Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 127:2
[It is] vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: [for] so he giveth his beloved sleep.
2. Vain is it for you, O ye that rise up early and sit down late,
Eating the bread of toil.
Anxious toilers are addressed. ‘Uprising’ and ‘downsitting,’ as in Psa 139:2, denote activity and rest. Men may begin their labours early, and continue them late; they may win their subsistence by a succession of unremitting labours (the word is plural), and lose all enjoyment of it through constant anxiety; but all this self-tormenting care is needless. For ‘toil’ cp. Pro 5:10 ( thy labours = the results of thy toil); Pro 10:22 (R.V. marg.); Gen 3:16 ( sorrow), 17 (R.V. toil).
for so he giveth his beloved sleep ] Omit for. This is the natural rendering of the Heb. text, but the sense of it is not obvious. Perhaps it may be, ‘Bethink yourselves! so, even while you toil and moil with sleepless energy (Ecc 8:16), Jehovah gives calm rest to those whom He loves.’ So Keble,
“Still on the favoured of His eyes
He bids sweet slumber freely wait.”
Compare Mrs Browning’s beautiful poem on the words.
Most commentators however adopt the rendering, So he giveth unto his beloved in sleep. While Jehovah’s people rest in calm dependence upon Him, He gives them all for which others toil with wearying anxiety [82] (Mar 4:26-27).
[82] This rendering is certainly not the natural rendering of the Heb. text. Wellhausen condemns it as “quite inadmissible.” It requires the supplement of an object to the verb, and must be taken as accus. of manner. If it were not for the exegetical difficulty, no one would hesitate to take ‘sleep,’ as the Ancient Versions take it, as the object of the verb ‘giveth.’ Some word however seems to be needed to correspond to the results of anxious toil, and though the Ancient Versions already had the present reading, the text may be corrupt. The anomalous form of the word for sleep ( for ) may point in this direction.
his beloved ] The singular may be collective, His beloved ones, or individualising, each of His beloved ones. The epithet applied to Israel (Psa 60:5; Deu 33:12; Jer 11:15) is transferred to each faithful Israelite who responds with unwavering confidence to the love which has chosen him.
It is hardly necessary to say that no sanction of idleness or depreciation of industry is here expressed or implied. What the Psalmist rebukes is the anxious spirit of those who toil restlessly as though they could ensure success by their own efforts, forgetting that God’s blessing is needed to prosper those efforts, and that He is ever ready to give that blessing to those who trust Him. It is the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount, Mat 6:25-34. Cp. 1Pe 5:7; Psa 33:16 ff; Psa 60:11 ff; Psa 147:10-11; Pro 21:31: and in particular Pro 10:22, “The blessing of Jehovah, it maketh rich, and He addeth no toil therewith.”
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
It is vain for you to rise up early – The psalmist does not here say that it is improper to rise early; or that there could be no advantage in it; or that people would be more likely to be successful in their undertakings if they did not rise early; but that, although this was done, they would be still altogether dependent on God. Mere early rising, without his blessing, would not secure what they hoped to accomplish, for everything is still in the hand of God. Health, strength, clearness of mind, and success, are all under his control; and though early rising may tend to produce all these – as it does in fact – yet still people are not the less dependent on God for success.
To sit up late – That you may labor or study. As in the former case the psalmist does not express any opinion about the propriety or impropriety of early rising, so it is in respect to this. He merely says that if it is done, this, of itself, will not accomplish the object; people are still dependent on God for success though they do it. As a matter of fact, however, sitting up late has less tendency to promote success in life than early rising; but in either ease there is the same dependence on God.
To eat the bread of sorrows – Bread of care, anxiety, or trouble; that is, bread earned or procured by the severity of toil. There may be an allusion here to the original sentence pronounced on man, Gen 3:17. The meaning is, that it is in vain that you labor hard, that you exhaust your strength, in order to get bread to eat, unless God shall bless you. After all your toil the result is with him.
For so he giveth his beloved sleep – The word for is not in the original, The sentence is very obscure in the connection in which it stands. The Septuagint and Latin Vulgate render it, Ye who eat the bread of care – rise when you have rested – when he hath given his beloved sleep. Some have supposed it to mean that God gives his people rest without toil, or that, while others labor, his beloved – his friends – sleep; but this interpretation is not necessarily demanded by the Hebrew, and is inconsistent with the general doctrine of the Bible. Others have supposed the idea to be, that God gives his beloved rest after labor; but though this is true, it is not true of them especially or exclusively. Some suppose, with as little probability, that the meaning is, that what others hope (but hope in vain) to get by labor, the Lord bestows upon his people in sleep, they know not how.
The meaning evidently is, that God bestows sleep upon his people in some sense in which it is not bestowed on others, or that there is, in regard to their case, something in which they differ from those who are so anxious and troubled – who rise so early for the sake of gain – who toil so late – who eat the bread of care. The idea seems to be that there would be calmness, repose, freedom from anxiety or solicitude. God makes the mind of his people – his beloved – calm and tranquil, while the world around is filled with anxiety and restlessness – busy, bustling, worried. As a consequence of this calmness of mind, and of their confidence in him, they enjoy undisturbed repose at night. They are not kept wakeful and anxious about their worldly affairs as other men are, for they leave all with God, and thus he giveth his beloved sleep. The particle so – ken – or thus, I apprehend, refers to the general sense of what had been said, rather than to what immediately precedes it; to the fact that all success depends on God Psa 127:1, and that it is always by his interposition, and not as the result of human skill, toil, or fatigue, that people find calmness, success, repose. It is only by the favor of God, and by their recognizing their dependence on him, that they find repose, success, and freedom from care.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 127:2
To eat the bread of sorrows.
The bread of toil and the fruit of righteousness
Labour is the law of life, and to this law nothing in Gods Word is opposed. Man goeth forth unto his work and to his labour until the evening is a description good for all time. Active in business, if we may believe St. Paul, is a truly Christian habit. But the question is, What form ought this activity to take? Work may be done in two moods or tempers, as is hinted in the text: it may be done in spite of God, or it may be done through Him; it may be done in a spirit that regards Him not, or it may be done in a spirit which leans upon Him. In the first case, the bread of toil is not secured at all, or when secured is verily the bread of carefulness, anxiety, disappointment. In the other ease the bread of toil is not the bread of carefulness or anxiety, but the bread of peace. God gives it to His beloved in their rest.
I. The best results of any thought or any effort of ours are reached unconsciously. Sir Isaac Newton, lying on his back in an orchard, and gaining a perception of the great law of gravitation from the sight of a falling apple, is a familiar type of the principle I am describing. Yet it offers no premium to idleness! The watchful calculations have been made; the inevitable reasonings have been faithfully traversed, but at last the result, the reward, the bread of all has dropped, as it were, upon the faithful worker out of heaven. You have heard, perhaps, of the great musical composer who always slept with a pencil and paper within reach, that at the very moment of waking be might register the inspirations of harmony that had visited him in his slumbers? And many of us, who are neither musicians nor philosophers, have had experience of the very same thing. We have gone to bed perplexed with tangled reasonings, embarrassed with ill-marshalled cogitations; we have looked away from them all, and committed ourselves and our thoughts to God; and lo! we have risen in the morning to a clear perception or an unquestioning resolution. It was in vain that we delayed taking rest to eat the bread of carefulness. God has given it to His beloved in their sleep!
II. In, through, and yet beyond their labours, God gives to His own people the assurance of peace–a peace which, while it may be manifested in the success of their plans, is not overthrown by the failure of them. To those who know of a surety that the never-failing providence of a Father ordereth all things both in heaven and earth, the desire becomes an assurance that things profitable shall be all given, and things hurtful put away.
III. Of all Gods gifts the highest and best is peace. If we take the text according to the common reading, we do no violence to the word sleep by interpreting it as spiritual restfulness. If we read it as declaring the condition under which Gods people have their bread given them, we are near the same truth. If God feeds His own as they sleep or rest in Him, then that sleep or rest, whether as given or as used, may be regarded as hallowed of God, as even appropriated by Him to be the channel or vehicle of His benedictions to the soul. The fruit of righteousness is peace, and in the fruit have we, as wrought up and comprehended, the gifts of earth and heaven, the fatness of the soil and the warmth of the sunlight, the soft showers of the morning and the dews of the eneningtide. So does this Divine peace, which passeth all understanding, alike in its source, channels, and influences, carry to the spiritual life of the Christian the highest evidence of the near presence of God. (A. S. Thompson, B. D.)
So He giveth His beloved sleep.—
Sleep
During sleep the brain becomes inactive, consciousness and volition are in abeyance; in the body the expenditure of energy is curtailed, the constructive forces dominate the destructive. It is a time of building up the system after the tear and wear of a day. God is the great giver of sleep.
I. The sound sleeper. Exercise of body and mind in the day promote sleep at night.
II. The bad sleeper.
1. There is the ambitious man who sits up late at night planning for to-morrow; by and by he goes to bed, his mind still full of business. You can see this man rolling from side to side of the bed. What is he doing? Is he formulating some great scheme for the benefit of his fellow-men? No, not likely; he is planning how he can make money. He has the gold fever, and when people have fever of any kind their body is diseased and they cannot sleep. Such an experience is the first step to a lunatic asylum.
2. The man with the evil conscience. Sin, like a terrible worm, is gnawing his inner life; the fire of sin is raging within, and the hot flames drive sleep away.
III. The good sleeper. Our text should read–He giveth His beloved in sleep, as if He imparted a gift to them in the quiet hours of the night. Sleep itself is a precious gift; it helps us to forget the cares and worries of daily life. We could not live amid lifes great anxieties unless God came to us night by night, breathed upon us the spirit of peace and rocked us to sleep; as the mother rocks the tired child to rest, so does God stand by the bedside of His beloved and give them sleep. The beloved of the Lord can lie down at night without fear; the day may have been hard and trying, enemies plotting and slandering, but in the arms of God His beloved find peace. (W. K. Bryce.)
Gods beloved
Here there is a beauteous blending of two opposite yet not wholly dissimilar elements. The love of earth rises towards, and is crowned by, the love of heaven. The absent husband and father in his affection and gratitude sees not only the fond wife, or dutiful child fulfilling his wish in the work of the house, or the tillage of the field, or the care of the vineyard. He has another, a fairer, holier vision. When every voice in that distant home is hushed in the stillness of the night, when each busy hand or foot is at rest beneath the potent spell of sleep, he sees the angel of Gods presence as constant in his guardianship of that sacred dwelling and of those loved ones as amid the busy hours or varied needs of the day. He sees how those sleeping ones are nestled beneath Gods protecting wing more gently and faithfully in their defenceless, unconscious moments, than when they were astir in the house or diligent in the field. He learns how the God of all grace loves his wife and children more and better than he; that the Perfect Father sheltereth and blesseth His beloved even while they sleep, even when they cannot be actively doing His will, or returning His goodness, or chanting His praise.
I. Let us try to realize a little more fully the beautiful significance of the fact that those whom we love and live for are, in deed and truth, very much more Gods beloved. One of the deepest roots and sublimest fruits of the Christian religion is this: the conviction that all earthly things at their truest and best are but shadows, types, symbols of the heavenly; that the love of earth is hut the reflection or parable of the fairer, diviner love of heaven. Hence to a pure-minded, noble-hearted man, the love of wife or child is next to the influence of Gods unspeakable gift–the Christ, the deepest baptism or sacrament in holy things which Heaven bestows. Statistics furnish many suggestive hints in this direction, telling how wedded life tends to lessen coarseness and crime in the homes of the people. Keen observers of life note these sacred facts, as did she who penned those almost idyllic words: In old days there were angels who came and took men by the hand and led them away from the city of destruction. We see no white-winged angels now. But yet men are led away from threatening destruction: a hand is put into theirs which leads them forth gently towards a calm and bright land, so that they look no more backward; and the hand may be a little childs. I say we trace these helpful conditions of the better life, but only the Searcher of hearts, only the Father of our spirits can fully know what founts of blessing, what angels of mercy, what sacraments of heaven are found amid marital, parental, filial ties, winning men from ways which are selfish, and hard, and low, and uplifting them towards whatsoever things are pure, and just, and true. And what follows, when men are thus sensible to these higher claims, alive to these holier voices? Do men interpret these messengers of good only in the light of their own welfare or gratification? Are they not rather prepared thereby to believe and understand how all these earthly affections are but the disclosure and the promise of those that are heavenly and eternal?
II. Let us call to mind two of the chief indications that we are Gods beloved.
1. There is one which by its very nature stands foremost in all reasoning on this subject. I mean Gods estimate of children. Jesus–the only adequate explanation of whose wondrous person seems to me to be this, that He was the very love of the. Father manifest in the flesh–Jesus in nothing gave so much Gods estimate of our being, our nature, our destiny as in His tribute to the greatness and sacredness of each child. Now, what Jesus thought of the infancy or the childhood, that, by parity of reason, and the very nature of the deep underlying relationships, He thought equally of the youth, the manhood, the womanhood, the old age.
2. Again, we find the strongest assurance that we are Gods beloved in the general scope and spirit of the Gospel of His Son. Every age that Gospel becomes more literally and explicitly glad tidings to the world. They are glad tidings which tell of endless ages upon ages, to which centuries are but as days or moments, in which God has means and room to satisfy the cravings of His good nature in the good of His children. Oh what founts of goodness, of care, of sympathy do these purposes reveal in the Divine nature! What confirmations they afford of the eternal love which shone so brightly in the face and cross of Jesus Christi What assurances they should inspire within our hearts that none among us, however unknown, however forlorn, however despised, will ever be able to reproach his Father with neglect or unkindness, or to charge God With having made him an outcast or an orphan!
III. Let us seek to comfort one another with some of the practical hopes in the present which this fact of our being Gods beloved allows and demands. It tells of tokens, of alleviations, of compensations from the heart of the Perfect Father to the hearts of His needy, suffering children, far beyond the measure of our sympathies or the spirit of our prayers. The poor brain may be beclouded, and reason have lost its reign, yet what calm moments, what lucid intervals have been known to come at the hour of prayer, or at the mention of the name of God. The poor sufferer in his prostration may have become unconscious, and seem to be deaf to all around, or have passed beyond our power to comfort or to aid, and yet what endless communications there may be within the Soul, what soothing glances from the angel of Gods presence, what gentle foldings of the protecting wing, what sweet foreshadowings of the meaning and the end! (J. T. Stannard.)
Gods gifts in sleep
I. Protection (Psa 121:3-4; Psa 91:1; Psa 91:5; Psa 91:9-10).
II. Refreshment (Ecc 5:12; Jer 31:26).
III. Enlightenment (Gen 46:2; Dan 7:1; Act 16:9; Act 18:9). No one is foolish enough to think that there is a Providence–a voice from God–in all our dreams. Perhaps most of them are self-originated. But unquestionably there are gifts of God–revelations of God to His tried, and sorrowing, and faithful ones in sleep. There are, perhaps, few of His children who have not heard His voice in the night. He not only protects and refreshes us, but enlightens us. Let us not despise those good and perfect gifts which come from above in the hours of gloom and loneliness. Let us thank and bless God for all those precious things which He giveth to His beloved while they sleep. (A. G. Maitland.)
The peculiar sleep of the beloved
The sleep of the body is the gift of God. So said Homer of old, when he described it as descending from the clouds, and resting on the tents of the warriors around old Troy. And so sang Virgil, when he spoke of Palinurus falling asleep upon the prow of the ship. Sleep is the gift of God; and not a man would close his eyes, did not God put His fingers on his eyelids; did not the Almighty send a soft and balmy influence over his frame which lulled his thoughts into quiescence, making him enter into that blissful state of rest which we call sleep. True, there be some drugs and narcotics whereby men can poison themselves well nigh to death, and then call it sleep; but the sleep of the healthy body is the gift of God. He bestows it; He rocks the cradle for us every night; He draws the curtain of darkness; He bids the sun shut up his burning eyes; and then He comes and says, Sleep, sleep, my child; I give thee sleep.
I. There is a miraculous sleep which God has sometimes given to His beloved–which He does not Now vouchsafe. Into that kind of miraculous sleep, or rather trance, fell Adam, when he slept sorrowfully and alone; but when he awoke he was no more so, for God had given him that best gift which He had then bestowed on man. The same sleep Abram had, when it is Said that a deep sleep came on him, and he laid him down, and saw a smoking furnace and a burning lamp, while a voice said to him, Fear not, Abram; I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. Such a hallowed sleep also was that of Jacob (Gen 28:12-15); Joseph (Gen 37:5-9); Daniel.
II. He gives His beloved the sleep of a quiet conscience. I think most of you saw that splendid picture, in the Exhibition of the Royal Academy–the Sleep of Argyle–where he lay slumbering on the very morning before his execution. You saw some noblemen standing there, looking at him almost with compunction; the jailor is there, with his keys rattling: but positively the man sleeps, though to-morrow morning his head shall be severed from his body, and a man shall hold it up, and say, This was the head of a traitor. He slept because he had a quiet conscience: for he had done no wrong. Then look at Peter. Did you ever notice that remarkable passage where it is said that Herod intended to bring out Peter on the morrow; but, behold, as Peter was sleeping between two guards, the angel smote him? Sleeping between two guards, when on the morrow he was to be crucified or slain! He cared not, for his heart was clear; he had committed no ill. He could say, If it be right to serve God or man, judge ye; and, therefore, he laid him down and slept.
III. There is the sleep of contentment which the Christian enjoys. How few people in this world are satisfied. No man ever need fear offering a reward of a thousand pounds to a contented man; for if any one came to claim the reward, he would, of course, prove his discontent. We are all in a measure, I suspect, dissatisfied with our lot; the great majority of mankind are always on the wing; they never settle; they never light on any tree to build their nest; but they are always fluttering from one to the other. This tree is not green enough, that is not high enough, this is not beautiful enough, that is not picturesque enough; so they are ever on the wing, and never build a peaceful nest at all. How few there are who have that blessed contentment–who can say, I want nothing else; I want but little here below–yea, I long for nothing more–I am satisfied–I am content.
IV. God giveth His beloved the sleep of quietness of soul as to the future. O that dark future! The present may be well; but ah! the next wind may wither all the flowers, and where shall I be? The future! All persons have need to dread the future, except the Christian. God giveth to His beloved a happy sleep with regard to the events of coming time.
V. There is the sleep of security. Solomon slept with armed men round his bed, and thus slumbered securely; but Solomons father slept one night on the bare ground–not in a palace–with no moat round his castle wall,–but he slept quite as safely as his son, for he said, I laid me down and slept, and I awaked, for the Lord sustained me.
VI. The last sleep God giveth His beloved is the sleep of a happy dismission. Dear servants of Jesus! There I see them! What can I say of them, but that so He giveth His beloved sleep? Oh! happy sleep! (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Gifts in sleep
(to children):–The beginning of the psalm is plain enough. Many a house has been built beautiful and strong; and perhaps the very night before the family were to go into it a fire burned it all down. The same with a city; the guards kept watch, but the enemy got in and the town was burned and destroyed. When people see things like that they say, We cant prevent accidents happening; it is God that does it; it is all in Gods hands. Then the poet goes on to say something more. You toil as hard as you can; you rise early and sit up late; and you are doing all that in order that you may get bread to eat; and do you know that in all that work of yours you cannot do without Gods help? It, would never get you your food if God didnt give it you. God is not asleep when you are sleeping., It is not only our food and our houses God gives us when we are asleep, but the better things He gives us too. When I was not thinking of it many of the sweetest friendships that have made life better and brighter have come to me–they were not sought for. Where men give themselves to be guided by God the best things come to them. I didnt plan them; they were dropped into my life somehow. When people are converted it is constantly most unexpectedly. (W. G. Elmslie, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 2. It is vain for you to rise up early] There seems to be here an allusion to the daily and nightly watches which Nehemiah instituted. The people are worn out with constant labour and watching; he therefore divided them in such a manner, that they who had worked in the day should rest by night, and that they who worked by night should rest in the day; and thus his beloved, a title of the Jews, the beloved of God, got sleep, due refreshment, and rest. As for Nehemiah and his servants, they never put off their clothes day or night but for washing.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
He directs his speech to the persons forementioned, the builders or watchmen, of both which sorts there are many that use the following course. To rise up early, to sit late; to use constant and unwearied diligence, from the very dawning of the day unto the dark night, that so you may accomplish your designs.
To eat the bread of sorrows; to eat the bread which you get by excessive and grievous pains. So, to wit, by his blessing, which, though not expressed, is sufficiently understood out of the former verse, where it is twice expressed. As therefore he saith it is in vain for them to build or watch, if God do not give his blessing and assistance, Psa 127:1; so here he adds that it is in vain to be diligent in their labours and callings, understand, without Gods blessing; for so, i.e. not singly by their industry, but by his blessing upon their labours. But the Hebrew word rendered so may be and is by others rendered when, or whereas, or since; by others, rightly, or well, when it is convenient and needful for them; by others, certainly; the sleep which they have is undoubtedly from Gods blessing, without which all possible endeavours would never procure it. He; the Lord, expressed in the former and in the following verses.
Giveth, to wit, freely, without that immoderate toiling and drudgery wherewith others pursue it.
His beloved; his people, who though hated and maligned by men, are beloved of God, over whom his providence watcheth in a special manner. In this expression he seems to allude to the name of Jedidiah, which was given to Solomon, and signifies the beloved of the Lord, 2Sa 12:25.
Sleep; a quiet rest, both of body and mind, which many of those greedy worldlings cannot enjoy, as is observed, Ecc 5:20.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
2. so he giveth his belovedsleepthat is, His providential care gives sleep which noefforts of ours can otherwise procure, and this is a reason for trustas to other things (compare Mt6:26-32).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
[It is] vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late,…. A description of an industrious and laborious person, who takes great pains to get a livelihood, or increase his substance; see Ps 104:23; which, yet, as in the former instances, depends upon the blessing of divine Providence, Pr 10:4. For, after all, it may come to nothing more at last than
to eat the bread of sorrows; that is, to eat bread gotten with much sorrow and labour; such get bread, and that is all, and not that without the providence of God;
[for] so he giveth his beloved sleep; that is, the Lord: such who are partakers of his grace, that fear and love him; to them, thus diligent and industrious, he gives not only bread to eat, but sleep, which to a labouring man is sweet; and having food and raiment, he gives them contentment, quietness, and satisfaction of mind, which is the greatest blessing of all. Sleep, even bodily sleep, was reckoned with the very Heathens a divine gift x. Some think respect is had to, Solomon, whose name was Jedidiah, and signifies the beloved of the Lord,
2Sa 12:24; to whom God gave peace, rest, and safety all around; or, as others, the kingdom without labour, when Absalom and Adonijah toiled for it: Christ, who is the Beloved of the Lord, the Son of his love, his well beloved Son, may be thought of, whose rest is glorious; his sleep in the grave, where his flesh rested from his labours and sufferings, in hope of the resurrection of it: and it may be applied to all the Lord’s beloved ones; to whom he gives spiritual rest in this world, sleep in the arms of Jesus at death, and an everlasting rest in the world to come; all which depends not on their endeavours, but on his grace and goodness.
x “—-prima quies–dono divum gratissima serpit”, Virgil. Aeneid. l. 2. v. 264, 265. , Homer. Iliad. 7. v. 482. & 9. v. 709. & Odyss. 16. v. ult.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
2. It is vain for you in hastening to rise early. Solomon now expresses more plainly that men in vain wear themselves out with toiling, and waste themselves by fasting to acquire riches, since these also are a benefit bestowed only by God. The more effectually to move them, he addresses himself to every man in particular. It is, says he, in vain for you He particularizes two means which are thought to contribute in an eminent degree to the amassing of riches. It is not surprising to find those growing rich in a short time who spare no exertion, but consume night and day in plying their occupations, and allow themselves only scanty fare from the product of their labor. Solomon, however, affirms that neither living at a small expense, nor diligence in business will by themselves profit anything at all. Not that he forbids us to practice temperance in our diet and to rise early to engage in our worldly business; but to stir us up to prayer, and to calling upon God, and also to recommend gratitude for the divine blessings, he brings to nought whatever would obscure the grace of God. Consequently, we shall then enter upon our worldly avocations in a right way when our hope depends exclusively upon God, and our success in that case will correspond to our wishes. But if a man, taking no account of God, eagerly makes haste, he will bring ruin upon himself by his too precipitate course. It is not, therefore, the design of the Prophet to encourage men to give way to sloth, so that they should think upon nothing all their life long, but fall asleep and abandon themselves to idleness- his meaning rather is, that, in executing what God has enjoined upon them, they should always begin with prayer and calling upon his name, offering to him their labors that he may bless them. The expression, the bread of sorrows, may be explained in two ways, either as denoting what is acquired by hard and anxious toil, or what is eaten with disquietude of mind; just as we see parsimonious and close-handed persons, when they have scarcely tasted a bit of bread, pulling back their hand from their mouth. It is of no great importance which of these senses is adopted; for we are simply taught that parsimonious men profit nothing — no not even when through their own niggardliness they grudge to eat as much as nature requires.
For thus will he give sleep to his beloved. The inspired writer intimates that the blessing of God, of which he has spoken, is actually seen in his children and servants. It will not suffice to believe this doctrine — that whatever, men attempt is to no purpose; it is necessary that the promise be added, in order to their being led with assured hope to perform their duty. The sentence may be read either — he will give sleep to his beloved, or, he will give in sleeping; that is, he will give them those things which unbelievers labor to acquire by their own industry. The particle, כן , ken, thus, is put to express certainty; (100) for with the view of producing a more undoubted persuasion of the truth — that God gives food to his people without any great care on their part — which seems incredible, and a fiction, Solomon points to the thing as it were with the finger. He indeed speaks as if God nourished the slothfulness of his servants by his gentle treatment; but as we know that men are created with the design of their being occupied, and as in the subsequent Psalm we shall find that the servants of God are accounted happy when they eat the labor of their hands, it is certain that the word sleep is not to be understood as implying slothfulness, but a placid labor, to which true believers subject themselves by the obedience of faith. Whence proceeds this so great ardor in the unbelieving, that they move not a finger without a tumult or bustle, in other words, without tormenting themselves with superfluous cares, but because they attribute nothing to the providence of God! The faithful, on the other hand, although they lead a laborious life, yet follow their vocations with composed and tranquil minds. Thus their hands are not idle, but their minds repose in the stillness of faith, as if they were asleep. If it is again objected, that God’s people are often agitated with distressing cares, and that, oppressed with pinching poverty, and destitute of all resources, they are anxiously concerned about the morrow, I answer, that if faith and love to God were perfect in his servants, his blessing, of which the Prophet makes mention, would be manifest. Whenever they are tormented above measure, this happens through their own default, in not resting entirely upon the providence of God. I farther add, that God punishes them more severely than unbelievers, because it is profitable for them to be agitated by disquietude for a season, that at length they may attain to this peaceful sleep. In the meantime, however, God’s grace prevails, and always shines forth in the midst of darkness, in respect of his cherishing his children as it were by sleep.
(100) Walford reads — “He truly granteth sleep to his beloved;” and observes that the sentence is enfeebled by the word “so” in the vulgar translation. “It most likely means,” he adds, “‘in truth,’ i.e., truly; and the sense will be, though all exertion is vain without God, yet he truly bestows refreshing sleep, free from anxiety and excessive exertion, upon those who are the objects of his love, inasmuch as they combine all their endearours with due regard to him.” Cresswell adopts the rendering of the Septuagint, which is “since he giveth his beloved sleep.”
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(2) It . . . sleep.This verse, of the literal rendering of which there is no question, has met with many different interpretations. About the first clause there is no difference. Early rising, to pursue the business of the day, is vain without the Divine blessing on the labour. The next two clauses admit two different interpretations. Some connect the sitting down with the meal: delaying to sit down and eat the bread of cares (or sorrow), i.e., so immersed in business as to allow hardly time for meals. But it seems far more natural to take the Hebrew in its more extended sense of resting, and so explain, nearly as the Authorised Version:
It is in vain to rise early;
To delay the hour of rest,
To eat the bread that has been won by toil;
At His pleasure He giveth to His beloved (in) sleep.
As to the last clause, it seems right, from its use in Genesis 1, it was so, to give so the sense at His pleasure, this being also indicated by the general drift of the psalm. The word sleep may be either the direct object, as in the LXX. and Vulg., or the accusative used adverbially, in sleep, while they sleep. That the latter suits the context best there can be no question. The whole intention of the psalm is to assert the truth which the Book of Proverbs sums up in one sentence (Pro. 10:22): The blessing of Jehovah maketh rich, and toil can add nothing thereto, the truth which was so impressively taught in the Sermon on the Mount, by the contrast of mans restless ambition with the unconscious dependence on the Divine bounty of birds and flowers. To say that what others toil for from morning till night in vain, God gives to His beloved without all this anxiety and exertion, while they sleep, puts this truth forcibly, and with that disregard of apparent paradox which was natural to a Hebrew, and which appears so prominently in our Saviours treatment of the subject. Labour is decried as unnecessary neither here nor in the Sermon on the Mount, but carking care is dismissed as unworthy those who, from past experience, ought to trust the goodness of the great Provider. The Greek proverb, The net catches while the fisher sleeps, and the German, God bestows His gifts during the night, bring common expressions to confirm this voice of inspiration, which was, in almost so many words, recalled in our Lords parable (Mar. 4:27). But old association pleads for the equally true and equally beautiful rendering which makes sleep the gift of God. If there is one thing which seems to come more direct from Heavens bounty than another, that in its character is more benign, in its effects more akin to the nature of God, it is the blessing of sleep. In all times men have rendered thanks to Heaven for this boon. The ancients not only spoke of sleep as most grateful of known gifts, but made itself a god. The psalmist unconsciously, but most truly, teaches us the further lesson that it is not only a Divine blessing, but a proof of Divine love:
Of all the thoughts of God that are
Borne inward unto souls afar,
Across the psalmists music deep,
Now tell me if that any is
For gift or grace surpassing this
He giveth His beloved sleep.
MRS. BROWNING.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
2. Rise early Namely, to engage in work.
Sit up late Not “sit up,” but sit down. It is not lateness in sitting down to rest at night merely, after the day’s work is done, as the antithesis might seem to require, but delaying to sit down by day as well, whether for momentary rest or for eating. See Deu 6:7; Psa 139:2. The reproof lies, not against labour and care as such, which are made necessary by a divine decree, (Gen 3:17-19,) and in which, as a judgment and a discipline, God takes tender sympathy with man, but against seeking the world with such absorbing care and desire as to rob the body of needful rest and the soul of quiet and meditation. Such a habit is inconsistent with dependence on God, who alone giveth prosperity. See Mat 6:24-34.
Bread of sorrows Bread procured by bitter labours and cares. The allusion is to Gen 3:17: “In sorrow shalt thou eat.” Excess of care should be rolled upon God: forethought and diligence belong to us, in reliance upon his guidance. 1Pe 5:7.
So he giveth The Hebrew , ( ken,) is a particle of comparison so, in like manner, thus; and the sense of this obscure sentence seems to be, that in the midst of cares and labours, thus tempered by faith and patience, God giveth to his beloved sleep. Hereby health and present enjoyment are secured, with a better guaranty of ultimate success by this godly advice. Quiet and healthful sleep was considered a special mark of divine care and favour. Lev 26:6; Pro 3:24.
His beloved The Hebrew , ( jedido,) “his beloved,” is supposed to refer to the name given to Solomon at his birth, , ( Jedidiah,) the “beloved” of Jehovah. 2Sa 12:25
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Psa 127:2. It is vain, &c. It is vain for you, ye that rise early, and late take rest: that eat the bread of fatigue: it is thus he giveth sleep to his beloved. Mudge: who observes, that the words, it is thus he giveth, and behold, in the next verse, evidently point, as he suggests in the note on the title, to a particular person whom God had blessed, without which all endeavours are vain. Some render the last clause, Since he giveth to his beloved sleep: but Green translates the passage, “It is in vain for you to rise up, &c.unless the Lord bless your endeavours: whereas he giveth to his beloved even while they sleep.” The plain meaning seems to be, that God affords and bestows to his beloved, or to good men, rest and comfort of life; and withal provides as much wealth for them and their families, as is best for them; and indeed, much more genuine wealth, than they can procure who incessantly harass and fatigue themselves, and deny themselves the enjoyment of all worldly comforts, in order to enrich their posterity. Mr. Merrick seems to have expressed it well in his paraphrase:
Why rise ye early, late take rest, And eat the bread of care? The balm of sleep, his gift confest, His children only share.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Anxiety and care will never improve either by exertion, for the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong. Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts. Ecc 9:11 ; Zec 4:6 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 127:2 [It is] vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: [for] so he giveth his beloved sleep.
Ver. 2. It is vain for you to rise up early ] Diluculantes surgere, tardantes sedere, to toil and moil a in the world. It were to be wished that this Nisi, nisi, frustra, frustra, were ever sounding in the ears of worldlings, who will needs act upon their own principles; “God is not in all their thoughts.”
To eat the bread of sorrows
For so he giveth his beloved sleep
a To make oneself wet and muddy; to wallow in mire
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
For so = Thus.
beloved = beloved one (singular) Hebrew. yedid. This was Solomon’s name (Jedidiah) given by Jehovah (2Sa 12:25). Solomon was given because David was beloved of Jehovah. Somecodices, with Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate, read plural
sleep = in sleep: i.e. while they sleep: i.e. without their labour. So He gave to Solomon (1Ki 3:5-15); to Adam (Gen 2:21, Gen 2:22); Abraham (Gen 15:12, Gen 15:13); Jacob (Gen 28:10-15); Samuel (1Sa 3:3, 1Sa 3:4), &c.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Psa 127:2
Psa 127:2
“It is vain for you to rise up early,
To take rest late,
To eat the bread of toil;
For so he giveth unto his beloved sleep.”
Of course, there is no prohibition here against getting up early, or working late, the point being simply that without the blessing of God, it will do no good at all.
This writer was in Japan as a guest chaplain of the USAF shortly after World War II, and he visited sister Nettie Andrews, who had lived in Shizuoka for thirty years, serving the Lord as a missionary. She survived the pitiless bombing of that great city by the USAF, which left the major part of it in total ruins, but when I asked her about her terror during the bombing she remarked, “He giveth his beloved sleep.” She had slept without interruption through that whole terrible night!
We have already noted in the chapter introduction that these first two verses are supposed to have applied particularly to Solomon in the matter of his building the Temple (house) and in that sleep at Gibeon in which God, by means of a dream, conveyed to Solomon remarkable wisdom and understanding.
However, we must not leave this without remembering, as Kidner suggested, that, “Like much of Solomon’s wisdom, the lessons of this psalm were mostly lost on him. His building, both personal and in the temple, became reckless (1Ki 9:10 ff, 19), his kingdom a ruin (1Ki 11:11 ff), and his marriages a disastrous denial of God (1 Kings 11 :lff). In fact, Solomon’s reign over Israel was an unqualified disaster, the scandal of forty generations. The most pitiful thing of all being that the Jews fell in love with it, a love that blinded their eyes to the Christ when he came. Their rejection of the Messiah was solely because the leaders of the nation wanted nothing, either in heaven or on earth, as much as they wanted the restoration of that godless earthly kingdom.
Before leaving this portion of the psalm, there is a quotation from Leupold which many Christians have found to be true: “Those who have put their trust for success in what it may please God to give have found it to be true, as the psalm says, that, `He will give what is right to his beloved while he sleeps.’ We cannot understand exactly how Leupold came up with this understanding of the passage; but we can find no fault with the statement as it stands. There are countless examples of where it has happened exactly that way.
E.M. Zerr:
Psa 127:2. God provides all that is necessary for man’s existence on this earth. It is true that he must cooperate, but it is vain, or unnecessary for him to spend both day and night to gain the wealth of the world; that is, the amount of it that is needed for his comfort and well-being. I do not believe the Lord planned the night as a work time, but for the time of rest. Or, in the words of our passage, the night is the time that God giveth his beloved sleep. If man were satisfied with the things actually necessary for his happiness in this life, he could do enough in the day time to get the production of the earth going, whether direct or indirect, that would be required for his consumption, and then while he was sleeping the Lord would be still at work with the laws of nature while his beloved was thus getting his needful rest in sleep.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
The Gifts of Sleep
So he giveth unto his beloved sleep.Psa 127:2
This is a psalm of prosperity, and of how it comes. It is sung in the ear of those who boast themselves as able to command success. They have, to begin with, the common ambition to rear a home, to keep it safe, and to fill it with plenty. Since, however, they do not ask these things of God, they cannot be sure of them. If God does not work with them, their own labour will be lost. They may toil at the walls and find that the rain or the wind foils them. They may build on a peopled hill, and take turns to man the ramparts, and yet, by stealth or force, the city may be taken and their home wrecked. They may be up before dawn, and be busy until the light fails, only to sit down to a table where the very bread seems made of the pains by which it was earned. For nothing they have made themselves so anxious that they could not sleep when they would.
As a pendant to that bustling scene, we have this picture of peace. The figure is that of the man who cares only to do Gods will and trusts God to work by him and for him. He lies under a canopy of Love Divine, with closed eyes, calm face, and restful hands. As we look, we seem to know that these sheltering walls are God-built; and that this peace is God-kept; and that God, with the morn, shall spread the table, and call His guest. All that the sleepless pant after, this man has, and he has his sleep too, both full and sound. Soby God Himself being builder, keeper, hosthe giveth unto his beloved sleep.
Mrs. Browning has told us that there was no verse in the Book of Psalms which fell upon her ear with such comfort as this
Of all the thoughts of God that are
Borne inward unto souls afar,
Along the Psalmists music deep,
Now tell me if that any is,
For gift or grace, surpassing this
He giveth His beloved, sleep?
The text yields three shades of meaning. In the one precious gift of sleep, there are really three givings
I.The Giving of Sleep.
II.The Giving in Sleep.
III.The Giving by Sleep.
I
The Giving of Sleep
1. He giveth unto his beloved sleep. The persons to whom this language must be taken to be addressed are the builders and the watchmen of the foregoing verse. For them God provided the gift of sleep. And the harder the building in the daytime, and the keener the watching while the sentry goes his round, the more certain is the man to value the blessing of slumber when God, in love, gives it to him. No doubt, the sleep of the labouring man is sweet. But, if it be only genuine sleep, the boon is far richer when it comes after care than when it comes only after muscular fatigue. We all know how natural are the cries for sleep which Henry IV. is represented as pouring out when he contrasts the lighter woes of the poor, allowing the gift to come, with the heavier anxieties he endured, banishing it from his pillow.
This is what Sancho Panzathe little Spanish peasant with the short legs who acted as squire to Don Quixotesaid about sleep. Sanchos words were: Now blessings light on him who first invented sleep! It covers a man all over, thoughts and all, like a cloak; it is meat for the hungry, drink for the thirsty, heat for the cold, and cold for the hot.1 [Note: C. Jerdan, Messages to the Children, 195.]
I cannot help my heart feeling heavy. I wonder during how many years of my life bed has been the one haven and longed for forgetfulness of care. I do not mean that I have not had much, very much, that I am grateful for, of mere human pleasantness, but that, on the whole, the cares of the day have outweighed the joys and made one glad of bed as an escape. Truly, bed is a wonderful haven, and I do thank God for having given me through so many years sleep. He giveth his beloved sleep; may it not be in this lower sense as well as in the higher? I would fain think so; at least, I know His gift of sleep has been nothing less than a gift of life to me.1 [Note: Life and Letters of Edward Thring, ii. 29.]
I sat up alone; two or three times I paid a visit to the childrens room. It seemed to me, young mothers, that I understood you!Sleep is the mystery of life; there is a profound charm in this darkness broken by the tranquil light of the night-lamp, and in this silence measured by the rhythmic breathings of two young sleeping creatures. It was brought home to me that I Was looking on at a marvellous operation of nature, and I watched it in no profane spirit. I sat silently listening, a moved and hushed spectator of this poetry of the cradle, this ancient and ever new benediction of the family, this symbol of creation sleeping under the wing of God, of our consciousness withdrawing into the shade that it may rest from the burden of thought, and of the tomb, that Divine bed, where the soul in its turn rests from life. To sleep is to strain and purify our emotions, to deposit the mud of life, to calm the fever of the soul, to return into the bosom of maternal nature, thence to re-issue, healed and strong. Sleep is a sort of innocence and purification. Blessed be He who gave it to the poor sons of men as the sure and faithful companion of life, our daily healer and consoler.2 [Note: Amiels Journal (trans. by Mrs. Humphry Ward), 38.]
When to soft sleep we give ourselves away,
And in a dream as in a fairy bark
Drift on and on through the enchanted dark
To purple daybreaklittle thought we pay
To that sweet better world we know by day.
We are clean quit of it, as is a lark
So high in heaven no human eye can mark
The thin swift pinion cleaving through the gray.
Till we awake ill fate can do no ill,
The resting heart shall not take up again
The heavy load that yet must make it bleed;
For this brief space the loud worlds voice is still,
No faintest echo of it brings us pain.
How will it be when we shall sleep indeed?3 [Note: Thomas Bailey Aldrich.]
2. Sleep, gift of love and more than golden, is but a word to stand for a rest yet sweeter and deeper. The blessing that drops as from the hovering hands of God upon the wearied frame is but the Amen to the better blessing breathed by the Spirit of God into the spirit of man. First He giveth His beloved peace of heart, and then comes the sign of it in the slumbering nerve and limb. This inner hush and rest is Gods own gift and His dearest love-token. Well do we know that it is no easy boon from His overflowing hand. It is no less than the gift of Himself. He gave Himself to live in our nature and to be for ever one with us and one of us. He gave Himself to do our part and bear our curse. He is ceaselessly giving Himself to us in ruling our lot and touching our heart. Jesus gives each of us the privilege of John, and we are wooed to lie back on His breast and lose ourselves in Him. The moment we do so, His peace flows from His heart to our heart. He giveth His beloved sleep.
Peace within makes peace without. Where there is no disturbance in the heart, there can be none in the billows, there can be none in the storm. These may wanton furiously. Their wild sport may threaten shipwreck to the vessel. But Gods sleep can exist amid them. It can hold in sweet oblivion the untroubled soul. And herein lies its chiefest virtue, its most refreshing use. Among storms and billows it is that the righteous man obtains the full blessedness of sleep. He cannot escape the troubles of life; they are part of the heritage of humanity. He is not exempt from business cares. He can claim no immunity from disaster and defeat. But in all perplexities and all distresses he enjoys the inestimable blessing of a quiet conscience at peace with man, at peace with God. And this will give him rest, refreshment, repose. After the longest and weariest day, he can lie down and lose all painful recollections in the untroubled atmosphere of sleep. For weary heads and aching hearts there is no remedy like this.
How beautifully has the sleep of one at peace with God been represented in a well-known modern picture. The amphitheatre is crowded by a fierce and eager throng; tier after tier is lined with the cruel faces of those who have come there to see the Christian martyr torn to pieces by savage beasts. The arena is prepared. The hungry tiger leaps with impatient roar at the bars of his cage, thirsting for blood. A slave pushes back the doors of the cell where lies the man doomed to death for his adherence to Christ, that he may come forth, and with his dying agonies make sport for the emperor, his court and the people. And what do you see there, as the door opens, and the cell of the martyr is disclosed? A youth sleeping peacefully, with the symbol of his faith clasped to his heart, and heavens own sunshine resting on his face; for all is well between him and God. The death which he knew last night was to be met to-day has no terrors for him; he has made it Christ to live, and shall find it gain to die. Looking on that scene, we have a comment on the inspired verse, Even so he giveth unto his beloved sleep.1 [Note: Canon Bell, The Name above every Name, 237.]
Remember the last moments of a noble Scottish Covenanter, the Earl of Argyleson of the Great Marquiswho was beheaded in 1685. An officer of State came to see him an hour before his execution, and found that he was taking his usual after-dinner sleep. The officer rushed home in a highly excited state, exclaiming, Argyle within an hour of eternity, and sleeping as pleasantly as a child!2 [Note: C. Jerdan, Messages to the Children, 198.]
3. For the enjoyment of this deeper gift, as of the nightly rest, we must put ourselves in the way of it. We have to prepare a welcome for it. We have to let ourselves sleep. We cease from self; we resign responsibility for ourselves; we pass into Gods hands. We are content to do His will and to wait His will. We are sure that His will, whatever it may be, is our true good. We trust a love and wisdom and might infinitely better than our own. Hence a peace that passeth all understandingno care, no fear, no duty too hard, no trial too sore, death no longer a foe and judgment a welcome! Even Godthe Giving Godcould give His beloved no more; for bliss itself shall be but this same peace free from all dispeace and made fully aware of itself.
Martyrs, confessors, and saints have tasted this rest, and counted themselves happy in that they endured. A countless host of Gods faithful servants have drunk deeply of it amid the daily burden of a weary lifedull, commonplace, painful, or desolate. All that God has been to them, He is ready to be to you; He only asks that you should seek no other rest save in Him. It is a rest which has never failed those who honestly sought it. The heart once fairly given to God, with a clear conscience, a fitting rule of life, and a steadfast purpose of obedience, you will find a wonderful sense of rest coming over you. What once fretted you ceases to do so; former unworthy exciting pleasures cease to attract you. No miser ever so feared to lose his treasure as the faithful soul fears to lose this rest when once tasted. Such words may seem exaggeration to those who have not tried it; but the saints will tell you otherwise. St. Paul will tell you of a peace which passeth understanding; Jesus Christ tells you of His peace which the world can neither give nor take away, because it is Gods gift only. Such peace may undergo many an assault, but it will but be confirmed thereby, and rise above all that would trouble it. He who has tasted it would not give it in exchange for all this life can give; and death is to him a passage from this rest to that of eternity.1 [Note: Jean Nicolas Grou, The Hidden Life of the Soul.]
II
Giving in Sleep
There cannot be the slightest doubt that the English equivalent for the Hebrew words is, He giveth to His beloved in sleep. He giveth blessing to His beloved during sleep. If the words so rendered are less perfect rhythmically, and suggest a less beautiful meaning or no meaning at all, we cannot help it. Some may think that this is almost a wanton and needless interference with a verse rendered sacred by long association; but when we consider that it really is the deepest line in the poem, the line which sums up and expresses the central thought of the poet, that where it stands it is a highly original thought, a genuine poetic flash, and that the old rendering of it robs it of its freshness and makes it very commonplace, we feel bound to make a little sacrifice of association and soothing sound in the interest of truth and fact.
The theme of the Psalmist is that, apart from the Divine blessing and working, all human effort is vain. By his own unaided efforts man can effect nothing. Even in such a matter as the building of a house, where, apparently, the hands of man accomplish everything and God is not in evidence at all, it is really God who builds. He has supplied the material. He has supplied the mind and the strength by which the material is shaped and put in its place. The watchers on the walls of the city may be never so vigilant and active, and everything may seem to depend on their wakefulness and care; but unless God watches with them and through them, their vigilance will avail nothing.
Moreover, God works when men do not work at all. He blesses and prospers them without effort of their own. The builders go home after a hard days toil and, laying themselves down to rest, get fresh strength for their work; and God, by giving them sleep, is really building the house. The guards on the city wall retire in turn and betake themselves to repose, and God by this gift of sleep is Himself watching all the while. He blesses all who love Him when they know it not. He blesses us and furthers the work of spiritual life while we work not, blesses us silently, as if in the watches of the night, when we are all unconscious of it. Yes, He giveth to His beloved in sleep.
The whole thought has a certain kinship with the teaching of our Lord when He says, Be not anxious for the morrow. Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin; and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. God blesses them, as it were, without effort of their own; they, as it were, dream through life. They are silent, receptive; He gives them beauty in their flower-sleep. Or perhaps it comes still closer to our Lords beautiful parable of the silent, unseen, unconscious growth of the spiritual life, both in the soul of man and in the spread of His Kingdom in the world: And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; and should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how.1 [Note: E. B. Speirs, A Present Advent, 280.]
1. Gods secret ministry is patent in our infancy. The little child is yet, so to say, asleep. His conscious environment is a very tiny and a very dreamy one. His heaven, as some one has said, is only three feet high! The familiar cares that are lying upon the hearts of those about him mean nothing for him; still less is he awake to the greater life that is passing out of doors. And that is as it should be. We would feel it unnatural if he understood too much of what went on about him. The things that occupy his elders minds, the work of which their hands are full, ought to have no concern for him. It is right that he should be unconscious of all that. Watchers by a bedside may settle great affairs while the sleeper does not stir. And so, pillowed on innocence, the little child should be all unaware of the life that plays around it; so far as this goes, it should be asleep. All the while stooping over it there is a mothers love, and all the splendour of a mothers patience. Shielding it there is a fathers strength, and to provide for all it needs, a fathers labour. And it is clad, and fed with food convenient, and cradled to rest, and sheltered from the storm. And should it ail, the best skill in the city is urgently summoned to the tiny sufferer. What a wealth of love and of loves care is here, yet who more passive than that little infant! Have these small hands helped in the preparation? Has that new heart done any of the planning? Helpless it lies, and doomed to certain death, if life depended on its puny efforts. But God giveth unto his beloved sleep.
We cannot underrate the enormous importance of discipline and training in childhood and youth, nor the enormous importance of teaching children to help themselves; but how much of the influence which goes to mould our human nature in its early days, and to build it up, is of the silent sortsubtle influences from nature with which children have an inborn kinship; subtle influences from the impalpable atmosphere of homenay, whisperings to the childs soul, we know not from whence; voices coming to them in their pure slumbers while they are Still in the temple of first intuitions and innocence, and have not yet gone out to mingle in the deafening din of the busy world? Samuel, Samuel: and Samuel, knowing not who calls, answered in his dreams, Here am I.1 [Note: E. B. Speirs, A Present Advent, 285.]
You cast an acorn into the ground and for a time it lies as dead. But natures hidden ministries gather round it. The humours of the earth begin to soften its dry husk; the gentle rain sets the sap aflowing; heavens sunshine tempts the tender shoot above the ground; and by-and-by a noble tree stands there, tossing its arms in defiance of the tempest through a thousand winters. And the roots of all true life and character are planted as deep as this, and nourished in ways as subtle and unknown. Long before men are alive to His presence with them in their life, long before they have learned to resist temptation and to cultivate the love of His will, long before they know to choose the good and refuse the evil, God has begun His wonderful ministry to their souls. Already His good Spirit is putting the seed of a true manhood in them, and straightway it springeth and groweth up, a man knoweth not how. So in the opening of their days He may bless His children while they reck not of itgiving to them, so to say, in sleep.1 [Note: A. Martin, Winning the Soul, 69.]
2. The same gracious ministry accompanies us in our pursuit of happiness. If anywhere in life, it is just there that it is vain to rise up early and to sit up late. Not when we are determined, come what may, to have a pleasant and a happy life; not then, as the reward of that insistence, does God bestow the music of the heart. He gives us when there is forgetfulness of self, and the struggle to be true to what is highest, though the morning break without a glimpse of blue, and the path be through the valley of the shadow. The one sure way to miss the gift of happiness is to rise early and to sit up late for it. To be bent at every cost on a good time is the sure harbinger of dreary days. It is when we have the courage to forget all that, and to lift up our hearts to do the will of God, that, like a swallow flashing from the eaves, happiness glances out with glad surprise.
In spite of his depressed condition, John Stuart Mill was able to do his usual work at the India Office. But it was done mechanically. He felt no interest in it. Melancholy ruled him. He began to ask whether life was worth living on such terms. I generally answered to myself, he says, that I did not think I could possibly bear it beyond a year. At length relief came to him. It came in a curious way. He was reading some biography, in which the pathos of an incident in the story so overcame him that he gave way to tears. The discovery that emotion was still within him, and that he had the power to feel for others, was salvation to him. From this moment my burden grew lighter. The oppression of the thought that all feeling was dead within me was gone. I was no longer hopeless. I was not a stock or a stone. I had still, it seemed, some of the material out of which all worth of character, and all capacity for happiness, are made. His old interests now revived. The cloud which had so darkened his life withdrew, and existence became to him once again pleasant and useful. He still believed that happiness is the test of all rules of conduct, but he had learned that this end was to be attained only by not making it the direct end. Those only are happy who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness; on the happiness of others, on the improvement of mankind, even on some art or pursuit, followed not as a means, but as itself an ideal end. Aiming thus at something else, they find happiness by the way.1 [Note: H. Lewis, Modern Rationalism, 103.]
3. All through our life Gods secret ministry is at work, and we owe much to it when we are called to lift the burden off our shoulders and rest a little. Less or more these grateful interruptions of our toil occur in the lives of all men, and, living at the pressure most of us do, they are as necessary as they are welcome. And it would be a pity if any one failed to reap from such a season the full benefit it was meant to bring him. Leisure is a good gift, and to be used wisely; and for leisure also we shall give account. Therefore let a man use it even earnestly if he will. Let him take advantage of it to pass his lifes affairs heedfully in review. Let him ask how things stand with him in Gods sight. Let him examine carefully his works and ways, and mend his plans for the future. But let him not forget the wisdom of a wise passiveness. Besides this conscious rearrangement of the life with all its interests and duties there is another benefit conceivable. Simply to have escaped from the crush and din of the life we have been living, and to breathe a freer, calmer atmospherethis alone may mean much for us. While the mind lies fallow it may gather to itself fresh life and power. The finest invigoration of the souls whole faculties may come to it in the profoundest rest. For God blesses His beloved while they sleep.
The sect called the Quietists, who flourished in the seventeenth century, and who taught that God came closest to the soul when it simply waited for Him, and did not actively search for Him, may have too exclusively chosen the Psalmists line for their motto, and its spirit as their guide in the religious life. But there is a sense in which we must all be Quietists, and rest from thinking and working that God may come to us in our dreams. To cherish such a belief, to feel that everything does not depend on us, far from being a hindrance to work, a temptation to spiritual idleness, is just the one thing which can enable us to do our work efficiently, because it enables us to do it without worry and over-anxiety.2 [Note: E. B. Speirs, A Present Advent, 290.]
God gives to many of us in our waking state, but not to the highest, not to the best beloved. Talent is got by waking, but not genius. Genius is like the nightingaleunconscious of the beauty of its own song. Even so is there a genius of the spirit. There are souls that win their virtue in the school of stern experience; God gives to them in waking. But there are others, like the garden of Eden, who need not a man to till the ground. They yield their fruit spontaneously. They are beautiful, not because they ought, but because they must. They can no more help being kind than the bee can help making its hive. They are not under the law, but under grace, and so they do everything, not legally, but gracefully. The flowers of their hearts are wild flowers; God alone has tended them; they have bloomed in the light of His smile; they have called no man master. These are they to whom the Father giveth in sleep.1 [Note: G. Matheson, Searchings in the Silence, 101.]
III
Giving by Sleep
1. A Godlike boon it is that frees us from our drudgery, heals our weariness, lifts our anxiety, and blinds us to the morrow. It is a blessed thing to be thus saved, even for a little while, from ourselves. But the night draws to dawn, and the gift of sleep is spent, and the old life claims the man anew. Now is it that he finds the gifts which God brings by sleep. He faces life with these in hand, and faces it therefore with new courage and vigour. His body has been strengthened, his mind cleared, his heart nerved, his will re-strung.
Wonderful is the work of repair in life that goes on while we sleep. Men bring the great ships to dock after they have ploughed the waves or battled with the storms and are battered and strained and damaged, and there they are repaired and made ready to go to sea again. At night our jaded and exhausted bodies are dry-docked after the days conflict and toils, and while we sleep the mysterious process of restoration and reinvigoration goes on; and when morning comes we are ready to begin a new day of toil and care. We lie down tired, feeling sometimes that we can never do another days work; but the morning comes again, and we rise renewed in body and spirit, full of enthusiasm, and strong and brave for the hardest duties.
The author of The Mystery of Sleep, Dr. John Bigelow, is not satisfied with the ordinary answer, that we sleep in order that we may rest and repair the waste tissues. He does not believe that that is a satisfactory answer to the question as to why we are compelled to sleep one hour out of three, eight hours out of every twenty-four, four months out of every year, and twenty-three years out of every threescore years and ten. He seriously assails this position by asserting that we do not rest when we sleep in any sense in which we do not rest when awake. He pertinently asks: What faculty of the spiritual or the physical nature of man is in repose during sleep? What single function or energy of the body is then absolutely suspended? Certainly not our hearts, which do not enjoy a moments rest from the hour of our birth to our decease. The heart is always engaged in the effort to send our blood, latent with vital energy, through every vein, artery, and tissue of our bodies. And so he goes on, taking up various organs of the human frame, and shows that nothing rests while we sleep.
He goes on to say that the great purpose of sleep is to dissociate us periodically from the world in which we live, and in a sense to regenerate us morally and spiritually. To his mind, we have in sleep conditions which are in harmony with one of the supreme behests of a Christian lifeutter deliverance from the domination of the phenomenal world; entire emancipation, for these few sleeping hours, from the cares and ambitions of the life into which we were born, and to the indulgence of which we are inclined by nature to surrender the service of all our vital energies. If it be a good thing to live above the world, to regard our earthly life as transitory, as designed to educate us for a more elevated existence, to serve us as a means, not an end, then we have in sleep, apparently, an ally and coadjutorat least, to the extent of delivering us for several hours every day from a servile dependence upon what ought to be a good slave, but is always a bad master.1 [Note: 1 L. A. Banks, The Great Promises of the Bible, 88.]
2. Gifts of spiritual illumination and direction have come through sleep. When God shuts the doors of sense, He keeps open His own way into the spirit; and many a time He gives His beloved thoughts of truth and desires for good that surprise the sleeper when he gets himself back again. He awakes to earth as one come from heaven, with the life of heaven still pulsing in his heart. How plain his duty is! how sure his help! how bright his hope! Abraham fell into a deep sleep, and in it God gave him a vision of what we often desire, that of the future; he told him that four hundred years hence the people of Israel would come out of Egypt and march in triumph to the Promised Land. Jacob, when he ran away from home, lay down to sleep, putting a stone beneath his head for a pillow, and as he lay there he dreamed of heaven. A ladder of light came down from the Throne of God, and on it angels ascending and descending; what a delightful experience in sleep, a vision of Heaven, a sight of Home. But there is still more in the vision; the ladder is a beautiful type of Jesus Christ. He has been let down from Gods Throne, so that men may reach the feet of their Father in Heaven.
There is an advice of my old mothers which I have often acted upon, and I pass it on to you: Before doing an action which may mean, by-and-by, a great crisis, sleep on it for a night or two. Do not act at once, or you may be foolish. After a good sleep, at least a mans nerves are steady and his brain and mind are well-balanced. God gives these to men in their sleep.1 [Note: W. K. Bryce, Appeals to the Soul, 68.]
The hours of day are like the waves
That fret against the shores of sin:
They touch the human everywhere,
The bright-divine fades in their glare,
And Gods sweet voice the spirit craves
Is heard too faintly in the din.
When all the senses are awake,
The mortal presses overmuch
Upon the great immortal part,
And God seems farther from the heart.
Must souls, like skies when day-dawns break,
Lose star by star at sunlights touch?
But when the sun kneels in the west
And gradually sinks as great hearts sink,
And in his sinking flings adown
Bright blessings from his fading crown,
The stars begin their song of rest
And shadows make the thoughtless think.
The human seems to fade away,
And down the starred and shadowed skies
The heavenly comes, as memories come
Of home to hearts afar from home,
And through the darkness after day
Many a winged angel flies.
And somehow, tho the eyes see less,
Our spirits seem to see the more;
When we look thro nights shadow-bars,
The soul Bees more than shining stars
Yea, sees the very loveliness
That rests upon the golden shore.1 [Note: Father Ryan.]
3. By a last sleep God leads His beloved to a perfect life and an endless day. Death is the sinking of the wearied man into the lap of Nature that she may soothe and refresh him. It is the draught that relaxes the strained energies, and smoothes the brow of care, and cools the fever of the heart; and from its gentle sway the man emerges with his powers refitted and rebraced for the toil and endeavours of his life. And what is Death but this? It is a sleep, no more; a sleep in which earths weariness is drowned for ever and care and sorrow sink into perpetual oblivion and the whole nature is finally recruited and refreshed for unending service elsewhere.
After forty years of indefatigable toil, Huxley retired to his home at Eastbourne on the cliffs of Englands southern coasts, still to breast the storms and enjoy the love and confidence of friends and foes, who, however much they agreed with or differed from him, gave him their united and hearty esteem. He died on June 29, 1895. His gravestone bears these significant and touching lines written by his wife:
Be not afraid, ye waiting hearts that weep:
For still He giveth His belovd sleep:
And if an endless sleep He wills,
So best.
This is beautiful resignation; but we believe that He who giveth His belovd sleep will assign to him eternal rest from earthly misgiving and fear, and also an appropriate sphere of future activity. Surely an existence so nobly filled with higher forms of human effort cannot be doomed to the extinction of endless sleep!1 [Note: S. P. Cadman, Charles Darwin, and Other English Thinkers, 86.]
Out yonder in the moonlight, wherein Gods Acre lies,
Go angels walking to and fro, singing their lullabies.
Their radiant wings are folded, and their eyes are bended low,
As they sing among the beds whereon the flowers delight to grow
Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd guardeth His sheep.
Fast speedeth the night away,
Soon cometh the glorious day;
Sleep, weary ones, while ye may,
Sleep, oh, sleep!
The flowers within Gods Acre see that fair and wondrous sight,
And hear the angels singing to the sleepers through the night;
And, lo! throughout the hours of day those gentle flowers prolong
The music of the angels in that tender slumber-song,
Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd loveth His sheep.
He that guardeth His flock the best
Hath folded them to His loving breast;
So sleep ye now, and take your rest,
Sleep, oh, sleep!
From angel and from flower the years have learned that soothing song,
And with its heavenly music speed the days and nights along;
So through all time, whose flight the Shepherds vigils glorify,
Gods Acre slumbereth in the grace of that sweet lullaby,
Sleep, oh, sleep!
The Shepherd loveth His sheep.
Fast speedeth the night away,
Soon cometh the glorious day;
Sleep, weary ones, while ye may,
Sleep, oh, sleep!2 [Note: Eugene Field, Second Book of Verse, 25.]
Literature
Banks (L. A.), The Great Promises of the Bible, 87.
Bell (C. D.), The Name above every Name, 232.
Boyd (A. K. H.), The Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson, i. 54.
Bryce (W. K.), Appeals to the Soul, 60.
Burns (D.), The Song of the Well, 77.
Christopherson (H.), Sermons, 43.
Jerdan (C.), Messages to the Children, 193.
Lefroy (E. C.), The Christian Ideal, 92.
McFadyen (J. E.), The Divine Pursuit, 83.
Martin (A.), Winning the Soul, 65.
Matheson (G.), Searchings in the Silence, 101.
Matheson (G.), Rests by the River, 198.
Miller (J. R.), A Help for the Common Days, 247.
Morrison (G. H.), The Wings of the Morning, 24.
Purves (P. C.), The Divine Cure for Heart Trouble, 295.
Speirs (E. B.), A Present Advent, 276.
Spurgeon (C. H.), New Park Street Pulpit, i. (1855), No. 12.
Church of England Pulpit, xxxvii. 205 (C. L. Coghlan).
Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible
vain: Psa 39:5, Psa 39:6, Ecc 1:14, Ecc 2:1-11, Ecc 2:20-23, Ecc 4:8
rise up: Pro 31:15-18
the bread: Gen 3:17-19, Ecc 6:7
for so he: Psa 3:5, Psa 4:8, Ecc 5:12, Jer 31:26, Eze 34:25, Act 12:5, Act 12:6
Reciprocal: Lev 26:6 – ye shall Deu 8:18 – he that Deu 16:3 – the bread 1Ki 22:27 – bread of affliction Pro 3:24 – and Pro 31:18 – her candle Ecc 2:22 – and of the Ecc 2:23 – all Ecc 5:17 – he eateth Ecc 8:16 – there is that Isa 30:20 – the bread Isa 37:27 – their inhabitants Hab 2:13 – is it Luk 5:5 – we
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
IF HE SLEEP, HE SHALL DO WELL
So He giveth His beloved sleep.
Psa 127:2
We take the sleep in our text as denoting death, and confine ourselves to an illustration of the passage under this one point of view. Here we have an idea which it would be well to work out in detail. God values death. He must value that which He reserves for the objects of His love. There are two great reasons to be given why death should be regarded as a gift to the believer, and why, therefore as being a gift, it should be called precious or valuable in Gods sight.
I. Regard the believer as testifying to the finished work of Christ.What evidence of the complete success of the scheme of redemption can exceed or equal that which is furnished by the death of Gods saints? That which they could never have learned from natural theology the Gospel has taught them: they have learned how to die. Thus the Gospel is put, as it were, to the greatest possible trial; and the trial does but issue in full evidence of its sufficiency.
II. Regard the believer as admitted in and through death into final security.Having fought the good fight and kept the faith dying as well as living, the righteous are henceforward placed beyond the reach of danger. Nothing can put their salvation in peril. If they be not crowned till the morning of resurrection, a crown is laid up for them which no thief can rifle and no moth corrupt. The death is a precious gift because the life is perilous; and God bestows a benefit on His people when He has gathered them into a separate state, because then they can be no more tempted to the forsaking of His law, no more exposed to the assaults of the Evil One, no more challenged to a battle in which, if victory be glorious, there is all the risk of a shameful defeat.
Canon Melvill.
Illustration
Sleep is here not contrasted with labour, but with trouble and care, and expresses the freedom from trouble and the peace of the man who reposes in Gods protection. The explanation of the last clause of the verse which is now generally followed is this: God is represented as giving to those whom He loves in sleep, that is without any fatiguing toil on their part, all things that are for their own good. Sleep is evidently contrasted with the late working of those who do not give themselves up to Gods protection, and who are alluded to in the first part of the verse.
Psa 128:1
THE PICTURE OF A GODLY MAN
Every one that feareth the Lord.
Psa 128:1
I. This is a perfectly-cut cameothe picture of a godly man, who fears God, and walks in His ways.It is a picture of an ideal home, such as was to be found in the best days of the Hebrew people, and is still to be found wherever the light of Christ has shone. Here is the husband and father, reverent and devout, coming from the hour of his private prayer, with the peace of God on his face, happy in himself and home, a benediction to wife and children, respected among his fellow-men, and successful in garnering the results of his toils. Our late Poet-Laureate has told us that the womans cause is mans; they rise or sink together, dwarfed or god-like, bond or free. If she be small, slight-natured, miserable, how shall men grow?
But surely the contrary holds also, that where man is noble, chivalrous, high-minded, leal-hearted, the woman (other things being equal) will become his worthy helpmate. If, then, a man fears God and walks in His ways, it will have the most ennobling effect possible on the wife, in the innermost parts of the house, and on the children around his table. Thus shall the man be blessed.
Then comes the statelier Eden back to man,
Then reign the worlds great bridals, chaste and calm;
Then springs the crowning race of humankind.
May these things be!
II. Though it seem impossible that the Psalmists ideal should ever be realised, yet go on fearing the Lord and walking in His ways.Be not weary in well-doing. Finally, the right, and holy, and loving influence of your Christian character will gain its silent mastery, as Gods will in the great household of creation.
Illustration
This psalm is not supplementary to Psalms 127. Even externally they do not indicate any closer connection, or least of all, such a resemblance that one psalm is to be regarded as a response to the other, sung by the congregation in chorus. There is a similarity in some of the ideas, in the aphoristic mode of expression, and in the felicitation at the end of the one and at the beginning of the other, but these do not oblige us to hold a contemporaneous composition.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
Psa 127:2. It is vain for you Builders or watch-men, or other persons engaged in any design, which to you seems important; to rise up early, to sit up late To use constant and unwearied diligence; to eat the bread of sorrows Or, the bread of fatigue, as some render it; to labour hard, and fare poorly. For so By his blessing, and not singly by industry without it; or, as the word is rendered in the margin, certainly, or since, as Dr. Hammond translates it; he giveth his beloved sleep His people, who, though hated and maligned by men, are beloved of God, and over whom his providence watcheth in a special manner. He gives them quiet rest, both of body and mind, and that freely, without that immoderate toiling and drudgery wherewith others pursue it. Observe, reader, the psalmist does not intend to say that labour and diligence are vain, but that they are so unless the Lord be with and bless the labourer: the business is not to be done by all the industry and pains, all the care and labour in the world, without him; whereas, if his aid be called in, if part of our time be spent in prayer, and not the whole of it in prayerless care and labour, our work will become easier and go on better: a solicitude and anxiety for its success and completion will no longer prey upon our minds by day, and break our rest at night; we shall cheerfully fulfil our daily tasks, and then, with confidence and resignation, lay our heads upon our pillows, and God will give us sweet and undisturbed sleep, which shall fit us to return every morning with renewed vigour and alacrity to our stated employments: see Horne.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
127:2 [It is] vain for {c} you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread {d} of sorrows: [for] so he giveth his beloved {e} sleep.
(c) Who watch and ward and are also magistrates and rulers of the city.
(d) Either that which is gained by hard labour, or eaten with grief of mind.
(e) Not exempting them from labour, but making their labours comfortable and as it were a rest.