{"commentary":{"id":"keil-delitzsch","name":"Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary","website":"https://worthy.bible/commentaries/keil-delitzsch-commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"bb5cc0f9cfe0a93b3c903bb6972c6bc8c4e9f2bd3be6c2a6d276737cf9c5edce","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":39,"totalNumberOfChapters":909,"totalNumberOfVerses":6516,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"PSA","commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","name":"Psalms","commonName":"Psalms","introduction":"The Book of Psalms\n\nIntroduction to the Psalter\n\nΠάντα ὥσπερ ἐν μεγάλῳ τινὶ καὶ κοινῷ ταμιείῳ τῇ βίβλῳ τῶν ψαλμῶν τεθησαύρισται.\n\nBasil\n\n1. Position of the Psalter among the Hagiographa, and More Especially among the Poetical Books\n\nThe Psalter is everywhere regarded as an essential part of the Kethubim or Hagiographa; but its position among these varies. It seems to follow from Luk 24:44 that it opened the Kethubim in the earliest period of the Christina era.\n\n(Note: Also from 2 Macc. 2:13, where τὰ τοῦ Δαυίδ appears to be the designation of the כתובים according to their beginning; and from Philo, De vita contempl. (opp. II 475 ed. Mangey), where he makes the following distinction νόμους καὶ λόγια θεσπισθέντα διὰ προφητῶν καὶ ὕμνους καὶ τὰ ἄλλα οἷς ἐπιστήμη καὶ εὐσέβεια συναύξονται καὶ τελειοῦνται.)\n\nThe order of the books in the Hebrew MSS of the German class, upon which our printed editions in general use are based, is actually this: Psalms, Proverbs, Job, and the five Megilloth. But the Masora and the MSS of the Spanish class begin the Kethubim with the Chronicles which they awkwardly separate from Ezra and Nehemiah, and then range the Psalms, Job, Proverbs and the five Megilloth next.\n\n(Note: In all the Masoretic lists the twenty four books are arranged in the following order: 1) בראשׁית; 2) ואלה שׁמות; 3) ויקרא; 4) וידבר (also במדבר); 5) אלה הדברים; 6) יהושׁע; 7) שׁופטים; 8) שׁמואל; 9) מלכים; 10) ישׁעיה; 11) ירמיה; 12) יחזקאל; 13) תרי עשׂר; 14) דברי הימים; 15) תהלות; 16) איוב; 17) משׁלי; 18) רות; 19) שׁיר השׁירים; 20) קהלת; 21) קינות (איכה); 22) אחשׁורושׁ (מגלה); 23) דניאל; 24) עזרא. The Masoretic abbreviation for the three pre-eminently poetical books is accordingly, not מתא but (in agreement with their Talmudic order) אםת (as also in Chajug'), vid., Elia Levita, Masoreth ha-Masoreth p. 19. 73 (ed. Ven. 1538) ed. Ginsburg, 1867, p. 120, 248.)\n\nAnd according to the Talmud (Baba Bathra 14b) the following is the right order: Ruth, Psalms, Job, Proverbs; the Book of Ruth precedes the Psalter as its prologue, for Ruth is the ancestor of him to whom the sacred lyric owes its richest and most flourishing era. It is undoubtedly the most natural order that the Psalter should open the division of the Kethubim, and for this reason: that, according to the stock which forms the basis of it, it represents the time of David, and then afterwards in like manner the Proverbs and Job represent the Chokma-literature of the age of Solomon. But it is at once evident that it could have no other place but among the Kethubim.\n\nThe codex of the giving of the Law, which is the foundation of the old covenant and of the nationality of Israel, as also of all its subsequent literature, occupies the first place in the canon. Under the collective title of נביאים, a series of historical writings of a prophetic character, which trace the history of Israel from the occupation of Canaan to the first gleam of light in the gloomy retributive condition of the Babylonish Exile (Prophetae priores) is first attached to these five books of the Thra; and then a series of strictly prophetical writings by the prophets themselves which extend to the time of Darius Nothus, and indeed to the time of Nehemiah's second sojourn in Jerusalem under this Persian king (Prophetae posteriores). Regarded chronologically, the first series would better correspond to the second if the historical books of the Persian period (Chronicles with Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther) were joined to it; but for a very good reason this has not been done. The Israelitish literature has marked out two sharply defined and distinct methods of writing history, viz., the annalistic and the prophetic. The so-called Elohistic and so-called Jehovistic form of historical writing in the Pentateuch might serve as general types of these. The historical books of the Persian period are, however, of the annalistic, not of the prophetic character (although the Chronicles have taken up and incorporated many remnants of the prophetic form of historical writing, and the Books of the Kings, vice versa, many remnants of the annalistic): they could not therefore stand among the Prophetae priores. But with the Book of Ruth it is different. This short book is so like the end of the Book of the Judges (ch. 17-21), that it might very well stand between Judges and Samuel; and it did originally stand after the Book of the Judges, just as the Lamentations of Jeremiah stood after his prophecies. It is only on liturgical grounds that they have both been placed with the so-called Megilloth (Canticles, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther, as they are arranged in our ordinary copies according to the calendar of the festivals). All the remaining books could manifestly only be classed under the third division of the canon, which (as could hardly have been otherwise in connection with תורה and נביאים) has been entitled, in the most general way, כתובים ,, - a title which, as the grandson of Ben-Sira renders it in his prologue to Ecclesiasticus, means simply τὰ ἄλλα πάτρια βιβλία, or τὰ λοιπὰ τῶν βιβλίων, and nothing more. For if it were intended to mean writings, written ברוח הקדשׁ, - as the third degree of inspiration which is combined with the greatest spontaneity of spirit, is styled according to the synagogue notion of inspiration-then the words ברוח הקדשׁ would and ought to stand with it.\n\n2. Names of the Psalter\n\nAt the close of the seventy-second Psalm (72:20) we find the subscription: \"Are ended the prayers of David, the Son of Jesse.\" The whole of the preceding Psalms are here comprehended under the name תּפלּות. This strikes one as strange, because with the exception of Psa 17:1-15 (and further on Ps 86; 90; 102; Psa 142:1-7) they are all inscribed otherwise; and because in part, as e.g., Psa 1:1-6 and Psa 2:1-12, they contain no supplicatory address to God and have therefore not the form of prayers. Nevertheless the collective name Tephilloth is suitable to all Psalms. The essence of prayer is a direct and undiverted looking towards God, and the absorption of the mind in the thought of Him. Of this nature of prayer all Psalms partake; even the didactic and laudatory, though containing no supplicatory address-like Hannah's song of praise which is introduced with ותתפלל (Sa1 2:1). The title inscribed on the Psalter is תּהלּים (ספר) for which תּלּים (apocopated תּלּי deta) is also commonly used, as Hippolytus (ed. de Lagarde p. 188) testifies: Ἑεβραῖοι περιέγραψαν τὴν βίβλον Σέφρα θελείμ.\n\n(Note: In Eusebius, vi. 25: Σέφηρ Θιλλήν; Jerome (in the Preface to his translation of the Psalms juxta Hebraicam veritatem) points it still differently: SEPHAR THALLIM quod interpretatur volumen hymnorum. Accordingly at the end of the Psalterium ex Hebraeo, Cod. 19 in the Convent Library of St. Gall we find the subscription: Sephar Tallim Quod interpretatur volumen Ymnorum explicit.)\n\nThis name may also seem strange, for the Psalms for the most part are hardly hymns in the proper sense: the majority are elegiac or didactic; and only a solitary one, Ps 145, is directly inscribed תהלה. But even this collective name of the Psalms is admissible, for they all partake of the nature of the hymn, to wit the purpose of the hymn, the glorifying of God. The narrative Psalms praise the magnalia Dei, the plaintive likewise praise Him, since they are directed to Him as the only helper, and close with grateful confidence that He will hear and answer. The verb הלּל includes both the Magnificat and the De profundis.\n\nThe language of the Masora gives the preference to the feminine form of the name, instead of תהלים, and throughout calls the Psalter ספר תהלות (e.g., on Sa2 22:5).\n\n(Note: It is an erroneous opinion of Buxtorf in his Tiberias and also of Jewish Masoretes, that the Masora calls the Psalter הלילא (hallla). It is only the so-called Hallel, Ps 113-119, that bears this name, for in the Masora on Sa2 22:5; Psa 116:3 is called הברו דהלילא (the similar passage in the Hallel) in relation to Psa 18:5.)\n\nIn the Syriac it is styled ketobo demazmûre, in the Koran zabûr (not as Golius and Freytag point it, zubûr), which in the usage of the Arabic language signifies nothing more than \"writing\" (synon. kitâb: vid., on Psa 3:1), but is perhaps a corruption of mizmor from which a plural mezâmir is formed, by a change of vowels, in Jewish-Oriental MSS. In the Old Testament writings a plural of mizamor does not occur. Also in the post-biblical usage mizmorı̂m or mizmoroth is found only in solitary instances as the name for the Psalms. In Hellenistic Greek the corresponding word ψαλμοί (from ψάλλειν = זמּר) is the more common; the Psalm collection is called βίβλος ψαλμῶν (Luk 20:42; Act 1:20) or ψαλτήριον, the name of the instrument (psantêrı̂n in the Book of Daniel)\n\n(Note: Νάβλα - say Eusebius and others of the Greek Fathers - παρ ̓ Ἑβραίοις λέγεται τὸ ψαλτήριον ὃ δὴ μόνον τῶν μουσικῶν ὀργάνων ὀρθότατον καὶ μὴ συνεργούμενον εἰς ἦχον ἐκ τῶν κατωτάτω μερῶν, ἀλλ ̓ ἄνωθεν ἔχων τὸν ὑπηχοῦντα χαλκόν. Augustine describes this instrument still more clearly in Psa 42:1-11 and elsewhere: Psalterium istud organum dicitur quod de superiore parte habet testudinem, illud scilicet tympanum et concavum lignum cui chordae innitentes resonant, cithara vero id ipsum lignum cavum et sonorum ex inferiore parte habet. In the cithern the strings pass over the sound-board, in the harp and lyre the vibrating body runs round the strings which are left free (without a bridge) and is either curved or angular as in the case of the harp, or encompasses the strings as in the lyre. Harps with an upper sounding body (whether of metal or wood, viz., lignum concavum i.e., with a hollow and hence sonorous wood, which protects the strings like a testudo and serves as tympanum) are found both on Egyptian and on Assyrian monuments. By the psalterium described by Augustine, Casiodorus and Isidorus understand the trigonum, which is in the form of an inverted sharp-cornered triangle; but it cannot be this that is intended because the horizontal strings of this instrument are surrounded by a three-sided sounding body, so that it must be a triangular lyre. Moreover there is also a trigon belonging to the Macedonian era which is formed like a harp (vid., Weiss' Kostmkunde, Fig. 347) and this further tends to support our view.)\n\nbeing transferred metaphorically to the songs that are sung with its accompaniment. Psalms are songs for the lyre, and therefore lyric poems in the strictest sense.\n\n3. The History of Psalm Composition\n\nBefore we can seek to obtain a clear idea of the origin of the Psalm-collection we must take a general survey of the course of the development of psalm writing. The lyric is the earliest kind of poetry in general, and the Hebrew poetry, the oldest example of the poetry of antiquity that has come down to us, is therefore essentially lyric. Neither the Epos nor the Drama, but only the Mashal, has branched off from it and attained an independent form. Even prophecy, which is distinguished from psalmody by a higher impulse which the mind of the writer receives from the power of the divine mind, shares with the latter the common designation of נכּא (Ch1 24:1-3), and the psalm-singer, משׁרר, is also as such called חזה (Ch1 25:5; Ch2 29:30; Ch2 35:15, cf. Ch1 15:19 and freq.); for just as the sacred lyric often rises to the height of prophet vision, so the prophetic epic of the future, because it is not entirely freed from the subjectivity of the prophet, frequently passes into the strain of the psalm.\n\nThe time of Moses was the period of Israel's birth as a nation and also of its national lyric. The Israelites brought instruments with them out of Egypt and these were the accompaniments of their first song (Ex 15) - the oldest hymn, which re-echoes through all hymns of the following ages and also through the Psalter (comp. Exo 15:2 with Psa 118:14; Exo 15:3 with Psa 24:8; Exo 15:4, Exo 14:27 with Psa 136:15; Ex 15: with Psa 78:13, Exo 15:11 with Psa 77:14; Psa 86:8; Psa 89:7.; Exo 15:13, Exo 15:17 with Psa 78:54, and other parallels of a similar kind). If we add to these, Ps 90 and Deut 32, we then have the prototypes of all Psalms, the hymnic, elegiac, and prophetico-didactic. All three classes of songs are still wanting in the strophic symmetry which characterises the later art. But even Deborah's song of victory, arranged in hexastichs, - a song of triumph composed eight centuries before Pindar and far outstripping him, - exhibits to us the strophic art approximating to its perfect development. It has been thought strange that the very beginnings of the poesy of Israel are so perfect, but the history of Israel, and also the history of its literature, comes under a different law from that of a constant development from a lower to a higher grade. The redemptive period of Moses, unique in its way, influences as a creative beginning, every future development. There is a constant progression, but of such a kind as only to develope that which had begun in the Mosaic age with all the primal force and fulness of a divine creation. We see, however, how closely the stages of this progress are linked together, from the fact that Hannah the singer of the Old Testament Magnificat, was the mother of him who anointed, as King, the sweet singer of Israel, on whose tongue was the word of the Lord.\n\nIn David the sacred lyric attained its full maturity. Many things combined to make the time of David its golden age. Samuel had laid the foundation of this both by his energetic reforms in general, and by founding the schools of the prophets in particular, in which under his guidance (Sa1 19:19.), in conjunction with the awakening and fostering of the prophetic gift, music and song were taught. Through these coenobia, whence sprang a spiritual awakening hitherto unknown in Israel, David also passed. Here his poetic talent, if not awakened, was however cultivated. He was a musician and poet born. Even as a Bethlehemite shepherd he played upon the harp, and with his natural gift he combined a heart deeply imbued with religious feeling. But the Psalter contains as few traces of David's Psalms before his anointing (vid., on Psa 8:1-9; Psa 144:1-15) as the New Testament does of the writings of the Apostles before the time of Pentecost. It was only from the time when the Spirit of Jahve came upon him at his anointing as king of Israel, and raised him to the dignity of his calling in connection with the covenant of redemption, that he sang Psalms, which have become an integral part of the canon. They are the fruit not only of his high gifts and the inspiration of the Spirit of God (Sa2 23:2), but also of his own experience and of the experience of his people interwoven with his own. David's path from his anointing onwards, lay through affliction to glory. Song however, as a Hindu proverb says, is the offspring of suffering, the חloka springs from the חoka. His life was marked by vicissitudes which at one time prompted him to elegiac strains, at another to praise and thanksgiving; at the same time he was the founder of the kingship of promise, a prophecy of the future Christ, and his life, thus typically moulded, could not express itself otherwise than in typical or even consciously prophetic language. Raised to the throne, he did not forget the harp which had been his companion and solace when he fled before Saul, but rewarded it with all honour. He appointed 4000 Levites, the fourth division of the whole Levitical order, as singers and musicians in connection with the service in the tabernacle on Zion and partly in Gibeon, the place of the Mosaic tabernacle. These he divided into 24 classes under the Precentors, Asaph, Heman, and Ethan = Jeduthun (1 Chron 25 comp. Ch1 15:17.), and multiplied the instruments, particularly the stringed instruments, by his own invention (Ch1 23:5; Neh 12:36)\n\n(Note: I tended, says David in the Greek Psalter, at the close of Ps, my father's sheep, my hands made pipes (ὄργανον = עוגב) and my fingers put together (or: tuned) harps (ψαλτήριον = נבל) cf. Numeri Rabba c. xv. (f. 264a) and the Targum on Amo 6:5.).\n\nIn David's time there were three places of sacrifice: on Zion beside the ark (Sa2 6:17.), in Gibeon beside the Mosaic tabernacle (Ch1 16:39.) and later, on the threshing-floor of Ornan, afterwards the Temple-hill (Ch1 21:28-30). Thus others also were stimulated in many ways to consecrate their offerings to the God of Israel. Beside the 73 Psalms bearing the inscription לדוד, - Psalms the direct Davidic authorship of which is attested, at least in the case of some fifty, by their creative originality, their impassioned and predominantly plaintive strain, their graceful flow and movement, their ancient but clear language, which becomes harsh and obscure only when describing the dissolute conduct of the ungodly-the collection contains the following which are named after contemporary singers appointed by David: 12 לאסף (Ps 50; 78:1-83:18), of which the contents and spirit are chiefly prophetic, and 12 by the Levite family of singers, the בני־קרה (Ps 42-49; 84:1-85:13; 87:1-88:18, including Psa 43:1-5), bearing a predominantly regal and priestly impress. Both the Psalms of the Ezrahite, Ps 88 by Heman and Ps 89 by Ethan, belong to the time of Solomon whose name, with the exception of Ps 72, is borne only by Psa 127:1-5. Under Solomon psalm-poesy began to decline; all the existing productions of the mind of that age bear the mark of thoughtful contemplation rather than of direct conception, for restless eagerness had yielded to enjoyable contentment, national concentration to cosmopolitan expansion. It was the age of the Chokma, which brought the apophthegm to its artistic perfection, and also produced a species of drama. Solomon himself is the perfecter of the Mashal, that form of poetic composition belonging strictly to the Chokma, Certainly according to Kg1 5:12 [Hebr.; Kg1 4:32, Engl.] he was also the author of 1005 songs, but in the canon we only find two Psalms by him and the dramatic Song of Songs. This may perhaps be explained by the fact that he spake of trees from the cedar to the hyssop, that his poems, mostly of a worldly character, pertained rather to the realm of nature than to the kingdom of grace.\n\nOnly twice after this did psalm-poesy rise to any height and then only for a short period: viz., under Jehoshaphat and under Hezekiah. Under both these kings the glorious services of the Temple rose from the desecration and decay into which they had fallen to the full splendour of their ancient glory. Moreover there were two great and marvellous deliverances which aroused the spirit of poesy during the reigns of these kings: under Jehoshaphat, the overthrow of the neighbouring nations when they had banded together for the exstirpation of Judah, predicted by Jahaziel, the Asaphite; under Hezekiah the overthrow of Sennacherib's host foretold by Isaiah. These kings also rendered great service to the cause of social progress. Jehoshaphat by an institution designed to raise the educational status of the people, which reminds one of the Carlovingian missi (Ch2 17:7-9); Hezekiah, whom one may regard as the Pisistratus of Israelitish literature, by the establishment of a commission charged with collecting the relics of the early literature (Pro 25:1); he also revived the ancient sacred music and restored the Psalms of David and Asaph to their liturgical use (Ch2 29:25.). And he was himself a poet, as his מכתב (מכתם?) (Isa 38) shows, though certainly a reproductive rather than a creative poet. Both from the time of Jehoshaphat and from the time of Hezekiah we possess in the Psalter not a few Psalms, chiefly Asaphic and Korahitic, which, although bearing no historical heading, unmistakeably confront us with the peculiar circumstances of those times.\n\n(Note: With regard to the time of Jehoshaphat even Nic. Nonne has acknowledge this in his Diss. de Tzippor et Deror (Bremen 1741, 4to.) which has reference to Psa 84:4.)\n\nWith the exception of these two periods of revival the latter part of the regal period produced scarcely any psalm writers, but is all the more rich in prophets. When the lyric became mute, prophecy raised its trumpet voice in order to revive the religious life of the nation, which previously had expressed itself in psalms. In the writings of the prophets, which represent the λεῖμμα χάριτος in Israel, we do indeed find even psalms, as Jon 2:1-10, Isa 12:1-6; Hab 3:1, but these are more imitations of the ancient congregational hymns than original compositions. It was not until after the Exile that a time of new creations set in.\n\nAs the Reformation gave birth to the German church-hymn, and the Thirty years' war, without which perhaps there might have been no Paul Gerhardt, called it into life afresh, so the Davidic age gave birth to psalm-poesy and the Exile brought back to life again that which had become dead. The divine chastisement did not fail to produce the effect designed. Even though it should not admit of proof, that many of the Psalms have had portions added to them, from which it would be manifest how constantly they were then used as forms of supplication, still it is placed beyond all doubt, that the Psalter contains many psalms belonging to the time of the Exile, as e.g., Ps 102. Still far more new psalms were composed after the Return. When those who returned from exile, among whom were many Asaphites,\n\n(Note: In Barhebraeus on Job and in his Chronikon several traditions are referred to \"Asaph the Hebrew priest, the brother of Ezra the writer of the Scriptures.\")\n\nagain felt themselves to be a nation, and after the restoration of the Temple to be also a church, the harps which in Babylon hung upon the willows, were tuned afresh and a rich new flow of song was the fruit of this re-awakened first love. But this did not continue long. A sanctity founded on good works and the service of the letter took the place of that outward, coarse idolatry from which the people, now returned to their fatherland, had been weaned while undergoing punishment in the land of the stranger. Nevertheless in the era of the Seleucidae the oppressed and injured national feeling revived under the Maccabees in its old life and vigour. Prophecy had then long been dumb, a fact lamented in many passages in the 1st Book of the Maccabees. It cannot be maintained that psalm-poesy flourished again at that time. Hitzig has recently endeavoured to bring forward positive proof, that it is Maccabean psalms, which form the proper groundwork of the Psalter. He regards the Maccabean prince Alexander Jannaeus as the writer of Psa 1:1-6 and Psa 2:1-12, refers Ps 44 to 1 Macc. 5:56-62, and maintains both in his Commentary of 1835-36 and in the later edition of 1863-65 that from Ps 73 onwards there is not a single pre-Maccabean psalm in the collection and that, from that point, the Psalter mirrors the prominent events of the time of the Maccabees in chronological order. Hitzig has been followed by von Lengerke and Olshausen. They both mark the reign of John Hyrcanus (b.c. 135-107) as the time when the latest psalms were composed and when the collection as we now have it was made: whereas Hitzig going somewhat deeper ascribes Ps 1-2; Psa 150:1-6 with others, and the arrangement of the whole, to Hyrcanus' son, Alexander Jannaeus.\n\nOn the other hand both the existence and possibility of Maccabean psalms is disputed not only by Hengstenberg, Hvernick, and Keil but also by Gesenius, Hassler, Ewald, Thenius, Bttcher, and Dillmann. For our own part we admit the possibility. It has been said that the ardent enthusiasm of the Maccabean period was more human than divine, more nationally patriotic than theocratically national in its character, but the Book of Daniel exhibits to us, in a prophetic representation of that period, a holy people of the Most High contending with the god-opposing power in the world, and claims for this contest the highest significance in relation to the history of redemption. The history of the canon, also, does not exclude the possibility of there being Maccabean psalms. For although the chronicler by Ch1 16:36 brings us to the safe conclusion that in his day the Psalter (comp. τὰ τοῦ Δαυίδ, 2 Macc. 2:13)\n\n(Note: In the early phraseology of the Eastern and Western churches the Psalter is simply called David, e.g., in Chrysostom: ἐκμαθόντες ὅλον τὸν Δαβίδ, and at the close of the Aethiopic Psalter: \"David is ended.\")\n\nwas already a whole divided into five books (vid., on Psa 96:1-13; 105:1-106:48): it might nevertheless, after having been completely arranged still remain open for later insertions (just as the ספר הישׁר cited in the Jos 1:1 and 2 Sam 1, was an anthology which had grown together in the course of time). When Judas Maccabaeus, by gathering together the national literature, followed in the footsteps of Nehemiah (2 Macc. 2:14: ὡσαύτως δὲ καὶ Ἰούδας τὰ δεισκορπισμένα διὰ τὸν πόλεμον τὸν γεγονότα ἡμῖν ἐπισυνήγαγε πάντα, καὶ ἔστι παρ ̓ ἡμῖν), we might perhaps suppose that the Psalter was at that time enriched by some additions. And when Jewish tradition assigns to the so-called Great Synagogue (כנסת הגדולה) a share in the compilation of the canon, this is not unfavourable to the supposition of Maccabean psalms, since this συναγωγή μεγάλη was still in existence under the domination of the Seleucidae (1 Macc. 14:28).\n\nIt is utterly at variance with historical fact to maintain that the Maccabean period was altogether incapable of producing psalms worthy of incorporation in the canon. Although the Maccabean period had no prophets, it is nevertheless to be supposed that many possessed the gift of poesy, and that the Spirit of faith, which is essentially one and the same with the Spirit of prophecy, might sanctify this gift and cause it to bear fruit. An actual proof of this is furnished by the so-called Psalter of Solomon (Ψαλτήριον Σαλομῶντος in distinction from the canonical Psalter of David)\n\n(Note: First made known by De la Cerda in his Adversaria sacra (1626) and afterwards incorporated by Fabricius in his Codex Pseudepigraphus V. T. pp. 914ff. (1713).)\n\nconsisting of 18 psalms, which certainly come far behind the originality and artistic beauty of the canonical Psalms; but they show at the same time, that the feelings of believers, even throughout the whole time of the Maccabees, found utterance in expressive spiritual songs. Maccabean psalms are therefore not an absolute impossibility - no doubt they were many; and that some of them were incorporated in the Psalter, cannot be denied priori. But still the history of the canon does not favour this supposition. And the circumstance of the lxx version of the Psalms (according to which citations are made even in the first Book of the Maccabees) inscribing several Psalms Ἀγγαίου καὶ Ζαχαρίου, while however it does not assign the date of the later period to any, is against it. And if Maccabean psalms be supposed to exist in the Psalter they can at any rate only be few, because they must have been inserted in a collection which was already arranged. And since the Maccabean movement, though beginning with lofty aspirations, gravitated, in its onward course, towards things carnal, we can no longer expect to find psalms relating to it, or at least none belonging to the period after Judas Maccabaeus; and from all that we know of the character and disposition of Alexander Jannaeus it is morally impossible that this despot should be the author of the first and second Psalms and should have closed the collection.\n\n4. Origin of the Collection\n\nThe Psalter, as we now have it, consists of five books.\n\n(Note: The Karaite Jerocham (about 950 a.d.) says מגלות (rolls) instead of ספרים.)\n\nΤοῦτό σε μὴ παρέλθοι, ὦ φιλόλογε - says Hippolytus, whose words are afterwards quoted by Epiphanius - ὅτι καὶ τὸ ψαλτήριον εἰς πέντε διεῖλον βιβλία οἱ Ἑβραῖοι, ὥστε εἶναι καὶ αὐτὸ ἄλλον πεντάτευχον. This accords with the Midrash on Psa 1:1 : Moses gave the Israelites the five books of the Thτra and corresponding to these (כנגדם) David gave them the book of Psalms which consists of five books (ספר תהלים שׁישׁ בו חמשׁה ספרים). The division of the Psalter into five parts makes it the copy and echo of the Thפra, which it also resembles in this particular: that as in the Thפra Elohistic and Jehovistic sections alternate, so here a group of Elohistic Psalms (42-84) is surrounded on both sides by groups of Jehovistic (1-41, 85-150). The five books are as follow:-1-41, 42-72, 83-89, 90-106, 107-150.\n\n(Note: The Karaite Jefeth ben Eli calls them אשׁרי ספר, כאיל ס etc.)\n\nEach of the first four books closes with a doxology, which one might erroneously regard as a part of the preceding Psalm (Ps 41:14; Psa 72:18., 89:53; Psa 106:48), and the place of the fifth doxology is occupied by Ps as a full toned finale to the whole (like the relation of Ps 139 to the so-called Songs of degrees). These doxologies very much resemble the language of the liturgical Beracha of the second Temple. The אמן ואמן coupled with ו (cf. on the contrary Num 5:22 and also Neh 8:6) is exclusively peculiar to them in Old Testament writings. Even in the time of the writer of the Chronicles the Psalter was a whole divided into five parts, which were indicated by these landmarks. We infer this from Ch1 16:36. The chronicler in the free manner which characterises Thucydides of Livy in reporting a speech, there reproduces David's festal hymn that resounded in Israel after the bringing home of the ark; and he does it in such a way that after he has once fallen into the track of Ps 106, he also puts into the mouth of David the beracha which follows that Ps. From this we see that the Psalter was already divided into books at that period; the closing doxologies had already become thoroughly grafted upon the body of the Psalms after which they stand. The chronicler however wrote under the pontificate of Johanan, the son of Eliashib, the predecessor of Jaddua, towards the end of the Persian supremacy, but a considerable time before the commencement of the Grecian.\n\nNext to this application of the beracha of the Fourth book by the chronicler, Psa 72:20 is a significant mark for determining the history of the origin of the Psalter. The words: \"are ended the prayers of David the son of Jesse,\" are without doubt the subscription to the oldest psalm-collection, which preceded the present psalm-pentateuch. The collector certainly has removed this subscription from its original place close after Psa 72:17, by the interpolation of the beracha Psa 72:18, but left it, as the same time, untouched. The collectors and those who worked up the older documents within the range of the Biblical literature appear to have been extremely conscientious in this respect and they thereby make it easier for us to gain an insight into the origin of their work, - as, e.g., the composer of the Books of Samuel gives intact the list of officers from a later document Sa2 8:16-18 (which closed with that, so far as we at present have it in its incorporated state), as well as the list from an older document (Sa2 20:23-26); or, as not merely the author of the Book of Kings in the middle of the Exile, but also the chronicler towards the end of the Persian period, have transferred unaltered, to their pages, the statement that the staves of the ark are to be found in the rings of the ark \"to this day,\" which has its origin in some annalistic document (Kg1 8:8; Ch2 5:9). But unfortunately that subscription, which has been so faithfully preserved, furnishes us less help than we could wish. We only gather from it that the present collection was preceded by a primary collection of very much more limited compass which formed its basis and that this closed with the Salomonic Ps 72; for the collector would surely not have placed the subscription, referring only to the prayers of David, after this Psalm if he had not found it there already. And from this point it becomes natural to suppose that Solomon himself, prompted perhaps by the liturgical requirements of the new Temple, compiled this primary collection, and by the addition of Ps 72 may have caused it to be understood that he was the originator of the collection.\n\nBut to the question whether the primary collection also contained only Davidic songs properly so called or whether the subscribed designation תהלות דוד is only intended a potiori, the answer is entirely wanting. If we adopt the latter supposition, one is at a loss to u","order":19,"numberOfChapters":146,"sha256":"e4faeedf9f4a36317a2f2a1f443740f9dc8b384666dc222941d9b34a3f96b6d6","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PSA/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PSA","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":150,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PSA/150.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PSA","chapter":150},"totalNumberOfVerses":650},"chapter":{"number":137,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":1,"content":["Beginning with perfects, the Psalm has the appearance of being a Psalm not belonging to the Exile, but written in memory of the Exile. The bank of a river, like the seashore, is a favourite place of sojourn of those whom deep grief drives forth from the bustle of men into solitude. The boundary line of the river gives to solitude a safe back; the monotonous splashing of the waves keeps up the dull, melancholy alternation of thoughts and feelings; and at the same time the sight of the cool, fresh water exercises a soothing influence upon the consuming fever within the heart. The rivers of Babylon are here those of the Babylonian empire: not merely the Euphrates with its canals, and the Tigris, but also the Chaboras (Chebar) and Eulaeos ('Ulai), on whose lonesome banks Ezekiel (Eze 1:3) and Daniel (ch. Dan 8:2) beheld divine visions. The שׁם is important: there, in a strange land, as captives under the dominion of the power of the world. And גּם is purposely chosen instead of ו: with the sitting down in the solitude of the river's banks weeping immediately came on; when the natural scenery around contrasted so strongly with that of their native land, the remembrance of Zion only forced itself upon them all the more powerfully, and the pain at the isolation from their home would have all the freer course where no hostilely observant eyes were present to suppress it. The willow (צפצפה) and viburnum, those trees which are associated with flowing water in hot low-lying districts, are indigenous in the richly watered lowlands of Babylonia. ערב (ערבה), if one and the same with Arab. grb, is not the willow, least of all the weeping-willow, which is called ṣafsâf mustahı̂ in Arabic, \"the bending-down willow,\" but the viburnum with dentate leaves, described by Wetzstein on Isa 44:4. The Talmud even distinguishes between tsaph-tsapha and ‛araba, but without our being able to obtain any sure botanic picture from it. The ערבה, whose branches belong to the constituents of the lulab of the Feast of Tabernacles (Lev 23:40), is understood of the crack-willow [Salix fragilis], and even in the passage before us is surely not distinguished with such botanical precision but that the gharab and willow together with the weeping-willow (Salix Babylonica) might be comprehended under the word ערבה. On these trees of the country abounding in streams the exiles hung their citherns. The time to take delight in music was past, for μουσικὰ ἐν πένθει ἄκαιρος διήγησις, Sir. 22:6. Joyous songs, as the word שׁיר designates them, were ill suited to their situation.\nIn order to understand the כּי in Psa 137:3, Psa 137:3 and Psa 137:4 must be taken together. They hung up their citherns; for though their lords called upon them to sing in order that they might divert themselves with their national songs, they did not feel themselves in the mind for singing songs as they once resounded at the divine services of their native land. The lxx, Targum, and Syriac take תּוללינוּ as a synonym of שׁובינוּ, synonymous with שׁוללינוּ, and so, in fact, that it signifies not, like שׁולל, the spoiled and captive one, but the spoiler and he who takes other prisoners. But there is no Aramaic תּלל = שׁלל. It might more readily be referred back to a Poel תּולל (= התל), to disappoint, deride (Hitzig); but the usage of the language does not favour this, and a stronger meaning for the word would be welcome. Either תּולל = תּהולל, like מהולל, Psa 102:9, signifies the raving one, i.e., a bloodthirsty man or a tyrant, or from ילל, ejulare, one who causes the cry of woe or a tormentor, - a signification which commends itself in view of the words תּושׁב and תּלמיד, which are likewise formed with the preformative ת. According to the sense the word ranks itself with an Hiph. הוליל, like תּועלת, תּוכחה, with הועיל and הוכיח, in a mainly abstract signification (Dietrich, Abhandlungen, S. 160f.). The דּברי beside שׁיר is used as in Psa 35:20; Psa 65:4; Psa 105:27; Psa 145:5, viz., partitively, dividing up the genitival notion of the species: words of songs as being parts or fragments of the national treasury of song, similar to משּׁיר a little further on, on which Rosenmller correctly says: sacrum aliquod carmen ex veteribus illis suis Sionicis. With the expression \"song of Zion\" alternates in Psa 137:4 \"song of Jahve,\" which, as in Ch2 29:27, cf. Ch1 25:7, denotes sacred or liturgical songs, that is to say, songs belonging to Psalm poesy (including the Cantica).\nBefore Psa 137:4 we have to imagine that they answered the request of the Babylonians at that time in the language that follows, or thought thus within themselves when they withdrew themselves from them. The meaning of the interrogatory exclamation is not that the singing of sacred songs in a foreign land (חוצה לארץ) is contrary to the law, for the Psalms continued to be sung even during the Exile, and were also enriched by new ones. But the shir had an end during the Exile, in so far as that it was obliged to retire from publicity into the quiet of the family worship and of the houses of prayer, in order that that which is holy might not be profaned; and since it was not, as at home, accompanied by the trumpets of the priests and the music of the Levites, it became more recitative than singing properly so called, and therefore could not afford any idea of the singing of their native land in connection with the worship of God on Zion. From the striking contrast between the present and the former times the people of the Exile had in fact to come to the knowledge of their sins, in order that they might get back by the way of penitence and earnest longing to that which they had lost Penitence and home-sickness were at that time inseparable; for all those in whom the remembrance of Zion was lost gave themselves over to heathenism and were excluded from the redemption. The poet, translated into the situation of the exiles, and arming himself against the temptation to apostasy and the danger of denying God, therefore says: If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, ימיני תּשׁכּח. תּשׁכּח has been taken as an address to Jahve: obliviscaris dexterae meae (e.g., Wolfgang Dachstein in his song \"An Wasserflssen Babylon\"), but it is far from natural that Jerusalem and Jahve should be addressed in one clause. Others take ימיני as the subject and תּשׁכּח transitively: obliviscatur dextera mea, scil. artem psallendi (Aben-Ezra, Kimchi, Pagninus, Grotius, Hengstenberg, and others); but this ellipsis is arbitrary, and the interpolation of מנּי after ימיני (von Ortenberg, following Olshausen) produces an inelegant cadence. Others again assign a passive sense to תשׁכח: oblivioni detur (lxx, Italic, Vulgate, and Luther), or a half-passive sense, in oblivione sit (Jerome); but the thought: let my right hand be forgotten, is awkward and tame. Obliviscatur me (Syriac, Saadia, and the Psalterium Romanum) comes nearer to the true meaning. תּשׁכּח is to be taken reflexively: obliviscatur sui ipsius, let it forget itself, or its service (Amyraldus, Schultens, Ewald, and Hitzig), which is equivalent to let it refuse or fail, become lame, become benumbed, much the same as we say of the arms of legs that they \"go to sleep,\" and just as the Arabic nasiya signifies both to forget and to become lame (cf. Gesenius, Thesaurus, p. 921b). La Harpe correctly renders: O Jerusalem! si je t'oublie jamais, que ma main oublie aussi le mouvement! Thus there is a correspondence between Psa 137:5 and Psa 137:6 : My tongue shall cleave to my palate if I do not remember thee, if I do not raise Jerusalem above the sum of my joy. אזכּרכי has the affixed Chirek, with which these later Psalms are so fond of adorning themselves. ראשׁ is apparently used as in Psa 119:160 : supra summam (the totality) laetitiae meae, as Coccejus explains, h.e. supra omnem laetitiam meam. But why not then more simply על כּל, above the totality? ראשׁ here signifies not κεφάλαιον, but κεφαλή: if I do not place Jerusalem upon the summit of my joy, i.e., my highest joy; therefore, if I do not cause Jerusalem to be my very highest joy. His spiritual joy over the city of God is to soar above all earthly joys. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["The second part of the Psalm supplicates vengeance upon Edom and Babylon. We see from Obadiah's prophecy, which is taken up again by Jeremiah, how shamefully the Edomites, that brother-people related by descent to Israel and yet pre-eminently hostile to it, behaved in connection with the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans as their malignant, rapacious, and inhuman helpers. The repeated imper. Piel ערוּ, from ערה (not imper. Kal from ערר, which would be ערוּ), ought to have been accented on the ult.; it is, however, in both cases accented on the first syllable, the pausal ערוּ (cf. כּלוּ in Psa 37:20, and also הסּוּ, Neh 8:11) giving rise to the same accentuation of the other (in order that two tone-syllables might not come together). The Pasek also stands between the two repeated words in order that they may be duly separated, and secures, moreover, to the guttural initial of the second ערוּ its distinct pronunciation (cf. Gen 26:28; Num 35:16). It is to be construed: lay bare, lay bare (as in Hab 3:13, cf. גּלּה in Mic 1:6) in it (Beth of the place), of in respect of it (Beth of the object), even to the foundation, i.e., raze it even to the ground, leave not one stone upon another. From the false brethren the imprecation turns to Babylon, the city of the imperial power of the world. The daughter, i.e., the population, of Babylon is addressed as השּׁדוּדה. It certainly seems the most natural to take this epithet as a designation of its doings which cry for vengeance. But it cannot in any case be translated: thou plunderer (Syriac like the Targum: bozuzto; Symmachus ἡ λῃστρίς), for שׁדד does not mean to rob and plunder, but to offer violence and to devastate. Therefore: thou devastator; but the word so pointed as we have it before us cannot have this signification: it ought to be השּׁדודה, like בּגודה in Jer 3:7, Jer 3:10, or השּׁדוּדה (with an unchangeable ā), corresponding to the Syriac active intensive form ālûṣo, oppressor, gōdûfo, slanderer, and the Arabic likewise active intensive form Arab. fâ‛ûl, e.g., fâshûs, a boaster, and also as an adjective: ǵôz fâshûs, empty nuts, cf. יקוּשׁ = יקושׁ, a fowler, like nâṭûr (נאטור), a field-watcher. The form as it stands is part. pass., and signifies προνενομευμένη (Aquila), vastata (Jerome). It is possible that this may be said in the sense of vastanda, although in this sense of a part. fut. pass. the participles of the Niphal (e.g., Ps 22:32; Psa 102:19) and of the Pual (Psa 18:4) are more commonly used. It cannot at any rate signify vastata in an historical sense, with reference to the destruction of Babylon by Darius Hystaspes (Hengstenberg); for Psa 137:7 only prays that the retribution may come: it cannot therefore as yet have been executed; but if השׁדודה signified the already devastated one, it must (at least in the main) have been executed already. It might be more readily understood as a prophetical representation of the executed judgment of devastation; but this prophetic rendering coincides with the imprecative: the imagination of the Semite when he utters a curse sees the future as a realized fact. \"Didst thou see the smitten one (maḍrûb),\" i.e., he whom God must smite? Thus the Arab inquires for a person who is detested. \"Pursue him who is seized (ilḥaḳ el̇ma'chûdh),\" i.e., him whom God must allow thee to seize! Thy speak thus inasmuch as the imagination at once anticipates the seizure at the same time with the pursuit. Just as here both maḍrûb and ma'chûdh are participles of Kasl, so therefore השּׁדוּודה may also have the sense of vastanda (which must be laid waste!). That which is then further desired for Babylon is the requital of that which it has done to Israel, Isa 47:6. It is the same penal destiny, comprehending the children also, which is predicted against it in Isa 13:16-18, as that which was to be executed by the Medes. The young children (with reference to עולל, עולל, vid., on Psa 8:3) are to be dashed to pieces in order that a new generation may not raise up again the world-wide dominion that has been overthrown, Isa 14:21. It is zeal for God that puts such harsh words into the mouth of the poet. \"That which is Israel's excellency and special good fortune the believing Israelite desires to have bestowed upon the whole world, but for this very reason he desires to see the hostility of the present world of nations against the church of God broken\" (Hofmann). On the other hand, it cannot be denied that the \"blessed\" of this Psalm is not suited to the mouth of the New Testament church. In the Old Testament the church as yet had the form of a nation, and the longing for the revelation of divine righteousness clothed itself accordingly in a warlike garb. \n"]}]},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PSA/137.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PSA","chapter":137},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PSA/138.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PSA","chapter":138},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PSA/136.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PSA","chapter":136},"numberOfVerses":2}