do what God’s Law never does. It worked towards injustice and unrighteousness. God’s Law is “holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.” The thing that seemed so unbearable to the psalmist was, that the tyrants of his day claimed to be acting according to law, seeking to hide their unrighteousness by a holy name.

I. SUBMISSION TO LAWFUL AUTHORITY IS A PRIMARY RELIGIOUS DUTY. Inculcated by Old Testament and New. Felt to be the right thing. Necessary to the individual and nation well being.

II. RESISTANCE TO UNLAWFUL AUTHORITY IS A PRIMARY RELIGIOUS DUTY. Unlawful authority is that which conflicts with the authority of God. All law that has claims on men is the translation, for particular relations, of the Law of God. Unless we can be sure that a thing can stand the Divine Law test, we are not bound to render obedience.

III. The case of the text is, however, more subtle than this. It brings before us lawful authority abused, and Divine Law dishonoured in its applications. And it may be difficult for men to see what is their duty in such a case. The psalmist seems to see his way clearly. He suggests that we should submit to the injustice, and cry mightily to God, that he would turn the hearts of the rulers. And he is right. To right law wrongly administered we should present submission, for history abundantly proves that through suffering the wrong doing of rulers is best revealed. But submission would be wrong if men had not the profound conviction that God rules the rulers, and is the Avenger of all the persecuted and oppressed.R.T.

HOMILIES BY C. SHORT

Psa 94:1-23

Divine retribution certain.

The psalm may be distributed under the following heads.

I. A PRAYER FOR THE PUNISHMENT OF WICKED OPPRESSORS. (Psa 94:1, Psa 94:2.) Probably in anticipation of the Assyrian invasion.

II. THE GROUND OF THE PRAYERTHE INSOLENT AND ATHEISTIC SPIRIT OF THEIR CRUEL WORK. (Psa 94:3-7.) They murder the fatherless, and say, “Jehovah seeth not?”

III. THE BLINDNESS AND CONTEMPT OF GOD THEY SHOW. (Psa 94:8-11.) All sin implies this.

IV. THE BLESSED REST AND CONFIDENCE OF THOSE WHO ARE CHASTENED AND TAUGHT OF GOD. (Psa 94:12-15.) “Judgment cannot always be pervertedcannot always fail.”

V. THE DEEP CONVICTION OF GOD‘S RIGHTEOUSNESS DERIVED FROM PAST EXPERIENCE. (Psa 94:16-19.)

VI. AN ANTICIPATION OF RETRIBUTION ALREADY ACCOMPLISHED UPON THE WICKED. (Psa 94:20-23.)S.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Psalms 94.

The prophet, calling for justice, complaineth of tyranny and impiety: he teacheth God’s providence: he sheweth the blessedness of affliction. God is the defender of the afflicted.

THE later Greeks ascribe this psalm to David; and indeed it is an exact description of the courtiers of Saul; who abused their authority to all manner of oppression and violence, especially against David, without any fear of God, or thoughts that he would call them to any account; as he complains in several other psalms, particularly the 57th, 58th, and 59th. Dr. Delaney is of opinion, that this psalm was composed by David on account of the battle fought between the Israelites and the allied armies of the Ammonites and Syrians, 2 Samuel 10. 1 Chronicles 19.; and he thinks that the 5th and 6th verses particularly refer to the outrages which they committed, in wasting his country, and murdering his subjects. Life of David, book 3: chap. 6. See on Psa 94:17.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

Psalms 94

1O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth;

O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.

2Lift up thyself, thou Judge of the earth:

Render a reward to the proud.

3Lord, how long shall the wicked,

How long shall the wicked triumph?

4How long shall they utter and speak hard things?

And all the workers of iniquity boast themselves?

5They break in pieces thy people, O Lord,

And afflict thine heritage.

6They slay the widow and the stranger,

And murder the fatherless.

7Yet they say, The Lord shall not see,

Neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.

8Understand, ye brutish among the people:

And ye fools, when will ye be wise?

9He that planted the ear, shall he not hear?

He that formed the eye, shall he not see?

10He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct?

He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?

11The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man,

That they are vanity.

12Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O Lord,

And teachest him out of thy law:

13That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity,

Until the pit be digged for the wicked.

14For the Lord will not cast off his people,

Neither will he forsake his inheritance.

15But judgment shall return unto righteousness:

And all the upright in heart shall follow it.

16Who will rise up for me against the evil doers?

Or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?

17Unless the Lord had been my help,

My soul had almost dwelt in silence.

18When I said, My foot slippeth:

Thy mercy, O Lord, held me up.

19In the multitude of my thoughts within me

Thy comforts delight my soul.

20Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee,

Which frameth mischief by a law?

21They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous,

And condemn the innocent blood.

22But the Lord is my defence;

And my God is the rock of my refuge.

23And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity,

And shall cut them off in their own wickedness;

Yea, the Lord our God shall cut them off.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Contents and Composition. The psalmist at first invokes the retribution of God as the Avenger (Deu 32:35) upon insolent transgressors (Psa 94:1-3); he then describes their bloody, violent and impious acts, by which they were destroying the people of God, and, at the same time, showing despite to God Himself (Psa 94:4-7); he next turns with warning and rebuke to the foolish of the people, who had begun to doubt even God Himself, (Psa 94:8-11); he pronounces the pious man happy, who submits to the chastening of God and thereby trusts to Gods compensating righteousness (Psa 94:12-15), praises, for his own part the Lord as his only but sure help, (Psa 94:16-18), and announces his assurance of the certain infliction of the retribution which he implores (Psa 94:19-23).

The intermingling of personal with general experiences is of such a kind that the former appears conditioned by the latter, which, again, are not occasioned by distractions within, but by the influence of enemies from without. From them, the people had learned many things that were reprehensible. David therefore, (Sept. and other versions), is not to be thought of as the author. Within the period of the exile also, (De Wette, Hupfeld) no suitable place can be found for this psalm, since nothing is said of the departure of the captives or of the return, of the desolation of the city or of the destruction of the temple. We hesitate, too, to descend to the Maccaban period (Venema, Rosenmller, Hesse, Olsh., Hitzig), though 1Ma 7:1 f., or 1Ma 9:23 f., contain similar descriptions. There remain, therefore, only the Assyrian or the Chaldean oppressions in their commencement (Hengst.), or those after the exile in general (Kster, Del.), According to Talmudic tradition, the Levites were singing this Psalm during the capture of Jerusalem by the Chaldees, and had just come to the last verse, when the enemy burst into the temple, so that they could not sing the concluding lines. To the objection that that day was the Sabbath, while this was a Psalm for the fourth day of the week in the temple liturgy, it is replied, that it was a song of lamentation, and sung on account of their situation (Erachin 11. a, in Delitzsch). The Sept. has, along with the statement, Song of praise of David the remark: for the fourth day of the week. [Alexander: There is nothing to determine the precise date of the composition, much less to restrict it to any particular historical occasion. Though some things in it seem peculiarly appropriate to the state of Judah on the eve of the Babylonian, conquest, it is so constructed as to be a vehicle of pious feeling to the Church in various emergencies.

Psa 94:1, f. Show thyself or shine forth, does not necessarily refer to a theophany in the strict sense. The construction of the form as a prt. (Sept. et al., Hengst.) would accord with the regular rule after Deu 33:2; Psa 1:2, but does not suit the context. A rarer form of the imperative instead of (Ges. 53, remark 2) is therefore to be assumed, without needing to point (Ewald), unless we prefer to hold that the final consonant has fallen away from the original form (Psa 80:2) on account of its similarity in sound to the first letter of the following word (Olshausen, Hitzig, Hupfeld, Del.). The plural, avengings, may denote not only the plurality of avenging deeds (Eze 25:17), but also the severity of the retribution (Jdg 11:36; 2Sa 4:8). The designation of God as the God of retributions is related to this.

Psa 94:8-10. The expression: foolish among the people [E. V. literally: brutish], is not another way of conveying the idea of the highest degree of stupidity (Geier, De Wette). It is not men in general or the heathen nations (most) who are addressed, but that part of Israel who had become accessible to seduction and suggestions of doubt (Olshausen and the recent expositors). But it is doubtful whether we ought to render in Psa 94:10 : the Instructor of the nations (Jerome, Clericus, Ewald, Kster, Maurer, Hengst., Hupfeld, Hitzig) or: He who hath chastised the heathen (Calvin, Geier, J. H. Michaelis, Rosenmller, Delitzsch). But the contrast is not between the Gentiles without and Israel with the revealed Law; or between Israels former punishment at the hands of oppressors, and that which is to be expected now, so that the one can be inferred from the other. An inference is rather made from one course of action on the part of God to another of similar character, and not to the same course of action with reference to distinct objects, or at different times. [Perowne: In the English Bible this is broken up into two questions, and a clause is supplied in the second member which does not exist in the Hebrew: Shall not He know? But this is incorrect. There is a change in the argument. Before it was from the physical constitution of man; now it is from the moral government of the world. He who is the great Educator of the race, who gives them all the knowledge they possess, has He not the right which even human teachers possess, of chastening, correcting, and improving? On this Divine education see Rom 1:20; Rom 2:15-16.J. F. M.].

Psa 94:11 b. Since the pronoun is in the masculine, it is natural to refer it to men, and translate: for they are breath, that is, nothingness, finitude, transitoriness (Geier, J. H. Mich., Hengst., Hupfeld). The metaphysical ground of Gods perfect knowledge of His creatures, which are formed by Him and absolutely dependent upon Him, would then be presented. But the context favors rather the interpretation that God who gives men knowledge, is the Omniscient One, to whom their thoughts, in their natural nothingness, lie fully disclosed. The Sept. also has so understood the sentence, and is followed by Paul (1Co 3:20) and Jerome. The position of the pronoun, moreover, justifies this view. If the first idea had been intended, the pronoun would have been placed before the noun (Jer 10:15). In a dependent sentence, however, corresponding to the accusative of the object, it may precede, contrary to the usual rule (Isa 61:9; Jer 46:5); also, when emphasis is required Ps. 9:21), like the accusative in a relative clause (Psa 99:4; Pro 2:16; Hos 7:2). The masculine would then be loosely employed instead of the feminine, as in Psa 34:20 (Hitzig, Del.).

Psa 94:13, etc.That Thou mayst give him rest.This is usually referred to the inward repose of the righteous man, who receives instruction from Gods law (Deuteronomy 8. f.) as to the design of the sufferings impending over him (Jer 49:23 compared with Isa 30:15), and strength for the trials of evil days, so that such a man, tried and purified as he is by sufferings, is even to be counted happy (Job 5:17; Pro 3:11 f.; Psa 34:9; Psa 40:5). But Psa 94:13 b. directs the view of the chastened to the end of the transgressor, and Psa 94:14 to Gods abiding with His people. This is the reason why the evil days will come to an end. God will afford the sufferer outward rest or deliverance from them (Job 3:13; Job 3:17 f.; Job 34:29; Pro 15:18). The in Psa 94:13 a. indicates, not the design of the teaching, but its contents (Calvin, Clericus, Hupfeld). The evil days are not called days of misfortune, nor days of the evil man, that is, of the wicked, but days of harm, in which bad men abuse their power to work mischief (Psa 49:6). From this cause sufferings arise for the righteous, which the latter regard as Divine chastisements, and make to contribute to their salvation. The throne of destruction, Psa 94:20 [E. V., throne of iniquity], is either the throne of the enemy, from which destruction threatens Israel, but to which Jehovah grants no duration and no fellowship with Him; or the chair of the judge, who causes distress [Heb., , E. V., mischief] by using the written law of God as an occasion for illegalities and the perversion of justice. The latter view agrees better with the mode of expression in Psa 94:20 b. For that sentence does not simply allude to a course of action disastrous in its results and opposed to the law, but to an ingenious forming of something burdensome and oppressive, the expression being suggested by and applied from the fashioning of statuets. [This idea is expressed in the rendering: who formest misery by law (rule).J. F. M.]

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The presumption of the ungodly is apt to increase, when they are allowed for a long period to employ with impunity their position in the world, their influence, and their resources, for the oppression of the weak and defenceless, and especially of the righteous. Their course of action often reaches to cruelty and reckless violence, and becomes criminality and wickedness, when, to the relentless ill-treatment of those, who, through Gods precepts, are made the special objects of His watchful love and compassionate help, are united the denial of His omniscience, the delusion of complete impunity, and derision of the belief in His government of the world and in His retributive righteousness.
2. Such conduct is indeed that of heathen, but yet it is not only displayed among heathen nations, but appears also among those who have received the law of God, but who either transgress it openly, insolently, and defiantly, or, while holding fast to the letter, practice injustice under the appearance and garb of righteousness, and in both cases oppress those who are weak, or offend them, or cause them to err in their faith, or seduce them from their allegiance to God.

3. A cry of prayer, therefore, sounds forth at times from the midst of the Church, invoking the judicial intervention of God against her destroyers, when they would, by violence or by perversion of justice, oppress the righteous and persecute them even to death. For Gods people hold fast to the belief which is oppugned and derided, that God is the supreme and faithful Judge and Avenger, who will bring to their due results the laws according to which He regulates the course of the world, and will reconcile the occasional contradictions between the actual state or administration of justice, and the principle and norm of righteousness. The premature rejoicings of the wicked and their scorn will then be stilled, when they fall into the abyss prepared for them; while the soul of the righteous will dwell no longer in the land of silence, for God is their help.
4. But God is not merely the Judge of the whole world and the righteous Avenger; He is also the Teacher of men, and has left Himself at no time and in no place without a witness. All understanding and knowledge, even of the heathen, spring from Him who is the Creator of men, and has given them reason and all their senses. Blessed are they who not only are acquainted with His Law, revealed in Israel, but come under its instruction and guidance. To give testimony to this is the duty assigned to the Church, in order that the ignorant be instructed, the erring set right, the tried comforted, the secure and presumptuous warned, sinners convicted in conscience, the doubting and weak strengthened, and all together confirmed in the certain assurance that God is both able and willing to execute judgment for the complete deliverance of the righteous and punishment of the impiety of the wicked, in accordance with the promises and commands of His Law.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

It is not enough to hold a general belief that a God exists; the question is: (1) what kind of God He is; (2) whether we adhere faithfully to Him.We cannot apply the promises of Gods law to ourselves, unless we value His commandments.God is not only the Creator and Ruler of the world. He is also the trustworthy Teacher and Educator of men, and their infallible Judge.How the wickedness of men often makes them fools, and how the folly of men often urges them deeper still into ruin.In order not to be obliged to forsake their sins, the wicked presume that they will remain unpunished, and in order not to be disturbed in their delusion, they deny the only true and living God.God is the righteous Avenger, but before He punishes He warns, and those who would be delivered must yield to His rule.He who would be freed from anxiety must listen to the words of God.If our souls are to be revived by the consolations of God, we must listen to His warnings and believe His promises.

Luther: He who so believes and is taught of God, can be patient, and let the wicked rage, while he looks to the end, and bides the time.

Starke: Thou dost arrogate to thyself Gods royal prerogative, whenever thou dost seek to avenge thyself on those who injure thee.Believers under oppression often cannot be reconciled to Gods great patience and long-suffering towards the wicked, and therefore sigh: Lord, how long? and yet God has not forgotten.The true Church has ever had her persecutors, but she has at all times employed prayer as the best means of overcoming them, and has found it a sure one.Whither can mens sins not beguile them? In order to quiet their consciences they seek to persuade themselves that God is not omniscient. Vain imagination.The joyful issue of a Christians troubles serves to strengthen the faith and patience of all fellow-Christians.The world forms an altogether wrong judgment as to Gods chastisements. It says: ill for him whom God chastens. But the judgment of the Holy Spirit is a different one. It is precious and consoling: blessed is he whom God chastens. Should not this serve to increase our patience?Nothing can revive the soul so sweetly, or penetrate therein so deeply, as the honey of the gospel. O gather a good supply when it abounds; it will soothe thee in time of need.When affliction is greatest, then does faith display itself in its true and fullest strength, and is at the same time purified in that fire.The righteous hand of God is often so clearly revealed in the destruction of the wicked, that even the least inexperienced in His ways must recognize it and say: The Lord hath done this!

Frisch: Thou hast here a mirror of an afflicted and yet believing heart. What dost thou see therein? (1) Many heart-griefs; (2) manifold consolations of God; (3) powerful and true reviving of soul.Rieger: Even in justifiable zeal, we are easily led to take too much upon ourselves, unless we keep within the bounds prescribed by Gods Spirit and word. A fire is useful in a house, but it must be used carefully.Richter (Hausbibel): The judgment of chastisement begins with believers; they are thus preserved from the destruction and fearful judgment of damnation, which is inflicted upon those who oppose Christ.Vaihinger: The education which God gives by daily experiences and sufferings, as well as His instruction by the written law, is, in the futility of human projects, a special privilege of believers, benefiting them in severe sufferings.

[Matt. Henry: When the teachings of the word and Spirit go along with the rebukes of Providence, they then both speak men blessed and help to make them so; for then they are the marks of adoption and means of sanctification. When we are chastened we must pray to be taught, and look into the law as the best expositor of Providence. It is not the chastening itself that does good, but the teaching that goes along with, and is the expositor of it.J. F. M.]

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS

It should seem that, this Psalm was composed at a time when the church was oppressed, and the enemy triumphed; and silence at a throne of grace proved a sharp exercise to the people. The subject is of this kind. Here are complaints and petitions follow e d up with faith, that the Lord will hear, and in due time answer the cries of his afflicted.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

It is always a mark of grace when the Lord’s afflicted ones can commit their cause, be it what it may, into the hands of God. But though a believing soul can, and will refer all into the divine wisdom and justice, yet it is profitable to draw nigh to the Lord with our complaints, and to leave them there. It is one thing to complain of God, and another to complain to God. The Lord hath commanded his troubled ones to draw nigh unto him. Call upon me in the time of trouble, and I will hear thee. And again, the Lord saith, For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord. Psa 12:5 .

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Psa 94:9-10

These verses assert that in due time God will act, for He cannot be otherwise than a God of knowledge, deep in whose heart counsels of inviolable righteousness lie hidden. He is always cognisant of what goes on in the world, and especially heedful of the cries and supplications of His own people. These acts of oppression, done to the fatherless and the widow, do not elude His notice. Drop by drop He counts the innocent blood that falls upon the green world He has made and bends His ear to each sigh of the downtrodden. There is a spiritual property in every sense with which the human body is informed, and that property has its immeasurable counterpart in the nature of the Godhead.

I. These words imply that if man possesses the attributes of personality, man’s Maker must also possess them in an enhanced degree. Hence arises the sure confidence that a Divine judgment draws nigh which will banish the wrongs under which the faithful groan. It has ever been so in the past. Righteous acts that are not the outcome of a living and a righteous personality are inconceivable. The power that makes for righteousness must see and hear and know, and then set itself to unflinching judgment.

II. The Psalmist affirms that the distinction between right and wrong which God imprints upon the nations through the providences of history has its primal type in the mind of God Himself. The agelong discipline of the generations is the sign of an intense moral life in the Great King of the earth which vitalizes that discipline. Many of us habitually disregard the conscience, and yet at the same time feel that it is the truest and most trustworthy of all the faculties with which our beings have been equipped.

III. We need to indoctrinate ourselves with the argument of the Psalmist, for there is a tendency to depersonalize God, sometimes on grounds directly opposite to those which influence the advocates of a materialistic philosophy. Many thinkers assume that the special attribute of personality is here in the body rather than in the spirit, and that we make God less than infinite by adopting these anthropomorphic modes of speech. It is true our knowledge of God is approximate, but if we negative our approximations by saying that God is neither personal nor impersonal, we make the conception absolutely powerless, futile as a random guess. The lowliest and most limited creature into whom the qualities of personality have come is greater than galaxies of impersonal suns.

IV. The man who has become honestly and intelligently possessed with the truth that God is a person will find every subsequent article of the Christian Creed comparatively easy of acceptance. We cannot go far wrong in our theology if we hold that God is a person, and he who thinks the world can do without theology is a trifler whose folly is beyond ordinary expletives. Not a little obscurity has its beginnings in looseness upon this cardinal subject. Admit that God is a free, conscious, intelligent, self-determining person, and if you have the logical outlook, it will soon be evident that you have committed yourself to the sum and substance of the Christian faith.

T. G. Selby, The God of the Frail, p. 22.

Psa 94:9-10

‘He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He that formed the eye, shall He not see? He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not He know?’ These verses made a strong impression on the mind of Sophia the Electress of Hanover, a woman of decided mental power, and were adopted with approbation by her friend the philosopher Leibnitz in his opposition to Atheism. The principle on which he reasoned was, that as the stream cannot rise above its fountain, intelligence in man implies an intelligent source. Thought must come from thought. Descartes had already given expression to the same idea in his Meditations, III.: ‘Now it is manifest by the light of nature that there must be as much reality in the efficient cause as in the effect; for whence could the effect draw its reality but from the cause? And how could the cause communicate the power to it, if it had it not in itself? And from this it follows, not only that nothing can be produced from nothing, but also that what is more perfect cannot be a result of, and dependent on, what is less perfect.’

J. K.

References. XCIV. 12. J. Budgen, Parochial Sermons, vol. ii. p. 219. Bishop Temple, Rugby Sermons (2nd Series), p. 39. XCIV. 16. J. Budgen, Parochial Sermons, vol. ii. p. 219.

The Christian’s Hidden Sources of Delight

Psa 94:19

Our thoughts form the hidden sources of our lives, whether for good or for evil.

I. I am sure it will be good for us if we can find the track along which ran David’s thoughts which gave him such great power and such sources of delight that his wonderful career was possible. The first of these thoughts of David he makes very clear to us in this Psalm. It was the thought of an immanent God in the world, one who hears and sees and cares. ‘He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He that formed the eye, shall He not see?’ Here is the starting-point of David’s hidden source of joy. God is in his world. He made it and He rules it. Here is the source of courage that will never grow weary.

II. Another thought that was a constant source of delight to David was the conviction that God was the defender of those who trusted Him. He cries out in this Psalm, ‘The Lord will not cast off His people, neither will He forsake His inheritance. But judgment shall return unto unrighteousness: and all the upright in heart shall follow it.’ And in another one of his great Psalms, having this same thought in mind, David says, ‘The Lord shall keep thee from all evil; He shall keep thy soul’.

III. Another thought that gave David great delight was his discovery that much of the sorrow and trial which he experienced was not punishment, but chastening and discipline. David had got hold of this great thought of God’s chastening love, and it was a source of delight to him; and it cannot help but be a source of perpetual delight to us if we will treasure this thought in our hearts and keep it to live by day and day.

IV. Another thought that gave David delight in his hour of darkness, so far as his outward circumstances were concerned, was the thought which he cherished that in the time of great emergency he could depend upon God’s mercy. His heart rejoiced in the mercy of the God who comes to the rescue of the man in peril, whose feet have slipped and will go to disaster without help. It is the glory of our Christianity that it has a word about mercy to the man whose feet have slipped.

L. R. Banks, Sermons Which Have Won Souls, p. 231.

The Cure for Care

Psa 94:19

This Psalm is a cry for help against the insolence and cruelty of Israel’s oppression, evidently at a time when the nation has been under the heel of heathen conquerors. There is a Divine purpose to be wrought out through all the struggles and the sorrow, a purpose of moral discipline.

I. The Psalmist questions his soul by his comforting faith. With spiritual insight he sees something of the meaning of discipline, and sees the hand of God in the dark passage through the cloud as well as in the brightness of the ultimate deliverance. He sees that if the Lord had not been his help all would have been ended long since. ‘When I said, My foot hath slipped, Thy mercy, O Lord, was holding me up.’ It is a vivid figure of compassing grace. Amid wickedness, rampant and triumphant, enmity without and trouble within, he entered into peace through the assurance of God’s presence.

II. Times alter and circumstances change, but the essentials of life remain, and this cry of a wounded heart is the human cry, and we can interpret the Psalm for our own individual needs and personal situation. The way to peace for us today, as in this echo of a long past time, is in the assurance of God. This is the one need of man’s heart. There can be no abiding consolation and no complete solution of the riddle of life, no safe refuge, except somewhere within where the soul can find rest. If life is meaningless, empty of any spiritual purpose, the world is a place of despair as much to us as the terrible situation depicted by the Psalmist of old. We, like him, and as much as him, need the comfort of God’s love for the multitude of our cares. There is nothing the heart of man needs more than a message of courage and hope and confidence. And where is such a message possible except as a message of faith? The world is built as if for discipline, and its one need is comfort of some sort.

III. The only cure for care is the cure of faith. What is this faith which has such magical power? It simply means to fall back upon God, to trust to His love and live in the secret of His presence. We learn to cast our care upon God when we know that He cares for us, and this is the meaning of our Communion. It has many a message and many a lesson, but its deepest message and sweetest lesson is that of comfort. The deepest lesson of Holy Communion, however we interpret it, is the Real Presence of Christ. What trouble or distress is there in life that will not be dissipated by the light of that faith? The remedy for care is to know the love of God in Christ, and that remedy is open to us, not fitfully and casually, but always and everywhere.

Hugh Black, Christ’s Service of Love, p. 42.

References. XCIV. 19. A. Tucker, Preacher’s Magazine, vol. xix. p. 510. J. Bunting, Sermons, vol. ii. pp. 214, 229. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xv. No. 883. Ibid. vol. xix. No. 1116. J. S. Boone, Sermons, p. 23. J. Thomas, Myrtle Street Pulpit, vol. ii. p. 305. XCIV. International Critical Commentary, vol. ii. p. 287. Expositor (2nd Series), vol. vi. p. 273.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

PSALMS

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE BOOK OF PSALMS

According to my usual custom, when taking up the study of a book of the Bible I give at the beginning a list of books as helps to the study of that book. The following books I heartily commend on the Psalms:

1. Sampey’s Syllabus for Old Testament Study . This is especially good on the grouping and outlining of some selected psalms. There are also some valuable suggestions on other features of the book.

2. Kirkpatrick’g commentary, in “Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges,” is an excellent aid in the study of the Psalter.

3. Perowne’s Book of Psalms is a good, scholarly treatise on the Psalms. A special feature of this commentary is the author’s “New Translation” and his notes are very helpful.

4. Spurgeon’s Treasury of David. This is just what the title implies. It is a voluminous, devotional interpretation of the Psalms and helpful to those who have the time for such extensive study of the Psalter.

5. Hengstenburg on the Psalms. This is a fine, scholarly work by one of the greatest of the conservative German scholars.

6. Maclaren on the Psalms, in “The Expositor’s Bible,” is the work of the world’s safest, sanest, and best of all works that have ever been written on the Psalms.

7. Thirtle on the Titles of the Psalms. This is the best on the subject and well worth a careful study.

At this point some definitions are in order. The Hebrew word for psalm means praise. The word in English comes from psalmos , a song of lyrical character, or a song to be sung and accompanied with a lyre. The Psalter is a collection of sacred and inspired songs, composed at different times and by different authors.

The range of time in composition was more than 1,000 years, or from the time of Moses to the time of Ezra. The collection in its present form was arranged probably by Ezra in the fifth century, B.C.

The Jewish classification of Old Testament books was The Law, the Prophets, and the Holy Writings. The Psalms was given the first place in the last group.

They had several names, or titles, of the Psalms. In Hebrew they are called “The Book of Prayers,” or “The Book of Praises.” The Hebrew word thus used means praises. The title of the first two books is found in Psa 72:20 : “The prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended.” The title of the whole collection of Psalms in the Septuagint is Biblos Psalman which means the “Book of Psalms.” The title in the Alexandrian Codex is Psalterion which is the name of a stringed instrument, and means “The Psalter.”

The derivation of our English words, “psalms,” “psalter,” and “psaltery,” respectively, is as follows:

1. “Psalms” comes from the Greek word, psalmoi, which is also from psallein , which means to play upon a stringed instrument. Therefore the Psalms are songs played upon stringed instruments, and the word here is used to apply to the whole collection.

2. “Psalter” is of the same origin and means the Book of Psalms and refers also to the whole collection.

3. “Psaltery” is from the word psalterion, which means “a harp,” an instrument, supposed to be in the shape of a triangle or like the delta of the Greek alphabet. See Psa 33:2 ; Psa 71:22 ; Psa 81:2 ; Psa 144:9 .

In our collection there are 150 psalms. In the Septuagint there is one extra. It is regarded as being outside the sacred collection and not inspired. The subject of this extra psalm is “David’s victory over Goliath.” The following is a copy of it: I was small among my brethren, And youngest in my father’s house, I used to feed my father’s sheep. My hands made a harp, My fingers fashioned a Psaltery. And who will declare unto my Lord? He is Lord, he it is who heareth. He it was who sent his angel And took me from my father’s sheep, And anointed me with the oil of his anointing. My brethren were goodly and tall, But the Lord took no pleasure in them. I went forth to meet the Philistine. And he cursed me by his idols But I drew the sword from beside him; I beheaded him and removed reproach from the children of Israel.

It will be noted that this psalm does not have the earmarks of an inspired production. There is not found in it the modesty so characteristic of David, but there is here an evident spirit of boasting and self-praise which is foreign to the Spirit of inspiration.

There is a difference in the numbering of the psalms in our version which follows the Hebrew, and the numbering in the Septuagint. Omitting the extra one in the Septuagint, there is no difference as to the total number. Both have 150 and the same subject matter, but they are not divided alike.

The following scheme shows the division according to our version and also the Septuagint: Psalms 1-8 in the Hebrew equal 1-8 in the Septuagint; 9-10 in the Hebrew combine into 9 in the Septuagint; 11-113 in the Hebrew equal 10-112 in the Septuagint; 114-115 in the Hebrew combine into 113 in the Septuagint; 116 in the Hebrew divides into 114-115 in the Septuagint; 117-146 in the Hebrew equal 116-145 in the Septuagint; 147 in the Hebrew divides into 146-147 in the Septuagint; 148-150 in the Hebrew equal 148-150 in the Septuagint.

The arrangement in the Vulgate is the same as the Septuagint. Also some of the older English versions have this arangement. Another difficulty in numbering perplexes an inexperienced student in turning from one version to another, viz: In the Hebrew often the title is verse I, and sometimes the title embraces verses 1-2.

The book divisions of the Psalter are five books, as follows:

Book I, Psalms 1-41 (41 chapters)

Book II, Psalms 42-72 (31 chapters)

Book III, Psalms 73-89 (17 chapters)

Book IV, Psalms 90-106 (17 chapters)

Book V, Psalms 107-150 (44 chapters)

They are marked by an introduction and a doxology. Psalm I forms an introduction to the whole book; Psa 150 is the doxology for the whole book. The introduction and doxology of each book are the first and last psalms of each division, respectively.

There were smaller collections before the final one, as follows:

Books I and II were by David; Book III, by Hezekiah, and Books IV and V, by Ezra.

Certain principles determined the arrangement of the several psalms in the present collection:

1. David is honored with first place, Book I and II, including Psalms 1-72.

2. They are grouped according to the use of the name of God:

(1) Psalms 1-41 are Jehovah psalms;

(2) Psalms 42-83 are Elohim-psalms;

(3) Psalms 84-150 are Jehovah psalms.

3. Book IV is introduced by the psalm of Moses, which is the first psalm written.

4. Some are arranged as companion psalms, for instance, sometimes two, sometimes three, and sometimes more. Examples: Psa 2 and 3; 22, 23, and 24; 113-118.

5. They were arranged for liturgical purposes, which furnished the psalms for special occasions, such as feasts, etc. We may be sure this arrangement was not accidental. An intelligent study of each case is convincing that it was determined upon rational grounds.

All the psalms have titles but thirty-three, as follows:

In Book I, Psa 1 ; Psa 2 ; Psa 10 ; Psa 33 , (4 are without titles).

In Book II, Psa 43 ; Psa 71 , (2 are without titles).

In Book IV, Psa 91 ; Psa 93 ; Psa 94 ; Psa 95 ; Psa 96 ; Psa 97 ; Psa 104 ; Psa 105 ; Psa 106 , (9 are without titles).

In Book V, Psa 107 ; III; 112; 113; 114; 115; 116; 117; 118; 119; 135; 136; 137; 146; 147; 148; 149; 150, (18 are without titles).

The Talmud calls these psalms that have no title, “Orphan Psalms.” The later Jews supply these titles by taking the nearest preceding author. The lack of titles in Psa 1 ; Psa 2 ; and 10 may be accounted for as follows: Psa 1 is a general introduction to the whole collection and Psa 2 was, perhaps, a part of Psa 1 . Psalms 9-10 were formerly combined into one, therefore Psa 10 has the same title as Psa 9 .

QUESTIONS

1. What books are commended on the Psalms?

2. What is a psalm?

3. What is the Psalter?

4. What is the range of time in composition?

5. When and by whom was the collection in its present form arranged?

6. What the Jewish classification of Old Testament books, and what the position of the Psalter in this classification?

7. What is the Hebrew title of the Psalms?

8. Find the title of the first two books from the books themselves.

9. What is the title of the whole collection of psalms in the Septuagint?

10. What is the title in the Alexandrian Codex?

11. What is the derivation of our English word, “Psalms”, “Psalter”, and “Psaltery,” respectively?

12. How many psalms in our collection?

13. How many psalms in the Septuagint?

14. What about the extra one in the Septuagint?

15. What is the subject of this extra psalm?

16. How does it compare with the Canonical Psalms?

17. What is the difference in the numbering of the psalms in our version which follows the Hebrew, and the numbering in the Septuagint?

18. What is the arrangement in the Vulgate?

19. What other difficulty in numbering which perplexes an inexperienced student in turning from one version to another?

20. What are the book divisions of the Psalter and how are these divisions marked?

21. Were there smaller collections before the final one? If so, what were they?

22. What principles determined the arrangement of the several psalms in the present collection?

23. In what conclusion may we rest concerning this arrangement?

24. How many of the psalms have no titles?

25. What does the Talmud call these psalms that have no titles?

26. How do later Jews supply these titles?

27. How do you account for the lack of titles in Psa 1 ; Psa 2 ; Psa 10 ?

XII

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE BOOK OF PSALMS (CONTINUED)

The following is a list of the items of information gathered from the titles of the psalms:

1. The author: “A Psalm of David” (Psa 37 ).

2. The occasion: “When he fled from Absalom, his son” (Psa 3 ).

3. The nature, or character, of the poem:

(1) Maschil, meaning “instruction,” a didactic poem (Psa 42 ).

(2) Michtam, meaning “gold,” “A Golden Psalm”; this means excellence or mystery (Psa 16 ; 56-60).

4. The occasion of its use: “A Psalm of David for the dedication of the house” (Psa 30 ).

5. Its purpose: “A Psalm of David to bring remembrance” (Psa 38 ; Psa 70 ).

6. Direction for its use: “A Psalm of David for the chief musician” (Psa 4 ).

7. The kind of musical instrument:

(1) Neginoth, meaning to strike a chord, as on stringed instruments (Psa 4 ; Psa 61 ).

(2) Nehiloth, meaning to perforate, as a pipe or flute (Psa 5 ).

(3) Shoshannim, Lilies, which refers probably to cymbals (Psa 45 ; Psa 69 ).

8. A special choir:

(1) Sheminith, the “eighth,” or octave below, as a male choir (Psa 6 ; Psa 12 ).

(2) Alamoth, female choir (Psa 46 ).

(3) Muth-labben, music with virgin voice, to be sung by a choir of boys in the treble (Psa 9 ).

9. The keynote, or tune:

(1) Aijeleth-sharar, “Hind of the morning,” a song to the melody of which this is sung (Psa 22 ).

(2) Al-tashheth, “Destroy thou not,” the beginning of a song the tune of which is sung (Psa 57 ; Psa 58 ; Psa 59 ; Psa 75 ).

(3) Gittith, set to the tune of Gath, perhaps a tune which David brought from Gath (Psa 8 ; Psa 81 ; Psa 84 ).

(4) Jonath-elim-rehokim, “The dove of the distant terebinths,” the commencement of an ode to the air of which this song was to be sung (Psa 56 ).

(5) Leannoth, the name of a tune (Psa 88 ).

(6) Mahalath, an instrument (Psa 53 ); Leonnoth-Mahaloth, to chant to a tune called Mahaloth.

(7) Shiggaion, a song or a hymn.

(8) Shushan-Eduth, “Lily of testimony,” a tune (Psa 60 ). Note some examples: (1) “America,” “Shiloh,” “Auld Lang Syne.” These are the names of songs such as we are familiar with; (2) “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” and “There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood,” are examples of sacred hymns.

10. The liturgical use, those noted for the feasts, e.g., the Hallels and Hallelujah Psalms (Psalms 146-150).

11. The destination, as “Song of Ascents” (Psalms 120-134)

12. The direction for the music, such as Selah, which means “Singers, pause”; Higgaion-Selah, to strike a symphony with selah, which means an instrumental interlude (Psa 9:16 ).

The longest and fullest title to any of the psalms is the title to Psa 60 . The items of information from this title are as follows: (1) the author; (2) the chief musician; (3) the historical occasion; (4) the use, or design; (5) the style of poetry; (6) the instrument or style of music.

The parts of these superscriptions which most concern us now are those indicating author, occasion, and date. As to the historic value or trustworthiness of these titles most modern scholars deny that they are a part of the Hebrew text, but the oldest Hebrew text of which we know anything had all of them. This is the text from which the Septuagint was translated. It is much more probable that the author affixed them than later writers. There is no internal evidence in any of the psalms that disproves the correctness of them, but much to confirm. The critics disagree among themselves altogether as to these titles. Hence their testimony cannot consistently be received. Nor can it ever be received until they have at least agreed upon a common ground of opposition.

David is the author of more than half the entire collection, the arrangement of which is as follows:

1. Seventy-three are ascribed to him in the superscriptions.

2. Some of these are but continuations of the preceding ones of a pair, trio, or larger group.

3. Some of the Korahite Psalms are manifestly Davidic.

4. Some not ascribed to him in the titles are attributed to him expressly by New Testament writers.

5. It is not possible to account for some parts of the Psalter without David. The history of his early life as found in Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, and 1and 2 Chronicles, not only shows his remarkable genius for patriotic and sacred songs and music, but also shows his cultivation of that gift in the schools of the prophets. Some of these psalms of the history appear in the Psalter itself. It is plain to all who read these that they are founded on experience, and the experience of no other Hebrew fits the case. These experiences are found in Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, and 1 and 2 Chronicles.

As to the attempt of the destructive critics to rob David of his glory in relation to the Psalter by assigning the Maccabean era as the date of composition, I have this to say:

1. This theory has no historical support whatever, and therefore is not to be accepted at all.

2. It has no support in tradition, which weakens the contention of the critics greatly.

3. It has no support from finding any one with the necessary experience for their basis.

4. They can give no reasonable account as to how the titles ever got there.

5. It is psychologically impossible for anyone to have written these 150 psalms in the Maccabean times.

6. Their position is expressly contrary to the testimony of Christ and the apostles. Some of the psalms which they ascribe to the Maccabean Age are attributed to David by Christ himself, who said that David wrote them in the Spirit.

The obvious aim of this criticism and the necessary result if it be Just, is a positive denial of the inspiration of both Testaments.

Other authors are named in the titles, as follows: (1) Asaph, to whom twelve psalms have been assigned: (2) Mosee, Psa 90 ; (3) Solomon, Psa 72 ; Psa 127 ; (4) Heman, Psa 80 ; (5) Ethem, Psa 89 ; (6) A number of the psalms are ascribed to the sons of Korah.

Not all the psalms ascribed to Asaph were composed by one person. History indicates that Asaph’s family presided over the song service for several generations. Some of them were composed by his descendants by the game name. The five general outlines of the whole collection are as follows:

I. By books

1. Psalms 1-41 (41)

2. Psalms 42-72 (31)

3. Psalms 73-89 (17)

4. Psalms 90-106 (17)

5. Psalms 107-150 (44)

II. According to date and authorship

1. The psalm of Moses (Psa 90 )

2. Psalms of David:

(1) The shepherd boy (Psa 8 ; Psa 19 ; Psa 29 ; Psa 23 ).

(2) David when persecuted by Saul (Psa 59 ; Psa 56 ; Psa 34 ; Psa 52 ; Psa 54 ; Psa 57 ; Psa 142 ).

(3) David the King (Psa 101 ; Psa 18 ; Psa 24 ; Psa 2 ; Psa 110 ; Psa 20 ; Psa 20 ; Psa 21 ; Psa 60 ; Psa 51 ; Psa 32 ; Psa 41 ; Psa 55 ; Psa 3:4 ; Psa 64 ; Psa 62 ; Psa 61 ; Psa 27 ).

3. The Asaph Psalms (Psa 50 ; Psa 73 ; Psa 83 ).

4. The Korahite Psalms (Psa 42 ; Psa 43 ; Psa 84 ).

5. The psalms of Solomon (Psa 72 ; Psa 127 ).

6. The psalms of the era of Hezekiah and Isaiah (Psa 46 ; Psa 47 ; Psa 48 )

7. The psalms of the Exile (Psa 74 ; Psa 79 ; Psa 137 ; Psa 102 )

8. The psalms of the Restoration (Psa 85 ; Psa 126 ; Psa 118 ; 146-150)

III. By groups

1. The Jehovistic and Elohistic Psalms:

(1) Psalms 1-41 are Jehovistic;

(2) Psalms 42-83 are Elohistic Psalms;

(3) Psalms 84-150 are Jehovistic.

2. The Penitential Psalms (Psa 6 ; Psa 32 ; Psa 38 ; Psa 51 ; Psa 102 ; Psa 130 ; Psa 143 )

3. The Pilgrim Psalms (Psalms 120-134)

4. The Alphabetical Psalms (Psa 9 ; Psa 10 ; Psa 25 ; Psa 34 ; Psa 37 ; 111:112; Psa 119 ; Psa 145 )

5. The Hallelujah Psalms (Psalms 11-113; 115-117; 146-150; to which may be added Psa 135 ) Psalms 113-118 are called “the Egyptian Hallel”

IV. Doctrines of the Psalms

1. The throne of grace and how to approach it by sacrifice, prayer, and praise.

2. The covenant, the basis of worship.

3. The paradoxical assertions of both innocence & guilt.

4. The pardon of sin and justification.

5. The Messiah.

6. The future life, pro and con.

7. The imprecations.

8. Other doctrines.

V. The New Testament use of the Psalms

1. Direct references and quotations in the New Testament.

2. The allusions to the psalms in the New Testament. Certain experiences of David’s life made very deep impressions on his heart, such as: (1) his peaceful early life; (2) his persecution by Saul; (3) his being crowned king of the people; (4) the bringing up of the ark; (5) his first great sin; (6) Absalom’s rebellion; (7) his second great sin; (8) the great promise made to him in 2Sa 7 ; (9) the feelings of his old age.

We may classify the Davidic Psalms according to these experiences following the order of time, thus:

1. His peaceful early life (Psa 8 ; Psa 19 ; Psa 29 ; Psa 23 )

2. His persecution by Saul (Psa 59 ; Psa 56 ; Psa 34 ; Psa 7 ; Psa 52 ; Psa 120 ; Psa 140 ; Psa 54 ; Psa 57 ; Psa 142 ; Psa 17 ; Psa 18 )

3. Making David King (Psa 27 ; Psa 133 ; Psa 101 )

4. Bringing up the ark (Psa 68 ; Psa 24 ; Psa 132 ; Psa 15 ; Psa 78 ; Psa 96 )

5. His first great sin (Psa 51 ; Psa 32 )

6. Absalom’s rebellion (Psa 41 ; Psa 6 ; Psa 55 ; Psa 109 ; Psa 38 ; Psa 39 ; Psa 3 ; Psa 4 ; Psa 63 ; Psa 42 ; Psa 43 ; Psa 5 ; Psa 62 ; Psa 61 ; Psa 27 )

7. His second great sin (Psa 69 ; Psa 71 ; Psa 102 ; Psa 103 )

8. The great promise made to him in 2Sa 7 (Psa 2 )

9. Feelings of old age (Psa 37 )

The great doctrines of the psalms may be noted as follows: (1) the being and attributes of God; (3) sin, both original and individual; (3) both covenants; (4) the doctrine of justification; (5) concerning the Messiah.

There is a striking analogy between the Pentateuch and the Psalms. The Pentateuch contains five books of law; the Psalms contain five books of heart responses to the law.

It is interesting to note the historic controversies concerning the singing of psalms. These were controversies about singing uninspired songs, in the Middle Ages. The church would not allow anything to be used but psalms.

The history in Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, and 1 and 2 Chronicles, and in Ezra and Nehemiah is very valuable toward a proper interpretation of the psalms. These books furnish the historical setting for a great many of the psalms which is very indispensable to their proper interpretation.

Professor James Robertson, in the Poetry and Religion of the Psalms constructs a broad and strong argument in favor of the Davidic Psalms, as follows:

1. The age of David furnished promising soil for the growth of poetry.

2. David’s qualifications for composing the psalms make it highly probable that David is the author of the psalms ascribed to him.

3. The arguments against the possibility of ascribing to David any of the hymns in the Hebrew Psalter rests upon assumptions that are thoroughly antibiblical.

The New Testament makes large use of the psalms and we learn much as to their importance in teaching. There are seventy direct quotations in the New Testament from this book, from which we learn that the Scriptures were used extensively in accord with 2Ti 3:16-17 . There are also eleven references to the psalms in the New Testament from which we learn that the New Testament writers were thoroughly imbued with the spirit and teaching of the psalms. Then there are eight allusions ‘to this book in the New Testament from which we gather that the Psalms was one of the divisions of the Old Testament and that they were used in the early church.

QUESTIONS

1. Give a list of the items of information gathered from the titles of the psalms.

2. What is the longest title to any of the psalms and what the items of this title?

3. What parts of these superscriptions most concern us now?

4. What is the historic value, or trustworthiness of these titles?

5. State the argument showing David’s relation to the psalms.

6. What have you to say of the attempt of the destructive critics to rob David of his glory in relation to the Psalter by assigning the Maccabean era as the date of composition?

7. What the obvious aim of this criticism and the necessary result, if it be just?

8. What other authors are named in the titles?

9. Were all the psalms ascribed to Asaph composed by one person?

10. Give the five general outlines of the whole collection, as follows: I. The outline by books II. The outline according to date and authorship III. The outline by groups IV. The outline of doctrines V. The outline by New Testament quotations or allusions.

11. What experiences of David’s life made very deep impressions on his heart?

12. Classify the Davidic Psalms according to these experiences following the order of time.

13. What the great doctrines of the psalms?

14. What analogy between the Pentateuch and the Psalms?

15. What historic controversies concerning the singing of psalms?

16. Of what value is the history in Samuel, 1 Kings and 2 Chronicles, and in Ezra and Nehemiah toward a proper interpretation of the psalms?

17. Give Professor James Robertson’s argument in favor of the Davidic authorship of the psalms.

18. What can you say of the New Testament use of the psalms and what do we learn as to their importance in teaching?

19. What can you say of the New Testament references to the psalms, and from the New Testament references what the impression on the New Testament writers?

20. What can you say of the allusions to the psalms in the New Testament?

XVII

THE MESSIAH IN THE PSALMS

A fine text for this chapter is as follows: “All things must be fulfilled which were written in the Psalms concerning me,” Luk 24:44 . I know of no better way to close my brief treatise on the Psalms than to discuss the subject of the Messiah as revealed in this book.

Attention has been called to the threefold division of the Old Testament cited by our Lord, namely, the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms (Luk 24:44 ), in all of which were the prophecies relating to himself that “must be fulfilled.” It has been shown just what Old Testament books belong to each of these several divisions. The division called the Psalms included many books, styled Holy Writings, and because the Psalms proper was the first book of the division it gave the name to the whole division.

The object of this discussion is to sketch the psalmist’s outline of the Messiah, or rather, to show how nearly a complete picture of our Lord is foredrawn in this one book. Let us understand however with Paul, that all prophecy is but in part (1Co 13:9 ), and that when we fill in on one canvas all the prophecies concerning the Messiah of all the Old Testament divisions, we are far from having a perfect portrait of our Lord. The present purpose is limited to three things:

1. What the book of the Psalms teaches concerning the Messiah.

2. That the New Testament shall authoritatively specify and expound this teaching.

3. That the many messianic predictions scattered over the book and the specifications thereof over the New Testament may be grouped into an orderly analysis, so that by the adjustment of the scattered parts we may have before us a picture of our Lord as foreseen by the psalmists.

In allowing the New Testament to authoritatively specify and expound the predictive features of the book, I am not unmindful of what the so-called “higher critics” urge against the New Testament quotations from the Old Testament and the use made of them. In this discussion, however, these objections are not considered, for sufficient reasons. There is not space for it. Even at the risk of being misjudged I must just now summarily pass all these objections, dismissing them with a single statement upon which the reader may place his own estimate of value. That statement is that in the days of my own infidelity, before this old method of criticism had its new name, I was quite familiar with the most and certainly the strongest of the objections now classified as higher criticism, and have since patiently re-examined them in their widely conflicting restatements under their modern name, and find my faith in the New Testament method of dealing with the Old Testament in no way shattered, but in every way confirmed. God is his own interpreter. The Old Testament as we now have it was in the hands of our Lord. I understand his apostle to declare, substantially, that “every one of these sacred scriptures is God-inspired and is profitable for teaching us what is right to believe and to do, for convincing us what is wrong in faith or practice, for rectifying the wrong when done, that we may be ready at every point, furnished completely, to do every good work, at the right time, in the right manner, and from the proper motive” (2Ti 3:16-17 ).

This New Testament declares that David was a prophet (Act 2:30 ), that he spake by the Holy Spirit (Act 1:16 ), that when the book speaks the Holy Spirit speaks (Heb 3:7 ), and that all its predictive utterances, as sacred Scripture, “must be fulfilled” (Joh 13:18 ; Act 1:16 ). It is not claimed that David wrote all the psalms, but that all are inspired, and that as he was the chief author, the book goes by his name.

It would be a fine thing to make out two lists, as follows:

1. All of the 150 psalms in order from which the New Testament quotes with messianic application.

2. The New Testament quotations, book by book, i.e., Matthew so many, and then the other books in their order.

We would find in neither of these any order as to time, that is, Psa 1 which forecasts an incident in the coming Messiah’s life does not forecast the first incident of his life. And even the New Testament citations are not in exact order as to time and incident of his life. To get the messianic picture before us, therefore, we must put the scattered parts together in their due relation and order, and so construct our own analysis. That is the prime object of this discussion. It is not claimed that the analysis now presented is perfect. It is too much the result of hasty, offhand work by an exceedingly busy man. It will serve, however, as a temporary working model, which any one may subsequently improve. We come at once to the psalmist’s outline of the Messiah.

1. The necessity for a Saviour. This foreseen necessity is a background of the psalmists’ portrait of the Messiah. The necessity consists in (1) man’s sinfulness; (2) his sin; (3) his inability of wisdom and power to recover himself; (4) the insufficiency of legal, typical sacrifices in securing atonement.

The predicate of Paul’s great argument on justification by faith is the universal depravity and guilt of man. He is everywhere corrupt in nature; everywhere an actual transgressor; everywhere under condemnation. But the scriptural proofs of this depravity and sin the apostle draws mainly from the book of the Psalms. In one paragraph of the letter to the Romans (Rom 3:4-18 ), he cites and groups six passages from six divisions of the Psalms (Psa 5:9 ; Psa 10:7 ; Psa 14:1-3 ; Psa 36:1 ; Psa 51:4-6 ; Psa 140:3 ). These passages abundantly prove man’s sinfulness, or natural depravity, and his universal practice of sin.

The predicate also of the same apostle’s great argument for revelation and salvation by a Redeemer is man’s inability of wisdom and power to re-establish communion with God. In one of his letters to the Corinthians he thus commences his argument: “For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? -For after that in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preach-ing to save them that believe.” He closes this discussion with the broad proposition: “The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God,” and proves it by a citation from Psa 94:11 : “The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain.”

In like manner our Lord himself pours scorn on human wisdom and strength by twice citing Psa 8 : “At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight” (Mat 11:25-26 ). “And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children that were crying in the temple and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David; they were sore displeased, and said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?” (Mat 21:15-16 ).

But the necessity for a Saviour as foreseen by the psalmist did not stop at man’s depravity, sin, and helplessness. The Jews were trusting in the sacrifices of their law offered on the smoking altar. The inherent weakness of these offerings, their lack of intrinsic merit, their ultimate abolition, their complete fulfilment and supercession by a glorious antitype were foreseen and foreshown in this wonderful prophetic book: I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices; And thy burnt offerings are continually before me. I will take no bullock out of thy house, Nor he-goat out of thy folds. For every beast of the forest is mine, And the cattle upon a thousand hills. I know all of the birds of the mountains; And the wild beasts of the field are mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee; For the world is mine, and the fulness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, Or drink the blood of goats? Psa 50:8-13 .

Yet again it speaks in that more striking passage cited in the letter to the Hebrews: “For the law having a shadow of good things to come, not the very image of the things, can never with the same sacrifices year by year, which they offer continually, make the comers thereunto perfect. For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshipers, once purged should have no more consciousness of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance made of sins year by year. For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins. Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not, But a body didst thou prepare for me; In whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hadst no pleasure: Then said I, Lo, I am come (In the roll of the book it is written of me) To do thy will, O God. Saying above, Sacrifice and offering and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou wouldst not, neither hadst pleasure therein, (the which are offered according to the law), then hath he said, Lo, I am come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second” (Heb 10:1-9 ).

This keen foresight of the temporary character and intrinsic worthlessness of animal sacrifices anticipated similar utterances by the later prophets (Isa 1:10-17 ; Jer 6:20 ; Jer 7:21-23 ; Hos 6:6 ; Amo 5:21 ; Mic 6:6-8 ). Indeed, I may as well state in passing that when the apostle declares, “It is impossible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins,” he lays down a broad principle, just as applicable to baptism and the Lord’s Supper. With reverence I state the principle: Not even God himself by mere appointment can vest in any ordinance, itself lacking intrinsic merit, the power to take away sin. There can be, therefore, in the nature of the case, no sacramental salvation. This would destroy the justice of God in order to exalt his mercy. Clearly the psalmist foresaw that “truth and mercy must meet together” before “righteousness and peace could kiss each other” (Psa 85:10 ). Thus we find as the dark background of the psalmists’ luminous portrait of the Messiah, the necessity for a Saviour.

2. The nature, extent, and blessedness of the salvation to be wrought by the coming Messiah. In no other prophetic book are the nature, fullness, and blessedness of salvation so clearly seen and so vividly portrayed. Besides others not now enumerated, certainly the psalmists clearly forecast four great elements of salvation:

(1) An atoning sacrifice of intrinsic merit offered once for all (Psa 40:6-8 ; Heb 10:4-10 ).

(2) Regeneration itself consisting of cleansing, renewal, and justification. We hear his impassioned statement of the necessity of regeneration: “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me. Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts,” followed by his earnest prayer: “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me,” and his equally fervent petition: “Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean; wash me and I shall be whiter than snow” (Psa 51 ). And we hear him again as Paul describes the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputes righteousness without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, And whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not reckon sin Psa 32:1 ; Rom 4:6-8 .

(3) Introduction into the heavenly rest (Psa 95:7-11 ; Heb 3:7-19 ; Heb 4:1-11 ). Here is the antitypical Joshua leading spiritual Israel across the Jordan of death into the heavenly Canaan, the eternal rest that remaineth for the people of God. Here we find creation’s original sabbath eclipsed by redemption’s greater sabbath when the Redeemer “entered his rest, ceasing from his own works as God did from his.”

(4) The recovery of all the universal dominion lost by the first Adam and the securement of all possible dominion which the first Adam never attained (Psa 8:5-6 ; Eph 1:20-22 ; Heb 2:7-9 ; 1Co 15:24-28 ).

What vast extent then and what blessedness in the salvation foreseen by the psalmists, and to be wrought by the Messiah. Atoning sacrifice of intrinsic merit; regeneration by the Holy Spirit; heavenly rest as an eternal inheritance; and universal dominion shared with Christ!

3. The wondrous person of the Messiah in his dual nature, divine and human.

(1) His divinity,

(a) as God: “Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever” (Psa 45:6 and Heb 1:8 ) ;

(b) as creator of the heavens and earth, immutable and eternal: Of old didst thou lay the foundation of the earth; And the heavens are the work of thy hands. They shall perish, but thou shalt endure; Yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment; As a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed. But thou art the same, And thy years shall have no end Psa 102:25-27 quoted with slight changes in Heb 1:10-12 .

(c) As owner of the earth: The earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof; The world, and they that dwell therein, Psa 24:1 quoted in 1Co 10:26 .

(d) As the Son of God: “Thou art my Son; This day have I begotten thee” Psa 2:7 ; Heb 1:5 .

(e) As David’s Lord: The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, Until I make thine enemies thy footstool, Psa 110:1 ; Mat 22:41-46 .

(f) As the object of angelic worship: “And let all the angels of God worship him” Psa 97:7 ; Heb 1:6 .

(g) As the Bread of life: And he rained down manna upon them to eat, And gave them food from heaven Psa 78:24 ; interpreted in Joh 6:31-58 . These are but samples which ascribe deity to the Messiah of the psalmists.

(2) His humanity, (a) As the Son of man, or Son of Adam: Psa 8:4-6 , cited in 1Co 15:24-28 ; Eph 1:20-22 ; Heb 2:7-9 . Compare Luke’s genealogy, Luk 3:23-38 . This is the ideal man, or Second Adam, who regains Paradise Lost, who recovers race dominion, in whose image all his spiritual lineage is begotten. 1Co 15:45-49 . (b) As the Son of David: Psa 18:50 ; Psa 89:4 ; Psa 89:29 ; Psa 89:36 ; Psa 132:11 , cited in Luk 1:32 ; Act 13:22-23 ; Rom 1:3 ; 2Ti 2:8 . Perhaps a better statement of the psalmists’ vision of the wonderful person of the Messiah would be: He saw the uncreated Son, the second person of the trinity, in counsel and compact with the Father, arranging in eternity for the salvation of men: Psa 40:6-8 ; Heb 10:5-7 . Then he saw this Holy One stoop to be the Son of man: Psa 8:4-6 ; Heb 2:7-9 . Then he was the son of David, and then he saw him rise again to be the Son of God: Psa 2:7 ; Rom 1:3-4 .

4. His offices.

(1) As the one atoning sacrifice (Psa 40:6-8 ; Heb 10:5-7 ).

(2) As the great Prophet, or Preacher (Psa 40:9-10 ; Psa 22:22 ; Heb 2:12 ). Even the method of his teaching by parable was foreseen (Psa 78:2 ; Mat 13:35 ). Equally also the grace, wisdom, and power of his teaching. When the psalmist declares that “Grace is poured into thy lips” (Psa 45:2 ), we need not be startled when we read that all the doctors in the Temple who heard him when only a boy “were astonished at his understanding and answers” (Luk 2:47 ); nor that his home people at Nazareth “all bear him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth” (Luk 4:22 ); nor that those of his own country were astonished, and said, “Whence hath this man this wisdom?” (Mat 13:54 ); nor that the Jews in the Temple marveled, saying, “How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?” (Joh 7:15 ) ; nor that the stern officers of the law found their justification in failure to arrest him in the declaration, “Never man spake like this man” (Joh 7:46 ).

(3) As the king (Psa 2:6 ; Psa 24:7-10 ; Psa 45:1-17 ; Psa 110:1 ; Mat 22:42-46 ; Act 2:33-36 ; 1Co 15:25 ; Eph 1:20 ; Heb 1:13 ).

(4) As the priest (Psa 110:4 ; Heb 5:5-10 ; Heb 7:1-21 ; Heb 10:12-14 ).

(5) As the final judge. The very sentence of expulsion pronounced upon the finally impenitent by the great judge (Mat 25:41 ) is borrowed from the psalmist’s prophetic words (Psa 6:8 ).

5. Incidents of life. The psalmists not only foresaw the necessity for a Saviour; the nature, extent, and blessedness of the salvation; the wonderful human-divine person of the Saviour; the offices to be filled by him in the work of salvation, but also many thrilling details of his work in life, death, resurrection, and exaltation. It is not assumed to cite all these details, but some of the most important are enumerated in order, thus:

(1) The visit, adoration, and gifts of the Magi recorded in Mat 2 are but partial fulfilment of Psa 72:9-10 .

(2) The scripture employed by Satan in the temptation of our Lord (Luk 4:10-11 ) was cited from Psa 91:11-12 and its pertinency not denied.

(3) In accounting for his intense earnestness and the apparently extreme measures adopted by our Lord in his first purification of the Temple (Joh 2:17 ), he cites the messianic zeal predicted in Psa 69:9 .

(4) Alienation from his own family was one of the saddest trials of our Lord’s earthly life. They are slow to understand his mission and to enter into sympathy with him. His self-abnegation and exhaustive toil were regarded by them as evidences of mental aberration, and it seems at one time they were ready to resort to forcible restraint of his freedom) virtually what in our time would be called arrest under a writ of lunacy. While at the last his half-brothers became distinguished preachers of his gospel, for a long while they do not believe on him. And the evidence forces us to the conclusion that his own mother shared with her other sons, in kind though not in degree, the misunderstanding of the supremacy of his mission over family relations. The New Testament record speaks for itself:

Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I sought thee sorrowing. And he said unto them. How is it that ye sought me? Knew ye not that I must be in my Father’s house? And they understood not the saying which he spake unto them Luk 2:48-51 (R.V.).

And when the wine failed, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine. And Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come. Joh 2:3-5 (R.V.).

And there come his mother and his brethren; and standing without; they sent unto him, calling him. And a multitude was sitting about him; and they say unto him. Behold, thy mother and thy brethren without seek for thee. And he answereth them, and saith, Who is my mother and my brethren? And looking round on them that sat round about him, he saith, Behold, my mother and my brethren) For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother Mar 3:31-35 (R.V.).

Now the feast of the Jews, the feast of tabernacles, was at hand. His brethren therefore said unto him, Depart hence, and go into Judea, that thy disciples also may behold thy works which thou doest. For no man doeth anything in secret, and himself seeketh to be known openly. If thou doest these things, manifest thyself to the world. For even his brethren did not believe on him. Jesus therefore saith unto them, My time is not yet come; but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that its works are evil. Go ye up unto the feast: I go not up yet unto this feast; because my time is not fulfilled. Joh 7:2-9 (R.V.).

These citations from the Revised Version tell their own story. But all that sad story is foreshown in the prophetic psalms. For example: I am become a stranger unto my brethren, And an alien unto my mother’s children. Psa 69:8 .

(5) The triumphal entry into Jerusalem was welcomed by a joyous people shouting a benediction from Psa 118:26 : “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord” (Mat 21:9 ); and the Lord’s lamentation over Jerusalem predicts continued desolation and banishment from his sight until the Jews are ready to repeat that benediction (Mat 23:39 ).

(6) The children’s hosanna in the Temple after its second purgation is declared by our Lord to be a fulfilment of that perfect praise forecast in Psa 8:2 .

(7) The final rejection of our Lord by his own people was also clear in the psalmist’s vision (Psa 118:22 ; Mat 21:42-44 ).

(8) Gethsemane’s baptism of suffering, with its strong crying and tears and prayers was as clear to the psalmist’s prophetic vision as to the evangelist and apostle after it became history (Psa 69:1-4 ; Psa 69:13-20 ; and Mat 26:36-44 ; Heb 5:7 ).

(9) In life-size also before the psalmist was the betrayer of Christ and his doom (Psa 41:9 ; Psa 69:25 ; Psa 109:6-8 ; Joh 13:18 ; Act 1:20 ).

(10) The rage of the people, Jew and Gentile, and the conspiracy of Pilate and Herod are clearly outlined (Psa 2:1-3 ; Act 4:25-27 ).

(11) All the farce of his trial the false accusation, his own marvelous silence; and the inhuman maltreatment to which he was subjected, is foreshown in the prophecy as dramatically as in the history (Mat 26:57-68 ; Mat 27:26-31 ; Psa 27:12 ; Psa 35:15-16 ; Psa 38:3 ; Psa 69:19 ).

The circumstances of his death, many and clear, are distinctly foreseen. He died in the prime of life (Psa 89:45 ; Psa 102:23-24 ). He died by crucifixion (Psa 22:14-17 ; Luk 23 ; 33; Joh 19:23-37 ; Joh 20:27 ). But yet not a bone of his body was broken (Psa 34:20 ; Joh 19:36 ).

The persecution, hatred without a cause, the mockery and insults, are all vividly and dramatically foretold (Psa 22:6-13 ; Psa 35:7 ; Psa 35:12 ; Psa 35:15 ; Psa 35:21 ; Psa 109:25 ).

The parting of his garments and the gambling for his vesture (Psa 22:18 ; Mat 27:35 ).

His intense thirst and the gall and vinegar offered for his drink (Psa 69:21 ; Mat 27:34 ).

In the psalms, too, we hear his prayers for his enemies so remarkably fulfilled in fact (Psa 109:4 ; Luk 23:34 ).

His spiritual death was also before the eye of the psalmist, and the very words which expressed it the psalmist heard. Separation from the Father is spiritual death. The sinner’s substitute must die the sinner’s death, death physical, i.e., separation of soul from body; death spiritual, i.e., separation of the soul from God. The latter is the real death and must precede the former. This death the substitute died when he cried out: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me.” (Psa 22:1 ; Mat 27:46 ).

Emerging from the darkness of that death, which was the hour of the prince of darkness, the psalmist heard him commend his spirit to the Father (Psa_31:35; Luk 23:46 ) showing that while he died the spiritual death, his soul was not permanently abandoned unto hell (Psa 16:8-10 ; Act 2:25 ) so that while he “tasted death” for every man it was not permanent death (Heb 2:9 ).

With equal clearness the psalmist foresaw his resurrection, his triumph over death and hell, his glorious ascension into heaven, and his exaltation at the right hand of God as King of kings and Lord of lords, as a high Driest forever, as invested with universal sovereignty (Psa 16:8-11 ; Psa 24:7-10 ; Psa 68:18 ; Psa 2:6 ; Psa 111:1-4 ; Psa 8:4-6 ; Act 2:25-36 ; Eph 1:19-23 ; Eph 4:8-10 ).

We see, therefore, brethren, when the scattered parts are put together and adjusted, how nearly complete a portrait of our Lord is put upon the prophetic canvas by this inspired limner, the sweet singer of Israel.

QUESTIONS

1. What is a good text for this chapter?

2. What is the threefold division of the Old Testament as cited by our Lord?

3. What is the last division called and why?

4. What is the object of the discussion in this chapter?

5. To what three things is the purpose limited?

6. What especially qualifies the author to meet the objections of the higher critics to allowing the New Testament usage of the Old Testament to determine its meaning and application?

7. What is the author’s conviction relative to the Scriptures?

8. What is the New Testament testimony on the question of inspiration?

9. What is the author’s suggested plan of approach to the study of the Messiah in the Psalms?

10. What the background of the Psalmist’s portrait of the Messiah and of what does it consist?

11. Give the substance of Paul’s discussion of man’s sinfulness.

12. What is the teaching of Jesus on this point?

13. What is the teaching relative to sacrifices?

14. What the nature, extent, and blessedness of the salvation to be wrought by the coming Messiah and what the four great elements of it as forecast by the psalmist?

15. What is the teaching of the psalms relative to the wondrous person of the Messiah? Discuss.

16. What are the offices of the Messiah according to psalms? Discuss each.

17. Cite the more important events of the Messiah’s life according to the vision of the psalmist.

18. What the circumstances of the Messiah’s death and resurrection as foreseen by the psalmist?

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

Psa 94:1 O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.

Ver. 1. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth ] Heb. Jehovah, God of revenges; so Jer 51:56 , “The Lord God of recompences.” “Vengeance is mine,” saith he, “I will repay,” Deu 32:35 . And it is best he should, for he returneth “a just recompense of reward,” Heb 2:2 ; whereas men seek oft an unequal revenge, Heb 10:30 , as a stab for the lie given; and, besides, in seeking the lives of others, they sometimes lose their own.

Show thyself ] Heb. shine forth, appear for thy poor wronged servant. David knew the law, and submitted to it; he turneth over his enemies to God to be ordered by him, neither did he himself herein any disservice. “I seek not mine own glory” (so mine own revenge), saith Christ, but there is one that seeketh it. God never faileth to do it, to be their champion, who strive not for themselves; only they must wait his leisure, and not usurp his executions.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

It is the cry of a righteous remnant anticipating and longing for the establishment of Jehovah’s righteous rule on the earth, as the preceding psalm proclaimed the great principles succinctly: Jehovah reigning, not Satan as now (Joh 14:30 , 2Co 4:4 , Eph 2:2 , Eph 2:6 : 12); His testimony very sure before His power is displayed superior to all opposition; holiness becoming His house forever on earth, as well as in heaven. This draws out the appeal for His vengeance on the evil then undisguised towering to heaven, and blasphemers in pride; and its folly is exposed before their brethren that believe not. But their own hearts take the comforts of His discipline, as yet in vain for the Gentiles, but in faithful keeping for His own. The return of righteousness to judgment is assured if He reign, and the impossibility of fellowship between Himself and the throne of iniquity. Such will be the blessedness when He brings in the First-begotten into the inhabited earth; and such in view of it the earnest prayer of the godly Israelite.

The next six Psalms may be viewed as completing the group which began with Psa 93 ; yet of themselves they mike an evident and well ordered progress. The first of the six (Psa 95 ) summons the people of God, in the Spirit of prophecy which animated the godly, to rejoice in Jehovah no longer to be hidden but revealed in Christ Who brings in salvation, glory, and rest; but no blessing is without hearing His voice. In the second the summons goes forth beyond Israel to the nations and peoples; as the third is the new song that is sought. The fourth demands a new song of Israel; and the fifth is the answer. This is completed by Psa 100 , which expresses Israel in the joy of grace, while owning their own portion, inviting all the earth to shout aloud to Jehovah, and with enlarged hearts welcoming into His gates with thanksgiving those whose approach they used jealously to fend off is dogs,

Fuente: William Kelly Major Works (New Testament)

NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Psa 94:1-7

1O Lord, God of vengeance,

God of vengeance, shine forth!

2Rise up, O Judge of the earth,

Render recompense to the proud.

3How long shall the wicked, O Lord,

How long shall the wicked exult?

4They pour forth words, they speak arrogantly;

All who do wickedness vaunt themselves.

5They crush Your people, O Lord,

And afflict Your heritage.

6They slay the widow and the stranger

And murder the orphans.

7They have said, The Lord does not see,

Nor does the God of Jacob pay heed.

Psa 94:1-7 This strophe expresses the frustration of a faithful follower when he/she sees the godlessness of those who claim to know God (i.e., other covenant partners, apparently the rich and powerful). They live and act as if there were no God of justice (i.e., practical atheists).

Notice

1. they are proud, Psa 94:2 b

2. they exult, Psa 94:3 b

3. they speak (lit. pour out, cf. Psa 59:7; Pro 15:2) arrogantly, Psa 94:4 a (cf. Psa 31:18; Psa 75:5)

4. they vaunt themselves, Psa 94:4 b, cf. Psa 10:3; Psa 52:1

5. they crush God’s faithful followers, Psa 94:5 a (i.e., used of corrupt courts in Job 5:4; Job 22:9; Psa 10:18; Psa 72:4; Psa 74:21; Pro 22:22; Isa 3:15)

6. they afflict God’s heritage, Psa 94:5 b, cf. Psa 94:14

7. they kill (may be literal or figurative of loss of legal rights)

a. the widow

b. the alien/stranger

c. the orphan (cf. Exo 22:21-24; Deu 10:18; Deu 14:29; Deu 26:12-15)

8. they assert that God does not see or care about their actions, Psa 94:7 (cf. Psa 10:11; Psa 59:7; Psa 64:5; Psa 73:11; Job 22:13; Isa 29:15; Isa 47:10; Eze 8:12; Mal 2:17)

Psa 94:1-2 There are three prayer requests (imperatives) beseeching God to act.

1. shine forth – BDB 422, KB 424, Hiphil imperative, cf. Psa 80:1; Psa 80:3; Psa 80:7; it is used in the Blessing of Moses in Deu 33:2

2. rise up – BDB 669, KB 724, Niphal imperative; see notes at Psa 3:7; Psa 7:6

3. render recompense (lit. bring back) – BDB 996, KB 1427, Hiphil imperative, cf. Deu 32:41; Deu 32:43; Isa 66:15

Psa 94:1 vengeance This feminine term (BDB 668) is plural. The NASB margin translates it as avenging acts. The masculine form appears in Deu 32:35; Deu 32:41. Vengeance is what YHWH does when His covenant is violated. Sometimes it relates to His own people (cf. esp. Leviticus 26; Deuteronomy 27-32; Jer 5:9; Jer 5:29; Jer 9:9; Mic 5:14), sometimes to pagan nations (cf. Psa 79:10; Psa 149:7; Isa 59:18; Isa 63:4; Nah 1:3).

Psa 94:2 the earth The Hebrew term has a wide semantic field (cf. NIDOTTE, vol. 1, pp. 518-526). Only context can determine its meaning (see Special Topic: Land, Country, Earth). Here it could refer to

1. all the planet (i.e., YHWH is the Judge of all the earth, cf. Gen 18:25)

2. the Promised Land, YHWH is the Covenant God

Which option depends on who the wicked of Psa 94:3 are.

1. non-Israelites

2. Israelites

I think option #2 fits this Psalm best because they are accused of violating Moses’ commands (cf. Psa 94:6) and then are called senseless among the people (cf. Psa 94:8 a). YHWH is the righteous Judge (cf. Gen 18:25; Jdg 11:27; Psa 7:11; Psa 50:6; Psa 75:7; Isa 33:22).

Psa 94:3 How long. . . This idiom is a way of asking

1. why has God not acted in justice – Psa 6:3; Psa 74:10; Hab 1:2; Zec 1:12

2. will God forgive His people – Psa 13:1; Psa 79:5; Psa 80:4; Psa 90:13; Isa 6:11

3. why have the wicked continued their actions – Exo 10:3; 1Sa 1:14; 1Ki 18:21; Psa 82:2; Jer 4:14; Jer 12:4; Hos 8:5; Hab 2:6

Humans do not understand God’s thoughts, timing, purposes (cf. Isa 55:9-11). This idiom expresses this lack of knowledge by a question format.

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

LORD. Hebrew. Jehovah. App-4.

GOD. Hebrew El. App-4. Note the Figure of speech Anaphora (App-6) in this verse.

shew Thyself = shine forth.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Psa 94:1-23 :

O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth ( Psa 94:1 );

Now, it’s hard for us to remember that. “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” ( Rom 12:19 ). So often we try to take vengeance ourselves against the evil that is done to us. So often we say or hear said, “I’ll get even with him,” as though it is our place to take vengeance.

But LORD God, vengeance belongeth to thee ( Psa 94:1 ),

But he said now,

show yourself ( Psa 94:1 ).

And take vengeance, Lord.

Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud. LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph? How long shall they utter and speak hard things? and all of the workers of iniquity boast themselves? They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, they afflict your heritage. They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless. Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it ( Psa 94:2-7 ).

Somehow there is that kind of feeling with those who are guilty of unrighteousness that God doesn’t see. No fear of the Lord in them. They do not realize that though they may get by with it here, someday they are going to answer for those things that they have done. Vengeance belongs to God and God is going to come in judgment to bring vengeance upon the workers of iniquity. But what fools they are thinking that God doesn’t see or that God doesn’t regard what they are doing.

Understand, you brutish among the people: you fools, when will ye be wise? ( Psa 94:8 )

When you going to wise up?

He that has created the ear, do you think he can’t hear? the one that created your eye, you think he can’t see? He that chastens the heathen, shall he not correct? he that teaches man knowledge, you think he doesn’t know? The LORD knows the thoughts of man, that they are emptiness. Blessed is the man whom you chasten, O LORD, and teach him out of your law; That you may give him rest from the days of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked. For the LORD will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance. But judgment shall return unto the righteous: and the upright in heart shall follow it. Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity? Unless the LORD had been my help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence ( Psa 94:9-17 ).

I would have been wiped out.

When I said, My foot slippeth; thy mercy, O LORD, held me up. In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frames mischief by the law? They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood. But the LORD is my defense; and my God is the rock of my refuge. And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off in their own wickedness; yea, the LORD our God shall cut them off ( Psa 94:18-23 ).

So the psalm is out of a troubled heart because of the oppression of the wicked, but the acknowledgment that God is the God of vengeance and God will avenge, and God will uphold the righteous. But those that have been guilty of wickedness shall be brought in judgment one day. “

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

Let us read this evening the ninety-fourth Psalm, and may the Spirit of God instruct us while we read it!

Psa 94:1. O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.

God is the God of justice, and when iniquity and oppression prevail, it is natural that his people should call upon him to come forth out of his hiding-places. Sometimes, when oppression and iniquity and error prevail, it seems as if God had hidden himself away. Hence the prayer of the psalmist, O Jehovah, the God of recompenses (or revenges, as the margin has it), show thyself.

Psa 94:2. Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud.

As one who is about to strike a heavy blow lifts himself up, to increase the force of the stroke, so the psalmist prays to the Lord, Lift up thyself, thou Judge of the earth. The proud are lifted up; lift up thyself. They boast, they glory, Lord, show them how great a God thou art in the defense of righteousness; lift up thyself, thou Judge of the earth.

Psa 94:3. LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?

That question, how long? uttered twice over, sounds a little like howling; and sometimes Gods saints get so dispirited that they cry unto God, and weep and wail before him until their wailing becomes almost like howling:

Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?

Psa 94:4-5. How long shall they utter and speak hard things? and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves? They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage.

Their words are heavier than stones, and when they hurl them at the Lords people with cruel intent, they do great mischief: They utter and speak hard things. All the workers of iniquity boast themselves. It seems to be the mark of the righteous that they are humble and lowly, and the mark of the wicked that they are boastful and proud. They have nothing of which they ought to boast, yet they do boast very loudly. Pride is ingrained in our evil nature; and the more there is of sin in us, the more there is of boasting by us.

Psa 94:6. They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.

Do you wonder that the psalmist prayed, O God of vengeance, show thyself? Can you see the fatherless robbed, and the widow and the stranger oppressed, without feeling your indignation burn? He who is never indignant has no virtue in him. He who cannot burn like coals of juniper against evil does not truly love righteousness. The psalmist was not a man of that sort, he was righteously angry with the wicked, who slew the widow and the stranger, and murdered the fatherless.

Psa 94:7. Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.

They were practically atheists, for, if they had a god nominally, they regarded him as a god who did not observe sins, a blind deity, a god who took no note of evil. Do you not think that this is the prevailing religion of today? Are there not many who say, Jehovah shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it? God is not in all their thoughts, he is to them a nonentity, not the Omniscient Jehovah, and hardly even a person, but a kind of secondary power or a feeble force, an unknown something or other not of much account: Jehovah shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.

Psa 94:8. Understand, ye brutish among the people:

When a man turns away from God, he casts off his manhood; he ceases to be a man, and becomes like a brute, a boar, for so this expression might be read, Ye boars among the people.

Psa 94:8-9. And ye fools, when will ye be wise? He that planted the ear, shall he not hear?

Did the Lord make mens ears, and put them near the brain in the very best place for hearing, and shall he not himself hear? The argument is overwhelming. God gave us ears, and made us hear; is he deaf himself?

Psa 94:9. He that formed the eye, shall he not see?

God makes all eyes; is he without eyes himself? The supposition is an absurdity. It needs only to be mentioned to be held up to ridiculous: He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? He that formed the eye, shall he not see?

Shall he who, with transcendent skill,

Fashiond the eye and formd the ear

Who modeld nature to his will,

Shall he not see? Shall he not hear?

Psa 94:10. He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct?

Whole nations were driven out of Canaan to make room for Israel. Many other nations have been crushed, doubled up, utterly destroyed, on account of their sin. Everybody who reads history knows that this has been the case, so the psalmist argues, He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? He that executeth judgment upon heathen nations, can he not deal with sinful man, and with single individuals? He that broke the power of Persia, and Assyria, and Greece, and Rome, will he not punish guilty men when they dare to set themselves up as oppressors of his people?

Psa 94:10. He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?

Our translators finish the question by putting Shall not he know? but those words are not in the original, and they are not at all necessary to the argument. It is as if the psalmist broke off his utterances abruptly, as much as to say, It is of no use arguing with you fellows, or else as if he said, Finish my sentence yourselves; I put the truth so clearly before you that there is no escaping from it. He that teacheth man knowledge: if God has taught men all that they know, does not he himself know all that is to be known? The psalmist does not say so much as that in words; but he leaves us to draw that as the only inference from what he says.

Psa 94:11. The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man,

God knows not only mens words and acts, but their thoughts also. God knows thoughtful men, the best sort of men, when they are at their best, when they are thinking; and what does God think of the thoughts of man?

Psa 94:11. That they are vanity.

Yet people talk about the thoughtful men of the age, and want us to bow down and worship their thoughts. This boasting about mans thoughts is only like the cracking of rotten sticks: The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.

Psa 94:12. Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O LORD, and teachest him out of thy law;

Here is the truly blessed man; not the boaster, not the infidel, not the proud thinker, but the divinely-chastened man. He is sore through the chastening of the Lord, his bones are full of pain, his heart is heavy, and his home, perhaps, as a place of torture to him; but still it is true that he is a blessed man: Blessed is the man whom thou chasteness, O Lord, and teachest him out of thy law.

Psa 94:13. That thou mayest give him rest; from the days of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked.

Christ has gone to prepare heaven for his people; it is a prepared place for a prepared people. So is it with the ungodly and their eternal inheritance, it is a prepared place, prepared for the devil and his angels, and when men make themselves like demons, and so are ripe for hell, then is the pit ready to receive them.

Psa 94:14. For the Lord will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.

If any of you are deeply troubled, I counsel you to get a hold of this promise. Perhaps it seems to you as if two seas of sorrow had met around you and that you were in a whirlpool of trouble; then I say again, lay hold of this text, and grip it firmly: Jehovah will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.

Psa 94:15-16. But judgment shall return unto righteousness: and all the upright in heart shall follow it. Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? or who will rise up for me against the workers of iniquity?

Well, David, you may ask the question; but we cannot tell you who among your fellow men will stand up for you. It sometimes happens that Gods people are left without an earthly friend; their case is so hard, their cause involves so much question, so much shame, perhaps, that nobody will stand up for them. If this be your trying condition just now, listen to the psalmists testimony:

Psa 94:17. Unless the LORD had been my help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence.

If it had not been for God, he would not only have had no hand to help him, but not even a voice to speak for him. He might not have suffered quite in silence, because he would have himself spoken; but what he would have said would only have made the matter worse. What would he have said if he had broken the silence?

Psa 94:18. When I said, My foot slippeth;

It is going, it is gone; my foot is now slipping, what then?

Psa 94:18. Thy mercy, O LORD, held me up.

God is grand at holding up his people in slippery places, and not only in slippery places, but when their feet actually do slip. When they think that they are gone, they are not really gone. Underneath are the everlasting arms. Thy mercy, O Lord, held me up.

Psa 94:19. In the multitude of my thoughts within me

I cannot collect my thoughts, they will not be gathered into orderly array, they rush to and fro, there is a multitude, a mob of them. It is good to have thoughts, but sometimes you may have too many of them; and they may come helter-skelter, blasphemous thoughts, perhaps, despairing, proud, unbelieving, all sorts of thoughts: In the multitude of my thoughts within me

Psa 94:19. Thy comforts delight my soul.

Comforts which thou dost bring me, comforts which arise from thoughts of thee, the comforts of the Comforter, the comforts of the God of all comfort, thy comforts delight my soul. You must often have noticed that troubles seldom come alone; if you get one trial, you will probably have a whole covey of them. It very rarely happens, I think, to any one of us to have a lone sorrow. In another place the psalmist says, Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts; all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me. It is so with some of us at this time; we have a multitude of troubled thoughts within us. But have you also noticed that Gods mercies do not come alone? They come in flocks; the psalmist says, Thy comforts not merely one comfort, but a great host of them, Thy comforts delight my soul, they not merely sustain me, and keep me alive, but they delight my soul. God never does anything by halves; when he gives us comfort, he does it thoroughly. The Lords flowers bloom double; he gives us not only comfort, but delight: Thy comforts delight my soul. Now the psalmist turns to God in prayer, and says:

Psa 94:20. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frameth mischief by a law?

Oh, how strong are the wicked! They think they can have everything all their own way, that they can make what laws they like, and crush out anything that they despise. Yes, there are many thrones of iniquity, but God has no fellowship with them; and if God has no fellowship with a throne, that throne will tumble down, God will not uphold it. The day will come when he will no longer tolerate its iniquity, and then one blow of his mighty right hand shall shiver it to atoms.

Psa 94:21. They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.

Agreed about nothing else, they all agree against Christ and against the holy seed: the soul of the righteous. They would blot out the righteous from under heaven if they could.

Psa 94:22. But the LORD is my defence; and my God is the rock of my refuge.

I commend these expressions to all believers, let them treasure them up. My God. Ah, you must personally appropriate God to yourself if he is to bless you! Another mans God is nothing to you unless you can also say, My God. When you have said, My God, you have uttered the grandest words that human lips can frame. If God be yours, all things are yours, earth and heaven, time and eternity. My God is the rock of my refuge. You are on the rock; you are in the rock; you are behind the rock; you must be safe now.

Psa 94:23. And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity,

That is the punishment of sin. It seems strange that it is so, but sin is the punishment of sin. When a man has once sinned, it is part of his punishment that he is inclined to sin again, and so on ad infinitum. He shall bring upon them their own iniquity.

Psa 94:23. And shall cut them off in their own wickedness;

It needs no fire nor worm to torment the ungodly, their own wickedness itself is fire, and worm, and pit without a bottom, and the hell that endeth not.

Psa 94:23. Yea, the LORD our God shall cut them off.

Surrounded by his saints, the Lord

Shall armd with holy vengeance come;

To each his final lot award

And seal the sinners fearful doom.

God save us from being of that company! May we all be numbered with his people for ever and ever! Amen.

Fuente: Spurgeon’s Verse Expositions of the Bible

Psa 94:1-3

ISRAEL CRIES OUT FOR GOD TO JUDGE THE WORLD

We are unable to assign either a date or an occasion for this psalm; the author is also unknown. Apparently, the sufferings of Israel in view here were not the result of oppression by a foreign power, but due to the gross wickedness of Israel’s own government. If so, then the times either of Zedekiah or Manasseh would have been suitable for such a complaint as this.

As proposed by Delitzsch, there are six paragraphs in the psalm.

Amos had specifically warned Israel against their oft-repeated cry for the coming of the Judgment Day.

“Woe unto you that desire the day of Jehovah! Wherefore would ye have the day of Jehovah? It is darkness, and not light. As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him; and he went into the house and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him. Shall not the day of Jehovah be darkness, and not light? even very dark, and no brightness in it” (Amo 5:18-20)?

In spite of such a warning, it seems that Israel continued to cherish their illusions about the Judgment Day.

Psa 94:1-3

A PRAYER FOR GOD TO JUDGE RAMPANT WICKEDNESS

“O Jehovah, thou God to whom vengeance belongeth,

Thou God to whom vengeance belongeth, shine forth.

Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth:

Render to the proud their desert.

Jehovah, how long shall the wicked,

How long shall the wicked triumph?”

“Shine forth” (Psa 94:1). It is clear enough here that the psalmist is thinking of the day of Jehovah, as indicated by this expression.

“Lift up thyself” (Psa 94:2). This is a plea for, “God to rouse himself from inaction, and to come and visit the earth as Judge.

“How long shall the wicked triumph?” (Psa 94:3). Although there is an element of faith in such a cry, “It is a cry of weakness and impatience. It also fails to heed Amos’ warning.

“This appeal has no sense of malice about it. It is a simple cry for recompense and a plea that ungodly deeds should recoil upon the perpetrators.

E.M. Zerr:

Psa 94:1. Vengeance usually has a harsh sound for our ears and we might be inclined to wonder why it would be attributed to God. The impression is due largely to abuse of the word. The term primarily means “Punishment inflicted in return for an injury or an offense.”–Webster. Improper or spiteful treatment of one who is even guilty of wrong would be wrong also, but that is not required by the meaning of the word. And furthermore, even the proper form or degree of vengeance must be administered by one having authority for doing so. The Psalmist here declares that God is the one to whom such right belongs. Paul taught the same thing in Rom 12:19. The Psalmist in our verse is calling upon God to show his vengeance upon the wicked enemy.

Psa 94:2. In the preceding verse David set forth the right of God to bring vengeance on those who deserved it. In this he calls upon Him to use that authority against the proud. The original for this last word means not only that the persons are vain of themselves, but also are impudent over it toward others.

Psa 94:3. This is another of David’s earnest prayers for the Lord’s judgments upon his enemies. And again we should observe that he does not imply any injustice from the Lord in suffering some affliction to come, but desired it not to continue long.

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

The placing of this song immediately after the one which sets forth the fact of the enthronement of Jehovah is remarkable. It creates a contrast, while it suggests a continuity of ideas. The contrast is seen in the fact that while the previous psalm celebrates the victory of Jehovah over all opposition, this one is an appeal to Him out of circumstances in which His enemies seem to triumph. The continuity of ideas is however, equally apparent.

To who should His own turn in times of such distress, save to the One Who sits high above the force and fury of the flood?

The psalm has three main movements. First, an appeal to Jehovah the Mighty, in the presence of the triumph of the wicked (vv. Psa 94:1-7). This is followed by an address to such as are doubting because of apparent inactivity of God. They are reminded that God hears, sees, and must act (vv. Psa 94:8-11). Finally, the song again becomes a prayer in which faith makes its great affirmations. The period of waiting is one of blessed chastening. Jehovah cannot ultimately cast off His people. Past experience testifies to this. The wrong of those apparently victorious enemies makes it impossible to believe that they can have fellowship with God. Therefore, the final words tell of the psalmists confidence.

Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

the Lord Who Ruleth over All

Psa 93:1-5; Psa 94:1-5

It is thought that these two psalms date from the Assyrian invasion in Hezekiahs time, and that the psalmist compares the strength of Sennacherib and his hosts to the mighty breakers of the sea. But they well befit all times of anxiety and opposition. It is interesting to remember, also, that these and the six psalms which follow have always been applied by the Jews to the days of the Messiah. Surely, then, we may apply them to our own time.

It is an infinite comfort to know that above and beyond all that distresses and hinders the Church or our individual lives, there exists the great fact of our Lords sovereignty. This encourages us in conflict and makes us steadfast and unmovable. We can almost hear the dash of successive breakers with foam and fury around the throne of God, which, however, stands without a tremor. The miracle of Jesus in quieting the storm has a symbolic and far-reaching meaning. He is in our hearts, in the world, and in His Church, as it is tossed on the surface of the storm-swept water-and Jesus rules the waves. He must vindicate the law of righteousness and save His people.

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

Psa 94:9

We know what the eye and ear of man are, what it is to have the eye or ear of a friend near to us, or the eye and the ear of a master watching over us. What a difference does it make at once in all our thoughts and feelings! Especially suppose it is a friend or a master whom we love and reverence very much, what a vast difference does his presence make! It is only for want of due attention and consideration that we do not thus think of Almighty God at all times. For, as the Psalmist asks, “He that made the ear, shall He not hear? He that made the eye, shall He not see?”

Notice some points in which a reflection on the great truth which is contained in these words may be of use to us.

I. With regard to the many confusions that abound in the world, the manifold disorders of the times, which affect so seriously both the Church and nation, and perhaps every closer circle of life in which each of us is placed. What a reason for deep quietness of soul, for awful stillness and listening regard, is the consciousness of Him who is in the midst of us, though we see Him not!

II. The awful doctrine of God’s omnipresent ear and eye may greatly assist us in the work of self-amendment. It is the thought of this which makes the saints of God always remarkable for profound humility. Whatever else there may be in common in good men, there never was a man accepted of God but that acceptance was in proportion to his humility.

III. As our ideas of God’s knowledge and watchfulness are taken from the eyes and ears of men, so may we apply also to the same matter human affections also, which are often signified by these. Thus it is said that “the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open unto their prayers.” What is there in the world so encouraging, so consoling, so supporting, as the eye and ear of a friend? It was in thus looking upon God as their sure and present Friend that the faith of the patriarchs and of that noble army of martyrs, and prophets, and saints mentioned in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews consisted, in that, as is there said of Moses, they endured “as seeing Him who is invisible.”

Plain Sermons by Contributors to “Tracts for the Times” vol. ii., p. 224.

References: Psa 94:9.-J. Culross, Contemporary Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 330. Psa 94:10.-S. W. Skeffington, Our Sins or our Saviour, p. 183.

Psa 94:12

I. The highest love is marked by its severity, for the absolute condition of it is that it will never rest till it has lifted up the man whom it reaches to a level with itself. The lower love will often shrink from giving pain, nay will rightly do so unless it knows that the pain will purify, but not so the love of God. His love cannot be content to leave us to be mere creatures of our own appetites and passions, of the whim of the moment, or of the besetting sin which has fastened on our souls, or of a mere worldly purpose. There is no such thing as forgiveness without cleansing, and the cleansing is in itself the punishment of the sin which it cleans.

II. Human love must be controlled ever by such love as this. No human love is true which puts the lower above the higher, or drags down what it loves from the path of honour or of duty.

III. Those who have been most touched with a sense of this have not prayed to be spared, but rather the contrary. Anything, everything, is welcome to those men which makes them more and more the true sons of God, which refines them to that purity which they themselves delight in. So, too, do men most deeply feel what is the meaning of the death of Christ. He suffered for us, indeed, but that suffering is all strange to us till we begin to suffer too.

Bishop Temple, Rugby Sermons, 2nd series, p. 39.

References: Psa 94:12.-E. Garbett, The Soul’s Life, p. 144. Psa 94:16.-H. R. Reynolds, Notes of the Christian Life, p. 283; J. Budgen, Parochial Sermons, vol. ii., p. 219. Psa 94:19.-Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xv., No. 883, and vol. xix., No. 1116. Psalm 94-S. Cox, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. vi., p. 273.

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

Psalm 94-100

Psalm 94

Prayer for the Execution of the Vengeance of God

1. The Prayer on account of the enemy (Psa 94:1-7)

2. Expostulation with the wicked (Psa 94:8-13)

3. The comfort of the righteous (Psa 94:14-23)

The seven Psalms which follow lead on to the full establishment of the kingdom on earth and most of these Psalms celebrate His judgment reign, and the blessings of the age to come. We start once more with a Psalm which pictures vividly the trials of the days which precede the coming of the Lord and the coming of His kingdom. The Spirit of God has arranged these Psalms, as we have by this time learned, in such a manner as to lead from suffering to glory, the path which He went and which His people are appointed to follow also. Hence we see in this Psalm the wicked persecuting and breaking in pieces the people of God, and the righteous remnant is calling to the God to whom vengeance belongeth to show Himself, that is, to manifest His glory in their behalf. The voice of faith we hear also, the assurance that the Lord will not forsake His people nor His inheritance, that the Lord will intervene in behalf of His own and cut off the wicked.

Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

am 3416, bc 588 – Title Dr. Delaney supposes that this Psalm was written by David on occasion of his war with the Ammonites, in consequence of the indignities shewn to his messengers; but it is more probable that it was written to bewail the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple.

God, to whom vengeance belongeth: Heb. God of revenges, O God. Deu 32:35, Deu 32:41, Deu 32:42, Isa 35:4, Isa 59:17, Jer 50:28, Nah 1:2, Rom 12:19, 2Th 1:8, Heb 10:30

show thyself: Heb. shine forth, Psa 80:1

Reciprocal: Lev 26:25 – avenge Num 31:2 – Avenge Jdg 5:2 – for the avenging 1Sa 24:12 – Lord judge 1Sa 25:31 – avenged 1Sa 26:10 – the Lord liveth 2Sa 18:31 – the Lord 2Sa 22:48 – avengeth me 2Ki 9:7 – I may avenge Psa 7:6 – lift up Psa 10:18 – judge Isa 34:8 – General Isa 47:3 – I will take Jer 50:15 – for it Jer 51:36 – take Jer 51:56 – the Lord Amo 1:7 – I will Rom 3:5 – Is God 1Th 4:6 – the Lord Rev 18:20 – God

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

The appeal of righteousness to power.

The introduction gives us, as already said, the cry of the righteous, -the appeal of righteousness to power. As the Lord says: “And shall not God avenge His own elect, who cry day and night unto Him; though He bear long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily” (Luk 18:7-8). And in Revelation (Rev 8:3-5) the angel takes the censer from which the smoke of the incense has gone up to God with the prayers of the saints, and fills it with the fire of the altar, and casts it to the earth, and there follow thunders and voices and lightnings and an earthquake -the answering judgments of God upon their persecutors.

1. Such is the cry then here: “God of vengeances, Jehovah” -covenant God of Thy people, pledged to take up their cause -“God of vengeances, shine forth.” The lightning-stroke is yet the revelation of the light: “Lift up Thyself, Thou Judge of the earth! render recompense to the proud.”

Aye, it is pride which calls for abasement. “The day of Jehovah of hosts shall be upon all that is proud and lofty, and upon all that is lifted up; and it shall be brought low: and upon all the cedars of Lebanon that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan; and upon all the high mountains, and upon all the hills that are lifted up; and upon every high tower, and upon every fenced wall. . . . And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low: and Jehovah alone shall be exalted in that day” (Isa 2:12-17).

Thus the cry here is in perfect accordance with the demands of holiness, and with the manner of the coming judgment. Pride is the very essence of sin; the creature lifted up out of its place and God dethroned from His; and for this the stroke must come. Here then is the prevailing plea.

2. The detailed catalogue of crime follows: continuous, and, as it would seem, triumphant rebellion; arrogant words pouring from their lips -boastings of utter vanity; Jehovah’s people and inheritance the object of attack; the widow, stranger, fatherless, all that have no strength to resist. And the patience of Jehovah scoffingly insulted, -the God of this poor despised Jacob. Enmity to Him is at the bottom of it all, and the heart that seeks its own things without regard to others.

3. The psalmist turns to expostulate with them, though they be like brutes that possess no faculty for knowing God. Does not the formation of the ear testify to One who hears? of the eye, to One who beholds? And is there not a moral government of the world which manifests itself, such as the Teacher of all human knowledge must possess -the rod of the Master? Ah, Jehovah knoweth well the thoughts of men that they are vanity; and happy is the man who knows the restraint of His government, and the teaching of His law. Kept in quiet from the fear of evil, he waits for the sure end of the wicked.

4. This leads him to affirm the judgment of experience, in which the faithfulness of God, realized as to His own; assures the soul that the reign of evil shall not continue. “Judgment” that has slipped away from righteousness, as Moses, rod (the sign of authority) out of his hand became a serpent. But as, after all, he retained authority over it, so that when he put forth his hand to take it, it became again a rod in his hand, so judgment shall return again to righteousness and all the upright in heart shall follow it: it shall be pursued in peace by these without the hindrance that now exists from the presence of evil.

Meanwhile the destitution of other help only shuts one up to God all the more. And the soul knows what help He has already given. Had it not been for this he would have already been dwelling in silence. But even when he had realized that his foothold was already gone, a Stronger than he, and with heart, not merely hand, supported him. Thus amid a multitude of anxieties within him, the comforts of God soothed -or, in the vivid imagery that he uses, “caressed” -his soul.

5. But this only gives him confidence the more to turn to Him as to the state of things which are still unanswered. He puts a question which seems bold to rashness, but it is only an appeal to righteousness which, amid all exercise, he knows full well to be in Him who is Supreme. Can He go on as if in partnership with a throne of iniquity* which makes wickedness into law? The dread figure of the “Lawless one” is evidently before us here, and makes one realize what energy could be thrown into such questions. “They band together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.”

{*”Depths.”}

But he comforts himself in God: “Jehovah will be a high tower for me, and my God my Rock of refuge.” And the end is that which will test where God is. He will return upon them their iniquity; He will cut them off: Jehovah our God will cut them off.”

Fuente: Grant’s Numerical Bible Notes and Commentary

Psa 94:1-4. O God, to whom vengeance belongeth To whom, as the supreme Judge of the world, the patron and protector of the righteous, and the declared enemy of all wickedness and wicked men, and to whom alone it belongs to take revenge on those who oppress thy people when they should protect them; show thyself Make thy justice conspicuous, by speedily avenging thine elect, and rendering a recompense to their enemies. Lift up thyself To punish thy proud enemies. Be exalted in thine own strength, and let those proud men, who have acted as if they thought none could control them, know that they have a superior. How long shall they utter Pour forth freely, constantly, abundantly, as a fountain doth water, (so , jabbignu, signifies,) and speak hard things Grievous, insolent, and intolerable words against thee and thy people; and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves Of their invincible power, and prosperous success in their wicked designs.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

This psalm was written under great oppression, in a time of war, but it bears no marks of being written in Babylon, for then they had no hope to rise against the wicked: Psa 94:16.

Psa 94:6. They slay the widow, and the stranger, and the fatherless; that is, the rich and the landed interest, having frittered away the jubilee to little more than a name, would not allow the destitute more than half bread. Our land proprietors do the same, in many parts of this kingdom; they force the widow to dine and sup on a potato feast. This complaint is proof that this psalm was not written in Babylon, as the Arians plead, to get rid of it, and twenty other psalms, as uninspired, and merely moral odes.

Psa 94:15. Judgment shall return to righteousness. The Lord will give a double portion of blessings to his people, after complicated afflictions; light being sown for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart.

Psa 94:20. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee? This, it would seem, was written when some idolatrous prince filled the throne, and some delicacy is due to misguided monarchs.

REFLECTIONS.

This psalm describes the sentiments which should animate a pious prince, a zealous magistrate, and a faithful minister for the reformation of manners. It opens with prayer to God, to whom vengeance primarily belongs; and who has commissioned parents to use the rod, and magistrates to bear the sword.

A farther argument for reformation arises from the character and works of God. He made the eye, and must see; he planted the ear, and must hear the wicked speeches of men. This mode of answering brutish men is very conclusive, and covers with silence and shame the tongues of the impious. He that teacheth man knowledge by the dictates of natural religion, and by the superior glory of revelation, shall he not know the rebellious thoughts and secret sins of men? He chastises the heathen world, as the old testament everywhere teaches; and as St. Paul affirms that God left not himself without witness, how shall the Hebrew, and how shall the Christian church expect to be exempt? We abound with impiety, and the neglect of public worship. Blasphemy and sabbathbreaking are notorious in all the land. Drunkenness, whoredom, and uncleanness everywhere abound. Routes, theatres, and the haunts of infamy, reproach the nation; and yet, infidel in principle, they say the Lord neither sees nor regards our crimes.

The better to effectuate a national reformation, good men should associate against the wicked. We want associations in every town to embolden supine magistrates, to protect female virtue, and suppress vice.

Purposes of this nature are honoured from heaven by spiritual comforts. In the multitude of my thoughts within me, thy comforts delight my soul. Thus the divine approbation warming the heart, shall make one good man not afraid of a thousand evildoers.

Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

XCIV. A Prayer for Vengeance on Oppressive Rulers and for Deliverance from them.

Psa 94:1-6. The wickedness of the arrogant. The bad rulers here are evidently Jews. They are oppressors, not invaders, and their offences against the moral law are just those which the prophets had denounced in the Israel of their day.

Psa 94:7-11. The practical (see on Psalms 14), not theoretical atheism of the arrogant. They thought God did not care for mens conduct. As if He who planted ear and eye would fail to hear and see! Only a Jew could adopt this semi-sceptical position to Israels God.

Psa 94:10 b. Emend, He that teacheth menshall he be without knowledge?

Psa 94:12-23. Hope of better days. He with whom evil cannot dwell, will in the end vindicate the good and destroy the wicked.

Psa 94:13. rest: not interior rest, but security from the calamities which will overtake the world.

Psa 94:15. Read, For authority shall return to the righteous man, And all the upright of heart shall follow him (Syr.). Good rulers will replace the bad (Pharisees or Sadducees?) and these last shall win the loyalty of the people.

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

PSALM 94

The cry of the godly remnant in Israel to Jehovah in the time of trial that precedes the coming of Christ to establish order and blessing through the judgment of evil.

(vv. 1-2) The theme of the psalm is stated in the first two verses. The godly realizing that the blessing of Israel, as of the world, can only be brought about by the judgment of evil, look to God to redress the wrongs of His people, and to execute judgment upon the wicked. The wicked, in the place of power, have lifted themselves up in pride against God and His people. Now the godly appeal to God to shine forth and lift Himself up, and thus intervene in a direct and manifest way.

(vv. 3-7) The grounds on which this appeal is based are clearly stated. First, the triumph of the wicked calls for the intervention of God. In the place of power they treat others with arrogance and insult while boasting in themselves. Secondly, their persecution of God’s people calls for the intervention of God. They crush God’s people and afflict God’s inheritance. Thirdly, their defiance of God Himself calls aloud for God to intervene. The impiety of the wicked leads them to say, The Lord shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.

(vv. 8-11) A solemn warning is addressed to the unbelieving mass of the nation, who are in alliance with the wicked, as to the folly and evil of their way. They are addressed as the brutish among the people. The people are the people of Israel, among whom there are found a great number who pursue their way like brutes, without reference to God, and like fools, gratify their lusts without fear of God. The folly of their course is exposed. He that planted the ear shall He not hear the hard and insolent speeches of the wicked? He that formed the eye, does He not see the violence and unrighteousness of the wicked? He that instructest the nations, shall He not correct if they are heedless of His instruction? He that teacheth man knowledge, does He not know the vanity of man’s thoughts?

(vv. 12-13) The godly soul learns, in the hour of trial, that, as ever, God uses the time of trial for the blessing of His people. Thus he can say, Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O Lord. Looking beyond those through whom the trial may come, he sees the chastening hand of God in the trial. Thus he can say, thou chastenest: thou teachest: that Thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity.

Thou chastenest is the admission that behind the hand of those who trouble God’s people there is the hand of God dealing with His people. Thou teachest is the acknowledgment that through chastening God teaches His people, not only what is in their hearts but the grace, the goodness, and the holiness of His own heart, so that distrusting themselves they may rest in God. Thus God’s chastening is often God’s way of teaching; and divine teaching leads to divine rest – That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity.

(vv. 14-15) Feeling the terrible evil of the world, there may be the attempt on the part of the godly to put things right, only to find that all such attempts will end in weariness and heart-breaking disappointment. When, however, by the chastening and teaching of God, the ways of God are seen in allowing evil to triumph for a time while the godly suffer, the submissive soul finds rest. It is then seen that though the wicked crush God’s people (v. 5), yet God will not cast off His people (v. 14); and though the wicked afflict God’s heritage (v. 5), yet God will not forsake His inheritance (v. 14). Further it is seen that the time is not far off when judgment shall return unto righteousness. Now judgment and righteousness are too often divorced. Power and authority have been put into the hands of the Gentiles, but they have abused the power by separating righteousness from judgment. This was manifestly so at the judgment seat of Pilate where judgment was with Pilate but righteousness with the holy Prisoner. The day is coming when judgment will return unto righteousness. Judgment will be exercised in righteousness, and the upright in heart will follow the judgment. They will approve and justify the judgment of evil.

Thus the heart finds rest from the evil, not by seeking to deal with it, but by submitting to God in the trial in the confidence that God will not cast off His people, and, in His own time will deal with the evil.

(vv. 16-19) If, however, there is quiet submission in the presence of evil, the question may arise, Who will rise up for me against the evil doers? Who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity? The answer is that such have the help of Jehovah (v. 17); the loving-kindness of Jehovah (v. 18); and the comforts of Jehovah (v. 19). The godly can say in the presence of evil, He is my help: in the presence of temptation, His loving-kindness held me up: when harassed by anxious thoughts His comforts delighted my soul.

But for His help we should have lapsed into silence in the presence of evil. We should have raised no testimony for God and allowed our hearts to become narrowed and our tongues dumb. But for His mercy our feet would have slipped into evil. But for His comforts our souls would have been overwhelmed with anxious thoughts.

(vv. 20-23) The godly soul realizes that it is impossible that there can be any fellowship between the throne of iniquity and a holy God. Hence God must judge the wicked; for it is manifest that God cannot allow that with which He cannot be joined. Thus in the time of trial the soul learns of rest in the consciousness that God is his defence against the wicked, his refuge in the storm, until the time comes when He will deal with evil and cut off the wicked.

Fuente: Smith’s Writings on 24 Books of the Bible

94:1 O LORD God, to whom {a} vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, {b} shew thyself.

(a) Whose office it is to take vengeance on the wicked.

(b) Show by effect that you are judge of the world to punish the wicked.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

Psalms 94

This psalm, which begins as a national lament (Psa 94:1-15) and ends as an individual lament (Psa 94:16-23), calls on God to avenge the righteous whom the wicked oppress unjustly. It manifests faith in the justice of God.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

1. A prayer for vengeance 94:1-7

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

The writer besought the Lord, as the Judge of the earth, to punish the wicked, who were boasting and rejoicing because they were getting away with oppressing the righteous.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

Psa 94:1-23

THE theme of God the Judge is closely allied to that of God the King, as other psalms of this group show, in which His coming to judge the world is the subject of rapturous praise. This psalm hymns Jehovahs retributive sway, for which it passionately cries, and in which it confidently trusts. Israel is oppressed by insolent rulers, who have poisoned the fountains of justice, condemning the innocent, enacting unrighteous laws, and making a prey of all the helpless. These “judges of Sodom” are not foreign oppressors, for they are “among the people”; and even while they scoff at Jehovahs judgments they call Him by His covenant names of “Jah” and “God of Jacob.” There is no need, therefore, to look beyond Israel for the originals of the dark picture, nor does it supply data for fixing the period of the psalm.

The structure and course of thought are transparent. First comes an invocation to God as the Judge of the earth (Psa 94:1-2); then follow groups of four verses each, subdivided into pairs, -the first of these (Psa 94:3-6) pictures the doings of the oppressors; the second (Psa 94:7-11) quotes their delusion that their crimes are unseen by Jehovah, and refutes their dream of impunity, and it is closed by a verse in excess of the normal number. emphatically asserting the truth which the mockers denied. The third group declares the blessedness of the men whom God teaches, and the certainty of His retribution to vindicate the cause of the righteous (Psa 94:12-15). Then follow the singers own cry for help in his own need, as one of the oppressed community, and a sweet reminiscence of former aid, which calms his present anxieties. The concluding group goes back to description of the lawless lawmakers and their doings, and ends with trust that the retribution prayed for in the first verses will verily be dealt out to them, and that thereby both the singer, as a member of the nation, and the community will find Jehovah, who is both “my God” and “our God,” a high tower.

The reiterations in the first two verses are not oratorical embellishments, but reveal intense feeling and pressing need. It is a cold prayer which contents itself with one utterance. A man in straits continues to cry for help till it comes, or till he sees it coming. To this singer, the one aspect of Jehovahs reign which was forced on him by Israels dismal circumstances was the judicial. There are times when no thought of God is so full of strength as that He is “the God of recompenses,” as Jeremiah calls Him, {Jer 51:56} and when the longing of good men is that He would flash forth, and slay evil by the brightness of His coming. They who have no profound loathing of sin, or who have never felt the crushing weight of legalised wickedness, may shrink from such aspirations as the psalmists, and brand them as ferocious; but hearts longing for the triumph of righteousness will not take offence at them.

The first group (Psa 94:3-6) lifts the cry of suffering Faith, which has almost become impatience, but turns to, not from, God, and so checks complaints of His delay, and converts them into prayer. “How long, O Lord?” is the burden of many a tried heart; and the Seer heard it from the souls beneath the altar. This psalm passes quickly to dilate on the crimes of the rulers which forced out that prayer. The portrait has many points of likeness to that drawn in Psa 73:1-28. Here, as there, boastful speech and haughty carriage are made prominent, being put before even cruelty and oppression. “They well out, they speak arrogance”: both verbs have the same object. Insolent self-exaltation pours from the fountain of their pride in copious jets. “They give themselves airs like princes.” The verb in this clause may mean to say among themselves or to boast, but is now usually regarded as meaning to behave like a prince-i.e., to carry oneself insolently. Vainglorious arrogance manifest in boasting speech and masterful demeanour characterises Eastern rulers, especially those who have risen from low origin. Every little village tyrant gave himself airs, as if he were a king; and the lower his rank, the greater his insolence. These oppressors were grinding the nation to powder, and what made their crime the darker was that it was Jehovahs people and inheritance which they thus harassed. Helplessness should be a passport to a rulers care, but it had become a mark for murderous attack. Widow; stranger, and orphan are named as types of defencelessness.

Nothing in this strophe indicates that these oppressors are foreigners. Nor does the delusion that Jehovah neither saw nor cared for their doings. which the next strophe (Psa 94:7-11) states and confutes imply that they were so. Cheyne, indeed, adduces the name “God of Jacob,” which is put into their mouths, as evidence that they are pictured as knowing Jehovah only as one among many tribal or national deities; but the name is too familiar upon the lips of Israelites, and its use by others is too conjectural, to allow of such a conclusion. Rather, the language derives its darkest shade from being used by Hebrews, who are thereby declaring themselves apostates from God as well as oppressors of His people. Their mad, practical atheism makes the psalmist blaze up in indignant rebuke and impetuous argumentation. He turns to them, and addresses them in rough, plain words, strangely contrasted with their arrogant utterances regarding themselves. They are “brutish” {cf. Psa 73:22} and “fools.” The psalmist, in his height of moral indignation, towers above these petty tyrants, and tells them home truths very profitable for such people, however dangerous to their utterer. There is no obligation to speak smooth words to rulers whose rule is injustice and their religion impiety. Ahab had his Elijah, and Herod his John Baptist. The succession has been continued through the ages.

Delitzsch and others, who take the oppressors to be foreigners, are obliged to suppose that the psalmist turns in Psa 94:8 to those Israelites who had been led to doubt God by the prosperity of the wicked; but there is nothing, except the exigencies of that mistaken supposition, to show that any others than the deniers of Gods providence who have just been quoted are addressed as “among the people.” Their denial was the more inexcusable, because they belonged to the people whose history was one long proof that Jehovah did see I and recompense evil. Two considerations are urged by the psalmist, who becomes for the moment a philosophical theologian, in confutation of the error in question. First, he argues that nothing can be in the effect which is not in the cause, that the Maker of mens eyes cannot be blind, nor the Planter of their ears deaf. The thought has wide applications. It hits the centre, in regard to many modern denials as well as in regard to these blunt, ancient ones. Can a universe plainly full of purpose have come from a purposeless source? Can finite persons have emerged from an impersonal Infinity? Have we not a right to argue upwards from mans make to God his maker, and to find in Him the archetype of all human capacity. We may mark that, as has been long ago observed, the psalm avoids gross anthropomorphism, and infers not that the Creator of the ear has ears, but that He hears. As Jerome (quoted by Delitzsch) says, “Membra sustulit, efficientias dedit.”

The teaching of the strophe is gathered up in Psa 94:11, which exceeds the normal number of four verses in each group, and asserts strongly the conclusion for which the psalmist has been arguing. The rendering of b is, “For (not That) they (i.e. men) are but a breath.” “The ground of the Omniscience which sees the thoughts of men through and through is profoundly laid in the vanity, i.e. the finiteness, of men, as the correlative of the Infiniteness of God” (Hupfeld).

In the strophe Psa 94:12-15 the psalmist turns from the oppressors to their victims, the meek of the earth, and changes his tone from fiery remonstrance to gracious consolation. The true point of view from which to regard the oppressors wrong is to see in it part of Gods educational processes. Jehovah, who “instructs” all men by conscience, “instructs” Israel, and by the Law “teaches” the right interpretation of such afflictive providences. Happy he who accepts that higher education! A further consolation lies in considering the purpose of the special revelation to Israel, which will be realised in patient hearts that are made wise thereby-namely, calm repose of submission and trust, which are not disturbed by any stormy weather. There is possible for the harassed man “peace subsisting at the heart of endless agitation.”

If we recognise that life is mainly educational, we shall neither be astonished nor disturbed by sorrows. It is not to be wondered at that the schoolmaster has a rod, and uses it sometimes. There is rest from evil even while in evil, if we understand the purpose of evil. Yet another consolation lies in the steadfast anticipation of its transiency and of the retribution measured to its doers. That is no unworthy source of comfort. And the ground on which it rests is the impossibility of Gods forsaking His people, His inheritance. These designations of Israel look back to Psa 94:5, where the crushed and afflicted are designated by the same words. Israels relation to Jehovah made the calamities more startling; but it also makes their cessation, and retribution for them on their inflicters more certain. It is the trial and triumph of Faith to be sure, while tyrants grind and crush, that Jehovah has not deserted their victims. He cannot change His purpose; therefore, sorrows and prosperity are but divergent methods, concurring in carrying out His unalterable design. The individual sufferer may take comfort from his belonging to the community to which the presence of Jehovah is guaranteed forever. The singer puts his convictions as to what is to be the upshot of all the perplexed riddles of human affairs into epigrammatic form, in the obscure, gnome-like saying, “To righteousness shall judgment return,” by which he seems to mean that the administration of justice, which at present was being trampled under foot, “shall come back to the eternal principle of all judicial action, namely, righteousness,”-in shorter words, there shall be no schism between the judgments of earthly tribunals and justice. The psalmists hope is that of all good men and sufferers from unjust rulers. All the upright in heart long for such a state of things and follow after it, either in the sense of delight in it (“Dem Recht mussen alle frommen Herzen zufallen”-Luther), or of seeking to bring it about. The psalmists hope is realised in the King of Men, whose own judgments are truth, and who infuses righteousness and the love of it into all who trust in Him.

The singer comes closer to his own experience in the next strophe (Psa 94:16-19), in which he claims his share in these general sources of rest and patience, and thankfully thinks of past times, when he found that they yielded him streams in the desert. He looks out upon the multitude of “evildoers,” and, for a moment, asks the question which faithless sense is ever suggesting and pronouncing unanswerable: “Where shall I find a champion?” As long as our eyes range along the level of earth, they see none such. But the empty earth should turn our gaze to the occupied throne. There sits the Answer to our almost despairing question. Rather, there He stands, as the proto-martyr saw Him, risen to His feet in swift readiness to help His servant. Experience confirms the hope of Jehovahs aid; for unless in the past He had been the singers help, he could not have lived till this hour, but must have gone down into the silent land. No man who still draws breath is without tokens of Gods sufficient care and ever-present help. The mystery of continued life is a witness for God. And not only does the past thus proclaim where a mans help is, but devout reflection on it will bring to light many times when doubts and tremors were disappointed. Conscious weakness appeals to confirming strength. If we feel our foot giving, and fling up our hands towards Him, He will grasp them and steady us in the most slippery places. Therefore, when divided thoughts (for so the picturesque word employed in Psa 94:19 means) hesitate between hope and fear, Gods consolations steal into agitated minds, and there is a great calm.

The last strophe (Psa 94:20-23) weaves together in the finale, as a musician does in the last bars of his composition, the main themes of the psalm-the evil deeds of unjust rulers, the trust of the psalmist, his confidence in the final annihilation of the oppressors and the consequent manifestation of God as the God of Israel. The height of crime is reached when rulers use the forms of justice as masks for injustice, and give legal sanction to “mischief.” The ancient world groaned under such travesties of the sanctity of Law; and the modern world is not free from them. The question often tortures faithful hearts, “Can such doings be sanctioned by God, or in any way be allied to Him?” To the psalmist the worst part of these rulers wickedness was that, in his doubting moments, it raised the terrible suspicion that God was perhaps on the side of the oppressors. But when such thoughts came surging on him, he fell back, as we all have to do, on personal experience and on an act of renewed trust. He remembered what God had been to him in past moments of peril, and he claimed Him for the same now, his own refuge and fortress. Strong in that individual experience and conviction, he won the confidence that all which Jehovah had to do with the throne of destruction was, not to connive at its evil, but to overthrow it and root out the evildoers, whose own sin will be their ruin. Then Jehovah will be known, not only for the God who belongs to, and works for, the single soul, but who is “our God,” the refuge of the community, who will not forsake His inheritance.

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary

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