The sterner aspect of Providence is dealt with in the next strophe (vv. 7-9). Some recent signal destruction of evil-doers seems to be referred to. It exemplifies once more the old truth which another psalmist had sung (Psalm xxxvii. 2), that the prosperity of evil-doers is short-lived, like the blossoming herbage, and not only short-lived, but itself the occasion of their destruction. The apparent success of the wicked is as a pleasant slope that leads downwards. The quicker the blossoming, the sooner the petals fall. "The prosperity of fools shall destroy them." As in the previous strophe the middle verse was central in idea as well as in place, so in this one. Ver. 8 states the great fact from which the overthrow of the wicked, which is declared in the verses before and after, results. God's eternal elevation above the Transitory and the Evil is not merely contrasted with these, but is assigned as the reason why what is evil is transitory. We might render "Thou, Jehovah, art high (lit. a height) for evermore," as, in effect, the LXX. and other old versions do; but the application of such an epithet to God is unexampled, and the rendering above is preferable. God's eternal exaltation "is the great pillar of the universe and of our faith" (Perowne). From it must one day result that all God's enemies shall perish, as the psalmist reiterates, with triumphant reduplication of the designation of the foes, as if he would make plain that the very name "God's enemies" contained a prophecy of their destruction. However closely banded, they "shall be scattered." Evil may make conspiracies for a time, for common hatred of good brings discordant elements into strange fellowship, but in its real nature it is divisive, and, sooner or later, allies in wickedness become foes, and no two of them are left together. The only lasting human association is that which binds men to one another, because all are bound to God.
From the scattered fugitives the psalmist turns first to joyful contemplation of his own blessedness, and then to wider thoughts of the general well-being of all God's friends. The more personal references are comprised in the fourth strophe (vv. 10-12). The metaphor of the exalted horn expresses, as in Psalms lxxv. 10, lxxxix. 17, triumph or the vindication of the psalmist by his deliverance. Ver. 10b is very doubtful. The word usually rendered "I am anointed" is peculiar. Another view of the word takes it for an infinitive used as a noun, with the meaning "growing old," or, as Cheyne renders, "wasting strength." This translation ("my wasting strength with rich oil") is that of the LXX. and other ancient versions, and of Cheyne and Baethgen among moderns. If adopted, the verb must be understood as repeated from the preceding clause, and the slight incongruity thence arising can be lessened by giving a somewhat wider meaning to "exalted," such as "strengthen" or the like. The psalmist would then represent his deliverance as being like refreshing a failing old age, by anointing with fresh oil.
Thus triumphant and quickened, he expects to gaze on the downfall of his foes. He uses the same expression as is found in Psalm xci. 8, with a similar connotation of calm security, and possibly of satisfaction. There is no need for heightening his feelings into "desire," as in the Authorised and Revised Versions. The next clause (ver. 11b) "seems to have been expressly framed to correspond with the other; it occurs nowhere else in this sense" (Perowne). A less personal verse (ver. 12) forms the transition to the last strophe, which is concerned with the community of the righteous. Here the singular number is retained. By "the righteous" the psalmist does not exactly mean himself, but he blends his own individuality with that of the ideal character, so that he is both speaking of his own future and declaring a general truth. The wicked "spring like herbage" (ver. 7), but the righteous "spring like the palm." The point of comparison is apparently the gracefulness of the tree, which lifts its slender but upright stem, and is ever verdant and fruitful. The cedar in its massive strength, its undecaying vigour, and the broad shelves of its foliage, green among the snows of Lebanon, stands in strong contrast to the palm. Gracefulness is wedded to strength, and both are perennial in lives devoted to God and Right. Evil blooms quickly, and quickly dies. What is good lasts. One cedar outlives a hundred generations of the grass and flowers that encircle its steadfast feet.
The last part extends the thoughts of ver. 12 to all the righteous. It does not name them, for it is needless to do so. Imagery and reality are fused together in this strophe. It is questionable whether there were trees planted in the courts of the Temple; but the psalmist's thought is that the righteous will surely be found there, and that it is their native soil, in which rooted, they are permanent. The facts underlying the somewhat violent metaphor are that true righteousness is found only in the dwellers with God, that they who anchor themselves in Him, as a tree in the earth, are both stayed on, and fed from, Him. The law of physical decay does not enfeeble all the powers of devout men, even while they are subject to it. As aged palm trees bear the heaviest clusters, so lives which are planted in and nourished from God know no term of their fruitfulness, and are full of sap and verdant, when lives that have shut themselves off from Him are like an old stump, gaunt and dry, fit only for firewood. Such lives are prolonged and made fruitful, as standing proofs that Jehovah is upright, rewarding all cleaving to Him and doing of His will, with conservation of strength, and ever-growing power to do His will.
Ver. 15 is a reminiscence of Deut. xxxii. 4. The last clause is probably to be taken in connection with the preceding, as by Cheyne ("And that in my Rock there is no unrighteousness"). But it may also be regarded as a final avowal of the psalmist's faith, the last result of his contemplations of the mysteries of Providence. These but drive him to cling close to Jehovah, as his sole refuge and his sure shelter, and to ring out this as the end which shall one day be manifest as the net result of Providence—that there is no least trace of unrighteousness in Him.
[PSALM XCIII.]
1 Jehovah is King, with majesty has He clothed Himself,
Jehovah has clothed Himself, has girded Himself with strength,
Yea, the world is set fast [that] it cannot be moved.
2 Fast is set Thy throne from of yore,
From eternity art Thou.
3 The streams, Jehovah, have lifted up,
The streams have lifted up their voice,
The streams lift up their tumult.
4 Above the voices of many waters,
Mighty [waters], ocean breakers,
Mightier is Jehovah on high.