Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 119:160
Thy word [is] true [from] the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments [endureth] forever.
160. The sum of thy word is truth, or perhaps, as LXX, Jer., of thy words. If he reckons up all God’s words of command or promise, their sum total is truth. Cp. Joh 14:6.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Thy word is true from the beginning – literally, The head of thy word is truth. Probably the meaning is, that the principles of Gods word were truth, or were based on truth. The main thing – that on which all relied – was truth, absolute truth. It was not made truth by the mere will of God, but it was founded on essential truth. Compare Psa 119:142, note; Psa 119:144, note. Margin, The beginning of thy word is true. Its origin is truth; its foundation is truth; its essential nature is truth. See Psa 19:9.
And every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever – Since any one of thy laws is as certainly founded in truth as any other, it must be that all alike are eternal and unchanging. It must be so with all the essential principles of morality. Mere regulations in regard to rites and ceremonies may be altered, as local and municipal laws among men may be; but essential principles of justice cannot be. A civil corporation – the government of a city or borough – may change its regulations about streets, and culverts, and taxes; but they can never enact laws authorizing murder or theft; nor can they alter the essential nature of honesty and dishonesty; of truth and falsehood.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 119:160
Thy word is true from the beginning.
The Bible–Gods Word
Civilization, intelligence, morality, and general prosperity unmistakably mark the pathway of the Bible. These are the results that follow its introduction, or they are the signs that mark its coming. Or if these evidences of civilization precede the Book, they precede it as the rays of the morning sun precede the sun itself.
I. The word of God would be exposed to objection, and also liable to rejection by reason of the natural state of the human heart. All truth is truth, but the truth of the Bible differs from other truth in an important particular. The truth of the Bible is addressed specially, not to the intellect, but to the ethical or the moral character, and hence it involves moral accountability, and is, therefore, imperative in a sense in which truth ordinarily is not imperative. The Book is the true reformer. It begins with the heart, and it requires changes there, and the evidences of which are also to be apparent in the life. Hence the disinclination of the unregenerate man to consult the Bible either for counsel or instruction. Hence also the ignorance of what the Book really contains.
II. The pride of the human reason also interferes with the study and the reception of the Word of God. This remark applies more especially to those who profess to be the more learned among their fellow-men. In some departments of knowledge they are entitled to the advanced position which they profess to have attained. But their knowledge is ascribed to discovery. New truths in science are said to be discovered, and their discovery is ascribed to the superior knowledge or wisdom of the discoverer. But the Bible is a revelation, and not in any sense merely a discovery of the human reason; and as such it also claims acceptance by the human reason, and that without any distinction of persons. But this again is not agreeable to the speculative turn and the ambitious spirit of the human mind, which has been accustomed to discover truth rather than to receive it in the ordinary manner. He who saw with clear and open eye the mystery of the human soul, accounted for His rejection on the one hand, and for the feeble influence of the Gospel on the other, by saying that men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. The same truth applies to the acceptance and to the rejection of the Bible. Not the want of sufficient evidence, but a moral cause, and often also a bad life is the strongest objection to the Bible. But the folly of the objection to the Bible, by reason of the purity of the heart and the uprightness of the life which it requires, is manifest in the fact that as any believe in a righteous God, to that extent also must there be a revelation possessing the characteristics of the God who makes it. The Book must bear the impress of its Divine Author.
III. But why should the Bible be rejected in view of its character and its influence on the earth? It is the most remarkable Book in the worlds literature. It is the basis for the religion of the civilized nations of the globe. It is everywhere the conserving companion of civil and religious freedom. It is the rock upon which governments must rest; it is the reflection of the Divinity, and the hope of humanity. It has been called the Star of Eternity, and rightly so, since only by its light the bark of man can cross the Sea of Life and reach the shores of immortality securely. It has been most truthfully said, that whilst the Bible comprises in bulk not more than the three-hundredth part of the Greek and the Roman literature extant, yet it has attracted and concentrated more thought upon itself, and has produced more books than all the Greek and Roman literature combined. This attraction and concentration of thought has also been on the part of those nations that occupy the very forefront of civilization, science, and learning. Said Thomas Carlyle, There never was any other book like the Bible, and there never will be such another. And when one said to Carlyle, There is nothing remarkable in the Book of Proverbs, Carlyles reply was, Make a few. Yes, make a few only. Ordinarily the philosopher writes books for those who are devoted to philosophy. The scientist writes books adapted to the student of science. The statesman writes books for the sage and the statesman. But in the Bible we have fishermen writing books for the philosopher. Men in the shepherds tent writing books for the statesman. Tax-gatherers writing books for teachers, judges, and legislators. Herdsmen writing poetry and prophecy. Physicians writing history and theology. No, there never was any other book like the Bible, and there never will be such another.
IV. the Word of the Lord endureth for ever. And so the Bible has come to stay. As long as there is a living soul upon the earth, so long also will that Book remain in the earth. It is the Word of God; and the Word of God and the human soul, which is also God-given, are in need of each other, and whilst the one remains here so also will the other. (J. B. Helwig, D. D.)
True from the first
Take this declaration in many ways. Take it as a reference of a documentary kind. Gods Word will be before us as a book or scroll, the scribe will refer to page one, line one, and he will go with us through every line and paragraph, and show us that the Word is true in root, and core, and origin, that the first syllable is a syllable of eternal, tranquil veracity. That would be the poorest way of all to take. A mere scribe never can be great. Yet even the scribe has his argument and his illustration, and we cannot do without the assistance of the scribe: we pass through the portal into the temple, we pass through the letter into the spirit; let us make a right use of the vestibule. Blind are they and foolish to themselves who tarry in the portico, thinking it the kings banqueting chamber. Look at the text from another and totally different point of view, namely, as covering all the instincts, desires, and aspirations of mans original moral constitution. In this sense it is true from the beginning; that is to say, the moment we begin to be, it begins to talk to us. The Bible is the dawn book; it whitens the east of our development, and goes with us through all the changing cloud and all the accumulating degrees until we wester towards our setting. If the Bible is not true in this sense, it cannot be true in any other. It is a moral revelation. If it can only join us at certain points in life, then it is an accidental book. The psalmist, with all the riches of his experience, with all his minute, personal, and kingly knowledge of life, says, Thy Word is true from the beginning. That is to say, it is not a guess, not a happy answer to a bewildering enigma. It comes to us with the authority of being right–true. The square was right before the building was put up, or before the square itself as an article in timber was ever made. The plumb-line cannot lie; the geometry of the universe is the text-book of all material, substantial, and permanent progress. The plumb-line does not by trial and use become true; it has not to be fastened down to something; let it alone, and it will swing itself into harmony with the process of the suns. Thus we come upon the greatest argument for inspiration, namely, the sufficiency of the Bible to meet us in all the need, and pain, and service of life. First thing in the morning, last thing at night, in the market-place, in affliction, in intellectual bewilderment, in moral self-disgust, everywhere, the Bible will join us, interpret us to ourselves, and interpret God to humanity. This, and not some cunning or skilful display of words, is the great and unanswerable argument for the inspiration of the Bible. What have we to do, then, with this Book of God? Test it. Lean upon it; draw out of it all that is in it, so far as your hunger and thirst require; put it to the proof, and if it fail you after honest trial, say so. But be sure of your interpretation. No Scripture is of any private interpretation. We must not use the Bible for purposes of sorcery or witchcraft, or prostitute it to any debased uses. We can only read the Bible aright in the spirit of the Bible itself, and we can only test the Bible aright when we test it honestly, broadly, continually. What is the testimony of people who have so tested it? Thy Word is true from the beginning. (J. Parker, D. D.)
The sum of Thy Word is truth
(R.V.):–That is to say, the total of it; in other words, it amounts to truth; in varied phrase it brings together all the elements that are necessary to constitute the sum-total of moral and spiritual truth; or, in still varied words, without it we should have parts of truth, little glimmerings and aspects of truth; but having Thy Word, we have Truth. Who translated that Word so? He who offered the intercessory prayer with Gethsemane in front of Him, with the shadow of Golgotha already falling upon His beautiful, but marred, face. Said he, Thy Word is truth; sanctify them by Thy Word; make them holy; complete them; set them apart to consecration by Thy Word. Thy Word is truth. Thus the voices join. What wonder if He who thus spake should, a few days afterwards, have begun at Moses and the Psalms, and expounded to wondering, saddened hearts all the things concerning Himself! The psalmist had said: The sum of Thy Word is truth; and He, greater Psalmist, with the blood-sweat soon to ooze from His bent brow and face, had said in prayer to God, Thy Word is truth. Thus age speaks to age, as star unto star speaks light. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 160. Thy word is true from the beginning] rosh, the head or beginning of thy word, is true. Does he refer to the first word in the Book of Genesis, bereshith, “in the beginning?” The learned reader knows that rash, or raash, is the root in that word. Every word thou hast spoken from the first in Bereshith (Genesis) to the end of the law and prophets, and all thou wilt yet speak, as flowing from the fountain of truth, must be true; and all shall have in due time, their fulfillment. And all these, thy words endure for ever. They are true, and ever will be true.
ANALYSIS OF LETTER RESH. – Twentieth Division
I. 1. The psalmist begins with a petition: “Consider my affliction.”
2. Begs that God would help him: “Deliver me.”
3. The reason for both: “I do not forget thy law.”
4. He begs God to be his Advocate: 1. “Plead my cause.” At the bar of men a just cause often miscarries for want of an able advocate, and is borne down by an unjust judge. Be thou my Advocate, and I shall not fail. 2. “Quicken me:” Revive my hopes, give new life to my soul.
II. He believes he shall be heard, because –
1. “Salvation is far from the wicked:” But he does not forget God’s law.
2. “They seek not God’s statutes:” But he meditates in God’s law day and night.
III. If he ever miscarries, or comes short, he flees to God for mercy.
1. On God’s mercies he bestows two epithets: 1. They are great or many, and they endure for ever. 2. They are tender; they are misericordiae, q.d., miseria cordis, feelings which occasion pain and distress to the heart. rachamim, such as affect and flow from the tender yearnings of the bowels. The word signifies what a mother feels for the infant that lay in her womb, and hangs on her breast.
2. He prays to be quickened. Let me not die, but live.
IV. He complains of his adversaries: –
1. They are many: Many devils, many men; many visible, more invisible.
2. Yet he continued steadfast: “I do not decline,” c.
3. They were “transgressors:” Not simple sinners, but workers of iniquity.
4. He was greatly distressed on their account: “I beheld them, and was grieved.”
V. He brings this as a proof of his attachment to God.
1. “Consider how I love:” No man dare say to God, “Look upon me,” but he who is persuaded that when God looks upon him he will like him. This was a sure proof of the psalmist’s sincerity.
2. He loves not merely the blessings he receives from God, but he loves God’s law and none will love this, who does not delight in obedience. And how few are there of this character, even in the Church of God!
3. And because he loves he prays to be quickened. The soul only which is spiritually alive, can obey.
VI. He concludes with a commendation of God’s word.
1. “Thy word is true,” in its principle and in all its details, from Adam to Moses; from Moses to Christ, from Christ to the present time; and from the present time to the end of the world.
2. For it “endures for ever:” All other things wear out or decay; lose their testimony, and become obsolete. But God will ever bear testimony to his own word, and continue to support its veracity by fulfilling it to all successive generations.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
From the beginning; either from the beginning of the world, or ever since thou hast revealed thy mind by thy word to the sons of men; all thy words have been found to be true and certain, and so they will be to the end of the world, as is implied in the next clause. Or, as it is in the margin, the beginning (or, as others render it, the sum, as this very word is used, Exo 30:12; Num 26:2; 31:26, to wit, the whole of it, there is not the least part of it which is not so) of thy word is true.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
160. God has been ever faithful,and the principles of His government will ever continue worthy ofconfidence.
from the beginningthatis, “every word from Genesis (called so by the Jews fromits first words, ‘In the beginning’) to the end of the Scriptures istrue.” HENGSTENBERGtranslates more literally, “The sum of thy words istruth.” The sense is substantially the same. The whole body ofrevelation is truth. “Thy Word is nothing but truth”[LUTHER].
SCHIN.(Ps 119:161-168).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Thy word [is] true [from] the beginning,…. Every word of promise God made from the beginning of the world, and in any period of time; as to Adam, to Abraham, to the Israelites, or to any other person or persons; was true in itself, and faithfully performed, not one ever failed; particularly the promise concerning the Messiah, made to Adam in Eden; and which has been spoken of by all the prophets which have been since the world began, Ge 3:15. Or it maybe rendered, as the Targum,
“the beginning of thy word is truth h:”
which a man finds to be so as soon as ever he enters upon the reading of it. Some refer this to the first chapter of Genesis; others to the first part of the decalogue, concerning the unity of God and his worship; so Aben Ezra, and R. Jeshua, as cited by him, and Jarchi; the same is mentioned by Kimchi as one of the senses, though the first he gives is agreeable to our version: but there is no need to restrain the sense to those particulars, or to the first part of the Scriptures, since the whole is truth; and the meaning may be, “the sum of thy word is truth” i: so the word here used is sometimes taken for the sum of anything, Nu 26:2; all that is contained in the word of God is truth; its promises, precepts and doctrines, histories, prophecies and proverbs, all the sayings of it are faithful and true;
and everyone of thy righteous judgments [endureth] for ever; every precept of the word, and doctrine of it; see Ps 119:152.
h “principium verbi tui veritas”, Pagninus, Musculus; “vel verborum tuorum”, V. L. i “Summa verbi tui est veritas”, Cocceius, Schmidt.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
160 Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever.
David here comforts himself with the faithfulness of God’s word, for the encouragement of himself and others to rely upon it. 1. It has always been found faithful hitherto, and never failed any that ventured upon it; It is true from the beginning. Ever since God began to reveal himself to the children of men all he said was true and to be trusted. The church, from its beginning, was built upon this rock. It has not gained its validity by lapse of time, as many governments, whose best plea is prescription and long usage, Quod initio non valet, tractu temporis convalescit–That which, at first, wanted validity, in the progress of time acquired it. But the beginning of God’s word was true (so some read it); his government was laid on a sure foundation. And all, in every age, that have received God’s word in faith and love, have found every saying in it faithful and well worthy of all acceptation. 2. It will be found faithful to the end, because righteous: “Every one of thy judgments remains for ever unalterable and of perpetual obligation, adjusting men’s everlasting doom.”
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
160. The beginning of thy word is truth. The design of the Prophet it is not difficult to perceive; but the words admit of being understood in two ways. Some interpret the noun beginning as denoting that the truth of God shines forth conspicuously in his word, immediately when we enter for the first time upon the study of it, so that this entrance may justly be called the beginning of the word. This sentence contains the profitable doctrine, that if we are finished with eyes of understanding, we will no sooner cast our eyes upon heavenly doctrine than the truth of it will meet our view. Others, however, give a different explanation, and perhaps with no less propriety, eliciting this sense, That the word of God has been from the beginning certain and infallible truth, and will continue so even to the end. These two clauses hang very well together — that God has been true to his word from the beginning, and that he will continue to be so everlastingly and immutably. The interpretation which refers the word judgment to the works of God and not to his doctrine, I would not altogether condemn, yet it is not in harmony with the context. Let us then retain this sense, That from the time when God began to speak he has always been faithful to his promises, and has never disappointed the hope of his people; and that the course of this faithfulness has been so uniform, that from the beginning even to the end his word is true and faithful.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
THE SCIENTIFIC ACCURACY OF THE SACRED SCRIPTURES
Psa 119:160
THY Word is true from the beginning (Psa 119:160), is an expression of the Psalmist that must be explained away before one can pit science and the Sacred Scriptures against each other. Arthur Pierson thinks the Psalmist meant to say that from the first word, the Sacred Scriptures are true.
The modern method of study objects to any assumption. It insists that every theme and thing shall be subjected to whatever tests are essential in the establishment of its claims. To this, intelligent believers take no exception. If the Bible will not bear investigation; if scrutiny discloses short-comings; if research disproves its assertions; if true Science discredits its clear claims, let it fall! We could forfeit it without a tear; join in digging its grave without regret, and return to the duties of life, smitten by no serious bereavement.
True, it is serious business to discredit a book which has accomplished for the world what the Bible has wrought; but it would be more serious to believe a lie, or even to accept an irresponsible chart in making ones way over the sea of life. True, the Bible was not written to show how the heavens go, but rather how to go to Heaven; it is not a text-book on Science, but a guide-book for Godly living. And yet, when it addresses itself at all to a subject of scientific concern, it should speak the truth, if it makes the claim of inspiration! When we study the words of men, however wise they may be, we expect to come upon mistake. When we read, and properly understand what God hath spoken we anticipate no such results. Let God be true,but every man a liar. He that believeth not God hath made Him a liar.
But, we are told, God has two books. One we call Nature, the other Revelation; He is just as certainly the author of the former as of the latter; one is the work of His hands and the other the fruit of our lips.
What Jesus, when once He stooped down and wrote in the sand, expressed, we do not know. But can any man imagine that His writings in the sand were out of harmony with His spoken addresses? Is it possible that an all-wise God has produced in Nature and in Revelation contradictory volumes?
We have no fear whatever that the Scriptures must be maintained at the expense of Science; and we are fully persuaded that true Science will never be established at the cost of Scripture. The thing to be feared is, that the dust of false reasoning (of which the air is full today) will get into the eyes of men, and make it impossible for one to read from the Sacred Page, and for another to see the meaning of the open book of Nature; and so, for either, to discern the perfect agreement between Gods Word and Gods Work.
First of all, then, let us give
THE DEFINITION OF THE TERMS INVOLVED.
What is Science? Can we improve upon the Standard Dictionarys statementKnowledge gained and verified by exact observation and correct thinking; especially as methodically formulated and arranged in a rational system?
That definition takes you at once out of the realm of speculation. It disposes of such terms as theory and hypothesis, making them possible servants of Science, but never its synonyms. It is admitted that almost every assertion made in the name of Science a hundred years since, is now out of date; and while this clearly demonstrates our progress, it also suggests that we are still in the hypothetical and theoretical stage. No one would dispute that Sir Isaac Newton was somewhat of a scientist; nor yet that Tyndall was equally worthy the name, and yet when they take exactly opposite positions concerning the refraction of light, both may be wrong, but both cannot be right. Huxley and Darwin are names that somehow sit easily together in the same sentence, and yet these men, working in almost the same realm, are not always in agreement. The explanation is easythe verification of knowledge by exact observation and correct thinking is the highest accomplishment of which the human mind is capable, and not every man who cries Eureka has found it.
This is not to inveigh against the sincerity of investigators, nor even to deride their conclusions, but only to call attention to the most patent fact of their experience! Knowledge, gained and verified by exact observation and correct thinking, will never be overthrown by mortal men, nor yet by God. God would dethrone Himself by such an endeavor! True science will stand!
What is Scripture? Paul defines all Scripture as that which is God-breathed, and the process of it is that holy men of God spake as they were moved (or borne along) by the Holy Ghost! Knowing himself to be of that company, Paul affirms, We speak, not in the words which mans wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
If one runs through the Old Testament he will find God everywhere assuming the Authorship of the Sacred Scriptures. The phrases are like these, The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, These are the words of the covenant, which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the Children of Israel; The Lord spake unto Joshua; The words of the commandment of the Lord and so forthNot scores, but hundreds of times, does God claim to be the Author of both the thought and the language of the Holy Book. David declares, The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and His Word was in my tongue (2Sa 23:2).
To me it is the most remarkable evidence of the skepticism of the age that because there are some difficulties in the theory of Verbal Inspiration, men are willing to throw it away, and adopt such notions as are now current, to the effect that God simply stimulated the thought, but did not determine the speech; that some parts of the Bible are literally true, and others are only allegory; that some are fact, others only fiction; that some are to be treated with credence and others with criticism; that all must come to the test of ones inner consciousness, and, at that court, be either accepted or rejected.
The same men who so define Inspiration or Illumination or whatever it is, would go into court tomorrow to insist upon the settlement of an estate, in which they were named as heirs, on a verbal basis. They would call the attention of attorneys and judge to what was written, and unless they had some unrighteous end to be conserved, they would permit no departure from the very words in which the testator expressed himself. It is little wonder, therefore, that the New Testament writers, who may be conceded to have known what the Scriptures were, refer to the Old Testament more than eighty times, as that which is written. Never once did they abandon the verbal interpretation of the same.
If the words of the Old Testament were the words of God, perhaps no believer, at least, will dispute that the New Testament stands upon the same level. And so the Bible does not contain the Scriptures,the Scriptures are the true Bible, Gods Word, which can hardly have been given to men with less care than any intelligent, faithful father would show in framing the article that bequeathed his possessions to his children. If, in civil courts, the lightest word of the testator is the weightiest law, who will dare to treat with contempt, thought or phrase found in the Divine Will?
Mark you, there is a decided difference between the plain statement of the Sacred Scriptures and some absurd opinion. It may be, that in the centuries of the past an uninstructed Christian conceived the world as having a fiat surface, the sky as a roof, and the stars as holes through the same. Kepler, who was something of a scientist, once expressed the conviction that the world was a living animal. Is that assertion to be confounded with Science? Fanciful interpretations in the one realm are just as common as in the other; and they neither prove nor disprove anything. I do not have to harmonize the Scriptures with the absurd statements of every man who may speak in the name of Science; and I do not have to harmonize Science with the assertions of every man who may mistakenly appeal to Moses, or even to Christ. Science is Gods voice in Nature; the Scriptures are Gods voice in grace, and it does not fall to the lot of any mortal man to harmonize them; the harmony is in Him. He cannot contradict Himself!
To say the least, it is a strange procedure when a man proclaims as his theme, The Harmony between Science and Scripture, and then shows how that comes to pass by just quietly disposing of the latter; by saying for instance, that the first chapter of Genesis is the best that Moses knew,the impression of that early age, but a mistake none the less. Is that harmony? Is is not, rather, annihilation? It may let you out of your difficulty, but you escape at the expense of inspiration; and to the unspeakable loss of the people. There used to be an eccentric preacher in Kentucky well known to the author. He did no great amount of study, and yet he commonly preached with unction. One day he found himself before an audience with no unction on hand; even thoughts refused to come. He floundered through a few ill-formed sentences, and then, squarely facing his audience, he said, Brethren and sisters, you think I have got into the brush and cant get out, dont you? Well, Ill show you ; well just look to the Lord and be dismissed!
But let it be understood that when you dismiss the claims of the Sacred Book and walk out of your difficulties, you have lost the Divine message and left the hungry multitudes unsatisfied.
GENESIS IN SCIENCE AND SCRIPTURE.
It will scarcely be disputed that so far as men have seen inharmony between the Sacred Scriptures and Science, the first chapter of Genesis has been made the storm center. On that account I invite your attention to this part of the Word, and dare the assertion that its careful study, instead of demonstrating the inharmony between Science and Scripture, will reveal the most undreamed of agreement in these great books of God.
First of all, think of the argument from fifteen facts in order.
First fact, in orderGod created the heavens; second fact, and the earth; thirdwater; fourth light; fifthfirmament; sixthgrass; seventh herb; eighth–tree; ninthappearance of heavenly bodies; tenthfish; eleventhmoving things; twelfthfowls; thirteenthcreeping things; fourteenthcattle; fifteenthman!
Now, the latest science will consent to this order of creation. The heavens were certainly made first; the earth certainly made second; water certainly appeared third; light, fourth; firmament next; grass thereafter; the manifestation of sun and moon, ninth; the appearance of fishtenth; moving thingseleventh; fowlstwelfth; creeping things thirteenth; cattle, and so forth, fourteenth, and lastman.
Other writers have called attention to the unspeakable significance of this order when considered before the law of permutation. The Standard Dictionary says, The number of permutations of any given number of things, taken all at a time, is equal to the product of the natural numbers from one up to the number given, inclusive.
Now, if Moses only spake the science of his times, he knew practically nothing of the order of creation. Consequently he must guess at it. He must guess whether the heavens or the earth were first formed. In his day no man imagined that the heavenly bodies were bigger than the earth, and all men supposed that they moved about it. How then does it happen that Moses, when he came to guess which was first formed, the heavens or the earth, mentioned the heavens in the primary place? You say, Well it was an easy accident, since there was only one other alternative. Did you ever hear the story of the Irishman who, meeting a neighbor, said, We have a fine baby at our house this marnin. What is it? asked the interested friend. Guiss! A girl, said the neighbor. No sir; guiss agin! A boy. Now, whos bin tellin ye? To be sure Moses had but one chance out of two on this arrangement. But he got it right!
Third factthe appearance of water. Here Moses task was not so easy, for it was not one in three, but one in six, according to the law of permutation. It could have been the heavens, first; water second; earth thirdbut that was not true. It could have been the earth first, water second and the heavens thirdbut that was not true. It could have been water first, the earth second and the heavens last, but that was not true. It could have been the earth first and the heavens second and the water last, but that was not true. In other words there are six different arrangements of these relations, 1-2-3, 1-3-2, 2-1-3, 2-3-1, 3-2-1, 3-1-2. But Moses somehow struck the right one. A good guesser! Introduce light and you make twenty-four such relations. Moses hit it again. One chance in twenty-four, but he was the lucky man.
When you get the fifth, you have 120 possible orders. Strange to say Moses does not miss it!
When you get to the sixth, you have 720. In other words there are 719 chances against you. But Moses got it right!
When you get to the seventh, you have 5,040. In other words 5,039 chances against him. But Moses hit it!
When you get to the eighth you have 40,320. Not a glorious prospect of striking it straight, but still Moses accomplishes it!
When you get to the ninth you only have one chance in 362,880.
When you get to the tenth you have only one chance in 3,628,800!
When you get to the eleventh, 39,916,800. When you get to the fifteenth, one chance in 1,307,674,-367,900. And yet, strange to say, in the whole arrangement, he never misses!
Go dig up Bob Ingersoll, and give the poor fellow a chance to apologize for ever having spoken of the mistakes of Moses. Bob should not come alone!
But this is not the end. We make bold to assert that from the beginning to the end of Genesis , 1st chapter, there is not a blunder from a scientific standpoint. It is scientific that the heavens were created first, and the earth second. The very latest Science would tell you that the earth was waste and void and the darkness resulting from the nebulous state, was upon the face of the deep. For a long time Science spoke of the third verse of Genesis as certainly involving a mistake, And God said, Let there be light; and there was light. This, in advance of the appearance of the sun, supposed to be the only source of light, but finally La Place declared it to be a scientific certainty, that in the condensation of the originally formless chaos, there was such molecular and chemical action as must have emitted, great volumes of light. No wonder Boardman, in his Creative Week, says, Why will the Academy vote Moses a blunderer for declaring that light existed before the sun appeared, and yet vote La Place a scientist for affirming precisely the same thing?
The next point of scientific attack was upon the fifth verse, And the evening and the morning were the first day. It was boldly asserted that Moses supposed all this change from chaos to cosmos took place in twenty-four hours. But mark you, Moses does not refer to twenty-four hours at all! From evening to morning is only twelve hours. You will not have finished this chapter before it is made perfectly clear that Moses is not speaking of twenty-four hour days. He knew the law of herbs, yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit after their kind; that these things are not accomplished in a day; and it took seasons to produce fruit, and even many years, to mature trees and make them reproductive. And yet that whole process he mentions as in the third day. Again Moses names three successive days before the sun and moon appear. Without the suns rays to mark off twenty-four hour daya solar day is impossible. What is Gods Day, according to the Bible?
In the second chapter, the entire creation, from start to finish, is mentioned as having occurred in a day. It could not, therefore, according to Moses, mean twenty-four hours. What is a yom with God? Peter tells us One day is with the Lord as a thousand years (2Pe 3:8). Moses, himself, in the ninetieth Psalm, declares that a thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night, and that he is speaking of this very period is evident in the context, where he says, Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever Thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting (from Olan to Olam: or, era to era) Thou art God.
But surely Moses was mistaken in the eighth verse, And God called the firmament Heaven? Even Mr. Huxley slipped here, by charging Moses with believing that heaven was a solid substance, resting like a canopy over the earth. But Mr. Huxley was not a Hebrew scholar; hence his mistake. The Hebrew word translated firmament means expanse. Can you improve it by your latest scientific expression?
The ninth verse also reveals the remarkable wisdom vouchsafed to this man, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear. There was not a man in the earth at that time that knew, or could have known, that all the seas were linked together, whereas the continents are divided. But exploration has proven it. Dana, in his Manual of Geology, says that while the continents are separated, the seas occupy one bed. As to the order of the appearance of life, Genesis and geology are exactly together, beginning with grass, and ending with man. There is not a geological mistake in Genesis.
Equally remarkable is the fact that instead of speaking of the sun and moon as giving their light from the first, Moses holds back their rays until the fourth day; at which time he does not declare they were created, for that belonged in the opening sentence, In the beginning God created the heavenbut they were made to divide the day from the night, and to be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years. Many scientists believe that the earth took on a certain angle of axis at this very period in its development, when it cooled to the point where the vapors condensed and fell upon it as water. And we know that without an axis-angle, determining its relation to the sun and moon, our seasons would fail, and we might experience an ice-age!
Now as to whether the law of generation as set forth in Genesis, every seed after his kind is true, or whether the origin of species is by natural selection, the whole weight of discovery is with Genesis and against Darwin. The truth of Genesis we know, from the lowest form of grass to soulful man; everything is bringing forth after its kind. We have seen that law executed tens of thousands of times and in millions of forms. The creation of a new species, by natural selection, no man has ever yet seen. Why, therefore, should we imagine that there is any conflict between Scripture and Science? At every point where it is possible to institute a comparison that is reliable, an utter agreement appears. The rocks, from the lowest strata to the last laid down, confirm the facts of Gods creative week.
A glory gilds the Sacred page,
Majestic like the sun,
It gives a light to every age,
It gives but borrows none.
The hand that gave it still supplies
The gracious light and heat;
His truths upon the nations rise,
They rise, but never set.
Permit me to mention some other inexplicable instances of Science in Scripture. Harvey, in modern times, discovered the circulation of the blood, and declared its relation to life. Moses affirmed it three thousand years ago, The life is in the blood.
You have heard Galileo glorified for having discovered that this part of the universe was heliocentric and not geocentric, as the ancients supposed; and Newton honorably mentioned for his great discovery of the law of gravitation. The Scriptures declared both a few thousand years before these brethren were born. Job declared of the day-spring, that it takes hold of the ends of the earth, * * it is turned as clay to the seal (Job 38:13-14), and as for gravitation, while scientists and churchmen alike were adopting theories of the earths support akin to the old maps and atlases some of us used to carry to school showing Atlas holding up the world by his huge shoulders, or akin to that which the Hindus now hold, namely, that it was a flat plane, with possible stories above and below, held up by the heads of elephants, with their tails turned out, and their feet resting on the shell of an immense tortoise, and the tortoise in turn on the coil of a snake, Job was remonstrating in these words, He hangeth the earth upon nothing, (Job 26:7)the very deliverance of your latest Science!
It is only in very modern times that any man imagined the atmosphere to have any weight, and we still employ the phrase, light as air, and yet we know that it has a weight of fifteen pounds to every square inch; and modern science could almost tell you exactly what was the awful pressure upon the face of the globe twenty-five thousand miles in circumference. This, however, was not information to the Old Testament writers! Job, one of the most ancient of them all, says of God, that He makes a weight for the winds; yea, he weigheth the waters by measure. Galileo discovered that air has gravity; but thirty centuries before him, Job affirmed the same. It would seem, therefore, that inspiration is as accurate as experimentation.
It is only within a few years that weather bureaus have had any occasion; that men imagined storms of cloud and wind, and waves of heat and cold obeyed unchangeable laws, and might, therefore, be tabulated and reported even in advance of their arrival. But Solomon understood it and wrote long since, in Ecc 1:6, The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.
It is only by modern discovery that men imagined that there were other sounds than those which our ears catch; but now we know that when we pass thirty-eight thousand vibrations per second, the ear cannot follow, and every heavenly body, in its motions, is making music, so that Job was not mistaken when he declared the morning stars sang together, nor David when he declared of Jehovah, Thou makest the outgoings of the morning and evening to rejoice.
Arthur Pierson, after having called attention to some of these remarkable instances of agreement, says Shakespeare was right when he wrote:
Theres not the smallest orb which thou beholdest,But in his motion, like an angel sings,Still choiring to the young-eyed cherubim.Such harmony is in immortal souls;But whilst this muddy vesture of decay Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
But a remarkable instance of Scripture anticipation of Science is the late discovery of nitrogenous enrichment of soil through annual snow and hail, showing what Job meant when he wrote thirty-five hundred years ago, Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow? or hast thou seen the treasures of the hail, which I have reserved against the time of trouble, against the day of battle and war? (Job 38:22-23).
We candidly believe that if the men who are spending much time in seeing what can be said against the Scriptures, should assume a friendly attitude and search with a kindred diligence for its remarkable defenses, they could find them with utter ease, and would be shortly confirmed in the faith once delivered and be able to boast with the poet:
I paused one day beside the blacksmiths door
And listened to the anvil ring the evenings chime.
And looking in, I saw upon the floor
Old hammers, worn with beating years of time.
How many anvils have you had, said I,
To wear and batter out these hammers so?
Just one, he answered, with a twinkling eye
The anvil wears the hammers out, you know.
And so, I thought, the Anvil of Gods Word
For ages skeptic blows have beat upon;
Yet, though the noise of infidel was heard,
The anvil is unwornthe hammers, gone!
SOME POINTS WHERE COMPARISON IS IMPOSSIBLE.
Not to all subjects to which Science speaks do the Scriptures address themselves. It is equally true that the Scriptures discuss many subjects with which Science has naught to do. There are points in human experience where the microscope, the scalpel, the telescope tell us nothing. They transcend all scientific investigation! And yet that problem is not more difficult than are the problems of sin, substitution and salvation.
A man may easily say that Moses was mistaken when he declared how sin came into the world. But who will attempt to demonstrate it, and how? We know that sin is here. The Bible affirms that it came through an evil spirit; that man accepted his suggestion and continues to accept it, and so suffers the penalty of violated law. Who has presented a saner explanation of sin?
It is the height of folly to speak of the Scriptures as teaching that the innocent must suffer for the sins of the guilty, that children are condemned because of their parents blunder. It never hints such a thing, and it never did!
The second commandment does not say that God is visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon their innocent children, but it does affirm that judgment falls upon the third and fourth generation of them that hate Him, and why shouldnt it, unto generations of generations?
Shall men hate God and escape judgment? The law, when first declared was, The soul that sinneth, it shall die. Is not that law righteous? The Scriptures are very careful to follow that statement with another from the pen of Ezekiel, The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father; neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him; and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.
It may be easy enough to get up untenable theories of sin, and assign them either to the Sacred Scriptures, or to the conservative defenders of the same, when neither have ever spoken aught to warrant such caricature.
I have been in the ministry over thirty years. My daily associations, of an intrinsic character, have been with the conservative wing of the church, and in that entire time I have never heard Jehovah described as a God who visited the sins of guilty parents upon the heads of innocent children, by any one of them. On the contrary, they have depicted Jehovah as a God of infinite love, punishing no innocent men or women; even pitying the sinner and proffering him grace in Jesus Christ.
Will the man who sets himself up as a student of Science, and a preacher of the Sacred Scriptures, object; and if so, has he a better view of God to present?
Again, if the God who breathed upon the waste of a darkened world, and converted its chaos into cosmos, and quickened its death into life, is willing to do the same for a man dead in trespasses and sins, will men object? Cannot He of whom Milton sang
Thou from the firstWast present, and with mighty wings outstretched,Dove-like, satst brooding on the vast abyss,And madest it pregnant.
quicken our dead souls that they shall live again? If we cannot bind the influence of the Pleiades, shall we attempt to set limits to the work of Gods own Spirit, or demand that He bring His endeavors within the limits of natural explanation?
Is it not written, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit, and are we not enjoined to marvel not about it, since the wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the voice thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth, and told, so is every one that is born of the Spirit?
Just how it happens that the drunken man who staggers into a sanctuary and listens to the Gospel of the Son of God, and goes out, never to drink again, supported, in his new sobriety, by the sense of Divine love, Science may never be able to explain ; but that does not disprove what you and I have seen in the clinic of regeneration.
Just how it happens that the woman who has walked in the ways of wickedness, is suddenly roused to repentance by the rehearsal of the Divine goodness, scientists may not even see, but the Son of Man rejoices and the angels are made happy by the sight of His face.
You can deny the direct creation of man in the Divine image, if you like, but you will never be able to disprove it. You may deny the unity of the race, but even there the evidences are against you; you may deny the description of the fall, but sin remains unexplained. You may deny that there is any supernaturalism, and yet, as against that, we say that he who starts along the path clearly marked in Sacred Scripture will go from sin to salvation; from salvation to sanctification and from sanctification to the eternal fellowship of the Father.
Years ago we went through the Hoosac Tunnel for the first time. Did you ever hear how it was constructed? There started two companies of men to work on opposite sides of the mountain, but the survey had been so accurately made that when the men met midway, the walls of the excavations were not an inch off the line. But the man who wants to turn home to God and Heaven has more than an accurate line marked by survey; he has a well beaten road lying full before him. Others have gone over it by the thousands; yea, by the millions, and as the prodigal who trudged his way back to the farm-house from which he had been so long separated, by a well-traveled road, found his father coming forth to meet him, so shall the lost man find God if he but turn his feet to the path upon which there falls the light of this bookthe Bible!
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
(160) Beginning.Heb., head; but here, as in Psa. 139:17, it might be rendered sum. (Comp. Pro. 1:7.) The translation from the beginning, of the Authorised Version must at all events be abandoned.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 119:160. Thy word is true The beginning of thy word was truth; and to everlasting shall every judgment of thy righteousness be so. “God’s word, and every article, of his law, was, and ever will be truth, first and last: what he spoke first was truth, and so will be every determination of his to the end of the world.” Houbigant and Mudge.
SCHIN.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Psa 119:160 Thy word [is] true [from] the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments [endureth] for ever.
Ver. 160. Thy word is true from the beginning ] Heb. The beginning of thy word is true; Primarium illud est in verbo tuo quod est firmissimum, this is a special praise of thy word, that it is very sure. These words are faithful and true, Rev 22:6 , from the one end of the Bible to the other. Some render it thus, Thy most excellent word is truth. This most excellent word Kimchi interpreteth to be particularly that in the head or preface to the decalogue, Hear, O Israel, Jehovah thy God, Jehovah is one. Theodoret will have it to be that promise made to Abraham that in his seed all nations of the earth should be blessed. Some read it, every chapter of thy word is truth.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
beginning. Hebrew. r’osh = head. Put by Figure of speech Synecdoche (of Part), App-6, for the whole (including the beginning, and “every one”, as in next line) = sum and substance, word and words (Jer 15:16. Joh 17:8, Joh 17:14); rendered “sum” in Psa 139:17.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Thy word is true from the beginning: Heb. The beginning of the word is true, Psa 119:86, Psa 119:138, Pro 30:5, 2Ti 3:16
and every one: Psa 119:75, Psa 119:142, Psa 119:144, Psa 119:152, Ecc 3:14, Mat 5:18
Reciprocal: Lev 20:22 – judgments Neh 9:13 – true laws Psa 19:9 – judgments Psa 56:4 – In God I will Psa 111:7 – all his Psa 119:66 – I Have Psa 119:89 – For ever Rom 3:4 – let God
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
119:160 Thy word [is] true [from] the {e} beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments [endureth] for ever.
(e) Since you first promised it, even to the end all your sayings are true.