Psalms 111 - Introduction

Psalms 111, 112 are closely connected in structure, contents, and language. Each consists of twenty-two lines, which begin with the letters of the alphabet in regular order, and are arranged in eight distichs and two tristichs. Psalms 111 celebrates the power, goodness, and righteousness of Jehovah; Psalms 112 describes the prosperity, beneficence, and righteousness of those who fear Him. Words and phrases applied to God in Psalms 111 are transferred in Psalms 112 with some modification of meaning, and sometimes with startling boldness, to the godly man, describing his character as the reflection of the character of Jehovah. Thus Psalms 112:1 atakes up the thought of Psalms 111:10 a: with Psalms 112:1 b(delighteth) cp. Psalms 111:2; Psalms 112:3 b, Psalms 111:9 b= Psalms 111:3 b; Psalms 112:4 b= Psalms 111:4 b: with Psalms 112:6 bcp. Psalms 111:4 a. The trustfulness of the godly man in Psalms 112:7-8 answers to the trustworthiness of Jehovah in Psalms 111:7-8. Other correspondences of thought and language may be noticed by the student.

Both Psalms draw largely from older Psalms and from Proverbs, and doubtless belong to the period after the exile, but to what part of it there is nothing to shew. Several MSS of the LXX, and the Vulgate, prefix to Psalms 112 the title, For the Return of Haggai and Zechariah(τῆς ἐπιστροφῆς Ἁγγαίου καὶ Ζαχαρίου): and the same title seems originally to have been prefixed to Psalms 111 in the LXX, though it is now found in the Syro-hexaplar version only.