This psalm may be divided into two equal parts, the first of which describes the happiness of those who trust in God and not in man, ver. 1-5, while the second gives the reason, drawn from the divine perfections, ver. 6 10. The psalm is distinguished from the Davidic series which precedes it (cxxxviii.-cxlv.) by its whole internal character. At the same time its coincidences of expression with the one immediately before it shew that it was meant to be used in connection with it, and may therefore be regarded as the closing psalm of the whole series beginning with Ps. cxxxv., and belonging to the time of Haggai and Zechariah, to which the psalm before us is expressly referred in the Septuagint Version.
1. Hallelujah! Praise, 0 my soul, Jehovah! See above, Ps. ciii. 1, 22, civ. 1, 35. The Hallelujah never appears in any psalm which bears the name of David, and is, indeed, as characteristic of the later psalms as the Selah is of the more ancient.
2. I will praise Jehovah while I live; I will make music to my God while I still (exist). For the literal meaning of these words, see above, on Ps. civ. 33, from which they are borrowed, with the unimportant change of sing to praise.
3. Trust ye not in princes, in the son of man, to whom there is no salvation, who cannot save either himself or others, but is wholly dependent upon God. Compare Ps. xl. 5 (4), lxxv. 7, 8 (6, 7), cviii. 13, cxvi. 11, cxliv. 10. This may be regarded as an exhortation to men in general from Israel, an exhortation founded on his own experience.
4. Forth goes his spirit, he returns to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish. For the meaning of the first clause, see above, on Ps. civ. 29. The primary idea of breath and the secondary one of spirit run into each other in the usage of the Hebrew word (rPIl), so that either may be expressed in the translation, without entirely excluding the other, ffis thoughts, his vain notions or ambitious schemes.
5. Happy he whose help is the God of Jacob, (and) his reliance on Jehovah his God. Whose help, literally in whose help, i. e. engaged, employed in it, or more probably among whose helpers. Compare Ps. xlv. 10 (9), liv. 6 (4), xcix. 6, cxviii. 7. The divine name (7N) here used suggests the idea of almighty power, as opposed to that of human weakness. Reliance, literally expectation, hope; but the first idea is necessarily suggested by the preposition on.
6. Who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that (is) in them—the (one) keeping truth for ever. Two reasons are here given for thus relying upon God; his almighty power, as exercised and proved in the creation of the world, and his unchangeable fidelity. See above, Ps. xxv. 5. Who made, literally making, with the usual reference to God’s creative power as still exerted in the sustentation of the universe. See above, on Ps. lxv. 7 (6), cxxi. 2, cxliv. 2,
7. Doing justice to the oppressed—giving bread to the hungry—Jehovah, freeing (or the liberator of) the bound. He is not only able but accustomed to relieve those in distress, of whom several distinct classes are here specified as samples. Compare Ps. xxxvii. 19, lxviii. 6, 7 (5, 6), cvii. 5, 9, 10, cxlv. 14. Hunger and captivity are both familiar figures for spiritual evils, as well as literal designations of external ones, both which may here be considered as included.
8. Jehovah opens (the eyes of) the blind; Jehovah raises up the bowed dotrn; Jehovah loves the righteous. The ellipsis in the first clause is not so harsh in Hebrew as in English, because the verb (nj^S) is almost confined, in usage, to the eyes, and would at once suggest them to a Hebrew reader. All the verbs are of the participial form, opening, raising, loving, i. e. continually doing so. The first clause is applicable both to bodily and mental blindness. Compare Deut. xxviii. 29, Isa. lix. 10, Job. xii. 25. The second clause is borrowed from Ps. cxlv. 14.
9. Jehovah preserves strangers; orphan and widow he relieves; and the way of wicked men makes crooked. The stranger, the orphan, and the widow are constantly presented in the Law as objects of compassion and beneficence. See above, on Ps. lxviii. 6, 7 (5, 6). Believes, restores, raises up from their low condition. As a straight path is an emblem of prosperity, to render one’s path crooked is to involve him in calamity. The same verb is applied, in a moral sense, to the perverse conduct of the wicked, Ps. cxix. 78.
10. Jehovah (reigns and) shall reign to eternity; thy God, O Zion, to generation and generation. Hallelujah (praise ye Jab)! The psalm closes with a grand sentence from the song of Moses, Exod. xv. 18, to which a parallel clause is added, and a concluding Hallelujah, winding up the whole series of psalms, supposed to have been sung at the completion of the second temple.
