CXLI. This is one of the most obscure psalms in the whole psalter, hardly a clause of Psalms 141:5 offering anything more than a conjectural meaning. The author appears from Psalms 141:2 to be a priest or Levite, being so familiar with the rites of the sanctuary as to use them as metaphors. From Psa... [ Continue Reading ]
SET FORTH... — See margin; but more literally, _be erected,_ suggesting the pillar of smoke (comp. Tennyson’s “Azure pillars of the hearth”) continually rising to heaven. Some think the _incense_ refers to the morning sacrifice, so that the verse will mean, “let my prayer rise regularly as morning a... [ Continue Reading ]
WATCH. — The image drawn from the guard set at city gates at night seems to indicate the evening as the time of composition of the psalm. DOOR OF MY LIPS. — Comp. “doors of thy mouth” (Micah 7:5), and so in Euripides, πύλαι στόματος. For the probable motive of the prayer, see Introduction. The poet... [ Continue Reading ]
TO PRACTISE WICKED WORKS... — The Vulg., _ad excusandas excusationes,_ following the LXX., not only preserves the expressive assonance of the original, but probably conveys its meaning better than the somewhat tame English version. Evidently the danger to be guarded against was not so much a sinful... [ Continue Reading ]
The difficulties of the psalm thicken here. Render, _Let a righteous man smite me, it is a kindness; and let him reprove me, it is oil for the head: my head shall not refuse it though it continue; yet my prayer is against their wickedness._ The word rendered “smite” is that used of Jael’s “hammer st... [ Continue Reading ]
This verse again is full of obscurities. The first clause probably should be rendered, _Let their judges be broken to pieces by the force_ (literally, _hands_)_ of the rock;_ or, _let their judges be cast down by the sides of the cliff — i.e.,_ hurled down the precipitous face of the ravine (See 2 C... [ Continue Reading ]
OUR BONES. — The literal rendering of this verse is _As when one cutteth and cleaveth in the earth our bones are scattered at the mouth of Sheôl._ The reading “our bones” necessarily makes this an abrupt transition from the fate of the unjust judges in the last verse to that of the afflicted people,... [ Continue Reading ]
Comp. Psalms 25:15.... [ Continue Reading ]
FROM THE SNARE. — The original idiom is far more forcible: “from the hands (or, ‘clutches’) of the snare.” (See above, Psalms 141:6, “in the hands of the cliff.”)... [ Continue Reading ]
Comp. Psalms 7:15. WITHAL. — Probably, _altogether_ (“whilst I altogether escape”), which some join with the previous clause, “Let the wicked fall into their own nets together, whilst I escape.”... [ Continue Reading ]