The psalmist's petition is next grounded on the revelation of God's name in Israel's past, and in creative acts of power. These at once encourage him to expect that God will pluck His hand out from the folds of His robe, where it lies inactive, and appeal to God to be what He has been of old, and to rescue the name which He has thus magnified from insult. There is singular solemnity in the emphatic reiteration of "Thou" in these verses. The Hebrew does not usually express the pronominal nominative to a verb, unless special attention is to be called to it; but in these verses it does so uniformly, with one exception, and the sevenfold repetition of the word brings forcibly into view the Divine personality and former deeds which pledge God to act now. Remembrance of past wonders made present misery more bitter, but it also fanned into a flame the spark of confidence that the future would be like the past. One characteristic of the Asaph psalms is wistful retrospect, which is sometimes the basis of rebuke, and sometimes of hope, and sometimes of deepened sorrow, but is here in part appeal to God and in part consolation. The familiar instances of His working drawn from the Exodus history appear in the psalm. First comes the dividing of the Red Sea, which is regarded chiefly as occasioning the destruction of the Egyptians, who are symbolised by the "sea-monsters" and by "leviathan" (the crocodile). Their fate is an omen of what the psalmist hopes may befall the oppressors of his own day. There is great poetic force in the representation that the strong hand, which by a stroke parted the waters, crushed by the same blow the heads of the foul creatures who "floated many a rood" on them. And what an end for the pomp of Pharaoh and his host, to provide a meal for jackals and the other beasts of the desert, who tear the corpses strewing the barren shore! The meaning is completely misapprehended when "the people inhabiting the wilderness" is taken to be wild desert tribes. The expression refers to animals, and its use as designating them has parallels (as Prov. xxx. 25, 26).
In ver. 15 another pregnant expression occurs, which is best filled out as above, the reference being to cleaving the rock for the flow of water, with which is contrasted in b the drying up of the Jordan. Thus the whole of the Exodus period is covered. It is noteworthy that the psalmist adduces only wonders wrought on waters, being possibly guided in his selection by the familiar poetic use of floods and seas as emblems of hostile power and unbridled insolence. From the wonders of history he passes to those of creation, and chiefly of that might by which times alternate and each constituent of the Kosmos has its appointed limits. Day and night, summer and winter, recur by God's continual operation. Is there to be no dawning for Israel's night of weeping, and no summer making glad the winter of its discontent? "Thou didst set all the bounds of the earth,"—wilt Thou not bid back this surging ocean which has transgressed its limits and filled the breadth of Thy land? All the lights in the sky, and chiefly the greatest of them, Thou didst establish,—surely Thou wilt end this eclipse in which Thy people grope.
Thus the psalmist lifts himself to the height of confident though humble prayer, with which the psalm closes, recurring to the opening tones. Its centre is, as we have seen, a double remonstrance—"How long?" and "Why?" The encircling circumference is earnest supplication, of which the keynote is "Remember" (vv. 2 and 18).
The gist of this closing prayer is the same appeal to God to defend His own honour, which we have found in the former verses. It is put in various forms here. Twice (vv. 18 and 22) God is besought to remember the reproach and contumely heaped on his name, and apparently warranted by His inaction. The claim of Israel for deliverance is based in ver. 19 upon its being "Thy turtle dove," which therefore cannot be abandoned without sullying Thy fame. The psalmist spreads the "covenant" before God, as reminding Him of His obligations under it. He asks that such deeds may be done as will give occasion to the afflicted and needy to "praise Thy name," which is being besmirched by their calamities. Finally, in wonderfully bold words, he calls on God to take up what is, after all, "His own" quarrel, and, if the cry of the afflicted does not move Him, to listen to the loud voices of those who blaspheme Him all the day. Reverent earnestness of supplication sometimes sounds like irreverence; but, "when the heart's deeps boil in earnest," God understands the meaning of what sounds strange, and recognises the profound trust in His faithfulness and love which underlies bold words.
The precise rendering of ver. 19 is very doubtful. The word rendered above by "company" may mean life or a living creature, or, collectively, a company of such. It has been taken in all these meanings here, and sometimes in one of them in the first clause, and in another in the second, as most recently by Baethgen, who renders "Abandon not to the beast" in a, and "The life of thine afflicted" in b. But it must have the same meaning in both clauses, and the form of the word shows that it must be construed in both with a following "of." If so, the rendering adopted above is best, though it involves taking the word rendered "greed" (lit., soul) in a somewhat doubtful sense. This rendering is adopted in the R.V. (margin), and is, on the whole, the least difficult, and yields a probable sense. Delitzsch recognises the necessity for giving the ambiguous word the same meaning in both clauses, and takes that meaning to be "creature," which suits well enough in a, but gives a very harsh meaning to b. "Forget not Thy poor animals for ever" is surely an impossible rendering. Other attempts have been made to turn the difficulty by textual alteration. Hupfeld would transpose two words in a, and so gets "Give not up to rage the life of Thy dove." Cheyne corrects the difficult word into "to the sword," and Graetz follows Dyserinck in preferring "to death," or Krochmal, who reads "to destruction." If the existing text is retained, probably the rendering adopted above is best.
[PSALM LXXV.]
1 We give thanks to Thee, O God, we give thanks;
And [that] Thy name is near, Thy wondrous works declare
2 "When I seize the set time,
I, I judge [in] equity.
3 Dissolved [in fear] are earth and its inhabitants:
I, I set firm its pillars. Selah.
4 I say to the fools, be not foolish:
And to the wicked, Lift not up the horn:
5 Lift not up your horn on high;
Speak not with stiff neck."
6 For not from east, nor from west,
And not from the wilderness is lifting up.
7 For God is judge:
This one He abases, and that one He lifts up.
8 For a cup is in the hands of Jehovah,
And it foams with wine; it is full of mixture,
And He pours out from it:
Yea, its dregs shall all the wicked of the earth gulp down and drink.
9 And as for me, I will declare [it] for ever,
I will harp to the God of Jacob.
10 And all the horns of the wicked will I cut off:
Exalted shall be the horns of the righteous.