The Fourth Book, according to the ancient traditional division of the Psalter, opens with the oldest Psalm in the collection. Or rather the author of the present arrangement, who was probably no other than Ezra, placed this sublime composition by itself, between the two great divisions of the book, containing respectively the Earlier and Later Psalms. See the Preface, p. 6. It may therefore be regarded as the heart or centre of the whole collection, and indeed as the model upon which even David, “the sweet psalmist of Israel “ (2 Sam. xxiii. 1), formed that glorious body of psalmodic literature or hymnology, which, with its later but inspired and authoritative imitations, constitutes the present Book of Psalms. The date of the composition, though uncertain because not recorded, may with most probability be fixed near the close of the Error in the Wilderness, when the dying out of the older generation on account of their transgressions, and the threatened exclusion of Moses himself from the Promised Land, were exactly suited to produce such views of man’s mortality and sinfulness as are here presented, but without destroying the anticipation of a bright futurity, such as really ensued upon the death of Moses, and is prospectively disclosed in the conclusion of this psalm. Its great theme is the frailty and brevity of human life, considered as the consequence of sin, and as a motive to repentance and obedience. He first contrasts the eternity of God with the mortality of man, ver. 1-6, which is then described as the effect of the divine wrath on account of sin, ver. 7-11, and made the ground of apr-yer, with which the psalm concludes, for the speedy restoration of the divine favour, ver. 12-17.
1. A Prayer. By Hosts, the Man of God. Lord, a home hast thou been to us, in generation and generation. The psalm is called a prayer, because the petition at the close (ver. 12-17) contains the essence of the composition, to which the rest is merely preparatory. For another case precisely similar, see above, on Ps. lxxxvi. 1. The correctness of the title, which ascribes the psalm to Moses, is confirmed by its unique simplicity and grandeur; its appropriateness to his times and circumstances, as ah-eady stated; its resemblance to the law in urging the connection between sin and death; its similarity of diction to the poetical portions of the Pentateuch, without the slightest trace of imitation or quotation; its marked unlikeness to the psalms of David, and still more to those of later date; and finally, the proved impossibility of plausibly assigning it to any other age or author. The arguments against its authenticity have commonly been framed by a preposterous inversion of the evidence, converting into proofs of later date the very points of similarity which prove that this was the original and model psalm, the primeval basis upon which even David reared a noble superstructure of his own. The title Man of God is given to Moses, in Deut. xxxiii. 1, Josh. xiv. 6, Ezra iii. 2. and is often applied to later prophets, especially Elijah and Elisha. See 1 Sam. ii. 27, 1 Kings xvii. 18, 24, xx. 28, 2 Kings i. 13, iv. 9, 21, 27, 42. It is here significant, implying that Moses wrote the psalm in this capacity. See above, on Ps. xviii. 1, xxxvi. 1, where David is in like manner called the Servant of Jehovah, a title given to Moses himself in the account of his death, Deut. xxxiv. 5, as David, on the other hand, is called the Man of God, 2 Chron. viii. 14. Instead of hast been some read art; but though the preterite of other verbs may be used to express general truths, the present of the substantive verb is so commonly suppressed, that its form, when inserted, must have some significance. The truth seems to be, that the verse expresses only what God had been, but implies what he still was and still would be. A home, a fixed or settled dwelling, even while they wandered in the desert. The same noun is used by Moses, Deut. xxvi. 15, and a kindred form, Deut. xxxiii. 27. In generation and generation, in all successive generations. See above, on Ps. x. 6, xxxiii. 11, xlv. 18 (17), xlix. 12 (11), lxi. 7 (6).
2. Before mountains were horn^ and (before) thou hadst brought forth earth and land, and (indeed) yVom eternity to eternity, thou (art) God. The mountains are first mentioned, according to a scriptural usage which describes them as the oldest portions of the earth. See Gen. xlix. 26, Num. xxiii. 7, Deut. xxxiii. 15, Hab. iii. 6. By a strong but common and intelligible figure, creation is here described as generation. This is true not only of the first verb but of the second, which is too vaguely rendered in the common version (thou hadst formed). Earth, as opposed to heaven; land, as opposed to sea. These are separately mentioned, as in the account of the creation. See Gen. i. 1,9. The last clause may also be translated, thou art, 0 God! It then simply asserts his existence from eternity. According to the other and more usual construction, it likewise asserts his omnipotence, the attribute denoted by the dinne name here employed. This is the fuller and more comprehensive sense; but in favour of the other may be urged, that it is simpler and agrees best with the proximate design of the Psalmist to contrast the eternal God with short-lived man.
3. Thou turnest man even to dust, and sayest, Return, sons of Man (or Adam)! The evident allusion to Gen. iii. 19, which is also found in Job X. 9, xxxiv. 15, and reappears in Ps. civ. 29 (compare Ps. ciii. 14), may serve to determine the meaning of the word translated dust in the first clause, but which is properly an adjective signifying crushed, broken to pieces, ground to powder, and is figuratively applied, in Ps. xxxiv. 19 (18), to brokenness of heart. Compare Isa. lvii. 15. The Hebrew preposition (“7^) is stronger than our to, and means as far as, even to. The full sense of the whole phrase is, even to the state of one completely crushed or ground to powder, even to a pulverised condition. The shortness and fragility of human life is thus brought into the strongest contrast with the eternity of God.
4. For a thousand years in thine eyes (are) as yesterday when it is past and a watch in the night. However long human life may appear to man himself, it is in God’s sight evanescent and contemptible. Even the patriarchal measure, which so often approximated to a thousand years, was in God’s sight like a single day in man’s, or rather like a mere subdivision of it, a third part of the night, which was divided by the ancient Hebrews into three watches. See above, on Ps. lxiii. 7 (6). That this division was as old as Moses, may be seen from Exod. xiv. 24. When it is past, or passing. It might also be translated, for it passes, i. e. no less hastily and swiftly. This verse is quoted and amplified, but without any change of meaning, 2 Pet. iii. 8.
5. Thou sweepest them away—a sleep are they—in the morning, like the grass, they pass away. The first Hebrew verb has no equivalent in English; it means to sweep away or carry off, as by a driving rain. The supposition of a reference to the flood is not necessary, though admissible. A derivative form of the same verb occurs above, Ps. lxxvii. 18 (17). The comparison of human life to a sleep or dream is common in all languages. The morning is mentioned as the time of waking, the time when we are most impressed with the unsubstantial nature of our dreams. See above, Ps. lxxiii. 20, and compare Ps. xxxix. 7 (6). The grass is an additional but obvious emblem of caducity. The last verb is not a plural form in Hebrew, but agrees with sleep, or rather with man, in the generic sense, whose life is here compared to sleep.
6. In the morning it blooms and (then) passes away, (for) at evening he mows and it withers. The mention of the morning, in ver. 5, as following the night, suggests the mention of the morning here, as followed by the evening. The first verb means not merely to flourish in the wide sense, but to bloom, as plants do. See above, on Ps. lxxii. 16, and compare Num. xvii. 23 (8), which proves it to be a Mosaic expression. The verbs may agree with grass, or with man, whom the grass represents, more probably the latter. The idea conveyed by supplying then is really involved in the grammatical relation of the Hebrew verbs, the second of which never means to grow or sprout, but always to pass or undergo a change. The third verb is active, but may be construed with an indefinite subject, and is then equivalent in meaning to a passive, he is mourn and withers. The withering is not here referred to as the effect of natural decay but of violent excision. With the whole verse compare Ps. xxxvii. 2, ciii. 15, Job xiv. 2.
7. For we fail in thine anger, and in thy wrath are we affrighted. The natural decay or violent interruption of man’s life is the effect of God’s displeasure. The first verb means to waste away, decay, wear out, cease to exist. Compare its use in Ps. lxxi. 9, lxxiii. 26. The other verb is very inadequately represented by the English troubled. It means shocked, confounded, agitated, terror-stricken. See above, on Ps. ii. 5, vi. 3, 4 (2, 3), xlviii. 6 (5), lxxviii. 33, lxxxiii. 16 (15), and below, on Ps. civ. 29, and compare my note on Isa. lxv. 23. It here denotes the natural instinctive dread of death. There is here a very sensible progression in the thought. Thus far the Psalmist had insisted merely on the frailty and brevity of human life; but now he proceeds further and propounds the fearful doctrine, that this sorrowful mortality is not an accident but an infliction, the direct effect of the divine wrath. Whatever instrumental agencies may be employed to kill us, our real destroyer is the anger of our Maker.
8. Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret (sins) in the light of thy countenance. As man’s mortality is the effect of God’s wrath, so this wrath itself is the efl!”ect of sin. And this sin becomes the cause of death. See Gen. ii. 17, and compare Rom. v. 12. The verse before us represents God in the act of shortening man’s life, and gives the necessary explanation of what might otherwise have seemed at variance with his infinite benevolence. The Bible, as an eminent interpreter has well said, throws the blame of death entirely on man himself. When God slays man, he puts his sins before him, looks directly at them; not only those which are notorious, but those which are concealed from every eye but that of omniscience. See Jer. xvi. 17, Heb. iv. 14, and compare Ps. xix. 15 (14), 1 Cor. iv. 4, 5. Another reading in the last clause, and most probably the true one, makes secret or concealed a singular and not a plural form, our secret; but the reference is still to sin. The word translated light does not properly denote the element itself, but that from which it is derived, a luminary, just as we call a candle or a lamp a light. See above, on Ps. lxxiv. 16. The precise sense seems to be, that God holds our sins to the light of his own countenance, and therefore cannot fail to see them.
9. For all our days are gone in thine anger; we spend our years like a thought. The all in the first clause is emphatic. What he says is true of our whole life. Are gone, literally turned away, as an act preparatory to departure. The word translated anger, though 6}synonymous, is not identical with either of those used above in ver. 7. It occurs, however, in Ps. vii. 7 (6), and according to its derivation properly denotes an outbreak of angry feeling. Spend, not as a mere synonyme of pass, but in the strong sense of consuming, wasting, as in Job xxxvi. 11 (compare xxi. 13). The Hebrew verb is the causative of that translated fail in ver. 7. The use of years as a parallel to days gives the sentence a climacteric effect. The word translated thought is elsewhere applied to audible sound (Ezek. ii. 10, Job xxxvii. 2), but only as the natural spontaneous expression of the thoughts and feelings, not to others but one’s self. See above, on Ps. lxiii. 7 (6), lxxvii. 13 (12). By some strange misapprehension the Septuagint and Vulgate make it mean a spider, and the English versions have the singular periphrasis, a tale that is told.
10. The days of our years! In them (are contained) seventy years, and if with strength eighty years, and their pride (is) trouble and mischief, for he drives (us) fast and we fly away. The parallelism of days and years in the preceding verse suggests their combination here, a combination used by Moses elsewhere in describing the long lives of the patriarchal history. See Gen. XXV, 7, xlvii. 8 (9). The words may here be taken simply as an absolute nominative, (as for) the days of our years, in them, &c. See above, on Ps. lxxxix. 3 (2). But it adds to their significance, as well as to the beauty of the sentence, to explain them as a kind of wondering exclamation, as if such a term scarcely deserved to be computed. In them are seventy years, this is what they comprise or comprehend, it is to this that they amount. The life of Moses was much longer (Deut. xxxiv. 7), but even in the history appears to be recorded as a signal exception to the general rule. If with strength, if accompanied with strength, or, as some prefer to construe it, if (the person be endued) with (more than usual) strength. The plural (strengths) may be an idiomatic form of speech, simply equivalent to the singular, or an intensive term denoting extraordinary strength. See above on Ps. xviii. 51 (50). Their pride, the best part of our days or years, the part in which we are most confident or most contented. The words translated trouble and mischief are in usage both applied to suffering at the hands or through the fault of others. The common version of the next verb (it is cut off) rests upon a doubtful etymology. In the only other place where the Hebrew verb certainly occurs (Num. xi. 31), it is applied to the driving of the quails by a strong wind over the camp of Israel. It may here agree with God himself, or with a subject undefined, one drives (us), which is tantamount to saying, we are driven. Fast, literally (in) haste or hastily. And, as a necessary consequence we fly before the propellent power.
11. Who knows the power of thine anger and, according to thy fear, thy wrath f The separation of the clauses as distinct propositions makes the last unmeaning. The whole is one interrogation, implying strong negation, as if he had said, no one knows the power of thine anger. See above, on Ps. xiv. 4, liii. 5 (4). The sense is no”t that no one can, but that no one will know it, as he might and ought. Knows, literally knowing, i. e. habitually. See above, on Ps. i. 6. The power of thine anger, its degree and the extent to which it operates. According to thy fear, as true piety or reverence for God demands. 21iy wrath, the same word that is used in the first clause of ver. 9 above.
12. To number our days thus make us know, and we will bring a heart of wisdom. The verb translated make us know is the causative of that in the preceding verse, to which there is an obvious allusion. It is therefore probable that they were meant to govern the same object. “ “Who knows the power of thine anger?” “ So make us know (the power of thine anger).” The first words of the verse before us are then not immediately dependent on the phrase make (us) know, but merely indicate the end for which the knowledge was desired. “In order that we may number our days, i.e. know and feel how few they are, thus make us know, i. e. give us this knowledge of the connection between God’s wrath and our own mortality.” The common version of the last clause (that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom) is forced and ungi-ammatical, without an arbitrary change of pointing. The only admissible construction of the masoretic text is that first given, which may either mean, as some of the rabbinical interpreters suppose, “ we will bring into ourselves (i. e. acquire) a heart of wisdom,” or “we will bring (as an offering to thee) a heart of wisdom,” with allusion to Gen. iv. 3, 4, where the same verb is absolutely used of Cain and Abel’s offerings.
13. Return, Jehovah! How long (wilt thou forsake us)?—And repent as to thy servants. To the prayer that the people may understand the causes of God’s wrath is now added a prayer for its removal. The loss of God’s favour is, as usual, represented as his absence. The aposiopesis in the question (hoio long?) is like that in Ps. vi. 4 (3), xiii. 2 (1). This clause being parenthetical, what follows is connected by the copulative particle with the imperative at the beginning. The meaning of the last clause is, so change thy dealing with thy servants as if thou hadst repented of afflicting them. The same bold form of speech is used by Moses elsewhere. See Exod. xxxii. 12, Deut. xxxii. 36, and compare the imitations in Judges ii. 18, Jer. xv. 6, Joel ii. 13, Jonah iv. 2, Ps. cxxxv. 14,
14. Satisfy us, in the morning, with thy mercy, and (then) we shall rejoice and be glad through all our days. God’s gi-ace is here presented as the food required for the sustenance of his people. Satisfy or sate us, i. e. fill us, abundantly supply us. In the morning, early, speedily, perhaps with an allusion to the night as a common figure for affliction. See above, on Ps. v, 4 (3), xlvi, 6 (5), xlix, 15 (14), lix, 17 (16), lxxxviii, 14 (13). The oblique construction of the last clause, that we may rejoice, dec, is really involved in the direct one, which is much more pointed and emphatic. In or through all our days, i. e. throughout the remainder of our lives. The English idiom allows the suppression of the particle, as in the common version.
15. Make us glad according to the days thou hast afflicted us, the years we have seen evil. According to, literally as or like. The meaning is, compensate all our sufferings by proportionate enjoyments. The ellipsis of the relative is common in both idioms. The English Bible, by supplying it, enfeebles the expression without making the sense clearer. Days and years, as in ver. 9. The plui-al forms in the Hebrew are unusual and borrowed from Deut. xxxii. 7, a Mosaic feature of the psalm which cannot possibly be reproduced in any version.
16. Let appear unto thy servants thy doing, and thy glory on their sorts (or children). He prays that even to the elder generation there may be vouchsafed a token for good (Ps. lxxxvi. 17), i. e. some assurance of the favours to be actually bestowed upon their children. Thus understood, the use of the two prepositions, to and on, is not unmeaning or fortuitous. God’s work or doing is the course of his providential dealings, as in Ps. xcii. 5 (4) below; his glory, the manifestation of his divine perfections in external act. See above, on Ps. viii. 6 (5) xlv. 4 (3). This was to appear not only to but on the younger race> i. e. in their ovra experience.
17. And let the beauty of Jehovah our God be upon us, and the work of our hands establish upon us, and the work of our hands, establish thou it. While the glory of Jehovah is expected to be fully revealed only in his dealings with the next generation, he is still besought to grant their fathers the experimental knowledge of his beauty, loveliness, or all that renders him an object of affection. See above, on Ps. xxvii. 4. The work of our hands is a favourite Mosaic phrase for all that we do or undertake, all our affairs and interests. See Deut. xiv. 29, xvi. 15, xxiv. 19, xxviii. 12, xxx. 9. To establish or confirm it is to prosper and succeed it, to bring it to a favourable issue. The expression on m, as before, suggests the idea of an influence exerted and a favour granted from above. The yea of the common version is substituted for the idiomatic repetition of the copulative and in the original.
