Paraphrase Upon the Books of the Psalms, Book 1 · Psalm 31
The Thirty First Psalm.
TO the chief Musitian, a Psalm of David.
Paraphrase. The Thirty first Psalm is an excellent mixture of prayer and praises, and constant affiance in God: it was composed by David, and committed to the Prefect of his Musick.
1. In thee, O Lord, doe I put my trust, let me never be ashamed; deliver me in thy righteousness.
O blessed Lord, I place my whole affiance and confidence in thee; doe not thou forsake and disappoint me, but make good thy promised mercies and deliverances unto me.
2. Bow down thine eare to me, deliver me speedily: be thou my strong rock, for an house of defense to save me.
Receive my prayer, and hasten to my relief: be thou to me as a fortress, and place of refuge, whereto I may confidently resort, and finde safety.
3. For thou art my rock and my fortress; therefore for thy names sake‖or, thou shalt lead me foreign lead me, and guide me.
And such indeed have I constantly experimented thee to be, whensoever I have made my applications to thee, thou hast succoured and secured me; and so, I doe not doubt, thou wilt still continue to doe, and (though I have no title of claim thereto, but onelyonly thy free mercy and most gracious promise) direct and conduct me in all my wayes.
4. Pull me out of the net that they have laid privily for me, for thou art my strength.
Rescue me, I pray thee, out of the mischief that is treacherously prepared and designed against me, for thou art my onelyonly helper.
5. Into thy hand I‖commit, deposite, give in pledge. foreign commend my spirit: thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth.
To thee I offer up my very soul, that part which alone is worth thy having; to thee I give it in pledge, as to one, that having already wrought so many deliverances for me, hast obliged me to be wholly thine, and withall ingaged thy selfe by those pawnes of thy goodness, to doe the like again in all my necessities.
6. a.I have hated them that regard†or, vanities to no purpose. a.lying vanities, but I trust in the Lord.
I detest all the Gentile practices, of consulting auguries and divinations, which, alas, never stand them in any stead, deceive and frustrate their confidences: All my addresses shall be made to thee, O Lord, and in thee will I repose all my confidence.
7. I will be glad and rejoyce in thy mercy: for thou hast considered my trouble; thou hast known my soul in adversities;
All my delight and joy shalbe in recounting thy continual goodness toward me, how thou hast had regard to my necessities, and owned me, and relieved me in my lowest condition,
8. And hast not shut me up into the hand of the enemy: thou hast set my feet in a large room.
And not delivered me up into the power and malice of my adversaries, but as yet preserved me in a state of liberty.
9. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble; my eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly.
Yet are not my troubles at an end, O Lord; I have long waited for rest, but have not yet attained to it. This is very grievous unto me, painfull to my soul, my sensitive faculty, and to my bowels, the seat of those affections, and of most accurate sense: O be thou graciously pleased to look upon me.
10. For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing: my strength faileth because of mineb. iniquity, and my bones are consumed.
For the continual distresses and troubles wherewith I have been exercised have even exhausted me; thy punishments for my sins have brought me very low: I am ready to sink and fail under them.
11. I was a reproach among all my enemies, *and very much foreignbut especially among my neighbours; and a fear to mine acquaintance: they that did see me without fled from me.
My enemies scoffe at me; and so also doe my friends in a great degree, seeing me, after all my confidence, to continue thus helpless. This makes them from whom I have most reason to expect relief, to be afraid to afford me any; and so I am avoided, and left destitute by all men.
12. I am forgotten as a dead man out of minde, I am like a broken vessel.
I am no more considered or cared for by them, than as a man dead and buried, and forgotten by his associates. I am lookt on, as one irrecoverably lost; and am therein resembled to a potters vessel, which if broken, cannot be made whole again, Jer. 18.11. and so as that refuse potsheard, cast out as good for nothing.
13. For I have heard the slander of many; c.‖fear onfear was on every side, while they†assembled foreign see note on Ps. 2. c. took counsel together against me, they devised to take away my life.
Many, and those no mean ones, I have heard reproaching and taunting me, calling me fugitive, a lost and undone person; hereby indeed expressing their wishes, and enterprizes, being all risen up in armes against me, and joyntly resolving to destroy me utterly.
14. But I trusted in thee, O Lord; I said, thou art my God.
Mean while I reposed my trust in thee, O Lord, incouraging my selfe with the meditation of thy mercy and render care, which would certainly secure me.
15. Myd. times are in thy hand: deliver me from the hand of my enemies, and from them that persecute me.
As for the fittest season of affording me deliverance, it must in all reason be referred to thy choice, O Lord, when thou seest it most opportune; be thou pleased to doe it for me.
16. Make thy face to shine upon thy servant: save me for thy mercies sake.
Restore thy favourable aspect unto me: deliver me of thy great kindness and mercy to me.
17. Let me not be ashamed, O Lord, for I have called upon thee:‖or, the wicked shall be ashamed foreign let the wicked be ashamed, and let them bee. †or, cut offsilent in the grave.
Lord, I have addrest my prayers to thee, relied and depended on thee, thine honour is concerned and ingaged in my preservation: should I be disappointed in my confidence, it would redound to thy reproach. It is the wicked mans portion to exspect and miss deliverance, and so to perish with shame and ignominie.
18. *or, the lying lips shall— foreignLet the lying lips be put to silence, which speak grievous things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous.
Thus is it ordinary for the slanderer to be disappointed in his designes, and brought to shame, and so for all others that scoffe and deride the faithful servants of God, and that with the greatest pride and contumely.
19. O how great is thy goodness, which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee, which thou hast wrought for them which trust in thee, before the sons of men!
But as for those that serve thee faithfully, and repose their whole trust in thee, and so use no other artifices to advantage themselves, but those which are perfectly allowable in thy sight, there is abundant mercy laid up for them with God, his works of deliverance and exaltation are constantly shewed forth to them, in a visible and eminent manner.
20. Thou shalt hide them‖with the covering of thy countenance. in thef. secret of thy presence from the pride of man; thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues.
Thy favour and providence over them, represented by the Cherubims wings in the Arke, is their sure refuge and guard, and defence, whatsoever contentious proud men can designe, or threaten against them.
21. Blessed be the Lord, for he hath shewed me his marvelous kindness in a strong city.
And thus hath God (his name be ever praised for it) given me evidence of his wonderfull mercies, securing me, as in a fortified city, from all the attempts of mine enemies.
22. For I saidg. in my†flight, or, fear. hast, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications, when I cryed unto thee.
I was once in a great sadnes of heart, at the time of my flight from Saul, and did verily think I should have been destroyed; and yet even then, upon the addressing my prayers to thee, thou immediately deliveredst me out of that danger.
23. O love the Lord all ye his Saints; for the Lordh. preserveth the faithfull, and*he that doth glorious, or high, or excellent things, rewardeth plenteously. plentifully rewardeth the proud doer.
Here is abundant cause for all pious men heartily to love God, and admire his goodness and admirable excellencies, by considering his constant deliverances afforded to all those that cleave fast to him; and not only deliverances, but victories, all or more than they stand in need of.
24. Be of good courage, and‖let your heart be strengthened. Psal. xxvii. 14. he shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the Lord.
And therefore let all that repose their trust in God chearfully proceed, and firmely and constantly adhere unto him, and never be tempted with any difficulties to fall off or forsake him.
Annotations on Psalm XXXI.
V. 6. I have hated] foreign foreignI have hated, (which the Chaldee retein in like manner in the first person,) the LXXII. render foreign, thou hast hated, (and so the Latine, Syriack, &c.) misreading, it seems, foreign in the second person. But foreign foreign, that follows in the verse, seems to be by them most significantly rendered, foreign in vain, adverbially, so as to affect foreign those that observe] precedent, and not to joyn with foreign vanities; for if they be such, the addition of lying] will adde little to them. The sense lies thus, that heathen men, when any danger or difficulty approacheth them, are solemnly wont to apply themselves to auguries and divinations, and so to false Gods, to receive advise and directions from them: but doing so, and observing their responses most superstitiously, they yet gain nothing at all by it; their applications and addresses are in vain, return them no manner of profit. And these David detests, and keeps close to God, hopes for no aid but from him. And thus the Latine and Arabick understand it also, though the Chaldee read paraphrastically [works like to vanity and a lye,] and the Syriack, [vain worships.]
V. 10. Iniquity] From foreign the verb, is the noun foreign sin, iniquity; and so foreign foreignbecause of my iniquity. But this the LXXII. read foreign in poverty, (and from thence the Syriack and Latine, &c.) as if it were foreign in poverty or affliction. The word foreign foreignas it signifies sin, so it signifies also the punishment of sin, Isa. Liii. 6. 11; and so here it seems to signifie, so as to connect with grief, and sighing precedent, and to denote those miseries which his sins had brought upon him. The learned Castellio renders it, in hoc supplicio, in this punishment: and that consideration perhaps, joyned with the affinity of the word foreign, might move the LXXII. &c. to render it poverty, for that, as it is evil, is a punishment of sin.
V. 13. Fear was on every side] foreign signifies to dwell, inhabite, and with the preposition ם from, to fear, 1 Sam. xviii. 14. Job xLi. 17. Psal. xxxiii. 8. Hence foreign foreignhere signifying fear, is by the Lxxii. rendered in that other sense of inhabiting, (and so Psal. xxxiv. 4. for foreign my fears] some copies of the Lxxii. have foreign my habitations, but others read foreign, & the Latine and Arabick tribulationibus,) and as if it were connected with foreign many] foregoing, (which it cannot doe) foreign, of many that dwell on every side; whereas the foreign foreignbelonging to foreign going before, the reproach of many or of great ones,] foreign fear must be joyned with foreign following, fear on every side, both governed of foreign I have heard, in the beginning of the verse. For it must here be remembred, what Jeremy saith to Pashur, Jer. xx. 3. the Lord, saith he, hath not called thee Pashur, but foreign we render it there as a proper name, Magor-Missabib, but in the margent, fear round abou…, or on every side; and the interpretation of the phrase is added, v. 4. For thus saith the Lord, I will make thee a terror to thy self and to all thy friends, &c. even a destruction and deportation, in the end of that verse. This then was a proverbial phrase, frequently used, and fit for a Prophetick and Poetick writing, to signifie utter ruine and destruction; and being here used by enemies against David, as a taunt, it signifies their threatning him utter destruction. I heard, saith he, foreign the reproach of many, or of great ones: and then 'tis not strange he should specifie and set down the very form of their reproach, Fear round about, i. e. an abject, lost, ruin'd fellow, as elsewhere he mentions, their crying Ah, Ah, &c. And so this is the most perfect rendring of the place. For as to this notion of reproach, for which this is proverbially used, it is yet more evident from Jer. xx. 10. I heard the defaming of many, Fear on every side; just as here, I heard the slander of many, Fear on every side: and as here it follows, they devised to take away my life; so there, to the like purpose, All my familiars waited for my halting, saying, he will be entised, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him. Meanwhile fear] here must be taken, as oft it is in Scripture, for the matter and cause of fear, danger. So Isa. Lxvi. 4. foreign and their fears will I bring upon them, i. e. those things which they feared: and so Psal. xxxiv. 4. where 'tis rendred tribulations.
V. 15. Times] From foreign opportunè fecit, or locutus est, doing or speaking opportunely, is foreign a season or opportune time; and so foreign foreignsignifies here, the fit seasons of Gods relieving him. The Chaldee reads it foreign the times of my redemption. For this the Copies of the Lxxii. read foreign, and the Latine from thence sortes meae my lots; and so Apollinarius, foreign my lots, and the Arabick and Aethiopick, my inheritance. But the Syriack read foreign times; and so the old Roman Psaltery, tempora mea, my times: which makes it very probable, that the purer reading of the Lxxii, was foreign, my seasons, but that by the Scribes antiently disguised into foreign, my lots.
V. 17. Silent] foreign foreignfrom foreign, which signifies both to be silent and to be cut off, is here by the addition of foreign in the grave, confined to the latter sense, cut off, destroyed. The Chaldee have been willing to take in both significations, Let them be put to silence, and descend into the grave; the Lxxii. no more than foreign, Let them be brought down—
V. 20. Secret of thy presence] That Gods face or presence, promiscuously exprest by foreign his faces, is frequently attributed to the Sanctuary, the peculiar place of his gracious residence, appears by the phrases of seeking his face there, and coming before his face, and many the like indications. Now this presence of his being said to be hid under the wings of the Cherubims, the phrase here foreign foreignthe covering of thy countenance, or presence, is evidently designed to signifie this blessing presence and favour of Gods, exhibited in the Sanctuary: as more manifestly appears by the ensuing mention of foreign Pavillion, or Tabernacle, the place of Gods inhabiting, or residence. And this very fitly expresseth a place or guard of perfect security; Gods gracious presence, or interposition, being most eminently such.
V. 22. My hast] foreign signifies to make hast, so as they that fly; foreignthus Exod. xii. 11. they were to eat the Passeover in hast: and accordingly to fly through fear, 2 King. vii. 11. where the Lxxii. read foreign to be sore afraid, as Psal. ciii. 8. 'tis rendred foreign to be afraid, and Psal. xLviii. 5. foreign they were set a shaking: and so also to be in an amazement, as fearful men are under a terror. In this last sense the LXXII. render it here foreign astonishment or ecstasie, the Latine, excessus mentis, excess of minde, and so the Arabick and Aethiopick: but the Syriack reads foreign in my swiftnesse, and the Chaldee more fully foreign when I sought to fly. And this is most probably the meaning of it, foreign in the time of Davids flight, that his greatest danger, and exigence (and so again Psal. cxvi. 11. foreign in my flying, the Chaldee read foreign when I fled) or in his great fear, such as he was in, when he fled from Saul.
V. 23. Preserveth] Where the Hebrew reads foreign foreignpreserveth the faithfull, the Copies which now we have of the Lxxii. read foreign requireth truth: but 'tis probable the right reading was foreign: and then foreign to require] being used by them for Gods avenging, or taking the part of innocent persons against those that injure them, they might well set that as the paraphrase for foreign, Gods preserving his faithful servants, and evidencing this by avenging them on their enemies. But in the latter part of the verse the difficulty is greater, arising from the ambiguity of the word foreign for foreign signifying elatus est, eminuit, that is taken sometimes in a bad sense, for pride and arrogancy, Psal. x. 2. sometimes in a good sense, for splendor, magnificence, strength, excellence. In this latter sense 'tis used of God, Psal. Lxviii. 35. foreign foreignhis height or excellence, and strength are in the clouds. And in this notion of the word foreign foreignhe that doth high things, or excellent things, is a fit title for God, and so in construction with foreign, and shall abundantly reward,] the rendring is very prompt and perspicuous, the Lord preserveth the faithful, and he that doth excellent things abundantly rewards them; so foreign foreign(from foreign abundavit, superfuit, reliquum fuit) is best rendered full measure, and running over, what they want, and more, shall God give them.