Paraphrase Upon the Books of the Psalms, Book 2 · Psalm 44
The Forty Fourth Psalme.
TO the chief Musitian for the sons of Corah, Maschil.
Paraphrase. The forty fourth Psalm is a description of the several conditions and states of the Jewish Church, and therein a commemoration of Gods former mercies, as a ground of confidence in, and prayer to him, for deliverance out of present dangers; and was composed in some time of general oppression by forein enemies, v. 11.12. and committed to the Prefect of the Musick, to be sung by the posterity of Corah (see Psal. xlii. 1.) to the tune called Maschil (see note on Psal. xxxii. a.)
1. We have heard with our ears, O Lord, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their dayes, in the times of old.
Thy doings in former ages, O Lord, are famously spoken of, and delivered down to us from father to son.
2. How thou didst drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantedst them; how thou didst afflict the people,a. and‖send cast them out.
How thou by thy power didst eject the Canaanites, &c. and in their stead didst place thine own people of Israel, having first brought them out of Egypt, rescued them from the hands of those heathen tyrants, smiting with ten several plagues the Egyptians that kept them in bondage.
3. For they gat not their land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them, but thy right hand and thine arm, and the b light of thy†presence countenance; because thou hadst a favour unto them.
A special work of thine this: for 'twas not any prowesse of arms, or opposition of greater strength, that got the children of Israel the victories which they obtained over these nations, or possest them of their land, but the signal interposition of thy power, shining and shewing forth it self visibly in that whole action; an effect and a testimony of thy special favour to them, which thus performed what thou hadst promised, of giving them this fruitful land to be injoyed by them.
4. Thou art my King, O God; command*the salvations of Jacob, foreign deliverance for Jacob.
Thou therefore that hast thus magnified thy power and mercy, in delivering this people of thine, art in all reason to be adored by us, as our God, and supream conducter, to whom alone I am to make my address at this time for the deliverances which thou hast promised to give, and hast constantly afforded to thy people.
5. Through thee will we‖gore foreign push down our enemies: through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us.
From thee must all our victories come, thou must furnish us with our offensive arms: such thou hast given to the beasts of the field, horns to the bull, &c. And thy presence and conduct must supply to us our natural want of these. And if thou be thus present with us, we shall certainly be as succesful, as the most mighty of those creatures over the weakest assailant. As they first gore and wound them with their‖So foreign signifies horns, and then trample them under their feet; so shall we deal with our stoutest enemies.
6. For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my sword save me.
As for artillery and provisions of war, we use them, without any trust or relyance on them, either to secure our selves, or hurt others.
7. But thou hast saved us from our enemies, and hast put them to shame that hated us.
'Tis thy strength onelyonly, and mercy to us, that hath wrought all our good successes, delivered us, and discomfited our enemies; and accordingly in that alone all our confidence is reposed.
8. ‖we have praised God.In Godc. we boast all the day long, and*will c… fess. praise thy name for ever. Selah.
All our victories have been hitherto due to thee; from thee we have received them, and to thee we have given all the praise of them: and consequently for the future, we have none else to rely on, none to acknowledge for our defender and reliever, but thee.
9. But thou hast cast us off, and put us to shame, and goest not forth with our armies.
But, alas, our sins have provoked, and removed thee from us; thou hast suffered us to be worsted by our enemies, and hast not of late shewn forth thy majesty for our aid and succour.
10. Thou makest us to turn back from our enemies, and they which hate us spoil for themselves.
Thou sufferest us to be put to flight and chased by our enemies, and consequently to be despoiled and pillaged by them.
11. Thou hast given us like sheep†for …cting foreign appointed for meat, and hast scattered us among the heathen.
Thou hast permitted many of us to be slaughtered like sheep (see v. 22.) such as are killed by the butcher, not the priest; for the shambles, to be freely used as men please, not for the altar, to which those that are set apart cannot be rudely handled without violation of religion. And as sheep again being worried by the Wolf, are driven from the flock and scattered upon the mountains; so are our armies destroyed and routed.
12. Thou sellest thy people*for … (or, without any) possession, and d… … gain by— ford. nought, and doest not increase thy wealth by their price.
We are, alas, cast away by God, as the worst kind of slaves, which are not thought worthy to have any price demanded for them by their masters; sadly handled, without the comfort of bringing in any honour to God by our calamities. Thy Church among us is defaced, and no other people taken in, instead of us, by whom thy name may be glorified.
13. Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and a derison to them that are round about us.
14. Thou makest us a by-word among the heathen, a shaking of the hand among the people.
Hereby we are rendred ridiculous, scoft and mockt at by those that are neer us, and by our enemies made a proverb of reproach, to signifie and express the most abject despicable men in the world.
15. My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me,
This is matter of so great shame to me, that I dare not shew my face: I cover it, like mourners, under a veil, desirous to hide my shame (Mic. 3.7.) but, alas, this covering will very ill conceal that, which indeed it doth betray, as being on purpose designed to hide it.
16. For the voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth, by reason of the enemie and avenger.
Betwixt their scorns and contumelies on the one side, and their designs of mischieving and destroying me on the other, I know not how to behave, which way to turn my self.
17. All this is come upon us; yet have we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsly in thy covenant.
Yet doth not all this discourage us, or tempt us to fall off to any other religion, from that which we hitherto have profest, to forget our duty to God, or to fall from that fidelity of obedience which we have vowed to him.
18. Our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way;
We will still abide constant in our loyalty, whatever our portion be in this world.
19. Though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death.
Yea, though thou deal never so sharply with us, beat our armies to dust, and disperse us into the most desolate condition of horrour and darkness, the very next degree to death it self.
20. If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange God,
21. Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.
For the sincerity of this constant resolution, we appeal to no other judge, but to the great searcher of hearts: From him we know we cannot be concealed, if either we slacken the diligence of our service to him, or fall off to any degree of Apostasy.
22. Yea for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep to the slaughter.
And of this our very sufferings are our witnesses: the malice and cruelty of our enemies, which is so great and bloody, as to slaughter us daily, having no other ground of provocation from us, but our adhering constantly to thy service.
23. Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? Arise, cast us not off for ever.
24. Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and forgettest our affliction and our oppression?
Lord, be thou gratiously pleased at length to consider our distresses, to interpose thy hand for our rescue, and no longer to forsake us in our extremities, and leave us without thy aid and succour, (see note a.) to be thus sorely afflicted and opprest by our enemies.
25. For our soule is bowed down to the dust; our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
For we are now brought to the lowest and saddest state of depression.
26. Arise for our help, and redeem us for thy mercies sake.
Now therefore be thou pleased to undertake our rescue, thereby in a fittest season to shew forth thy pitty to us; which we have no ground of solliciting, but what we fetch from thine own goodness, so frequently experimented by us.
Annotations on Psalm XLIV.
V. 2. Cast them out] The word foreign from whence foreign comes doth generally signifie misit and emisit, foreignsending, and sending out, or setting free and at liberty, which we call manumission, and in that notion the word is elsewhere used: and though by the Lxxii. in this place, and one more Ex. xii. 33. it be rendered foreign to cast out, in the notion of foreign, which is of such affinity to it, that, as Abu Walid observes, Jer. xxxviii. 6. and 11. they are used promiscuously for the same; yet in many hundred places, they render it elsewhere by foreign to send, as in some hundreds more by foreign to send out; by which also Aquila renders it here. And to this the Syriack accords, whether we read with the ordinary Copies (for then the rendering is not literal, but by way of paraphrase) thou hast afflicted the kingdomes foreign and hast established them, or, which is much more probable, and the change very easy, but of a point, foreign from foreign to send, and thou didst send them out. And to this agrees the forme of Gods mandate for the bringing out of the Israelites, Exod. v. 1. foreign thus saith the Lord, let goe, or send out, or manumit my people, &c. and therefore in all reason this is to be resolved the meaning of it in this place. And in that one other place where the Lxxii. render it foreign, it evidently signifies (as by our English 'tis rendered) sending out, Ex. xii. 33. The Aegyptians were urgent upon the people, that they might send them out of the land in haste. The undoubtedness of this interpretation will be assented to, if the latter part of the verse be compared with the former. In the former 'tis expresly said, foreign thou hast cast out the nations, foreign and hast planted them; sure not the same whom he had cast out, but, as the Chaldee paraphrases, (the people of Canaan in the former, and) foreign the house of Israel in the latter: and then by proportion, in the second part, as foreign thou hast a…flicted the nations] belongs to the Aegyptians; so must foreign and thou hast sent them out] belong to the Israelites: and if the foreign by thy hand] in the beginning of the verse, be (as reasonably it may) applyed to all that follows in the verse, then 'tis literally, thou hast manumitted them, i. e. set at liberty the Israelites. And so that is the full meaning of it.
V. 3. Light of thy countenance] foreign foreignthe light of thy faces, seems here to be set to signifie the majestatick presence of God, his visible presiding in their militia; for so the matter spoken of exacts, and the mention precedent of thy right hand, and thine arme. And accordingly the Chaldee render it foreign, the light of the splendor of thy glory, by Gods glory ordinarily signifying the special presence of God (his Schechinah mentioned by them v. 10.) however evidenced or testified; and that is frequently the interpretation of foreign faces, even when it is rendred foreign by the Lxxii. so Gen. iii. 8. the faces, i. e. presence of the Lord, as we render it; so Gen. iv. 16. Cain went out from the faces, we duly read, from the presence of the Lord; and often elsewhere. And so here v. 24. the hiding his faces, is by the Chaldee rendred, the taking away foreign the Schechinah or majestatick presence of his glory. And so that will be the best rendring here, the light of thy presence, (as God, we know, testified his presence to the Israelites by a light shining cloud going before them, and conducting them) and not the light of thy countenance, as that is all one with his favour; the mention of that following in the next words, as the original, and reason of this his shining presence, and not as the thing it selfe.
V. 8. Boast] foreign in Piel signifying to praise or celebrate, foreign foreignis regularly to be rendred here [We have praised.] And the preposition ב prefixt to foreign makes no difference, being many times a pleonasine; and then foreign foreign, the future from foreign, will be best rendred in the future, we will confess thy name for ever, by the former signifying what is past, as the pledge and pawn of his future mercies, whereon he is resolved to depend for the future. And thus in both parts the Syriack renders it, we have praised, and, we will confess.
V. 12. Nought] foreign foreignsignifies wealth, or any kinde of valuable possession, and so fitly follows foreign i. e. literally [and hast not multiplied] but it must best be rendred [and hast not gained] or made advantage, or increase, as men are wont to doe by the sale of those things that are any way valuable. The Romane copies of the Lxxii. read (as 'tis evident S. Augustine did) foreign, and there was no multitude in their jubilations, and Asulanus's copy reads yet worse, foreign. But it is apparent, both by the Latine, which reads in commutationibus, and so by the Syriack also, that the true reading was foreign, according to their use of foreign for a price. The plain meaning is, that as things that are useless and burthensome, are not sold for any valuable price, but allowed to be taken away by any that will have them; so are they dealt with by God at this time, not regarded by him, and so permitted to be conquered, and carried away captive by every one that will assault them. The Arabick here hath, contrary to use, rendred it with some difference from the Lxxii. thou hast diminished the multitude of their numbers; seeming thereby to refer to the first captivity in Aegypt, where servitude encreased their numbers, they multiplyed in children, as their task-masters encreased their tale of brick: But here their captivity is not thus recompensed, but the contrary is the effect of it.