Paraphrase Upon the Books of the Psalms, Book 5 · Psalm 139
The Hundred Thirty Ninth Psalm.
To the chief Musitian a Psalm of David. The hundred thirty ninth is the acknowledgment of God in that great attribute of his, of being the searcher of hearts, and consequently an appeal to him, as the witness of his sincerity, and the avenger of him against his enemies. It was composed by David, it appears not on what particular occasion, and commended to the Prefect of his Musick.
1. O Lord, thou hast searched me and known me.
2. Thou knowest my down-sitting and mine uprising; thou understandest my thoughts‖from farr foreign afarr off.
3. a.Thou†searchest compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my wayes.
4. *or, When there is not a word in my tongue, O Lord, thou knowest all (see note b.)For there is not a word in my tongue, but lo, O Lord, thou knowest it alltogether.
5. b.Thou hast‖distrest, or begirt beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.
Paraphrase. Blessed Lord, thou hast the perfect inspection and knowledge of me, of al my designes and undertakings, of the beginnings and ends of my actions, of all the traverses of our lives, Deut. 6.7. and even of my very thoughts. A long time before my deeds discover them to men, they are all naked and bare to thine all-seeing eye in heaven. Thou hast wayes of discovering and discerning the bent and inclination of my heart, not only as men have by words (and actions) but by immediate inspection into the heart, being so close and present to me in every the least motion of that, that a man can no more escape or march undiscovered out of a city the most closely besieged, when the galleries are prepared, and the assailant just ready to enter, than a thought can arise in my heart which is not perfectly discerned by thee, who are nearer and more intrinsick to me then my very soul. See Heb. iv. 13.
6. Such knowledge is†admirable above too wonderfullc. for me: it is high, I cannot*doe or deal with it attein unto it.
7. Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
8. If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold thou art there.
9. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
10. Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
11. If I say,‖but, or yet foreign the darkness shall cover me, then the night shall be light about me.
12. Yea the darkness hideth not from thee, but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.
This is an admirable power or virtue, a most divine excellence of thine, such as I am no way able to deal with or resist. There is no means imaginable for me or any mortall to escape the reach of thy most penetrating eye, to secure our selves from thy allseeing presence: neither could an ascent to heaven, nor descent to the state of the dead, (that which hath its denomination from being invisible) nay though we were able to fly as swift as light, which of an instant overruns the whole horizon, and carries day to the most distant regions, the utmost parts of the world, those beyond the Ocean (whither it is thought there is no passage) can stand us in any stead toward the concealing us from thy sight and judgments. The darkest night, the closest and most artificious recess, the subtilest disguises and hypocrisies are all naked and bare and discernible before thee, and as much so as any the most open scandalous sins, which are committed before the sun, or on the house top.
13. For thou hastd. ‖formed, or power ofpossessed my reins, thou hast†compacted covered me in my mothers womb.
My very affections and inclinations, the original bents and pronenesses of my nature are within thy reach; my fabrick and formation in the very womb of my mother being a work of thine.
14. I will*confess to foreign praise thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvailous are thy works, and that my soule knoweth right well.
And that work, I must confess, a strange and prodigious work: so that if I look no farther than mine own original and formation, I cannot but acknowledge thee a God of stupendious operations.
15. My substance was not hid from thee when I was made in secret, ande. ‖embroideredcuriously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
16. Thine eyes did see myf. †rude mass, and on thy books were all written (as they were daily fashioned) and not one of them was left out, or when there was not one of them.substance yet being imperfect, and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there were none of them.
But even then when in the wombe of my mother, that place which no mortal eye can look into, my body was most secretly wrought, and all the art used that is imaginable to adorn it with the most various imbroidery, from the first being of that masse, through all the changes that daily and hourely and minutely were made, till at length it came to a perfect formation, with all the parts which it brings into the world with it; thy all-seeing eye long before, even from all eternity, exactly discerned every the least change or variety which happened all that while, and thy book of register still reteins them, not one the least circumstance being omitted.
17. How pretious also are thyg. thoughts unto me, O God! how*prevailing or exceeding great is the summe of them!
18. If I should count them, they are‖multiplied above the- more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee.
And as thy omniscience and all-seeing power is most wonderfull, so are thy counsels, and most wise and various dispensations of thy providence most observable. Only the depth of them is so great, and the variety so infinite, that it is not possible for me to get by all my search to the bottome of them. The farther I proceed in this study, the farther I am from an end of it; I am as it were in a maze, no farther advanced to day then I was yesterday, this being indeed an abysse unsearchable, which cannot be founded by any humane understanding. In all the turns and varieties of my life, whatsoever my condition is, thy assistance and safeguard is continually present to me.
19. †or wilt thou foreignSurely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men.
20. For theyh. *talke of thee for mischiefspeak against thee wickedly; and thine enemies take thy name in vaine.
21. Doe not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? and am not I‖wearied, nonseated, foreign grieved with those that rise up against thee?
22. I hate them with a perfect hatred:†they have been to me for enemies. foreign I count them mine enemies.
All that I can reach unto in the view of thy acts of providence, that particularly of permitting wicked men to prosper here in their impieties, is, that they are reserved for some greater evill, their prosperity will not long last, but end in utter ruine and destruction. Whether this be the designe of thy permitting them to prosper, I cannot affirme; but this I am resolved of, that I will have nothing to doe with such kinde of bloody men, such as oppose and hate God, yet talk demurely of him, make use of his name in their professions and protestations, as of an art of deceiving and mischieving others more advantageously. And those that doe so, that profess kindness to God, and yet resist and oppose him, and under the veil of piety cover their mischievous designes, I cannot but abhorr, and nauseate, and vehemently dislike; I am weary to think of them: I am as much concerned, as nearly toucht with these their impieties, as if they were acts of injury and enmity against my self; no wrong that could be done me, would incense me more than what I see thus committed against piety and humanity it selfe, under the pretence of both.
23. Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts.
24. And see if there be anyi. wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
And for this I appeal to thy all-searching eye, which I am sure discerns the deepest of my heart, v. 4. even the secrets of my thoughts, in which I hope thou wilt not finde any the least degree of unsincerity, any false accursed concealment. If there be, I heartily desire to be rid of it, to have it quite purged out of my heart, and to be constantly led and directed in that course of uprightness, both toward God and man, which alone can be able to bear the inspection of that all-seeing eye, and which alone will finally be the gainer, when frauds and colours and disguises are brought forth and severely punished.
Annotations on Psalm CXXXIX.
V. 3. Compasseth my path and my lying down] For foreign foreignmy lying down, from foreign recubuit, our copies of the Lxxii. read foreign, and from thence the Latine funiculum meum, my cord. But the Chaldee reteins the Hebrew, with an addition of foreign lying down to study: and the Syriack foreign which the translater renders my path, may more fitly be rendred my rest, my vacancy; for there appears no reason why for lying down they should render path, when foreign immediately precedent had signified that. The Lxxii, as now we have them, read foreign: but 'tis the conjecture of the learned Hugo Grotius, that they read not foreign but foreign, not cord, but lying down, and that the affinity caused the change of one into the other, and then the Latine following the corrupted copies, render foreign funiculum. The greater difficulty is how foreign foreignis to be rendred. The Chaldee certainly mistake it, rendring it foreign art become strange, as if it were from foreign strange; but the Syriack foreign thou knowest, and the Lxxii. foreign thou hast sought out and investigated, and so the Latine and Arabick, (though the Jewish Arab, deriving it against analogy of Grammar from foreign a span, render it, thou hast as it were spanned.) And this comes nearest the sense of it; for the Hebrew foreign as it signifies to disperse & dissipate, so 'tis peculiarly taken in the sense of fanning or ventilating. So Jer. iv. 11. foreign to fan, and so Jer. Li. 2. foreign and they shall fann them. And then as fanning is designed to the separating and discriminating the good corne from the chaffe, so the word is here used in the metaphorical sense for searching, examining, as sifting, ventilating, winnowing doth oft signify. As for the supposed use of the word for incompassing, it is no where met with in Scripture, nor pretended by Lexicographers, save only in this place whereof the question is, and so that deserves not much to be considered.
V. 5. Beset me] The Hebrew foreign signifies 1. to press, afflict, distress, 2. to besiege, 3. by pressing to forme or frame any thing. The Lxxii. taking it in the last sense render foreign foreignhere, foreign, thou hast formed me, (and so the Syriack, foreign thou hast framed me; and so the Latine and the Arabick, thou hast coagulated me) and to that purpose joyne the foreign behinde and before, to the former part of the period, thus, foreign, thou, O Lord, knowest all things, the last and the first. But the Chaldee confirme our punctation and reading of the period out of the Hebrew, onelyonly with this change, v. 4. that they render foreign foreignnot for but when, When there is not a word in my mouth, and then suppose the foreign all to belong to all that is within, i. e. to all the thoughts of the heart. And truly that is a very probable interpretation, foreign when there is not a word in my mouth, foreign behold, O Lord, thou knowest all. Our words are the only instruments by which men come to know our hearts: but God without that help, though there be not a word spoken, knows, discovers all, hath his immediate inspection into the heart, and there sees the thoughts, without any optick of our words to look through. And then for foreign, they render it foreign thou hast prest, distrest, driven me to streights, as one that hath laid a close siege on every side, that there is no escaping. And that this is the meaning of it appears by what follows, foreign and thou hast put thy hand upon me, as they that have besieged so close that they can sieze on or take when they please. And so 'tis all one whether we read it distrest me, or begirt me, taking it either way in the notion of a strict and close siege, by which means the besieger, i. e. God here, hath exact knowledge of the state of the besieged, and can seize on him whensoever he pleaseth.
V. 6. Too wonderfull for me] The Hebrew foreign is best rendred admirable above me, foreigni. e. more admirable than that I can resist it or avoid it. To that sense the Antecedents and Consequents exact it: the Antecedents, which affirme the very thoughts to be manifest, and discernible before him; and the Consequents, that whithersoever he goes, he is still within his prospect. To the same sense is the other part of the verse, It is high, foreign,foreign I cannot to it, or with it, i. e. I cannot deal with it. I am not able to doe ought that may be of any force this way, i. e. toward the concealing any thing from him; whither shall I goe? i. e. I can goe no whither, from thy spirit.
V. 13. Possessed my reins] The word foreign foreignas it signifies to get, to acquire, so 'tis also simply to have in ones power or dominion. In the notion of getting, 'tis indifferently used of whatsoever kinde of acquiring, particularly of that which is by way of generation; as when Eve names her first-borne Cain, Gen. iv. 1. she renders that reason of it, foreign I have gotten a man from the Lord (or a man the Lord, as foreign may probably be rendred.) In that place, as in this, the Lxxii. render it by foreign I have possest. But Gen. xiv. 19. where God is called foreign, we read possessor of heaven and earth; the Lxxii. read foreign who created, and so the Latine, qui creavit, and so the Persian Targum, the Creator of heaven and earth. And here the Syriack, that reteins (as the Chaldee doth also) the Hebrew word, foreign, is by the interpreter rendred condidisti, hast framed. Thus 'tis certain the Chaldee have rendred the word, Prov. viii. 22. where for the Hebrew foreign the Lord hath possessed me, they read foreign the Lord hath begotten or created me, and so the Syriack also foreign, as well as the Lxxii. foreign. And though that were made use of by the Arrians, to prove Christ to be foreign a creature, and to avoid that consequent 'tis conjectured that the true reading was foreign possest, not foreign created; yet some prejudices there are against that conjecture: as 1. that the Lxxii. never use that word in the active, but still foreign, and foreign, and foreign, which hath not that affinity with foreign: 2. that the Chaldee and Syriack render it by foreign, which exactly accords with foreign, not with foreign. It will therefore be more reasonable to render such an account of the Lxxii. their rendring it by foreign, as may be applicable to those other interpreters, and yet reconcileable with Catholick doctrine, viz. that foreign with them is not so strictly or nicely to be taken, as to denote a creation foreign out of nothing, nor any more then what is taught by the Church, of Christs eternal generation, in respect of which he is truly styled the eternal son of God. Thus we know that foreign is used in Chaldee of generation, Job iii. 3. There is a man-child conceived, they read foreign. And so the Hebrew foreign is Zach. xiii. 5. rendred by the Lxxii. foreign begotten (where yet the context inclines it to the notion of educating.) And so still this notion of foreign for forming or begetting may have place in this verse of this Psalm, and the rendring be, thou hast formed (in stead of possessed) my reins; as Deut. xxxii. 6. after, is he not thy Father? is added foreign, we read, that hath bought thee, the Chaldee more generally foreign thou art his, and the Jewish Arab, thou art King or possessor of my inward parts, but the Persian Targum, he hath created thee; and to that the consequents also incline it, foreign he hath made thee and formed thee, (as all the interpreters acknowledge.) And thus it well connects here with the Psalmists argument, of Gods knowing him, and nothing being concealed from him; for having formed the reins, the natural seats of the affections, from whence proceed the very first motions of sin, he must needs be acknowledged to know them exactly. And thus it best suits also with what follows, foreign,foreign we render, thou hast covered me, but the Chaldee foreign thou hast founded me, Castellio, composuisti me, hast compounded me: and so it may most probably be from the notion of foreign to mix or put together, thereby expressing the formation of the childe in the wombe. Or if it be in the notion of covering, then 'tis to be expounded by Job x. ii. thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, foreign (from foreign, which is all one with foreign) thou hast fenced me with bones and sinews, (to which notion the Lxxii. their foreign hast holpen me in this place must be referred, so as covering and fencing, protecting and helping are all one) and so still this returns to that of compounding or compacting, (so the Chaldee renders it in Job) and then the whole verse will be best thus rendred, Thou hast formed my reins, thou hast compacted me in my mothers womb: and then regularly follows, v. 14. I am fearfully and wonderfully made. If this notion of foreign be not yet accepted, then it must be resolved to signify such a possessing as praerequires not any acquiring, but only implyes having power over, as the Jewish Arab rendred it. And so the sense will well bear, Thou hast power over my reins, thou hast covered, or formed me in my mothers womb; he that hath so formed, having certainly the power over his very reins, and he that hath that creative power, having nothing concealed from him.
V. 15. Curiously wrought] The Hebrew foreign foreignsignifies being embroidered. So Exod. xxxv. 35. with the ingraver and cunning workman is joyned foreign and the embroiderer. Of this see the learned Nicholas Fuller, Miscellan. l. 1. c. xx. And thus is it here most fitly used of the formation and contexture of the child in the wombe (that certeinly is the meaning of foreign in the lower parts of the earth; for which the Jewish Arab reads, as if I had been in the lowest or bottome of the earth, saying that he addes foreign as if, because the scope of the words is to describe the state or manner of his forming in the mothers womb: and so the like phrase may be understood not improbably Eph. iv. 9. see note on that place) wherein the flesh, and bones, and skin, and veins, and nerves, and arteries are so artificially weaved together, that no embroidery or carpet-work in the world can compare with it. What is here said of being made in secret, may seem to have some Emphasis, and reflect on the way of tapestry work, which requires a clear light, both to see what is wrought, and to view the pattern. For this the Lxxii. put foreign, reading, as the learned Val. Schindler most probably conjectures, foreign (from foreign stature) through the affinity betwixt ר and ו, and not, as the learned H. Grotius, foreign my substance, riches, which is much more remote in sound, if not also in signification.
V. 16. Substance being yet imperfect] The Hebrew here hath no more then foreign.foreign The word signifies an embryon, or unformed lump, or mass of flesh, which the Chaldee read foreign my body, but the Lxxii. foreign that which was unwrought of me, the masse or lump, before it had that curious embroidery mentioned in the former verse. An evident continuation of the former similitude of tapestry, to the making of which there is nothing praerequired but rude glomi or skeins of silk, and yet when the artificers hand hath past upon it, there arises presently an unexpected beauty and accurate harmony of colours and proportions. And as the workman hath still his book or pattern before him, to which he allwayes recurrs, by as exact a method were all my members fashioned. Rabbi Tanchum reads, my matter before the introduction of the forme of man, and so makes the matter fit for the reception of any forme, before the introduction of the forme, to be foreign. The Syriack here seems to have misread it, by changing the order of the letters, for foreign and so render it foreign my retribution. Of this rude mole or masse in the womb, two things are here added, one in respect of it selfe, the other in relation to Gods seeing it, which is the principal thing here considered. In the first respect 'tis said, foreign foreignthey are formed or fashioned daily, i. e. from that rude masse receive daily some degree of figuration. In the second respect 'tis said, that in Gods book, foreign foreignupon his book, or register, or book of remembrance, as the Chaldee styles it, foreign they are all written; to which, I suppose, is to be annext that which ends the verse, foreign:foreign the Lxxii. render it literally, foreign, and not one of or among them. Wherein there being an Ellipsis, that may not improbably be thus best supplied, There was not one, or any of or among them, omitted. 'Tis true, the words are so placed, that that part of the period foreign are daily formed, lies betwixt their being written in the book, and this close of the verse, not one of, or among them: but this is no unusual Hyperbaton, and may be avoided also by including those words in a Parenthesis, thus, Thine eyes did see my rude masse, and on thy register all were written (they were, or as they were daily fashioned) and not any of them was left out or omitted. And this is very consonant to the context, which is wholly designed to set down how all things lie open before Gods eyes, are discerned and registred by him, and so written in his book, even to the least figuration in the body of the childe in the wombe, not one of them omitted. But it may also be thus rendred, foreign and there was not one of them, i. e. before there was any one of them formed, for this answers the knowing the thoughts afarr off, the knowing the word, when 'tis not in the tongue, v. 4. which Aben Ezra understands of Gods praescience.
V. 17. Thy thoughts] foreign foreignis an aequivocal word, signifying both thy thoughts and thy friends. In the latter notion all the antient interpreters take it: foreign thy lovers, say the Chaldee; foreign, thy friends, the Lxxii. and so the rest. But the designe of the whole context inclines it the other way. How pretious to me are thy thoughts? (as most latter interpreters have acknowledged) and then foreign must be lookt on as a numeral word, and is by us rightly rendred the summe of them (though the Chaldee, in accordance with their other interpretation, read foreign their rulers, and the Lxxii. foreign, the Latine, principatus eorum, their principalities) as more clearly appears foreign If I number them— v. 18. But then foreign foreignis not so fully rendred how great? but (as the Lxxii. foreign they are advanced in strength) how prevailing is the summe of them, how exceeding? i. e. much above me, or my comprehension. For so it follows, If I number them foreign they are multiplied foreign above the sand. All the difficulty is, what is the meaning of the conclusion of the verse, foreign,foreign literally, I awaked, and I am still with thee. A way of explaining it will be by keeping this latter part of the verse to the same matter to which the former part belonged, and so making the parts of this answerable to the parts of that. There 'twas, I will number them, the future for the subjunctive, If, or when I would number them: Here, I awaked, i. e. in proportion with that, when I doe awake. There 'twas, They are multiplied above the sands: Here 'tis, I am still with thee, i. e. as in a work which hath no end, (such is numbring of sands, and such is comprehending the counsels or thoughts of God) when I awake, I still am i. e. where I was before I went to sleep, the more I think of it the more I may, 'tis such an Abysse, that I can never get to the bottome of it. Another interpretation the phrase is capable of, by laying the weight on the Amphibology which foreign occasions, signifying 1. to be faint, and wearied out by work, then 2. to awake from sleep, which usually refreshes, and 3. to arise from the dead, see 2 Kin. iv. 31. the childe is not awaked, i. e. revived, and Isa. xxvi. 19. Thy dead men shall live, arise, awake, &c. And then by the elegance of this comprehensive word, the meaning may be, that whether fainting, or refresht, or rising from the dead, in whatsoever condition we are, God is present with us by his special assistance: and then fitly follows on the other side, his vengeance on wicked men, surely thou wilt slay, &c.
V. 20. Speak against thee wickedly] The Hebrew foreign foreignsignifying a thought (whence the Lxxii. render it foreign) but that generally is an ill sense, a wicked, mischievous thought, a contrivance for the hurt of some body, the phrase foreign must be rendred, for mischief, (and that so foreign signifies, by which the Lxxii. render it, see note on Mat. xv. e.) and then foreign foreignmust be interpreted (not they speak against thee, but) they speak or talk of thee, their talking of God, pretending to piety, is but a stratageme to doe mischief. That this is the meaning of the phrase, appears by that which immediately follows, foreign. First, they are Gods enemies (so certainly foreign foreignsignifies 1 Sam. xviii. 16. and so foreign is rendred by the Lxxii. foreign enemies Isa. xiv. 21. though here they read it, as from foreign city, foreign thy cities) and being so, sure their mentioning or naming of God must be on designe to doe mischief by it. Secondly, their assuming in vaine, foreign(foreign assuming for vanity or falseness, say the Lxxii.) is swearing falsely, mentioning the name of God for the confirming some falsity; and so that perfectly agrees with the former sense, of speaking of God for mischief. And accordingly the Chaldee render both phrases to the same sense, foreign they swear by thy name for deceit, and again, they swear falsely.
V. 24. Wicked way] The Original hath foreign foreignway of falseness. foreign signifies sorrow, labour, and withall any thing laboriously or artificially contrived, and so frequently an idol or image, which is exprest in scripture style by vanity and falseness. And so here the Chaldee render it foreign the way of error, and the Syriack foreign of falseness; the Lxxii. read more generally foreign iniquity. This the Psalmist here disclaims in reference to the deceitfull pretenders to piety, v. 20. their way being a way of deceit and falseness; and because he looked on that as that which would not long stand, God would at length discover and bring out such glozers, he therefore here addes, and lead me foreign into the way of lasting, foreignof eternity, that way which alone will hold out when all others faile, when the way of the ungodly shall perish.